pale before her lustre as a tallow dip does before an illumination."

The clock struck twelve before she returned to them. Just as the last
stroke sounded the door was thrown open, and there she stood, a woman on
each side of her, holding a large silver candelabra bright with wax
tapers high above her, so that she was in a flood of light.

She was attired in rich brocade of crimson and silver, and wore a great
hooped petticoat, which showed off her grandeur, her waist of no more
bigness than a man's hands could clasp, set in its midst like the stem of
a flower; her black hair was rolled high and circled with jewels, her
fair long throat blazed with a collar of diamonds, and the majesty of her
eye and lip and brow made up a mien so dazzling that every man sprang to
his feet beholding her.

She made a sweeping obeisance and then stood up before them, her head
thrown back and her lips curving in the triumphant mocking smile of a
great beauty looking upon them all as vassals.

"Down upon your knees," she cried, "and drink to me kneeling. From this
night all men must bend so--all men on whom I deign to cast my eyes."




CHAPTER V--"Not I," said she. "There thou mayst trust me. I would not
be found out."


She went no more a-hunting in boy's clothes, but from this time forward