487:1 I have briefly despatched Kumbha and Nikumbha, each of whom has in the text a long Canto to himself. When they fall Rvan sends forth Makarksha or Crocodile-Eye, the son of Khara who was slain by Rma in the forest before the abduction of Sit. The account of his sallying forth, of his battle with Rma and of his death by the fiery dart of that hero occupies two Cantos which I entirely pass over. Indrajit again comes forth and, rendered invisible by his magic art slays countless Vnars with his unerring arrows. He retires to the city and returns bearing in his chariot an effigy of Sit, the work of magic, weeping and wailing by his side. He grasps the lovely image by the hair and cuts it down with his scimitar in the sight of the enraged Hanmn and all the Vnar host. At last after much fighting of the usual kind Indrajit's chariot is broken in pieces, his charioteer is slain, and he himself falls by Lakshman's hand, to the inexpressible delight of the high-souled saints, the nymphs of heaven aud other celestial beings.
487:1b The Lokaplas are sometimes regarded as deities appointed by Brahm at the creation of the word* to act as guardians of different orders of beings, but more commonly they are identified with the deities presiding over the four cardinal and four intermediate points of the compass, which, according to Manu V.96, are 1, Indra, guardian of the East; 2, Agni, of the South-east; 3, Yama, of the South; 4, Srya, of the South-west: 5, Varuna, of the West; 6, Pavana or Vyu, of the North-west; 7, Kuvera, of the North; 8, Soma or Chandra, of the North-east.