2. Lo! here the ground has become a lake of blood, with the heads of the slaughtered hosts floating as lotuses upon it; and there the air has become as the starry heaven, glittering with broken weapons, flying like birds in the sky.
3. Behold the air is reddened with the particles of vermeil blood, borne above by the winds, and the sky presenting the evening clouds, with the glow of the setting sun at midday.
4. What are these, says one, that are flying as straws in the firmament? They are, says the other, no straws, but the flight of arrows, that have filled the atmosphere.
5. As long as the dust of the earth, cries another, is moistened by the bloodshed of the brave, so long are the heroes entitled to glory, and have their abode in heaven for myriads of years.[18]
6. Fear not these sable swords, says the sástra, whose blades are worn by the brave like petals of blue lotuses about their necks and breasts; and bravoes are favourites in the eyes of the goddess of fortune. (Fortune favours the brave).
7. The heavenly nymphs that beheld the fighting, felt a desire to embrace the brave, and the god of the flowery bow (Káma or Cupid), was busy to loosen their waist bands. (Cupid by inversion is Dípuc, another name of the Indian Káma. And Fairies or Paries and Huries are said to fall to the lot of the fighters in Jehad-battle. So says Dryden: “None but the brave deserve the fair”).
8. They beckoned their welcome by the waving of their reddish palms, in the shaking of the ruddy leaves of trees, and by the round glances of their eyes, in the blooming blossoms of plants, and by the perfume of their breath in the honied fragrance of flowers.
9. The geniuses of the garden of Paradise, were singing sweetly in the notes of the sylvan choir, and betook themselves to dancing in the wagging tails of peacocks.
10. As the brave warrior was breaking the line of the enemy with his hardy axe; so was his beloved breaking his hard heart and spirit, with the soft glances of her eyes.
11. It is by my lance, says the lancer, that I have severed the head of my adversary with the rings in his ears, like the head of the ascending node of Ráhu, approaching the disk of the sun.