The maiden answered: “My illustrious sire is gathering herbs, but if thou wilt tarry he will return ere long.”
Dushyanta was entranced by the beauty and sweet smiles of the gentle girl, and his heart was moved towards her, for she was in the bloom of youth. So he spake, saying: “Who art thou, O fairest one? Whence comest thou, and why dost thou wander alone in the woods? O comely maiden, thou hast taken captive my heart.”
The bright-eyed one made answer: “I am the daughter of the holy and high-souled Kanva, the ever-wise and ever-constant.”
Said the king: “But Kanva is chaste and austere and hath ever been a celibate, nor can he have broken his rigid vow. How came it that thou wert born the daughter of such a one?”
Then the maiden, who was named Shakuntala, because that the birds (shakunta) had nursed her, revealed unto the king the secret of her birth. Her real sire was Vishwamitra[191], the holy sage who had been a Kshatriya and was made a Brahman in reward for his austerities. It came to pass that Indra became alarmed at his growing power, and he feared that the mighty sage of blazing energy would, by reason of his penances, cast down even him, the king of the gods, from his heavenly seat. So Indra commanded Menaka, the beauteous Ap'sara, to disturb the holy meditations of the sage, for he had already achieved such power that he created a second world and many stars. The nymph called on the wind god and on the god of love, and they went with her towards Vishwamitra.
Menaka danced before the brooding sage; then the wind god snatched away her moon-white garments, and the love god shot his arrows at Vishwamitra, whereupon that saintly man was stricken with love for the nymph of peerless beauty, and he wooed her and won her as his bride. So was he diverted from his austerities. In time Menaka became the mother of a girl babe, whom she cast away on the river bank.
Now the forest was full of lions and tigers, but vultures gathered round the infant and protected her from harm. Then Kanva found and took pity on the child; he said: “She will be mine own daughter.”
Said Shakuntala: “O king, I was that child who was abandoned by the nymph, and now thou dost know how Kanva came to be my sire.”