f pain not much heedful,
So long as the process was needful.

* * * * *

She went out 'mid hooting and laughter;
Clement Marot stayed; I followed after."

Catching her up, he asked what it had all meant. "I'm a poet," he added;
"I must know human nature."

"She told me, 'Too long had I heard
Of the deed proved alone by the word:
For my love--what De Lorge would not dare!
With my scorn--what De Lorge could compare!
And the endless descriptions of death
He would brave when my lip formed a breath,
I must reckon as braved'" . . .

--and for these great gifts, must give in return her love, as love was
understood at the Court of King Francis. But to-day, looking at the
lion, she had mused on all the dangers affronted to get that beast to
that den: his capture by some poor slave whom no lady's love was to
reward, no King or Court to applaud, but only the joy of the sport, and
the delight of his children's wonder at the glorious creature. . . . And
at this very Court, the other day, did not they tell of a page who for
mere boyish bravado had dropped his cap over the barrier and leaped
across, pretending that he must get it back? Why should she not test De
Lorge here and now? For _now_ she was still free; now she could find out
what "death for her sake" really meant; otherwise, he might yet break
down her doubts, she might yield, still unassured, and only then
discover that it did not mean anything at all! So--she had thrown the
glove.

"'The blow a glove gives is but weak:
Does the mark yet discolour my cheek?
But when the heart suffers a blow,
Will the pain pass so soon, do you know?'"

* * * * *

De Lorge, indeed, had braved "death for her sake"; but he had then been
capable of the public insult. The pain of _that_, had she loved him,
must quite have broken her heart. And not only had he been capable of
this, but he had not understood her, he too had thought it "mere
vanity." Love then was nowhere--neither in his heart nor in hers. . . .
Ronsard, following her with his eyes as she went finally away, saw a
youth keeping as close as he dared to the doorway by which she would
pass. He was a mere plebeian; naturally his life was not so precious as
that of the brilliant De Lorge (thus Ronsard ironically remarks); but
there was no doubt what _he_ would have done, "had our brute b