1. Shanggasba is possibly a Tibetian word, bsang, grags, pa = "of good
fame," but more probably it is compounded from the Mongolian sSang,
"treasure." (Jülg.)
2. Garudâ: see note 2, Tale I. The allusion in this place is to an
image of him over a shrine.
3. Silk was cultivated in India at a very early date, probably much
earlier than any records that remain to us can show; there are twelve
indigenous species of silkworm. That of China was not introduced
into India before the year 419 of our era (Ritter, vol. vi. pt. 1,
698). The indigenous silkworms fed upon other trees besides the
mulberry and notably on the ficus religiosa. The Greeks would seem to
have learnt the use of silk from the Indians, or at least from the
Persians. Nearchos is the first Greek writer in whom mention of it
is found; he describes it as like the finest weft of cotton-stuff,
and says it was made from fibre scraped from the bark of a tree; an
error in which he was followed by other writers; others again wrote
that the fibres were combed off the leaf of a tree; yet Pausanias had
mentioned the worm as the intermediary of its production (C. Müller,
Pref. to his Edition of Strabo, and notes). The Romans also carried
on a considerable trade in silk with India, and Pliny, vi. 20, 2,
mentions one kind of Indian silk texture that was so fine and light,
you could see through it, "ut in publico matrona transluceat." Horace
also alludes to the same, Sat. i. 2, 101. Pliny also complains of the
luxury whereby this costly stuff was used, not only for dresses, but
for coverings of cushions. [68] Vopiscus, in his life of the Emperor
Aurelian, tells us that at that time a pound weight of silk was worth
a pound weight of gold. In India itself the luxurious use of silk has
restrictions put upon it in the Manu. It was also prescribed that when
men devoted themselves to the hermit life in the jungle, they should
lay aside their silken clothing; and we find Râma (Râmajana, ii. 37,
14) putting on a penitential habit over his silken robe. The Mâha
Bhârata (ii. cap. 50) contains a passage in which among the objects
brought in tribute to Judhishthira is kîtaga, or the "insect-product,"
a word used to designate both silk and cochineal.
4. A similar episode occurs in a tale collected in the neighbourhood
of Schwaz in North Tirol which I have given under the name of
"Prince Radpot" in "Household Stories from the Land of Hofer." The
rest of the story recalls that called "The three Black Dogs" in the
same collection, but there is much more grace and pathos about the
Tirolean version.