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Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa 3.40.23

Araṇya Kāṇḍa, sarga 40: The golden deer appears. Mārīca yields to Rāvaṇa, travels to the hermitage and assumes a jewelled deer’s form that attracts Sītā while frightening the real deer

In the sequence: he repeatedly goes away and returns, mingling with the deer → the real deer smell him and flee; he suppresses his habit of eating them so as not to expose himself

3.40.23

vikrīḍaṃś ca punar bhūmau punar eva niṣīdati
āśramadvāram āgamya mṛgayūthāni gacchati

Frolicking on the ground, again and again he would sit down; coming to the hermitage door, he would go off to the herds of deer.

Words: vikrīḍaṃś ca — and frolicking; punar — again; bhūmau — on the ground; punar eva — again; niṣīdati — sits down; āśramadvāram — the hermitage door; āgamya — having come; mṛgayūthāni — the herds of deer; gacchati — goes

Composed by Maharṣi Vālmīki, the ādikavi of the ādikāvya: the first poet of the first poem. Sanskrit: The Vālmīki-Rāmāyaṇa: Critical Edition, Oriental Institute, Baroda, 1960–1975 (gen. eds. G. H. Bhatt, U. P. Shah); IAST from GRETIL (Göttingen). Translation and word glosses: Claude Opus 4.6–4.7; summaries and sequences: ChatGPT Astra (machine-made). Numbering follows the Critical Edition, not the vulgate (e.g. Gita Press, valmikiramayan.net), so sarga and verse numbers can differ from those editions.