to the rank of Yuvaraja. Royal fortune and the love of the father, however, clung to Fikrama alone. He bore also, the burden of the duties of the king and of the Yuvaraja, "just as the primeval tortoise carries the serpent S'esha and the earth."[१]
With the permission of Ahavamalla, Vikrama, then, set out on a series of warlike expeditions.[२] He repeatedly defeated the Cholas (III. 61, 63, 65, 66; IV. 22-28) and plundered Kanchi. He lent his assistance to the king of Málava, who came to him for protection, to regain his kingdom (III. 67) and carried his arms as far north as Gauda and Kámarúpa. He attacked also the king of Simhala or Ceylon, who fled before him to the hermitage of the husband of Lopamudra (III. 77; IV. 20). He destroyed the sandal wood forests of the Malaya hills and slew the Lord of Kerala (IV. 1-18.) He, finally, conquered Gângakunda (IV. 21), Vengi (IV. 29) and Chakrakota (IV.,30),[३]
After having accomplished these brilliant exploits Vikrama turned homewards. He had come as far as the Krishna, when he suddenly was disquieted by the appearance of unfavourable omens which announced some great impending misfortune.
- ↑ III. 26-59. This part of the narrative of Vikrama's life, also, which strongly puts forward his fitness for the throne and his gene rosity to the less able Somes'vara, looks as if it had been touched up in order to whitewash V.'s character and to blacken that of his enemy.
- ↑ III. 60-IV, 30.
- ↑ Bilhana's rhapsodic treatment of this portion of Vikrama's career makes it impossible to determine the chronological order of these wars. Only so much may be considered certain that his last exploits were performed in the South, as he came on his homeward march to the Krishna. The assertion that Vikrama defeated the kings of Gauda and Kamarupa sounds very strange. It is, however, possible that he made with his cavalry a raid into their territories.-Vengi (not Chengi as the text reads) is the coast country between the Godavari and the Krishna and belonged about this time to the Cholas (see below). Gângakunda, or Gândakunda as the MS. has primâ manu, must have been another Chola dependency, compare below VI. 21,
