“As the priest said when he kissed the serving-wench,” snarled Scaramouche, and went on eating.

“His humour, like your own, you will observe, is acrid,” said Pantaloon.  He passed on.  “Then that rascal with the lumpy nose and the grinning bucolic countenance is, of course, Pierrot.  Could he be aught else?”

“I could play lovers a deal better,” said the rustic cherub.

“That is the delusion proper to Pierrot,” said Pantaloon, contemptuously.  “This heavy, beetle-browed ruffian, who has grown old in sin, and whose appetite increases with his years, is Polichinelle.  Each one, as you perceive, is designed by Nature for the part he plays.  This nimble, freckled jackanapes is Harlequin; not your spangled Harlequin into which modern degeneracy has debased that first-born of Momus, but the genuine original zany of the Commedia, ragged and patched, an impudent, cowardly, blackguardly clown.”

“Each one of us, as you perceive,” said Harlequin, mimicking the leader of the troupe, “is designed by Nature for the part he plays.”

“Physically, my friend, physically only, else we should not have so much trouble in teaching this beautiful Leandre to become a lover.  Then we have Pasquariel here, who is sometimes an apothecary, sometimes a notary, sometimes a lackey — an amiable, accommodating fellow.  He is also an excellent cook, being a child of Italy, that land of gluttons.  And finally, you have myself, who as the father of the company very properly play as Pantaloon the roles of father.  Sometimes, it is true, I am a deluded husband, and sometimes an ignorant, self-sufficient doctor.  But it is rarely that I find it necessary to call myself other than Pantaloon.  For the rest, I am the only one who has a name — a real name.  It is Binet, monsieur.

“And now for the ladies...  First in order of seniority we have Madame there.”  He waved one of his great hands towards a buxom, smiling blonde of five-and-forty, who was seated on the lowest of the steps of the travelling house.  “She is our Duegne, or Mother, or Nurse, as the case requires.  She is known quite simply and royally as Madame.  If she ever had a name in the world, she has long since forgotten it, which is perhaps as well.  Then we have this pert jade with the tip-tilted nose and the wide mouth, who is of course our soubrette Columbine, and lastly, my daughter Climene, an amoureuse of talents not to be matched outside the Comedie Francaise, of which she has the bad taste to aspire to become a member.”

The lovely Climene — and lovely indeed she was — tossed her nut-brown curls and laughed as she looked across at Andre-Louis.  Her eyes, he had perceived by now, were not blue, but hazel.

“Do not believe him, monsieur.  Here I am queen, and I prefer to be queen here rather than a slave in Paris.”

“Mademoiselle,” said Andre-Louis, quite solemnly, “will be queen wherever she condescends to reign.”