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undertook a monthlong fast. The king, desirous of carning mcrit by offering him food on the day of his päraņā, issued a royal decrec in which he claimed that privilege for himself and threatened to punish any one who should como forth to sccd the monk when his fast was over. At the end of tic thirty days, thic muni Vasiştha caine out of scclusion and cntcrcd Mathură, walking in silence in front of the houses, expecting a lay person to properly invite him in for a mcal, as besits a Digambara monk. Unfortunately, Mic king had forgotlen his resolve to feed the monk, and the people were afraid of brcaking the king's command. As a result Vasiştha returned to his abode without concluding the fast and as is customary in such cascs, he underwent another month of sasting. He relurned again to Mathurā, but the king was distracted by a raging fire in the palace and Vasişilia had lo lcave the city without food for the second time. He returned for the third time after the lapse of another monui's fast, but as satc would have it, the king again failed to honor luis promise occupied as he was with an elephant which had gone on a rampage, and Vasiştha returned without finishing his pārajā. An old woman saw thic silent monk rclurning without alms and informed him of thc unjust order of the King Ugrasena. The āhūra-sanjññā is a deadly instinct, und as the wisc frog Gangadatta of the Pancalantra observed: "What sin would not a hungry man commit, for indeed weak men becoine devoid of pity!" (bubhukşitaḥ kiin na karoti pūpam, kşiņā nară nişkarunā bhavanti.)23 Infuriated by this callous ucaunent, Vasiştha in a moment of hunger forgot his mendicant vows and resolved to avenge this insult and deprivation. Ilc died in anguish and was immicdiately conceived in the womb of Padmāvatī, thic chics queen of the same King Ugrasena. Soon after, the queen started having pregnancy cravings (dohala) of an extraordinary kind. She conceived a desire, prompied 110 doubt by the fetus, to cut the heart of her husband and to drink luis bloud in her folded hands. The king, using certain stratagems, sulfilled hier desires and a son was born whom both parents thought it wisc to abandon to avert any danger to the kingdom. They placed him in a copper container (kāmsya-manjūṣā) with a royal scal indicating his true origin and floated it in die river Yanıunā. Thus was the origin of the villain Kamsa who would even
pally imprison his father the King Ugrasena and would himself be killed by Krsna, Ulic son of Vasudeva and Devak7.24
This is not the occasion for examining the question whether tlic pregnant
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