Jaiminīya (Talavakāra) Brāhmaṇa 2.284

whoever speaks against him incurs misfortune. Then Ūrj Jānāyana asked Kapivana Bhauvāyana: 'Since the morning pressing is Gāyatrī, the midday pressing Triṣṭubh, and the third pressing Jagatī, what then is this unexhausted Anuṣṭubh that flies toward the beginnings of the pressings and carries the sacrifice to its end?' He said: 'Speech indeed is the Anuṣṭubh; through speech the sacrifice is extended. Just as, yonder, they run repeatedly with a fine bull harnessed with a rope, either for an uphill slope or to carry a heavy load, so indeed they harness this speech, the Anuṣṭubh, for the course at the beginnings of the pressings. For the beginnings of the pressings are, as it were, uphill slopes. This speech itself, unexhausted, carries the sacrifice to its end. He who knows the Anuṣṭubh as reaching into everything, to him there is a share in merit everywhere. The Gāyatrī has eight syllables, the Triṣṭubh eleven syllables, the Jagatī twelve syllables; "vāc" is the finale of the Yajñāyajñīya. That makes thirty-two; thirty-two syllables has the Anuṣṭubh. Indeed, there is a share of this [Anuṣṭubh] in the morning pressing, in the midday pressing, and in the third pressing; there is a share of this [Anuṣṭubh] in the priesthood, in the nobility, and in the common folk; there is a share of this [Anuṣṭubh] in this world, in the intermediate space, and in that world. He who thus knows this Anuṣṭubh as reaching into everything, to him there is indeed a share in merit everywhere.'

Then Keśin Dārbhya excluded Ahīnas Āśvatthi from the domestic priesthood

of Keśin Sātyakāmi.

Ahīnas was older; Keśin was younger.

He said to him: 'Keśin, knowing what of mine did you take away the nobleman?'

He said: 'Burn! We worship the Anuṣṭubh alone as all the meters, as the Bṛhatī, as cattle, as the sacrifice, as the heavenly

world.'

A tear came to him [Ahīnas].

He grieved.

[Keśin] said to him: 'Do not grieve.

If you grieve out of desire for a nobleman, here is your nobleman.

We shall seek another nobleman.'

He said: 'It is not this, O Keśin, out of desire for a noble; rather, it was through [my] studenthood that I—'

Recalling that, he wept.

Indeed he lived as a student.

'We have heard this only until old age, which this young boy makes known,' [they thought].

Just so, recalling this, he wept.

As for his stating that the anuṣṭubh is all the meters: the gāyatrī has eight syllables, the triṣṭubh eleven syllables,