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338
N. M. Kansara
Jambu-jyoti
and gladly accepted the mantra. Consequently, after death, the bull was reborn as a son named Vardhanakuñjara of king Vairasimha and queen Nandadevī. In this new embodiment he happened to make friends with two reliable twin brothers named Punyodaya and Dhumadhvaja. Vardhanauñjara mastered 72 arts and crafts. In view of his progress in education and other good qualities, king Vairasimha consulted an astrologer who also was an expert palmist, with regard to the prince's suitability for inheriting the responsibility of kingship after himself. The astronomer warned that, despite all the education and good qualities, the prince was getting perverted due to the influence of his bad companion named Vaiśvānara. The king was rather dejected, but the palmist assured him that the prince will part company with this companion when he is married to princess Kṣānti, the daughter of king Subhapariņāma and queen Niṣprakampatā ruling in the city named Citta-saundarya. Then, the king proposed to depute the astrologer to king Subhaparināma with an offer of his daughter's marriage with his prince, but the astrologer asked him to wait for proper time and not to hurry. And, prince Vardhanakuñjara used to quarrel and fight due to instigation from his bad companion. Once, when the king was about to mount an attack on a troublesome feudatory Kālasena, the prince took initiative himself and captured the feudatory alive, who was presented before the king and the latter released him after imposing heavy fine on him, From that day, the prince regarded Vaiśvānara as his well-wisher and a favourite friend.
Once the prince went to a forest named Svadeha with his twin friends and there he saw a man standing on an anthill named Uccaya and with a noose and about to commit suicide. The man bound his head in the noose and released himself from the branch, in the presence of the prince. But the prince cut off the noose and saved him. Even then the man tried to attempt suicide once again. When asked for the reason for his rashness and desperation, the man related the following account about his misfortune.
The man, whose name was Sparśana, said: 'I had a very dear and close friend named Jantu who always conducted himself in a manner totally to my liking. Once, deceived by a man named Susamaya, he began to look upon Sparśana as a dangerous person and, being instigated by Susamaya, he would resort to picking up my hair, making me sleep on bare ground,
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