Page:Sushruta Samhita Vol 1.djvu/527

Chap.XLV.] of the water, which is affected as regards its smell (Gandha-Dosha). The water, which being taken gives rise to thirst and to a sense of heaviness of the limbs, colic, and a flueut coryza, is said to be affected or vitiated in its potency (Virya-Dosha), whereas that, which takes a long time to be digested, or is retained in the stomach for an inordinate length of time, is said to be affected as regards digestion or chemical transformation (Vipaka-Dosha). Atmospheric water is free from the abovesaid defects. The defiled or contaminated water should be purified by boiling it, or by heating it in the sun, or by immersing a red-hot iron, or hot sands or stones in the same, and its smell should be removed by perfuming it with the Nageshvara, Champaka, Utpala, or Patala flowers, etc.

Metrical Texts:—Water should be drunk perfumed in a golden, silver, copper or an earthen goblet, or in a bowl made of bell metal or of precious stones. Contaminated water, as well as rain water accumulated in an improper season, should never be used for drinking purposes, inasmuch as it tends to derange the fundamental humours of the body, and is positively injurious to the human system. The man, who drinks, or bathes in, any contaminated water without previously purifying it as before directed, incurs the risk of being speedily affected with oedema, jaundice, cutaneous affections, indigestion, dyspnoea,