Buttoo

By Toru Dutt

The following are the main excerpts of Toru Dutt’s poem on Ekalavya, the hunter boy who lived in the forests and learnt archery making an image of Guru Dronacharya. Dronacharya, to keep up his promise to make only Arjuna the greatest archer in the Earth, asks Ekalavya to cut off his right thumb, as fees or Guru Dakshina, making him bereft of his capacity to shoot arrows!

“Ho! Master of the wondrous art!
Instruct me in fair archery,
And buy for aye,–a grateful heart
That will not grudge to give thy fee.”
Thus spoke a lad with kindling eyes,
A hunter’s low-born son was he,–
To Dronacharjya, great and wise,
Who sat with princes round his knee.


Unseen the magic arrow came,
Amidst the laughter and the scorn
Of royal youths,–like lightning flame
Sudden and sharp. They blew the horn,
As down upon the ground he fell,
Not hurt, but made a jest and game;–
He rose,–and waved a proud farewell,
But cheek and brow grew red with shame.


What glorious trees! The sombre saul
On which the eye delights to rest,
The betel-nut,–a pillar tall,
With feathery branches for a crest,
The light-leaved tamarind spreading wide,
The pale faint-scented bitter neem,
The seemul, gorgeous as a bride,
With flowers that have the ruby’s gleam,

The Indian fig’s pavilion tent
In which whole armies might repose,
With here and there a little rent,
The sunset’s beauty to disclose,
The bamboo boughs that sway and swing
‘Neath bulbuls as the south wind blows,
The mangoe-tope, a close dark ring,
Home of the rooks and clamorous crows,


Glanced the sharp knife one moment high,
The severed thumb was on the sod,
There was no tear in Buttoo’s eye,
He left the matter with his God.
“For this,”–said Dronacharjya,–“Fame
Shall sound thy praise from sea to sea,
And men shall ever link thy name
With Self-help, Truth, and Modesty.”