The Boar and the Pit

At the hermitage the prince put down every obstacle that troubled the knowers of Brahman, and from then on he was called Kuvalayāśva, the rider of Kuvalaya. The demon, swollen with pride, did not know he was there. Once, while Gālava was at his twilight prayers, it came to attack him in the form of a boar.

The disciples cried out. The prince leapt onto his horse and rode after it, bow in hand, and struck it with an arrow whose head was shaped like the half moon. The wounded boar fled into a great forest of hills and trees, and the horse, swift as thought, followed. They went on for thousands of yojanas, until the boar plunged into a pit that opened in the earth, and the prince and his horse fell after it into the dark.

When he came out of the darkness the boar was gone. He was in Pātāla, and it was full of light. Before him stood a city of hundreds of golden palaces, walled and ramparted, like the city of Indra, and there was no man anywhere in it.