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VEDIC HYMNS.
Max Müller (vol. xxxii, p. 207) translates, “springs up like young sprouts.'
Verse 5. Note 1. It is the Neshtri's office to lead the wife of the sacrificer to the place where the sacrifice is being performed. Thus Agni, the divine Neshtri, is represented as accompanied by female beings, by the milch-cows,' meaning the oblations of ghrita, &c., or possibly the dawns.
Note 2. Are the three sisters' (comp. Bergaigne, I, 321; II, 107) identical with the milch-cows spoken of in the first hemistich? Ludwig (vol. iv, p. 166) very appropriately calls attention to the fact that three cows were milked at the sacrifice of the full and the new moon. Comp. Hillebrandt, Altindisches Neu- und Vollmondsopfer, p. 12 seq. Three dawns are mentioned in VIII, 41, 3.
Verse 6. Note 1. The sister bringing ghrita seems to be the sacrificial spoon. Is the mother the milk-vessel or possibly the cow ?
Note 2. Does 'their' refer to the mother and the sister (cf. Delbrück, Altindische Syntax, p. 102)? Or are 'the three sisters who have gone there' referred to ?
Verse 7. Note 1. The one Ritvig is Agni; the other possibly is the Agnidh who refreshes the Ritvig Agni. See verse 1, note 1.
Note 2. After at we should expect, instead of áram, another accusative, possibly rikam (see VII, 66, 11): 'may we master the praise, the sacrifice, and the verse.' Aram may have found its way into the text from verse 8.
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