to take him to husbande, neuer ceasing
from teares and supplication, vntyl she had consented to their
requeste. Then the mariage was solempnised with great ioy and
triumph, and the whole City after that tyme, lyued in great
felicity and quiet, so long as nature lengthned the dayes of
those two Noble Prynces.

THE SIXTEENTH NOUELL.

_The Marchionisse of Monferrato, with a banket of Hennes, and
certaine pleasant wordes, repressed the fond loue of Philip the
French Kynge._

Good Euphimia (as you haue harde) did fondly apply hir loue vpon
a seruile man, who though bred vp in court where trayninge and
vse doth alter the rude conditions of sutch as be intertayned
there, yet voyde of all gentlenesse, and frustrate of Nature's
sweetenesse in that curteous kinde, as not exchaunginge natiue
fiercenesse for noble aduauncement, returned to hys hoggish
soyle, and walowed in the durty filth of Inhumanity, _whose
nature myght wel with fork, or staffe be expelled, but home
againe it would haue come_, as Horace pleadeth in his Epistles.
O noble Gentlewoman, that mildly suffred the displeasure of the
good king hir father, who would fayne haue dissuaded hir from
that vnseemely match, to ioyne with a yong Prince, a king,
a Gentleman of great perfection: and O pestilent Carle, being
beloued of so honourable a pucell, that for treason discharged
thy head from the block, and of a donghill slaue preferred thee
to be a king, wouldest for those deserts in the ende frame
sayned matter to consume hir. With iust hatred then did the
Noble Emperour Claudius Caesar prosecute those of bond and
seruile kinde that were matched with the free and noble. Right
well knew hee that some taste of egrenesse would rest in sutch
sauage fruite, and therefore made a law, that the issue of them
should not haue like liberty and preheminence, as other had,
which agreeably did couple. What harme sutch mariage hath
deferred to diuers states and persons (t'auoide other examples)
the former Nouell teacheth. Wherfore to ende the same, with
bewailing of Euphimia for hir vnluckie lot, begin we now to glad
our selues with the wise and stoute aunswer of a chaste
Marquesse, a Gentlewoman of singular beauty and discretion, made
to the fond demaund of a mighty Monarch, that fondly fell in
loue with hir, and made a reckening of that, which was doubtfull
to recouer. This king by Louing Hir whome he neuer saw, fared
like the man that in his slepe dreamed that he