His prayers are irresistible; but Brahma forewarns him, that the unbroken descent of Ganga from heaven would be so overpowering, that the earth would be unable to sustain it, and Siva must be propitiated, in order that he may receive on his head the precipitous cataract. Under this wild and unwieldy allegory appears to lurk an obscure allusion to the course of the Ganges among the summits, and under the forests of the Himalaya, which are the locks of Siva.
'High on the top of Himavān the mighty Mashawara stood;
And "Descend," he gave the word to the heaven-meandering water—
Full of wrath, the mandate heard Himavān's majestic daughter.
To a giant's stature soaring and intolerable speed,
From heaven's height down rush'd she pouring upon Siva's sacred head.
Him the goddess thought in scorn with her resistless might to sweep
By her fierce waves o'erborne, down to hell's remotest deep.'
Siva, in his turn enraged, resists her fury.
'Down on Sankara's holy head, down the holy fell, and there
Amid the entangling meshes spread, of his loose and flowing hair.
Vast and boundless as the woods upon the Himalaya's brow,
Nor ever may the struggling floods rush headlong to the earth below.
Opening, egress was not there, amid those winding, long meanders.
Within that labyrinthine hair, for many an age the goddess wanders.'
The king again has recourse to his penances, Siva is propitiated, and the stream by seven[159] channels finds its way to the plains of India. The spirit and the luxuriance of the description which follows, of the king leading the way, and the obedient waters rolling after his car, appear to us of a high order of poetry.
'Up the raja at the sign upon his glittering chariot leaps,
Instant Ganga the divine follows his majestic steps,
From the high heaven burst she forth first on Siva's lofty crown,
Headlong then and prone to earth thundering rushed the cataract down.
Swarms of bright-hued fish came dashing; turtles, dolphins in their mirth,
Fallen or falling, glancing, flashing, to the many gleaming earth.
And all the host of heaven came down, spirits and genii, in amaze,
And each forsook his heavenly throne, upon that glorious scene to gaze.
On cars, like high tower'd cities, seen, with elephants and coursers, rode,
Or on soft swinging palanquin, lay wondering each observant god.
As met in bright divan each god, and flash'd their jewell'd vestures' rays,
The coruscating æther glow'd, as with a hundred suns ablaze.
And with the fish and dolphins gleaming, and scaly crocodiles and snakes,
Glanc'd the air, as when fast streaming the blue lightning shoots and breaks:
And in ten thousand sparkles bright went flashing up the cloudy spray,
The snowy flocking swans less white, within its glittering mists at play.
And headlong now poured down the flood, and now in silver circlets wound,
Then lakelike spread all bright and broad, then gently, gently flowed around,
Then 'neath the cavern'd earth descending, then spouted up the boiling tide,
Then stream with stream harmonious blending, swell bubbling up or smooth subside.
By that heaven-welling water's breast, the genii and the sages stood,
Its sanctifying dews they blest, and plung'd within the lustral flood.
Whoe'er beneath the curse of heaven from that immaculate world had fled,
To th' impure earth in exile driven, to that all-holy baptism sped;
And purified from every sin, to the bright spirit's bliss restor'd,
Th' etherial sphere they entered in, and through th' empyreal mansions soar'd.
The world in solemn jubilee behold these heavenly waves draw near,
From sin and dark pollution free, bathed in the blameless waters clear.
Swift king Bhagiratha drave upon his lofty glittering car,
And swift with her obeisant wave bright Ganga followed him afar.'
[159] Schlegel supposes the three western streams to be the Indus, which appears under its real name the Sind, the Iaxartes, and the Oxus; are not the Sareswatie, or perhaps the Sutlej, under the name of Sita, and the Jumna meant? Of the eastern branches, it is not difficult to fix the Burhampooter. Schlegel suggests the Irawaddy, and the Blue River of China. Why not the Alacananda and the Gogra? The main stream bears the name of the Bhaghiratha, till it joins the Alacananda and takes the name of the Ganges.