ily get the chest out of your
head."

"Halloa, there!" said the jeweller to his smiths and apprentices;
"come down!"

In the twinkling of an eye his people were before him. Then he, their
master, having briefly ordered the handling of the said chest, this
piece of furniture dedicated to love was tumbled across the room, but
in passing the advocate, finding his feet in the air to the which he
was not accustomed, tumbled over a little.

"Go on," said the wife, "go on, it's the lid shaking."

"No, my dear, it's the bolt."

And without any other opposition the chest slid gently down the
stairs.

"Ho there, carrier!" said the jeweller, and Chiquon came whistling his
mules, and the good apprentices lifted the litigious chest into the
cart.

"Hi, hi!" said the advocate.

"Master, the chest is speaking," said an apprentice.

"In what language?" said the jeweller, giving him a good kick between
two features that luckily were not made of glass. The apprentice
tumbled over on to a stair in a way that induced him to discontinue
his studies in the language of chests. The shepherd, accompanied by
the good jeweller, carried all the baggage to the water-side without
listening to the high eloquence of the speaking wood, and having tied
several stones to it, the jeweller threw it into the Seine.

"Swim, my friend," cried the shepherd, in a voice sufficiently jeering
at the moment when the chest turned over, giving a pretty little
plunge like a duck.

Then Chiquon continued to proceed along the quay, as far as the
Rue-du-port, St. Laudry, near the cloisters of Notre Dame. There he
noticed a house, recognised the door, and knocked loudly.

"Open," said he, "open by order of the king."

Hearing this an old man who was no other than the famous Lombard,
Versoris, ran to the door.

"What is it?" said he.

"I am sent by the provost to warn you to keep good watch tonight,"
replied Chiquon, "as for his own part he will keep his archers ready.
The hunchback who has robbed you has come back again. Keep under arms,
for he is quite capable of easing you of the rest."

Having said this, the good shepherd took to his heels and ran to the
Rue des Marmouzets, to the house where Captain Cochegrue was feasting
with La Pasquerette, the prettiest of town-girls, and the most
charming in perversity that ever was; according to all the gay ladies,
her glance was sharp and piercing as the stab of a dagger. Her
appearance was so tickling to