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LIFE OF MAHÁVÍRA.
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songs of triumph, and the purifying wind moving gently along, and circling around the place where lay the Lord and his mother. The joyous multitude were engaged in celebrating the vernal festivals, and even the earth seemed to share in the delight. It was at midnight, under the constellation of Uttara Phálgui, at a lucky conjunction of the moon and planets, that the event took place. On the night in which the adorable ascetic was born, many gods and goddesses continued going and coming to and from this world with a divine splendour, manifesting, by laughter and other signs, the intensity of their joy. On the night in which the adorable ascetic Mahavira was born, many livinities, dwellers in the world under the comunand of Kuvera, rained down showers of precious ores, gold, diamonds, garments, jewels, sweetsmelling leaves, of flowers, fruits, seeds, garlands, ambergris, sandal-wood, and strings of pearls. The four classes of gods, those who dwell in subterranean places, those of the aërial regions, those of the starry firmament, and those from the highest heavens, all floekel to the abode of the noble
• In the Decen there is the lirmi Jayanti le at this time, but the great vernal festival is crlebrated a month carlier, These festivals are not Brachuonial, but belong to the ancient ritual of the Hindus.
