my @column1;
my @column2;
my @column3;
my @column4;

while( @array and $array[0] ne '--') {
    push @column1, shift @array;
};
shift @array;
while( @array and $array[0] ne '--') {
    push @column2, shift @array;
};
shift @array;
while( @array and $array[0] ne '--') {
    push @column3, shift @array;
};
shift @array;
while( @array and $array[0] ne '--') {
    push @column4, shift @array;
};
shift @array;

for my $row (1..3) {
    print join "\t", $column1[$row], $column2[$row],$column3[$row],$column4[$row];
    print "\n";
};

##</code><code>##

my @column;

my $curr_column = 0;
my $rows = 0;
while( @array and ) {
    if( $array[0] ne '--' ) {
        $column[ $curr_column ] ||= []; # a new column
        push @{ $column[ $curr_column ] }, shift @array;
        if( $rows < $#{ $column[ $curr_column ] } ) {
            $rows = $#{ $column[ $curr_column ] };
        };
    } else {
        $index++;
        shift @array;
    };
};

for my $row (0..$rows) {
    print join "\t", map { $_->[ $row ] } @column;
    print "\n";
};