1878J 
G. A. Grierson —The Song of MdniJc Chandra. 
145 
than break his promise, he told his companion to pawn him for the money. 
The Hadi took him at his word to the bazar , where all the women fell in 
love with him, which gives rise to an amusing scene. However they could 
not afford the twelve Icaoris demanded j so the Hadi finally took him to the 
house of a harlot named Hira. 
Hi'ra' the Harlot. 
According to popular tradition, Hira is said to have lived at “ Khola 
Kuta a village in the west of the Dinajpur District.” This place I have 
been unable to identify. Mr. Westmacott, who has most kindly taken 
much trouble in assisting me on this point, suggests that the place may be 
Khola Hati, a village in the east of that District, where the Dinajpur and 
Rangpur road crosses the river Karatoya. There were lately extensive ruins 
to its north, but they have been excavated by the Northern Bengal Railway 
people for ballast. This theory is not at all so improbable as it might 
seem at first sight, for every tradition leads us to believe that Hira’s residence 
was near the Karatoya. Dinajpur is to the west of Rangpur, and if the 
original belief was that Khola Ivuta ( ? Khola Hati) was “ to the west in 
Dinajpur” the change for “in” to “ of” need not surprise us, The locality 
of Hira’s house is not mentioned in the poem, but a reference to v. 658 
will show that it probably was Khola Hati. 
Hira, of course, fell in love with the king, and, being a woman of pro¬ 
perty, easily found it in her power to borrow the twelve fcaoris from a 
neighbouring banker. The banker drew up the deed of transfer, conveying 
Gopi Chandra to the harlot’s sole use and possession for a period of twelve 
years, and she then and there paid over the money, and took delivery. The 
procedure of the sale is worth noticing (vv. 537-546). 
After obtaining possession of the king, Hira had him bathed and 
adorned in gorgeous apparel; she then sent for him and tried to tempt 
him, but though she exerted all her fascinations, and the king was almost 
yielding, she failed ignominiously, Gopi Chandra piously remembering 
his mother’s parting words.* Indignant at her repulse the harlot went to 
the other extreme, and put him to perform the meanest and vilest offices of 
her household. The king was continually ill-used, and beaten, and one 
of his hardest daily labours, was carrying twelve bhangi loads of water 
from the Karatoya to her house. 
On the last day of the twelve years he went to draw water as usual,—• 
but his strength failed him and he fell into the river. 
* Gopi Chandra is much lauded for his continence, hut, as it appears that tho 
Hadi before leaving him made him a neuter, there is really little ground for credit. 
