8. Excellent art thou, O night, like a decorated bowl; thou bearest [as] maiden the whole form of kine; full of eyes, eager, [thou showest] me wondrous forms; thou hast put on (prati-muc) the stars of heaven (divyá).
Of this verse also the translation is a make-shift, following in part the mss. and in part our conjectural emendations. In a the only point of question is the last word, which the mss. read as ṣiṣṭás (so the majority) or çiṣṭas or viṣṭás ⌊etc.⌋: the comm. has viṣṭas (= bhojanārtham pariviṣṭas). Ppp. gives the whole pāda as bhadrā ’si rātris tapaso nu viṣṭo. In b, nearly all the mss. give víçvaṁ górūpaṁ yuvatir ⌊several have -tím⌋ bibharṣi (one has bíbh-), and this the translation follows, alterations not seeming to supply a better sense. SPP., however, follows the comm. in offering víṣvan̄ for víçvam (in saṁhitā he prints it incorrectly víṣvaṁ gó-, as if there were an assimilated final in the case); ⌊but in his Corrections at the end of vol. iv. he duly notes the error;⌋ he would hardly accept the comm's interpretation, = viṣūcī (one gender for another); but how he would render it, it is hard to see. Ppp. reads viçvaṁ gorūpaṁ yuvatid vibharṣi, but another hand has written above -tir bibha-. In c, nearly all the mss. (including the comm's text, as stated by SPP.) leave me unchanged before uçatī́ and SPP. accepts it in his text, though against all rule and practice; two of our mss. have ma. ⌊All the authorities give cákṣuṣmatī, and this is followed by the comm. and SPP., and also by W. in the translation, therein departing from the emendation ('to me having eyes') of the Berlin ed.⌋ Ppp. has for the pāda cakṣuṣmatī ve yuvatī ’va rūpaḥ. The translation supplies a verb, as seems necessary unless the text be still further altered. For d the general ms.-reading is práti tyā́ṁ divyā́ tákmā amukthāḥ (also tvám and tvā́ for tyā́m, and takmā́; p. takmā̀ḥ or -mā́ḥ); but the comm. offers práti tváṁ divyā́ ná kṣā́m amukthāḥ, and this SPP. accepts ⌊accenting thus⌋ and prints. Ppp. has pratyāṁ dityāṁ divyām arukṣam amugdhaḥ. The comm's version of the text is senseless, and his attempt to put meaning into it very absurd; it might suggest práti tváṁ divyā́ nákṣatrāṇy amukthāḥ. Our text ought to accent tā́rakā am-, if the reading is admitted.
9. What thief shall come today, [what] malicious mortal villain, may night, going to meet him, smite away the neck, ⌊away⌋ the head of him;—
The two following pādas ⌊10 a, b⌋ evidently belong to this verse rather than to verse 10; but our division is that of the mss. and the Anukr., and so is adopted also by SPP. The comm. inserts another line after our 9 a, b: yo mama rātri surūpa āyati sa sampiṣṭo apāyati; and then he divides the four lines that follow into two verses of four pādas each, giving eleven verses to the whole hymn. The majority of mss. accent martyás in b. The comm. reads harat for hanat at the end. Ppp. has yu dya stenā yutv aghāyu mṛtyo ripuḥ; and, in d, pra gīyasva pra. Pāda a is the a of iv. 3. 5, ⌊of which the b recurs here as the second pāda of the comm's inserted line and also as the fourth pāda of our vs. 10⌋.
