Page:The Mythology of All Races Vol 6 (Indian and Iranian).djvu/61

Rh winged with a thousand feathers, and sometimes he carries a goad. He travels in a golden chariot drawn by two or more horses, as many as eleven hundred being mentioned. He is a gigantic eater and drinker; at his birth he drank soma and for the slaying of Vṛtra he drank three lakes or even thirty. He eats the flesh of twenty or a hundred buffaloes, and when he was born the worlds quaked with fear. His mother is described as a cow and he as a bull; she is also called Niṣṭigrī, and he willed to be born unnaturally through her side. His father is Dyaus or Tvaṣṭṛ; from the latter he stole the soma and even slew him and made his mother a widow; more than this he fought against the gods, perhaps for the soma. His wife Indrāṇī is mentioned, and he is often called Śacīpati, or "Lord of Strength," whence later mythology coined a wife Śacī for him. He is closely connected with the Maruts and with Agni, and is actually identified with Sūrya.

The might and power of Indra are described everywhere in terms of hyperbole. He is the greatest of the gods, greater even than Varuṇa, lord of all that moves and of men, who won in battle wide space for the gods. Occasionally he bears Varuṇa's title of universal ruler, but more often he has his own of independent ruler. The epithet "of a hundred powers" is almost his alone, and his also is that of "very lord." The deed which wins him his high place is the feat, ever renewed, of slaying the dragon which encompasses the waters. He smites him on the head or on the back, he pierces his vitals. After slaying Vṛtra he lets loose the streams; he shatters the mountains, breaks open the well, and sets the waters free; he kills the dragon lying on the waters and releases the waters. He cleaves the mountain to liberate the cows; he loosens the rock and makes the kine easy to obtain; he frees the cows which were fast within the stone; he slays Vṛtra, breaks the castles, makes a channel for the rivers, pierces the mountain, and makes it over to his friends the cows. Again, however, he wins the light by his deed; he gains the sun as well as the waters by freeing the demons;