A Servant of Satan: Romantic Career of Prado the Assassin — page 171: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A SERVANT OF SATAN, | 163 all about it, instead of me. Having been present on one of these occasions, he is certainly in a better position to satisfy your curiosity than I am.” ‘“Not at all, my dear colonel. If the ladies insist on hearing about this vilaine affaire, I had much rather that— you would tell them. But,” he added, in a somewhat agi- tated voice, is it not rather a dismal subject to discuss? Let us talk of something else.” ‘“No, no,” urged Lady Margaret. ‘‘We are in for the horrible! ‘Don’t disappoint us, I beg of you.” ‘Well, then, as the count is so modest and ‘declines to give us another proof of his talents as a narrator, I will tell you what I know about the matter,” Bald Colonel Clery, as he resumed his seat. “It was about eight or nine years ago, and I had ante recently returned to India from a long furlough in England, when all Baroda and Bombay society were startled by the announcement of the murder of a very prominent and well-known Hindoo widow, whose body had been dis- covered among the ruins of a temple in the outskirts of Baroda. <A poor, half-witted beggar had been found remoy- ing some jewels from the corpse as it lay in the long grass, and it was immediately taken for granted that it was he who had killed her. He was immediately seized and dragged before the guicowar or king, who lost no time in sentencing him to suffer death by the elephant. ‘This most atrocious — punishment, as Monsieur de Vaugelade will doubtless have informed you, consists in tying the culprit, who is securely bound hand and foot and unable to stir, by a long rope to the hind leg of the monster. ‘The latter is then urged to a sharp trot, and at each movement of its leg the helpless body of the victim is jerked with a bound over the stone pavement. ‘This is kept up for about the space of half a mile or so, after which the poor wretch’s sufferings are brought to a close, his head being placed on a stone a ¢s) (Ele) =} ‘COomMmichboo