for the blessed Saint Julian. I had been saying my orisons
to that holy Saint late in the night before last, wherein (as he is known to be
the guardian of travellers) I made it my humble petition that he would augment
my household with such wandering foreigners, as might best establish throughout
our kingdom unlimited devotion to our will; and I vowed to the good Saint in
guerdon, that I would, in his name, receive, and relieve, and maintain them.«
    »And did Saint Julian,« said Oliver, »send your Majesty this long-legged
importation from Scotland in answer to your prayers?«
    Although the barber, who well knew that his master had superstition in a
large proportion to his want of religion, and that on such topics nothing was
more easy than to offend him - although, I say, he knew the royal weakness, and
therefore carefully put the preceding question in the softest and most simple
tone of voice, Louis felt the innuendo which it contained, and regarded the
speaker with high displeasure.
    »Sirrah,« he said, »thou art well called Oliver the Devil, who darest thus
to sport at once with thy master and with the blessed Saints. I tell thee, wert
thou one grain less necessary to me, I would have thee hung up on yonder oak
before the Castle, as an example to all who scoff at things holy! - Know, thou
infidel slave, that mine eyes were no sooner closed, than the blessed Saint
Julian was visible to me, leading a young man, whom he presented to me, saying,
that his fortune should be to escape the sword, the cord, the river, and to
bring good fortune to the side which he should espouse, and to the adventures in
which he should be engaged. I walked out on the succeeding morning, and I met
with this youth, whose image I had seen in my dream. In his own country he hath
escaped the sword, amid the massacre of his whole family, and here, within the
brief compass of two days, he hath been strangely rescued from drowning and from
the gallows, and hath already, on a particular occasion, as I but lately hinted
to thee, been of the most material service to me. I receive him as sent hither
by Saint Julian, to serve me in the most difficult, the most dangerous, and even
the most desperate services.«
    The King, as he thus expressed himself, doffed his hat, and selecting from
the numerous little leaden figures with which the hat-band was garnished,