g their women go.

Now, when this was done and the last had gone, the Rani descended the
steps, and the Rana, taking a torch dipped in fragrant oils, followed
her, and the Princes walked after, clad like bridegrooms but with no
faces of bridal joy. At the entrance of the caves, having lit the torch,
he gave it into her hand, and she, receiving it and smiling, turned once
upon the threshold, and for the first time those Princes beheld the face
of the Queen, but they hid their eyes with their hands when they had
seen. So she departed within, and the Rana shut to the door and barred
and bolted it, and the men with him flung down great rocks before it so
that none should know the way, nor indeed is it known to this day; and
with their hands on their swords they waited there, not speaking, until
a great smoke rose between the crevices of the rocks, but no sound at
all.

(Ashes of roses--ashes of roses!--Ahi! for beauty that is but touched
and remitted!)

The sun was high when those men with their horses and on foot marched
down the winding causeway beneath the seven gates, and so forth into the
plains, and charging unarmed upon the Moslems, they perished every man.
After, it was asked of one who had seen the great slaughter,--

"Say how my King bore himself."

And he who had seen told this:--

"Reaper of the harvest of battle, on the bed of honour he has spread a
carpet of the slain! He sleeps ringed about by his enemies. How can the
world tell of his deeds? The tongue is silent."

When that Accursed, Allah-u-Din, came up the winding height of the
hills, he found only a dead city, and his heart was sick within him.

Now this is the Sack of Chitor, and by the Oath of the Sack of Chitor do
the Rajputs swear when they bind their honour.

But it is only the ascetic Visravas who by the power of his yoga has
heard every word, and with his eyes beheld that Flame of Beauty, who,
for a brief space illuminating the world as a Queen, returns to birth in
many a shape of sorrowful loveliness until the Blue-throated God shall
in his favour destroy her rebirths.

Salutation to Ganesa the Elephant-Headed One, and to Shri the Lady of
Beauty!

THE BUILDING OF THE TAJ MAHAL

In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful--the Smiting!
A day when the soul shall know what it has sent on or kept back.
A day when no soul shall control aught for another.
And the bidding belongs to God.

THE KORAN.

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