Foreword

In the radiant and far-off yesterdays of our history, it was the sacred duty of Indian womanhood to kindle and sustain the hearth-fires, the beacon-fires and the altar-fires of the nation.

The Indian woman of to-day is once more awake and profoundly alive to her splendid destiny as the guardian and interpreter of the Triune Vision of national life—the Vision of Love, the Vision of Faith, the Vision of Patriotism.

Her renascent consciousness is everywhere striving for earnest expression in song or speech, service or self-sacrifice, that shall prove an offering not unworthy of the Great Mother in the eyes of the world that honour her.

Poignantly aware of the poverty of my gift, I still venture to make my offering with joined palms uplifted in a Salutation of Song.

Hyderabad, Deccan, 1916