that Rishi possessed of the splendour of fire, king
Kualaswa with his troops, accompanied by the Brahmana
Utanka, as also by all his sons set out for that region,
O bull of the Bharata race! And after that grinder
of foes, the royal Kuvalaswa, had set out, accompanied
by his twenty-one thousand sons all of whom were exceedingly
powerful, the illustrious Lord Vishnu filled him with
his own energy at the command of Utanka and impelled
by the desire of benefiting the triple world and while
that invincible hero was proceeding on his way and
loud voice was heard in the sky repeating the words,
’This fortunate and unslayable one will become
the destroyer of Dhundhu to-day.’ And the
gods began to shower upon him celestial flowers.
And the celestial kettle drums began to sound their
music although none played upon them. And during
the march of that wise one, cool breezes began to
blow and the chief of the celestials poured gentle
showers wetting the dust on the roads and, O Yudhishthira,
the cars of the celestials could be seen high over
the spot where the mighty Asura Dhundhu was.
The gods and Gandharvas and great Rishis urged by
curiosity, came there to behold the encounter between
Dhundhu and Kuvalaswa and, O thou of the Kuru race,
filled by Narayana with his own energy, king Kuvalaswa,
aided by his sons, soon surrounded that sea of sands
and the king ordered that wilderness to be excavated
and after the king’s sons had excavated that
sea of sands for seven days, they could see the mighty
Asura Dhundhu. And, O bull of the Bharata race,
the huge body of that Asura lay within those sands,
effulgent in its own energy like the Sun himself.
And Dhundhu, O king, was lying covering the western
region of the desert and surrounded on all sides by
the sons of Kuvalaswa, the Danava was assaulted with
sharp-pointed shafts and maces and heavy and short
clubs and axes and clubs, with iron spikes and darts
and bright and keen-edged swords, and thus assaulted,
the mighty Danava rose from his recumbent posture
in wrath. And enraged, the Asura began to swallow
those various weapons that were hurled at him and he
vomited from his mouth fiery flames like unto those
of the fire called Samvarta that appeareth at the
end of the Yuga and by those flames of his, the Asura
consumed all the sons of the king and, O tiger among
men, like the Lord Kapila of old consuming the sons
of king Sagara, the infuriated Asura overwhelming
the triple world with the flames vomited from his mouth,
achieved that wonderful feat in a moment. And,
O thou best of the Bharatas, when all those sons of
king Kuvalaswa were consumed by the fire emitted by
the Asura in wrath, the monarch, possessed as he was
of mighty energy, then approached the Danava who,
like unto a second Kumbhakarna of mighty energy, had
come to the encounter after waking from his slumbers.
From the body of the king, O monarch, then began to
flow a mighty and copious stream of water and that
stream soon extinguished, O king, the fiery flames