And one day the goddess was much troubled by the advent of spring, and she was sitting surrounded by the Gaṇas at the foot of a tree, thinking about her beloved, when a noble Gaṇa, named Maṇipushpeśvara, looked lovingly at a young maiden, the daughter of Jayá, called Chandralekhá, who was waving a chowrie over the goddess. He was a match for her in youth and beauty, and she met his glance with a responsive look of love, as he stood by her side. Two other Gaṇas, named Pingeśvara and Guheśvara, when they saw that, interchanged glances, and a smile passed over their faces. And when the goddess saw them smiling, she was angry in her heart, and she cast her eyes hither and thither, to see what they were laughing at in this unseemly manner. And then she saw that Chandralekhá and Maṇipushpeśvara were looking lovingly in one another’s faces.
Then the goddess, who was quite distracted with the sorrow of separation, was angry, and said, “These young people have done well to look lovingly[10] at one another in the absence of the god, and these two mirthful people have done well to laugh when they saw their glances: so let this lover and maiden, who are blinded with passion, fall into a human birth; and there the disrespectful pair shall be man and wife; but these unseasonable laughers shall endure many miseries on the earth; they shall be first poor Bráhmans, and then[11] Bráhman-Rákshasas, and then Piśáchas, and after that Chaṇḍálas, and then robbers, and then bob-tailed dogs, and then they shall be various kinds of birds,—shall these Gaṇas who offended by laughing; for their minds were unclouded, when they were guilty of this disrespectful conduct.
When the goddess had uttered this command, a Gaṇa of the name of Dhúrjaṭa said, “Goddess, this is very unjust; these excellent Gaṇas do not deserve so severe a curse, for a very small offence.” When the goddess heard that, she said in her wrath to Dhúrjaṭa also, “Fall thou also, great sir, that knowest not thy place, into a mortal womb.” When the goddess had inflicted these tremendous curses, the female warder Jayá, the mother of Chandralekhá, clung to her feet, and addressed this petition to her, “Withdraw thy anger, goddess; appoint an end to the curse of this daughter of mine, and of these thy own servants, that have through ignorance committed sin.” When Párvatí had been thus entreated by her warder Jayá, she said, “When all these, owing to their having obtained insight, shall in course of time meet together, they shall, after visiting Śiva the lord of magic powers, in the place[12] where Brahmá and the other gods performed asceticism, return to our court, having been freed from their curse. And this Chandralekhá, and her beloved, and that Dhúrjaṭa shall, all three of them, be happy in their life as mortals, but these two shall be miserable.”
When the goddess had said this, she ceased; and at that very moment the Asura Andhaka came there, having heard of the absence of Śiva. The presumptuous Asura hoped to win the goddess, but having been reproached by her attendants he departed, but he was slain on that account by the god, who discovered the reason of his coming, and pursued him.[13] Then Śiva returned home having accomplished his object, and Párvatí delighted told him of the coming of Andhaka, and the god said to her, “I have to-day slain a former mind-born son of thine, named Andhaka, and he shall now be a Bhṛingin here, as nothing remains of him but skin and bone.” When Śiva had said this, he remained there diverting himself with the goddess, and Maṇipushpeśvara and the other five descended to earth.
“Now, king, hear the long and strange story of these two, Pingeśvara and Guheśvara.”
Story of the metamorphoses of Pingeśvara and Guheśvara.
There is on the earth a royal grant to Bráhmans, named Yajnasthala. In it there lived a rich[14] and virtuous Bráhman named Yajnasoma. In his middle age he had two sons born to him; the name of the elder was Harisoma and of the younger Devasoma. They passed through the age of childhood, and were invested with the sacred thread, and then the Bráhman their father lost his wealth, and he and his wife died.
Then those two wretched sons, bereaved of their father, and without subsistence, having had their grant taken from them by their relations, said to one another, “We are now reduced to living on alms, but we get no alms here. So we had better go to the house of our maternal grandfather, though it is far off. Though we have come down in the world, who on earth would welcome us, if we arrive of our own accord. Nevertheless let us go. What else indeed are we to do, for we have no other resource?”
After deliberating to this effect they went, begging their way, by slow stages, to that royal grant, where the house of their grandfather was. There the unfortunate young men found out, by questioning people, that their grandfather, whose name was Somadeva, was dead, and his wife also.