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Book Iv. Canto Xlix. Angad's Speech

Canto Xlix.: Angad'S Speech.


Then Angad spake: 'We Vnars

Have searched each valley, cave, and dell,

And hill, and brook, and dark recess,

And tangled wood, and wilderness.

But all in vain: no eye has seen

The robber or the Maithil queen.

A dreary time has passed away,

And stern is he we all obey.

Come, cast your grief and sloth aside:

Again be every effort tried;

So haply may our toil attain

The sweet success that follows pain.

Laborious effort, toil, and skill,

The firm resolve, the constant will

Secure at last the ends we seek:

Hence, O my friends, I boldly speak.

Once more then, noble hearts, once more

Let us to-day this wood explore,

And, languor and despair subdued,

Purchase success with toil renewed.

Sugrva king austere,

And Rma's wrath we needs must fear.

Come, Vnarsye think it wise,

And do the thing that I advise'

Then Gandhamdan replied

With lips that toil and thirst had dried;

'Obey his words, for wise and true

Is all that he has counselled you.

Come, let your hosts their toil renew

And search each grove and desert through,

Each towering hill and forest glade.

By lake and brook and white cascade,

Till every spot, as our great lord

Commanded, be again explored.'

Uprose the Vnarsand all,

Obedient to the chieftain's call,

And over the southern region sped

Where Vindhya's tangled forests spread.

They clomb that hill that towers on high

Like a huge cloud in autumn's sky,

Where many a cavern yawns, and streaks

Of radiant silver deck the peaks.

In eager search they wandered through

The forests where the Lodh trees grew,

Where the dark leaves were thick and green,

But found not Rma's darling queen.

Then faint with toil, their hearts depressed,

Descending from the mountain's crest,

Their weary limbs a while to ease

They lay beneath the spreading trees.

Footnotes

381:1
The Bengal recension--Corrosions edition-- calls this Asur or demon the son of Mrcha
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