Note 6 — Chapter LXVI

And when the sun, the lamp of the world, had mounted high in the heaven, there came there a certain prince on horseback. When he saw Hemaprabhá dressed as an ascetic, he dismounted from his horse, and conceiving admiration for her, he went and saluted her respectfully. She, for her part, entertained him, and made him take a seat, and feeling love for him, said, “Who are you, noble sir?” Then the prince said, “Noble lady, there is a king of auspicious name, called Pratápasena. He was once going through a course of asceticism to propitiate Śiva, with the view of obtaining a son. And that merciful god appeared to him, and said, ‘Thou shalt obtain one son, who shall be an incarnation of a Vidyádhara, and he, when his curse is at an end, shall return to his own world. And thou shalt have a second son, who shall continue thy race and uphold thy realm.’ When Śiva said this to him, he rose up in high spirits, and took food. Then he had one son born to him, named Lakshmísena, and in course of time a second, named Śúrasena. Know, lovely one, that I am that same Lakshmísena, and that to-day when I went out to hunt, my horse, swift as the wind, ran away with me and brought me here.” Then he asked her history, and she told it him, and thereupon she remembered her former birth, and was very much elated, and said to him, “Now that I have seen you, I have remembered my birth and the sciences which I knew as a Vidyádharí,6 for I and this friend of mine here are both Vidyádharís, that have been sent down to earth by a curse. And you were my husband, and your minister was the husband of this friend of mine. And now that curse of me and of my friend has lost its power. We shall all meet again in the world of Vidyádharas.” Then she and her friend assumed divine forms and flew up to heaven, and went to their own world. But Lakshmísena stood for a moment lost in wonder, and then his minister arrived tracking his course. While the prince was telling the whole story to him, king Buddhiprabha arrived, anxious to see his daughter. When he could not see his daughter, but found Lakshmísena there, he asked for news of her, and Lakshmísena told him what had happened. Then Buddhiprabha was cast down, but Lakshmísena and his minister remembered their former existence, their curse having spent its force, and they went to their own world through the air. He recovered his wife Hemaprabhá and returned with her, and then taking leave of Buddhiprabha, he went to his own town. And he went with his minister, who had recovered his wife, and told their adventures to his father Pratápasena, who bestowed on him his kingdom as his successor by right of birth. But he gave it to his younger brother Śúrasena, and returned to his own city in the country of the Vidyádharas. There Lakshmísena, united with his consort Hemaprabhá, and assisted by his minister, long enjoyed the delights of sovereignty over the Vidyádharas.