eeping on a balcony cooled by the rays of the
moon. And a fairy prince named Love-speed was flying through the air,
and as he passed he saw Beautiful asleep beside her husband. He took
her, still asleep, and carried her off through the air.

Presently Hariswami awoke, and not seeing the mistress of his life, he
rose in anxiety. And he wondered: "Oh, where has my wife gone? Is she
angry with me? Or is she playing hide-and-seek with me, to see how I
will take it?" So he roamed anxiously all over the balcony during the
rest of the night. But he did not find her, though he searched as far
as the garden.

Then he was overcome by his sorrow and sobbed convulsively. "Oh,
Beautiful, my darling! Fair as the moon! White as the moonlight! Was
the night jealous of your beauty; did she carry you away? Your
loveliness shamed the moon who refreshed me with beams cool as sandal;
but now that you are gone, the same beams torment me like blazing
coals, like poisoned arrows!"

And as Hariswami lamented thus, the night came to an end, but his
anguish did not end. The pleasant sun scattered the darkness, but could
not scatter the blind darkness of Hariswami's madness. His pitiful
lamentations increased a hundredfold, when the nightly cries of the
birds ended. His relatives tried to comfort him, but he could not pluck
up courage while his loved one was lost. He went here and there,
sobbing out: "Here she stood. And here she bathed. And here she adorned
herself. And here she played."

His relatives and friends gave him good advice. "She is not dead," they
said. "Why should you make way with yourself? You will surely find her.
Pluck up courage and hunt for her. Nothing is impossible to the brave
and determined man." And when they urged him, Hariswami after some days
plucked up heart.

He thought: "I will give all my fortune to the Brahmans, and then
wander to holy places. Thus I will wear away my sins, and when my sins
are gone, perhaps I shall find my darling in my wanderings." So he
arose and bathed.

On the next day he provided food and drink, and made a great feast for
the Brahmans, and gave them all he had except his piety. Then he
started to wander to holy places, hoping to find his wife.

As he wandered, the summer came on him like a lion, the blazing sun its
mouth, and the sunbeams its mane. And the hot wind blew, made hotter
yet by the sighs of travellers separated from their wives. And the
yellow mud dried and cracked, as if