________________
[Footnote 37: So, too, Bhaga is Dawn's brother, I. 123. 5. P[=u]shan is Indra's brother in VI. 55. 5. Gubernatis interprets P[=ujshan as 'the setting
sun.')
[Footnote 38: Contrast I. 42, and X. 26 (with 1. 138. 1). In the first hymn P[=u]shan leads the way and drives away danger, wolves, thieves, and helps to booty and pasturage. In the last he is a war-god, who helps in battle, a 'far-ruler,' embracing the thoughts of all (as in III. 62. 9).]
[Footnote 39: For the traits just cited compare IV. 57. 7; VI. 17. 11; 48. 15; 53, 55; 56. 1-3; 57. 3-4; 58. 2-4; II. 40; X. 17. 3 ff.; 26. 3-8; 1. 23. 14; all of I. 42, and 138; VIII. 4. 15-18; III. 57. 2. In X. 17.4, Savitar, too, guides the souls of the dead.]
[Footnote 40: That is to say, one hymn is addressed to Bhaga with various other gods, VII. 41. Here he seems to be personified good-luck ("of whom even the king says, 'I would have thee," vs. 2). In the Br[ra]hmanas 'Bhaga is blind,' which applies better to Fortune than to the Sun.]
[Footnote 41: The hymn is sung before setting out on a forray for cattle. Let one observe how unsupported is the assumption of the ritualists as applied to this hymn, that it must have been "composed for rubrication."]
[Footnote 42: After Muir, V. p. 178. The clouds and cattle are both called gàs 'wanderers,' which helped in the poetic identification of the two.]
[Footnote 43: Compare IX. 97.55, "Thou art Bhaga, giver of gifts."]
[Footnote 44: Bhágam bhaksh! Compare baksheesh. The word as 'god' is both Avestan, bagha, and Slavic, bogu (also meaning 'rich'). It may be an epithet of other gods also, and here it means only luck.]