Rāmāyaṇacampū 3

English (machine translation) 3

Language: English

Then Hanūmat, swift as the king of birds, his impetuous speed expanding, / rose from the plateau of Mount Mahendra into the pathway of the cāraṇas to seek Sītā, who had been carried off by the Ten-necked One. (1)

3.2

At that moment, unable to endure the crushing pressure of his feet firmly planted to leap over the ocean, this mountain fell into a distress beyond the reach of words: as if shedding a ceaseless shower of tears with its completely out-pouring torrents of cascades; as if having its braided hair loosened and dishevelled by the masses of clouds spread here and there; as if swollen with inflammation because of its herds of elephants panicking; as if bleeding blood from its broad slopes reddened by lines of mineral dust thrown up by the split-open tips of the extremely sharp hooves of deer fleeing in terror; as if crying out because its caves resounded with lions awakened at that instant; as if its garland of entrails was spilling out due to serpents issuing thickly from surrounding chasms; as if breaking into sweat by taking on a form budded with clusters of spray dripping from dense clouds struck by the tips of swinging tree branches; and as if panting with rising heavy breaths as the sky was filled with the hissing roar of the wind bursting through the cavities of hollow bamboos shattered by the falling of crystal boulders.
Having followed in procession behind Māruti through the momentum raised by his leap, / the series of trees of the dense forest of Mahendra fell in succession; / with their crests exposed in the midst of the ocean, / they gave the illusion in the waters of a line of pegs driven into the ground along a plumb line for the future bridge. (2)

3.3

From the ocean, whose lines of waves were emptied by the force of his wing-strokes, / Mount Maināka rose up eagerly for the son of the Wind to rest upon, / pinning down the world of heaven with its array of lofty peaks. (3)

3.4

Thinking, "An obstacle to my journey has arisen here," Hanūmat struck him down with his chest; as he was advancing, Hiraṇyanābha addressed him soothingly: (9)
"I have been sent today by the grateful Ocean / to allay your fatigue from the journey, O son of the Wind; / resting [here], gentle one, proceed on your way. (4)

3.5

"I was formerly saved by your father from the Splitter of Mountains; / therefore, I am not your adversary today; resort to me, for I have wings [and am an ally]!" (5)

3.5_4

When Hanūmat, having honoured him who made this request, proceeded onward out of necessity for the task at hand: (12)

3.6

Seeing Hiraṇyanābha resting in the ocean, Śatamanyu, whose thunderbolt crushes the pride of Bala, / was freed from wrath toward him because of his service to the son of the Purifying Wind. (6)

3.7

Thereupon, as Hanūmat rushed forward swiftly toward the city of Laṅkā as before, Surasā, mother of the serpents, opened her mouth swiftly and blocked his path, as Mount Vindhya blocked the course of the Sun whose charioteer is Aruṇa.
As the son of the Purifying Wind expanded with force to conquer Surasā, / his two feet rested in the ocean, / while his head bore a garland of fine spray thrown up by the ripples of the celestial river. (7)

3.8

Then, having made his body tiny, Hanūmat / entered into her belly; / and having emerged from it, he rivalled the very stride of Trivikrama, the wielder of the discus. (8)

3.9

Once more, advancing with the speed of Nṛsiṃha, that messenger of the lord of the Raghus, / his anger aroused because his shadow was seized, / tore Siṃhikā’s body on the way with his sharp-pointed claws. (9)

3.9_5

Thereafter, alighting upon Mount Lamba on the far shore of the ocean, having assumed a very minute form and approached the northern city gate of Laṅkā, his inner heart became stretched with threads of intense anxiety:
"How can the vānara army cross this ocean that spreads obstacles? Even granting that it crosses, how could it approach this capital of the rākṣasas? The son of Daśaratha will have his desires completely frustrated; I alone have accomplished the leaping of the ocean in vain; and I do not know whether the daughter of Janaka is alive or not." Desiring thus to find the venerable Sītā there, the son of Añjanā wished solely for the setting of the Sun, the garlanded with rays, for the sake of moving about in disguise.
Thereupon, as the lordly Sun was entering the western direction, as if to tell Varuṇa that the time of purpose was approaching for Indra's bow deposited in Agastya's presence:
As the evening glow arose, creating a multitude of doubts for everyone—wondering whether this sky was reddened by rows of forest-fire flames surging from the slopes of the western mountain; or if it was tinged pale-red by masses of flames flaring from clusters of sunstones on the shore emitting fire due to the tighter wrapping of the sun's setting rays; or if it was flushed crimson by the rays of rubies disgorged from the depths of the ocean by Varuna with a delighted heart to offer a costly oblation to his arrived friend, the sun; or if it was colored here by the mass of rays from the submarine fire of the western ocean that had swelled even to taste the waters of the celestial river—while the rows of lotuses closed the panels of their petal-doors; while the bee-twice-born wandered from blue lotus to blue lotus begging for nectar; while the evening breezes became astringent by brushing against blooming blue lotus buds; while darkness spread here and there; while the gateways of the cities of the world-guardians were blackened by masses of black aloe smoke; while in every lotus pond the plaintive cry of the cakravāka birds commenced as the prelude to the agony of separation; and while the elephant of the sky was adorned with a garland of stars,

