3. The ointment, born on the earth, excellent, giving life to men—let it make [me] unperishing, of chariot-swiftness, free from offense.
Ppp. reads in d rathajūtam. The comm. thinks the word may mean either rathavadvegagāminam or rathavantam.
4. O breath, rescue thou breath; O life-breath (ásu), be gracious to life-breath; O destruction, free us from the fetters of destruction.
⌊Prose.⌋ The comm. follows a different division in verses 4-7, making of them but three verses,* and of the whole hymn but nine. The method of the mss. and the Anukr. is plainly decidedly preferable; it is followed also by SPP. One does not see any justification for the division by the Anukr. of the last five words of this verse into two pādas, with five syllables (çan̄ku-) in the closing one. ⌊It counts 7 + 7: 7 + 5.⌋ Ppp. reads trāyasva aso ‘save. The comm. has mām instead of nas. About half the authorities give at the beginning prā́ṇas. ⌊For the citation of the vs. by Kāuç., see introd. to this hymn, and cf. especially p. 897, ¶3.⌋ *⌊Our 4,5ab = his 4; our 5cd, 6ab = his 5; our 6cd,7 = his 6.⌋
5. Embryo of the river art thou, flower of the lightnings; the wind [thy] breath, the sun [thine] eye, from the sky [thy] milk.
⌊Prose.⌋ SPP. and the comm. read púṣpam, and all the mss. probably are to be regarded as having it; ṣpa and ṣya are practically indistinguishable in the mss. Ppp. also gives puṣpam. At the beginning all the mss. have síndho (p. síndho íti); even SPP. emends to síndhos, the comm. giving it. The comm. curiously explains vidyutām puṣpam by vṛṣṭyudakam: one can hardly help suspecting a misreading. The Anukr. scans the "verse" (restoring the a of asi) as 6 + 5: 12 = 23; its definition is far from acceptable. ⌊Bloomfield discusses the vs., AJP. xvii. 405.⌋
6. O divine ointment, thou from the three-peaked [mountain], do thou protect me all about; the herbs do not surpass (tṛ) thee—those from abroad and those from the mountains.
All the mss. ⌊save one of SPP's⌋ read dévāñjanam (p. déva॰āñj-) trāíkakudam; SPP. emends the former to -na, but not the latter to -da, although this is as indisputably vocative as the other; the comm. ⌊with one of SPP's mss.⌋ makes the same difference, though he regards trāikakudam as vocative (he trāik-). Ppp. reads devāñjani trāikakuda. ⌊As to the rarity of neuter vocatives, see my Noun-Inflection, p. 339.⌋ The great majority of mss. accent bāhyā́s; SPP. reads bā́hyās. The comm. understands the word as meaning "from other localities than the mountains." Our emendation to bāṭyā́s, supported by an article ⌊2. vāṭyá 'cultivated'⌋ in the major Pet. Lex. ⌊vi. 903⌋ is withdrawn by the omission of that article in the minor Lex. Ppp. reads corruptly bāhyaṁ parvatyā.
7. The demon-slayer, disease-expeller, hath crept down over the middle here, expelling all diseases, making portents vanish from here.
