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CHAPTER TWO
wavering on the banks of Ratnaśaila ; their creeper-like arms shining with jeweled bracelets like beautiful quivers deposited by Ananga; wearing girdles made of priceless jewels like bow-strings drawn for Love wishing to conquer the world : adorned with jeweled anklets clinging to lotusfeet like the light of all the Jyotişkas overcome by the light of the body; some with a dark body-radiance like priyangu-creepers, some spreading a grove of tālis 68 in the sky, as it were, by their own light; some spreading light like the light of dawn, some bathing the sky with light like clear moonlight; some putting golden threads, as it were, on the sky with their light, some like dolls of cat'seye in beauty; all with their rounded breasts resembling rivers with cakravākas, all resembling rājahansis in their graceful gait; all with delicate hands like creepers with sprouts, all beautiful-eyed like lotus-ponds with blooming lotuses; all with a flood of loveliness like ponds with water; all endowed with fairness like goddesses of love; startled by the shaking of their thrones, saying, “What is this?” the fifty-six (Dikkumārīs) at once employed clairvoyant knowledge.
Then by means of clairvoyant knowledge the Dikkumāris knew simultaneously the purifying birth of a Tīrthakệt. They reflected : "In this very Jambūdvipa in the middle part of the southern half of Bharata in the great city Vinitā the second blessed Tirthakrt of this avasarpiņi, possessing three kinds of knowledge, has been borne to King Jitaśatru of the Ikşvāku-family by his wife Vijayā.” .
After these reflections, they joyfully got up from their seats and took seven or eight steps, looking in the direction of the Tirthakrt. After they had placed the Jineśvara before them in their minds, as it were, and had bowed to him, all with deep devotion paid homage to him with the Sakrastava. Returning, they sat down on their
08 139. The Corypha taliera, the mountain-palm, i.e., green.
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