3.10

there appeared on the peak of the eastern mountain the hare-marked moon, / the very life of the erotic sentiment, an axe to the tamāla-forest of darkness. (10)

3.11

Obstructed by darkness, his rays shone in the courtyard of the sky, / like lotus shoots in a lake covered with masses of moss. (11)

3.12

At that nightfall, Hanūmat suddenly appeared, / having drawn back the curtain of his enemy’s glory, / the stage manager of the new drama of entering Laṅkā, to delight the gods. (12)

3.13

At that time, having subdued the tutelary goddess of Laṅkā, who had taken the form of a young woman to fight with him and, becoming a bolt across the passage, was fiercely threatening him; and having received her permission as she reported, by the command of the Lotus-seated Brahmā, the destruction of her own abode originating from the humiliation caused by a monkey; Māruti, searching without omission for the princess of Mithilā throughout Laṅkā, reached the palace of the emperor of the rākṣasas.
There: / "This is the city of the sovereign of the rākṣasas, guarded by the demon army; / this is his palace, bearing a cloud-bank upon its golden pinnacle; / this is the Puṣpaka chariot seized from Kubera"—thus attentively / the night, with the directions illuminated by the lamp-rays of the moon, revealed to Māruti. (13)

3.14

Moreover: / "The sun will have accomplished his purpose through his son, who desires to win matchless fame / by rendering such assistance to Sītā's husband." / Reflecting thus, desiring surely to seize great renown himself, / the moon acted as a lamp upon the path of Raghunātha's messenger in Laṅkā. (14)

3.15

Wandering around in this very way, seeing even the women of the inner apartments who surpassed the stamp of beauty of sleepless celestial maidens lying down in the bedchamber surrounded by courtesans without any hindrance, but having his desire frustrated there, Māruti, entertaining many kinds of worries, jumped down from the rampart and bowed to his chosen deity in order to search for the princess of Mithilā in the Aśoka grove as well.
Searching here and there for Janaka's daughter, in a moment / he reached the Aśoka grove, free from wandering on any other path, / just as a sage, whose wealth is tranquility, desiring the highest state and free of possessiveness, / approaches the Triple Veda, the sole divine medicine that quells all sins. (15)

3.16

Then, wandering in it—which was surrounded by numerous groves of trees consisting mostly of nāgapuṃnāga, tāla, hintāla, tamāla, kṛtamāla, sarala, bakula, vañjula, tilaka, āmalaka, kuṭaja, likuca, kataka, kakkola, aṅkola, lavaṅga, vikaṅkata, ketakī, kadamba, udumbara, kapittha, aśvattha, kuravaka, maruvaka, mākanda, kunda, tinduka, candana, syandana, campaka, cāmpeya, panasa, vetasa, palāśa, pāṭalā, rasāla, and priyālu—he climbed a certain golden śiṃśapā tree, whose sky-scraping and monstrous branches filled the expanse of the sky.
There, his body concealed by its leaves, the son of the Wind / took on the state of Janārdana lying upon a banyan leaf. (16)

3.17

Then, seeing her, he thought thus:
Beholding the queen, whose ornament of dress was gone, / like a jasmine plant transplanted by a barbarian from a mango grove into a cactus thicket, / or like a garland thrown into a cremation ground by a dog thinking it to be flesh, / brought deceitfully from the hermitage to his own palace by the night-roamer, Māruti thought: (17)

3.18

"The cool-rayed moon might live through the night even without the moonlight; / the lord of day too might shine even without his shadow-consort; / but that the lord of the Raghus lives, preserving his breath of life by clinging to fortitude / without her—this is indeed a wonder!" (18)

