Note 7 — VI. PRINCE JĪVAKA AS THE KING OF PHYSICIANS.1

There lived in Rājagṛha a householder who suffered from a swelling of the glands,7 and had been given up by all the physicians. He resolved to go to Jīvaka. If he could be cured by him, well and good; if not, then he was ready to die. He came to Jīvaka, and entreated him to cure him. Jīvaka said that the remedies which his case required were hard to find. Thus the man thought, “As even Jīvaka has given me up, what is there for me to do? As my time has come, I will die of my own accord.” So he went away to the cemetery. Now a corpse was being burnt there, and an ichneumon and a lizard, which were fighting with one another, fell into the fire. Being tormented by hunger, he devoured them both. Then he drank some rain-water which he found in the cemetery, and afterwards he betook himself to a cattle-shed in the neighbourhood of the cemetery, where he fed upon kodrava8 porridge and sour milk mixed with butter. Thereupon the tumour gave way, and he, after it had discharged upwards and downwards, was restored to health.