go by the falling-off (apadhvaṅsá) of roads; let Indra smite him with the thunderbolt.
The first half-verse is identical with xix. 49. 9 a, 10 d. The comm. separates apa from dhvaṅsena, and construes it with etu; dhvaṅsa he renders "bad road" (kaṣṭena mārgeṇa).
6. Ruined (mūrṇá) [are] the teeth of the beast (mṛgá); crushed in also [are its] ribs; disappearing be for thee the godhā́; downward go (ayat) the lurking (? çaçayú) beast.
The comm. takes mūrṇās from mūrch, and renders it mūḍhās; in b he reads api çīrṣṇās, the latter being horns and the like, that grow "on the head." The second half-verse is extremely obscure and doubtful: Ludwig translates "into the depth shall the crocodile, the game go springing deep down"; Grill, "with lame sinew go to ruin the hare-hunting animal." Ni-mruc is used elsewhere only of the 'setting' of the sun etc.; the comm. renders it here "disappearing from sight"; and he takes çaçayu from çī 'lie'; godhā is, without further explanation, "the animal of that name." The translation given follows the comm.; it does not seem that a "hare-hunting" animal would be worth guarding against. R. conjectures a figure of a bird of prey, struck in flight: "the sinew be thy destruction; down fall the hare-hunting bird." Pāda a lacks a syllable. ⌊W. takes mūrṇá from mṛ 'crush'; cf. xii. 5. 61 and Index.—In a and b, supply "be" rather than "are"?⌋
7. What thou contractest (sam-yam) mayest thou not protract (vi-yam); mayest thou protract what thou dost not contract; Indra-born, soma-born art thou, an Atharvan tiger-crusher (-jámbhana).
The sense of a, b is obscure; the comm. takes viyamas and saṁyamas as two nouns. Ppp. makes one verse of our 7 a, b and 6 a, b (omitting the other half-verses), and puts it next after our vs. 3; its version of 7 a, b is yat saṁ naso vi yan naso na saṁ nasa. The verse is scanned by the Anukr. as 8 + 8: 6 + 12 = 34 syllables. ⌊Read indrajā́ asi?—For a, b, see Griffith.⌋
4. For recovery of virility: with a plant.
[Atharvan.—aṣṭarcam. vānaspatyam. ānuṣṭubham: 4. purauṣṇih; 6, 7. bhurij.]
Found in Pāipp. iv. (except vs. 7, and in the verse-order 1-3, 5, 8, 4, 6). Used by Kāuç. (40. 14) in a rite for sexual vigor.
Translated: Griffith, i. 134 and 473; Bloomfield, 31, 369; Weber, xviii. 16.
1. Thee that the Gandharva dug for Varuṇa whose virility (? -bhráj) was dead, thee here do we dig, a penis-erecting herb.
The meaning of bhráj ⌊cf. vii. 90. 2⌋ has to be inferred from the connection; the comm. paraphrases by naṣṭávīrya. The plant intended he declares to be "that called kapitthaka" (Feronia elephantum). The pada-reading of the last word is çepaḥ॰hárṣaṇīm, and Prāt. ii. 56 prescribes the loss of the visarga of çepaḥ in saṁhitā; the comment to Prāt. iv. 75 gives the reading thus: çepoharṣaṇīm iti çepaḥ॰harṣaṇīm; and one of our pada-mss. presents it in the same form, adding kramakāle 'this is the krama-reading'; and the comm. has çepoha-; but Ppp., çepaharṣiṇī. As çépa is as genuine and old a form as çépas, there seems to be no good reason for the peculiar treatment of the compound.
