Puranic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Puranic Literature c7.526

c7.526

When the disciples found that the King was not in favour of the work, they took it back to Guṇāḍhya. Guṇāḍhya felt a great dejection. He went to a hillock nearby with his disciples and made a big fire-pit. He set aside the story of the Vidyādhara named Naravāhanadatta composed of a lakh of granthas for the use of his disciples and then started putting into the fire-pit the rest, reading aloud each leaf before he put it into the fire. The sad disciples watched it weeping. Even the wild animals of the forest flocked to the place and stood there listening to Guṇāḍhya. At that time Sātavāhana became a sick man. The physicians of the palace said that the illness was caused by the dry flesh the he was taking. The cook was called in and he accused the hunters who supplied them with flesh daily. The hunters were questioned and they informed the King that only such flesh was available since all the beasts and birds were standing without food listening to a man who was reading something from a leaf and then burning it in a fire-pit before him. Sātavāhana immediately went to the place guided by the hunters. There to his astonishment he found Guṇāḍhya sitting before a fire-pit surrounded by weeping beasts and birds and throwing leaves of his book one by one into the fire after reading each before it was put into the fire. Sātavāhana ran to him and prostrated before him. Guṇāḍhya then told Sātavāhana his story in satanic language beginning from the curse on Puṣpadanta down to his destroying his own work in the fire.