“What is your name?” said the young marquis.

“Griselda,” said the shepherd girl.

“Well, Griselda,” said the Marquis of Saluzzo, “I am looking for a wife.  If I marry you, will you study to please me and carry out all my demands, whatever they are, without a murmur or a sullen look?”

“Yes, my lord,” said Griselda.

Thereupon, the marquis sent his servants to fetch some rich and costly robes, and, leading Griselda out by the hand, he clothed her in gorgeous apparel, and set a coronet upon her head, and putting her on a palfrey, he led her to his palace.  And there he celebrated his nuptials with as much pomp and grandeur as if he had been marrying the daughter of the King of France.

Griselda proved to be a good wife.  She was so sweet-natured, and so gentle and kind in her manners, that her husband thought himself the happiest man in the world; and her subjects honoured her and loved her very dearly.  In a very short time, her winning behaviour and her good works were the common subject of talk throughout the country, and great were the rejoicings when a daughter was born to her.

Unfortunately, her husband got a strange fancy into his head.  He imagined she was good and gentle merely because everything went well with her; and, with great harshness, he resolved to try her patience by suffering.  So he told her that the people were greatly displeased with her by reason of her mean parentage, and murmured because she had given birth to a daughter.

“My lord,” said Griselda, “I know I am meaner than the meanest of my subjects, and that I am unworthy of the dignity to which you have advanced me.  Deal with me, I pray, as you think best for your honour and happiness, and waste no thought upon me.”

Soon afterwards one of his servants came to Griselda, and said:  “Madam, I must either lose my own life, or obey my lord’s commands.  He has ordered me to take your daughter, and—­”

He would not say anything more, and Griselda thought that he had orders to kill the child.  Taking it out of the cradle, she kissed it, and tenderly laid it in the servant’s arms.  The marquis sent the little girl to one of his relatives at Bologna, to be brought up and educated.  Some years afterwards Griselda gave birth to a boy.  The marquis, naturally enough, was mightily pleased to have an heir; but he took also this child away from his wife.

“I am not able to live any longer with my people,” he said.  “They say they will not have a grandson of a poor shepherd as their future lord.  I must dispose of this child as I did the other.”

“My lord,” replied Griselda, “study your own ease and happiness without the least care for me.  Nothing is pleasing to me that is not pleasing to you.”

The next day the marquis sent for his son in the same way as he had sent for his daughter, and had him brought up with her at Bologna.  His people thought that the children had been put to death, and blamed him for his cruelty, and showed great pity for his wife.  But Griselda would not allow them to attack her husband, but found excuses for him.