tions to his cousin, and his Highness was now upon the point
of setting out for Urbino, to perform the comedy of wooing the Lady
Valentina. This was the explanation of that scurrying of servitors and
pages, that parading of men-at-arms, and that stamping of horses and
mules in the quadrangle below. Francesco watched the scene with a smile
of some bitterness, his companion with one of supreme satisfaction.

"Praised be Heaven for having brought his Highness at last to a sense of
his duty," remarked the courtier.

"It has often happened to me," said Francesco, disregarding his
companion's words, "to malign the Fates for having brought me into the
world a count. But in the future I shall give them thanks, for I see how
much worse it might have been--I might have been born a prince, with
a duchy to rule over. I might have been as that poor man, my cousin, a
creature whose life is all pomp and no real dignity, all merry-making
and no real mirth--loveless, isolated and vain."

"But," cried the amazed Fanfulla, "assuredly there are compensations?"

"You see that bustle. You know what it portends. What compensation can
there be for that?"

"It is a question you should be the last to ask, my lord. You have seen
the niece of Guidobaldo, and having seen her, can you still ask what
compensation does this marriage offer Gian Maria?"

"Do you, then, not understand?" returned Aquila, with a wan smile. "Do
you not see the tragedy of it? Is it nothing that two States, having
found that this marriage would be mutually advantageous, have determined
that it shall take place? That meanwhile the chief actors--the
victims, I might almost call them--have no opportunity of selecting for
themselves. Gian Maria goes about it resignedly. He will tell you that
he has always known that some day he must wed and do his best to beget
a son. He held out long enough against this alliance, but now that
necessity is driving him at last, he goes about it much as he would go
about any other State affair--a coronation, a banquet, or a ball. Can
you wonder now that I would not accept the throne of Babbiano when
it was offered me? I tell you, Fanfulla, that were I at present in my
cousin's shoes, I would cast crown and purple at whomsoever had a fancy
for them ere they crushed the life out of me and left me a poor puppet.
Sooner than endure that hollow mockery of a life I would become a
peasant or a vassal; I would delve the earth and lead a humble life, b