[ 65 ] 



told their master. When, therefore, Creeshna came nigh, Sal 

 stepped forward, and meeting him, and lifting on high a glittering 

 spear, was on the point of aiming it at Creeshna's driver ; but he 

 had not yet launched it, when Creeshna snapt it in his hand with 

 an arroAv. Sal, violently enraged, shot an arrow, which broke 

 Creeshna's bow with a crash that resounded to heaven, and he now 

 began to triumph as in certain victory, exclaiming aloud, " O 

 Creeshna ! dost thou remember the day when thou didst steal Ro- 

 kemenee from Rajah Seesoopal, my beloved friend, and after- 

 wards how thou didst stain Judishter's Yug with his blood ? For 

 these acts I am this day going to take revenge. It is useless for 

 thee to bemoan thy inferiority ; stand firm, nor attempt to flee, 

 for there is no road open for retreat." Creeshna rebuked him for 

 his idle boasting, and taking his Geda, aimed it so forcibly at Sal, 

 that he vanished away, and for two hours was utterly invisible. At 

 the expiration of that period, he appeared before Creeshna in the 

 dress of a messenger, having changed his natural form for another, 

 and, with his hair all clotted with dirt, and speaking with the voice 

 of one out of breath, he said, " O Creeshna ! Vasudeva, your 

 noble father, sent me hither to acquaint you that he knows you 

 came into the world for the relief of the oppressed and the support 

 of the weak ; yet, in spite of this, Rajah Sal has taken that father 

 prisoner, and is carrying him off." Creeshna was wonderfully struck 

 with this event, yet thought that perhaps it was true. This mistake, 

 indeed, is not reconcilable with Creeshna's omniscience, but it is a 

 mark of his taking on himself the exact state of human life, that such 

 opinions should occupy his mind. In this interval, Rajah Sal, by 

 Maya, formed a counterfeit Vasudeva, and caused him to appear 

 upon that spot, making him utter these words : " O Creeshna ! 

 with so godlike a son as you, is it not lamentable that your father 

 should be in so wretched a plight?" Sal, in his own shape, 

 Vol. in. I 



