es, we know that well enough: he has no right to them,--indeed he
does not ask for them on that account, but he has well deserved them for
another reason."

"Never mind about that," said Madame. "I will willingly give the
material out of love for you, mesdames, who have so warmly pleaded for
him, if you will undertake to do the sewing."

"Yes, truly, Madame."

Like one who when he wakes in the morning has but to give himself a
shake and he is ready, Monsieur needed but a bunch of twigs to beat his
clothes and he was ready, and so he went to Mass; and Madame and her
women followed him, laughing loudly at him I can assure you.

And you may imagine that during the Mass there was more than one giggle
when they remembered that Monsieur, whilst he was in the chest (though
he did not know it himself) had been registered in the book which has no
name. (*) And unless by chance this book falls into his hands, he will
never,--please God--know of his misfortune, which on no account would I
have him know. So I beg of any reader who may know him, to take care not
to show it to him.

(*) The Book of Cuckolds.

*****

[Illustration: 28.jpg The incapable Lover.]

STORY THE TWENTY-EIGHTH -- THE INCAPABLE LOVER. [28]

By Messire Miohaut De Changy.

_Of the meeting assigned to a great Prince of this kingdom by a damsel
who was chamber-woman to the Queen; of the little feats of arms of the
said Prince and of the neat replies made by the said damsel to the Queen
concerning her greyhound which had been purposely shut out of the room
of the said Queen, as you shall shortly hear._

If in the time of the most renowned and eloquent Boccaccio, the
adventure which forms the subject of my tale had come to his knowledge,
I do not doubt but that he would have added it to his stories of great
men who met with bad fortune. For I think that no nobleman ever had a
greater misfortune to bear than the good lord (whom may God pardon!)
whose adventure I will relate, and whether his ill fortune is worthy
to be in the aforesaid books of Boccaccio, I leave those who hear it to
judge.

The good lord of whom I speak was, in his time, one of the great
princes of this kingdom, apparelled and furnished with all that befits a
nobleman; and amongst his other qualities was this,--that never was man
more destined to be a favourite with the ladies.

Now it happened to him at the time when his fame in this respect most
flourished, and ever