“Fight, for this time it is to the death.”
Then each day she watched bow the baskets of earth, emptied upon the
plain at first, made nothing, an ant heap whereat fools might laugh. But
each day as the trains of men came, spilling their baskets, the great
earthworks grew and their height mounted. Day after day the Rajputs rode
forth and slew; and as they slew it seemed that all the teeming millions
of the earth came forth to take the places of the slain. And the Rajputs
fell also, and under the pennons the thundering forces returned daily,
thinned of their best.
(A hi! that Evil rules the world as God!)
And still the earth grew up to the heights, and the protection of the
hills was slowly withdrawn from Chitor, for on the heights they made
they set their engines of war.
Then in a red dawn that great saint Narayan came to the Queen, where she
watched by her window, and spoke.
“O great lady, I have dreamed a fearful dream. Nay, rather have I seen a
vision.”