Page:Tales of the Sun.djvu/244

228 for a ghaṭikâ,” said the robbers to each other; and all with one voice said “agreed,” and at once the order for the performance was given.

Chandralêkhâ, who was clever in every department of knowledge, began her performance, and, by the most exquisite movement of her limbs, held the audience spell-bound, when suddenly tâ, tai, tôm, clashed the cymbals. This was the signal for the destruction of the robbers, as well as the sign of the close of a part of the nautch. In the twinkling of an eye the seven disguised followers of the dancing-girl had thrown down the thieves and were upon them. Before the servants of the robbers could come to the help of their masters the footsteps of an army near were heard, and in no time the prince’s one thousand men were on the spot and took all the robbers and their followers prisoners.

So great had been the ravages of these robbers in and round Kaivalyam that, without any mercy being shown to them, they and their followers were all ordered to be beheaded, and the prince was so much won over by the excellent qualities of Chandralêkhâ that, notwithstanding her birth as a dancing-girl, he regarded her as a gem of womankind and married her.

“Buy a girl in a bâzâr” (kanniyai kaḍaiyir koḷ) is a proverb. What matter where a girl is born provided she is virtuous! And Chandralêkhâ, by her