Democratic Sentinel, Volume 22, Number 29, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 August 1898 — ROMANCE Qf A DIAMOND. [ARTICLE]

ROMANCE Qf A DIAMOND.

A Bnattis Crown J®wel*e Htatory ci Murder wed Robbery. There is a famous diamond now la the crown regalia of Russia wbich has a moot extraordinary history of murder and blood. How many murders were done for Its sake before It came Into Hie possession of the groat Nadir, Shah of Persia, will never be knows, but from that time until it was purchased for the Russian Empress, Catharine the Great, its story was one of. crime. Nadir Shah was - assassinated in 1747 by four of his officers whom he Intended to pat to death, and after 1 they had- done their work they hastily, appropriated such of his jewels as they j could easily conceal and decamp. Qne! of the stolen gems was the Shah, which Nadir wore in his turban. The uoblei man to whose portion fell the Shah fled into Afghanistan and was never heard of again. Four or five years later a jeweler in B&ssora was visited by an Afghan, who offered the Shah, together with an emerald, a ruby and & sapphire, all of great size, for sale at a very modest figure. The jeweler did not bare the money at the moment, and made an appointment to meet the Afghan the next day, but the latter did Dot return. Four years later the Jew- j •lev, an Armenian, was in Bagdad, j where he again met the Afghan, pnd j learned from Mm that the gems h®d been sold to a Jewish merchant fer 05,000 francs. Shafrns, the Armenian, enlisted the services of hi? two brothers, the three murdered tbs Afghan and the Jew, threw their bodies lute the river, took the gems and made off. Somej where In the desert between the En- | phrates and Armenia, the oldest of the Brothers murdered the other twe, possessed himself of all the gems and went an to Constantinople. Fearful of attempting to sell the jewels there, he went by sea to France, and, falling to find a buyer, visited most of the capitals of Europe, finally offering the diamond to Catherine the Great She refused to buy at the figure he demanded, and he at once disappeared, being heard from ten years later In Astrakhan, where he was seen by some of the Russian courtiers. He refused to negotiate save alt Smyrna, and started thither, but was murdered on the way by the Russians, the gem secured and sold to ffittherino for $650,000.