shall fall by one another's hand.' After he of
Dasharha's race had said these words, the Pandavas became stupefied.
Filled with anxiety all of them became hopeless of life!"

26

"The holy one said, 'Arise, arise, O Gandhari, do not set thy heart on
grief! Through thy fault, this vast carnage has taken place! Thy son
Duryodhana was wicked-souled, envious, and exceedingly arrogant.
Applauding his wicked acts, thou regardest them to be good. Exceedingly
cruel, he was the embodiment of hostilities, and disobedient to the
injunctions of the old. Why dost thou wish to ascribe thy own faults to
me? Dead or lost, the person that grieves for what has already occurred,
obtaineth more grief. By indulging in grief, one increases it two-fold. A
woman of the regenerate class bears children for the practice of
austerities; the cow brings forth offspring for bearing burdens; the mare
brings forth her young for acquiring speed of motion; the Shudra woman
bears a child for adding to the number of servitors; the Vaishya woman
for adding to the number of keepers of cattle. A princess, however, like
thee, brings forth sons for being slaughtered!'"

Vaishampayana said, "Hearing these words of Vasudeva that were
disagreeable to her, Gandhari, with heart exceedingly agitated by grief,
remained silent. The royal sage Dhritarashtra, however, restraining the
grief that arises from folly, enquired of Yudhishthira the just, saying,
'If, O son of Pandu, thou knowest it, tell me the number of those that
have fallen in this battle, as also of those that have escaped with life!'

"Yudhishthira answered, 'One billion 660 million and 20,000 men have
fallen in this battle. Of the heroes that have escaped, the number is
240,165.'

"Dhritarashtra said, 'Tell me, O mighty-armed one, for thou art conversant
with everything, what ends have those foremost of men attained.'

"Yudhishthira said, 'Those warriors of true prowess that have cheerfully
cast off their bodies in fierce battle have all attained regions like
those of Indra. Knowing death to be inevitable, they that have
encountered it cheerlessly have attained the companionship of the
Gandharvas. Those warriors that have fallen at the edge of weapons, while
turning away from the field or begging for quarter, have attained the
world of the guhyakas. Those high-souled warriors who, observant of the
duties of Kshatriya-hood and regarding flight from battle to be shameful,
have fallen, mangled with