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HYMNS OF THE ATHARVA-VEDA.
5. May your stable be auspicious to you, prosper ye like the sâri-birds and parrots! And right here do ye beget (your young)! With us do we unite you.
6. Attach yourselves, O cows, to me as your possessor; may this stable here cause you to prosper ! Upon you, growing numerous, and living, may we, increasing in wealth, alive, attend !
VI, 59. Prayer to the plant arundhatt for pro
tection to cattle. 1. Thy foremost protection, O Arundhati, do thou bestow upon steer and milch-kine, upon (cattle of) the age when weaned from their mother, upon (all) four-footed creatures !
2. May Arundhatt, the herb, bestow protection along with the gods, render full of sap the stable, free from disease our men!
3. The variegated, lovely, life-giving (plant) do I invoke. May she carry away for us, far from the cattle, the missile hurled by Rudra!
VI, 70. Charm to secure the attachment of a
cow to her calf. 1. As meat, and liquor, and dice (abound) at the gambling-place, as the heart of the lusty male hankers after the woman, thus shall thy heart, O cow, hanker after the calf!
2. As the elephant directs his steps after the steps of the female, as the heart of the lusty male hankers after the woman, thus shall thy heart, O cow, hanker after the calf!
3. As the felloe, and as the spokes, and as the
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