fore he could draw back into cover, a head in
a fantastic cap appeared above the bushes. It was the village Jester
capering along the path as if the world were thistledown and every day a
holiday. But when he saw Aldebaran he stopped agape and crossed himself.
Then he pushed nearer.

Now those who saw the Jester only on a market day or at the country fair
plying his trade of merriment for all 'twas worth knew not a sage was
hid behind that motley or that his sympathies were tender as a saint's.
Yet so it was. The motto written deep across his heart was this: _"To
ease the burden of the world!"_ It was beyond belief how wise he'd grown
in wheedling men to think no load lay on their shoulders. Now he stood
and gazed upon the prostrate man who turned away his face and would not
answer his low-spoken words: "What ails thee, brother?"

It boots not in this tale what wiles he used to gain Aldebaran's ear and
tongue. Another man most surely must have failed, because he shrank from
pity as from salt rubbed in a wound, and felt that none could hear his
woeful history and not bestow that pity. But if the Jester felt its
throbs he gave no sign. Seated beside him on the grass he talked in the
light tone that served his trade, as if Aldebaran's woes were but a
flight of swallows 'cross a summer sky, and would as soon be gone. And
when between his quirks he'd drawn the piteous tale entirely from him,
he doubled up with laughter and smote his sides.

"And I'm the fool and thou'rt the sage!" he gasped between his peals of
mirth. "Gadzooks! Methinks it is the other way around. Why, look ye,
man! Here thou dost go a-junketing through all the earth to find a
chance to show unequalled courage, and when kind Fate doth shove it
underneath thy very nose, thou turn'st away, lamenting. I've heard of
those who know not beans although the bag be opened, and now I laugh to
see one of that very kind before me."

Then dropping his unseemly mirth and all his wanton raillery, he stood
up with his face a-shine, and spake as if he were the heaven-sent
messenger of hope.

"Rise up!" he cried. "_Knowest thou not it takes a thousandfold more
courage to sheathe the sword when one is all on fire for action than to
go forth against the greatest foe?_ Here is thy chance to show the
world the kingliest spirit it has ever known! Here is a phalanx thou
mayst meet all single-handed--a daily struggle with a host of hurts that
cut thee to the quick. This sheath