Thy life, O thou of limited foresight,
now depends upon me! If I like, I can suffer thee to live, but thou art
not capable of protecting thy own life! Thou hadst at one time especially
endeavoured to burn us to death and to take our lives by means of snakes
and other kinds of poison and by drowning us! We were also wronged by
thee, O king, by the deprivation of our kingdom, by the cruel words
spoken by thee, and by thy maltreatment of Draupadi! For these reasons, O
wretch, thy life must be taken! Rise, rise, and fight us! That will
benefit thee!"'
"Sanjaya continued, 'In this strain, O king, those heroes, the Pandavas,
flushed with victory, repeatedly spoke there (rebuking and mocking
Duryodhana).'"
32
(Gada-yuddha Parva)
"Dhritarashtra said, 'Thus admonished (by his foes), how, indeed, did
that scorcher of enemies, my heroic and royal son, who was wrathful by
nature, then behave? He had never before listened to admonitions such as
these! He had, again, been treated by all with the respect due to a king!
He, who had formerly grieved to stand in the shade of an umbrella,
thinking he had taken another's shelter, he, who could not endure the
very effulgence of the sun in consequence of his sensitive pride, how
could he endure these words of his foes? Thou hast, with thy own eyes, O
Sanjaya, seen the whole earth, with even her Mlecchas and nomad tribes,
depend upon his grace! Rebuked thus at that spot by the sons of Pandu in
particular, while lying concealed in such a solitary place after having
been deprived of his followers and attendants, alas, what answer did he
make unto the Pandavas upon hearing such bitter and repeated taunts from
his victorious enemies? Tell me everything, O Sanjaya, about it!'
"Sanjaya continued, 'Thus rebuked, O monarch, by Yudhishthira and his
brothers, thy royal son, lying within those waters, O king of kings,
heard those bitter words and became very miserable.
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