When the Ten-headed saw that the courtiers had taken fright, he laughed and invented an ingenious argument: ‘How can the mere dropping down of crowns be all ill omen to him in whose case even the loss of heads proved a lasting boon?

Now return each to your own home and go to bed.’ They all bowed and took their leave. But anxiety had settled in Mandodari’s heart ever since her earrings had dropped to the ground.

With eyes full of tears and folded hands she said, ‘Listen to my prayer, O lord of my life! Give up your hostility to Rama, O my husband, and do not indulge your obstinacy with the idea that he is a mortal man.

Believe my word that the jewel of the house of Raghu is the omnipresent Lord; for the Vedas declare that in his every limb is the fabric of a distinct sphere.

The lower regions (patala) are his feet and the abode of Brahma his head, while the other (intermediate) sphere are located in his other limbs; dread death is the play of his eyebrows, the sun is his eyes and the massing clouds his locks.

The two Ashvins are his nostrils and night and day the constant winking of his eyes; the ten quarters, so the Vedas declare, are his ears; the winds are his breath and the Vedas his own speech;

- his lips are greed and his fearsome teeth the god of death; his smile is Maya (cosmic illusion) and his arms the regents of the ten quarters; fire is his mouth, Varuna (the lord of waters) his tongue and creation, preservation and dissolution his gestures.