"Gently, then, gently, dear friends--dear companions! When was it we
parted? In the spring of the year--and we meet now in the late summer.
As the seasons change so do our conditions: if the spring is a season of
folly, then is the harvest-time the period for reflection. When we last
met I was a strolling poet, glad to serve your gifted company within the
scope of my talents--now, ladies and gentlemen, now"--he drew himself up
with pride--"now you behold in me the governor and friend of the
heir-presumptive of Pianura."

Cries of incredulity and derision greeted this announcement, and one of
the girls called out laughingly, "Yet you have the same old cassock to
your back!"

"And the same old passage from your mouth to your belly," added an
elastic Harlequin, reaching an arm across the women's shoulders. "Come,
Cantapresto, we'll help you line it with good wine, to the health of his
most superlatively serene Highness, the heir-presumptive of Pianura; and
where is that fabulous personage, by the way?"

Odo at this retreated hastily behind the soprano; but a pretty girl
catching sight of him, he found himself dragged into the centre of the
company, who hailed him with fantastic obeisances. Supper meanwhile was
being laid on the greasy table down the middle of the room. The Matamor,
who seemed the director of the troupe, thundered out his orders for
maccaroni, fried eels and sausages; the inn-servants flanked the plates
with wine-flasks and lumps of black bread, and in a moment the hungry
comedians, thrusting Odo into a high seat at the head of the table, were
falling on the repast with a prodigious clatter of cutlery.