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118 possessed with grief and sorrow, and shedding copious tears, and touching water according to the form, the monarch spake. And reflecting for a moment, as if settling something in his mind, the angry monarch, addressing all ministers, said these words :

"I have heard your account of my father's ascension to heaven. Know ye now what my fixed resolve is. I think no time must be lost in avenging this injury upon the wretch Takshaka that killed my father! He burnt my father making Sringin only secondary cause. From malignity alone he made Kasya pa return. If that Brahmana had arrived, my father assuredly would have lived. What would he have lost if the king had revived by the grace of Kasyapa and the precautionary measures of his ministers? From ignorance of the effects of my wrath, he prevented Kasyapa-that excellent of Brahmanas-whom he could not defeat, from coming to my father with the desire of reviving him. The act of aggression is great on the part of the wretch Takshaka who gave wealth unto that Brabmana in order that he might not revive the king. I must now avenge myself on my father's enemy to please myself, the Rishi Utanka and you all!"

So ends the fiftieth section in the Astika Parva of the Adi Parva.

Sauti said.--"King Janamejaya having said so, his ministers expressed their approbation. And the monarch then expressed his determination to perform a snake-sacrifice. And that lord of the Earth that tiger of the Bharata tace the son of Parikshit, then called his priest and Ritwikas. And accomplished in speech, he spake unto them these words relating to the accomplishment of his great task:-'I must avenge myself on the wretch Takshaka who killed my father. Tell me what I must do. Do you know any act by which I may cast into the blazing fire the snake Tak haka with his relatives ? I desire to burn that wretch even as he burnt, of yore, by the fire of his poison, my father l'"

"The chief priest answered, -'There is, o king, a great sacrifice for thee devised by the gods themselves. It is known as the snake-sacrifice, and is read of in the Purana. O king, thou alone canst accomplish it, and no one else! Men versed in the Purana have told us, there is such a sacrifice.'" :

Sauti continued, -"Thus addressed, the king. O excellent one, thought Takshaka to be already burnt and thrown into the blazing mouth of Agni, the eater of the sacrificial butter. The king then said