“If,” said Ennasuite, “there be a man as perfect as you say, quis est ille et laudabimus eum?” (8)

     7 I St. John, iv. 20.

     8 We have been unable to find this anywhere in the
     Scriptures.—­Ed.

“There are men,” said Dagoucin, “whose love is so strong and true that they would rather die than harbour a wish contrary to the honour and conscience of their mistress, and who at the same time are unwilling that she or others should know what is in their hearts.”

“Such men,” said Saffredent, “must be of the nature of the chameleon, which lives on air. (9) There is not a man in the world but would fain declare his love and know that it is returned; and further, I believe that love’s fever is never so great, but it quickly passes off when one knows the contrary.  For myself, I have seen manifest miracles of this kind.”

     9 A popular fallacy.  The chameleon undoubtedly feeds upon
     small insects.—­D.

“I pray you then,” said Ennasuite, “take my place and tell us about some one that was recalled from death to life by having discovered in his mistress the very opposite of his desire.”

“I am,” said Saffredent, “so much afraid of displeasing the ladies, whose faithful servant I have always been and shall always be, that without an express command from themselves I should never have dared to speak of their imperfections.  However, in obedience to them, I will hide nothing of the truth.”

[Illustration:  020.jpg Tailpiece]

[Illustration:  021a.jpg The Lord de Riant finding the Widow with her Groom]

[The Lord de Riant finding the Widow with her Groom]

[Illustration:  021.jpg Page Image]

TALE XX.

The Lord of Riant, being greatly in love with a widow lady and finding her the contrary of what he had desired and of what she had often declared herself to be, was so affected thereby that in a moment resentment had power to extinguish the flame which neither length of time nor lack of opportunity had been able to quench. (1)

1 The unpleasant discovery related in this tale is attributed by Margaret to a gentleman of Francis I.’s household, but a similar incident figures in the introduction to the Arabian Nights.  Ariosto also tells much the same tale in canto xxviii. of his Rolando Furioso, and another version of it will be found in No. 24 of Morlini’s Novella, first issued at Naples in 1520.  Subsequent to the Heptameron it supplied No. 29 of the Comptes du Monde Adventureux, figured in a rare imitation of the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles printed at Rouen early in the seventeenth century, and was introduced by La Fontaine into his well-known tale Joconde.  On the other hand, there is certainly a locality called Rians in Provence, just beyond the limits of Dauphine, and moreover among Francis I.’s “equerries of the stable” there was a Monsieur