{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/rama/ry364.htm","path":"hin/rama/ry364.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/rama/ry364.htm","text":"Then anger swelled in R\u00e1van's breast,\n Who fiercely thus the dame addressed:\n 'Tis ever thus: in vain we sue\n To woman, and her favour woo.\n A lover's humble words impel\n Her wayward spirit to rebel.\n The love of thee that fills my soul\n Still keeps my anger in control.\n As charioteers with bit and rein\n The swerving of the steed restrain.\n The love that rules me bids me spare\n Thy forefeit life, O thou most fair.\n For this, O S\u00edt\u00e1, have I borne\n The keen reproach, the bitter scorn,\n And the fond love thou boastest yet\n For that poor wandering anchoret;\n Else had the words which thou hast said\n Brought death upon thy guilty head.\n Two months, fair dame, I grant thee still\n To bend thee to thy lover's will.\n If when that respite time is fled\n Thou still refuse to share my bed,\n My cooks shall mince thy limbs with steel\n And serve thee for my morning meal.' \u00a01\n \u00a0\u00a0 The minstrel daughters of the skies\n Looked on her woe with pitying eyes,\n And sun-bright children of the Gods \u00a02\n Consoled the queen with smiles and nods.\n She saw, and with her heart at ease,\n Addressed the fiend in words like these;\n 'Hast thou no friend to love thee, none\n In all this isle to bid thee shun\n The ruin which thy crime will bring\n On thee and thine, O impious King?\n Who in all worlds save thee could woo\n Me, R\u00e1ma's consort pure and true,\n As though he tempted with his love\n Queen Sach\u00ed\u00a03 on her throne above?\n How canst thou hope, vile wretch, to fly\n The vengeance that e'en now is nigh,\n When thou hast dared, untouched by shame,\n To press thy suit on R\u00e1ma's dame?\n Where woods are thick and grass is high\n A lion and a hare may lie;\n My R\u00e1ma is the lion, thou\n Art the poor hare beneath the bough,\n Thou railest at the lord of men.\n But wilt not stand within his ken,\n \n \n What! is that eye unstricken yet\n Whose impious glance on me was set?\n Still moves that tongue that would not spare\n The wife of Das'aratha's heir?'\n \u00a0\u00a0 Then, hissing like a furious snake,\n The fiend again to S\u00edt\u00e1 spake:\n 'Deaf to all prayers and threats art thou,\n Devoted to thy senseless vow.\n No longer respite will I give,\n And thou this day shalt cease to live;\n Now I, as sunlight kills the morn,\n Will slay thee for thy scathe and scorn.'\n \u00a0\u00a0 The R\u00e1kshas guard was summoned: all\n The monstrous crew obeyed the call,\n And hastened to the king to take\n The orders which he fiercely spake:\n 'See that ye guard her well, and tame,\n Like some wild thing, the stubborn dame,\n Until her haughty boul be bent\n By mingled threat and blandishment.' \u00a01b\n \u00a0\u00a0 The monsters heard: away he strode,\n And passed within his queens' abode.\n \n \n \n \n408:1 This threat in the same words occurs in Book III. Canto LVI.\n408:2 R\u00e1van carried off and kept in his palace not only earthly princesses but the daughters of Gods and Gandharvas.\n408:3 The wife of Indra.","title":"BOOK V: Canto XXII.: R\u00e1van's Threat.","type":"page"}