CHAPTER VI.

The Miseries of Birth of the Sinful.

1. Garuda said:--Tell me, O Kes'ava, how he who returns from hells is formed in the womb of the mother, and what miseries he suffers in the embryonic condition.

2. Visnu said: I will tell you how the mortal is born when the male and female elements are bound together by the union of man and woman.

3. In the middle of the menstruation period, in the three days on which Indra incurs the sin of Bramicide, the body of the sinful begins to form.

4. The mother of one returning from hell is regarded on the first day as an outcaste woman, on the second as the murderer of a Brahmin, and on the third as a washerwoman.

5. The creature, in obtaining a body, according to karma, the divine eye, enters the womb of a woman, which is the receptacle of a man's seed.

6. In one night it becomes a lump; by the fifth night round; by the tenth day like the fruit of the jujube tree, and after that an egg of flesh.

7-8. By the first month the head, by the second the arms and other parts of the body are formed; by the third occurs the formation of nails, hair, bones, skin, linga and other cavities;

By the fourth the seven bodily fluids; by the fifth hunger and thirst arise; by the sixth, enveloped by the chorion, it moves to the left of the womb.

9. The bodily substances are formed of the foods and liquids of the mother, and the creature at the time of birth lies in the disgusting hollow of the loins, amid foeces and urine.

10. All its limbs bitten constantly by hungry worms, it swoons away repeatedly through excessive pain, as they are very tender.

11. Thus enveloped by the womb and bound outside by the sinews, it feels pain all over its body, caused by the mother's eating many things--pungent, bitter, hot, salt, sour and acid.

12. With its head placed in its belly and its back and neck curved, it is unable to move its limbs,--like a parrot in a cage.

13. There he remembers, by divine power, the Karma generated in hundreds of previous births,--and remembering, sobs for a long time, obtaining not the least happiness.

14. Having this insight he, with hands put together, bound in seven bonds, imploring and trembling, adores in plaintive tones Him who placed him in the womb.

15. From the beginning of the seventh month, though he gains consciousness, he who is in the womb trembles and moves about because of the parturition winds, like a uterine worm.

16-23. The creature says, "I seek refuge in Visnu; the husband of S'ri, the supporter of the universe, the destroyer of evil, who is compassionate to those who come for shelter.

"I am bewildered by Thy magic, as regards body and son and wife; misled by my egoism I am transmigrating, O Lord.