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woman. She screamed forth " Let go ", " Let go ", " No more ". Her
eyes expanded. She cast up and down her hands and feet again and
again in profuse perspiration. Her groans made heaven and earth
tremble and space itself resounded on all sides. At last she fell dead
like a great mountain, crushing down trees within an ambit of twelve
miles. Fearlessly the boy played on her body.
The Gopa ladies hurried to the place with Rohini and Yasoda.
They bathed the boy in cows' urine and dust from cow's feet. They
pronounced the twelve names of Vishnu (Kesava and others) over twelve
parts of his body. Then after touching water, they duly uttered the
root mantras over their own body and that of the child. Lastly they
invoked Vishnu by different names to protect the child from danger
of all sorts. (The protective mantra uttered by the mother with passes
of the hand over different parts of the body was supposed to shield
the child from danger. Latterly the custom has been to get the mantra
written, with due ceremonies, by a qualified Brahman, on the sacred
bark (Bhurja) and then to tie it round the hand.)
Yasoda then placed the child on her lap and gave him milk.
By this time Nanda had returned to Vrindabana. He saw the
huge body of the Asura woman and realised the force of Vasudeva r s
warning.
The people of Vraja cut the body into parts and burnt them
with fuel. The smoke was sweet-scented, as the touch of Krishna's
body purifies even the enemy.
THE UPTURNING OF THE CART.
SKANDHA X. CHAP. 7.
The ceremony observable on the child being able to stand on
his legs and the birth-day ceremony were observed together and there
was a great feast at the house of Nanda. Yasoda placed the child
near a cart, containing brass vessels with articles of food, and became
busily engaged in receiving her guests. The child wept but she did
not hear. He then raised his feet aloft, weeping for his mother's milk,
and struck the cart with his feet. The cart was upset, the brass
vessels broken and the wheel and axle upturned. The Gopa ladies
could not account for this wonderful phenomenon. The boys, who
sat near the child, told all that they saw, but people could not easily
believe what they said.
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