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VIMALANĀTHACARITRA
103
for amusement.
I will cut off your head. Go! Go now, villain! What shame is there to crows and robbers running away?
Svayambhu said, "If such fighting is for amusement, then your fighting in anger must be seen. For I came for that. If heroes taking away enemies' wealth are robbers, then you are the first robber. Who gave it to you? If any running away is to be done after you have thrown the cakra, now you do the running. What shame is there to crows and robbers running away? Throw the cakra! Throw it! Let its strength be seen, so you, dying, will feel no regret.'
دو
So addressed, Meraka whirled the cakra terrifying with flames, like another Mars, in the air and hurled it at the enemy. It landed with a hard blow on Śarngapani's breast, like a cymbal on a cymbal. Dazed by a blow from the tip of the hub, Svayambhu fell on the floor of his chariot, his eyes tremulous like an intoxicated man's. Muśalin, devoted to his brother, with tears in his eyes, supported him on his lap, saying, "Breathe, breathe, dear brother." Sprinkled by his brother's tears, Särngabhṛt regained consciousness and stood up, saying to the enemy, "Wait! Wait!" After getting up and taking the cakra, like the wheel of fortune of enemies, Hari, watched with wide-open eyes by his men, said to Meraka, "This is your entire wealth of weapons and this is your duration of life. It has gone today, as you looked on, like the head-jewel of a snake. 147 By what support do you remain? Go! Go, now! Svayambhu does not kill enemies fleeing from battle."
Meraka said, "Throw it. Do you also see its strength. How could one who did not become the wife of the lord, become the wife of a petty lord?"
147 162. Crooke (p. 390) says that if any one obtains the snakejewel, the snake dies. On the other hand, in Ceylon it is believed that misfortune follows the killing of the snake to obtain it, according to Hardy, Eastern Monachism, p. 316.
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