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OLD DECCAN DAYS.

that which the eagles had stolen. No sooner did he see the one belonging to Chandra, which Koila was trying to sell, than he said to himself, 'That is the very thing I want, if I can only get it.' So he called his wife, and said to her, 'Go to that bangle-seller and speak kindly to him; say that the day is nearly gone, and invite him to come and lodge at our house for the night. For if we can make friends with him and get him to trust us, I shall be able to take the bangle from him, and say he stole it from me. And as he is a stranger here, every one will believe my word rather than his. This bangle is exactly the thing for me to take Coplinghee Ranee, for it is very like her own, only more beautiful.'

The Jeweller's wife did as she was told, and then the Jeweller himself went up to Koila and said to him, 'You are a bangle-seller, and I am a bangle-seller; therefore I look upon you as a brother. Come home, I pray you, with us, as my wife begs you to do, and we will give you food and shelter for the night, since you are a stranger in this country.' So these cunning people coaxed Koila to go home with them to their house, and pretended to be very kind to him, and gave him supper, and a bed to rest on for the night; but next morning early the Jeweller raised a hue and cry, and sent for the police, and bade them take Koila before the Rajah instantly, since he had stolen and tried to sell one of Coplinghee Ranee's bangles which he (the Jeweller) had been given to clean. It was in vain that Koila protested his innocence, and declared that the bangle he had belonged to his wife; he was a stranger—nobody would believe him. They dragged him to the palace, and the Jeweller accused him to the Rajah, saying, 'This man tried to steal the Ranee's bangle (which I had been given to clean) and to sell it. If he had done so, you would have thought I had stolen it, and killed me; I demand, therefore, that he in punishment shall be put to death.'

Then they sent 'for the Ranee to show her the bangle, but as soon as she saw it she recognised it as one of the bangles which had belonged to Chandra, and burst into tears, crying, 'This is not my bangle. O my lord, no jeweller on earth made this bangle! See, it is different from mine; and when any one comes near it, it tinkles, and all the little bells begin to ring. Have you forgotten it? This was my beauty's bangle! my diamond's! my little darling's! my lost child's! Where did it come from? How did it come here? How into this land, and into this town and bazaar, among these wicked people? For this