We thus, after a long pilgrimage in the fields of tradition, return to the Vedic bull Indras, from whom we started, and to his female form, which, having a human nature, became a cow, and being a cow, assumed a divine shape:—
"Quæ bos ex homine, ex bove facta Dea."[525]
CHAPTER II.
THE HORSE.
SUMMARY.
The horse, favourite animal of the solar hero.—Attributes of the Vedic solar hero.—Animals which draw the Vedic gods.—The Açvinâu sons of a mare.—The mule, the ass, and the horse in relation to each other.—The hero's horse, prior to being noble and handsome, is vile and ill-favoured; proofs.—The teeth of the horse.—The figs that make tails grow.—The excrement of the horse.—Three colours of the heroic horse.—Pluto's horses abhor the light.—Pêgasos an imperfect horse.—The black horse generally demoniacal.—The hippomanes.—The monster that makes horses perspire and grow lean; the fire in stables.—To dream of black horses.—The horse of the third brother is small, humpbacked, and lame.—The hero transforms himself into a horse.—The grey horse differs from the black one.—The red horse frees the hero.—The three steps, the three races, the three leaps, the three castles, the three days, the three brothers, and the three horses correspond to each other.—Two horsemen change the hero's bad horse into a heroic steed.—The horse's ears; the hero in the horse's ears.—The horse's head blesses the good maiden, and devours the wicked one.—The black horseman, the white horseman, and the red one.—The horse-monster that devastates the field surprised by the hero, and destroyed by fire, in the Ṛigvedas.—The Dioscuri washing the sweat off their horses.—Salt on the horse's back.—The hero-horse covered by the waters.—The Açvinâu and Agnis give a good horse to the hero who has a bad one.—The three steps of Vishṇus are made by the horses of Indras.—Vishṇus as horse.—Indras and the Açvinâu find the bride on horseback.—Râmas as horse.—Dadhyańć and his ambrosial horse's head, which discomfits the hostile monsters.—The bones of the horse.—The exchange of heads.—The two brother horses Pêgasos and Chrüsaor in opposition to one another.—Castor and Pollux.—Discussion upon the nature of the Açvinâu.—The two brothers at discord; Sundas and Upasundas.—Nakulas and Vasudevas.—Râmas and Lakshmaṇas.—The brothers who resemble each other; Bâlin and Sugrîvas; the brother betrays his brother and steals his wife.—Kereçâçpa and Urvâksha.—Piran and Pilsem.—The sky a mountain of stone; heroes, heroines, and horses of stone.—The brother seducer in the Tuti-Name.—Sunlight and moonlight, two brothers.—The minister's son and the king's son.—Horse and cat.—The two brothers on a journey; one becomes a king, the other spits gold; the candle of one of the two brothers lights of its own accord, and he therefore obtains the kingdom; the other brother's treasure.—Digression concerning the interpretation of the myth.—Agamêdês and Trophonios; Piedmontese story of the skilful thief.—The two brothers who resemble each other; mistaken one for the other by the wife of one of them; the brother sleeps with his sister-in-law without touching her; the legend of the pilgrim who comes from Rome; the head fastened on again.—The horse led away out of hell.—The solar horse destined for sacrifice carried off by Kapilas; that is, the solar horse escapes, like the solar bull, from the sacrifice.—The stallion destined for the sacrifice touched, and the horse's fat smelted by Kâuçalyâ as an augury of fruitfulness.—The horse's head as the mouth of hell.—The robber of the horse and of the treasure.—The horns of the stag, the horns or mane of the horse, and the hair of the hero, which catch and fasten themselves to the trees of the forest.—The thief now protects thieves, and now protects men from thieves.—The Miles gloriosus; hero, horse, and tree, united together, discomfit the enemies.—The heroic horse.—The tail of Indras's horse, and the Hindoo war-horse.—The war-horses of Rustem, of Alexander, of Bellerophon, and of Cæsar; the winged horse.—The horse goes through water and fire.—The horse and the apple.—The chains of the heroic horse, and the difficulty of riding him.—The horse that speaks; the horse-spy.—The chariot that speaks.—The solar horse bound that it may not come back again.—The hero who flees in the shape of a horse, and the horse sold with the bridle; transformations of the horse.