unperceived by them.  During the progress of that general engagement when all the combatants were mangled in battle, hundreds and thousands of headless trunks stood up on the field.  Weapons and coats of mail, drenched with gore, looked resplendent, like cloths dyed with gorgeous red.  Even thus occurred that fierce battle marked by the awful clash of weapons.  Like the mad and roaring current of the Ganga it seemed to fill the whole universe with its uproar.  Afflicted with shafts, the warriors failed to distinguish friends from foes.  Solicitous of victory, the kings fought on because they fought that fight they should.  The warriors slew both friends and foes, with whom they came in contact.  The combatants of both the armies were deprived of reason by the heroes of both the armies assailing them with fury.  With broken cars, O monarch, the fallen elephants, and steeds lying on the ground, and men laid low, the Earth, miry with gore and flesh, and covered with streams of blood, soon became impassable, Karna slaughtered the Pancalas while Dhananjaya slaughtered the Trigartas.  And Bhimasena, O king, slaughtered the Kurus and all the elephant divisions of the latter.  Even thus occurred that destruction of troops of both the Kurus and the Pandavas, both parties having been actuated by the desire of winning great fame, at that hour when the Sun had passed the meridian.’”

29

“Dhritarashtra said, ’I have heard from thee, O Sanjaya, of many poignant and unbearable griefs as also of the losses sustained by my sons.  From what thou hast said unto me, from the manner in which the battle has been fought, it is my certain conviction, O Suta, that the Kauravas are no more.  Duryodhana was made carless in that dreadful battle.  How did Dharma’s son (then) fight, and how did the royal Duryodhana also fight in return?  How also occurred that battle which was fought in the afternoon?  Tell me all this in detail, for thou art skilled in narration, O Sanjaya.’

“Sanjaya said, ’When the troops of both armies were engaged in battle, according to their respective divisions, thy son Duryodhana, O king, riding on another car and filled with rage like a snake of virulent poison, beholding king Yudhishthira the just, quickly addressed his own driver, O Bharata, saying, “Proceed, proceed, quickly take me there, O driver, where the royal son of Pandu, clad in mail shineth under yon umbrella held over his head.”  Thus urged by the king, the driver, in that battle, quickly urged his royal master’s goodly car towards the face of Yudhishthira.  At this, Yudhishthira also, filled with rage and looking like an infuriate elephant, urged his own driver saying, “Proceed to where Suyodhana is.”  Then those two heroes and brothers and foremost of car-warriors encountered each other.  Both endued with great energy, both filled with wrath, both difficult of defeat in battle, approaching each other, those two great bowmen began to mangle each other with their arrows in that battle.