[22] The power of assuming a multiplicity of forms at will, and of passing from a huge to a minute size, or the reverse, to suit the exigencies of the moment is enjoyed by a great number of personages in the Hindu epics.
[23] We shall in the course of the development of this story have frequent opportunities of learning the awful and irrevocable character of curses uttered by Brahmans and others, rejoicing in the possession of stores of power acquired by the practice of austerities.
[24] Vide M. N. Dutt’s “Ramayana,” p. 75.
[25] “The remains of the capital founded by Janaka and thence termed Janakapur are still to be seen, according to Buchanan, on the northern frontier at the Janeckpoor of the maps.”—Note to Professor H. H. Wilson’s translation of the “Uttara Rama Charitra.”
[26] I have had the good fortune to be present at a marriage ceremony, carried out professedly in accordance with Vedic rites, which closely resembled the wedding of Rama and his brothers, as described by Valmiki.
[27] In this description of Rama and in other places I have borrowed the epithets I find in Dutt’s translation of the “Ramayana,” in order to preserve something of the peculiar character of the original.
[28] Here is a pretty picture for an artist, Hindu or other.
[29] Dasahratha himself attributed these misfortunes to his having when a youth unwittingly killed, with a chance arrow, a young hermit in the forest. The boy’s father, himself a hermit, cursed Dasahratha, and the effects of the malediction were apparent in the troubles attending the king’s declining years.
[30] This significant passage from the “Ramayana” ought to clear away the doubts that may linger in anyone’s mind regarding the fact that animal food was commonly eaten in ancient India, since animal sacrifices are constantly referred to. Of course there is abundant positive evidence on the subject as in the preceding page.
[31] Near Salem in Southern India are “some chalk hills supposed by the natives to be formed of the bones of the mythical bird Jatayus, killed by Ravana when carrying off Sita.”—Professor Sir Monier Williams’s “Modern India,” p. 165.