3.19

While Hanūmat was reflecting thus and midnight had somehow passed, and the lord of the night was also longing to attend upon the vicinity of the western mountain's peak, the Ten-necked One, whose eyes were troubled with remnants of sleep and struck by Love's arrows, whose passion was revealed by his fresh sandal-paste ointment and his desire to see Jānakī, and who eclipsed the host of stars with the garland worn across his chest and the radiance of the gems of his crown, slowly entered the Aśoka grove.
Whatever darkness was wiped away in every direction at the end of the night / by the brooms of lamps held in the hands of the courtesans, / all of that entirely entered / the heart of Rāvaṇa alone. (19)

3.20

That wicked one, his heart blinded with lust, his conduct destroyed, approached the wife of the hero of the Raghus, thinking her a mere woman, / like a lord of elephants approaching the sacrificial fire-flame, / mistaking it for a tender sallakī shoot sprouting from its root. (20)

3.20_6

Trembling like a creeper at the sight of him, her heart torn by the sequence of harsh words spoken by that base man, the princess of Mithilā, relying on the conviction of her beloved husband's heart, placed a mere blade of grass between them and spoke:
"Ah, Parameṣṭhin, who is firmly established as the foundation of all righteous conduct, is indeed the ancestral guru of your family! Delight in another's wife surely brings disgrace to those born in that lineage.
If you were to take this person back again to the vicinity of Pañcavaṭī, like a favorable wind bringing a strayed boat to the proximity of the shore, then surely the lord of my life will show mercy even to you, and Yama, the lord of life himself, would become merciful toward you.
You will also become an object of the imperishable friendship of the son of Daśaratha."

3.21

“Yet who but you would believe to wash, with the stream of blood welling from his own heart, the noble prince’s arrow, its tip muddy with the thick fat adhering delightfully at the time of crushing the night-roamer army headed by Khara?
Or else, if your own misconduct brings about the breakfast of blood-water for the cataka-birds that are the arrows of the son of Sumitrā, who have thirsted under the drought of a lack of battle ever since the battle of Janasthāna, who would be able to avert it?”
Then, to the lord of the night-roamers pierced by the five arrows of Love,
not a single word of Janaka's daughter brought relief;
for when a man is bitten by a five-headed serpent and his death has arrived,
can the power of an herb whose poison-remedying virtue has been neutralized enter him? (21)

3.22

Hearing this speech of disdain from Janaka’s daughter, the Ten-faced One turned his face away in wrath, and addressing the female rākṣasa guards living around her: “All of you must surely make her yield by the four stratagems. If she will not consent, take this wretched woman to the kitchen for tomorrow's morning meal!” Having thus ordered, as the end of night approached, he entered his own dwelling.
Thereupon Janaka’s daughter, the lotus of her heart closed by the display of terrible glares and abusive words from the female night-roamers, assuming the posture of a doe surrounded by a pack of tigers, like a youthful celestial woman fallen to the earth by the force of a curse, fell into anxious thought thus:
“Surely, once Jaṭāyu had passed away after learning what had transpired,
did my noble lord, the sovereign, not discover me staying here? (22)

3.23

Or is it rather that, his mind confounded by the deceit of the flesh-eater, indifference has arisen in the descendant of Kakutstha?
Not only did that evil-souled one steal me away,
he also stole Rāma’s innate compassion;
if this were not so, would he, affectionate to those seeking his refuge,
the peerless hero of the universe, remain silent? (23)”

3.24

Lamenting in this way, constantly meditating only on the bull among the Raghus, she fell into a faint with difficulty.
Trijaṭā, secretly holding back the female night-roamers who were threatening that woman of faultless conduct,
related a single nightmare witnessed by herself, which was a festival for the world of the sleepless gods: (24)

3.25

Moreover:
As Sītā, the creeping vine, approached the earth and rolled for a long time on the ground
because her supporting tree was out of sight,
emaciated by the faces of the female night-roamers, Trijaṭā became her matted root. (25)

3.26

Immediately after this, while the princess of Mithilā was longing to cast away her life, Māruti, taking up the thought: “This ascetic woman, who does not abandon rightful conduct, is not to be neglected,” drew nearer to her.
Then:
He gently showered down the sweet honeys of reciting Rāma’s praise,
composed in accordance with his lineage,
to inspire her confidence—medicines to heal the wound
inside the queen’s ears torn by the thunderbolt of the Ten-headed One's words. (26)

