Sent to the South

There came a time when the Vindhya mountain set itself to rival Meru, the golden mountain at the centre of the world. It rose higher and higher, until it touched the shell of the universe and blocked the paths of the sky. The lands beneath it lost the measure of day and night. The gods were afraid it would cover the whole earth, and they turned their thoughts to the short sage and called on him to come quickly.

Agastya was then living in austerity in a grove on the slopes of golden Meru, and in his own heart he knew what had happened. He thought of Śiva with tears in his eyes and folded hands, his body melting with love, and Śiva appeared to him on his white bull, with his hosts around him. Agastya rose in awe and bowed again and again at his feet, his head touching the ground, and then stood and praised him. Śiva asked what he wanted. The Vindhya has quarrelled with Meru, Agastya said, and blocked the sky. Give me a little grace, that I may break its strength.

In that very moment I have given you the power, said Śiva. Destroy the Vindhya's might, root and all, and go to the south, and dwell on the beautiful Potiyil.

Agastya bowed and praised him and asked for one thing more. Give me a sacred river for the south, he said, so that I may worship you rightly there, with water that never fails for the tanks and the wells.

Śiva thought of the Kāviri, the holiest of the seven rivers who lived with him as goddesses on Kailāsa, his mountain, and she came before him and bowed. Go with this sage to the southern land, Śiva told her. The Kāviri answered, He has conquered the five senses, lord, but he is a man. Is it right for me, a woman, to follow behind him? Śiva said, His mind does not waver. Neither evil nor good can touch him. His heart is single, and he is great among those who love us. Go after him.

The river agreed. I will go with this blameless sage, she said, but tell me when I may leave him. Śiva said, Good, so be it, lady. The day he stretches out his hand toward you, leave him and go and dwell upon the earth. Then he said to Agastya, Hold the great flood of the Kāviri in your water-pot, and the river came and stayed with the sage. Śiva vanished with his hosts, and Agastya set out for the south.

On his way he came to the land where an asura named Krauñca lived, a demon of endless illusions, who could make the sky into earth and the earth into sky, the sea into a mountain and the mountain into a sea, the sun into the moon and the moon into the day. Krauñca saw the sage coming and took the form of a great mountain lying across his road, with a path running into it. Agastya was surprised and went into the path, and it ended in a wilderness. He turned back, and the path he had come by was gone. He took another track, and fire and whirlwind and rain and thunder and thick darkness closed around him.

Then Agastya looked within, by the light of his own wisdom, and saw what was happening. He laughed in anger and struck his hands together. So this is the asura's doing, he said. Today I will take away his strength. With his staff he struck the mountain and pierced it full of holes, and he cursed the demon. Lose your old nature and stand here as a long mountain, he said, the dwelling of all the asuras, doing harm to ascetics and to gods for many days, and these holes my staff has made will be the dens of all your illusions; then, at a later day, you will die quickly by the spear of Murukaṉ, the son of our lord. Then he took water from his water-pot, sprinkled it with a mantra, and the illusion broke apart, and he found his true road and went on to the south.

He crossed the snowy mountains and came to Kāśī, where the Gaṅgā flows, and bowed at the lotus feet of Śiva there, the lord of all. Then he left Kāśī and went on toward the Vindhya.