352 THE FOREST. bespangled with jewels. When Síta saw this wondrously beautiful creature clothed with loveliness in its every limb, she cried : "0 Raghubír, hearken, kind sir, this deer has a most charming skin ; I pray you, shoot it, most amiable lord, and bring me the hide." Thereupon Ráma, who understood the meaning of it all, arose with joy to execute the purpose of the gods. Having marked the deer, he girded up his waistbelt, took his bow in his hand and trimmed his shapely arrows. Then the lord cautioned Lakshman : "Many demons, bro-. ther, roam the forest ; take care of Síta with all thought and consideration and with force too, if occasion requires it." The deer, seeing the Lord, took to flight: Ráma pursued with ready bow : even he, to whom the Veda cannot attain, nor Siva is able to contemplate, hastened in pursuit of a mimic deer. Now close at hand, now fleeing at a distance, at one time in sight, at another hid, alter- nately showing and concealing itself and practising every kind of wile, in this. manner it took the Lord far away. At last Ráma aimed and let fly the fatal shaft ; the deer fell to the ground with a terrible cry, first calling aloud to Lakshman, but afterwards mentally invoking Ráma. his natural form and devoutly repeated the name of Ráma, who in his wisdom recognizing his inward love, gave him such a place in heaven as saints can. scarcely attain to. As life ebbed, he resumed. Dohá 23. The gods rained down abundant flowers and hymned the Lord's high vir-. tue : "Raghunáth, the suppliant's friend, raises to his own sphere even a demon !" Chaupái. As soon as he had slain the monster, Raghubír returned ; the bow gleam-. ing in his hand and the quiver by his side. When Síta heard the agonizing cry, she called to. Lahshman in the greatest alarm : "Go in haste, your brother is in some sad strait." Lakshman answered with a smile : “ Hearken, mother; he, by the play of whose eyebrows the world is annihilated, cannot be imagined as having fallen into any difficulty." But when Sita urged him with taunting words, Lakshman's resolution-for such was Hari's will-was shaken; he made over charge of everything to the forest and its gods, and went after the Ráhu of the moon-like Rávan. When the Ten-headed saw the ground vacant he drew near in the guise of an anchorite. He, for fear of whom gods and demons trembled and could neither sleep by night nor eat food by day, even that Rávan, came looking this side and that, as furtively as a cur, bent on thiev- ing. After he bad turned his steps, Garúr, to this vile course, not a particle of
