into the sky with its burden of palaces and towers.

Here dwelt the Queen Padmini and her husband Bhimsi, the Rana of the
Rajputs.

The sight of the holy ascetic Visravas pierced even the secrets of the
Rani's bower, where, in the inmost chamber of marble, carved until it
appeared like lace of the foam of the sea, she was seated upon cushions
of blue Bokhariot silk, like the lotus whose name she bore floating upon
the blue depths of the lake. She had just risen from the shallow bath of
marble at her feet.

Most beautiful was this Queen, a haughty beauty such as should be a
Rajput lady; for the name "Rajput" signifies Son of a King, and this
lady was assuredly the daughter of Kings and of no lesser persons. And
since that beauty is long since ashes (all things being transitory),
it is permitted to describe the mellowed ivory of her body, the smooth
curves of her hips, and the defiance of her glimmering bosom, half
veiled by the long silken tresses of sandal-scented hair which a maiden
on either side, bowing toward her, knotted upon her head. But even
he who with his eyes has seen it can scarce tell the beauty of her
face--the slender arched nose, the great eyes like lakes of darkness
in the reeds of her curled lashes, the mouth of roses, the glance,
deer-like but proud, that courted and repelled admiration. This cannot
be told, nor could the hand of man paint it. Scarcely could that fair
wife of the Pandava Prince, Draupadi the Beautiful (who bore upon her
perfect form every auspicious mark) excel this lady.

(Ashes--ashes! May Maheshwara have mercy upon her rebirths!)

Throughout India had run the fame of this beauty. In the bazaar of
Kashmir they told of it. It was recorded in the palaces of Travancore,
and all the lands that lay between; and in an evil hour--may the Gods
curse the mother that bore him!--it reached the ears of Allah-u-Din, the
Moslem dog, a very great fighting man who sat in Middle India, looting
and spoiling.

(Ahi! for the beauty that is as a burning flame!)

In the gardens beneath the windows of the Queen, the peacocks, those
maharajas of the birds, were spreading the bronze and emerald of their
tails. The sun shone on them as on heaps of jewels, so that they dazzled
the eyes. They stood about the feet of the ancient Brahmin sage, he
who had tutored the Queen in her childhood and given her wisdom as the
crest-jeweled of her loveliness. He, the Twice-born sat under the shade
of a neem tree,