ce of the jester.

He looked not at the young girl, but calmly met the scrutiny
of the king.

UNDER THE ROSE

CHAPTER I

A NEST OF NINNIES

"A song, sweet Jacqueline!"

"No, no--"

"Jacqueline!--Jacqueline!--"

"No more, I say--"

A jingle of tinkling bells mingled with the squeak of a viola; the
guffaws of a rompish company blended with the tuneless chanting of
discordant minstrels, and the gray parrot in its golden cage, suspended
from one of the oaken beams of the ceiling, shook its feathers for the
twentieth time and screamed vindictively at the roguish band.

Jingle, jingle, went the merry bells; squeak, squeak, the tightened
strings beneath the persistent scraping of the rosined bow. On his
throne in Fools' hall, Triboulet, the king's hunchback, leaned
complacently back, his eyes bent upon a tapestry but newly hung in that
room, the meeting place of jesters, buffoons and versifiers.

"We appeal to Triboulet--"

"Triboulet!"

A girl's silvery laugh rang out.

"Triboulet!"

Again the derisive musical tones.

Upon his chair of state, the dwarf did not answer; professed not to
hear. By the uncertain glimmer of torches and the flickering glow of
the fire he was engaged in tracing a resemblance to himself in the
central figure of the composition wrought in threads of silk--Momus,
fool by patent to Jove, thrust from Olympus and greeting the earth-born
with a great grin.

"An excellent likeness!" muttered Triboulet. "A very pretty likeness!"
he continued, swelling with pride.

And truly it was said that sprightly ladies, working between love and
pleasure times, drew from the court fool for their conception of the
mythological buffoon, reproducing Triboulet's great head; his mouth,
proportionately large; his protruding eyes; his bowed back, short,
twisted legs and long, muscular arms; and his nose far larger than that
of Francis, who otherwise had the largest nose in the kingdom.

But how could they depict the meanness of soul that dwelt in that
extraordinary shell? The blithesome tapestry-makers, albeit adepts in
form, grace and harmony, could not touch the subjectiveness of
existence. Thus it was a double pleasure for Triboulet to see, limned
in well-chosen hues, his form, the crookedness of which he was as proud
as any courtier of his symmetry and beauty, the while his dark, vain
soul lay concealed behind the mask of merry deformity and laughing
monstrosity.

"Would your Maje