A TRAGEDY IN REAL LIFE.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2885, 24 October 1895, Page 3

A TRAGEDY IN REAL LIFE.

The Cochin Argus recounts a tragedy in r.al life that surpasses the imagination of the novelist:- “ It would appear that a Brahmin travelling between Chittur and Nemara was belated on the road, and asked for shelter for the night at a house where ho was received by two Nair women. He entrusted to the elder sister 1000 rupees for safe keeping. This raised her cupidity and induced her to propose to her younger sister to make away with their unsuspecting guest and pocket the money. The latter, however, stoutly refused to take part in the crime. Later in the night the husband of the elder woman arrived on the scene, when he readily fell in with the proposal of his wife. In the meanwhile the younger woman determined to avert the murder, warned the guest of hisd anger, and locked him np in a cullum attached to the house. The brother of the two women returned towards midnight, and, fatigued with his journey, seeing tho house shut, quietly lay down and slept on the mat vacated by the Brahmin. Soon after the would-be murderers, utterly unconscious of the change made m the occupant of the mat, settled the sleeper with one blow of t ho rice-pounder, and buried the corpse in the dark without knowing of their fatal mistake, and, effacing all tho traces of the blood that was spilt, retired to their guilty repose. In tho morning the Brahmin was released by his fair rescuer, and words cannot describe the surprise and horror that overcame the murderers when their supposed victim appeared before them and demanded the money. Dumb with horror they restored it to the Brahmin, who gave information to the police of his intended murder. While tho police inquiry was in progress, it transpired that the brother of these women had mysteriously disappeared. The police accordingly made a vigorous search, and unearthed the corpse of the deceased and found some traces of bloodstain at the doorstep which had not been properly removed. The police have accordingly arrested the culprits and the matter is under investigation. To conclude the interest of the narrative,' we have only to add that these revelations have impressed the Brahmin with a due souse of tho extent of the danger he had escaped and the magnitude of the service rendered to him by his rescuer. He, therefore, made her a present of the 1000 rupees which was the original incentive to crime on the part of the murderers.” The private letter of a correspondent in Cochin gives a similar account of this strange story. The Nairs are a people eking out a little husbandry with a good deal of roguery.