His admiration of this marvellous faculty so engrossed his thought, that the duties of his state and the pleasures of his palace, were equally neglected.
But after awhile his minister returned, having subdued the king’s enemies in the hills, and is amazed and disgusted to find his king in close conference with a naked mendicant, instead of occupying himself as formerly with his appointed duties.
He quickly ascertains the pretensions of the ascetic, and asked the king if what he had heard of the mendicant’s celestial visit was true.
The king assured him that it was, and the ascetic offered to satisfy the general’s apparent scepticism, by departing for Swarga in his presence.
With this intent the king and his courtiers accompanied the Sramanaka to his cell, which he entered, and closed the door.
After some delay, the general asked the king when they would see him again. The king answered, ‘Have patience, on these occasions the sage quits his earthly body and assumes an ethereal form in which alone he can enter Indra’s heaven.’
‘If this be the case,’ said the general, ‘let us burn his cell, and thus prevent his reassuming his earthly body; your majesty will then have constantly an angelic person in your presence.’
To reconcile the king to this mode of proceeding the general tells him a story which has reference to the serpent, or Nâga tribes of ancient India.
‘A Brahman named Devasarman had no child, which denial made his wife miserable. At length, however, owing to some mystic words, a son is promised, but what was the surprise of the mother, and the horror of the attendants, when the child so eagerly desired proved to be a snake.
‘The assistants wished to destroy the monster, but maternal affection prevailed, and the snake was reared with all possible care and affection.