in their wombs, their
bodies being afflicted by his energy, they failed to obtain peace
anywhere (in heaven or on earth). Filled with energy as their bodies
were, the time at last came for delivery. All of them, it so happened, O
prince of men, delivered at the same time. Though held in six different
wombs, yet all the portions, as they came out, united into one. The
goddess Earth held the child, taking it up from a heap of gold. Verily,
the child, endued with excellent form, blazed with splendour even like
the god of Fire. Of beautiful features, he began to grow in a delightful
forest of reeds. The six Krittikas beheld that child of theirs looking
like the morning sun in splendour. Filled with affection for
him,--indeed, loving him very much,--they began to rear him with the
sustenance of their breasts. In consequence of his having been born of
the Krittikas and reared by them, he came to be known throughout the
three worlds as Kartikeya. Having sprung from the seed which had fallen
off from Rudra he was named Skanda, and because of his birth in the
solitude of a forest of reeds he came to be called by the name of Guha
(the secret-born). The gods numbering three and thirty, the points of the
compass (in their embodied forms) together with the deities presiding
over them, and Rudra and Dhatri and Vishnu and Yama and Pushan and
Aryaman and Bhaga, and Angas and Mitra and the Sadhyas and Vasava and the
Vasus and the Aswins and the Waters and the Wind and the Firmament and
Chandramas and all the Constellations and the Planets and Surya, and all
the Ricks and Samans and Yajuses in their embodied forms, came there to
behold that wonderful child who was the son of the deity of blazing
flames. The Rishis uttered hymns of praise and the Gandharvas sang in
honour of that child called Kumara of six heads, twice six eyes, and
exceedingly devoted to the Brahmanas. His shoulders were broad, and he
had a dozen arms, and the splendour of his person resembled that of fire
and Aditya. As he lay stretched on a clump of heath, the gods with the
Rishis, beholding him, became filled with great delight and regarded the
great Asura as already slain. The deities then began to bring him diverse
kinds of toys and articles that could amuse him. As he played like a
child, diverse kinds of toys and birds were given unto him. Garuda of
excellent feathers gave unto him a child of his, viz., a peacock endued
with plumes of variegated hue. The Rakshasas g