easier for him to think than anyone else seeing that at the Rue
d'Hirundelle my lord king passed the greater portion of his time
embracing her always as though he would see if such a lovely article
would wear away: but he wore himself out first, poor man, seeing that
he eventually died from excess of love. Although she took care to
grant her favours only to the best and noblest in the court, and that
such occasions were rare as miracles, there were not wanting those
among her enemies and rivals who declared that for 10,000 crowns a
simple gentleman might taste the pleasures of his sovereign, which was
false above all falseness, for when her lord taxed her with it, did
she not reply, "Abominable wretches! Curse the devils who put this
idea in your head! I never yet did have man who spent less than 30,000
crowns upon me."

The king, although vexed could not repress a smile, and kept her on a
month to silence scandal. And last, la demoiselle de Pisseleu, anxious
to obtain her place, brought about her ruin. Many would have liked to
be ruined in the same way, seeing she was taken by a young lord, was
happy with him, the fires of love in her being still unquenched. But
to take up the thread again. One day that the king's sweetheart was
passing through the town in her litter to buy laces, furs, velvets,
broideries, and other ammunition, and so charmingly attired, and
looking so lovely, that anyone, especially the clerks, would have
believed the heavens were open above them, behold, her good man, who
comes upon her near the old cross. She, at that time lazily swinging
her charming little foot over the side of the litter, drew in her head
as though she had seen an adder. She was a good wife, for I know some
who would have proudly passed their husbands, to their shame and to
the great disrespect of conjugal rights.