Page:Old Deccan Days.djvu/55

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A FUNNY STORY.
17

Then he grieved much over the sad fate of his parents-in-law.

When the party returned home, the Rajah's brother said to him, 'Where did you get these magnificent presents?' He replied, 'They are gifts from my father- and mother-in-law.' At this news the Rajah's brother went home to his wife very discontented, and asked her why she had never told him of her parents, and taken him to see them, whereby he might have received rich gifts as well as his brother. His wife then went to her sister, and inquired how she had managed to get all her beautiful new things. But the Ranee said, 'Go away, you wicked woman! I will not speak to you. You killed the poor dog, our mother.'

But afterwards she told her all about it.

The sister then said, 'I shall go and see the cobra, and get presents too.' The Ranee answered, 'You can go if you like.' So the sister ordered her palanquin, and told her husband she was going to see her parents, and prepare them for a visit from him. When she reached the ants' nest, she saw the cobra there, and she went and put her finger in his mouth, and the cobra bit her, and she died.