IV. THE PALACE BAZAAR
It was the Naoroz, the annual festivity of the New-year night, and the Palace of Agra looked its best when the night came. The moon poured a silver light on marble halls and spires, arch and pillar were decorated with festoons and creepers, and fountains played in sparkling showers among beds of flowers. Innumerable lights, fed with fragrant oil, blazed on gateways and peeped from bushes, and a bright bevy of beautiful and bejewelled ladies thronged the paved courtyards and arched colonnades, filling the night with sounds of laughter and joy.
For, according to custom, a Fancy Bazaar was held in the inner palace on this festive night, and wives of Omrahs, Mansabdars and Rajas came there and had their stalls. Queens and Begums were the purchasers, and women of exalted rank, bearing on their jewelled necks and arms the ransom of a kingdom, haggled over the price of a muslin scarf or a velvet cap. A queenly purchaser sneered at the articles and tried to beat down the price; a titled vendor scoffed at the stinginess of her royal customer and bade her go to other stalls for cheaper articles. Sallies of wit and sarcasm spiced these transactions and all entered merrily into the game of haggling, dear to the souls of women. And when the price was settled, sometimes to a fraction of a penny, the purchaser dropped a few pieces of gold, as if by oversight, in addition to the price fixed, and carried off her purchase in triumph.
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