607:5 The term is Eraká, which is explained in some medical lexicons, 'a kind of grass.' The commentator also calls it a kind of grass: and in the text of the Mahábhárata the term subsequently used, and as synonymous with it, is Trińa, 'grass.' The Mahábhárata, when describing the affray which follows, mentions that the grass or rushes, on being plucked by Krishńa and the Yádavas, turn to clubs. The text, and that of the Bhágavata, here say, that the powdered particles, floating on the sea, became rushes; or the latter may imply, that they fastened upon grass or weeds. The commentator, however, explains that the particles of iron being borne to land, they were so transformed. The Mahábhárata says nothing of the piece which could not be pounded, and this seems to be an embellishment either of our text or the Bhágavata. The Mahábhárata, however, adds another precaution, which the two others have left unnoticed. Ugrasena causes a proclamation to be made, that none of the inhabitants of Dwáraká shall thenceforth drink wine, on pain of being impaled alive: and the people for some time observe the prohibition.

608:6 Nothing of this kind occurs in the Mahábhárata: our text therefore offers an embellishment. The Bhágavata, again, improves upon the text; for, not content with a messenger, it makes Brahmá with the Prajápatis, Śiva with the Bhútas, Indra with the other divinities, all come in person; indicating evidently a later date, as plainly as the addition of the text shews it to be subsequent to the date of the legend in the Mahábhárata.

608:7 The Mahábhárata, which delights in describing portents and signs, does not fail to detail them here. A dreadful figure, death personified, haunts every house, coming and going no one knows how, and being invulnerable to the weapons by which he is assailed. Strong hurricanes blow; large rats multiply, and infest the roads and houses, and attack persons in their sleep; Sárikás, or starlings, utter inauspicious screams in their cages; storks imitate the hooting of owls, and goats the howling of jackals; cows bring forth foals, and camels mules; food, in the moment of being eaten, is filled with worms; fire burns with discoloured flames; and at sunset and sunrise the air is traversed by headless and hideous spirits. There is more to the same effect, which neither our text nor the Bhágavata has ventured to detail. The whole passage has been published in Maurice's Ancient History of Hindustan, II. 463; translated apparently p. 609 by the late Sir Charles Wilkins. The names have been much disfigured either by the copyist or compositor.