he was away from me: I never inquired into it, because in such matters
all men are fools. But I put up with no nonsense at home, and he made me
a fair husband, as husbands go. That much I will say for him gladly: and
if any widow says more than that, Florian, do you beware of her, for she
is an untruthful woman."

"Be that as it may," replied Florian, "it is not quite becoming to speak
thus of your dead husband. No doubt you speak the truth: there is no
telling what sort of person you may have married in what still seems to
me unseemly haste to provide me with a successor: but even so, a little
charitable prevarication would be far more edifying."

He spoke with such earnestness that there fell a silence. The women
seemed to pity him. And in the silence Florian heard from afar young
persons returning from the woods behind Storisende, and bringing with
them the May-pole. They were still singing.

Sang they:

"_Unwillingly foreknowing
That love with May-time flees,
We take this day's bestowing,
And feed on fantasies_--"


4. _Youth Solves It_

The tale tells how lightly and sweetly, and compassionately, too, then
spoke young Sylvie de Nointel.