then? or the jackal?' And he has not another word to
say.

FOOTNOTE:

[2] A galail is a double-stringed bow from which bullets or pellets of
hard dried clay can be fired with considerable force and precision.

_THE COMB AND THE COLLAR_

Once upon a time there was a king of Lombardy who, though he was
uglier than any of his subjects, loved beauty in others, so he married
a wife who was declared by everyone to be the handsomest of women;
and, whispered some, the most ill-natured also. Certainly she could
not endure the sight of a pretty person, and her ladies were all the
plainest of their sex. Worse than all, she was desperately jealous of
the king's son and daughter by his former wife.

Unfortunately, in spite of all her evil qualities, the king was her
complete slave, and badly though she treated the boy, the lovely
princess was made to suffer ten times as much. Not contented with
giving the girl, for a governess, a woman whose temper was as bad as
the queen's own, the cruel step-mother did everything she could think
of to spoil the girl's beauty, and to force her to appear as ugly as
she was herself; but, try as she might, when the hideous clothes and
frightful brown paint had been removed, her loveliness shone out as
bright as ever.

* * * * *

Now the king of Lombardy was cousin to the Archduke of Placenza, who
had lately lost his reason, to the great grief of his son and
daughter, Perarthrites and Ferrandina. The doctors having all failed
to restore him to health, the prince and princess sent a messenger to
consult a famous enchantress, called the Mother of Sheaths, because
everyone who visited her brought with him a knife, which she thrust
into one of the sheaths with which her cavern was lined. However, they
obtained little comfort from the witch, who bade them 'seek their
father's wits in the place where he had lost them.' Against the wishes
of the chief ministers, Perarthrites and Ferrandina rode off to the
mysterious castle where the king had slept when his terrible fate had
overtaken him, and, once inside the gates, nothing more was heard of
them.

* * * * *

When three weeks had passed and still there was no news, the king's
chief minister called a council to talk over the matter, and, at the
end, it was decided that a company of distinguished persons should
visit the Mother of Sheaths, and that the knives they must take wit