SECTION 9
"Sanjaya said, 'Then commenced the battle between the Kurus and the
Srinjayas, O monarch, that was as fierce and awful as the battle between
the gods and the Asuras. Men and crowds of cars and elephants, and
elephant-warriors and horsemen by thousands, and steeds, all possessed of
great prowess, encountered one another. The loud noise of rushing
elephants of fearful forms was then heard there resembling the roars of
the clouds in the welkin, in the season of rains. Some car-warriors,
struck by elephants, were deprived of their cars. Routed by those
infuriate animals other brave combatants ran on the field. Well-trained
car-warriors, O Bharata, with their shafts, despatched large bodies of
cavalry and the footmen that urged and protected the elephants, to the
other world. Well-trained horsemen, O king, surrounding great
car-warriors, careered on the field, striking and slaying the latter with
spears and darts and swords. Some combatants armed with bows,
encompassing great car-warriors, despatched them to Yama's abode, the
many unitedly battling against individual ones. Other great car-warriors,
encompassing elephants and foremost warriors of their own class, slew
some mighty one amongst that fought on the field, careering all around.
Similarly, O king, elephants, encompassing individual car-warriors
excited with wrath and scattering showers of shafts, despatched them to
the other world. Elephant-warrior rushing against elephant-warrior and
car-warrior against car-warrior in that battle slew each other with darts
and lances and cloth-yard shafts, O Bharata. Cars and elephants and
horses, crushing foot-soldiers in the midst of battle, were seen to make
confusion worse confounded. Adorned with yak-tails, steeds rushed on all
sides, looking like the swans found on the plains at the foot of Himavat.
They rushed with such speed that they seemed ready to devour the very
Earth. The field, O monarch, indented with the hoofs of those steeds,
looked beautiful like a beautiful woman bearing the marks of (her
lover's) nails on her person. With the noise made by the tread of heroes,
the wheels of cars, the shouts of foot-soldiers, the grunts of elephants,
the peal of drums and other musical instruments, and the blare of conchs,
the Earth began to resound as if with deafening peals of thunder. In
consequence of twanging bows and flashing sabres and the glaring armour
of the combatants, all became so confused there, that nothing could be
distinctly marked. Invulnerable arms, lopped off from human bodies, and
looking like the tusks of elephants, jumped up and writhed and moved
furiously about. The sound made, O monarch, by heads falling on the field
of battle, resembled that made by the falling fruits of palmyra trees.
Strewn with those fallen heads that were crimson with blood, the Earth
looked resplendent as if adorned with gold-coloured lotuses in their
season. Indeed, with those lifeless heads with upturned eyes, that were
exceedingly mangled (with shafts and other weapons), the field of battle,
O king, looked resplendent as if strewn with full blown lotuses. With the
fallen arms of the combatants, smeared with sandal and adorned with
costly Keyuras, the earth looked bright as if strewn with the gorgeous
poles set up in Indra's honour. The field of battle became covered with
the thighs of kings, cut off in that battle and looking like the tapering
trunks of elephants. Teeming with hundreds of headless trunk and strewn
with umbrellas and yak-tails, that vast army looked beautiful like a
flowering forest. Then, on the field of battle, O monarch, warriors
careered fearlessly, their limbs bathed in blood and therefore looking
like flowering Kinsukas. Elephants also, afflicted with arrows and
lances, fell down here and there like broken clouds dropped from the
skies. Elephant divisions, O monarch, slaughtered by high-souled
warriors, dispersed in all directions like wind-tossed clouds. Those
elephants, looking like clouds, fell down on the Earth, like mountains
riven with thunder, O lord, on the occasion of the dissolution of the
world at the end of the Yuga. Heaps upon heaps, looking like mountains,
were seen, lying on the ground, of fallen steeds with their riders. A
river appeared on the field of battle, flowing towards the other world.
Blood formed its waters and cars its eddies. Standards formed its trees,
and bones its pebbles. The arms (of combatants) were its alligators, bows
its current, elephants its large rocks, and steeds its smaller ones. Fat
and marrow formed its mire, umbrellas its swans, and maces its rafts.
Abounding with armour and head-gears, banners constituted its beautiful
trees. Teeming with wheels that formed its swarms of Chakravakas, it was
covered with Trivenus and Dandas. Inspiring the brave with delight and
enhancing the fears of the timid, that fierce river set in, whose shores
abounded with Kurus and Srinjayas. Those brave warriors, with arms
resembling spiked bludgeons, by the aid of their vehicles and animals
serving the purposes of rafts and boats, crossed that awful river which
ran towards the region of the dead. During the progress of that battle, O
monarch, in which no consideration was shown by anybody for anyone, and
which, fraught with awful destruction of the four kinds of forces,
therefore, resembled the battle between the gods and the Asuras in days
of old, some among the combatants, O scorcher of foes, loudly called upon
their kinsmen and friends. Some, called upon by crying kinsmen, returned,
afflicted with fear. During the progress of that fierce and awful battle,
Arjuna and Bhimasena stupefied their foes. That vast host of thine, O
ruler of men, thus slaughtered, swooned away on the field, like a woman
under the influence of liquor. Having stupefied that army, Bhimasena and
Dhananjaya blew their conchs and uttered leonine roars. As soon as they
heard that loud peal, Dhrishtadyumna and Shikhandi, placing king
Yudhishthira at their head, rushed against the ruler of the Madras.
Exceedingly wonderful and terrible, O monarch, was the manner in which
those heroes, unitedly and as separate bodies, then fought with Shalya.
The two sons of Madri, endued with great activity, accomplished in
weapons, and invincible in battle, proceeded with great speed against thy
host, inspired with desire of victory. Then your army, O bull of Bharata's
race, mangled in diverse ways with shafts by the Pandavas eager for
victory, began to fly away from the field. That host, thus struck and
broken by firm bowmen, O monarch, fled away on all sides in the very
sight of your sons. Loud cries of "Oh!" and "Alas!" O Bharata, arose from
among your warriors, while some illustrious Kshatriyas among the routed
combatants, desirous of victory, cried out saying, "Stop, stop!" For all
that, those troops of thine, broken by the Pandavas, fled away, deserting
on the field their dear sons and brothers and maternal, uncles and
sister's sons and relatives by marriage and other kinsmen. Urging their
steeds and elephants to greater speed, thousands of warriors fled away, O
bull of Bharata's race, bent only upon their own safety.'"
--------------------END OF PARVA 9 : UPA-PARVA 9 ---------------------
