of this great calamity fraught with dreadful danger, I solicit your wealth for devising the means of your protection.  When the danger passes away, I will give you what I now take.  Our foes, however, will not give back what they (if unopposed) will take from you by force.  On the other hand (if unopposed), they will even slay all your relatives beginning with your very spouses.  You certainly desire wealth for the sake of your children and wives.  I am glad at your prosperity, and I beseech you as I would my own children.  I shall take from you what it may be within your power to give me.  I do not wish to give pain to any one.  In seasons of calamity, you should, like strong bulls, bear such burthens.  In seasons of distress, wealth should not be so dear to you.  A king conversant with the considerations relating to Time should, with such agreeable, sweet, and complimentary words, send his agents and collect imposts from his people.  Pointing out to them the necessity of repairing his fortifications and of defraying the expenses of his establishment and other heads, inspiring them with the fear of foreign invasion, and impressing them with the necessity that exists for protecting them and enabling them to ensure the means of living in peace, the king should levy imposts upon the Vaisyas of his realm.  If the king disregards the Vaisyas, they become lost to him, and abandoning his dominions remove themselves to the woods.  The king should, therefore, behave with leniency towards them.  The king, O son of Pritha, should always conciliate and protect the Vaisyas, adopt measures for inspiring them with a sense of security and for ensuring them in the enjoyment of what they possess, and always do what is agreeable to them.  The king, O Bharata, should always act in such a way towards the Vaisyas that their productive powers may be enhanced.  The Vaisyas increase the strength of a kingdom, improve its agriculture, and develop its trade.  A wise king, therefore, should always gratify them.  Acting with heedfulness and leniency, he should levy mild imposts upon them.  It is always easy to behave with goodness towards the Vaisyas.  There is nothing productive of greater good to a kingdom, O Yudhishthira, then the adoption of such behaviour towards the Vaisyas of the realm.’”

SECTION LXXXVIII

“Yudhishthira said:  ’Tell me, O grandsire, how should the king should behave if, notwithstanding his great wealth, he desires for more.’

“Bhishma said, ’A king, desirous of earning religious merit, should devote himself to the good of his subjects and protect them according to considerations of place and time and to the best of his intelligence and power.  He should, in his dominions, adopt all such measures as would in his estimation secure their good as also his own.  A king should milk his kingdom like a bee gathering honey from plants.[253] He should act like the keeper of a cow who draws milk