भरतस्य मार्गयात्रा अयोध्यादर्शनं च

In the previous sarga Bharata had taken leave of his grandfather Aśvapati and left Rājagṛha in his chariot with Śatrughna. Here the poet follows his seven-day journey stage by stage, and a description so full of the names of rivers, villages and forests is rare anywhere in the Rāmāyaṇa. Setting out eastward from Rājagṛha, the valiant prince first crossed the river Sudāmā and looked back at it. Then the glorious delight of the Ikṣvākus crossed the Śatadru, a refreshing river with a far shore, its waves running westward. At Ailadhāna he crossed a river, reached the Apara mountains, crossed the Śilā too, the river said to turn whatever falls into it to stone, and came to the country called Śalyakarṣaṇa in the south-east. True to his word and keeping himself pure, he gazed on the river Śilāvahā, passed the great crags and went on toward Kubera's Caitraratha wood. Through all this the poet does not let us forget Bharata's haste: at every step he is moving and nowhere does he rest, because the messengers' words about urgent business are lodged in his heart. The two epithets, true to his word and pure, are telling as well; the man who does not give up purity or his pledge even on the road is the man who will later refuse the kingdom itself.

Coming on the Sarasvatī and the Gaṅgā together, he entered the Bhāruṇḍa forest north of the Vīramatsya country. There he saw the swift and refreshing river Kuliṅgā, ringed by hills; then he reached the Yamunā, crossed it and let his troops rest. He cooled their limbs, weary from the road, with water, revived the tired horses, bathed and drank himself, and set off again carrying water for the way ahead. Then the prince, auspicious himself and riding an auspicious carriage, crossed a great forest where few men went, swift as the wind crossing the sky. The simile is subtle: like the wind his course could not be checked, but the wind blows gladly, and he went in dread. That he stopped to rest his men shows that the leader thought of his followers' weariness, not only his own, which is a mark of Bharata's kingly nature. And in calling him auspicious in an auspicious carriage the poet plays on the word, for the reader knows that where he is going nothing auspicious awaits.

Reaching the Bhāgīrathī, that great river hard to cross, at Aṃśudhāna, the Rāghava came swiftly to the famous town of Prāgvaṭa. Crossing the Gaṅgā there, he came to the river Kuṭikoṣṭikā, crossed it too with his forces, and reached the town of Dharmavardhana. Passing through the southern half of Toraṇa he came to Jambūprastha, and the son of Daśaratha then went on to the pleasant village of Varūtha. After spending one night in the lovely wood there, he went on eastward to the garden of Ujjihānā, where the priyaka trees grow in numbers. There he had swift horses yoked to his chariot, gave the army leave to follow slowly, and hurried on by himself. This is the turning point of the journey: from here Bharata leaves even his army behind and races on in his chariot alone. His road differed from the messengers', for they had come by the direct way, while he, with a full army in train, had to pass by other villages, rivers and towns. And there is a quiet hint too: the prince who took no pleasure in his grandfather's gifts of wealth, elephants, horses and ministers now leaves all of it behind on the road. Splendour was not his aim; only his destination. And the poet repeats that he went eastward, for east was the direction of Ayodhyā.

After halting at Sarvatīrtha he crossed the river Uttānikā and many other rivers in a chariot drawn by horses bred in the hills. Reaching the village of Hastipṛṣṭhaka he crossed the Kuṭikā, and that tiger among men forded the Kapīvatī at Lohitya. He crossed the Sthāṇumatī at Ekasāla and the Gomatī at Vinata, came to the sāla forest at Kaliṅganagara, and pressed on quickly though his horses were utterly spent. Crossing that forest at speed, at dawn after the seventh night he came in sight of Ayodhyā, the city built by King Manu. That tiger among men had spent seven nights on the road when he saw the city from afar. The poet fixes the number firmly: the journey took seven nights, and Bharata himself will say so to his mother in the next sarga. In that time everything in Ayodhyā had changed, though he did not know it. Calling it the city built by King Manu deepens the pathos: the city founded by the first of the line is today stained with the grief of that line. Dawn too is telling, for it is at the hour of light that he will see darkness. Here the account of the journey ends; all the rest of the sarga describes the emptiness of the city.

