One age followed another--and still, generation after generation, the

successors of the three Brahmins watched their priceless Moonstone,

night and day. One age followed another until the first years of the

eighteenth Christian century saw the reign of Aurungzebe, Emperor of the

Moguls. At his command havoc and rapine were let loose once more among

the temples of the worship of Brahmah. The shrine of the four-handed

god was polluted by the slaughter of sacred animals; the images of

the deities were broken in pieces; and the Moonstone was seized by an

officer of rank in the army of Aurungzebe.

Powerless to recover their lost treasure by open force, the three

Advertisement..

guardian priests followed and watched it in disguise. The generations

succeeded each other; the warrior who had committed the sacrilege

perished miserably; the Moonstone passed (carrying its curse with it)

from one lawless Mohammedan hand to another; and still, through all

chances and changes, the successors of the three guardian priests kept

their watch, waiting the day when the will of Vishnu the Preserver

should restore to them their sacred gem. Time rolled on from the first

to the last years of the eighteenth Christian century. The Diamond fell

into the possession of Tippoo, Sultan of Seringapatam, who caused it to

be placed as an ornament in the handle of a dagger, and who commanded

it to be kept among the choicest treasures of his armoury. Even then--in

the palace of the Sultan himself--the three guardian priests still kept

their watch in secret. There were three officers of Tippoo's household,

strangers to the rest, who had won their master's confidence by

conforming, or appearing to conform, to the Mussulman faith; and to

those three men report pointed as the three priests in disguise.




Most Popular