________________
112
S. T. Ninkar
1182-1185. And then, that army of night-prowlers (i.e. demons),
which was painful to sight by the flames of fire emanating from their wide open jaws, which had made the sky tawny with sparks of fire from their terrible Kartikaweapons. which had filled the quarters with the echoes of long shrieks given out (from their mouths), which had made itself visible as the darkness was removed by fire from their eyes, the fiends in which had tied their long, rough and tawny hair with wet intestines etc. and had the cloth covering their hips horribly encircled by a row of human skulls and (the army) which was as dark as bees, buffaloes, clouds full of water, Tamāla trees, cuckoo or collyrium, came charging towards the king.
1186. In (the thick of) the night started a terrible battle between
those princes and demons, in wbich warriors were fearlessly challenged (by each other) with terrible screams and
war-cries. 1187. Some wrathful demon struck some prince in such a way
that with his body split into two, he fell down (but not
before) felling the enemy. 1188. Some great warrior, even with his head cut off with the
hard blow of a sword kept brandishing his sword aimlessly
through indignation. 1189. Seized with his master's honour, remembered at the end
of his swoon, some soldier was filled with shame as he had not vanquished the enemy army.
1190. As some (soldier) was knocked down with a stroke, a
demon drank the steaming hot blood from his chest, burning with the fire of anger, as if blowing it with his
mouth (to cool it down). 1191. Although dead, a warrior looking fierce with his sword
held fast in his fist was avoided from a distance by a frightened demon (or, struck from a distance by a demon with fear, acc. to com.).
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