Texts 3-4
yasya nirhrāditenāṅga
niṣṭhureṇa gavāṁ nṛṇām
patanty akālato garbhāḥ
sravanti sma bhayena vai
nirviśanti ghanā yasya
kakudy acala-śaṅkayā
taṁ tīkṣṇa-śṛṅgam udvīkṣya
gopyo gopāś ca tatrasuḥ
yasya — whose; nirhrāditena — by the reverberating sound; aṅga — my dear King (Parīkṣit); niṣṭhureṇa — rough; gavām — of cows; nṛṇām — of humans; patanti — fall; akālataḥ — untimely; garbhāḥ — the embryos; sravanti sma — are miscarried; bhayena — out of fear; vai — indeed; nirviśanti — enter; ghanāḥ — clouds; yasya — whose; kakudi — onto the hump; acala — as a mountain; śaṅkayā — by the mistaken identification; tam — him; tīkṣṇa — sharp; śṛṅgam — whose horns; udvīkṣya — seeing; gopyaḥ — the cowherd women; gopāḥ — the cowherd men; ca — and; tatrasuḥ — became frightened.
My dear King, clouds hovered about sharp-horned Ariṣṭāsura’s hump, mistaking it for a mountain, and when the cowherd men and ladies caught sight of the demon, they were struck with terror. Indeed, the strident reverberation of his roar so frightened the pregnant cows and women that they lost their fetuses in miscarriages.
The Vedic literature categorizes miscarriages as follows: Ā-caturthād bhavet srāvaḥ pātaḥ pañcama-ṣaṣṭhayoḥ/ ata ūrdhvaṁ prasūtiḥ syāt. “Up to the fourth month a premature delivery is called srāva, in the fifth and sixth months it is called pāta, and after this it is considered a birth (prasūti).”