A WIFE SHOULD OBEY HER HUSBAND The countess was right (women are always right--past sixty). A fortnight of happiness set Pazza on her feet again, and enabled her to make a triumphant entry into the city with the king, her husband. Her paleness, and her wounded arm, which she carried in a sling, added to her grace and beauty. Charming had eyes for no one but the queen, and the people's looks followed the king's. They were more than an hour in reaching the castle. The magistrates had erected not less than three triumphal arches, frowning fortresses, defended each by thirty-six deputations and thirty-six speeches. The first arch, made of trellis-work, and adorned with leaves and flowers, bore the inscription, TO THE MOST TENDER AND FAITHFUL OF HUSBANDS This was intrusted to the keeping of five or six thousand young girls, dressed in white, with pink ribbons, representing the spring of the year, the hope of the future, welcoming Glory and Beauty. The second arch, more solidly built, was a frame covered with tapestry, surmounted by Justice, with her eyes bandaged and her scales in her hand. On the pedestal of the statue was written, TO THE FATHER OF HIS PEOPLE, THE BEST AND WISEST OF PRINCES A host of priests, statesmen, and magistrates, in robes of all colors, represented Religion, Wisdom, and Virtue; at least so said these venerable and discreet personages, who are never in error. Last came an immense arch, a true military trophy, bearing as its motto, TO THE BOLDEST AND MOST VALIANT OF KINGS Here the army awaited its general, and the queen was saluted by the majestic voice of a hundred cannon and two hundred drums--a voice before which all human eloquence falters, and which always has the last word. I spare you a description of the dinner, which was interminable, and of sixty more speeches from the court gazette, where they had already done service two or three times, and wherein they were again deposited for the use of future generations. There is nothing so monotonous as happiness, and we must be indulgent to those who sing its praises officially. In such cases, the ablest is he who says the least. The long evening, during which the king had lavished his most gracious smiles on those whom he despised at the bottom of his heart, was at length at an end, and Charming led Pazza, no longer to a dungeon, but to a magnificent apartment, where a new surprise awaited her. At the bottom of the room was an illuminated transparency, on which were written lines so bad that a king alone could have been the author of them. These lines, which were published in the official gazette, have been handed down to us by one of those indiscreet persons who suffer no follies of the past to be lost. Such persons are the rag-pickers of history.