Seeing Ayodhyā before him, Bharata said to his charioteer: “This famous city with its holy gardens does not look to me as it should, nor as bright as it once was. From far off, charioteer, Ayodhyā looks as pale as dust. It used to be thronged with sacrificers, with virtuous brahmins who had mastered the Vedas and with many prosperous people, and ruled by the best of royal sages; in Ayodhyā there always rose a great tumult of men and women on every side, and today I do not hear it. In the evening the pleasure gardens used to shine, with men leaving their play and hurrying home from all directions; today they look different to me — abandoned by lovers, as if they were weeping. This city seems to me to have become a wilderness, charioteer. No carriages are to be seen, no elephants, no horses, and no leading men going out or coming in as they used to.” Throughout this passage the poet follows a single method: he does not describe what is there, but counts what used to be there and is there no longer. “Once… and today not” comes back again and again, so that the city's former glory and its loss rise together in the reader's mind. Bharata has heard nothing, yet the city itself is telling him. The charioteer keeps silent; he knows the truth but cannot bring himself to speak it.

“The gardens that used to shine, full of joy and revelry and richly furnished for people's pleasures, I now see utterly joyless, the trees along the path shedding their leaves as though crying out. Even now no sound is heard of excited beasts and birds calling again and again in sweet, impassioned voices. The pure and lovely breeze that used to blow, mingled with sandal and aloe and laden with incense — why does it not blow today as it did before? And the sound of drums, tabours and lutes struck with the bow, always to be heard before — why has it stopped today? I see many evil and ill-omened signs of every kind, and my mind sinks under them. Charioteer, in every way it seems that all is not well with my kinsmen. There is no reason for it, yet my heart is bewildered and sinks within me.” So over many verses the poet paints a picture of emptiness, showing the city's grief by counting what is missing. Notice the order of the senses: first the eye sees the gardens, then the ear misses the sound of birds, beasts and music, then the nose misses the scent of sandal, aloe and incense, and through all three senses one truth arrives. The image of the trees crying out is especially moving: the trees are dropping their leaves, but the poet sees it as a lament, as mourners let down their hair. At last Bharata states his own conclusion, that all is not well with his kinsmen, and admits there is no reason for his fear; still his heart will not be quiet. This is Vālmīki's understanding of the mind: reason sees no cause, but the heart already knows.

Dejected, weary at heart, frightened and with his senses in turmoil, Bharata quickly entered the city ruled by the Ikṣvākus. His horses spent, he came in by the Vaijayanta gate, the royal gate of Ayodhyā; the gatekeepers rose, hailed him with cries of victory and walked along with him. That customary cry of victory rings very sadly here, for the one being hailed has lost his father and his brother has gone to the forest. His mind scattered in many directions, he returned the gatekeepers' greeting — he honoured them, but his thoughts were elsewhere — and spoke to Aśvapati's weary charioteer. The charioteer was worn out from driving seven nights, yet Bharata asked him, because there was no one else he could trust. “Why have I been brought here in such haste, blameless friend, with no reason given? My heart forebodes evil and my composure is failing. All the signs we have heard of that appear when kings perish, I see every one of them here, charioteer. I see the houses unswept and rough, their doors left unbarred, wholly without beauty, without offerings, without the fragrance of incense, their households unfed and their people without any lustre. I see householders' homes marked with ill fortune, stripped of garlands, their courtyards unswept.” Bharata's suspicion grows firmer step by step, his gaze moving from gardens to houses to temples, from the outside inward. The houses show five marks — unswept, doors unbarred, offerings neglected, no incense, households going hungry — and all are marks of a house in mourning; the whole city had become like a house under the impurity of a death.

“The temples stand empty and do not shine as they used to; the images of the gods are neglected, and so are the halls of sacrifice. No wares are on show in the flower-sellers' stalls today, and the merchants are not to be seen as before. People's hearts are troubled with brooding and they are hemmed in by the collapse of trade; in the temples and shrines the birds and beasts look wretched. And in the city I see the people, women and men alike, soiled, their eyes full of tears, wretched, lost in thought, thin and full of longing.” Having said this, Bharata, sick at heart, looked at those grim sights in Ayodhyā and went on to the royal palace. He saw the crossroads, houses and streets deserted, the doors, their panels and bolts reddened with dust, in a city that had once been as bright as Indra's own, and he was filled to overflowing with sorrow. By setting “bright as Indra's city” and “doors red with dust” in a single verse, the poet shows in an instant the gap between what was and what is. Seeing things that grieved his mind and had never before been seen in that city, he bowed his head and, dejected and joyless, entered his father's house. The prince who had set out with his head held high now enters his father's house with his head bowed. With this the sarga ends; in the next he will not find his father there, will go to his mother's rooms and there hear the truth. Through the whole sarga Bharata has been told nothing, yet he has sensed everything; this is the poet's skill, that the shadow of the grief touches the reader before the grief itself is told.