The Mahabharata/Book 1: Adi Parva/Section 10

Section X. ( Pauloma Parva continued. )

Sauti said:—"And Ruru on hearing those words replied, 'My wife, dear to me as life, was bit by a snake; upon which, I made, O snake, a dreadful vow, viz, that I would kill every snake that I might see. Therefore shall I smite thee and thou shalt be deprived of life.'

"And the Dundubha replied, 'O Brahmana, they are other snakes that bite man. It behoveth thee not to slay Dundubhas who are serpents only in name. Subject with other serpents to the same calamities but not sharing their good fortune, in woe the same but in joy different, the Dundubhas should not be slain by thee for thou canst judge between right and wrong.'"

Sauti continued:—"And the Rishi Ruru hearing these words of the serpent, and seeing that it was perplexed with fear besides being really of the Dundubha species, killed it not. And Ruru, the possessor of the six attributes, comforting the snake addressed it, saying, 'Tell me fully, O Snake, who art thou thus metamorphosed?' And the Dundubha replied, 'O Ruru! I was formerly a Rishi of name Sahasrapat. And it is by the curse of a Brahmana that I have been metamorphosed into a snake.' And Ruru asked, 'O thou best of Snakes, for what wast thou cursed by a Brahmana in wrath? And how long also shall thy form continue so?'"

And so ends the tenth Section of the Pauloma of the Adi Parva.