of loose hair maintained not a uniform level of height on the crown of her head because of their crispness. So these ringlets showed themselves in small dark waves on the surface. The face is no longer half-concealed amidst her thick folds of hair. Rather it shone out bright and radiant. Only at places, the loosened stray locks caked on to parts bedewed with moisture. The skin displayed the same colour—the silver grey of a half-moon. Now gold ear-rings suspended from her ears and a gold necklace hung round her neck. The brightness of the gold rather than paling before the lustre of the skin gained in effect like the night-flowers adding to the charms of the sweet earth bathed in a flood of the weird mellow light of a quarter moon. The figure was draped in a piece of white cloth which appeared a milky cloud sailing in the silvery sky flooded with the splendours of a glorious moon. The skin showed the same gleam of moon-shine though it looked to have acquired a darker tinge than before like a speck of black cloud gathering in some distant corner of the far-off horizon. Kapalkundala was not seated alone, having Shyamasundari by her side. We shall narrate a portion of the conversation passing between them to our reader.
"How long will the brother-in-law stay here?" enquired Kapalkundala.
"He leaves to-morrow evening" replied Shyamasundari. "Alas! If I could but root up the medicinal plant to-night, I would have scored a success over him in taming him into submission. But what indignities
