“Excellent, Gualtiero, excellent,” cried the Pope, sinking back into the chair which the pages promptly thrust again beside the table. “Your three years in that barbarous North have not ruined your excellent Latinity. After all”--this between large mouthfuls of his favorite peacock sausages--“your Germans are not so desperate. Your Magister Johann Eck, now in Rome, can speak very fair Latin--though a somewhat greasy, unkempt creature himself. But why talk of Germany, Gualtiero, why of Germany? _Peste!_ What with the troubles I’ve been in touching the election of the Emperor (heaven grant he play me fair as to my getting Ferrara!) and this heretic friar, I get no sleep nights. I grow thin, Gualtiero; yes, thin, though my chamberlains will not have it so, and pretend my garments show I am stouter. But away with such trifles now. You have come on a noble hunting day. I’m sure Cardinal Cornaro will lend you one of his horses for the afternoon, if your steed isn’t suitable. And now while I eat you shall tell me how you have managed to pass three years away from Rome.” Thus bidden, I narrated to the Pope what I truthfully could of my doings in the North without trenching upon the topic of Luther, or the affair of Ilsa, and making much of the problems connected with my Regenstein vassals. I was hopeful the matter of the Bulls against the heretic would not be laid before Leo ere evening, and as a favored guest at the hunt I promised myself a thousand opportunities of opening the ticklish subject during the afternoon, when of a sudden I was interrupted. Into the gay, informal company, like a shadow, intruded the black gown of a sombre figure I knew overwell--Sylvestro Priario the Censor. In his hand was a paper packet. With a gesture to an usher he moved to the table and stood silent, like a gloomy pillar, until he caught the Pope’s eye; then proffered a silent genuflection and held out the document. Leo motioned for me to cease, and received the paper, beckoning simultaneously for writing materials. “A moment, only a moment, Gualtiero. Then you may continue your fascinating adventures. You see how business pursues me even hither. I am obliged to authenticate briefs and the like even on hunt days. Was ever a pontiff so persecuted? Santa Maria--those saintly old Popes who fed the Colosseum panthers were better off! Well--give me the pen. Do I sign here?” I felt the blood rush into my face. I knew my heart was beating wildly. I had at least expected a chance to present my problem fairly, and without too great prejudice. But the crisis was none of my making. I must do what I could. I took a step nearer the table. My eye met the dark eye of Priario, and instinctively we exchanged hostile glances. “Your Holiness,” I said, “may I do a very bold and uncourtly thing? May I requite the marked graciousness you have just displayed to me by asking a most impertinent question,--may I know the nature of this paper presented by Monsignore Priario?”