It was in this year 1249 that Viradha-Pál, the young prince, began to take his place in the government of Mandu as a person of importance. Indeed it was time that he came into his own. Bhavani had kept him too long in the background. Mandu was beginning to whisper that he should have been at war for them these five years past: that it behoved a Kshatriya to follow his profession. And Viradha, allowed liberty of action, proved himself worthy of his people by quickly claiming his own. Bhavani let him go; for he knew that the spirit of the old warrior kings was upon the youth; and he knew also, still better, that the time approached when a warrior would be sorely needed in Mandu. For Bhavani, in his peacefulness, was by no means blind to the outlook of India; and it was no surprise when Viradha came to him with tales of Mohammedan invasions in the north, and demands of an army with which to march against the alien race. Bhavani acceded to his demands, making, however, one stipulation. Viradha must marry. _Then_ he might leave his wife and go forth to battle. Such was the rule in the Orient. Thus it came about, after all, that there were marriage feasts that year in Mandu. A princess was brought from Mandaleshwar, on the north bank of the Narmáda, far to the east. And there was a great Brahman sacrifice, and the usual three days of ceremonial. The deserted zenana was opened once more, and a new woman installed there in her loneliness. One week her husband tarried by her side. Then he took his man’s privilege, and left her alone in her state, while he marched away at the head of his little army—fifteen hundred men—into the echoing north. The benedictions and the adoration of all Mandu followed him. Old Bhavani had been a good ruler, the kindest, the most just of men. But, after all, men were made for war, and it was better that the princes of men should be generals than judges. Alas for Mandu! Rejoicing in its newly raised standards, shouting itself hoarse with its own battle-cries, deaf to presentiment, to rumor, to the prophecies of the gods, what wonder that it heard nothing of that faintly-echoing cry that was ringing out over all the plains and heights of India? The cry that had risen out of the black Kaaba of far Mecca, and now rolled, in one continuous shout, from western Granada to Benares, the holy city, transcending speech by its sharp fanaticism, finding by force a home in every land: “_La-ilaha-il-lal-laha!_” This was the cry that Viradha had gone forth to oppose. It was the same cry to which Viradha’s grandfather had answered with his death.