Page:The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa (Volume 1).pdf/482

468 "Narada continued, Hearing these words of Brahman, Sunda and Upasunda said,- Grandsire, let us have no fear then from any created thing, mobile or immobile, in the three worlds, except only from each other!—The Grandsire then said, I grant you what you have asked and said, even this your desire And granting them this boon, the Grandsire made them desist from their asceticism, and returned to his own region. Then the brothers, those mighty Daityas, having received those several boons became incapable of being slain by anybody in the universe. They then returned to their own abode. All their friends and relatives, bebolding those Daityas of great intelligence, crowned with success in the matter of the boons they had obtained, became exceed. ingly glad. And Sunda and Upasunda then cut off their matted locks and wore coronets on their heads. Attired in costly robes and ornaments, they looked exceedingly handsome. They caused the Moon to rise over their city every night even out of his season. And friends and relatives gave themselves up to joy and merriment with happy hearts. Eat, feed, give, make merry, sing, drink-these were the sounds beard everyday in every house. And here and there arose loud uproars of hilarity mixed with clappings of hands which flled the whole city of the Daityas, who being capable of assuming any form at will, were engaged in every kind of amusement and sport and scarcely noticed the flight of time, even, regarding a whole year as a single day."

Thus ends the two hundred and eleventh section in the Rajya-labha Parva of the Adi Parva.

"Narada continued. As soon as those festivities came to an end, the brothers Sunda and Upasunda, desirous of the Sovereignty of the three worlds, took counsel and commanded their forces to be arranged. Obtaining the assent of their friends and relatives, of the elders of the Daitya race and of their ministers of state, and performing the prelimipary rites of departure, they set out in the night when the constellation Magha was in the ascendant. The brothers set out with a large Daitya force clad in the mail and armed with maces and axes and lances and clubs. The Daitya heroes set out on their expedition with joyous hearts, the charanas (bards) chanting auspicious panegyrics indicative of their future triumphs. Furious in war, the Daitya brothers, capable of