ld a picture be able to stop his flood of
tears. "The god of love has pierced my heart and now he tortures me by
denying my wish." Encouraged by these words, but unwilling to make
herself visible, Urvasi takes a piece of birch-bark, writes on it a
message, and throws it down. The king sees it fall, picks it up and
reads:

"I love you, O master; you did not know, nor I, that
you burn with love for me. No longer do I find rest on
my coral couch, and the air of the celestial grove
burns me like fire."

"What will he say to that?" wonders Urvasi, and her friend replies,
"Is there not an answer in his limbs, which have become like withered
lotos stalks?" The king declares to his friend that the message on the
leaf has made him as happy as if he had seen his beloved's face.
Fearing that the perspiration on his hand (the sign of violent love)
might wash away the message, he gives the birch-bark to the
viduschaka. Urvasi's friend now makes herself visible to the king, who
welcomes her, but adds that the sight of her delights him not as it
did when Urvasi was with her. "Urvasi bows before you," the apsara
answers, "and sends this message: 'You were my protector, O master,
when a demon offered me violence. Since I saw you, god Kama has
tortured me violently; therefore you must sometime take pity on me,
great king!'" And the king retorts: "The ardor of love is here equally
great on either side. It is proper that hot iron be welded with hot
iron." After this Urvasi makes herself visible, too, but the king has
hardly had time to greet her, when a celestial messenger arrives to
summon her hastily back to heaven, to her own great distress and the
king's.

Left alone, the king wants to seek consolation in the message written
on the birch-bark. But to their consternation, they cannot find it. It
had dropped from the viduschaka's hand and the wind had carried it
off. "O wind of Malaya," laments the king,

"you are welcome to all the fragrance breathing from
the flowers, but of what use to you is the love-letter
you have stolen from me? Know you not that a hundred
such consolers may save the life of a love-sick man who
cannot hope soon to attain the goal of his desires?"

In the meantime the queen and her maid have appeared in the
background. They come across the birch-bark, see the message on it,
and the maid reads it aloud. "With this gift of the celestial girl let
us now meet her lov