[Illustration]

PLATE 7

Krishna milking

Illustration to the Bhagavata Purana
Garhwal, Punjab Hills, c. 1800
G.K.  Kanoria collection, Calcutta

Like Plate 4, an illustration of an isolated episode.  Krishna, having graduated from tending the calves, is milking a cow, his mind filled with brooding thoughts.  A cowgirl restrains the calf by tugging at its string while the cow licks its restive offspring with tender care.  Other details—­the tree clasped by a flowering creeper, the peacock perched in its branches—­suggest the cowgirls’ growing love.  The image of tree and creeper was a common symbol in poetry for the lover embraced by his beloved and peacocks, thirsting for rain, were evocative of desire.

In style, the picture represents the end of the first great phase of Garhwal painting (c. 1770-1804) when romantic themes were treated with glowing ardour.

[Illustration]

PLATE 8

The Quelling of the Snake Kaliya

Illustration to the Bhagavata Purana
Kangra, Punjab Hills, c. 1790
J.K.  Mody collection, Bombay

With Plates 3, 5 and 6, an example of Kangra painting in its most serene form.

Krishna, having defied the hydra-headed snake whose poison has befouled the River Jumna, is dancing in triumph on its sagging heads.  The snake’s consorts plead for mercy—­one of them holding out bunches of lotus flowers, the others folding their hands or stretching out their arms in mute entreaty.  The river is once again depicted as a surging flood but it is the master-artist’s command of sinuous line and power of suffusing a scene of turmoil with majestic calm which gives the picture greatness.

Although the present study is true to the Bhagavata Purana where the snake is explicitly described as vacating the water and meeting its end on dry land, other pictures, notably those from Garhwal[129] follow the Vishnu Purana and show the final struggle taking place in the river itself.

[Footnote 129:  Reproduced A.K.  Coomaraswamy, Rajput Painting (Oxford, 1916), Vol.  II, Plates 53 and 54.]

[Illustration]

PLATE 9

Balarama killing the Demon Pralamba

Illustration to the Bhagavata Purana
Kangra, Punjab Hills, c. 1790
National Museum, New Delhi

A further example from the Kangra series, here attributed to Purkhu.