{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/rama/ry353.htm","path":"hin/rama/ry353.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/rama/ry353.htm","text":"But soon the baseless thought was spurned\n And longing hope again returned:\n 'No: R\u00e1ma's wife is none of these,\n No careless dame that lives at ease.\n Her widowed heart has ceased to care\n For dress and sleep and dainty fare.\n She near a lover ne'er would lie\n Though Indra wooed her from the sky.\n Her own, her only lord, whom none\n Can match in heaven, is Raghu's son.'\n \u00a0\u00a0 Then to the banquet hall intent\n On strictest search his steps he bent.\n He passed within the door, and found\n Fair women sleeping on the ground,\n Where wearied with the song, perchance,\n The merry game, the wanton dance,\n Each girl with wine and sleep oppressed\n \n \n Had sunk her drooping head to rest.\n That spacious hall from side to side\n With noblest fare was well supplied,\n There quarters of the boar, and here\n Roast of the buffalo and deer,\n There on gold plate, untouched as yet\n The peacock and the hen were set.\n There deftly mixed with gait and curd\n Was meat of many a beast and bird,\n Of kid and porcupine and hare,\n And dainties of the sea and air.\n There wrought of gold, ablaze with shine\n Of precious stones, were cups of wine.\n Through court and bower and banquet hall\n The V\u00e1nared and viewed them all;\n From end to end, in every spot,\n For S\u00edt\u00e1 but found her not.\n \n \n \n \n402:1 R\u00e1van fought against Indra and the Gods, and his body was still scarred by the wounds inflicted by the tusks of Indra's elephant and by the fiery bolts of the Thunderer.","title":"BOOK V: Canto XI.: The Banquet Hall.","type":"page"}