ran better than Mingo;" and finally, all came to the conclusion that Artidoro, the strange shepherd, bore off the palm from all, each one praising in detail his graces one by one; and all these praises, I have already said, redounded to my delight. When the morning of the day after the festival came, before fresh dawn lost the pearly dew from her lovely locks, and the sun had fully displayed his rays on the peaks of the neighbouring mountains, some twelve of us shepherdesses, the most admired of the village, came together, and, linking hands, to the sound of a flageolet and a bagpipe, weaving and unweaving intricate turns and dance-movements, we went from the village to a green meadow not far away, giving great pleasure to all who saw our mazy dance. And fortune, which so far was guiding my affair from good to better, ordained that in that same meadow we should find all the shepherds of the place, and Artidoro with them. When they saw us, straightway attuning the sound of a tabor they had to that of our pipes, they came forth to meet us with the same measure and dance, mingling with us in bewildering but well-ordered maze; and as the instruments changed their note, we changed the dance, so that we shepherdesses had to unlink and give our hands to the shepherds; and my good fortune willed that I should chance to give mine to Artidoro. I know not, my friends, how to describe fully to you what I felt at such a moment, unless by telling you that I was so perturbed, that I failed to keep fitting step in the dance; so much so that Artidoro was obliged to draw me violently after him, in order that the thread of the measured dance might not be broken if he let me go. Seizing the opportunity for it, I said to him: "Wherein has my hand offended you, Artidoro, that you press it so hard?" He replied in a voice that could be heard by none: "Nay, what has my soul done to you that you use it so ill?" "My offence is clear," I replied gently; "but for yours, neither do I see it, nor will it be seen." "This is just the mischief," replied Artidoro, "that you can see your way to do evil, but not to cure it." Herewith our discourse ended, for the dancing ended, and I remained happy and thoughtful at what Artidoro had said to me; and though I thought they were loving words, they did not convince me that they came from one in love. Straightway we all, shepherds and shepherdesses, sate down on the green grass; and when we had rested a while from the fatigue of the dances that were over, the aged Eleuco, attuning his instrument, which was a rebeck, to the pipe of another shepherd, asked Artidoro to sing something, for he should so rather than any other, since Heaven had bestowed such talent on him that it were ingratitude to wish to conceal it. Artidoro, thanking Eleuco for the praises he gave him, straightway began to sing some verses; and I fixed them in my memory, since the words he had spoken to me before