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XIV KÂNDA, 2 ADHYAYA, 2 BRÂHMANA, 35. 487
sounding-holes (pratirava), doubtless, are the vital airs, for everything here is pleased (pratirata) with the vital airs: it is the vital airs he thus bestows upon him. Having offered (with the third stick) he leans it against the middle enclosingstick.
35. “Hail to the Fathers, (seated) upon the Barhis, and drinking the Gharma!'-even without offering he secretes (this, the fourth stick) under the barhis of the south part (of the vedi ) whilst looking towards the norths. When the sacrifice had its head cut off, its life-sap flowed away, and went to the Fathers—the Fathers being three in number: it is them he thus pleases. And
(otherwise echo '), the proper term for the sounding-holes being
upa-rava,' cf. III, 5, 4, 1, where they are likened to the eyes and ears, as channels of the vital airs.
If this rendering (St. Petersb. Dict.) of Ordhvabarhis' is correct-the term being apparently based on the Fathers' epithet 'barhishadah,' seated on the barbis' (sacrificial grass-covering of the altar-ground the force of ardhva' in the compound is very peculiar. Mahîdhara takes it in the sense of having their barhis pointed upwards,' i. e. towards the east, the peculiar feature of the barhis in the present case-as far as the participation of the Fathers in the drinking of the Gharma is concerned-being its having the tops of the grass-stalks turned to the east instead of to the south, as is the case in all ceremonies relating to the Fathers. The term "ardhvabarhis might possibly mean'having their (Special) barhis above,' i. e. in the world of the Fathers, where they would be supposed to partake of the libations of hot milk; whilst yet another suggested by the next paragraph) would be that of
having the barhis above them;' which would, however, be more appropriate if the secreting of the stick under the barhis applied to the present, instead of the next one.
• The comm. on Katy. XXVI, 6, 14 calls this part of the barhis *atithyabarhis' (?).
. And accordingly, without looking at it.
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