ON SIAMESE LITERATTRE. 



363 



2. 



1 clmng le \\ hen no-an la hong |1 an song ong-khd wilaa wan 



2 phra phak chau phe-ang chan 



\j \j 



1 mu-an nung \\ si daa chau Me phu yachai 



2 md hu-e haat |] a-naat nai 



3 if/u' rm i(Aaa || thau thu long song 



Phra Ram or Rama, is the hero in this piece, as he is in the original 

 Hindu romance Thots-akan or Havana, tyrant of Ceylon, and a Yak or 

 rakhsha carries Ram's wife off. One day the king who is inconsolable at 

 her loss, descends to the bank of the river to bathe. 



" When the king had reached the brink of the stream, and had delivered his upper garments 

 and ornaments into the hands of his attendants he was about to plunge into the water, M'hen he 

 observed a corpse floating down, the shape and features of which exactly resembled those of his 

 queen. Lovely were her features even in death, resplendent as the moon when she casts her 

 radiance from a full orb. 



Distracted at the sight, the King exclaimed, O form of my long cherished, now lost Sita- 

 DEVi, what evil destiny has thrown thy remains on the white sand in presence of thy former lord. 



Thus did Beng Yakai by spells deceive the king by assuming the likeness of his queen, and 

 check for a time the ardor with which he sought to rescue her from the Yak." 



HoNLAMAN or Hanuman cndeavours to undeceive the king, sagaci- 

 ously observing, that there must be something unnatural in the circum- 

 stance, because the tide was then flowing and the body came down against 

 the flood. He therefore advises His Majesty to burn the body. The 

 experiment is tried, when the Yak or rakltslia who had assumed the 

 likeness of Sitadevi instantly resumed her ov/n form and vanished. 



On another occasion the King having returned from a battle which 

 he had been obliged to fight with his father-in-law Thau kroong Phaan, 

 is met by a band of the maids of honor or attendants upon his Queen, 

 who chant the following strain while preceding him to his palace. 



Rdngot — Air. 



Principal, . . . . 



_ _ o — w 'J 



O ! ica phra yat \ yau wa raat 



me cham wa-rU'ndt |1 sanehaa 



Chorus. 



