“O Lady of Loretto, plead for thy servant!” (crash). “_Mea maxima culpa_--I will confess--if your Majesty will condescend to keep it to yourself--I am really a stupid man” (loud ring)--“well meaning, holy mother; well meaning, San Gennaro, but dull, as kings go, and surrounded by greater fools than myself. I have been seventeen times a father” (ring)--“at least” (loud ring), “and only once a husband” (groan). “Fool though I be, I have propagated my race for the glory of Holy Mother Church--and the confusion of the learned, her enemies. For the sake of my family, Madonna, succour me!” He chattered so loud, racing up and down all the time, that I could hear his every word where I stood, awaiting events, by the door. Once, in a lull of the storm, he swooped round my way, and, suddenly becoming aware of me, stopped as if petrified, then rattled out, in a thick, gulping voice-- “Do you know who I am, madam? Do you know who I am?” I curtsied profoundly. “Sire,” I murmured, “--such a little cloud--to hide the sun of Majesty!” He stared at me, and down at himself. “I am the king,” he muttered; “is it not so?” The officer hurried to him, and whispered in his ear. “Eh!” he exclaimed, “my wife’s physician? You find me very distraught, madam, very overtasked. I am so constituted I never could abide thunder”--and he was off again. “Monsieur,” I whispered, “if we could get him prostrated on a sofa.” “Ah!” replied the officer, “for myself, it would be madness. But you--you are beautiful--you may dare.” I did not hesitate, but, stealing catlike to a couch, took the opportunity of His Majesty’s passing to seize him by his wing-cases, and with such effect that in a moment he was sprawling on his back on the cushions, with his legs in the air. Then, before he could protest or avoid me, I had clapped the duck-stone to his nostrils. Instantly the convulsion of his limbs relaxed, and a great sigh heaved itself out of his depths. His wig had tumbled off; his brows were dark over goggle eyes; he had a long, aquiline nose falling to a slack jaw. Imagine all this revealing itself in an expression of the most perfect contentment and idiocy. The soldier tiptoed across, and looked down scared. “God in heaven, madam!” he whispered, “what have you done to His Majesty? He is not himself.” “Pardon me, monsieur,” I said; “never so much so.” He came round in about ten minutes, and gazed at me in a sort of affectionate beatitude. “_Dio mercè!_” he murmured; “I dreamt I was in purgatory, and awake to find myself in paradise. Another dose--one more.” I shook my head. “Enough is as good as a feast.” “I will give thee a fortune for thy talisman.” “Its virtue lies in myself.” “Ah! Then the casket must be mine too.” He sat up suddenly, all rumpled, and bellowed out in a thick, slurred voice,-- “Away, dolts and rapscallions! What! are you prying and listening?” The secretary hurried to the door, and disappeared. The officer lingered only to protest--