“Ah, my child,” exclaimed her Majesty softly, as she leaned forward and kissed Dorothy’s fair cheek.

Dorothy wept gently for a moment and familiarly rested her face upon the queen’s breast.  Then she entwined her white arms about Elizabeth’s neck and turned her glorious eyes up to the queen’s face that her Majesty might behold their wondrous beauty and feel the flattery of the words she was about to utter.

“He said also,” continued Dorothy, “that my eyes in some slight degree resembled your Majesty’s, but he qualified his compliment by telling me—­he did not exactly tell me that my eyes were not so large and brilliant as your Majesty’s, for he was making love to me, and of course he would not have dared to say that my eyes were not the most perfect on earth; but he did say that—­at least I know that he meant—­that my eyes, while they resembled yours, were hardly so glorious, and—­and I am very jealous of your Majesty.  John will be leaving me to worship at your feet.”

Elizabeth’s eyes were good enough.  The French called them “marcassin,” that is, wild boar’s eyes.  They were little and sparkling; they were not luminous and large like Dorothy’s, and the girl’s flattery was rank.  Elizabeth, however, saw Dorothy’s eyes and believed her words rather than the reply of the lying mirror, and her Majesty’s heart was soft from the girl’s kneading.  Consider, I pray you, the serpent-like wisdom displayed by Dorothy’s method of attack upon the queen.  She did not ask for John’s liberty.  She did not seek it.  She sought only to place John softly on Elizabeth’s heart.  Some natures absorb flattery as the desert sands absorb the unfrequent rain, and Elizabeth—­but I will speak no ill of her.  She is the greatest and the best sovereign England has ever had.  May God send to my beloved country others like her.  She had many small shortcomings; but I have noticed that those persons who spend their evil energies in little faults have less force left for greater ones.  I will show you a mystery:  Little faults are personally more disagreeable and rasping to us than great ones.  Like flying grains of sand upon a windy day, they vex us constantly.  Great faults come like an avalanche, but they come less frequently, and we often admire their possessor, who sooner or later is apt to become our destroyer.

“I can hardly tell you,” said Dorothy in response to a question by Elizabeth, “I can hardly tell you why I informed your Majesty of Queen Mary’s presence at Rutland.  I did it partly for love of your Majesty and partly because I was jealous of that white, plain woman from Scotland.”

“She is not a plain woman, is she?” said Elizabeth, delighted to hear Mary of Scotland so spoken of for once.  One way to flatter some women is to berate those whom they despise or fear.  Elizabeth loved Dorothy better for the hatred which the girl bore to Mary.  Both stood upon a broad plane of mutual sympathy-jealousy of the same woman.  It united the queen and the maiden in a common heart-touching cause.