The Kathá Sarit Ságara; or, Ocean of the Streams of Story
[131] Or more literally of the month Chaitra, i. e., March-April.
[132] At nine o'clock in the morning.
[133] Anas Casarca, commonly called the Brahmany duck. The male has
to pass the night separated from its female: if we are to trust the
unanimous testimony of Hindu poets.
[134] A name of Durgá. Cp. Prescott's account of the human sacrifices
in Mexico, Vol. I pp. 62, 63.
[135] This incident reminds us of the fifth rule in Wright's Gesta
Romanorum.
[136] Or it may mean "from a distance," as Dr. Brockhaus takes it.
[137] Pulinda, name of a savage tribe.
[138] Mr. Growse remarks: "In Hindi the word Nágasthala would assume
the form Nágal; and there is a village of that name to this day in
the Mahában Pargana of the Mathurá District."
[139] A common way of carrying money in India at the present day.
[140] Compare the last Scene of the Toy Cart in the 1st volume of
Wilson's Hindu Theatre.
[141] The esculent white lotus (Sanskrit kumuda) expands its petals
at night, and closes them in the daytime.
[142] In Sanskrit poetry horripilation is often said to be produced
by joy. I have here inserted the words "from joy" in order to make
the meaning clear.
[143] Literally drunk in.
[144] Alluding to his grey hairs. In all eastern stories the appearance
of the first grey hair is a momentous epoch. The point of the whole
passage consists in the fact that jará, old age, is feminine in
form. Cp. the perturbation of King Samson in Hagen's Helden-Sagen,
Vol. I, p. 26, and Spence Hardy's Manual of Buddhism (1860) pp. 129
and 130.
[145] There is a pun between the name of the king Udayana and
prosperity (udaya).
[146] Not Vásuki, but his eldest brother.
[147] Chháyá means "colour;" he drank their colour, i. e., made them
pale. It also means "reflection in the wine."
[148] i. e., given by Buddha.
[149] The four Upáyas or means of success are sáman, negotiation,
which his pride would render futile, dána, giving, which appeals to
avarice, bheda, sowing dissension, which would be useless where a
king is beloved by his subjects, and danda, open force, of no use in
the case of a powerful king like Udayana.
[150] The chief vices of kings denounced by Hindu writers on statecraft
are: Hunting, gambling, sleeping in the day, calumny, addiction to
women, drinking spirits, dancing, singing, and instrumental music,
idle roaming, these proceed from the love of pleasure, others proceed
from anger, viz., tale-bearing, violence, insidious injury, envy,
detraction, unjust seizure of property, abuse, assault. See Monier
Williams s. v. vyasana.
[151] Sudhádhauta may mean "white as plaster," but more probably here
"whitened with plaster" like the houses in the European quarter of the
"City of palaces."
[152] A linga of Siva in Ujjayiní. Siva is here compared to an earthly
monarch subject to the vyasana of roaming. I take it, the poet means,
Ujjayiní is a better place than Kailása.
[153] Cp. the way in which Kandar goes in search of a sword in Prym
and Socin's Syrische Märchen, p. 205.
[154] Dr. Brockhaus translates it--Stürzte den Wagen des Königs
um. Can Syandana mean horses, like magni currus Achilli? If so,
áhatya would mean, having killed.
[155] Rasa means nectar, and indeed any liquid, and also emotion,
passion. The pun is of course most intentional in the original.
