1870.] The Vdstu Yaga. 205 



proffered fruit to his nose, than a snake, the takshaka serpent, 

 issued forth from it and stung him. The Raja fell a victim to the 

 virulent venom of the snake. Janmejaya, his son, with a view to 

 avenge the death of his father, instituted a Yajna, entitled sarpa- 

 satra, the snake-sacrifice. The priests with their mantras poured 

 purified ghi into the blazing altar, and snakes from all parts of the 

 world, coming in millions, fell senseless into it, and were soon 

 consumed. The sacrifice went on till Takshaka's turn came, and 

 when the unswerving priest offered his ahuti (oblation of ghi) with a 

 powerful mantra to Agni invoking Takshaka, the great serpent felt 

 deeply the irresistible influence of the sacrificial fire. Yet unwilling 

 to yield to it, and trembling at his approaching doom, he fled to 

 the court of Indra. But the mantras of the sacred munis were even 

 more potent than the lord of the immortals, and Takshaka was 

 wrenched from his hiding-place. He hovered over the blazing- 

 flame, and was about to fall into it, when Astika, the offspring of 

 the intermarriage between an Aryan and a Naga woman, a nephew 

 of Yasuki, the serpent king, interfered. He begged of Janmejaya 

 to put a stop to the sacrifice, and thereby saved the serpent race. 

 Both these stories, however, appear more like poetical versions of 

 border warfare with antagonistic races, than pure myths. 



These stories regarding the Nagas and serpents are obviously 

 mythical, and may be explained away by unravelling the allegories 

 upon which they are based. In none does the true reptile, the snake, 

 make its appearance. Nor is this remarkable, for the authors of 

 Sdstras have carefully separated the Nagas and Sarpas, the ophidian 

 race from true snakes. The Nagas are a class of demigods, some of 

 whom at will assume the forms of men, but generally have the 

 lower extremities of their body ending in a snake's tail, while 

 above the waist they are shaped like gods and men. In some 

 cases, however, their heads are backed by hoods of serpents. But 

 this form of the Naga, though frequently found in sculptured stones, 

 appears to be a later representation. Everywhere in the Puranas, 

 the Nagas speak like men, and have bodies like them. The Sarpas 

 on the other hand are a family of reptiles not at all connected with 

 the Nagas, and are in no Purana found to speak or act like men. 

 Nor are they ever worshipped by the Brahmans, though a later 



