e is tortured by the same doubt regarding
him. "Did Brahma first paint her and then infuse life into her, or did
he in his spirit fashion her out of a number of spirits?" he exclaims.
He wonders what excuse he can have for lingering in the grove. His
companion suggests gathering the tithe, but the king retorts: "What I
get for protecting her is to be esteemed higher than piles of jewels."
He now feels an aversion to hunting. "I would not be able to shoot
this arrow at the gazelles who have lived with her, and who taught the
beloved to gaze so innocently." He grows thin from loss of sleep.
Unable to keep his feelings locked up in his bosom, he reveals them to
his companion, the jester, but afterward, fearing he might tell his
wives about this love-affair, he says to him:

"Of course there is no truth in the notion that I
coveted this girl Sakuntala. Just think! how could we
suit one another, a girl who knows nothing of love and
has grown up perfectly wild with the young gazelles?
No, my friend, you must not take a joke seriously."

But all the time he grows thinner from longing--so thin that his
bracelet, whose jewels have lost all their lustre from his tears,
falls constantly from his arm and has to be replaced.

In the meantime Sakuntala, without lacking the reserve and timidity
proper to the girls of penitents, has done several things that
encouraged the king to hope. While she avoided looking straight at him
(as etiquette prescribed), there was a loving expression on her face,
and once, when about to go away with her companions, she pretended
that her foot had been cut by a blade of kusagrass--but it was merely
an excuse for turning her face. Thus, while her love is not frankly
discovered, it is not covered either. She doubts whether the king
loves her, and her agony throws her into a feverish state which her
companions try in vain to allay by fanning her with lotos leaves. The
king is convinced that the sun's heat alone could not have affected
her thus. He sees that she has grown emaciated and seems ill. "Her
cheeks," he says,

"have grown thin, her bosom has lost its firm tension,
her body has grown attenuated, her shoulders stoop, and
pale is her face. Tortured by love, the girl presents
an aspect as pitiable as it is lovable; she resembles
the vine Madhavi when it is blighted by the hot breath
of a leaf-desiccating wind."

He is watching her, unseen hi