Preceptors are wise, and sinless, and very kind to all creatures.  They, however, should never be consulted at times of peril.  It is in luxurious palaces, and assemblies and pleasure-gardens, that learned men, capable of making speeches, seem to be in their place.  Performing many wonderful things, in the assembly, it is there that learned men find their place, or even there where sacrificial utensils and their proper placing and washing are needed.  In a knowledge of the lapses of others, in studying the characters of men, in the science of horses and elephants and cars, in treating the diseases of asses and camels and goats and sheeps and kine, in planning buildings and gateways, and in pointing out the defects of food and drink, the learned are truly in their own sphere.  Disregarding learned men that extol the heroism of the foe, make ye such arrangements that the foe may be destroyed.  Placing the kine securely, array the troops in order of battle.  Place guards in proper places so that we may fight the foe.’”

SECTION XLVIII

“Karna said, ’I behold all these blessed ones, looking as if alarmed and panic-struck and unresolved and unwilling to fight.  If he that is come is the king of the Matsyas or Vibhatsu, even I will resist him as the banks resist the swelling sea.  Shot from my bow these straight and flying arrows, like gliding snakes, are all sure of aim.  Discharged by my light hands, these keen-edged arrows furnished with golden wings shall cover Partha all over, like locusts shrouding a tree.  Strongly pressed by these winged arrows, the bow-string will cause these my leathern fences to produce sounds that will be heard to resemble those of a couple of kettle-drums.  Having been engaged in ascetic austerities for the (last) eight and five years, Vibhatsu will strike me but mildly in this conflict, and the son of Kunti having become a Brahmana endued with good qualities, hath thus become a fit person to quietly receive shafts by thousands shot by me.  This mighty bowman is indeed, celebrated over the three worlds.  I, too, am, by no means, inferior to Arjuna, that foremost of human beings.  With golden arrows furnished with vulturine wings shot on all sides, let the firmament seem today to swarm with fire-flies.  Slaying Arjuna in battle, I will discharge today that debt, difficult of repayments, but promised of old by me unto Dhritarashtra’s son.  When man is there, even amongst all the gods and the Asuras, that will endure to stand in the teeth of the straight arrows shot from my bow?  Let my flying arrows, winged and depressed at the middle, present the spectacle of the coursing of the fire-flies through the welkin.  Hard though he be as Indra’s thunderbolt and possessed of the energy of the chief of the celestials, I will surely grind Partha, even as one afflicts an elephant by means of burning brands.  A heroic and mighty car-warrior as he is, and the foremost of all wielders of weapons I shall seize the unresisting