Verse 62

⁶²Told this, the king's boy walked round him and bowed, and went to the holy Madhuvana, marked over by Hari's feet. ⁶³When the boy had gone to the wood of austerity, the sage went into the inner rooms; the king honoured him with what was due, and seated at his ease the sage said to him: ⁶⁴King, what are you brooding on so long, with your face gone dry? Has something come to harm, your desire, or dharma, or your wealth along with it? ⁶⁵Brahmin, my son, a boy of five and a great seer, was driven out with his mother by me, a man ruled by a woman and with no pity in him. ⁶⁶Brahmin, may the wolves not eat that child in the forest with no one to keep him, worn out and lying down and hungry, the lotus of his face gone slack.

⁶⁷See what a mean soul is mine, beaten by a woman: worst of men that I am, I did not welcome him when he tried out of love to climb into my lap. ⁶⁸Do not grieve, lord of men, do not grieve for your own son; a god keeps him. You do not know his power: his fame covers the world. ⁶⁹Mighty as he is, he will do a deed too hard even for the guardians of the worlds, and before long, king, he will come back, and make your fame wide. ⁷⁰Hearing what the sage of the gods had said, the lord of the earth set his royal fortune aside and thought of nothing but his son.