SEEING AND BELIEVING.
My father (said the damsel) is King of the Distant Islands, where the treasure of the earth is collected. Never was greater wealth known, and I was heiress of it all.
But it is impossible to foresee what is most to be desired for us in this world. I was a king's daughter, I was rich, I was handsome, I was lively; and yet to all those advantages I owed my ill-fortune.
Among other suitors for my hand there came two on the same day, one of whom was a youth named Ordauro, handsome from head to foot; the other an old man of seventy, whose name was Folderico. Both were rich and of noble birth; but the greybeard was counted extremely wise, and of a foresight more than human. As I did not feel in want of his foresight, the youth was far more to my taste; and accordingly I listened to him with perfect good-will, and gave the wise man no sort of encouragement. I was not at liberty, however, to determine the matter; my father had a voice in it; so, fearing what he would advise, I thought to secure a good result by cunning and management. It is an old observation, that the craft of a woman exceeds all other craft. Indeed, it is Solomon's own saying. But now-a-days people laugh at it; and I found to my cost that the laugh is just. I requested my father to proclaim, first, that nobody should have me in marriage who did not surpass me in swiftness (for I was a damsel of a mighty agility); and secondly, that he who did surpass me should be my husband. He consented, and I thought my happiness secure. You must know, I have run down a bird, and caught it with my own hand.
Well, both my suitors came to the race; the youth on a large war-horse, trapped with gold, which curvetted in a prodigious manner, and seemed impatient for a gallop; the old roan on a mule, carrying a great bag at his side, and looking already tired out. They dismounted on the place chosen for the trial, which was a meadow. It was encircled by a world of spectators; and the greybeard and myself (for his age gave him the first chance) only waited for the sound of the trumpet to set off.
I held my competitor in such contempt, that I let him get the start of me, on purpose to make him ridiculous; but I was not prepared for his pulling a golden apple out of his bag, and throwing it as far as he could in a direction different from that of the goal. The sight of a curiosity so tempting was too much for my prudence; and it rolled away so roundly, and to such a distance, that I lost more time in reaching it than I looked for. Before I overtook the old gentleman, he threw another apple, and this again led me a chase after it. In short, I blush to say, that, resolved as I was to be tempted no further, seeing that the end of our course was now at hand, and my marriage with an old man instead of a young man was out of the question, he seduced me to give chase to a third apple, and fairly reached the goal before me. I wept for rage and disgust, and meditated every species of unconjugal treatment of the old fox. What right had he to marry such a child as I was? I asked myself the question at the time; I asked it a thousand times afterwards; and I must confess, that the more I have tormented him, the more the retaliation delights me.
However, it was of no use at the moment. The old wretch bore me off to his domains with an ostentatious triumph; and then, his jealousy misgiving him, he shut me up in a castle on a rock, where he endeavoured from that day forth to keep me from the sight of living being. You may judge what sort of castle it was by its name—Altamura (lofty wall). It overlooked a desert on three sides, and the sea on the fourth; and a man might as well have flown as endeavoured to scale it. There was but one path up to the entrance, very steep and difficult; and when you were there, you must have pierced outwork after outwork, and picked the lock of gate after gate. So there sat I in this delicious retreat, hopeless, and bursting with rage. I called upon death day and night, as my only refuge. I had no comfort but in seeing my keeper mad with jealousy, even in that desolate spot. I think he was jealous of the very flies.
My handsome youth, Ordauro, however, had not forgotten me; no, nor even given me up. Luckily he was not only very clever, but rich besides; without which, to be sure, his brains would not have availed him a pin. What does he do, therefore, but take a house in the neighbourhood on the sea-shore; and while my tormentor, in alarm and horror, watches every movement, and thinks him coming if he sees a cloud or a bird, Ordauro sets people secretly to work night and day, and makes a subterraneous passage up to the very tower! Guess what I felt when I saw him enter! Assuredly I did not show him the face which I shewed Folderico. I die with joy this moment to think of my delight. As soon as we could discourse of any thing but our meeting, Ordauro concerted measures for my escape; and the greatest difficulty being surmounted by the subterraneous passage, they at last succeeded. But our enemy gave us a frightful degree of trouble.
There was no end of the old man's pryings, peepings, and precautions. He left me as little as possible by myself; and he had all the coast thereabouts at his command, together with the few boats that ever touched it.
Ordauro, however, did a thing at once the most bold and the most ingenious. He gave out that he was married; and inviting my husband to dinner, who had heard the news with transport, presented me, to his astonished eyes, for the bride. The old man looked as if he would have died for rage and misery.
"Horrible villain!" cried he," what is this?"
Ordauro professed astonishment in his turn.
"What!" asked he; "do you not know that the princess, your lady's sister, is wonderfully like her, and that she has done me the honour of becoming my wife? I invited you in order to do honour to yourself, and so bring the good families together."
"Detestable falsehood!" cried Folderico. "Do you think I'm blind, or a born idiot? But I'll see to this business directly; and terrible shall be my revenge."
So saying, he flung out, and hastened, as fast as age would let him, to the room in the tower, where he expected to find me not. But there he did find me:—there was I, sitting as if nothing had happened, with my hand on my cheek, and full of my old melancholy.
"God preserve me!" exclaimed he; "this is astonishing indeed! Never could I have dreamt that one sister could be so like another! But is it so, or is it not? I have terrible suspicions. It is impossible to believe it. Tell me truly," he continued; "answer me on the faith of a daring woman, and you shall get no hurt by it. Has any one opened the portals for you to-day? Who was it? How did you get out? Tell me the truth, and you shall not suffer for it; but deceive me, and there is no punishment that you may not look for."
It is needless to say how I vowed and protested that I had never stirred; that it was quite impossible; that I could not have done it if I would, &c. I took all the saints to witness to my veracity, and swore I had never seen the outside of his tremendous castle.
The monster had nothing to say to this; but I saw what he meant to do—I saw that he would return instantly to the house of Ordauro, and ascertain if the bride was there. Accordingly, the moment he turned the key on me, I flew down the subterraneous passage, tossed on my new clothes like lightning, and sat in my lover's house as before, waiting the arrival of the panting old gentleman.
"Well," exclaimed he, as soon as he set eyes upon me, "never in all my life—no—I must allow it to be impossible—never can my wife at home be the lady sitting here."
From that day forth the old man, whenever he saw me in Ordauro's house, treated me as if I were indeed his sister-in-law, though he never had the heart to bring the two wives together, for fear of old recollections. Nevertheless, this state of things was still very perilous; and my new husband and myself lost no time in considering how we should put an end to it by leaving the country. Ordauro resorted, as before, to a bold expedient. He told Folderico that the air of the sea-coast disagreed with him; and the old man, whose delight at getting rid of his neighbour helped to blind him to the deceit, not only expedited the movement, but offered to see him part of the way on his journey!
The offer was accepted. Six miles he rode forth with us, the stupid old man; and then, taking his leave, to return home, we pushed our horses like lightning, and so left him to tear his hair and his old beard with cries and curses, as soon as he opened the door of his tower.