ame by some rogues, who ran off with his clothes, though he had
cried out, "Thieves! thieves!" several times, as loud as he could. The
cunning Cat had hidden the clothes under a great stone. The King
immediately commanded the officers of his wardrobe to run and fetch one
of his best suits for the Lord Marquis of Carabas.

[Illustration: "THE MARQUIS OF CARABAS IS DROWNING!" p. 48.]

The King was extremely polite to him, and as the fine clothes he had
given him set off his good looks (for he was well made and handsome),
the King's daughter found him very much to her liking, and the Marquis
of Carabas had no sooner cast two or three respectful and somewhat
tender glances than she fell in love with him to distraction. The King
would have him come into the coach and take part in the airing. The Cat,
overjoyed to see his plan begin to succeed, marched on before, and,
meeting with some countrymen, who were mowing a meadow, he said to
them:--

"Good people, you who are mowing, if you do not tell the King that the
meadow you mow belongs to my Lord Marquis of Carabas, you shall be
chopped as small as herbs for the pot."

The King did not fail to ask the mowers to whom the meadow they were
mowing belonged.

"To my Lord Marquis of Carabas," answered they all together, for the
Cat's threat had made them afraid.

"You have a good property there," said the King to the Marquis of
Carabas.

"You see, sire," said the Marquis, "this is a meadow which never fails
to yield a plentiful harvest every year."

The Master Cat, who went still on before, met with some reapers, and
said to them:--

"Good people, you who are reaping, if you do not say that all this corn
belongs to the Marquis of Carabas, you shall be chopped as small as
herbs for the pot."

The King, who passed by a moment after, wished to know to whom belonged
all that corn, which he then saw.

"To my Lord Marquis of Carabas," replied the reapers, and the King was
very well pleased with it, as well as the Marquis, whom he congratulated
thereupon. The Master Cat, who went always before, said the same thing
to all he met, and the King was astonished at the vast estates of my
Lord Marquis of Carabas.

Monsieur Puss came at last to a stately castle, the master of which was
an Ogre, the richest ever known; for all the lands which the King had
then passed through belonged to this castle. The Cat, who had taken care
to inform himself who this Ogre was and what he could do