she has served food, the plates are emptied, and they look into the cooking-pot. Padmāvatī[1] observes how eagerly Śiva eats, and smiles. Śukta[2] is finished, and they fall upon broth. Meantime the plates are all emptied of rice, and they all want more."Mother!" says Kārttika, "Give us rice!" and Gaṇeśa also repeats the request, while the Lord of Destruction says, "O Umā, bring more rice." . . . Umā smiles, and distributes rice. Gaṇeśa says, "I have finished my curry, what more have you in store?" Hastily she comes, and serves ten different kinds of dried food. Śiva is much pleased, and praises her for her good cooking. The fried dhutarā[3] fruit and cups of siddhi[3] are given to the Great God, and he nods his head in approval as he sips. When all the curries are finished, they all call at the same time for more. . . . She finds it hard to serve so many. . . . She next serves pudding of pleasant flavour, and then a sauce both sweet and sour. Her hair becomes dishevelled, and her dress grows loose. With sweetmeats of milk and rice, the dinner ends.'[4]
On the tenth day of the moon, the images of Durga are thrown into the water, and people go from house to house, greeting their friends. This is the Vijayā[5] milana, or 'meeting together in victory,' festival. Vijayā songs, bidding farewell to Umā, who has already
- ↑ Umā's maid-servant.
- ↑ The first curry.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 The narcotics to which Śiva is addicted. Dhutarā (more correctly, dhutārā) is datura; Siddhi is cannabis sativa.
- ↑ Sen, pp. 247-48.
- ↑ From Vijayā, Victory. But no one seems to know why the festival has this name. It is by some connected with Rama's victory over Rāvana, after worshipping Durgā; by some with Durgā's own victory over the demon Mahishāsura. Neither explanation is convincing Dr. Farquhar writes: 'In both the hymns to Durgā in the Mahābhārata she is called Jayā and Vijayā, and in the hymn in the Harivaṁśa, which she is addressed as Āryā, the same epithets are applied to her. From the time of the Mārkaṇdeya Parāṇa, Jayā and Vijayā are the names of Chaṇḍī's chief maids. Clearly Vijayā, originally, had no relation to the fight with Mahisha, whatever the idea may have been. Jayā and Vijayā differ no more than Victrix and Victoria. How the festival got its name, I do not know.'
