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THE STORY OF BHISHMA 325 yet Yama himself, as all men know, cannot drav^ near to thee without first obtaining thy consent. We have come, therefore, to crave from thee the permit of death, and to beg the knowledge of how we may hope to slay thee. For all our attempts during the past nine days have failed."

The aged knight smiled gently. Now indeed had the moment of release arrived. He held in his own hands power over his own life, and never in all these long years till now had there been =»^ moment in which, without shirking his duty, he could have left the world. But here all this was changed. For the Doom of the Kurus must break, and the Triumph of the Pandavas be es- tablished, and man may not stand in the path of events. That same faithfulness that had so long bidden him to stay, was now calling him to go. The hours of servitude were over, the moment of rest was nigh at hand.

" It is true, my child," he said to Yudisthira, '* it is in vain that you look for victory while I lead the Kuru hosts ; and neither may you hope to slay me while I hold my weapons and fight for life. Yet there are certain things before which I lay down my arms. Note them well. Before those who are afraid, those who are weak from wounds or illness, those who have surrendered to my mercy, and any who were born woman, 1 will not fight