Chapter XXV

. In Ch. LII we find trees with trunks of gold and leaves

and fruit of jewels. A similar tree is found in the mediæval romance of king Alexander. Dunlop compares the golden vine carried away by Pompey. Liebrecht remarks that there was also a golden vine over the gate of the temple at Jerusalem, and compares the golden lotus made by the Chinese emperor Tunghwan. He refers also to Huon of Bordeaux, Ysaie le Triste, and Grimm's Kindermärchen 130 and 133. (Liebrecht's Dunlop, p. 184). See also Milton's Paradise Lost, IV. 220 and 256. Cp. Thalaba the Destroyer, Book I, 30. The passage in the Pseudo-Callisthenes will be found in III, 28, Karl Mueller's Edition.

[708] See page 445.

[709] Cp. the story of Seyf ul Mulk in the Persian Tales, and the Bahar-Danush, c. 35 (Dunlop, Vol. II, p. 208, Liebrecht's translation, p. 335) see also Dunlop's remarks upon the Polexandre of Gomberville. In this romance Abdelmelec, son of the emperor of Morocco, falls in love with Alcidiana by seeing her portrait (Vol. II, p. 276, Liebrecht's translation, p 372.) A similar incident is found in the romanco of Agesilaus of Colchos, (Liebrecht's Dunlop, p. 157.) See Prym und Socin, Syrische Märchen, p. 3; Rohde, Der Griechische Roman, p. 49; Coelho, Contos Populares Portuguezes, p. 109.

[710] For the vidruteshu of Brockhaus's edition I read nihateshu, which I find in the Sanskrit College MS.

[711] An elaborate pun. Rasika also means "full of (poetical) flavour."

[712] Dim traditions of this mountain seem to have penetrated to Greece and Rome. Aristophanes (Acharnians v. 82) speaks of the king of Persia as engaged for 8 months epi chrysôn orôn. Clark tells us that Bergler quotes Plautus, Stichus 24, Neque ille mereat Persarum sibi montes qui esse perhibentur aurei. (Philological Journal, VIII. p. 192.) See also Ter. Phormio I, 2, 18, Pers. III, 65. Naraváhanadatta's journey through the air may remind the reader of the air-voyage of Alexander in the Pseudo-Callisthenes, II, 41. He sees a serpent below him, and a halôs in the middle of it. A divine being, whom he meets, tells him, that these objects are the earth and the sea.

[713] I. e. Siva.

[714] See note on page 488.

[715] i. e. city of heroes. See Cunningham's Ancient Geography of India, p. 99.

[716] Cp. the properties of the magic ring given to Canace in the Squire's tale, and Grimm's story of "Die drei Sprachen," (No. 33, Kindermärchen). See also Tylor's Primitive Culture, Vol. I, pp. 18, 423. In the Edda, Sigurd learns to understand the language of birds by tasting the blood of Fafner. For other parallels see Liebrecht's Dunlop, p. 184, and note 248.

[717] Cp. the 77th chapter of this work, the second in the Vetála Panchavinsati, and Ralston's exhaustive note, in his Russian Folk-tales, pp. 231, 232, 233. Cp. also Bernhard Schmidt's Griechische Märchen, p. 114, and Bartsch's Sagen, Märchen, und Gebräuche aus Meklenburg, Vol. I, p. 486. The Pseudo-Callisthenes (Book II, c. 40) mentions a fountain that restored to life a salt fish, and made one of Alexander's daughters immortal. This is perhaps the passage that was in Dunlop's mind, when he said (page 129 of Liebrecht's translation) that such a fountain is described in the Greek romance of Ismenias and Ismene, for which Liebrecht takes him to task. See the parallels quoted by Dunlop and Liebrecht. Wheeler, in his Noted Names of Fiction, tells us that there was a tradition current among the natives of Puerto Rico, that such a fountain existed in the fabulous island of Bimini, said to belong to the Bahama group. This was an object of eager and long-continued quest to the celebrated Spanish navigator, Juan Ponce de Leon. By Ismenias and Ismene Dunlop probably means Hysminias and Hysmine. See also Birlinger, Aus Schwaben, p. 185. Kuhn in his "Herabkunft des Feuers" traces this story back to the Satapatha Bráhmana.

