Page:Tales of old Lusitania.djvu/48

38 dress. She feared the negro, and had no alternative but to do what he told her. She was in his power! As she was returning to her only shelter, the loft, she met the Count, who was very handsomely dressed, and he said to her that as some flour had been stolen by some of the women, she, like the rest, must be searched. The wretched lady trembled at this, and shortly after the housekeeper came to her, and on searching her person, found the flour; for which she was ignominiously turned out of the palace, much to her shame and humiliation; but she was allowed to return to the loft. When the negro came back to her she related to him all that had happened to her through his bad advice and command. To this the negro replied that if she had not the sense to do things more cleverly, she must bear the consequences.

The negro next day told her that a dress was to be embroidered for the princess whom the Count was going to marry, and that as she knew so well how to embroider, she might, he thought, undertake the task, and receive very good wages for it. The princess obtained the task, and embroidered the dress most cleverly and beautifully. Next day, as she was crying bitterly, thinking in great distress of her altered position, the negro came with a number of attendants and pages in their best livery, bringing embroidered towels and basins made of pure gold and silver, which the negro said were for her use, as the