Myths of the Hindus & Buddhists

Dasharatha sGrief ^P Deathfor Rama s safe return. To Shyama Slta also prayed,saluting him with folded hands "O : great tree, I bow tothee. May my lord s vow be all fulfilled, and we againbehold Kaushalya and Sumitra." Then as they went alongthe forest path, Slta, seeing trees and flowers unknown,asked Rama many questions, as of their names andvirtues; and Lakshman brought her flowers and fruits tojpleasure her; and the rippling streams, and the cries ofj cranes and peacocks, and the sight of elephants andmonkeys delighted her.Dn the second day they reached the Chitrakuta mountain,ivhere was the hermitage of Valmiki. Greeted by thatishi, Rama told him all that had befallen. Then Lakshnanfetched divers sorts of wood, and those brothers}uilt a goodly house with doors and thatched with leaves.Then Lakshman slew a deer and cooked it, and Ramanade ritual offeringsto the divinities of that very place,md after communion with the deities he entered the wellvroughtthatched house with Slta and Lakshman, and.hey rejoiced with happy hearts and cast off grieving for\yodhya.DasJiarathds Grief and DeathVIeanwhile Ayodhya was a place of grief and mourning,On the fifthday ofwithout comfort for king or people.lama s exile, just when Kaushalya for a moment yieldedto her sorrow and reproached her lord, there came intoDasharatha s mind a recollection of a sin committed in a>ast life by means of an arrow-finding-its-mark-by-soundwhich sin now bore the fruit of exile and death.Remembering this sin, he told Kaushalya the same nightlow it had been committed :I was then so skilled a bowman as to earn the name of47