Gaucelm the Fortunate came upon the scene with an easy quietness. He was a large man, wearing a _bliaut_ of dark silk, richly belted, and around his hair, that was a silvering brown, a fillet or circlet of gold. There breathed about him something easy, humorous, wise. He did not talk much, but what he said was to the purpose. Now he had a profound and brooding look, and now his eye twinkled. In small things he gave way; where he saw it his part to be firm he was firm enough. Though he listened to many, the many did not for ever see their way taken. He may have been religious, but he exhibited little or nothing of his time’s religiosity. He had a stilly way of liking the present minute and putting much into it. He did not laugh too easily, but yet he seemed to find amusement in odd corners where none else looked for it. He was not fond of state, but relaxed it when he could, yet kept dignity. He came now into the castle garden with but a few attending, and beside him, step for step, moved the young princess, his daughter Audiart. CHAPTER VII THE UGLY PRINCESS SHE had a way of dressing, for preference, in dark hues, reds like wine or the deeper parts of rubies, blues like the ripened bunches between the vineyard leaves, browns like a Martinmas wood. To-day she wore the latter hue. Around her head was a golden fillet, but no other tire. She wore to-day no Eastern veil, nor did her long, dark hair, securely braided, give shadow to her face. Her shape was good, a slender shape, endued with nervous strength. But her face showed plain, dark, and thin, intelligent, but with features irregular beyond the ordinary. The Court of Roche-de-Frêne, beneath its breath, called her the Ugly Princess. She sat now beside her step-mother, Alazais, and made a foil for that lovely dame. In the past two generations there had come a change in the world. True it was that to appearance it affected only a small ring—only the top strata, the capstones of the feudal system; only the world of lords and knights and poets and “ladies.” As the jongleur had told Garin, it was not supposed to descend to shepherdesses. Even in the other world by no means was it always present. Sometimes the lack of it was as shocking as might be. Sometimes it was there only in very small part, only in unimportant issues. Sometimes it was mere affectation. Sometimes it was used as a mask, and behind it went on ill realities. But it had itself come into the world as a reality. It knew motion and growth, and it manifested itself, though in degrees. There was much alloy, but at its purest and best it was a golden thing, a flower of light. It called itself chivalric love.