^274:3 This is Sankara's explanation, in which bana is taken to mean the same as sarira, body. But there seems to be no authority for such a meaning, and Anandagiri tries in vain to find an etymological excuse for it. Bana or Vana generally means an arrow, or, particularly in Brahmana writings, a harp with many strings. I do not see how an arrow could be used as an appropriate simile here, but a harp might, if we take avashtabhya in the sense of holding the frame of the instrument, and vidharayamah in the sense of stretching and thereby modulating it.

^274:4 On this dispute of the organs of sense, see Brih. Up. VI, 1, p. 201; Khand. Up. V, 1 (S. B. E., vol. i, p. 72).

^275:1 In Sanskrit it is madhukararaga, king of the bees.

^275:2 When a sraddha is offered to the Pitris.

^275:3 Explained as the eye and the other organs of sense which the chief Prana supports; but it is probably an old verse, here applied to a special purpose.

^275:4 Another reading is pranate, they breathe.

^276:1 A person for whom the samskaras, the sacramental and initiatory rites, have not been performed. Sankara says that, as he was the first born, there was no one to perform them for him, and that he is called Vratya, because he was pure by nature. This is all very doubtful.

^276:2 Agni is said to be the Rishi of the Atharvanas.

^276:3 Instead of the irregular vocative Matarisva, there is another reading, Matarisvanah, i.e. thou art the father of Matarisvan, the wind, and therefore of the whole world.