would have sufficed to render to others blessed with the joys of
maternity. So then the minx, seizing the page by the head and
squeezing him to her, cried out--"Oh, Rene! Thou hast awakened me!"

And in fact there was no sleep could stand against it, and it is
certain that saints must sleep very soundly. From this business,
without any other mystery, and by a benign faculty which is the
assisting principle of spouses, the sweet and graceful plumage,
suitable to cuckolds, was placed upon the head of the good husband
without his experiencing the slightest shock.

After this sweet repast, the seneschal's lady took kindly to her
siesta after the French fashion, while Bruyn took his according to the
Saracen. But by the said siesta she learned how the good youth of the
page had a better taste than that of the old seneschal, and at night
she buried herself in the sheets far away from her husband, whom she
found strong and stale. And from sleeping and waking up in the day,
from taking siestas and saying litanies, the seneschal's wife felt
growing within her that treasure for which she had so often and so
ardently sighed; but now she liked more the commencement than the
fructifying of it.

You may be sure that Rene knew how to read, not only in books, but in
the eyes of his sweet lady, for whom he would have leaped into a
flaming pile, had it been her wish he should do so. When well and
amply, more than a hundred times, the train had been laid by them, the
little lady became anxious about her soul and the future of her friend
the page. Now one rainy day, as they were playing at touch-tag, like
two children, innocent from head to foot, Blanche, who was always
caught, said to him--