The Suta said: "He (Shamika) had a young son, fiery and a great ascetic, named Shringi — exceedingly wrathful, hard to appease, [strict] in a great vow. He, in strict self-restraint, would from time to time approach the supreme lord, the god Brahma, devoted to the welfare of all beings; and, given leave by Brahma, [one day] he was returning home. To the sage's son, hot-tempered, exceedingly wrathful, like poison, his friend then said, playing and laughing — [another] sage's son, slight of build, in jest, O best of the twice-born: "Do not be proud, O Shringi, that your father is [so] radiant and [such] an ascetic — for he carries a corpse upon his shoulder! When the sons of sages such as us speak — we who have attained perfection, knowers of Brahman, ascetics — do not say a [haughty] word to us. Where [now] is your manly pride, where are your proud words born of arrogance, you who are [destined] to see your own father bearing a corpse?"