In their eagerness and excitement to see Rama, no one felt the least fatigue or pain from the journey, for their souls were with Rama and Vaidehi (Janaka’s daughter); and who without a soul can be conscious of bodily pain or pleasure?

In this manner Janaka and his retinue came advancing, their minds intoxicated with love. When they drew near and saw one another, they were enraptured and began to greet one another with love and courtesy.

King Janaka adored the feet of the hermits (who came from Ayodhya) and Ragunatha made obeisance to the seers (who accompanied Janaka). Then Rama and his younger brothers greeted the king (their father-in-law) and led him and his company to the hermitage.

Rama’s hermitage was an ocean overflowing with the pure water of quietude, and the host that accompanied Janaka was like a river of compassion, which Raghunatha was now conducting (to the ocean of his hermitage).

The river flooded the banks of wisdom and detachment and was joined in its course by tributary streams and rivulets of sorrowful speeches. Sighs and lamentations were its wind-driven waves that uprooted the noble trees on its banks of fortitude.

It had grievous anguish for its swift-flowing current, and dread and delusion for its numberless eddies and whirlpools. Sages were ferrymen and knowledge their huge boat, but in no way could they row it, because they had no idea of the river’s depth.

The poor Kols and Kiratas who roamed through the forest were the travellers who had lost heart at the sight of the turbulent stream and stood aghast. When the stream of compassion reached and mingled with the ocean of the hermitage, the sea seemed to swell, agitated with a sudden rush of waters.