Page:Agastya in the Tamil land.djvu/22

Rh this 'confusion worse confounded', the later Paurānic writers also have spun all sorts of amazing tales of mystery and imagination round this Aryan sage without an eye to smooth away inconsistencies and escape contradictions. Probably they may have thought that the sage was too great a man to sink under the weight of their legendary lore.

As a first step in the so-called Aryanisation of Dakṣiṇāpatha (Southern India) and Further India, the northern tradition which has gathered round his hermitage near Daṇḍakāraṇya gives us a valuable clue.