3.27

Immediately after this, Janaka's daughter cast her eyes all around, and having caught sight of a monkey on that branch, her heart alarmed with the thought of an evil dream, praying for welfare for her husband Rāma together with Lakṣmaṇa, reflected: “How could a dream come to this person for whom sleep is hard to obtain?”, and fearing him to be the lord of the rākṣasas arrived through sorcery, she was terrified of the son of the Wind.
He too, the son of Añjanā, descended, and in order to inspire confidence in Janaka’s daughter by the elegance of his speech, spoke with folded hands:
“O auspicious lady, do not take me to be otherwise than the messenger of the chief of the Raghus,
who languishes with intense anguish through separation from you! (27)

3.28

His thoughts departing together with you,
sharing the same condition as the cakravāka bird at night,
the prince of Kosala has spoken through my mouth
a word of greeting asking after your welfare, O princess of Mithilā. (28)

3.29

Moreover:
The son of Sumitrā offered you homage with his head;
and he too, the sovereign of the forest-dwellers, inquired after your welfare. (29)”

3.30

Questioned then by her, who had gained confidence and was freed from fear upon being addressed in this manner, the son of the Wind, having related the cause of Vālin's death and his alliance with Sugrīva, gave her the auspicious ring engraved with Rāma's name, which was ever-present like the mind of Prācetasa.
Truly, the day of the marriage-celebration for Janaka's daughter
did not attain even the hundredth fraction on earth
of the day she beheld the ring of Rāma
brought by the son of the Wind, bearer of joy. (30)

3.31

Then, with boundless joy, Jānakī spoke to him:
“O noble one! Death approaches this wicked-souled one in every way; so it was told by Vibhīṣaṇa’s daughter named Analā, sent by her mother. Furthermore, this man of ignoble nature will not surrender me to the noble prince without the fourth stratagem. Surely I too shall not be able to sustain my wretched breath beyond a month.”
Hearing this, Māruti said: “O noble lady, do not fear! Carrying you indeed, having swiftly leaped over the ocean, I shall reach the vicinity of the lotus-feet of the best of the Raghus. Do not consider me incapable!”
Moreover:
He assumed an immense growth comparable to a great mountain,
by which indeed the mass of waters assumed a state equal to a little ditch. (31)

3.32

Then that delighted daughter of the king of Janaka said to him:
“What indeed is difficult for you, who have crossed the ocean on foot?
Yet, O bull among monkeys, if you go with me,
surely your journey will turn out to be fraught with peril. (32)

3.33

Moreover:
If I were to reduce him to ashes by the fire of devotion to my husband,
truly the arrow of Daśaratha's son would have no meal suited to itself;
moreover, even the moon of his fame would become faded in splendor.
Brother, once Rāvaṇa has been punished by the lord of the Raghus, my departure will be for the better. (33)”

3.34

Thus addressed, the son of the Wind spoke again to the humble Sītā:
“O princess of Mithilā, for you, deceived by an illusory deer,
to return by means of a monkey is unbefitting.
If even this tale were to spread through the world,
what renowned praise would remain for Rāma’s bow? (34)”

3.35

"Why say more? Only this was considered: what was worthy of the wife of Raghu's scion, precisely that was decided; what was fitting for such conduct, precisely that was revealed; what corresponded to retaliating for Rāvaṇa's offense, precisely that was approved; what was in keeping with the character of a noble wife, precisely that was spoken; what was appropriate to the dignified speech of a kṣatriya woman, precisely that was undertaken." Praising her repeatedly thus, [he said,] "O Jānakī, know that by all means Rāma and Lakṣmaṇa have reached this Laṅkā. Grant this servant permission to depart;
let some token of recognition previously known to the descendant of Kakutstha be given."
She, however, sighing deeply and making up her mind, [said,] "Long ago indeed, in the forest on the slopes of Citrakūṭa, while I rested my head on the lap of Raghu's delight—[a forest] whose beauty of youthful trees made the splendor of the Nandana garden pale—the lord of the Raghus beheld a crow named Dhāradhara inflicting a wound with the sharp tips of his claws upon the swell of my breast.
That hero discharged against the crow, the son of Indra, / the missile of the lotus-seated Brahmā in the form of a blade of grass; / then, by his mercy, deprived only of an eye, / that long-lived one bore a name true to its meaning."

