thing, much less do it in your presence. Wherefore 'tis evident that 'tis
some illusion of sight that is propagated from the pear-tree; for nought
in the world would have made me believe that I saw not you lying there in
carnal intercourse with your wife, had I not heard you say that you saw
me doing that which most assuredly, so far from doing, I never so much as
thought of." The lady then started up with a most resentful mien, and
burst out with:--"Foul fall thee, if thou knowest so little of me as to
suppose that, if I were minded to do thee such foul dishonour as thou
sayst thou didst see me do, I would come hither to do it before thine
eyes! Rest assured that for such a purpose, were it ever mine, I should
deem one of our chambers more meet, and it should go hard but I would so
order the matter that thou shouldst never know aught of it." Nicostratus,
having heard both, and deeming that what they both averred must be true,
to wit, that they would never have ventured upon such an act in his
presence, passed from chiding to talk of the singularity of the thing,
and how marvellous it was that the vision should reshape itself for every
one that clomb the tree. The lady, however, made a show of being
distressed that Nicostratus should so have thought of her,
and:--"Verily," quoth she, "no woman, neither I nor another, shall again
suffer loss of honour by this pear-tree: run, Pyrrhus, and bring hither
an axe, and at one and the same time vindicate thy honour and mine by
felling it, albeit 'twere better far Nicostratus' skull should feel the
weight of the axe, seeing that in utter heedlessness he so readily
suffered the eyes of his mind to be blinded; for, albeit this vision was
seen by the bodily eye, yet ought the understanding by no means to have
entertained and affirmed it as real."

So Pyrrhus presently hied him to fetch the axe, and returning therewith
felled the pear; whereupon the lady, turning towards Nicostratus:--"Now
that this foe of my honour is fallen," quoth she, "my wrath is gone from