66 Evolution of Life and Form. 



working in order to prepare what is wanted of moun- 

 tain and of valley, of river and of plain ; see the 

 might of his work as well as that of his brother 

 Agni, in apparent clash but really in harmony ; fire 

 and water meet, explode, and toss up a mountain- 

 chain where before there was none ; see how he 

 gathers snow on the mountain peaks, and gradually 

 fills with masses of this snow, frozen into ice, the 

 mountain ravines made by the combined volcanic 

 action ; see how the slow ploughing begins ; plough- 

 ing, ploughing and ploughing again, as the 

 mighty God works onward in the form of glaciers, 

 grinding his furrow through the earth, and prepar- 

 ing for the future ; see, ages later, how the channel 

 cut out by the glacier is filled by the tumbling 

 cataracts from melted snow, and a turbulent torrent 

 rolls downwards, and against its resistless waves 

 nothing is able to stand ; the valley dug out by the 

 plough of the ice is filled with water, and from it 

 the soil is gradually deposited, which in the future 

 will make fertile land for crops in order that man 

 may live. Then Varuna binds his waters into a 

 narrower and narrower channel, until there is moun- 

 tain range and valley and a river flowing through 

 it : and he carries his river downwards and pours it 

 into the sea and his brother Agni draws it up again 

 to form the clouds. There has come by that mighty 



