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156
Mitránanda was very importunate, Amaradatta at length sent him, guarded by his servants, towards Vasantapura.
But as no news came of him, after some days the king
Employed a man to inquire, but no intelligence came. Then the king said to himself : What has become of my friend? If there were any seer in the neighbourhood, I would ask for information about my friend.' While the king was saying this to himself, a keeper of the garden and plantations came to him, and said : To-day a great hermit, possessing four kinds of knowledge, named the priest* Dharmaghosha, has arrived in the park.' When the king heard that, he was delighted, and went with Ratnamanjarí to adore him; and after bowing before him he received from his mouth religious instruction. At this moment an inhabitant of that town, a merchant, Açokadatta by name, bowed before the religious teacher, and said : 'Reverend sir, for what action is my daughter dişeased in this birth? What is the cause of her sickness ?' The holy man had her brought there, and cured her completely by casting one look at her. Then the merchant said : Revered sir, what action did this my daughter commit in a former birth ?' The holy man said:
In a former age there was a merchant named Bhútadeva in the city of Bhútasála. He had a wife named Kukshimatí. One day Kukshimatí saw the cat drinking the milk, and she spoke a wicked speech to her daughter-in-law, saying: “Are you possessed by the female demons, that you do not save the milk from the cat?” When that daughter-in-law heard that, she was immediately deluded by a female demon. Then the king and the rest of the people delivered her from the demon. So the wife of the merchant's son recovered her condition of health, but the mother-in-law, Kukshimatí, acquired the sobriquet of “ Black-tongue." Then Kukshimatí, hearing the way in which she was reviled by the public, became inclined to
* Súri, a common title of Jaina teachers. Usually five kinds of knowledge are enumerated. See Dr. Hoernle's Uvásaga Dasáo,' p. 48, note.
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