[718] Here there is an elaborate pun. "King" may also mean "mountain," "race" may mean "wings," and the whole passage refers to Indra's clipping the wings of the mountains.

[719] Compare the remarkable passage which M. Lévêque quotes from the works of Empedocles (Les Mythes et les Légendes de l'Inde, p. 90).

Estin anankês chrêma, theôn psêphisma palaion, aidion, plateessi katesphrêgismenon horkois, eute tis amplakiêsi phonô phila gyia miênê haimasin ê epiorkon hamartêsas epomossê daimôn, hoi te makraiônos lelachasi bioio, tris min myrias hôras apo makarôn alalêsthai, phyomenon pantoia dia chronou eidea thnêtôn, argaleas biotoio metallassonta keleuthous.

I have adopted the readings of Ritter and Preller, in their Historia Philosophiæ, in preference to those of M. Lévêque. It is clear that Empedocles supposed himself to be a Vidyádhara fallen from heaven in consequence of a curse. As I observed in an article in the Calcutta Review of 1875, "The Bhagavad Gítá and Christianity," his personality is decidedly Indian.

[720] Cp. Odyssey IX. 27, 28.

[721] Comprising the modern provinces of Allahabad, Agra, Delhi and Oude.

[722] For anrityata I should like to read anartyata.

[723] i. e., one who has obtained a prize.

[724] Badarínátha is a place sacred to Vishnu in the Himálayas. The Badarínátha peaks, in British Gurwhal, form a group of six summits, from 22,000 to 23,400 feet above the sea. The town of Badarínátha is 55 miles north-east of Srínagar, on the right bank of the Vishnuganga, a feeder of the Alakananda. The temple is situated in the highest part of the town, and below it a tank, supplied by a sulphureous thermal spring, is frequented by thousands of pilgrims. The temple is 10,294 feet above the sea. (Akbar, an Eastern Romance, by Dr. Van Limburg-Brouwer, with an introduction by Clements Markham, p. 1, note.)

[725] Prajá means subjects and also offspring.

[726] The word artha means wealth, and also meaning.

[727] The story of Anangaprabhá may be the origin of the seventh Novel of the IInd day in the Decameron of Boccacio.

[728] Prayága--Allahabad, the place of sacrifice kat' exochên. Here the Gangá and Yamuná unite with the supposed subterranean Sarasvatí.

[729] The word in the original is kárpatika. Böhtlingk and Roth explain it in this passage as "ein im Dienste eines Fürsten stehender Bettler." It appears from Taranga 81, that a poor man became a kárpatika by tearing a karpata, a ragged garment, in a king's presence. The business of a kárpatika seems to have been to do service without getting anything for it.

[730] Cp. the 1st Novel in the 10th Day of the Decameron and Ralston's Russian Folk Tales, p. 197.

[731] There is a pun here. The word palása also means "cruel, unmerciful."

[732] The word used shews that he was probably a Buddhist mendicant.

[733] Cp. Miss Frere's Old Deccan days, p. 171, and Giles's Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, p. 430, where the young lady says to Ma; "You have often asked me for money, but on account of your weak luck I have hitherto refrained from giving you any."

[734] This story is found in the Hitopadesa, p. 89 of Johnson's translation.

[735] These two lines are an elaborate pun--ku = evil, and also earth, guna = virtue, and also string, avichára = injustice, also the movement of sheep.

[736] I follow the MS. in the Sanskrit College which reads rodorandhre.

[737] Here with the Sanskrit College MS. I read ruditam for the unmetrical kranditam.

[738] I read dhrishyan, i. e., rejoicing, from hrish.

[739] The word sattvavara here means "possessing pre-eminent virtue."

[740] In sl. 163 (a) I read mama for mayá with the Sanskrit College MS.

[741] The story, as told in