14 HIKAYAT SERI RAMA. 
béringgil. Taking his stand under an enormous béringin tree 
in the centre of the plain, and placing his arms akimbo, he sue- 
cessively faced the four points of the compass, and called upon 
the Chiefs of the tribes by name to come and attend him. 
Then with a rushing sound like that of a hurricane or the 
crashing of a thunderbolt came the monkey-chiefs with their 
troops. These were Janggit, Mabit, Baya Panglima Baya, 
Bégar Hulubalang, Nila Kamala, Dardi, Malah, Jambuana, Sang 
Kamala Sina, Raja Marjan Singa, and Marjan Singa Béranta- 
lawi. Very ferocious did they look, with gaping mouths as 
red as the fires of Jahanam, and as cruel as a tiger which 
has just seized its prey. ji 
The monkey hordes speedily acknowledged the new-comer 
as their sovereign, and he took up his abode in the plain of 
Anta-béranta at their head. 
The story then shifts to a certain Maharaja Duwana 
(Ravana), who inhabited the island of Kachapuri* in the mid- 
dle of the ocean. He had fallen in love with the Princess 
Sa-kuntum Bunga Sa-tangkai merely from hearing the desecrip- 
tion of her beauty, how her waist could be encireled by the 
fourth fingers and thumbs joined, how her figure was as slim 
as a stem of millet, her fingers as slender as the stalk of the 
lemon-grass, and her heels as small as birds’ eggs; how when 
she ate szrzh or drank water her face acquired an indescribable 
charm. The supernatural power which Maharaja Duwana 
possessed enabled him to fly through the air from his own 
country to Tanjong Bunga, where he alighted outside Séri 
Rama’s palace. There the magic charms which he employed 
strangely affected the Princess, though she was in her own 
apartments, and neither she nor her attendants could under- 
stand her uneasiness. 
Subsequently, when she was amusing herself in the morn- 
*The ancient name of Conjeveram in the Madras Presidency, 46 
miles S. W. of Madras. It is called Kachechiin Tamil literature, and 
Kachchipuram is probably represented by the modern name.—Yule’s 
Glossary, p. 782. The incidents which, in the Ramayana, take place 
at Lanka are, in this story, transferred to Kachapuri. 
jour, Straits Branch 
