'Get out, you saucy, rude creature! How dare you to remind me of your
rudeness? As for your little trumpery twopenny ring, there, sir, there!'
And she flung it out of the window.

'It was my mother's marriage-ring,' cried Giglio.

'_I_ don't care whose marriage-ring it was,' cries Angelica. 'Marry the
person who picks it up if she's a woman; you shan't marry ME. And give
me back MY ring. I've no patience with people who boast about the things
they give away! _I_ know who'll give me much finer things than you ever
gave me. A beggarly ring indeed, not worth five shillings!'

Now Angelica little knew that the ring which Giglio had given her was a
fairy ring: if a man wore it, it made all the women in love with him;
if a woman, all the gentlemen. The Queen, Giglio's mother, quite an
ordinary-looking person, was admired immensely whilst she wore this
ring, and her husband was frantic when she was ill. But when she called
her little Giglio to her, and put the ring on his finger, King Savio did
not seem to care for his wife so much any more, but transferred all his
love to little Giglio. So did everybody love him as long as he had the
ring; but when, as quite a child, he gave it to Angelica, people began
to love and admire HER; and Giglio, as the saying is, played only second
fiddle.

'Yes,' says Angelica, going on in her foolish ungrateful way. '_I_
know who'll give me much finer things than your beggarly little pearl
nonsense.'

'Very good, miss! You may take back your ring too!' says Giglio, his
eyes flashing fire at her, and then, as his eyes had been suddenly