r making such a request is
past[375]."

The narrative becomes more human when it relates how one afternoon he
looked at the town and said, "This will be the last time that the
Tathagata will behold Vesali. Come, Ananda, let us go to Bhandagama."
After three halts he arrived at Pava and stopped in the mango grove of
Cunda, a smith, who invited him to dinner and served sweet rice, cakes,
and a dish which has been variously interpreted as dried boar's flesh or
a kind of truffle. The Buddha asked to be served with this dish and bade
him give the sweet rice and cakes to the brethren. After eating some of
it he ordered the rest to be buried, saying that no one in heaven or
earth except a Buddha could digest it, a strange remark to chronicle
since it was this meal which killed him[376]. But before he died he sent
word to Cunda that he had no need to feel remorse and that the two most
meritorious offerings in the world are the first meal given to a Buddha
after he has obtained enlightenment and the last one given him before
his death. On leaving Cunda's house he was attacked by dysentery and
violent pains but bore them patiently and started for Kusinara with his
disciples. In going thither he crossed the river Kakuttha[377], and some
verses inserted into the text, which sound like a very old ballad,
relate how he bathed in it and then, weary and worn out, lay down on his
cloak. A curious incident occurs here. A young Mallian, named Pukkuisa,
after some conversation with the Buddha, presents him with a robe of
cloth of gold, but when it is put on it seems to lose its splendour, so
exceedingly clear and bright is his skin. Gotama explains that there are
two occasions when the skin of a Buddha glows like this--the night of his
enlightenment and the night before his death. The transfiguration of
Christ suggests itself as a parallel and is also associated with an
allusion to his coming death. Most people have seen a face so light up
under the influence of emotion that this popular metaphor seemed to
express physical truth and it is perhaps not excessive to suppose that
in men of exceptional gifts this illumination may have been so bright as
to leave traces in tradition.

Then they went on[378] to a grove at Kusinara, and he lay down on a
couch spread between two Sala trees. These trees were in full bloom,
though it was not the season for their flowering; heavenly strains and
odours filled the air and spirits unseen crowded round th