04.031
Vaiśampāyana said.
The brave Matsyas, having departed from the city in battle formation, ready for attack, did not reach the Trigartas when the sun had set. (04-31-1)
The Trigartas and the Matsyas, fierce and battle-maddened, roared at each other with mighty strength, each coveting the cattle. (04-31-2)
And also mighty drunken elephants, driven with spears and goads, were mounted by chiefs and skillful mahouts. (04-31-3)
O king, their meeting was a terrible, tumultuous, and hair-raising encounter, equal to a battle between the gods and asuras, which took place while the sun was still overhead. (04-31-4)
Dust rose from the earth, and nothing was visible. Birds, covered with dust raised by the army, fell to the ground. (04-31-5)
The Sun was obscured by arrows and disappeared from view. The sky, filled as if with fireflies, glowed. (04-31-6)
The golden-backed bows of the archers, interlaced, fell to the left and right of the fallen world-heroes who had shot them. (04-31-7)
Chariots joined chariots, foot-soldiers met foot-soldiers, riders confronted riders, and great elephants faced great elephants also. (04-31-8)
O king, enraged in the battle, they struck one another with swords, spears, lances, śaktis, and even with tomaras. (04-31-9)
The club-armed heroes, slaying each other in battle, though extremely enraged, could not make the other heroes turn their backs. (04-31-10)
A head—fashioned with upper lip, beautiful nose, adorned with arranged hair—severed, covered in dust and wearing earrings, was seen. (04-31-11)
There, in the great battle, the severed limbs of the kṣatriyas, cut in pieces by arrows, which resembled the trunks of śāla trees, became invisible. (04-31-12)
There, the earth was strewn with arms resembling the coils of serpents and anointed with sandalwood paste, as well as with heads adorned with earrings. (04-31-13)
As the dust settled on the earth with blood spreading, a dreadful and limitless stupor set in. (04-31-14)
Śatānīka, after killing a hundred men, and Viśālākṣa, after slaying four hundred, both mighty chariot-warriors entered the great army of the Trigartas. Overcome with fury, they attacked each other, fighting hair to hair and nail to nail. (04-31-15)
After observing the Trigartas, the two entered the chariot division, followed by Sūryadatta and Madirāśva from behind. (04-31-16)
Virāṭa, there in the battle, slew five hundred charioteers, and here, after slaying hundreds of horses, he also killed five great warriors. (04-31-17)
Moving along various paths among the chariots, the chief of the chariot-warriors approached Suśarmā of the Trigartas, who was in his golden chariot on the battlefield. (04-31-18)
Those two, both great-souled and mighty, confronted each other there, each roaring at the other in the cowshed like two bulls. (04-31-19)
Then the two charioteers, mounted on their chariots, wheeled past each other on all sides, and rapidly released arrows like streams of water poured forth by two clouds. (04-31-20)
Both, exceedingly enraged and intolerant, roamed attacking one another, adept in weapons, wielding sharp arrows, swords, spears, and maces. (04-31-21)
Then the king pierced Suśarman with ten arrows, and with five plus five arrows he pierced his four horses. (04-31-22)
Similarly, Suśarmā, proud in battle and skilled in supreme weapons, struck the Matsya king with fifty sharp arrows. (04-31-23)
Then, having surrounded the armies of the Matsya king and Suśarman, they did not recognize each other at dusk when all was covered in dust. (04-31-24)
