16 



because he tKought that they had used magic incantations, fell 

 asleep, and in a dream was addressed as follows by the Naga: 

 "Be not angry ; what they did was done to show me their vene- 

 ration. They have neither despised nor wounded me, for my 

 body supports the sttipa; moreover, the tree has become a 

 beam of the stupa, and I can protect it; the stupa of the DaQa- 

 bala, of the Exalted one, should I ever have been able to protect 

 it (if not in this way)? . . . There was still another reason, why 

 I had not sufficient power (to resist the Buddha). I am going 

 to tell you this reason, listen attentively: Taksaka, the Naga 

 king, came here in person and took possession of this tree ; 

 could I protect it? Elapatra, the Naga king, himself came to 

 this spot with Vaiijramana: was my power sufficient to resist 

 those Devas and Nagas, full of majesty?" When the Brahman 

 awoke, he became a monk. 



This remarkable story shows us the Naga as an inhabitant of 

 a pond, but at the same time as a tree demon, in which function 

 we often found the serpent in Chinese and Japanese tales, but 

 never in Indian Naga legends. As a rain and thunder god he is 

 said to produce clouds and thunder when he is angry. Taksaka 

 and Elapatra are mentioned here as the mightiest of the Naga 

 kings, and VaiQramana, the guardian of the North, king of the 

 Yakshas, is probably confounded with Virupaksha, the guardian 

 of the West, king of the Nagas. The whole legend is a typical 

 specimen of the way in which Buddhism subdued the other cults. 



After having learned the Naga's nature from these Buddhist 

 writings which made him known in China and Japan, we may 

 venture one step into another direction, in turning to the Katha- 

 saritsagara or "Ocean of the streams of story". This "largest and 

 most interesting collection" of tales was composed by the Kashmi- 

 rian court poet Somadeva, "one of the most illustrious Indian 

 poets" ', in the eleventh century of our era ^ .but the original 

 collection, its source, entitled the Brhatkatha, is must older, and, 

 according to Prof. Speyer ^, "must have been arranged in that 

 period of Indian history, when Buddhism, exercised its sway over 

 the Hindoo mind side by side with 9aivism and so many other 

 manifold varieties of sectarian and local creeds, rites and theoso- 

 phies". "The main story and a large number of the episodes are 



1 Cf. Speyer, Studies about the Kathasaritsagara, Verhandelingen der Koninldiike 

 Akademie van Wetenschappen te Amsterdam, Afd. Letterkunde, Nieuwe Reeks Deel 

 VIII, n» 5 (1908); p. 2. 



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