"You have never been so close to a fine hooded bird before, I warrant," said the innkeeper.
"I have birds of my own, and they are all hooded," replied the child indifferently.
The people seated at the table glanced significantly at each other as if to ask, "Is she bragging, or is she of a higher rank than she pretends to be?" for middle-class folk did not possess hooded birds.
"To whom does this one belong?" asked the child.
"To that gentleman seated at the head of the table," was the reply.
She looked at him thoughtfully and then at the bird. "I wonder how a hawk likes belonging to a fool," she said.
Everybody laughed, Le Glorieux loudest of all. "No matter how wise a fool may appear, his cap and bells will always betray him," he said. "Yes, my friends, as you no doubt have suspected, I am a court jester. I belonged to Duke Charles the Bold of Burgundy, and now I am being sent as a present to her Grace, the young Duchess of Brittany."
"I have suspected your identity all along," said a fat friar seated at the other end of the table. "I was at Beauvais during the siege and I heard of you there. You are Le Glorieux."
The jester rose and made an extravagant bow. "At your service," said he. "Yes," he continued, taking his place again, "I was at the siege of Beauvais. I saw the young maid Jeanne Fourquet, in imitation of the Maid of Orleans, fight like a witch with her little ax, for which she was named Jeanne Hachette, and when a tall Burgundian was scaling the walls and was planting his banner, she pushed him over into the ditch and waving her flag shouted, 'Victory!' I am not boring anybody by talking about the past, am I?" asked the fool suddenly.
"On the contrary," said the host, "it is more interesting than a tale of gnomes and pixies."