The Funeral

CANTO LXXVI.: THE FUNERAL

The saint Vas'ishtha, best of all
Whose words with moving wisdom fall,
Bharat, Kaikeyí's son, addressed,
Whom burning *?fires of grief distressed:
'O Prince, whose fame is widely spread,
Enough of grief: be comforted.
The time is come: arise, and lay
Upon the pyre the monarch's clay.'

He heard the words Vas'ishtha spoke,
And slumbering resolution woke.
Then skilled in all the laws declare,
He bade his friends the rites prepare
They raised, the body from the oil,
And placed it, dripping, on the soil;
Then laid it on a bed, whereon
Wrought gold and precious jewels shone.
There, pallor o'er his features spread,
The monarch, as in sleep, lay dead.
Then Bharat sought his father's side,
And lifted up his voice and cried:
'O King, and has thy heart designed
To part and leave thy son behind?
Make Ráma flee, who loves the right,
And Lakshman of the arm of might?
Whither, great Monarch, wilt thou go
And leave this people in their woe.
Mourning their hero, wild with grief,
Of Ráma reft, their lion chief?
Ah, who will guard the people well
Who in Ayodhyá's city dwell,
When thou, my sire, hast sought the sky,
And Ráma has been forced to fly?
In widowed woe, bereft of thee,
The land no more is fair to *see*
The city, to my aching sight,
Is gloomy as a moonless night.'

Thus, with o'erwhelming sorrow pained,
Sad Bharat by the bed complained:
And thus Vas'ishtha, holy sage,
Spoke his deep anguish to assuage:
'O Lord of men, no longer stay;
The last remaining duties pay:
Haste, mighty-armed, as I advise,
The funeral rites to solemnize.'

And Bharat heard Vas'ishtha's rede
With due attention and agreed.
He summoned straight from every side
Chaplain, and priest, and holy guide.
The sacred fires he bade them bring
Forth from the ohapel of the king,
Wherein the priests in order due,
And ministers, the offerings threw,
Distraught in mind, with sob and tear,
They laid the body on a bier,
And servants, while their eyes brimmed o'er
The monarch from the palace bore,
Another band of mourners led
The long procession of the dead:
Rich garments in the way they cast,
And gold and silver, as they passed,
Then other hands the corse bedewed
With fragrant juices that exude
From sandal, cedar, aloe, pine,
And every perfume rare and fine.
Then priestly hands the mighty dead
Upon the pyre deposited.
The sacred fires they tended next,
And muttered low each funeral text;
And priestly singers who rehearse

p. 186

The S'aman  1 sang their holy verse.
Forth from the town in litters came,
Or chariots, many a royal dame,
And honoured so the funeral ground,
With aged followers ringed around.
With steps in inverse order bent,  2
The priests in sad procession went
Around the monarch's burning pyre
Who well had nursed each sacred fire:
With Queen Kaus'alyá and the rest,
Their tender hearts with woe distressed,
The voice of women, shrill and clear
As screaming curlews, smote the ear,
As from a thousand voices rose
The shriek that tells of woman's woes.
Then weeping, faint, with loud lament,
Down Sarjú's shelving bank they went.
   There standing on the river side
     With Bharat, priest, and peer,
   Their lips the women purified
     With water fresh and clear.
   Returning to the royal town,
     Their eyes with tear-drops filled,
   Ten days on earth they laid them down,
     And wept till grief was stilled.

Footnotes

185:1 Bharat does not intend these curses for any particular person: he merely wishes to prove his own innocence by invoking them on his own head if he had any share in banishing Ráma.