The Ramayan by Valmiki

[I omit Canto V. which corresponds to chapter XI. in Gorresio's edition. That scholar justly observes: "The eleventh chapter, Description of Evening, is certainly the work of the Rhapsodists and an interpolation of later date. The chapter might be omitted without any injury to the action of the poem, and besides the metre, style, conceits and images differ from the general tenour of the poem; and that continual repetition of the same sounds at the end of each hemistich which is not exactly rime, but assonance, reveals the artificial labour of a more recent age." The following sample will probably be enough.

Fair shone the moon, as if to lend His cheering light to guide a friend, And, circled by the starry host, Looked down upon the wild sea-coast. The Vanar cheiftain raised his eyes, And saw him sailing through the skies Like a bright swan who joys to take His pastime on a silver lake; Fair moon that calms the mourner's pain. Heaves up the waters of the main, And o'er the life beneath him throws A tender light of soft repose, The charm that clings to Mandar's hill, Gleams in the sea when winds are still, And decks the lilly's opening flower, Showed in that moon her sweetest power.