k, and the women, whose gorgeous
gowns exposed their bepowdered skin halfway to their waists, measuring
from the chin, and whose lifted petticoats made a proportionate display,
measuring from the feet, surely were brought from some fair land of folly
and shame.

I touched Frances's hand to awaken her, and whispered: "Show neither
wonder nor interest. See nothing, or these fools about us will laugh."

She laughed nervously, nodding her head to tell me that she understood.

"But I must look. I can't help it," she said.

"You must see it all without looking," I suggested, and Mary helped me
out by saying:--

"It is all tinsel, not worth looking at. That is the quality of all you
will see at court; gold foil, king and all."

Presently I saw the gentlemen removing their hats and tucking them under
their arms, so I knew the king had entered, and felt sure he would soon
come up to salute his hostess, the duchess, near whom we were standing.

I told Frances that she was about to meet the king, and admonished her to
keep a strong heart. She smiled as she answered:--

"I think I have met him already." Then she told us briefly of her
encounter with the tipsy gentleman in the Stone Gallery.

She had entirely recovered her self-possession and was prepared to meet
calmly the man who was a demigod to millions of English subjects.

The queen did not come with the king, so he loitered a moment among the
courtiers before making his way to the duchess, but the delay was short,
and soon he presented himself. The duchess rose when he approached, but
hardly allowed him time to finish his bow till she took his arm, turned
toward us, and smiled to Frances to approach. I touched my cousin's arm,
gently thrusting her forward, and the next moment she was courtesying to
the floor before the man who believed, in common with most of his
subjects, that he owned by divine right the body and soul of every
man in England, together with every man's ox and his ass, his wife and
his daughter, and all that to him belonged.

The king raised Frances, still retaining her hand, and bent most
gallantly before her.

"I have met Mistress Jennings," said he, smiling, "and she told me to pay
my compliments to the devil."

The king laughed, so of course the courtiers who heard him also laughed.
Instantly the news spread, and one might have heard on every hand, "The
new maid told the king to go to the devil." But as the king seemed to be
pleased, the co