The Mahabharata/Book 1: Adi Parva/Section XII
Section XII.
( Pauloma Parva continued. )
Sauti continued:—"Ruru then asked, 'O best of Dwijas, why was the king Janamejaya bent upon destroying the serpents? And why were they saved by the wise Astika? I am anxious to hear all this in detail.'
"The Rishi replied, 'O Ruru, the important history of Astika you will learn from the lips of the Brahmanas'. Saying this, he vanished.
"Ruru rushed out in search of the disappearing Rishi, and having failed to find him in all the wood, fell down upon the ground. And revolving in his mind the words of the Rishi, he swooned away. On regaining his senses, he went home and asked his father to relate the history in question. Thus asked, his father related all about the story."
And so ends the twelfth Section in the Pauloma of the Adi Parva.