{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/rama/ry325.htm","path":"hin/rama/ry325.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/rama/ry325.htm","text":"'Assailed by thirst and hunger, dame,\n Within a gloomy vault we came.\n We saw the cavern opening wide,\n And straight within its depths we hied.\n But utterly amazed are we\n At all the marvels that we see.\n Whose are the golden trees that gleam\n With splendour like the morning's beam?\n These cates of noblest sort? these roots?\n This wondrous store of rarest fruits?\n Whose are these calm and cool retreats,\n These silver homes and golden seats,\n And lattices of precious stones?\n Who is the happy lord that owns\n The golden trees, of rarest scent,\n Neath loads of fruit and blossom bent?\n Who, strong in holy zeal, had power\n To deck the streams with richest dower,\n And bade the lilies bright with gold\n The glory of their blooms unfold,\n \n \n Where fish in living gold below\n The sheen of changing colours show?\n Thine is the holy power, I ween,\n That beautified the wondrous scene;\n But if another's, lady, deign\n To tell us, and the whole explain.'\n To him the lady of the cave\n In words like, these her answer gave:\n 'Skilled Maya framed in days of old\n This magic wood of growing gold.\n The chief artificer in place\n Was he of all the D\u00e1nav.\n He, for his wise enchantments famed,\n This glorious dwelling planned and framed\n He for a thousand years endured\n The sternest penance, and secured\n From Brahm\u00e1 of all boons the best,\n The knowledge Us'anas \u00a01b possessed.\n Lord, by that boon, of all his will,\n He fashioned all with perfect skill;\n And, with his blissful state content,\n In this vast grove a season spent.\n By Indra's jealous bolt he fell\n For loving Hem\u00e1's\u00a02b charms too well.\n And Brahm\u00e1 on that nymph bestowed\n The treasures of this fair abode,\n Wherein her tranquil days to spend\n In happiness that ne'er may end.\n Sprung of a lineage old and high,\n Merus\u00e1varni's \u00a03b daughter, I\n Guard ever for that heavenly dame\n This home, Svayamprabh\u00e1t\u00a04b my name,-\n For I have loved the lady long,\n So skilled in arts of dance and song.\n But say what cause your steps has led\n The mazes of this grove to tread.\n \n \n How, strangers did ye chance to spy\n The wood concealed from wanderer's eye?\n Tell clearly why ye come: but first\n Eat of this fruit and quench your thirst.'\n \n \n \n \n382:1 The skin of the black antelope was the ascetic's proper garb.\n382:1b Us'anas is the name of a sage mentioned in the Vedas. In the epic poems he is identified with S'ukra, the regent of the planet Venus, and described as the preceptor of the Asuras or Daityas, and possessor of vast knowledge.\n382:2b Hem\u00e1ne of the nymphs of Paradise.\n382:3b Merus\u00e1varni general name for the last four of the fourteen Manus.\n382:4b Svayamprabh\u00e1 \"self-luminous\" is according to DE GUBERNATIS the moon: \"In the Svayamprabh\u00e1too, we meet with the moon as a good fairy who, from the golden palace which she reserves for her friend Hem\u00e1 golden one:) is during a month the guide, in the vast cavern of Hanumant and his companions, who have lost their way in the search of the dawn Sit\u00e1is is not quite accurate: HanumHanum\u00e1n and his companions wander for a month in the cavern without a guide, and then Svayamprabh\u00e1s them out.","title":"BOOK IV: Canto LI.: Svayamprabh\u00e1","type":"page"}