3.35_7

She, whose wretched state was doubled by the recollection of that familiar tale, untied this other token of recognition fastened in her hair,

3.36

and the slender-limbed woman, the fire of whose wrath was heaped up by terror of the Ten-faced One, / gave the crest-jewel to the foremost of monkeys. / Taking it with a reverent bow, he set out, / his arm like a serpent whose mouth holds a ruby.

3.37

Then, having accomplished his task, the son of the Wind went forth and, in order to make his arrival known to the lord of the night-roamers, shattered the Aśoka grove.
Manifesting through his actions an extreme bending of branches, / roaming off the proper path, effecting the ruin of blossoms, / and causing terror to birds of sweet notes— / he displayed in the garden of Laṅkā the sport of the Ten-faced One.

3.38

Thereupon, after Hanūmat had slain the Kiṅkaras—dreadful as the servants of the Lord of Ancestors, dispatched by the Ten-faced One who was enraged at the destruction of the pleasure-grove reported in haste by the troop of guarding rākṣasas—together with Jambumālin, son of Prahasta, and had mounted the arch of the temple;
Rāvaṇa, having once again heard of the slaughter of an endless host of night-roamers, sent forth five ministers headed by Prahasana, who possessed the valor of lions, [commanding:] "Capture the monkey alive!"
When he had dispatched those five as well to their death with the crossbar of the gateway, and was repeatedly proclaiming himself, "I am the envoy of Daśaratha's son!", the ruler of all the rākṣasas hurled forth prince Akṣa, his commander, to subdue Hanūmat.
Hanūmat, united with the glory of a hero, / reddening out of season the path of the stars / with the dust rising from the golden temple wall shattered by the impact of his chest, / hastened to the courtyard of the city of the Ten-faced One / to play a game of dice with the champion among the rākṣasas as the piece to be cast down onto the gaming board of the earth's surface.

3.39

At that very moment, under the watchful gaze of the night-roamers, having accomplished the slaughter of [Akṣa] on the battlefield and having burned the temple palace with the fire produced from an uprooted pillar, the son of the Wind once again took refuge on the gateway arch. When he heard this incident as well, the twenty eyes of the enraged lord of the night-roamers fell all at once upon his son, the vanquisher of Indra, for the sake of battle.
"In the realm of the gods, in the sky, or on the surface of the earth, / who is capable of facing you when you have entered into battle?" / Praising Meghanāda with these words of eulogy, / the lord of the rākṣasas dispatched him, saying: "Bring the monkey here!"

3.40

To bring grief upon the lord of the night-roamers, to destroy the army of the rākṣasas, / to make the women of his inner quarters weep without pride, / and to purify with fire the city of Laṅkā, which was deprived of the entrance of the sun and moon— / battle was joined at the gateway between this monkey and the conqueror of Indra.

3.41

In that stormy day of battle raining arrows, / Māruti rejoiced at Meghanāda, / as a peacock rejoices at the rumble of thunder.

3.42

Thereupon, furious at the death of the foremost warriors of the yātudhāna army and perceiving the futility of various weapons, the son of the Ten-necked One bound the son of the Wind, in whom lingered the fragrance of the goddess of victory, with the weapon of Brahmā.
When his body was incapacitated by that divine weapon, the flesh-eaters bound him with ropes of hemp.
That binding of Māruti, born of the nooses of the night-roamers, / became the cause of release from bondage / for the celestial beauties formerly imprisoned / by that defiler of the lineage of Pulastya.

3.43

Thereupon, observing the power of the divine weapon, which was concealed because it could not brook the binding by another, the son of the lord of the night-roamers led the son of the Wind into the presence of his own father.
He beheld the Ten-necked One, the strength of whose arms was tested / by the lifting of the pleasure-mountain of the enemy of Andhaka, / his upper garment stirred by the wind from the chowries / waved by the fingertips of the captive courtesans of Indra's city,

3.44

the splendor of whose body was variegated by the stream of radiance from his fangs / shining between the rims of his slightly pale lips, / like the sapphire mountain of Indra, charming / with streaks of nectar-rays in the midst of evening clouds,

3.45

the expanse of whose chest was imprinted with the broken and embedded tusks / of the directional elephants through clashes in the sport of battle, / like an ocean endowed with disks of the cool-rayed moon / reflected upon every wave,

3.46

as though the ripening of the sins of the three worlds had assumed bodily form / to obstruct the path leading to final beatitude, / or as though darkness had been consecrated according to its desire, / having conquered through the power of asceticism the splendors of the sun, moon, and fire.

