s just been sprinkled and
cleaned and received a coat of green. The threshold of it is pretty
as a picture with the offerings of all sorts of fragrant flowers. It
stretches up its head as if it wanted to peep into the sky. It is
adorned with strings of jasmine garlands that hang down and toss
about like the trunk of the heavenly elephant. It shines with its
high ivory portal. It is lovely with any number of holiday banners
that gleam red as great rubies and wave their coquettish fingers as
they flutter in the breeze and seem to invite me to enter. Both
sides are decorated with holiday water-jars of crystal, which are
charming with their bright-green mango twigs, and are set at the
foot of the pillars that sustain the portal. The doors are of gold,
thickly set with diamonds as hard to pierce as a giant's breast.
It actually wearies a poor devil's envy. Yes, Vasantasena's house-door
is a beautiful thing. Really, it forcibly challenges the attention
of a man who doesn't care about such things.

[68.16. S.

_Maid._ Come, sir, and enter the first court.

_Maitreya._ [_Enters and looks about._] Well! Here in the first court
are rows of balconies brilliant as the moon, or as sea-shells, or as
lotus-stalks; whitened by handfuls of powder strewn over them;
gleaming with golden stairways inlaid with all sorts of gems: they
seem to gaze down on Ujjayini with their round faces, the crystal
windows, from which strings of pearls are dangling. The porter sits
there and snoozes as comfortably as a professor. The crows which
they tempt with rice-gruel and curdled milk will not eat the
offering, because they can't distinguish it from the mortar. Show
me the way, madam.

_Maid._ Come, sir, and enter the second court.

_Maitreya._ [_Enters and looks about._] Well! Here in the second
court the cart-bullocks are tied. They grow fat on mouthfuls of
grass and pulse-stalks which are brought them, right and left, by
everybody. Their horns are smeared with oil. And here is another,
a buffalo, snorting like a gentleman insulted. And here is a ram[53]
having his neck rubbed, like a prize-fighter after the fight. And
here are others, horses having their manes put in shape. And here
in a stall is another, a monkey, tied fast like a thief. [_He looks in
another direction._] And here is an elephant, taking from his drivers
a cake of rice and drippings and oil. Show me the way, madam.

_Maid._ Come, sir, and enter the third court.

_Maitreya._