Nalopakhyana Parva — The curse of Damayanti on the hunter

Brihadashva said: O king, after Nala, had gone away, the slender-waisted Damayanti, getting over her fatigue, awoke in terror in that solitary wilderness. Terrified at not finding her husband and oppressed with grief and troubles, she called aloud for Naishadha, saying: O Maharaja.

O master! O mighty sovereign! O husband! why have you forsaken me? Alas! I am done for, I ain lost, I am (greatly) terrified in this lonely forest.

O mighty monarch! you are virtuous and truthful. How then, promising not to do so you have forsaken me asleep, in the woods?

Why have you gone away forsaking your able and devoted, wife, specially when she had done you no harın, but you have been wronged by others?

O lord of your people! you ought faithfully to fulfill those words of yours in respect of mc, that you had uttered in days gone by, before the guardian deities of the worlds.

O best of men! because mortals are not ordained to die before their appointed time, therefore, it is, that your beloved wife live even a moment after your abandonment of her.

O foremost of men! enough of this joke, let us have no more of it. O invincible one! I am awfully frightened. O lord! show yourself.

You are discovered O king! you discovered! O ruler of the Nishadhas I have scen you! concealing yourself behind the corpses, why do you not answer me?

Alas, O king of kings! it is very cruel of you. For sceing me in this and so bewailing, you do not, O king, come near to console me.

I lament not for myself, nor for any thing else. But, O king, I only grieve thinking, how you will live alone.

O king! when, in the evening you will sit thirsty, hungry and worn out with toils under the trees, how will you live without seeing ine (by your side)?

Then oppressed with poignant grief and burning with anger, the miserable Damayanti began to run hither and thither bewailing.

At times the youthful princess would stand up suddenly. At other times she would sink down bewildered. Now she would conceal herself alarmed and the next moment, she would cry and wail aloud.

Then the chaste daughter of Bhima, bewildered and afflicted with heavy grief and sighing again and again, spoke weeping:

‘May that being suffer grief greater than ours, through whose curse the afflicted king of the Nishadhas bear this woc!'

May that sinful wretch, who has reduced Nala of pious heart into this plight, live a more miserable life than his (Nala's) own, fraught with such greater woes.'

Thus bewailing, the consort of that highsouled monarch began to search her dear lord in that forest, infested with wild beasts. Thus continuously lamenting, the daughter of Bhima ran hither and thither like an insane person, crying aloud, 'alas alas O king.'

As she was crying aloud and bitterly lamenting like a female osprey, grieving profusely in piteous words and bewailing again and again, a huge and hungry serpent suddenly scized the daughter of Bhima, who camc and rolled near it.

Being devoured by the monster and swelling with sorrow, she grieved not so much for herself, as for the king of the Nishadhas.

'O lord! why do you not run after me, seeing that I am swallowed by this huge serpent like one helpless, in this desolate wilderness?

O king of the Nishadhas! how will you live, when you shall remember me (when I am gone)? O master! how have you gone away today forsaking me in the woods?

How will you live without me, when liberated from your curse, you will regain your mind, senses and wealth? O lord of the Nishadhas! O sinless one! O foremost of kings! who will remove your fatigue when you will be worn out with toil, oppressed with hunger and depressed with grief?'

Then a hunter who was roaming in the deep forest, hearing the sound of her loud wailing's speedily came near her.

The hunter, who live upon the proceeds of hunting, seeing that large-eyed one swallowed up by a serpent, came up with haste and speed and dispatching that inert snake with a sharpedged weapon, tore it open from its mouth. Then O Bharata! the hunter freeing her from the coils of the serpent and washing her with water and consoling her, asked her when she had taken some food.

'O you having cyes like those of a young gazelle! whose are you! Why also have you entered into this forest? O handsome one! how have you fallen in this great predicament?'

O lord of your people! O descendant of Bharata's race! thus questioned by him, Damayanti, related unto him precisely, all that had occurred.

The huntsman, seeing her, covered with half a piece of a cloth, with heaving breasts and shapely lips, with delicate and faultless limbs, with countenance resembling the full moon, with cyes furnished with graceful eye-lashes and with words very pleasing, was made the slave of the god of love.

Inflamed with lust, the hunter comforted her mildly and in smooth words. But the graceful Damayanti soon saw through his purposes.

The chaste Damayanti then understanding the intentions of this evil-minded one, possessed with fierce rage, seemed to blaze forth in anger.

That evil minded one, having waxed irascible and fired with desire, endeavoured to insult her (by force) who was unconquerable even as a flame of blazing fire.

Then Damayanti afflicted with sorrow and deprived of her husband and kingdom, bursting with rage, cursed the huntsman when he had passed the limit of being checked by words.

'If even in my mind I have never thought of any other person than the king of the Nishadhas, then let this puny one living by। hunting, fall down devoid of life.

No sooner did she utter these words, than that one subsisting on chase, fell down dead on the ground, even as a tree consumed by fire.