squeezed from ripe stems dwell, when drunk, in the hearts of the
worshipper--see how on their shoulders there clings as if a clinging
wife; in their hands the quoit is held and the sword. Lightly they have
come down from heaven of their own accord: Immortals, stir yourselves
with the whip! The mighty Maruts on dustless paths, armed with brilliant
spears, have shaken down even the strong places. O ye Maruts, who are
armed with lightning-spears, who stirs you from within by himself, as
the jaws are stirred by the tongue? You shake the sky, as if on the
search for food; you are invoked by many, like the solar horse of the
day. Where, O Maruts, is the top, where the bottom of the mighty sky
where you came? When you throw down with the thunderbolt what is strong,
like brittle things, you fly across the terrible sea! As your conquest
is violent, splendid, terrible, full and crushing, so, O Maruts, is your
gift delightful, like the largess of a liberal worshipper,
wide-spreading, laughing like heavenly lightning. From the tires of
their chariot-wheels streams gush forth, when they send out the voice of
the clouds; the lightnings smiled upon the earth, when the Maruts shower
down fatness. Prisni brought forth for the great fight the terrible
train of the untiring Maruts: when fed they produced the dark cloud, and
then looked about for invigorating food. May this praise, O Maruts, this
song of Mândârya, the son of Mâna, the poet, ask you with food for
offspring for ourselves! May we have an invigorating autumn, with
quickening rain!

VI

The Maruts charged with rain, endowed with fierce force, terrible like
wild beasts, blazing in their strength, brilliant like fires, and
impetuous, have uncovered the rain-giving cows by blowing away the
cloud. The Maruts with their rings appeared like the heavens with their