Uncle Joe's Stories

by Baron Edward Hugessen Knatchbull-Hugessen Brabourne

"He does no such thing!" she cried angrily; "he and I are now nearly of an age, and if you were a real good sister you would be glad to see how fond he is of me, instead of trying to take him away, you spiteful thing."

Amabilia replied with equal warmth, and poor Zac's position became one of extreme discomfort, both princesses claiming him as their own, when he in reality neither belonged nor wished to belong to either.

Presently, however, they brought their animated discussion to a close by appealing to Zac himself. Amabilia ingenuously declared that as she was eldest she ought to have the first choice, and that since matters had come to this pass, she would not be ashamed of telling Zac to his face that she loved him dearly, and was prepared to accept him for her husband. To this she added that in most courts such a hint as she had given would be considered equivalent to a command, and that she was thankful to say and feel that, as in their case there was love on both sides, a command would be quite superfluous.

Concaterina then put in her claim. She said that in matters of love it was not a question of being eldest or youngest, the heart must follow its own promptings. She loved Zac—oh, so dearly! and she felt that he returned her love, only diffidence forbade him to confess it. But if he would be hers, she was certain her sister would soon find another mate, and that the king, her father, would make no objection. Thus accosted by two young and beautiful princesses, poor Zac would have had a most difficult task to decide between them, had it not been that the path of duty lay straight before him, and he had all along resolved to follow it.

"Dear ladies!" he said, addressing them both, and bowing respectfully to one and the other, "I thought you were but playing with me, and I would fain hope so still. If not—what reply can I make to you? I love you both—each has been so kind to me since I first entered the palace, that I should be worse than a brute if I did not love you both. But I came here as the promised husband of your sister Belinda. My troth is plighted to her. She believes in and trusts me. How can I break my word and her heart? Dear princesses, you are so beautiful that you can command love whenever and wherever you wish it. It is not so with poor Belinda. She has but me, and I have vowed to be faithful to her!"

Whilst Zac was speaking thus, his eyes fired with animation, and his face beaming with excitement, the princesses thought they had never seen him look so handsome. But when his words showed them that their efforts to wean his heart from their younger sister had been unsuccessful, rage gradually took possession of their souls.

"You despise our love!" they both cried out at once. "You, a mere peasant boy, who was only taken into the palace out of charity, you dare to say that you despise our beauty and ourselves, and take up with that little lump of deformity, Belinda! How can you be such a fool?"

Poor Zac protested that he was far from despising either of them, and admired their beauty greatly, as indeed anyone with eyes must do. This, however, was far from satisfying the enraged damsels. They insisted upon it that the youth had encouraged them both, and the only dispute between them now was as to which of them had been worse treated by him. They told him, moreover, that his pretended fidelity to Belinda should not bring happiness either to him or her. They would plague her life out, for the matter of that. Ugly little toad! why should she have a husband at all? And as for him—he should be punished handsomely for this, and that, too, perhaps, sooner than he thought.

They then left the summer-house, and, I am sorry to say, allowed their anger to carry them far beyond what could in any way be justified. They agreed to go to their father that very afternoon, and tell him that Zac had been very impertinent to both of them, and that Amabilia had surprized him trying to kiss Concaterina against her will in the summer-house. This they accordingly did, and the effects were much what they had expected.

The king flew into a violent passion, threw both his boots with an unerring aim at the head of Lord Pompous, and vowed that the world must certainly be coming to an end. When the courtiers had all agreed to this as a novel but most reasonable remark, he called them a parcel of fools for thinking such a thing at all probable, and ordered Zac to be immediately arrested. When told of what he was accused, the poor boy was almost beside himself with grief. He was sorry enough for the trouble he was in, and for that which might fall upon Belinda in consequence; but he was still more sorry for the cruel conduct of the two princesses, whom he had really liked, and who had behaved so heartlessly to him for only doing his duty. Even now, however, he behaved like a true gentleman.