2 PICTURES AND PEN-PICTURES

a virtual image of the battle as described in the Hindu
epic, the Mahaihamta—in reality, there is only a
bare, vast plain.

Delhi has ever been imperial: as the Indraprastha
of the epics and the Delhi of history. Through the
ruins of seven Delhis the mind can conjure, like the
successive scenes of a moving picture, the events of
nearly two thousand years: sc enes of the days -when
epic heroes wandered in exile and built their fort; of the
days when the first sultanate of Delhi was established
and Qntb-ud-din Aibak commanded the construction of
the Qutb Minar; of the days when the peacock throne
stood on the marble pedestal in the palace of the Bed
Fort and an emperor gave private audience to his
courtiers. u If there is a paradise on earth it is this, it
is this, it is this", reads the inscription in Persian;

inlaid walls, marble floors and water channels, filigreed
windows and finely worked ceilings, fill the mind with
pictures of the splendour and magnificence characteristic
of the life of the imperial Mughals.

Happy are they who come here to wash away their
sins in this river of the gods, the Ganges^ at the ghats
of Benares. The scenes of philgrims bathing from the
ghats has changed but little, it seems, through the
centuries'; for, from very ancient times, Benares has
been held sacred. How many millions of pilgrims have
bathed at these ghats ? How many rajas have ruled this
city? How many saints have found asylum in this
Benares ? Even the Buddha came here. Blurred visions
crowd upon the mind; the story in the Buddhist
scriptures of the Wise One flying across the river like
the King of Birds, translates itself into picture. To