same locket to have been the
object which Messire Heleigh flung into the river, shortly before we
began our combat. I do not rob the dead, madame."

"The act was very like him," the Queen said. "Messire Camoys, I think
that this day is a festival in heaven."

Afterward she set to work on requisitions in the King's name. But Osmund
Heleigh she had interred at Ambresbury, commanding it to be written on
his tomb that he died in the Queen's cause.

How the same cause prospered (Nicolas concludes), how presently Dame
Alianora reigned again in England and with what wisdom, and how in the
end this great Queen died a nun at Ambresbury and all England wept
therefor--this you may learn elsewhere. I have chosen to record six days
of a long and eventful life; and (as Messire Heleigh might have done) I
say modestly with him of old, _Majores majora sonent_. Nevertheless, I
assert that many a forest was once a pocketful of acorns.

THE END OF THE FIRST NOVEL

II

The Story of the Tenson

"_Plagues a Dieu ja la nueitz non falhis,
Ni 'l mieus amicx lonc de mi no s partis,
Ni la gayta jorn ni alba ne vis.
Oy Dieus! oy Dieus! de l' alba tan tost ve!_"

THE SECOND NOVEL.--ELLINOR OF CASTILE, BEING
ENAMORED OF A HANDSOME PERSON, IS IN HER FLIGHT FROM
MARITAL OBLIGATIONS ASSISTED BY HER HUSBAND, AND
IS IN THE END BY HIM CONVINCED OF THE RATIONALITY
OF ALL ATTENDANT CIRCUMSTANCES.

The Story of the Tenson

In the year of grace 1265 (Nicolas begins), about the festival of Saint
Peter _ad Vincula_, the Prince de Gatinais came to Burgos. Before this
he had lodged for three months in the district of Ponthieu; and the
object of his southern journey was to assure the tenth Alphonso, then
ruling in Castile, that the latter's sister Ellinor, now resident at
Entrechat, was beyond any reasonable doubt the transcendent lady whose
existence old romancers had anticipated, however cloudily, when they
fabled in remote time concerning Queen Heleine of Sparta.

There was a postscript to his news, and a pregnant one. The world knew
that the King of Leon and Castile desired to be King of Germany as
well, and that at present a single vote in the Diet would decide
between his claims and those of his competitor, Earl Richard of
Cornwall. De Gatinais chaffered fairly; he had a vote, Alphonso had a
sister. So that, in effect--ohe, in effect, he made no question that
his Majesty understood!

The Astronom