मेरा आजीवन कारावास / माझी जन्मठेप (स्वातंत्र्यवीर सावरकर - काले पानी का ऐतिहासिक संस्मरण)

the fate that they had suffered. That is the test of worth and will to power. And we have passed the test, and I feel proud of it more than of success and the golden opinions we would have won in consequence of that success. We are both in this prison, but we are going on all the same. We are doomed to rot and die here, we know. And those for whom we had paid our hostages to fortune may be cursing us, no doubt. But that is our life's ideal, as great as to thrive and rise on the tide of fortune, and to hear the applauses of the crowd, and the drums of victory beating in our ears. For failures are but stepping stones to success. We have served our country by our failures; let others serve her by their successes. Yet we consider our failures as glorious as they may regard their successes. The tears of blood that we shed in this dungeon, and our forgotten lives on this earth, are as valuable assets of final victory as the trumpets and drums sounded in the hour of victory in the fields." What of our Cause? "You ask me that question. And my answer to it is no other than the song I composed on the day that the High Court was to deliver its judgment against me. Those thoughts and feelings shall inspire me, when my transportation has thrust me into the jaws of death itself. The lines which I wrote in that song run thus:-The Indian battleline of three hundred million soldiers of liberty led by the charioteer Shri Krishna, and by the warrior Rama,-heroes of Hind, and her invincible ideal- shall not fall back because we are not in it. It will hem in the enemy, it will beat and conquer; it will hold fast the flag of victory and freedom; and it will plant it firm- 'Hind's Oriflamme',-on the snowy summits of the eternal Himalayas-the abode of our holy trinity-Brahma, Vishnu and Maheshwar. Glory to them, glory to Hind; and victory to the battleline of a three hundred million Soldiers of freedom, the soldiers of Hind. That is my faith and that is my solace. " Such was the letter I wrote to my brother and saw that it reached him safely. It heartened him, and it gave me new zest, new hope, and new courage, to do the work I did. End of Chapter X