[156] Cp. the story of Ohimé in the "Sicilianische Märchen" collected
by Laura von Gonzenbach where Maruzza asks Ohimé how it would be
possible to kill him. So in Indian Fairy Tales, collected by Miss
Stokes, Hiralál Básá persuades Sonahrí Rání to ask his father where
he kept his soul. Some interesting remarks on this subject will be
found in the notes to this tale (Indian Fairy Tales, p. 260.) See
also No. I, in Campbell's Tales of the Western Highlands, and
Dr. Reinhold Köhler's remarks in Orient and Occident, Vol. II,
p. 100. Cp. also Ralston's Russian Folk-Tales, pp. 80, 81 and
136. Cp. also Veckenstedt's Wendische Sagen, p. 72. In the Gehörnte
Siegfried (Simrock's Deutsche Volksbücher, Vol. III, pp. 368 and 416),
the hero is made invulnerable everywhere but between the shoulders,
by being smeared with the melted fat of a dragon. Cp. also the story
of Achilles. For the transformation of Chandamahásena into a boar
see Bartsch's Sagen, Märchen und Gebräuche aus Meklenburg, Vol. II,
pp. 144, 145, and Gubernatis, Zoological Mythology, Vol. II, p. 14. See
also Schöppner's Geschichte der Bayerischen Lande, Vol. I, p. 258.
[157] They would not go near for fear of disturbing it. Wild elephants
are timid, so there is more probability in this story, than in that
of the Trojan horse. Even now scouts who mark down a wild beast in
India, almost lose their heads with excitement.
[158] I. e., they sat in Dharna outside the door of the palace.
[159] Perhaps we should read samantatah one word.
[160] Sattva, when applied to the forest, means animal, when applied
to wisdom, it means excellence.
[161] Vetála is especially used of a goblin that tenants dead
bodies. See Colonel R. Burton's Tales of Vikramáditya and the
Vampire. They will be found in the 12th book of this work. In the
Vth Chapter of Ralston's Russian Folk-Tales will be found much
interesting information with regard to the Slavonic superstitions
about Vampires. They resemble very closely those of the Hindus. See
especially p. 311. "At cross-roads, or in the neighbourhood of
cemeteries, an animated corpse of this description often lurks,
watching for some unwary traveller whom it may be able to slay
and eat."
[162] Cp. the way in which the Ritter Malegis transmutes Reinold in the
story of Die Heimonskinder (Simrock's Deutsche Volksbücher, Vol. II,
p. 86). "He changed him into an old man, a hundred years of age, with
a decrepit and misshapen body, and long hair." See also p. 114. So
Merlin assumes the form of an old man and disguises Uther and Ulfin,
Dunlop's History of Fiction, translated by Liebrecht, p. 66.
[163] Such people dance in temples I believe.
[164] Mr. Growse writes to me with reference to the name
Lohajangha--"This name still exists on the spot, though probably
not to be found elsewhere. The original bearer of the title is said
to have been one of the demons whom Krishna slew, and a village is
called Lohaban after him, where an ancient red sandstone image is
supposed to represent him, and has offerings of iron made to it at
the annual festival.
[165] Ráginí means affectionate and also red.
[166] Ataví is generally translated "forest." I believe the English
word "forest" does not necessarily imply trees, but it is perhaps
better to avoid it here.
[167] For the vritam of the text I read kritam. Cp. this incident with
Joseph's adventure in the 6th story of the Sicilianische Märchen. He
is sewn up in a horse's skin, and carried by ravens to the top of a
high mountain. There he stamps and finds a wooden trap-door under his
feet. In the notes Dr. Köhler refers to this passage, Campbell No. 44,
the Story of Sindbad and other parallels. Cp. also Veckenstedt's
Wendische Sagen, p. 124. See also the story of Heinrich der Löwe,
Simrock's Deutsche Volksbücher, Vol. I, p. 8. Dr. Köhler refers to
the story of Herzog Ernst. The incident will be found in Simrock's
version of the story, at page 308 of the IIIrd Volume of his Deutsche
Volksbücher.
[168] Names of Vishnu, who became incarnate in the hero Krishna.
[169] See Chapter 22 sl. 181 and ff. Kasyapa's two wives disputed
about the colour of the sun's horses. They agreed that whichever was
in the wrong should become a slave to the other. Kadrú, the mother
of the snakes, won by getting her children to darken the horses. So
Garuda's mother Vinatá became a slave.
