भगवद्यान पर्व — गालव की कथा

Narada said The king (Yayati) too, being desirous of giving her (Madhvi) a husband by Svayamvara, went to the hermitage at the confluence of the Ganga and Yamuna,

Making, Madhvi seated on a chariot with garlands and flowers on her person; Puru and Yadu too followed their sister to the hermitage.

There, in that hermitage, came together Nagas, Yakshas, and human beings, Gandharvas, animals and birds and dwellers of mountains, woods and forests.

There was also a concourse of the kings of many countries and the forest, that surrounded the hermitage, was filled with Rishis equal (in asceticism) to Brahma himself.

The lady, of good complexion, being directed to choose a husband, passed over all these husbands and selected the forest as her husband.

Getting down from the chariot, the damsel saluted her friends and having gone to the sacred forest, the lady born of Yayati, practiced austerities,

By observing fasts and different sorts of religions rites, as also ceremonies. She reduced her body and adopted the life of a deer.

Subsisting on sweet and green grass resembling the blades of the Vaidurya gem and which were both sweet and bitter,

And drinking the best of holy waters of sacred fountains which was sweet, pure and cool,

And roaming in thick forests from which the kings of animals (lions) and tigers had been exiled and in deserts which had no conflagration in them,

In company with deer and adopting their mode of life she earned much religious merit, by practicing Brahmacharya.

Yayati, too following the mode of life of the kings before him, lived for a thousand years and then paid the debt of nature.

The two best among men Puru and Yadu perpetuating the family were established (as king) in this world and the son of Nahusha in the next.

O monarch, dwelling in heaven Yayati, resembling a great Rishi, enjoyed the choicest blessings of heaven.

After many thousands of years had elapsed in great happiness and while seated among royal Rishis of great luster and renown.

Yayati, with his senses stupefied and his intellect beside himself, insulted all the human beings and the gods and the body of Rishis.

Then did the god Shakra, the slayer of Vala, perceived his folly and all those royal Rishis said-fie, fie.

And seeing the son of Nahusha, enquiries were made, who is he, what king's son is he, and how did he come to heaven?

By which deeds did he obtain salvation? In what forest did he practice asceticism? How is he known in heaven and by whom, is he so known?

The dwellers of heaven made such enquiries about the king among themselves pointing to Yayati, the ruler of men.

The hundreds of the charioteers of heaven and hundreds of the fate keepers of heaven and the persons who had the seats of heaven in their charge being asked about the matter, saidwe do not know.

None of them was then in proper senses and did know that ruler of men, and speedily was that ruler of men shorn of his heavenly effulgence.