d Durmukha
to ascertain the popular opinion as to his own treatment of his
subjects.

Lakshmana now asks Rama and Sita to come out and see their early history
drawn on the terrace of the palace. They move about and the different
parts of the picture are shown to Sita, when the eyes of Sita turn on
the 'yawn-producing' weapons. Rama asks her to salute them so that they
would attend also on her children. Sita then feels tired and lays her
head on the arm of her husband and sleeps.

Then Durmukha, who, as an old and trusted servant, had free admission to
the inner apartments, comes and whispers to him that people condemn his
receiving back a queen, abducted by a fiend, after her long residence in
a stranger's house. In short, he is told that they still gossip and talk
scandal about her and Ravana. The scrupulously correct and
over-sensitive Rama, though convinced of his wife's fidelity after her
submission to the fiery ordeal, and though she is now likely to become a
mother, feels himself quite unable to allow the slightest cause of
offence to continue among his subjects.

He has no other resource. People must be satisfied. He orders his dear
Sita's exile, and the messenger goes away to deliver the order to
Lakshmana to seclude her somewhere in the woods. He is torn by
contending feelings. He is overpowered with grief, withdraws his arm
from his sleeping wife and pours forth pathetic lamentation. Then he
takes up her feet and cries when the announcement of the arrival of
frightened Rishis makes him go out to send Satrughna to their succour.
The messenger Durmukha then enters and takes Sita unsuspectingly to
mount the chariot which is to lead her to exile.

Lakshmana takes Sita to the forest and leaves her there.

She is protected by divine agencies. Her twin sons, Kusa and Lava, are
born and entrusted to the care of the sage Valmiki, the author of the
Ramayana, who brings them up in his hermitage. The boys have no
knowledge of their royal descent.

An incident now occurs which leads Rama to revisit the Dandaka forest,
the scene of his former exile. The child of a Brahman dies suddenly and
unaccountably. His body is laid at Rama's door. Evidently some national
sin is the cause of such a calamity, and an aerial voice informs him
that an awful crime is being perpetrated; for a Sudra, named Sambuka, is
practising religious austerities, instead of confining himself to his
proper vocation of waiting on the twice-born cast