—The sun without a horse and without a bridle.—The horses of the sun, arrested or wounded, precipitate the solar hero into the waters.—The eternal hunter.—Etaças, Phaethôn, Hippolytos.—The horse that delivers the hero.—The neighing of Indras's horse; the horse of Darius which neighs at the sight of the sun on account of the smell of a mare.—Number of the solar horses.—The hero born of a mare.—The mare's egg.—The hare born of a mare devours the mare.—Spanish mares made pregnant by the wind.—Horses sons of the wind.—The hero Açvatthâman neighs immediately after birth.—The horses that weep; mythical signification of these tears.—Vedic riddle and play of words upon the letter r, and the root varsh relative to the horse.—The foam from the horse's mouth destroys enemies and cures the cough.—The Açvinâu, the Dioscuri, Asklêpios and his two sons as physicians.—Caballus.—Ambrosia from the hoof of the Vedic horse.—Hippokrênê; the horse's hoof in relation with water.—Exchanges between moon and sun and between bull and horse.—Horses sacred to the gods and to saints.—Holy horsemen who help the heroes mercede pacta.
The myth of the horse is perhaps not so rich in legends as that of the bull and the cow, but certainly no less interesting. As the horseman is the finest type of the hero, so the horse which carries him is in mythology the noblest of animals.
We have already observed that the best of the three brothers, the third, the victorious one, the morning sun, is, in tradition, distinguished from the other brothers by his swiftness; and that the morning dawn or aurora, which is the third sister, the good one, the best of the three sisters, is she who wins the race. It is, therefore, natural that the favourite animal of the hero should be his horse. The two Hindoo Dioscuri, that is, the Açvinâu, the two horsemen, derive their name from the açvas or horse, as being the swift one;[526] and they are very probably identical with the two fair-haired, amiable, splendid, and ardent coursers of Indras, of Savitar (the sun), and proper and worthy to bear heroes,[527] who yoke themselves at a word,[528] are maned, adapted to make fruitful, full of life,[529] having eyes like the sun,[530] made by the Ṛibhavas,[531] who, as they made the cow out of a cow, also made a horse out of the horse,[532] black, with white feet, drawing the chariot with the golden yoke, revealing the beings;[533] the two rapid ones; the two most rapid ones;[534] plunging into the inebriating drink before Indras yokes them;[535] beautiful, by means of which the chariot of the Açvinâu is as swift as thought;[536] who carry Indras, as every day they carry the sun;[537] are the two rays of the sun;[538] who neigh, dropping ambrosia;[539] the very pure horses of the bull Indras, inebriated, who illumine the sky,[540] with manes the colour of a peacock,[541] bridled sixty times (properly six times twice five);[542] beneficent, winged, indefatigable, resolute destroyers (of the enemies).[543] The Âitareya Brâhmanam, when giving the characteristics of the race of each god, whilst it tells us that Agnis, at the marriage of Somas and Sûryâ, is drawn by mules, and the aurora by red cows (or bulls), teaches us that Indras is drawn by horses, and the Açvinâu by asses; the Açvinâu carried off the prize.[544] In the Mahâbhâratam,[545] we find another important circumstance, i.e., the Açvinâu represented as sons of a mare, or of Tvashtrî, wife of the sun Savitar, who took the form of a mare. Therefore we have here the sons of the mare, who may be horses or mules, according as the mare united herself with a horse or with an ass. Here, then, we have already an evident proof of the identification of the heroes Açvinâu with the animals, horses or asses, which draw them. The Ṛigvedas does not as yet know the word açvatara, or mule, but in representing the Açvinâu drawn now by horses and now by asses, it shows us the intermediate character of the real animal that draws the Açvinâu, a grey beast, dark-coloured, and white only in its fore parts. Night is the mule that carries the Açvinâu or twilights, in the same way as, in the above-quoted Âitareya, it carries or awakens Agnis, fire or light. In the Iliad,[546] mules are sung of as being better adapted than oxen to draw the plough.