27. Know the all quiescent, and the unborn One, who is without beginning, middle and end; who is self manifest and felicity itself; and who is inconceivable and beyond all assignable property or quality. He is all quiescent, and all verbal and ocular indications of him are entirely false. Yet for the sake of our comprehension, he is represented as the Holy one, _on_ or om. CHAPTER LVIII. LEGEND OF SURAGHU; AND ADMONITION OF MÁNDAVYA. Argument. Self-dejectedness of Suraghu; and Mándavya’s Admonitions to him. Vasishtha said:—Hear me relate to you Ráma, an old legend, in illustration of this subject; and it is the account of the Kiráta Chief Suraghu, which is marvelous in its nature. 2. There is a tract of land in the regions on the north, which was hoary as a heap of camphor with its snowfalls, and which seemed to smile as the clear night, under the moon-beams of the bright fortnight. 3. It was situated on the summit of Himálaya, and called the peak of Kailása; it was free from mountainous elephants, and was the chief of all other peaks (owing to its being the seat of Siva). 4. It was as milk-white, as the bed of Vishnu in the milky ocean, and as bright as the empyrean of Indra in heaven; it was as fair as the seat of Brahmá, in the pericarp of the lotus; and as snow-white as the snowy peak of Kedára, the favourite seat of Siva. 5. It was owing to the waving of the Rudráksha trees over it, and the parade of the Apsara fairies about it, as also by the pencils of rays of its various gems, that it appeared as the undulating sea (of milk or curd). 6. The playful Pramathas, and other classes of demigods (ganadevatás) frolicked here as gaily as blossoms of Asoka plants, when tossed about by the feet of their wanton damsels. (It is said that the Asoka jonesia flowers blossom, better, when they are kicked by and trodden under the feet of females). See Sir W. Jones’ Indian plants. 7. Here the god Siva wanders about, and sees the water falls proceeding from and receding into the caves of the mountain, by dilution of the moon-stones contained in them (the thick ice and snows here, are taken for moon-stones). 8. There was a spot of ground here enclosed by trees, and by plants and creepers and shrubs of various kinds; and which is intersected by lakes, hills and rivers, and interspersed by herds of deer and does of various species. 9. There dwelt a race of the Kirátas called Himajátas at this spot, who were as numerous as the ants living at the foot by a big banian tree. 10. They lived like owls in the shades and hollows of the trees, and subsisted upon the fruits and flowers and herbage of the nearest forests, and by felling and selling the Rudráksha woods of the Kailása mountain. 11. They had a chief among them, who was as nobleminded, as he was brave to baffle his enemies; he was as the arm of the goddess of victory, and stretched it for the protection of his people.