The hot weather now comes.  Trees are heavy with blossom, peacocks strut in the glades and a general lethargy seizes the cowherds.  One day Krishna and his friends are out with the cattle when Pralamba, a demon in human form, comes to join them.  Krishna warns Balarama of the demon’s presence and tells him to await an opportunity to kill him.  He then divides the cowherds into two groups and starts them on the game of guessing fruits and flowers.  Krishna’s side loses and as a penalty they have to run a certain distance carrying Balarama’s side on their shoulders.  Pralamba carries Balarama.  He runs so fast that he quickly outstrips the others.  As he reaches the forest, he changes size, becoming ‘large as a black hill.’  He is about to kill Balarama when Balarama himself rains blows upon him and kills him instead.[23] While this is happening, the cows get lost, another forest fire ensues and Krishna has once again to intervene.  He extinguishes the fire, regains the cattle and escorts the cowherds to their homes.[24] When the others hear what has happened, they are filled with wonder ‘but obtain no clue to the actions of Krishna.’

During all this time, Krishna as ‘son’ of the wealthiest and most influential cowherd, Nanda, has been readily accepted by the cowherd children as their natural leader.  His lack of fear, his bravery in coping with demons, his resourcefulness in extricating the cowherds from awkward situations, his complete self-confidence and finally his princely bearing have revealed him as someone altogether above the ordinary.  From time to time he has disclosed his true nature as Vishnu but almost immediately has exercised his ‘illusory’ power and prevented the cowherds from remembering it.  He has consequently lived among them as God but their love and admiration are still for him as a boy.  It is at this point that the Purana now moves to what is perhaps its most significant phase—­a description of Krishna’s effects on the cowgirls.

[Footnote 11:  Note 7.]

[Footnote 12:  Magadha—­a region corresponding to present-day South Bihar.]

[Footnote 13:  Plate 3.]

[Footnote 14:  Note 8.]

[Footnote 15:  Note 9.]

[Footnote 16:  Plate 4.]

[Footnote 17:  Plate 5.]

[Footnote 18:  Plate 6.  In the Harivansa, the cause of the migration is given as a dangerous influx of wolves.]

[Footnote 19:  Note 10.]

[Footnote 20:  Plate 7.]

[Footnote 21:  Note 7.]

[Footnote 22:  Plate 8.]

[Footnote 23:  Plate 9.]

[Footnote 24:  Plate 10.]

(ii) The Loves of the Cowgirls