Hanuman's Leap Across the Ocean

Hanuman stood on the peak of Mount Mahendra. He bowed to the Sun, to Indra, to the Wind and to Brahma, and then, facing east, to his father Vayu. He said to the vanaras, "As an arrow loosed by Ram flies, so will I go to Lanka. If I do not find Sita there I will search as far as heaven, and if she is not there either, I will bind Ravana and bring him back."

Then he gathered his body, set his arms against the mountain and leapt. The shock made the mountain tremble; springs burst from the rocks; and the trees uprooted by his speed flew after him for some distance, as people walk a little way behind a loved one who is leaving. On the sea below his shadow lay ten yojanas wide and thirty long.

Mainaka

The Ocean thought, "I was enlarged by the sons of King Sagara of the Ikshvaku line. This Hanuman goes on the work of Ram, of that same line. I should serve him." He said to Mount Mainaka, with its golden peaks, hidden in his depths, "Rise up and give him rest."

Mainaka broke through the water. Hanuman took it for an obstacle and knocked it down with his chest. Then Mainaka took human form and said, "Best of vanaras, I am no obstacle. Your father, the Wind, once saved me. Rest a while on my peak, eat some fruit, and then go on."

Hanuman merely touched him with his hand and said, "Your asking is welcome enough. But I have vowed not to stop on the way, and the day is ending." Tulsidas puts it like this:

Hanuman tehi parsa kar puni kinh pranam,
Ram kaju kinhe binu mohi kahan bishram.

"Hanuman touched it with his hand and bowed: until Ram's work is done, where is there rest for me?"

Surasa

The gods wished to test Hanuman's wit. They sent Surasa, mother of the serpents. She took the form of a terrible rakshasi and stood in his way. "Brahma has given me a boon: no one may pass me without entering my mouth. Come, enter."

Hanuman said, "Mother, I am on Ram's errand. Let me carry news of Sita and return; then I will enter your mouth. That is my true word." Surasa refused. "Then open your mouth wide enough to hold me," he said, and became ten yojanas tall. Surasa stretched her mouth to twenty. He grew to thirty; she opened to forty. He to fifty, she to sixty. When her mouth had reached a hundred yojanas, Hanuman suddenly shrank to the size of a thumb, went in and came straight out.

"Mother, I have been into your mouth, and your boon holds true. Now give me leave." Surasa returned to her own form and laughed. "Go, my son. You have both strength and wit. Your task will succeed."

Simhika

Further on Hanuman felt something dragging him back, as a boat is held by a contrary wind. Looking down, he saw in the sea a rakshasi named Simhika, who caught flying creatures by their shadows and pulled them in. She gaped. Hanuman made himself small, shot into her mouth, tore her vitals from within and came out. She sank into the water.

The celestial beings in the sky said, "One who has these four, steadiness, foresight, intelligence and skill, fails in nothing." Three obstacles came, and each had a different answer: kindness Hanuman declined with courtesy, a test he passed by wit, and an enemy he destroyed by strength.

The shore of Lanka

The hundred yojanas were done. Before him was a coast covered in green forest, and beyond it, on the summit of Mount Trikuta, a city that shone like gold in the evening sun. Hanuman thought, "Such a huge body will startle the rakshasas." He returned to his natural size and came down on Mount Lamba.

He was not out of breath and not tired. "A hundred yojanas? I could leap many hundreds like these." Then he looked at Lanka and sat down to think. Around the city ran a moat and a wall of gold, and at the gates stood rakshasas with bows. This was work for patience, not for force. He waited for the sun to set.