silent, and ashamed, with fallen hearts, and sunken faces, moody, and bewildered 2 .
8. Now the Bhikkhunl Mettiyd came up to the place where the Bhikkhus who were followers of Mettiya and Bhummagaka were: and when she had come there she said to them: 'My salutation to you, Sirs 3!'
When she had so said the Bhikkhus who were followers of Mettiya and Bhummagaka did not speak to her. So a second time she said to them: 'My salutation to you, Sirs!' and they did not speak. And a third time she said to them: 'My salutation to you, Sirs ! ' Still the third time the Bhikkhus who were followers of Mettiya and Bhummagaka did not speak. And she said: 'Wherein have I offended you, Sirs? Wherefore do you not speak tome?'
'Are you then so indifferent 4 , sister, when we are tormented by Dabba the Mallian?'
But what can I do, Sirs ? '
Pattakkhandha which the Samanta PdsjLdikd explains by patitakkhandhi. Khandha" here seems to mean ' faculties/ Com- pare the use of Dhammi, in a similar connection at Mahd-parinib- bana Sutta II, 32=Mah£vagga V, 13, 9 ; and see Buddhaghosa's commentary on that passage, quoted by Rh. D. in ' Buddhist Suttas from the Pdli/ p. 36.
Appa/ibh&na Pa/ibh£na/w is the rapid suggestion of an idea in a case of doubt or difficulty, an illumination; so that pa/ibh&nako, the man of ready wit, may be compared with updya-kusalo, the man fertile in resource. 'Absent-minded' would be an incorrect rendering; they had no idea what to think or do, and the appearance of the nun on the scene (in the next paragraph) supplied the want. Till then they hesitated, drifted.
The following narrative, down to § 9, is repeated almost word for word in V, 20, only that the person there persuaded to bring the false accusation is different.
Agghupekkhati. Compare Gâtaka I, 147.
