Vessantara-Jataka in Pali and English - MyWebSpace

Translation 586 Vessantara-Jåtaka
[Fausbøll, Jåtaka, vol. VI, p. 586]
The Master explained it thus:
"Now while they talked together thus, the mother there was seen
Approaching to the door afoot, barefooted though a queen.
Vessantara and Maddī then their mother went to greet,
And Maddī ran and laid her head before her mother's feet.
The children safe and sound afar then Maddī did espy,
Like little calves that see their dam loud greetings they did cry.
And Maddī saw them safe and sound: like one possest she sped,
Trembling, and felt all full of milk the breasts at which they fed."
At that moment the hills resounded, the earth quaked, the great ocean was troubled,
Sineru, king of mountains, bent down: the six abodes of the gods were all one mighty
sound. Sakka, king of the gods, perceived that six royal personages and their attendants
lay senseless on the ground, and not one of them could arise and sprinkle the others with
water; so he resolved to produce a shower of rain. This he did, so that those who wished
to be wet were wet, and those who did not, not a drop of rain fell upon them, but the
water ran off as it runs from a lotus-leaf. That rain was like rain that falls on a clump of
lotus-lilies.