prisoner.
    I could not rouse the man; so I said we would take him to her, and see - to
the bride who was the fairest thing in the earth to him, once - roses, pearls
and dew made flesh, for him; a wonder-work, the master-work of Nature: with eyes
like no other eyes, and a voice like no other voice, and a freshness, and lithe
young grace, and beauty, that belonged properly to the creatures of dreams - as
he thought - and to no other. The sight of her would set his stagnant blood
leaping; the sight of her -
    But it was a disappointment. They sat together on the ground and looked
dimly wondering into each other's faces a while, with a sort of weak animal
curiosity; then forgot each other's presence, and dropped their eyes, and you
saw that they were away again, and wandering in some far land of dreams and
shadows that we know nothing about.
    I had them taken out and sent to their friends. The queen did not like it
much. Not that she felt any personal interest in the matter, but she thought it
disrespectful to Sir Breuse Sance Pité. However, I assured her that if he found
he couldn't stand it I would fix him so that he could.
    I set forty-seven prisoners loose out of those awful rat-holes, and left
only one in captivity. He was a lord, and had killed another lord, a sort of
kinsman of the queen. That other lord had ambushed him to assassinate him, but
this fellow had got the best of him and cut his throat. However, it was not for
that that I left him jailed, but for maliciously destroying the only public well
in one of his wretched villages. The queen was bound to hang him for killing her
kinsman, but I would not allow it: it was no crime to kill an assassin. But I
said I was willing to let her hang him for destroying the well; so she concluded
to put up with that, as it was better than nothing.
    Dear me, for what trifling offences the most of those forty-seven men and
women were shut up there! Indeed some were there for no distinct offence at all,
but only to gratify somebody's spite; and not always the queen's, by any means,
but a friend's. The newest prisoner's crime was a mere remark which he had made.
He said he believed that men were about all alike, and one man