e eyes, "must I
indeed put all the hopes your kindness has roused in me these last few
days to a shuffle in yonder urn, taking my chance with all these lazy
fellows? In that land whereof I was, we would not have had it so, we
loaded our dice in these matters, a strong man there might have a
willing maid though all heaven were set against him! But give me
leave, sweet lady, and I will ruffle with these fellows; give me a
glance and I will barter my life for your billet when it is drawn, but
to stand idly by and see you won by a cold chance, I cannot do it."

That lady laughed a little and said, "Men make laws, dear Jones, for
women to keep. It is the rule, and we must not break it." Then,
gently tugging at her imprisoned fingers and gathering up her skirts to
go, she added, "But it might happen that wit here were better than
sword." Then she hesitated, and freeing herself at last slipped from my
side, yet before she was quite gone half turned again and whispered so
low that no one but I could hear it, "A golden pool, and a silver fish,
and a line no thicker than a hair!" and before I could beg a meaning of
her, had passed down the hall and taken a place with the other
expectant damsels.

"A golden pool," I said to myself, "a silver fish, and a line of hair."
What could she mean? Yet that she meant something, and something
clearly of importance, I could not doubt. "A golden pool, and a silver
fish--" I buried my chin in my chest and thought deeply but without
effect while the preparations were made and the fateful urn, each maid
having slipped her name tablet within, was brought down to us, covered
in a beautiful web of rose-coloured tissue, and commenced its round,
passing slowly from hand to hand as each of those handsome, impassive,
fawn-eyed gallants lifted a corner of the web in turn and helped
themselves to fate.

"A golden pool," I muttered, "and a silver fish"--so absorbed in my own
thoughts I hardly noticed the great cup begin its journey, but when it
had gone three or four places the glitter of the lights upon it caught
my eye. It was of pure gold, round-brimmed, and circled about with a
string of the blue convolvulus, which implies delight to these people.
Ay! and each man was plunging his hand into the dark and taking in his
turn a small notch-edged mother-of-pearl billet from it that flashed
soft and silvery as he turned it in his hand to read the name engraved
in unknown characters thereon. "Why,"