y,
filled with joy, encompassed that mighty warrior after he had thus
penetrated into the midst of the foe, and commenced to smite him.
[Causing the earth to resound] with noise of diverse musical instruments,
with shouts and slaps of arm-pits and roars, with yells and leonine
shouts, with exclamations of "Wait, Wait," with fierce confused voices
with cries of, "Do not go, Wait, Come to me", with repeated exclamations
of, "This one, It is I, The foe," with grunt of elephants, with the
tinkling of bells and ornaments, with bursts of laughter, and the clatter
of horse-hoofs and car-wheels, the (Kaurava) warriors rushed at the son
of Arjuna. That mighty hero, however, endued with great lightness of
hands and having a knowledge of the vital parts of the body, quickly
shooting weapons capable of penetrating into the very vitals, slew those
advancing warriors. Slaughtered by means of sharp shafts of diverse
kinds, those warriors became perfectly helpless, and like insects falling
upon a blazing fire, they continued to fall upon Abhimanyu on the field
of battle. And Abhimanyu strewed the earth with their bodies and diverse
limbs of their bodies like priests strewing the altar at a sacrifice with
blades of Kusa grass. And Arjuna's son cut off by thousands the arms of
those warriors. And some of these were cased in corslets made of iguana
skin and some held bows and shafts, and some held swords or shields or
iron hooks and reins; and some, lances or battle axes. And some held
maces or iron balls or spears and some, rapiers and crow-bars and axes.
And some grasped short arrows, or spiked maces, or darts, or Kampanas.
And some had goads and prodigious conchs; and some bearded darts and
Kachagrahas. And some had mallets and some other kinds of missiles. And
some had nooses, and some heavy clubs, and some brickbats. And all those
arms were decked with armlets and laved with delightful perfumes and
unguents. And with those arms dyed with gore and looking bright the field
of battle became beautiful, as if strewn, O sire, with five-headed snakes
slain by Garuda. And Phalguni's son also scattered over the field of
battle countless heads of foes, heads graced with beautiful noses and
faces and locks, without pimples, and adorned with ear-rings. Blood
flowed from those heads copiously, and the nether-lips in all were bit
with wrath. Adorned with beautiful garlands and crowns and turbans and
pearls and gems, and possessed of splendour equal