is never dried up.  The lightning lows like a cow, it follows as a mother follows after her young, when the shower has been let loose.  Even by day the Maruts create darkness with the water-bearing cloud, when they drench the earth, etc.

The number of the Maruts was originally seven, afterwards raised to thrice seven, and then given variously,[17] sometimes as high as thrice sixty.  They are the servants, the bulls of Dyaus, the glory of Rudra (or perhaps the ’boys of Rudra’), divine, bright as suns, blameless and pure.  They cover themselves with shining adornment, chains of gold, gems, and turbans.  On their heads are helmets of gold, and in their hands gleam arrows and daggers.  Like heroes rushing to battle, they stream onward.  They are fair as deer; their roar is like that of lions.  The mountains bow before them, thinking themselves to be valleys, and the hills bow down.  Good warriors and good steeds are their gifts.  They smite, they kill, they rend the rocks, they strip the trees like caterpillars; they rise together, and, like spokes in a wheel, are united in strength.  Their female companion is Rodas[=i] (lightning, from the same root as rudra, the ’red’).  They are like wild boars, and (like the sun) they have metallic jaws.  On their chariots are speckled hides; like birds they spread their wings; they strive in flight with each other.  Before them the earth sways like a ship.  They dance upon their path.  Upon their chests for beauty’s sake they bind gold armor.  From the heavenly udder they milk down rain.  “Through whose wisdom, through whose design do they come?” cries the poet.  They have no real adversary.  The kings of the forest they tear asunder, and make tremble even the rocks.  Their music is heard on every side.[18]

RUDRA.

The father of the Maruts, Rudra, is ‘the ruddy one,’ par excellence and so to him is ascribed paternity of the ‘ruddy ones.’  But while Indra has a plurality of hymns, Rudra has but few, and these it is not of special importance to cite.  The features in each case are the same.  The Maruts remain as gods whose function causes them to be invoked chiefly that they may spare from the fury of the tempest.  This idea is in Rudra’s case carried out further, and he is specially called on to avert (not only ‘cow-slaying’ and ‘man-slaying’ by lightning,[19] but also) disease, pestilence, etc.  Hence is he preeminently, on the one hand, the kindly god who averts disease, and, on the other, of destruction in every form.  From him Father Manu got wealth and health, and he is the fairest of beings, but, more, he is the strongest god (ii. 33. 3, 10).  From such a prototype comes the later god of healing and woe—­Rudra, who becomes Civa.[20]

RAIN-GODS.