52 HISTORY OF CASHMIR. 



there are no limits to the advance of the ambitious, as there is no return of 

 the water, which the rivers, running into foreign countries, bear far away 

 from its native springs. In consequence of this expectation, he directed the 

 ministers to crown his son, Cuvalayaditya, with which order they sor- 

 rowfully complied. The king's anticipations were realized : neither he nor his 

 army ever returned, and their fate was never exactly known. Some reports 

 say, that he was slain in battle; others that he and his host were overwhelm- 

 ed and lost in a heavy fail of snow in Arydriacq. Some persons believe 

 that he burnt himself, whilst others credit the tales that carry him to the 

 farthest north, to those climes that are easily accessible to the immortals on- 

 ly, and speak of the wonders there seen and performed by him, and the fi- 

 nal destruction of him and his troops. Lalitaditya reigned 36 years and 

 eight months : he was a popular prince, and much beloved by those about 

 his person: his chief ministers were all deeply afflicted by his loss, and one 

 of them, Mitea Serma, disdaining to survive his master, drowned himself 

 at the confluence of the Sindhu and Vitasta. 



A D Cuvala yapira,* the son of Lalitaditya by Camaladevi, succeeded to 



his father ; in the first days of his reign, apprehending the rebellion of his 

 brother, a prince of a more active and violent temper, he put him and his 

 mother Ckacramerdicd into confinement : thus relieved from the fear of do- 

 mestic disturbances he began to contemplate foreign acquisitions, when he 

 was diverted from his purpose by a change in the tenor of his reflections: 

 having been thrown into a paroxysm of fury by an act of unimportant dis- 

 obedience, in one of his ministers, he reflected, when he became calm, upon 

 the folly of yielding to the impulses of passion : his meditations extended 

 farther, and convincing him of the futility of human power, and the short- 

 ness of human existence, he determined to exchange his kingly throne for 

 the cell of an ascetic. Having adopted this determination, he withdrew to 

 the mountain Dricpafha, leaving, after a short reign of little more than a 

 year, the crown to his brother Vajraditya.| 



* Kmlyanund.— Alulfazl, f Bijradut.— Ibid. 



751 



