Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Hooper.djvu/85



was a wise and powerful king. He had an only daughter, remarkable for her beauty, of whom he was extremely fond. He committed her to the custody of five soldiers; and charged them, under the heaviest penalties, to preserve her from every possible injury. The soldiers were on guard night and day; and before the door of her bed-chamber they suspended a burning lamp, that the approach of an intruder might be the more easily detected. And they kept a dog, whose bark was loud and piercing, to rouse them from sleep. From all these circumstances, it would appear that every precaution had been taken: but, unhappily, the lady panted for the pleasures of the world. As she was one day looking abroad, a certain duke passed by, who regarded her with impure and improper