The festival was proclaimed, and from the assembled suitors the lady selected her future husband.

The Swayembara is not among the eight kinds of marriages mentioned in the third book of Menu, as customary among the higher castes, in which the parents in general arrange such contracts.
The provision in the ninth book (v.

90), appears to belong to the lower classes.--"Three years let a damsel wait, though she be marriageable; but after that term let her choose for herself a bridegroom of equal rank." In the Raghuvansa, a poem, parts of which the author of this translation, if he could command leisure to make himself better acquainted with Sanscrit, would consider well worthy of being introduced to the English reader, there is a very remarkable and beautiful book, describing a Swayembara.

This is likewise held at Vidarbha by the daughter of the king.

The Mahabharata also describes the Swayembara of the princess Draupadi.] [Footnote 25: p.6.l.17._The lord of many peasants_.