Still moving eastwards, he visited the famous shrine of (Hindu) Gaya and was joined by two of his men whom he had sent there beforehand. Then they started for the temple of Jagannath at Puri on the seashore of Orissa. "Through travelling long distances on foot every day, he felt a desire for riding. At the time of buying a pony he had not a
sufficient number of Rupees with him. So, opening his purse of gold coins, he gave a few of them to the horse-dealer. The flight of Shivaji had already been noised abroad, and the man cried out, 'You
must be Shiva, as you are paying so much for a little pony ! ' At this Shivaji gave him the whole purse [as hush money] and fled from the place." (Dil. 61.)
After worshipping Jagannath at Puri, he turned westwards and returned home by way of Gondwana, Haidarabad and Bijapur territories.
We have a characteristic anecdote about an incident during this journey. The story runs (Chit. 118; variant in Dig. 254), that the pretended sannyasis one evening took refuge in the house of a peasant in a village on the Godavari.*[1] The old mother of the host apologised to the holy men for the poor
Shivaji. He had given me 9 gems, 9 ashrafis and 9 hurts.Then without going to my preceptor I returned to my country and reached Surat. The grand house that I have here was bought with that money."
- ↑ * Probably near Indur, a town 10 m. e. of Dharur and 10 m. n. of the Manjira, an affluent of the Godavari. Dig. 253 names Indur.
