Once upon a time what is now Benares was a city called Sudassana and in it dwelt king Brahmadatta. His chief consort gave birth to the °° Bodhisatta. His face was glorious as the full moon, and therefore he was named Somakumāra. When he arrived at years of discretion, owing to his fondness for Soma juice and his habit of pouring libations of it, men knew him as Sutasoma (Soma-distiller). When he was of age, he was instructed in the liberal arts at Takkasilā, and on his return home be was presented with a white umbrella by his father and ruled his kingdom righteously and owned a vast dominion, and he had sixteen thousand wives with Candadevī as chief consort. By and bye when he was blest with a numerous family, he grew discontented with domestic life and retired into a forest, desiring to embrace the ascetic rule. One day he summoned his barber and thus addressed him, "When you see a grey hair on my head, you are to tell me." The barber agreed to do so and by and bye he espied a grey hair and told him of it. The king said, "Then, sir barber, pull it out and place it in my hand." The barber plucked it out with a pair of golden tweezers and laid it in his hand. The Great Being, when he saw it, exclaimed, "My body is a prey to old age," and in a fright he took the grey hair and descending from the terrace [178] he seated himself on a throne placed in the sight of the people. Then he summoned eighty thousand councillors headed by his general and sixty thousand brahmins headed by his chaplain and many others of his subjects and citizens and said to them, "A grey hair has appeared on my head; I am an old man, and you are to know that I am become an ascetic," and he repeated the first stanza:

On hearing this each one of them in a fit of dejection repeated this stanza:

Then the Great Being spoke the third stanza:

His counsellors, being unable to answer the king, went to his mother and told her about it. She came in hot haste [179] and asking him, "Is this true what they say, dear son, that you long to be an ascetic?" she repeated two stanzas: °°

While his mother thus lamented, the Bodhisatta uttered not a word. She remained apart all by herself, weeping. Then they told his father. And he came and repeated a single stanza:

On hearing this the Great Being held his peace. Then his father said, "My dear Sutasoma, even though you have no affection for your parents, you have many young sons and daughters. They will not be able to live without you. At the very moment when they are grown up, will you become an ascetic?" and he repeated the seventh stanza:

Hearing this the Great Being repeated a stanza:

Thus did the Great Being declare the Law to his father. And when he heard his exposition of the Law, he held his peace. Then they told his seven hundred wives. And they, descending from the palace tower, came into his presence, and embracing his feet they made lamentation and repeated this stanza:

The Great Being, on hearing their lamentation as they threw themselves at his feet and cried aloud, repeated yet another stanza:

Then they told his queen consort, and she being heavy with child, though her time was well nigh come, approached the Great Being and saluting him stood respectfully on one side and repeated three stanzas: °°

Then the Great Being repeated a stanza:

On hearing his words she was no longer able to control her grief, and holding her heart with both her hands, said, "Henceforth, my lord, our glory is no more." Then wiping away her tears she loudly lamented. The Great Being to console her repeated a stanza:

Being unable to bear his words she mounted the palace tower and sat there weeping. Then the Bodhisatta's elder son seeing it said, "Why does my mother sit here weeping?" and he repeated this stanza in the form of a question:

Then the queen uttered this stanza:

Hearing her words he said, "Dear mother, what is this that you say? If this be so, we shall be helpless," and making lamentation he spoke this stanza:

Then his younger brother who was seven years old, when he saw them both weeping, drew nigh to his mother and said, "My dear ones, why do ye weep?" and hearing the cause he said, "Well, cease to weep; °° I will not allow him to become an ascetic," and he comforted them both, and with his nurse, coming down from the palace tower, he went to his father and said, "Dear father, they tell me you are leaving us against our will and say you will be an ascetic; I will not allow you to become an ascetic," and clasping his father firmly by the neck he uttered this stanza:

The Great Being thought, "This child is a source of danger to me; by what means am I to get rid of him?" then looking at his nurse he said, "Good nurse, behold this jewel ornament: this is yours: [184] only take away the child, that he be not a hindrance to me," and being unable by himself to get rid of the child who held him by the hand, he promised her a bribe and repeated this stanza:

She took the bribe and comforting the child she went with him to another place, and thus lamenting repeated this stanza:

