The Ramayana/Book III/Canto VIII: The Hermitage

So Ráma and Sumttrá's son, When every honour due was done, Slept through the night. When morning broke, The heroes from their rest awoke. Betimes the son of Raghu rose, With gentle Sítá, from repose, And sipped the cool delicious wave Sweet with the scent the lotus gave, Then to the Gods and sacred flame The heroes and the lady came, And bent their heads in honour meet Within the hermit's pure retreat. When every stain was purged away, They saw the rising Lord of Day: Then to Sutíkhna's side they went, And softly spoke, most reverent: 'Well have we slept, O holy lord, Honoured of thee by all adored: Now leave to journey forth we pray: These hermits urge us on our way. We haste to visit, wandering by, The ascetics' homes that round you lie, And roaming Dandak's mighty wood To view each saintly brotherhood, For thy permission now we sue, With these high saints to duty true, By penance taught each sense to tame,-- In lustre like the smokeless flame. Ere on our brows the sun can beat With fierce intolerable heat. Like some unworthy lord who wins His power by tyranny and sins, O saint, we fain would part.' The three Bent humbly to the dovotee. He raised the princes as they pressed His feet, and strained them to his breast; And then the chief of devotees Bespake them both in words like these. 'Go with thy brother, Ráma, go, Pursue thy path untouched by woe: Go with thy faithful Sítá, she Still like a shadow follows thee Roam Dandak wood observing well The pleasant homes where hermits dwell,-- Pure saints whose ordered souls adhere To penance rites and vows austere. There plenteous roots and berries grow, And noble trees their blossoms show, And gentle deer and birds of air In peaceful troops are gathered there. There see the full-blown lotus stud The bosom of the lucid flood, And watch the joyous mallard shake The reeds that fringe the pool and lake. See with delighted eye the rill Leap sparkling from her parent hill, And hear the woods that round thee lie Reëcho to the peacock's cry. And as I bid thy brother, so, Sumitrá's child, I bid thee go. Go forth, these varied beauties see, And then once more return to me.' Thus spake the sage Sutikshna: both The chiefs assented, nothing loth. Round him with circling steps they paced, Then for the road prepared with haste. Tnere Sítá stood, the dame long-eyed, Fair quivers round their waists she tied, And gave each prince his trusty bow, And sword which ne*er a spot might know. Each took his quiver from her *and. And clanging bow and gleaming brand: Then from the hermits' home the two Went forth each woodland scene to view. Eavh beauteous in the bloom of age, Dismissed by that illustrious sage, With bow and sword accoutred, hied Away, and Sítá by their side.