the elephant’s girth, cleaning it with a delicate cloth, and decking it with excellent garlands and a network of wires.[6] O charioteer’s son, bring me also, with speed, some fleet steeds of the hue of tawny clouds, not lean, and bathed in water sanctified with mantras, and furnished with trappings of bright gold.  Bring me also, with speed, an excellent car decked with garlands of gold, adorned gems, bright as the sun or the moon, furnished with every necessary, as also with weapons, and unto which are yoked excellent animals.  Bring me also a number of excellent bows of great toughness, and a number of excellent bow-strings capable of smitting (the foe), and some quivers, large and full of shafts and some coats of mail for my body.  Bring me also, with speed, O hero, every (auspicious) article needed for occasions of setting out (for battle), such as vessels of brass and gold, full of curds.  Let garlands of flowers be brought, and let them be put on the (proper) limbs of my body.  Let drums also be beaten for victory!  Go, O charioteer, quickly to the spot where the diadem-decked (Arjuna), and Vrikodara, and Dharma’s son (Yudhishthira), and the twins, are.  Encountering them in battle, either I shall slay them, or, being slain by them, my foes, I shall follow Bhishma.  Arjuna, and Vasudeva, and Satyaki, and the Srinjayas, that force, I think, is incapable of being conquered by the kings.  If all-destroying Death himself with unremitting vigilance, were to protect Kiritin, still shall I slay him, encountering him in battle, or repair myself to Yama’s abode by Bhishma’s track.  Verily, I say, that I will repair into the midst of those heroes.  Those (kings) that are my allies are not provokers of intestine feuds, or of weak attachment to me, or of unrighteous souls.’

“Sanjaya continued, Riding on an excellent and costly car of great strength, with an excellent pole, decked with gold, auspicious, furnished with a standard, and unto which were yoked excellent steeds that were fleet as the wind, Karna proceeded (to battle) for victory.  Worshipped by the foremost of Kuru car-warriors like Indra by the celestials, that high-souled and fierce bowman, endued with immeasurable energy like the Sun himself, upon his car decked with gold and jewels and gems, furnished with an excellent standard, unto which were yoked excellent steeds, and whose rattle resembled the roll of the clouds, proceeded, accompanied by a large force, to that field of battle where that bull of Bharata’s race (Bhishma) had paid his debt to nature.  Of beautiful person, and endued with the splendour of fire, that great bowman and mighty car-warrior, viz., the son of Adhiratha, then mounted on his own beautiful car possessed of the effulgence of fire, and shone like the lord of the celestials himself riding on his celestial car.’”

SECTION III