Page:The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa (1884).djvu/504

which was unto them as nectar. Then Kunti accompanied by the Brahmana went unto the son of Vayu (Bhima) and asked him to accomplish (that difficult task). Bhima replied unto them, saying, 'So be it."

Thus ends the hundred and sixty-third Section in the Vaka-badha of the Adi Parva.

Vaisampayana said, "After Bhima had pledged himself to accomplish the task, saying 'I will do it,' the Pandavas, O Bharata, returned home with the alms they had obtained during the day. Then Yudhish-thira the son of Pandu, from Bhima's countenance alone, suspected the nature of the task he had undertaken to accomplish. Sitting by the side of his mother, Yudhish-thira asked her in private, 'What is this task, O mother, that Bhima of terrible prowess seeketh to accomplish? Doth he do so at thy command or at his own will?' Kunti replied, 'Bhima the oppressor of all foes will, at my command, do this great deed for the good of the Brahmana and the liberation of this town.'

"Yudhish-thira said, 'What rash act hast thou done, O mother! It is difficult of being performed and almost amounteth to suicide! The learned never applaud one's abandonment of one's own child. Why dost thou, O mother, wish to sacrifice thy own child for the sake of another's? Thou hast, O mother, by this abandonment of thy child, acted not only against the course of human practices but also against the teachings of the Vedas! That Bhima relying on whose arms we sleep happily in the night and hope to recover the kingdom of which we have been deprived by the covetuous son of Dhrita-rashtra, that hero of immeasurable energy remembering whose prowess Duryodhana and Sakuni do not sleep a wink during the whole night and by whose prowess we were rescued from the palace of lac and various other dangers, that Bhima who caused the death of Purochana, and relying on whose might we regard ourselves as having already slain the sons of