nd
puled for pap--bear up the awful weight of crown, orb, sceptre? gird
on the sword my royal fathers wore, and meet in fight the tough Crimean
foe?"

And then the monarch went on to argue in his own mind (though we need
not say that blank verse is not argument) that what he had got it was
his duty to keep, and that, if at one time he had entertained ideas of a
certain restitution, which shall be nameless, the prospect by a CERTAIN
MARRIAGE of uniting two crowns and two nations which had been engaged
in bloody and expensive wars, as the Paflagonians and the Crimeans had
been, put the idea of Giglio's restoration to the throne out of the
question: nay, were his own brother, King Savio, alive, he would
certainly will the crown from his own son in order to bring about such a
desirable union.

Thus easily do we deceive ourselves! Thus do we fancy what we wish is
right! The King took courage, read the papers, finished his muffins
and eggs, and rang the bell for his Prime Minister. The Queen, after
thinking whether she should go up and see Giglio, who had been sick,
thought, "Not now. Business first; pleasure afterwards. I will go and
see dear Giglio this afternoon; and now I will drive to the jeweller's,
to look for the necklace and bracelets." The Princess went up into her
own room, and made Betsinda, her maid, bring out all her dresses; and
as for Giglio, they forgot him as much as I forget what I had for dinner
last Tuesday twelve-month.

II. HOW KING VALOROSO GOT THE CROWN, AND PRINCE GIGLIO WENT WITHOUT.

Paflagonia, ten or twenty thousand years ago, appears to have been one
of those kingdoms where the laws of succession were not settled; for
when King Savio died, leaving his brother Regent of the kingdom, and
guardian of Savio's orphan infant, this unfaithful regent took no sort
of regard of the late monarch's will; had himself proclaimed sovereign
of Paflagonia under the title of King Valoroso XXIV., had a most
splendid coronation, and ordered all the nobles of the kingdom to pay
him homage. So long as Valoroso gave them plenty of balls at Court,
plenty of money and lucrative places, the Paflagonian nobility did not
care who was king; and as for the people, in those early times, they
were equally indifferent. The Prince Giglio, by reason of his tender
age at his royal father's death, did not feel the loss of his crown and
empire. As long as he had plenty of toys and sweetmeats, a holiday
five times a week and