He obeyed her; bathed, worshipped earnestly in the temple, and ate heartily. Then he returned to her, and, in the simple words of the old Mahratta Chronicle, "laid his head at his mother's feet, and besought a blessing. He then arose, put on a steel cap, and chain armour, which was concealed under a thickly-quilted cotton gown; and, taking a crooked dagger which he hid under his sleeve, and the 'tiger's claws'[18] in his right hand, he girded his loins, and went out."
FOOTNOTES:
[17] The celebrated Hindu temple in the southern point of India.
[18] A treacherous and deadly weapon, in the shape of tiger's claws, which, fitted on the fingers, shuts into the hand.
[CHAPTER LXXVIII.]
The morning broke, calm and beautiful. Long before the highest peaks of the mountains blushed under the rosy light which preceded the sunrise, the Khan and Fazil, with Zyna, had risen and performed their morning prayer. The deep booming sound of the kettle-drums woke the echoes around, and reverberated from side to side of the valley, retiring to recesses among the glens, and murmuring softly as it died away among the distant peaks and precipices. As yet, the valley was partially filled with mists, which clung to its wooded sides; but as the sun rose, a slight wind sprang up with it, which, breaking through these mists, drove them up the mountain, and displayed the scenery in all its fresh morning beauty, as though a curtain had been suddenly drawn from before it.
Behind them were the stupendous mountains of the Maha-bul-eshwur range; before, at a short distance, and divided from them by a chain of smaller hills, rose up the precipices of Pertâbgurh, glittering in the morning light, and crowned by the walls and bastions of the fortress.
Long before daylight the lady Lurlee had risen, and, careful for her husband, had, in conjunction with Kurreema, cooked his favourite dish of kichéri and kabobs. "It was a light breakfast," she said, "and would agree with them better than a heavier repast, and dinner would be ready when they returned." So Afzool Khan, his son, and the priest, ate their early meal, not only in joyful anticipation of a speedy return, but of accomplishing what would result in honour to all concerned.
They remembered afterwards, that as an attendant brought before the Khan the usual mail shirt he wore, and the mail-cap, with its bright steel chains, over which his turban was usually tied when fully accoutred, he laughingly declined both. "They will be very hot and uncomfortable," he said, "and we are not going to fight. No, give me a muslin dress," which he put on. A few words about ordinary household matters to Lurlee, a few cheering sentences to Zyna, as he passed from the inner and private enclosure of the tent, and he went out among the men.