Then his commander-in-chief thought, "This king, methinks, has come to the conclusion that he has but little treasure in his house; I will let him know he has a great quantity," so standing up he saluted him and repeated this stanza:

Hearing this, the Great Being repeated this stanza:

[185] When he had departed on hearing this, a rich merchant named Kulavaddhana stood up and saluting the king repeated this stanza:

°°

On hearing this the Great Being repeated a stanza:

As soon as Kulavaddhana had heard this and was gone, he thus addressed his younger brother Somadatta, "Dear brother, I am as discontented as a wild cock in a cage, my dislike to household life gets the better of me; this very day will I become a hermit; do you undertake to rule this kingdom," and handing it over to him he repeated this stanza:

On hearing these words Somadatta too longed to be a hermit and to make this clear he repeated another stanza:

Then in refusing this Sutasoma repeated a half-stanza:

[186] On hearing this the people threw themselves down at the feet of the Great Being and, lamenting, said

Then the Great Being said, "Well, grieve not: though I have been long with you, I shall now have to part from you; there is no permanence in any existing thing," and teaching the Law to the people, he said,

°° [187] Thus did the Great Being instruct the people in the Law, and climbing to the top of the Palace of Flowers he stood on the seventh storey, and with a sword he cut off his top-knot and cried, "I am now nothing to you; choose ye a king of your own," and with these words he threw his top-knot, turban and all, into the midst of the people. The people seized hold of it, and as they rolled over and over on the ground they loudly lamented, and a cloud of dust rose at this spot to a great height, and the people stepping back stood and looked at it, and said, "The king must have cut off his top-knot and thrown it, turban and all, into the midst of the crowd, and therefore it is that a cloud of dust has risen near the palace," and lamenting they uttered this stanza:

But the Great Being sent an attendant and had all the requisites for an ascetic brought to him, and had a barber to remove his hair and beard, and throwing his magnificent robe on a couch he cut off strips of dyed cloth, and putting on these yellow patches he fastened an earthen bowl on the top of his left shoulder and with a mendicant staff in his hand he paced backwards and forwards on the topmost storey, and then descending from the palace tower he stepped out into the street, but no one recognised him as he went. Then his seven hundred royal wives ascending the tower and not finding him, but seeing only the bundle of his adornments, came down and told the other sixteen thousand women, saying, "Mighty Sutasoma, your dear lord, has become an ascetic," and loudly lamenting they went out. At this moment [188] the people learned that he had become an ascetic, and the whole city was greatly stirred, and the people said, "They tell us, our king has become a monk," and they assembled at the palace door, and crying, "The king must be here or there," they ran to all the places frequented by him, and not finding the king they wandered to and fro, uttering their lament in these stanzas:

°°

[190] Thus did the people utter lamentation in these various places, and then returning to the palace yard they repeated this stanza:

Then they went forth leaving all their household gear, and taking their children by the hand they repaired to the Bodhisatta, and with them went their parents and young children and sixteen thousand dancing girls. The whole city had the appearance of a deserted place, and behind them followed the country folk. The Bodhisatta with a company covering twelve leagues set out in the direction of the Himalayas. Then Sakka, taking note of his Renunciation of the World, addressing Vissakamma said, "Friend Vissakamma, king Sutasoma is retiring from the world. [191] He ought to have a place to dwell in: there will be a huge gathering of them." And he sent him, saying, "Go and have a hermitage erected, thirty leagues long and five leagues broad, on the banks of the Ganges in the Himalayan country." He did so, and, providing in this hermitage all that was requisite for the ascetic life, he made a foot-path straight to it and then returned to the angel-world. The Great Being entered the hermitage by this path, and, after he himself was first of all ordained, he admitted the rest to orders, and by and bye a great number was ordained, insomuch that a space of thirty leagues was filled with them Now how the hermitage was built by Vissakamma, and how a great number took orders and how the Bodhisatta's hermitage was arranged —all this is to be understood in the way related in the Hatthipāla [67] Birth. In this case if a thought of desire or any other false thought sprang up in the mind of any one whatsoever, the Great Being approached him through the air, and sitting cross-legged in space he by way of admonition addressed him in a couple of stanzas:

°° [192] And this company of saints abiding by his admonition became destined to the Brahma world, and the story is to be told exactly as it is in the Hatthipāla Birth.