u can find at
Tiffany's. There are strings of pearls as large as marbles, and
a rope of pearls nearly four feet long braided of four strands.
Every pearl is said to be perfect and the size of a pea. The
rope is about an inch in diameter. Besides these are necklaces,
bracelets, brooches, rings and every conceivable ornament set
with jewels of every variety, which have been handed down from
generation to generation in this princely family for several
hundred years. One of the most interesting of the necklaces is
made of uncut rubies said to have been found in India. It has
been worn for more than a thousand years. These jewels are kept
in a treasure-room in the heart of the Nazar Bgah Palace, guarded
night and day by a battalion of soldiers. At night when the palace
is closed half a dozen huge cheetahs, savage beasts of the leopard
family, are released in the corridors, and, as you may imagine, they
are efficient watchmen. They would make a burglar very unhappy.
During the daytime they are allowed to wander about the palace
grounds, but are carefully muzzled.

Malhar Rao built a superb palace at a cost of $1,500,000 which
is considered the most perfect and beautiful example of the
Hindu-Saracenic order of architecture in existence, and its interior
finish and decoration are wonderful for their artistic beauty,
detail and variety. In front of the main entrance are two guns
of solid gold, weighing two hundred and eighty pounds each, and
the carriages, ammunition wagons and other accoutrements are made
of solid silver. The present Maharajah is said to have decided
to melt them down and have them coined into good money, with
which he desires to endow a technical school.

Behind the palace is a great walled arena in which previous rulers
of Baroda have had fights between elephants, tigers, lions and other
wild beasts for the amusement of their court and the population
generally. And they remind you of those we read about in the
Colosseum in the time of Nero and other Roman emperors. Baroda
has one of the finest zoological gardens in the world, but most of
the animals are native to India. It is surrounded by a botanical
garden, in which the late gaikwar, who was passionately fond of
plants and flowers, took a great deal of interest and spent a
great deal of money.

He built a temple at Dakar, a few miles from Baroda, which cost
an enormous sum of money, in honor of an ancient image of the Hindu
god, Krishna. It has been t