of sacrifices, receiving of gifts, and study as the sixth.  To which of these six was that Drona devoted who has been stain by me?  Fallen off from the duties of his own order and practising those of the Kshatriya order, that achiever of wicked deeds used to stay us by means of superhuman weapons.  Professing himself to be a Brahmana, he was in the habit of using irresistible illusion.  By an illusion itself hath he been slain today.  O Partha, what is there that is improper in this?  Drona having been thus punished by me, if his son, from rage, uttereth loud roars, what do you lose by that?  I do not think it at all wonderful that Drona’s son, urging the Kauravas to battle, will cause them to be slain, unable to protect them himself.  Thou art acquainted with morality.  Why then dost thou say that I am a slayer of my preceptor?  It was for this that I was born as a son to the king of the Panchalas, having sprung from the (sacrificial) fire.  How, O Dhananjaya, you call him a Brahmana or Kshatriya, with whom, while engaged in battle, all acts, proper and improper, were the same?  O foremost of men, why should not he be slain, by any means in our power, who, deprived of his senses in wrath, used to slay with the Brahma weapons even those that were unacquainted with weapons?  He that is unrighteous is said by those that are righteous to be equal to poison.  Knowing this, O thou that art well versed with the truths of morality, why dost thou, O Arjuna, reproach me?  That cruel car-warrior was seized and slain by me.  I have done nothing that is worthy of reproach.  Why then, O Vibhatsu, dost thou not congratulate me?  O Partha, I have cut off that terrible head, like unto the blazing sun or virulent poison or the all-destroying Yuga fire, of Drona.  Why then dost thou not applaud an act that is worthy of applause?  He had slain in battle only my kinsmen and not those of any one else.  I say that having only cut off his head, the fever of my heart hath not abated.  The very core of my heart is being pierced for my not having thrown that head within the dominion of the Nishadas, like that of Jayadratha![264] It hath been heard, O Arjuna, that one incurreth sin by not slaying his foes.  Even this is the duty of a Kshatriya, viz., to slay or be slain.  Drona was my foe.  He hath been righteously slain by me in battle, O son of Pandu, even as thou hast slain the brave Bhagadatta, thy friend.  Having slain thy grandsire in battle, thou regardest that act to be righteous.  Why then shouldst thou regard it unrighteous in me for my having slain my wretched foe?  In consequence of our relationship, O Partha, I cannot raise my head in thy presence and am like a prostrate elephant with a ladder against his body (for helping puny creatures to get on his back).  It, therefore, behoveth thee not to reproach me.  I forgive all the faults of thy speech, O Arjuna, for the sake of Draupadi and Draupadi’s children and not for any other reason.  It is well known that my hostility with the preceptor has descended from sire to son.  All persons in this world know it.  Ye sons of Pandu, are ye not acquainted with it?  The eldest son of Pandu hath not been untruthful in speech.  I myself, O Arjuna, am not sinful.  The wretched Drona was a hater of his disciples.  Fight now.  Victory will be thine.’”