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304
CHAPTER ELEVEN Rāma may kill you from anger at my killing. Take my kaustubha as a token. Go to the Paņdavas. Tell them the whole story., Let them be of assistance to you. You must go somehow from here with reversed footprints so that Rāma, following your footprints, will not find you quickly. With my voice you should ask pardon from all the Pāņdavas and others also formerly harassed by me, when I possessed lordship, by making them render service, et cetera.”
So instructed again and again by Kșşņa, he went away just so, after he had pulled the arrow from Kịşņa's foot, taking the kaustubha. When Jāreya had gone, Janārdana, suffering from pain in his foot, his hands folded respectfully, began to speak:
“Homage to the Blessed Arhats, homage to the siddhas, triple homage to the ācāryas, to the upādhyāyas, and to sādhus. Homage to the blessed Ariştanemi, master of the world, who founded a congregation on earth, abandoning the wicked, us and others.”
After reciting this, resting on a couch of grass, placing a foot on a knee and covering (himself) with a cloth, Kșşņa thought again: “ The blessed Nemi is fortunate, and Varadatta and others, the princes, Pradyumna and others, my wives, · Rukmiņi and others, who abandoned the status of a house
holder, the cause of dwelling in existence and became mendicants, but shame on me here who have experienced mortification.”
As he was meditating thus, a strong case of tetanus 299 raged like a brother of Kștānta, breaking his limbs throughout. Suffering from thirst, the blow from the arrow, and the tetanus, his discernment breaking down suddenly, he thought again: “From birth I was never defeated by any one, man or god. I was reduced to such a state first by Dvaipāyana. Even with so much time elapsed, if I should see him, I would get up and
299 160. I have translated vāyu, 'the windy humor,' as 'tetanus' on the authority of an Indian doctor. Kșşņa certainly died from tetanus. LAI, p. 180, takes vāyu to be paralysis,' but it certainly can not be that here.
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