How can I
answer thee, O lady, about the cause that is pursued by wicked females?
It doth not become thee, lady, to pursue the questions, or doubt me,
after this, for thou art endued with intelligence and art the favourite
wife of Krishna. When the husband learns that his wife is addicted to
incantations and drugs, from that hour he beginneth to dread her like a
serpent ensconced in his sleeping chamber. And can a man that is
troubled with fear have peace, and how can one that hath no peace have
happiness? A husband can never be made obedient by his wife's
incantations. We hear of painful diseases being transmitted by enemies.
Indeed, they that desire to slay others, send poison in the shape of
customary gifts, so that the man that taketh the powders so sent, by
tongue or skin, is, without doubt, speedily deprived of life. Women have
sometimes caused dropsy and leprosy, decrepitude and impotence and
idiocy and blindness and deafness in men. These wicked women, ever
treading in the path of sin, do sometimes (by these means) injure their
husbands. But the wife should never do the least injury to her lord.
Hear now, O illustrious lady, of the behaviour I adopt towards the
high-souled sons of Pandu. Keeping aside vanity, and controlling desire
and wrath, I always serve with devotion the sons of Pandu with their
wives. Restraining jealousy, with deep devotion of heart, without a
sense of degradation at the services I perform, I wait upon my husbands.
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