{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/rama/ry388.htm","path":"hin/rama/ry388.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/rama/ry388.htm","text":"Then fierce the giant's fury blazed\n As on Han\u00fam\u00e1n's form he gazed,\n And shaken by each wild surmise\n He spake aloud with flashing eyes:\n 'Can this be Nandi \u00a02b standing here,\n The mighty one whom all revere?\n Who once on high Kail\u00e1sa's hill\n Pronounced the curse that haunts me still?\n Or is the woodland creature one\n Of Asur race, or Bali's \u00a03b son?\n The wretch with searching question try:\n Learn who he is, and whence; and why\n He marred the glory of the grove,\n And with my captains fiercely strove.'\n \n \n Prahasta heard his lord's behest,\n And thus the V\u00e1nar chief addressed:\n 'O monkey stranger, be consoled:\n Fear not, and let thy heart be bold.\n If thou by Indra's mandate sent\n Thy steps to Lank\u00e1's isle hast bent,\n With fearless words the cause explain,\n And freedom thou shalt soon regain.\n Or if thou comest as a spy\n Despatched by Vishnu in the sky,\n Or sent by Yama, or the Lord\n Of Riches, hast our town explored;\n Proved by the prowess thou hast shown\n No monkey save in form alone;\n Speak boldly all the truth, and be\n Released from bonds, unharmed and free.\n But falsehood spoken to our king\n Swift punishment of death will bring.'\n \n \n He ceased: the V\u00e1nar made reply;\n 'Not Indra's messenger am I,\n Nor came I hither to fulfil\n Kuvera's hest or Vishnu's will.\n I stand before the giants here\n A V\u00e1nar e'en as I appear.\n I longed to see the king--'twas hard\n To win my way through gate and guard.\n And so to gain my wish I laid\n In ruin that delightful shade\n No fiend, no God of heavenly kind\n With bond or chain these herbs may bind.\n The Eternal Sire himself of old\n Vouchsafed the boon that makes me bold,\n From Brahm\u00e1's magic shaft released \u00a01\n I knew the captor's power had ceased,\n The fancied bonds I freely brooked,\n And thus upon the king have looked.\n My way to Lank\u00e1 have I won,\n A messenger from Raghu's son.'\n \n \n \n \n421:1b Durdhar, or as the Bengal recension reads Mahodara, Prahasta, Mah\u00e1p\u00e1rs'va, and Nikumbha.\n421:2b The chief attendant of S'iva.\n421:3b Bali, not to be confounded with B\u00e1li the V\u00e1nar, was a celebrated Daitya or demon who had usurped the empire of the three worlds, and who was deprived of two thirds of his dominions by Vishnu in the Dwarf incarnation.","title":"BOOK V: Canto L.: Prahasta's Questions.","type":"page"}