"Ah, you are so good, so true, and so beautiful," said Dorothy.
Her familiarity toward the queen was sweet to the woman, to whom it was new.
Dorothy did not thank the queen for her graciousness. She did not reply directly to her offer. She simply said:—
"John has told me many times that he was first attracted to me because I resembled you."
The girl had ample faith in her own beauty, and knew full well the subtle flattery which lay in her words. "He said," she continued, "that my hair in some faint degree resembled yours, but he said it was not of so beautiful a hue. I have loved my hair ever since the day he told me that it resembled your Majesty's." The girl leaned forward toward the queen and gently kissed the royal locks. They no more resembled Dorothy's hair than brick dust resembles the sheen of gold.
The queen glanced at the reflection of her hair in the mirror and it flatly contradicted Dorothy. But the girl's words were backed by Elizabeth's vanity, and the adroit flattery went home.
"Ah, my child," exclaimed her Majesty softly, as she leaned forward and kissed Dorothy's fair cheek.
Dorothy wept gently for a moment and familiarly rested her face upon the queen's breast. Then she entwined her white arms about Elizabeth's neck and turned her glorious eyes up to the queen's face that her Majesty might behold their wondrous beauty and feel the flattery of the words she was about to utter.
"He said also," continued Dorothy, "that my eyes in some slight degree resembled your Majesty's, but he qualified his compliment by telling me—he did not exactly tell me that my eyes were not so large and brilliant as your Majesty's, for he was making love to me, and of course he would not have dared to say that my eyes were not the most perfect on earth; but he did say that—at least I know that he meant—that my eyes, while they resembled yours, were hardly so glorious, and—and I am very jealous of your Majesty. John will be leaving me to worship at your feet."
Elizabeth's eyes were good enough. The French called them "marcassin," that is, wild boar's eyes. They were little and sparkling; they were not luminous and large like Dorothy's, and the girl's flattery was rank. Elizabeth, however, saw Dorothy's eyes and believed her words rather than the reply of the lying mirror, and her Majesty's heart was soft from the girl's kneading. Consider, I pray you, the serpent-like wisdom displayed by Dorothy's method of attack upon the queen. She did not ask for John's liberty. She did not seek it. She sought only to place John softly on Elizabeth's heart. Some natures absorb flattery as the desert sands absorb the unfrequent rain, and Elizabeth—but I will speak no ill of her. She is the greatest and the best sovereign England has ever had. May God send to my beloved country others like her. She had many small shortcomings; but I have noticed that those persons who spend their evil energies in little faults have less force left for greater ones. I will show you a mystery: Little faults are personally more disagreeable and rasping to us than great ones. Like flying grains of sand upon a windy day, they vex us constantly. Great faults come like an avalanche, but they come less frequently, and we often admire their possessor, who sooner or later is apt to become our destroyer.