Rámáyan of Válmíki (World's Classics Series). Valmiki

crushing blow,

      Or in the pangs this day I feel

      My lifeless frame had sunk below.

      Death waits his hour, nor takes me now:

      But this sad thought augments my pain,

      That prayer and largess, fast and vow,

      And Heavenward service are in vain.

      Ah me, ah me! with fruitless toil

      Of rites austere a child I sought:

      Thus seed cast forth on barren soil

      Still lifeless lies and comes to naught.

      If ever wretch by anguish grieved

      Before his hour to death had fled,

      I mourning, like a cow bereaved,

      Had been this day among the dead.”

1 The comparison may to a European reader seem a homely one. But Spenser likens an infuriate woman to a cow “That is berobbed of her youngling dere.” Shakspeare also makes King Henry VI compare himself to the calf’s mother that “Runs lowing up and down, Looking the way her harmless young one went.” “Cows,” says De Quincey, “are amongst the gentlest of breathing creatures; none show more passionate tenderness to their young, when deprived of them, and, in short, I am not ashamed to profess a deep love for these gentle creatures.”