ed in many
stories, methinketh, nevertheless, I shall be able yet more plainly to
show forth to you in one which I purpose to tell you and wherein you
shall hear of a lady, who was in her actions much more favoured of
fortune than well-advised of reason; wherefore I would not counsel any
one to adventure herself in the footsteps of her of whom I am to tell,
for that fortune is not always well disposed nor are all men in the
world equally blind.

In Argos, city of Achia far more famous for its kings of past time
than great in itself, there was once a nobleman called Nicostratus, to
whom, when already neighbouring on old age, fortune awarded a lady of
great family to wife, whose name was Lydia and who was no less
high-spirited than fair. Nicostratus, like a nobleman and a man of
wealth as he was, kept many servants and hounds and hawks and took the
utmost delight in the chase. Among his other servants he had a young
man called Pyrrhus, who was sprightly and well bred and comely of his
person and adroit in all that he had a mind to do, and him he loved
and trusted over all else. Of this Pyrrhus Lydia became so sore
enamoured that neither by day nor by night could she have her thought
otherwhere than with him; but he, whether it was that he perceived not
her liking for him or that he would none of it, appeared to reck
nothing thereof, by reason whereof the lady suffered intolerable
chagrin in herself and being altogether resolved to give him to know
of her passion, called a chamberwoman of hers, Lusca by name, in whom
she much trusted, and said to her, 'Lusca, the favours thou hast had
of me should make thee faithful and obedient; wherefore look thou none
ever know that which I shall presently say to thee, save he to whom I
shall charge thee tell it. As thou seest, Lusca, I am a young and
lusty lady, abundantly endowed with all those things which any woman
can desire; in brief, I can complain of but one thing, to wit, that my
husband's years are overmany, an they be measured by mine own,
wherefore I fare but ill in the matter of that thing wherein young
women take most pleasure, and none the less desiring it, as other
women do, I have this long while determined in myself, since fortune
hath been thus little my friend in giving me so old a husband, that I
will not be so much mine own enemy as not to contrive to find means
for my pleasures and my weal; which that I may have as complete in
this as in other things, I have beth