Page:Sagas from the Far East; or, Kalmouk and Mongolian traditionary tales.djvu/380

356 they gave in and accepted the teaching of the Sthavira, like the rest of the country. Under which last image, we can easily read the fact that the Buddhist teacher suffered his followers to continue the worship, while he set limits to it and delivered them from the extreme awe in which they had previously stood of the serpents. See also note 4 to Tale XXII.

2. Strong drink. See note 8 to Tale V., and note 3 to Tale VI.

3. Baling-cakes. See notes 6 and 9 to Tale IV.

4. On the custom adopted by priests of hiding precious objects in the sacred images of the gods, see Lassen, Indische Alterthumskunde, iii. 351.

1. Milk-broth is mentioned by Abbé Huc repeatedly in his travels as a staple article of food in Mongolia.

2. Schimnu or Schumnu (in Sanskrit, Kâma or Mâra) is the Buddhist Devil, or personified evil. He is also the God of Love, Sin, and Death, the Prince of the third or lower world. Sensuality is called his kingdom. The Schumnus are represented as tempters and doing all in their power to hinder mortals in their struggle after perfection, and in this view, take every sort of forms according to their design at the time. They as often appear in female as in male form. Schmidt's translation of sSanang sSetsen.

3. As an instance of the migration of myths, I may mention here, that I met in Spain with a ballad, which I am sorry I have mislaid and cannot therefore quote the verse, in which the love-lorn swain in singing the praises of his mistress, among other charms enumerates, that the flowers spring from the stones as she treads her way through the streets.

The present story, too, reminds forcibly in all its leading details of the legend I have entitled "The Ill-tempered Princess," in "Patrañas," though so unlike in the dénouement.

4. I have had occasion to speak in another place of the early Indian's belief in the dwelling of the gods being situated among the inaccessible heights which bound his sight and his fancy. The mountain of Meerû was a spot so sacred that it was fabled the sun might not pass it. Consult Lassen, i. 847, &c. &c.