United States or Italy ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
She pointed to incidents of their youth; her vision was acutely retrospective. The wealth of her nephew and niece caused such a view of them to be, as she remarked, anxious past endurance. She had grounds for fearing that John, who might step to an alliance with any one of the proudest houses in the Kingdom, would marry a beggar-maid. As for Jane, she was the natural prey of a threadbare poet.
At that moment Prince Merlin approached the throne clothed all in black silk, more appropriate for a scene of mourning than of festivity; and the King said to him: "Wilt thou lead this beggar-maid in the dance?" The Prince's face grew as white for a moment as the lace of his collar, but he replied proudly, "At a ball a man chooses his own partners."
Lorimer looked at her with some inquisitiveness. "What makes you say that, my dear?" "Because I feel it so much," she replied. "Dear Mrs. Lorimer, you cannot, perhaps, understand but when he married me, it seemed as if the old story of the king and the beggar-maid were being repeated over again. I sought nothing but his love his love was, and is my life!
Is not King Cophetua and the Beggar-maid an adjudged case in point? 'Professional! professional! another forfeit, exclaimed the tumultuary nobility.
And her discoloured, old blue frock and her broken boots seemed only like the romantic rags of King Cophetua's beggar-maid. She suddenly became aware of his keen blue eyes upon her, taking her all in. Instantly her broken boots and her frayed old frock hurt her. She resented his seeing everything. Even he knew that her stocking was not pulled up. She went into the scullery, blushing deeply.
In youthful days at college he had married, neither wisely nor well, a beggar-maid without those virtues usually credited to beggar-maidens who marry gentlemen. Well, Houghton, the beggar-maid was supposed to have died. She hadn't died; she had shammed. Meanwhile, between her death and her resurrection, the man came to love that good woman. And so, lines got crossed; things went wrong.
His long fingers rested on the marble balustrade, and the royal rings winked wickedly at the Princess. The King said to her, "What did my sons say and do to you?" Then she related everything. The King frowned. "But how do I know whether you are really the Princess Myrtle? You may for all that be but a goose-girl or a beggar-maid."
Word Of The Day