"You see, fair lady, what risk I run in your service, and how the Queen
has forbidden you to speak with me. You see, further, what manner of
man is your father, who has no thought whatsoever of bestowing you in
marriage. He has rejected so many excellent suitors, that I know of
none, whether near or far, that can win you. I know that I am poor, and
that you could not wed a gentleman that were not richer than I; yet,
if love and good-will were counted wealth, I should hold myself for the
richest man on earth. God has given you great wealth, and you are like
to have even more. Were I so fortunate as to be chosen for your husband,
I would be your husband, lover and servant all my life long; whereas,
if you take one of equal consideration with yourself--and such a one
it were hard to find--he will seek to be the master, and will have
more regard for your wealth than for your person, and for the beauty
of others than for your virtue; and, whilst enjoying the use of your
wealth, he will fail to treat you, yourself, as you deserve. And now my
longing to have this delight, and my fear that you will have none such
with another, impel me to pray that you will make me a happy man, and
yourself the most contented and best treated wife that ever lived."

When Rolandine heard the very words that she herself had purposed
speaking to him, she replied with a glad countenance--

"I am well pleased that you have been the first to speak such words as
I had a long while past resolved to say to you. For the two years that
I have known you I have never ceased to turn over in my mind all the
arguments for you and against you that I was able to devise; but now
that I am at last resolved to enter into the married state, it is time
that 1 should make a beginning and choose some one with whom I may look
to dwell with tranquil mind. And I have been able to find none, whether
handsome, rich, or nobly born, with whom my heart and soul could agree