3.47

Beholding the monkey, the son of the Wind, / the lord of the flesh-eaters, his heart filled with wonder, / thought that Nandīśvara himself had arrived, / he who had pronounced the curse at the offense of shaking Mount Kailāsa.

3.48

Then Māruti, interrogated in various ways by Prahasta, replied to Rāvaṇa.
"Here am I, a messenger of the glorious son of Daśaratha—the crest-jewel of the solar race, true to his promise, devoted to forest life undertaken at his father's command; whose arrows are like the fires of universal dissolution to the straw-bundle of forces led by Khara and the other night-roamers, enraged by the disfigurement suffered by Śūrpaṇakhā when she assailed the enemy of Śūrpa [Lakṣmaṇa]; who formed an alliance with Sugrīva while searching for his wife abducted during the slaying of the counterfeit deer; who uprooted the thorn that was Vālin; and who destroyed the pride in arm-strength of the son of Jamadagni, that treasury of austerities and wind to the forest of the wicked warrior lineage. I am one among the vānaras sent in every direction by the son of the Sun to search for Sītā's trail. Swift of foot across the ocean, having bowed to the lawful wife of the best of the Raghus at the boundary of your city's pleasure-garden, and wishing to depart, I crushed the grove of trees in the Aśoka grove only to make my arrival known, and merely out of curiosity to see you did I submit to the binding of the rākṣasa's spider-thread and approach your presence.
Imprisoning here the wife of the lord of Raghu's line, / whose noble conduct is celebrated as far as heaven, / why do you strive to tie up with a cloth, O ill-mannered one, / the friend of the wind born from the sacrificial altar? ..48..

3.49

Moreover: / Hovering in the vanguard of battle out of hunger for flesh, / may the assembly of birds not take on the appearance of an umbrella around your body wounded by the arrows of the son of Sumitrā! / Quickly, O Paulastya, should the extinction of Pulastya's lineage be brought about on your account, / may the water pouring from the corners of your beloved wives' eyes not become the funeral water! ..49..

3.50

Though bent on seizing another's wife, O ignoble one, / do not go near the wife of the leader of the Ikṣvākus! / Saying to himself 'I am a wind-eater', does a serpent / whose palate craves breeze long for the breath of the son of Vinatā [Garuḍa]? ..50..

3.51

Drawn forth from the hollow of his quiver, / the serpent-arrow of the sandalwood-armed lord of the Raghus / will drink your life-breath, O ill-mannered one, / without allowing any delay! ..51..

3.52

Why say more? / With the phantom deer as the stage-manager of the drama of battle, / and the branch-deer [monkey] possessing a tail hostile to you, / what other armor is there against the arrow of the lord of the Raghus, / already seen to be raised, except the armor of bowing in submission? ..52..

3.53

Hearing this, the king of flesh-eaters, enraged, / commanded his soldiers: 'Deprive him of his life!' / But here Vibhīṣaṇa, of mind pure from birth, / checked him with the rule of the treatises: 'An envoy must not be slain.' ..53..

3.54

Rāvaṇa too, accepting Vibhīṣaṇa's speech, ordered the rākṣasas: 'Among the limbs of monkeys, the tail is indeed the best. Wrap it in cotton cloths, set it ablaze, proclaim his crimes at crossroad after crossroad, and parade him around the city with beatings!'
As they were doing so: / From his tail, which defied determination [as to its length], / variegated like a cluster of karṇikāra blossoms, / by the accumulated fortune of the unblinking gods / the divine [fire] that awakens at dawn flared up. ..54..

3.55

Hearing this news related with arrogance by the troop of female rākṣasa guards, Jānakī, her mind tormented with grief, approached the fire and prayed with folded hands: 'Be cool to Hanūmat!'
Thinking, 'May I not become for even an instant the kindling / of the terrible fire made of the austerities of Rāghava's wife,' / the Fire, spreading coolness, remained on the tip of the son of the Wind's tail / like a jeweled lamp. ..55..

