Puranic Encyclopaedia: A Comprehensive Dictionary with Special Reference to the Epic and Puranic Literature c9.1327

c9.1327

It was the story of king Svottha that the muni was telling his son as follows:—“He was famous for his noble qualities and unique prowess. He possessed three bodies, which possessed capacity to rule the country. One of the three bodies was the best, the other midway between good and bad and the third bad. The very origin of the King was in the wide and extensive sky; like birds he lived in the sky. He built a city in the sky with fourteen streets and three divisions or sectors. There were also forests, woods and mountains for games in the city; seven big tanks, wavy-white with creepers of pearl and two lamps, spreading heat and coolness, burning always. The King, who went about all his time in this vast city, built in it many movable inner dwellings, and they were divided between the upper and lower parts of the city. They were thatched with a kind of black grass. Each inner house had nine doors, some of them windows, which admitted air always. In each house five lamps burned, the lamps resting on three pillars and a white piece of wood. Each house was glitteringly plastered and had courtyards. A particular sect of bhūtas, who ever feared light, guarded the houses. When the houses created thus by magic moved from one place to another, King Svottha enjoyed, like birds in nests, playing various games therein. The king, who possessed three bodies, used to go out after playing for some time with the guards, and run about like one possessed of a desire to occupy houses, newly built, and then reach the city, which was like a Gandharva city. Frail and unsettled in mind, the king, off and on, developed a will to die, and accordingly he died. Just as waves come up in the sea, the king used to be born again from the sky and to attend to worldly affairs. At times he used to repent about and weep over his actions asking himself what he, the fool, was doing and why he should be sad like that. At other times he used to feel elated and enthusiastic. Briefly put, he used to be, by turns drinking, walking, jumping, expanding, contracting, feeling, drowsy and then exuberant. The great and handsome king was actually, like the sea, rendered restless by wind, possessed by various moods.