“For this reason is her hair cut, showing that she has lost the honour of virginity and purity.  Should it please you to take the trouble to see her, I will lead you to her.”

To this Bernage willingly consented, and going-downstairs they found her in a very handsome apartment, seated all alone in front of the fire.  The gentleman drew aside a curtain that hung in front of a large cupboard, wherein could be seen hanging a dead man’s bones.  Bernage greatly longed to speak to the lady, but durst not do so for fear of the husband.  The gentleman, perceiving this, thereupon said to him—­

“If it be your pleasure to say anything to her, you will see what manner of grace and speech is hers.”

Then said Bernage to her—­“Lady, your patience is as great as your torment.  I hold you to be the most unhappy woman alive.”

With tears in her eyes, and with the humblest grace imaginable, the lady answered—­

“Sir, I acknowledge my offence to have been so great that all the woes that the lord of this house (for I am not worthy to call him husband) may be pleased to lay upon me are nothing in comparison with the grief I feel at having offended him.”

So saying, she began to weep bitterly.  The gentleman took Bernage by the arm and led him away.

On the following morning Bernage took his leave, in order to proceed on the mission that the King had given him.  However, in bidding the gentleman farewell, he could not refrain from saying to him—­

“Sir, the love I bear you, and the honour and friendship that you have shown me in your house, constrain me to tell you that, having regard to the deep penitence of your unhappy wife, you should, in my opinion, take compassion upon her.  You are, moreover, young and have no children, and it would be a great pity that so fair a lineage should come to an end, and that those who, perhaps, have no love for you, should become your heirs.”

The gentleman, who had resolved that he would never more speak to his wife, pondered a long time on the discourse held to him by the Lord de Bernage, and at last recognised that he had spoken truly, and promised him that, if his wife should continue in her present humility, he would at some time have pity upon her.

Accordingly Bernage departed on his mission, and when he had returned to his master, the King, he told him the whole story, which the Prince, upon inquiry, found to be true.  And as Bernage among other things had made mention of the lady’s beauty, the King sent his painter, who was called John of Paris, (3) that he might make and bring him a living portrait of her, which, with her husband’s consent, he did.  And when she had long done penance, the gentleman, in his desire to have offspring, and in the pity that he felt for his wife who had submitted to this penance with so much humility, took her back again and afterwards had by her many handsome children. (4)