She had been born very pretty, but the excess of her vanity, and her coquetry, had made her lose all her advantages. She was beautiful as Nature had created her; she wished to be beautiful as beauty is painted: she exaggerated all her graces and changed them into deformities. She asked for silken hair--she had long locks of silk, without life or colour; she desired to have teeth of pearl, and her teeth appeared horrible: she wished for a wasp-waist, and her body, drawn in by a tight belt, was without grace or suppleness, and looked as if it might snap in two at any moment; she asked for hands of alabaster, and her hands became dull and cold; she desired to have the feet of a child, and these deformed feet were not strong enough to sustain the weight of her body or to permit her to walk. Nothing more hideous was ever seen: it was ideal ugliness. [Illustration: "A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN WAS LYING UPON A SOFA."] "Thousand centimes!" exclaimed the beggar; "how horrible this 'beautiful woman' is!--the sight of her makes me in love again with my old wife!" Evening being come, a sleeping apartment was offered the strangers for the night. "A room here will be better than any I can get at an inn," thought Alméric, following the valet, who conducted him to a magnificent bedroom prepared for travellers. Exhausted by the fatigues of the day, he lost no time in undressing and getting into bed. But he had scarcely stretched himself before beginning to utter loud cries of distress. "Horror! my skin is being torn from my body! I am in torture! What is the meaning of it? A perfidy! An abominable piece of cruelty!" and a thousand like complaints: and yet all he complained of arose from nothing but the admirable care which had been taken with his bed. The sheets which covered it were of the finest Indian muslin, embroidered with gold spangles, charming to look upon, but inappreciable by a person used to lie upon sheets of coarse Holland. It takes time to get accustomed to inconveniences of this sort. Poor Alméric's feet were scratched all over. Every movement he made in getting out of this terrible bed tore his skin; his arms were covered with blood. "Vanity of vanities!" he cried. "Old man, beggar, let us fly from this place; there is no sleeping in this palace, and I am dying for want of sleep." "What do you think of sheets embroidered with gold spangles?" asked the old man, laughing. "Could you have a more superb bed to sleep in?" "Let us get out of this place," cried the young traveller, who was in no jesting mood; "I'll not remain here another hour. The men here are all stupid, the women frightful; one can neither eat here nor sleep. Let us be off, old man--let us be off instantly!" Alméric, who had hastily redressed himself, roughly pushed the beggar out of the room, the old man laughing heartily all the while, and they quitted the palace together, taking the way to the beggar's hovel. [Illustration: "I AM IN TORTURE!"]