1876.] F. S. Growse — Sri Swarni Sari Das of Brindaban. 315 



sufficiently prominent feature in the English translation, is far greater in 

 the Hindi text, where no indication is given of a change of person and a 

 single form answers indifferently for every tense of a verb and every case of 

 a noun. The Bhakt-Sindhu expands the two stanzas into a poem of 211 

 couplets and supplies a key to all the allusions in the following detailed 

 narrative : 



Brahm-dhir, a Sanadh Brahman of Kol or Jalesar, had a son Gyan- 

 dhir, who entertained a special devotion for Krishna under his form of 

 Giridhari — ' the mountain- supporter' — and thus made frequent pilgrimages 

 to the holy hill of Gobardhan. On one such occasion he took to himself a 

 wife at Mathura, and she in due time bore him a son whom he named 

 As-dhir. The latter eventually married a daughter of Ganga-dhar, a 

 Brahman of Bajpur — a small village adjoining Brindaban — who on the 8th 

 of the dark fortnight of the month of Bhadon in the Sambat year 1441 

 gave birth to Hari Das From his earliest childhood he gave indications 

 of his future sanctity, and instead of joining in play with other children was 

 always engaged in prayer and religious meditation. In spite of his parents 5 

 entreaties he made a vow of celibacy, and at the age of 25 retired to a 

 solitary hermitage by the Man Sarovar, a natural lake on the left bank of 

 the Jamuna, opposite Brindaban. He afterwards removed to the Nidh-ban 

 in that town, and there formally received his first disciple, Bithal-Bipul, who 

 was his own maternal uncle. His fame soon spread far and wide, and among 

 his many visitors was one day a Khattri from Delhi, by name Dayal Das, who 

 had by accident discovered the philosopher's stone, which transmuted into 

 gold everything with which it was brought in contact. This he presented 

 as a great treasure to the Swami, who however tossed it away into the 

 Jamuna j but then seeing the giver's vexation, he took him to the margin 

 of the stream, and bade him take up a handful of sand out of the water. 

 When he had done so, each single grain seemed to be a facsimile of the stone 

 that had been thrown away and when tested was found to possess precisely 

 the same virtue. Thus the Khattri was made to understand that the saints 

 stand in no need of earthly riches, but are complete in themselves ; and he 

 forthwith joined the number of Hari Das's disciples. 



Some thieves however hearing that the sage had been presented with 

 the philosopher's stone, One day when he was bathing, took the opportunity 

 of stealing his sdlagrdm, which they thought might be it. On discovering 

 it to be useless for their purpose, they threw it away under a bush, and as 

 the saint in his search for it happened to pass by the spot, the stone itself 

 found voice to tell him where it lay. From that time forth he received 

 every morning by miraculous agency a gold muhr, out of which he was to 

 provide the temple-offerings (bhog) and to spend whatever remained over 

 in the purchase of grain wherewith to feed the fish in the Jamuna and the 

 peacocks and monkeys on its banks. 



