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216
THE QUESTIONS OF KING MILINDA. IV, 2, 18.
“Yes, that is common custom to this day in the world.'
• Then what you said that Pirit and medicine are alike useless is wrong. And when Pirit has been said over a man, a snake, ready to bite, will not bite him, but close his jaws—the club which robbers hold aloft to strike him with will never strike; they will let it drop, and treat him kindly—the enraged elephant rushing at him will suddenly stop-the burning fiery conflagration surging towards him will die out-the malignant poison he has eaten will become harmless, and turn to food—assassins who have come to slay him will become as the slaves who wait upon him—and the trap into which he has trodden will hold him not.
18. 'Again, have you never heard, O king, of that hunter who during seven hundred years failed to throw his net over the peacock who had taken Pirit, but snared him the very day [153] he omitted to do so '?'
Yes, I have heard of it. The fame of it has gone through all the world.'
Then what you said about Pirit and medicine being alike useless must be wrong. And have you never heard of the Danava ? who, to guard his wife, of the Pâli Text Society' for 1884, p. 87. Hinafi-kumburê, p. 191, translates as follows: Maha ragâneni, wisha winasa karanna wû mantra pada yakin wisha ya baswana ladda wû, wisha sanhinduwana ladda wû, arddhâdho bhagayehi awushadha galayen temana ladda wû, nayaku wisin dashta karana ladda w û kisiwek topa wisin daknâ ladde de yi wikála seka.
i This is the Mora-Gâtaka, Nos. 159, 491, or (which is the same thing) the Mora-Paritta.
s An Asura, enemy of the gods, a Titan. Rakshasa says the Simhalese.
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