[170] Divine personages of the size of a thumb; sixty thousand were
produced from Brahmá's body and surrounded the chariot of the sun. The
legend of Garuda and the Bálakhilyas is found in the Mahábhárata,
see De Gubernatis, Zoological Mythology, p. 95.
[171] A yojana is probably 9 miles, some say 2-1/2, some 4 or 5. See
Monier Williams s. v.
[172] Compare the 5th story in the first book of the Panchatantra,
in Benfey's translation.
Benfey shows that this story found its way into Mahometan collections,
such as the Thousand and one Nights, and the Thousand and one Days, as
also into the Decamerone of Boccaccio, and other European story-books,
Vol. I, p. 159, and ff.
The story, as given in the Panchatantra, reminds us of the Squire's
Tale in Chaucer, but Josephus in Ant. Jud. XVIII, 3, tells it of a
Roman knight named Mundus, who fell in love with Paulina the wife of
Saturninus, and by corrupting the priestess of Isis was enabled to pass
himself off as Anubis. On the matter coming to the ears of Tiberius, he
had the temple of Isis destroyed, and the priests crucified. (Dunlop's
History of Fiction, Vol. II, p. 27. Liebrecht's German translation,
p. 232). A similar story is told by the Pseudo-Callisthenes of
Nectanebos and Olympias. Cp. Coelho's Contos Populares Portuguezes,
No. LXXI, p. 155.
[173] Thus she represented the Arddhanárísvara, or Siva half male,
and half female, which compound figure is to be painted in this manner.
[174] She held on to it by her hands.
[175] Wilson remarks that this presents some analogy to the story
in the Decamerone (Nov. 7 Gior. 8) of the scholar and the widow
"la quale egli poi, con un suo consiglio, di mezzo Luglio, ignuda,
tutto un dì fa stare in su una torre." It also bears some resemblance
to the story of the Master Thief in Thorpe's Yule-tide Stories, page
272. The Master thief persuades the priest that he will take him to
heaven. He thus induces him to get into a sack, and then he throws
him into the goose-house, and when the geese peck him, tells him that
he is in purgatory. The story is Norwegian. See also Sir G. W. Cox's
Mythology of the Aryan Nations, Vol. 1. p. 127.
[176] Cp. the way in which Rüdiger carries off the daughter of king
Osantrix, Hagen's Helden-Sagen, Vol. I, p. 227.
[177] têrêsantes nykta cheimerion hydati kai anemô kai ham' aselênon
exêsan. Thucyd. III. 22.
[178] The word dasyu here means savage, barbarian. These wild mountain
tribes called indiscriminately Savaras, Pulindas, Bhillas &c., seem
to have been addicted to cattle-lifting and brigandage. So the word
dasyu comes to mean robber. Even the virtuous Savara prince described
in the story of Jímútaváhana plunders a caravan.
[179] Cathay?
[180] Compare the rose garland in the story of the Wright's Chaste
Wife; edited for the early English Text Society by Frederick
J. Furnivall, especially lines 58 and ff.
"Wete thou wele withowtyn fable
"Alle the whyle thy wife is stable
"The chaplett wolle holde hewe;
"And yf thy wyfe use putry
"Or telle eny man to lye her by
Then welle yt change hewe,
And by the garland thou may see,
Fekylle or fals yf that sche be,
Or elles yf she be true.
See also note in Wilson's Essays on Sanskrit Literature, Vol. I,
p. 218. He tells us that in Perce Forest the lily of the Kathá Sarit
Ságara is represented by a rose. In Amadis de Gaul it is a garland
which blooms on the head of her that is faithful, and fades on the
brow of the inconstant. In Les Contes à rire, it is also a flower. In
Ariosto, the test applied to both male and female is a cup, the wine
of which is spilled by the unfaithful lover. This fiction also occurs
in the romances of Tristan, Perceval and La Morte d'Arthur, and is
well known by La Fontaine's version, La Coupe Enchantée. In La Lai
du Corn, it is a drinking-horn. Spenser has derived his girdle of
Florimel from these sources or more immediately from the Fabliau, Le