as hers, and that he had come to punish her.
His words occasioned a discussion among the
horses. "Is this true?" asked Lead. "Ay,
indeed!" responded Bronze. Iron, on the other
hand, suggested a reconciliation.

"Good!" said Almerigo to the iron horse;
"as you and your mistress so perfectly understand
each other, I'll turn you into a lion, and
she shall be your lioness."

No sooner said than done; but the newly-
made lioness put on a face so extremely piteous,
that Almerigo could retain his appearance of
indignation no longer.

"No, my Sabina," he cried; "be once more
your former self; come to my arms, and love
me, even as I love you."

So they were married, and are living together
happily unto the present time, young as when
the above-recorded incidents occurred. For,
such powerful magicians are superior to the
assaults of either death or old age.

Possibly a question has suggested itself to
some of our readers. Almerigo went to London
on purpose to see his parents. Did he ever
call upon them? The Venetian historian leaves
this question unanswered, allowing us the choice
between two hypotheses. Either he was so
absorbed by his political affairs in England that
he forgot his family altogether; or, the interview
between the parents and the child was so
entirely devoid of pathos, that it was not
deemed worth mentioning. The manner in
which he parted from his father renders both
hypotheses probable.

The fiend, Belphegor, wishing to marry, ascended
to earth, assumed the shape of a young
handsome man, and built himself a fine large
house; which was no sooner finished and daintily
furnished, than he introduced himself to
the father of a family who had three pretty
daughters, and paid court to the eldest. The
girl was pleased with the personal appearance
of her suitor, the parents were delighted that
fortune had provided for her so excellent a match,
and very speedily the wedding took place.
When the bridegroom had conducted his bride
home, he presented her with a very tasteful
nosegay, led her to all the rooms in the house,
and at last showed her a closed door. "The rest
of the house," he informed her, "was entirely
at her disposal; but she must not open the
closed door under the penalty of death."

Every one who knows the story of Blue Beard
—that is to say, every one in Great Britain,
Ireland, France, the United States of America,
and the British colonies—is already perfectly
sure that the young wife, however solemnly she
promised to obey her husband's mandate, would
break the promise at the first convenient
opportunity. Belphegor left home—as he said, to
hunt—on the following day, and scarcely was he
out of sight than the lady opened the door, and
discovered, to her horror, a vast fiery gulf, the
flames from which singed the nosegay in her
bosom. When the husband returned, the
condition of the flowers, like the blood on Blue
Beard's key, revealed the act of disobedience.
His manner, however, was rather contemptuous
than wrathful.

"As you are so anxious," he said, "to see
what is behind that door, I will gratify your
curiosity myself."

Having spoken these words, he led her to the
door, opened it, gave her a little push that sent
her down into the gulf, re-closed the door, and
walked away as if nothing had happened. The
parents of the young lady do not seem to have
cared much about her, as a few months afterwards
he wooed and won the second daughter,
whose fate precisely resembled that of the first.

He then wooed the third sister, who was named
Margarita, and who, it is scarcely necessary to
state, was much sharper than the other two.
She thus reasoned with herself on receiving
his proposal:

"The fact that this handsome stranger killed
both my sisters is certainly not in his favour;
but, on the other hand, I may look far before
I find a more brilliant match; and therefore, all
things considered, I think I may as well accept
his offer. Besides, I may be more fortunate
than my elders."

The third wedding accordingly took place,
and was followed, according to rule, by the gift
of the nosegay, and the prohibition. The new
bride was even more curious than her sisters,
but she was more prudent, and therefore she
took the precaution to dip the nosegay into water
before she opened the forbidden door; thus
breaking off all further connexion between the
Venetian tale and the story of Blue Beard.

The opened door revealed, not only the fiery
gulf, but her two sisters in the midst of the
flames; and she now guessed what sort of man
she had married. Her first act was to extricate
her sisters, and hide them somewhere in the
house. Which leads one to conjecture that the
gulf was neither so deep nor so hot as it looked.

The freshness of the nosegay, caused by its
immersion in the water, convinced Belphegor
that his mandate had been obeyed, and he now
resolved to live comfortably with his third wife.
His affection, however, was not returned, and
in a few days the lady requested him to carry
three large chests, one after another, home to
her parents, without setting any one of them
down by the way.

"Mind you do as I tell you," she said, "for
I shall be at the window, keeping a sharp eye
upon you."

Belphegor promised to obey orders, and on
the following morning a chest containing the
eldest sister was placed on his shoulder. The
burden being terribly heavy, he felt much
inclined to set it down even before he was out of
sight of the house; but his wife cried out:
"Mind what you are about; I'm looking."
When he had turned a corner, he thought he
had a chance of a little rest, but now the lady
in the chest called out: "No, no, I'm looking
at you still." As the voices of the two sisters
closely resembled each other, and as Belphegor
clearly was not skilled in measuring distances
by the ear, he concluded that his wife was still
speaking.