fter all, I've been learning these last weeks; at any
rate I know that what I do know isn't worth knowing, and that's
something."

"Then stay with me," said Merriwig heartily. "My swineherd will teach
you your work, and when he retires you can take it on."

"Do you mean it?"

"Of course I do. I shall be glad to have you about the place. In the
evening, when the pigs are asleep, you can come in and have a chat
with us."

"Bless you," said the new apprentice; "bless you, your Majesty."

They shook hands on it.

"My dear," said Merriwig to Belvane that evening, "you haven't married
a very clever fellow. I discovered this afternoon that I'm not even
as clever as I thought I was."

"You don't want cleverness in a King," said Belvane, smiling lovingly
at him, "or in a husband."

"What do you want then?"

"Just dearness," said Belvane.

And now my story is done. With a sigh I unload the seventeen volumes
of Euralian History from my desk, carrying them one by one across the
library and placing them carefully in the shelf which has been built
for them. For some months they have stood a rampart between me and
the world, behind which I have lived in far-off days with Merriwig and
Hyacinth and my Lady Belvane. The rampart is gone, and in the bright
light of to-day which streams on to my desk the vision slowly fades.
Once on a time . .

Yet I see one figure clearly still. He is tall and thin, with a white
peaked face of which the long inquisitive nose is the outstanding
feature. His hair is lank and uncared for; his russet smock, tied in
at the waist, wants brushing; his untidy cross-gartered hose shows up
the meagerness of his legs. No knightly figure this, yet I look upon
him very tenderly. For it is Roger Scurvilegs on his way to the
Palace for news.

To Roger too I must say good-bye. I say it not without remorse, for I
feel that I have been hard upon the man to whom I owe so much.
Perhaps it will not be altogether good-bye; in his seventeen volumes
there are many other tales to be found. Next time (if there be a next
time) I owe it to Roger to stand aside and let him tell the story more
in his own way. I think he would like that.

But it shall not be a story about Belvane. I saw Belvane (or some one
like her) at a country house in Shropshire last summer, and I know
that Roger can never do her justice.

[Illustration: _Roger Scurvilegs_]

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of