STORY THE TWENTY-EIGHTH — THE INCAPABLE LOVER. [28]
By Messire Miohaut De Changy.
Of the meeting assigned to a great Prince of this kingdom by a damsel who was chamber-woman to the Queen; of the little feats of arms of the said Prince and of the neat replies made by the said damsel to the Queen concerning her greyhound which had been purposely shut out of the room of the said Queen, as you shall shortly hear.
If in the time of the most renowned and eloquent Boccaccio, the adventure which forms the subject of my tale had come to his knowledge, I do not doubt but that he would have added it to his stories of great men who met with bad fortune. For I think that no nobleman ever had a greater misfortune to bear than the good lord (whom may God pardon!) whose adventure I will relate, and whether his ill fortune is worthy to be in the aforesaid books of Boccaccio, I leave those who hear it to judge.
The good lord of whom I speak was, in his time, one of the great princes of this kingdom, apparelled and furnished with all that befits a nobleman; and amongst his other qualities was this,—that never was man more destined to be a favourite with the ladies.
Now it happened to him at the time when his fame in this respect most flourished, and everybody was talking about him, that Cupid, who casts his darts wherever he likes, caused him to be smitten by the charms of a beautiful, young, gentle and gracious damsel, who also had made a reputation second to no other of that day on account of her great and unequalled beauty and her good manners and virtues, and who, moreover, was such a favourite with the Queen of that country that she shared the royal bed on the nights when the said Queen did not sleep with the king.
This love affair, I must tell you, had advanced to such a point that each only desired time and place to say and do what would most please both. They were many days considering how to find a convenient opportunity, and at last, she—who was as anxious for the welfare of her lover as she was for the safety of her own reputation—thought of a good plan, of which she hastened to inform him, saying as follows;