Verse 24

²⁴Looking at him, dark as a rain cloud, in yellow silk, with the Srivatsa on his chest, made splendid by the shining Kaustubha, ²⁵four-armed, glowing with the Vaijayanti garland, his face lovely and quiet, the fish-shaped earrings flashing at it, ²⁶worth the looking of the whole world of men, his glance a smile with love in it, at a beautiful age, with the open stride of a rutting lion, ²⁷the king of great understanding, borne down by that splendour and made uncertain, asked him slowly, as one hardly to be faced for his splendour: ²⁸Who are you, come here into this wood, into this hollow of the hill, walking on feet like lotus petals over all these thorns?

²⁹Are you the splendour of the splendid, or the revered fire? Are you the sun, the moon, great Indra, or some other guardian of the worlds? ³⁰I take you for the bull among men of the three gods of gods, since you push back the dark of the cave as a lamp does with its light. ³¹Bull of men, we would hear you gladly and without pretence. Tell us your birth, your deeds, your line, if it please you.