37. But Ráma and his brother princes, kept company with the sage to his hermitage; and having prostrated themselves at his feet, they returned to their princely mansions. 38. The hearers of the sage having arrived at their houses made their ablutions; then worshipped the gods, and offered their offerings to the manes of their ancestors. They then treated their guests and gave alms to beggars. 39. Then they took their meals with their Brahman guests, and members of the family; and their dependants and servants were fed one after the other, according to the rules and customs of their order and caste. 40. After the sun had set down, with the diurnal duties of men, there rose the bright moon on high, with impositions of many nocturnal duties on mankind. 41. At last the great king and the princes, and chiefs of men and the _munis_, together with the sages and saints, and all other terrestrial beings, betook themselves to their several beds, with silken coverlets and bed cloths of various kinds. 42. They lay thinking intensely in themselves, on the admonitions of the sage Vasishtha; on the mode of their passing over the boisterous gulf of this world, by means of this spiritual knowledge. 43. Then they slept and lay with their closed eyelids, for one watch of the night only; and then opened their eyes, like the opening buds of lotuses, to see the light of the day. 44. Ráma and his brother princes, passed full three watches of the night in waking; and pondering over the deep sense of the lectures, of their spiritual guide--Vasishtha. (The present ritual allots three watches of the night to sleep, while formerly they gave but one watch to it). 45. They slept only one and a half watch of the night, with their closed eye lids; and then they shook off the dullness of their sleep, after driving the lassitude of their bodies by a short nap. 46. Now the minds of these, being full of good will, raised by the rising reason in their souls, and knowledge of truth; they felt the crescent of spiritual light lightening their dark bosoms, as the sextant of the moon, illumes the gloom of night; which afterwards disappeared at the approach of daylight, and the gathering broils of daytime. CHAPTER II. ON THE PERFECT CALM AND COMPOSURE OF THE MIND. Argument.--The sages joining the assembly the next morning, and preaching of Divine knowledge to it. Válmíki related: Then the shade of night, with her face as dark as that of the darkened moon, began to waste and wane away; as the darkness of ignorance and the mists of human wishes, vanish before the light of reason. 2. Now the rising sun showed his crown of golden rays, on the top of the eastern mountain, by leaving his rival darkness to take its rest, beyond the western or his setting mount of _astáchala_ (the two mountains mean the eastern and western horizons).