"Very good, miss! You may take back your ring, too!" says Giglio, his eyes flashing fire at her; and then, as if his eyes had been suddenly opened, he cried out, "Ha! what does this mean? Is _this_ the woman I have been in love with all my life? Have I been such a ninny as to throw away my regard upon _you_? Why--actually--yes--you are--a little crooked!" "Oh, you wretch!" cries Angelica. "And, upon my conscience, you--you squint a little." "Eh!" cries Angelica. "And your hair is red--and you are marked with the small-pox--and what? you have three false teeth--and one leg shorter than the other!" "You brute, you brute you!" Angelica screamed out: and as she seized the ring with one hand, she dealt Giglio one, two, three smacks on the face, and would have pulled the hair off his head had he not started laughing, and crying,-- "Oh, dear me, Angelica! don't pull out _my_ hair, it hurts! You might remove a great deal of _your own_, as I perceive, without scissors or pulling at all. Oh, ho, ho! ha, ha, ha! he, he, he!" And he nearly choked himself with laughing, and she with rage; when with a low bow, and dressed in his Court habit, Count Gambabella, the first lord-in-waiting, entered and said, "Royal Highness! Their Majesties expect you in the Pink Throne-room, where they await the arrival of the Prince of CRIM TARTARY." Prince Bulbo's arrival had set all the court in a flutter; everybody was ordered to put his or her best clothes on: the footmen had their gala liveries; the Lord Chancellor his new wig; the Guards their last new tunics; and Countess Gruffanuff, you may be sure, was glad of an opportunity of decorating _her_ old person with her finest things. She was walking through the court of the palace on her way to wait upon their Majesties, when she spied something glittering on the pavement, and bade the boy in buttons, who was holding up her train, to go and pick up the article shining yonder. He was an ugly little wretch, in some of the late groom-porter's old clothes cut down, and much too tight for him; and yet, when he had taken up the ring (as it turned out to be), and was carrying it to his mistress she thought he looked like a little Cupid. He gave the ring to her; it was a trumpery little thing enough, but too small for any of her old knuckles, so she put it into her pocket. "Oh, mum!" says the boy, looking at her, "how--how beyoutiful you do look, mum, to-day, mum!"