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376
VEDIC HYMNS.
8. Enjoy, O Agni, our sacrifice, our offering, O son of strength who dwellest in three abodes. May we be well-doers before the gods. Protect us with thy thrice-protecting shelter.
9. Bring us across all difficulties and dangers, O Gatavedas, as with a boat across a river. Agni, being praised with adoration as (thou hast been praised) by Atri, be a protector of our bodies.
10. When I, the mortal, call thee, the immortal, thinking of thee with humble mind ', bestow glory on us, O Gâtavedas ; may I attain immortality, O Agni, with my offspring.
11. The well-doer to whom thou, O Agni Gâtavedas, createst pleasant freedom, will happily attain wealth with horses and sons, with valiant men and
Cows.
NOTES.
The same Rishi and metre.-Verse 1 =TS. I, 4, 46, 2. Verse 2=TS. III, 4, 11, 1; MS. IV, 12, 6; 14, 15. Verse 5=AV. VII, 73, 9; TB. II, 4, 1, 1; MS. IV, 11, 1. Verse 9=TB. II, 4, 1, 5; TA. X, 2, 1; MS. IV, 10, 1. Verses 10, 11=TS. I, 4, 46, 1.
Verse 2. Note 1. According to the traditional text, su-gårhapatyah must be an epithet of fshah. But the conjecture of Böhtlingk-Roth, su-gårhapatyáh, has great probability : (as the good protector of our household, shine food on us.' Cf. AV. XII, 2, 45=TB. I, 2, 1, 20.
Note 2. The second hemistich is nearly identical with III, 54, 22.
Verse 10. Note 1 See Pischel, Vedische Studien, I, 221.
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