Chapter CL: Section VIII

Staying in that mansion, that intelligent monkey, the offspring of the Wind-god, beheld that splendid aerial car, beauteous with excellent jewels, and furnished with windows of burnished gold. And the car, embellished with transcendentally beautiful figures,--belauded by Vicwakarma himself constituting the acme (of his art),--which, mounting the welkin, looked like a mark of the Sun's orbit,--appeared . resplendent. And there was nothing in that car which was not made skilfully;--nothing that did not look like a precious jewel (sprung spontaneously on its person),--and the style displayed in its various parts surpassed anything that could be found in the cars of the celestials themselves,--and everything in that car was executed in the highest style of excellence--(that car) obtained (by Ravana) in virtue of prowess sprung from asceticism and contemplation (of the Deity); capable of repairing wherever (the owner) wished to wend; displaying various kinds of constructive skill; composed of materials procured from diverse sources,--such as were worthy of a celestial car; fleet-coursing in consonance with the wish of its master; incapable of being approached;[259] equal to the wind in celerity; the source of happiness unto ious, high-souled, and pious ones--possessors of (word missing) fineless'[260] and high rapture; coursing through the firmament in a variety of ways,--the congeries of all wonderful things,--adorned with ranges of chambers; captivating to the mind; stainless as the autumnal Moon; furnished with splendid summits, like the crest of a mountain; which was borne by rangers of the night, given to mighty meals, ranging the sky, with faces graced with ear-rings; and by thousands of ghosts possessed of terrible speed, having expansive, winkless and rolling eyes. That heroic first of monkeys saw that excellent car, beauteous with vernal blossoms,--fairer than the month of spring and furnished with flowers.

[259] By the impious. Another reading is _duravaram_--incapable of being
approached by the enemy.--T.

[260] _Vide Othello_.--T.