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other man agreed to lead him there. When they reached the place where Mahāvira was they greeted him, bowed to him and reverentially went round him thrice. They sat down to listen to the religious discourse and when it was over, and every one had gone back, the blind man also was led away by his friend. Gautama looked at the blind man with great curiosity and also with compassion and wondered whether there were any other such blind persons in the town. He made the query to his great Master who said that indeed in the very same city there was a most unfortunate boy who was not only blind but had only apertures in the body where the eyes, nose, ears, hands and feet should have been. He was merely a lump and his mother looks after him carefully. Gautama wanted to know who the boy was and Mahāvira said that it was the son of Vijaya the king of the place and his queen Mrgā. Gautama expressed his desire to go and see the boy if his Master permitted him.
When Mahävira allowed him to go to the palace of the queen, Gautama met her and got the whole story from the mother. She appeared initially rather unwilling but later was convinced of the sincerity of the feeling Gautama had felt for the boy. She agreed to take him with her to the secret place where the boy was kept. When the time for the boy's meal came, she asked Gautama to accompany her. She changed her dress and covered her mouth with a piece of cloth which was folded four times. She asked Gautama to do likewise. When they were both ready and plenty of food and drinks and other eatables were loaded on a wooden cart,
ueen pushed the cart towards the underground cell. She opened the door with her face turned back but as she pushed the door open, there came forth a terribly foul smell like that of a dead snake or the dead body of some such reptile. In fact, the smell was much more foul and stinking than that. However the boy Mrgāputra was attracted more by the smell of the food that his mother had brought him and he quickly devoured all the food that was in the cart. He quickly digested the whole of it inside him. All the food so digested quickly turned into pus and blood. This also he devoured.
Gautama wondered what horrible things he had in his previous
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