THE STRIDOR OF PUSHKARÁVARTA CLOUDS.
Argument:—Description of the Devouring fire below, and the
Deluging clouds above.
Vasishtha added:—Now blew the destroying winds, shaking the mountains by
their force: and filling the seas with tremendous waves, and rending the
skies with cyclonic storms.
2. The bounded seas broke their bounds, and ran to the boundless oceans
by impulse of the wind, as poor people run to the rich, by compulsion of
their driving poverty.
3. The earth being fried by the fire, went under the overflowing waters;
and joined with the infernal regions, lying below the waters of the
deep.
4. The heaven disappeared into nothing, and the whole creation vanished
into the air. The worlds were reduced to vacuum, and the solar light
dwindled to that of a star in the starry sphere.
5. There appeared from some cavity of the sky some hideous clouds,
called Pushkara Avartaka and others in the forms of dreadful demons, and
roaring with tremendous noise.
6. The noise was as loud as the bursting of the mundane-egg, and the
hurling down of a large edifice; and as the dashing of the waves against
one another, in a furiously raging sea.
7. The loud peal resounding through the air and water, and reechoing
amidst the city towers, was deafening and stunning to the ear; and the
swelling at the tops of mountains, filled the world with uproar.
8. The sound swelling as it were, in the conch-shell of the mundane-egg,
was returned with triple clangor, from the vaults of heaven and sky and
the infernal world.
9. The supports of all the distant sides, were tottering at their base;
and the waters of all the seas were mixed up together, as if to quench
the thirst of the all devouring doomsday.
10. The doomsday advanced as the God Indra, mounted on the back of his
elephantine clouds; which roared aloud amidst the waters, contained in
the etherial ocean from the beginning.
11. The great doomsday was attended with a hubbub, as loud as that of
the churning of the ocean before; or as that emitted by the revolving
world or a hydrostatic engine of immense force.
12. Hearing this roaring of the clouds, amidst the surrounding fires, I
became quite astonished at the stridor, and cast my eyes on all sides to
see the clouds.
13. I saw no vestige of a cloud in any part of the heavens, except that
of hearing their roar and finding flashes of firebrands flaming in the
sky, with showers of thunderbolts falling from above. (_i.e._ It was a
thunderstorm preceding the rain).
14. The flaming fire spread over millions of miles, on all the sides of
earth and heaven; and burnt away every thing in them, to a horrid
devastation.
15. After a little while I descried a spot at a great distance in the
sky; and felt a cool air blowing to my body from it.
16. At this time I observed the _Kalpa clouds_, appearing and gathering
at a great distance in the sky, where there was no relic of the living
fire perceptible to the naked eye.
17. Then there breathed the _Kalpa airs_, from the watery corner or
western side of the sky; which burnt at last in blasts, capable of
blowing and bearing away the great mountains of Meru, Malaya and
Himálaya.
18. These winds blew away the mountainous flames, and put to flight the
burning cinders as birds to a distance; they bore down the spreading
sparks, and drove away the fire from all sides.
19. The clouds of fire disappeared from the air, as evening clouds; then
clouds of ashes rose to the sky, and the atmosphere was cleared of every
particle of fire.
20. The air was blowing with fire, and passing every where as the fire
of incendiarism; and melted down the golden citadels on the flying
mountain of Meru.
21. The mountains on earth being put on fire, their flames spread all
about as the rays of the twelve suns.
22. The waters of oceans were boiling with rage, and the trees and
leaves of the forest were burning with blaze.
23. The cities and celestials sitting on their happy seats, in the
highest heaven of Brahmá, fell down below with all their inhabitants of
women and young and old people, being burnt by the flames.
24. The Kalpánta or chaotic fire was mixed with the water, in the lake
of Brahmá.
25. The strong winds uprooted the deep rooted mountains and rocks, and
plunged them headlong into the fiery mire of the infernal regions.
26. The chaotic clouds advanced as a troop of sable camels, moving
slowly in the azure sky with a grumbling noise.
27. They appeared from a corner of the sky, like a huge mountain
flashing with lightnings of gorgeous flame; and fraught with the waters
of the seven oceans.
28. These clouds were capable of rending the great vault of the world
(heaven), with their loud uproar; and splitting all the sides of heaven,
standing upon their solid snow white and impregnable walls.
29. The doomsday was as the raging ocean, and the planets were the
rolling islands in the whirlpools of their orbits; the flitting
lightnings likened its shifting aquatic animals, and the roaring of the
clouds was as the howling of its waters.
30. The moon being devoured by Ráhu, and burnt away by the fiery comet,
rose to heaven again and assumed the colder form of the cloud, to pour
down more moisture than her nightly beams and dews.
31. Lightning like golden sphere in the shape of frigidity of the sort
of Himalaya, held all stupefied waters, woods and hills.
32. After the clouds had split the vault of heaven, by their harsh
crackling and thunders; they dropped down the solid snows at first, which
were then melted down in the form of liquid rain.
33. There was a jarring of dissonant sounds, that grated upon the ear,
and proceeded from the bursting of woods by wild fire, and the stridor
of thunder-claps in the rebellowing air; and the cracking and crackling
and dashing and crashing of every thing in the shattering world.
34. There was a sharp and shrill noise, arising from the warring winds
blowing in a hundred ways, and the drift of bleak cold showers of
driving snows, covering the face of heaven.
35. The vault of heaven which is supported by the blue and sapphire-like
pillars of the azure skies on all sides, shattered the earth and its
props of the mountains, with big and heavy showers of diluvian rain.
36. The earth was bursting and splitting sound, by the blazing furnaces
of fire on all sides; and the hearts of all living beings, were rent by
the loud rattling of thunderbolts from heaven.
37. The rain that reigned long over the realm of the fiery earth, was
now going upward in the form of smoke, which the burning earth heaved
from her bosom, as her sighs towards heaven.
38. Now the vault of heaven, appeared to be overspread with a network,
studded with red lotuses of the flying fires on high; while the dark
showers had the appearance of swarms of black bees, and the rain drops
likened their fluttering wings.
39. All the sides of heaven resounded to the mingled clatter of
hailstone and fire brands, falling down simultaneously from the comingled
clouds of dire and dreadful appearance; and the scene all around was as
diresome to behold, as the mingled warfare of two dreadful forces, with
dire arms and commingled bloodshed.