By thus unveiling herself before the crowd, she would sink herself to the level of the most unworthy of her sex—­while the violation of an established usage, in the time of such excitement and excess, might lead to the wildest disorder, and the queen might be exposed to every insult from crowds maddened by wine and ripe for disorder; while the monarch himself might not be able to protect her in a position so strange and unfitting.

The modesty of the woman and the dignity of the queen alike forbade compliance with the strange order—­and Vashti might well presume that, in the hour of reflection, when his senses had returned, the monarch would thank her for a prudence which probably alone preserved her dignity and his honour.

But the passions of the king were inflamed.  His reason was blinded, and artful courtiers, from motives of intrigue or pique, stimulated his anger.  There are ever those who stand ready to administer to unholy passions, and who are watching for the fall of such as are high in place or favour.  And still under the influence of wine, the rash monarch, by his own act, placed an inseparable barrier between himself and her whose charms had so lately been his proudest boast, and whose conduct had proved that she well deserved all honour and all affection.  Vashti was separated from the king’s favour; and flattering sycophants extolled the act of folly, as a measure which gave peace and security to every household in the realm.  “All the wives shall give to their husbands honour, both to great and small.”  And thus the day closed by an edict that brought sorrow to many hearts, and desolation even to the gates of the palace.

The excitement was past.  The hour of reflection arrived, and “the king remembered Vashti.”  His resentment was appeased.  “He remembered what she had done, and what was decreed against her.”  That which had been magnified into a crime and had given such deep offence, was now seen to be an act of wisdom and prudence—­the result of true modesty, and that deep affection which sought alone the love of her husband, which shrank from the admiration of the crowd, and which ventured to disobey rather than forfeit self-respect and womanly pride—­preferring to lose his love rather than expose his honour.  An immutable decree—­his own—­separated him from one lately so beloved, and so truly worthy of high honour.

The darkened and saddened aspect of the monarch declared his late repentance; and those who had precipitated the fall of the queen, to screen themselves, were prompt to devise methods of banishing the remembrance of the divorced Vashti.  They would replace her by a new favourite.  Yet, so surpassing was her loveliness, and so rare her beauty, that the courtiers could with difficulty find one whose charms might banish from memory the repudiated consort, until they sought through all the provinces of that vast empire for the fairest of the daughters of men.