3.56

Thereupon, the son of the Wind, thinking, 'Indeed, I did not see this city very clearly by night; therefore I shall inspect the entire city with the fire as witness,' struck down the host of night-roamers with an iron bar from the familiar city gate.
In order to deliver the Kamalā named Sītā to his master, / the Creator, indeed, churned the ocean of Laṅkā, / terrifying with the waves of agitated armies, / with the Mandara that was the son of the Wind, coiled around by the body of the serpent king [his burning tail] as the churning-rope. ..56..

3.57

Then, as Laṅkā was burning:
Hanūmat scattered across the sky a mass of smoke like Trijaṭā to Vaidehī: / a night to the lotus-faces of the demon women, / the arrival of the monsoon to the peahen that is the earth, / a mass of storm clouds to the flock of kadamba birds that was the Ten-faced One's fame, / and like the ascetic tresses of the bride Laṅkā whose mind was resolved on the attire suited to widowhood. ..57..

3.58

Moreover: / In order to serve as a pretext for the vidyādharas / who wished out of fear of the rākṣasa king to conceal the tears of joy / produced by watching this feat of valor, / this mass of smoke expanded so profusely / that even in heaven it aroused the suspicion of the waves of the daughter of Mount Kalinda [the Yamunā]. ..58..

3.58_8

[The note indicates] 'tadā' is a variant reading [for 'mudā'].

3.59

First the beauty of blue silk, then the splendor of a waistband set with emeralds, / then a pattern of musk-paste, and for an instant the rival of a garland of blooming blue lotuses, / and afterwards resembling glistening collyrium—such did the smoke born from the burning of the Ten-faced One's city / then become upon the hips, breasts, waists, necks, and eyes of the women of the quarters. ..59..

3.60

'Alas, father! Alas, mother! Alas, son! Alas, comrade! / Alas, grandson! Alas, dear friend! Where indeed? Alas, I am ruined!' / With these and other words laden with the laments of the citizens, / the city of Rāvaṇa, encircled by fire, was filled to the brim. ..60..

3.61

Those which performed the wave-offering of light before the faces of divine beauties, / those which formed an array of lightning even in a cloudless sky— / those rising sparks of fire from his tail, not having gone out even for two or three days, / displayed in the ocean the grandeur of the flames of the submarine fire. ..61..

3.62

Seeing Laṅkā, whose wealth was reduced to nothing but embers / by contact with the blazing tail of the son of the Wind, / the night-roamers standing in the sky were, as it were, / extinguishing their own houses with the waters born of their eyes. ..62..

3.63

The deed that the troop of demons, dispatched by the King of the Night-Roamers, / could not perform in the forefront of battle even by order of Śakrajit, / was accomplished by the seven-flamed Fire united with Hanūmat as it burned Laṅkā; / yet even when united with his father, the Wind, it was not so skilled in the work of burning. ..63..

3.64

Having undergone purification in that fire / born from the kindling-stick that was Hanūmat, / the Royal Fortune of the King of the Gods, abducted by the strength of the lord of Laṅkā's arms / in his eagerness for the sport of battle, wished to return to her own husband. ..64..

3.65

What need of many words now? / Having arrived, this messenger of the descendant of Kakutstha / made the city of Laṅkā, guarded by Rāvaṇa's arms, / easily accessible to the messenger of Death. ..65..

3.66

As if purifying the sin arising from contact with the sinful Paulastya, / that vānara performing a sacrifice, / having accomplished the conquest of Akṣa [and the dice], / offering oblations of the rākṣasa kindling-sticks in the fire of his own tail, attained a good destination [and a good gait]. // 66

3.67

Knowing from the words of the celestial bards that the beloved of the lord of the Raghus was unharmed even during the burning of Laṅkā, / joyfully bowing to her and receiving her command for the return journey, / mounting Mount Ariṣṭa and effortlessly crossing the reservoir of waters at speed, / Hanūmat went to Mount Mahendra and fulfilled the desires of the leaders of the monkey race. // 67

3.68

Then, having honored the army commanders according to their rank, Māruti, questioned by them, narrated his entire story.
Thereupon, gladdened by the words of the son of the Wind, the vānara army, followed by the troop leaders—rushing in mutual rivalry as if wishing to share and tell to the son of Daśaratha and Sugrīva the joy born of seeing her—overran, with Hanūmat's consent, the Madhuvana protected by Dadhimukha on the way, and enjoyed the pleasure of drinking honey.
Then this enraged Dadhimukha, / with folded hands, said to Aṅgada, tall as the best of mountains: / "You must swiftly stop these monkeys, / who are like arrows in ruining the honey!" // 68