{"collection":"Hinduism","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/hin/rama/ry425.htm","path":"hin/rama/ry425.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/hin/rama/ry425.htm","text":"'Not if the Gods in heaven who dwell,\n Gandharvas, and the fiends of hell\n In banded opposition rise\n Against me, will I yield my prize.\n Still trembling from the ungentle toucb\n Of V\u00e1nar hands ye fear too much,\n And bid me, heedless of the shame,\n Give to her lord the Maithil dame.'\n \u00a0\u00a0 Thus spoke the king in stern reproof;\n Then mounted to his palace roof\n Aloft o'er many a story raised,\n And on the lands beneath him gazed.\n There by his faithful spies he stood\n And looked on sea and hill and wood.\n There stretched before him far away\n The V\u00e1nars' numberless array:\n Scarce could the meadows' tender green\n Beneath their trampling feet be seen.\n He looked a while with furious eye,\n Then questioned thus the nearer spy:\n 'Bend, S\u00e1ran, bend thy gaze, and show\n The leaders of the V\u00e1nar foe\n Tell me their heroes' names, and teach\n The valour, power and might of each.'\n \n \n Obedient S\u00e1ran eyed the van,\n The leaders marked, and thus began:\n That chief conspicuous at the head\n Of warriors in the forest bred,\n Who hither bends his ruthless eye\n And shouts his fearful battle cry:\n \n \n Whose voice with pealing thunder shakes\n All Lank\u00e1, with the groves and lakes\n And hills that tremble at the sound,\n Is Nila, for his might renowned:\n First of the V\u00e1nar lords controlled\n By King Sugr\u00edva lofty-souled.\n He who his mighty arm extends,\n And his fierce eye on Lank\u00e1 bends,\n In stature like a stately tower,\n In colour like a lotus flower,\n Who with his wild earth-shaking cries\n Thee, R\u00e1van, to the field defies,\n Is Angad, by Sugr\u00edva's care\n Anointed his imperial heir:\n In wondrous strength, in martial fire\n Peer of King Bali's self, his sire;\n For R\u00e1ma's sake in arms arrayed\n Like Varun called to S'akra's aid.\n Behind him, girt by warlike bands,\n Nala the mighty V\u00e1nar stands,\n The son of Vis'vakarm\u00e1, he\n Who built the bridge athwart the sea.\n Look farther yet, O King, and mark\n That chieftain clothed in Sandal bark.\n 'Tis S'weta, famed among his peers,\n A sage whom all his race reveres.\n See, in Sugr\u00edva's ear he speaks,\n Then, hasting back, his post reseeks,\n And turns his practised eye to view\n The squadrons he has formed anew.\n Next Kumud stands who roamed of yore\n On Gomati's \u00a01 delightful shore,\n Feared where the waving woods invest\n His seat on Mount Sanrochan's crest.\n Next him a chieftain strong and dread,\n Comes Chanda at his legions' head;\n Exulting in his warrior might\n He hastens, burning for the fight.\n And boasts that his unaided powers\n Shall cast to earth thy walls and towers.\n Mark, mark that chief of lion gait,\n Who views thee with a glance of hate\n As though his very eyes would burn\n The city walls to which they turn:\n 'Tis Rambha, V\u00e1nar king; he dwells\n In Krishnagiri's tangled dells,\n Where Vindhya's pleasant slopes are spread\n And fair Sudars'an lifts his head.\n There, listening with erected ears,\n S'arabha, mighty chief, appears.\n His soul is burning for the strife,\n Nor dreads the jeopardy of life.\n He trembles as he moves, for ire,\n And bends around his glance of fire.\n Next, like a cloud that veils the sides,\n A chieftain of terrific size,\n Conspicuous mid the V\u00e1nars, comes\n With battle shout like rolling drums,\n 'Tis Panas, trained in war and tried,\n \n \n Who dwells on P\u00e1riy\u00e1tra's side.\n He, far away, the chief who throws\n A glory o'er the marshalled rows\n That ranged behind their captain stand\n Exulting on the ocean strand,\n Is Vinata the fierce in fight.\n Pre\u00ebminent like Dardur's height.\n That chieftain bending down to drink\n On lovely Ven\u00e1's verdant brink,\n Is Krathan; now he lifts his eyes\n And thee to mortal fray defies.\n Next Gavaya comes, whose haughty mind\n Scorns all the warriors of his kind.\n He comes to trample - such his boast -\n On Lank\u00e1 with his single host.'\n \n \n \n \n448:1 The Goomtee.","title":"BOOK VI: Canto XXVI.: The V\u00e1nar Chiefs.","type":"page"}