SECTION LXXVII.
When the ten days had gone by, the king's son, his uncleanness (consequent on the demise of his father) removed, performed the srāddha on the twelfth day. On the occasion of the ceremonies for the welfare of the departed spirit, the son of the king conferred on Brāhmanas wealth and gems, and rice in abudance, and herds of goats, and silver in profusion, and countless kine, and maid-servants and man-servants, and vehicles and spacious mansions. And on the thirteenth day, the long armed Bharata, overwhelmed with grief, burst into lamentation. And coming to the foot of the funeral pyre for gathering the bones of the departed, he overcome with grief, with his throat obstructed with the sounds of lamentation, said, "my father, on brother Rāma, to whom I had been consigned by thee, having gone to the forest, I have been cast by thee into vacancy. My father, forsaking forlorn mother Kauçalyā, whose stay her son, had gone to the forest, where hast thou gone, O king?" And seeing the spot where lay the bones of his father mixed with ashes and embers, Bharata looking at the place where occurred the dissolution of his father's frame, carried away by emotion, indulged in sorrow. And seeing this, he exceedingly distressed, crying fell down to the ground. And raised up (by others) he looked like an uplifted banner of Sakra bound to an engine. And his counsellors rushed towards that one of pure vows, like the saints making towards Jayati as he was falling on the extinction of his merit. Seeing Bharata plunged in grief, Satrughna remembering the king, fell down to the ground deprived of consciousness. And devoid of sense and like a madman, he in grief of heart began to lament remembering all the virtues of his father again and again. "This terrible sea of grief owing its origin to Mantharā, containing its ferocious aquatic animal in the shape of Kaikeyi, and incapable of being disturbed in consequence of the bestowal of the boon drowns (us). O father, where hast thou gone, leaving the tender and youthful Bharata fondled by thee, to lament (thy loss). Thou didst use to confer on us eatables and drinkables and attires and ornaments. Who will now do so? Deprived of thee, the high souled king cognisant of duty, the earth albeit her time of riving is come, is not yet riven. My father having gone to heaven and Rāma having sought the woods, how can I live? I will enter fire. Bereft of my brother and sire, I will not enter the empty Ayodhyā governed by the Ikshwākus. I will repair to the forest of asceticism." Hearing his lamentations and seeing that disaster, all the followers became all the more distressed. Then depressed and exhausted, both Satrughna and Bharata rolled on the earth like two bulls with their horns fractured. Then the all-knowing priest of their father possessed of sterling worth, Vasishtha, raising Bharata, said unto him, "O Lord this is the thirteenth day since the cremation of thy sire. Why dost thou delay, when thou hast to collect the bones? Three couples[169] pertain in especial to all creatures and these being inevitable, thou ought not to bear yourself thus. And Sumantra also versed in the nature of things, raising up Satrughna and pacifying him, discoursed the birth and death of all beings. Being raised up, those renowned chiefs of men looked like Indra's banner stained by shine and shower. And as the princes stood there shedding tears, with reddened eyes, and speaking sadly, the courtiers urged them on in behalf of the rites that remained.