CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE BATH.
At Valvins, beneath the impenetrable shade of flowering osiers and willows, which, as they bent down their green heads, dipped the extremities of their branches in the blue waters, a long and flat-bottomed boat, with ladders covered with long blue curtains, served as a refuge for the bathing Dianas, who, as they left the water, were watched by twenty plumed Acteons, who, eagerly, and full of desire, galloped up and down the moss-grown and perfumed banks of the river. But Diana herself, even the chaste Diana, clothed in her long chlamys, was less beautiful — less impenetrable, than madame, as young and beautiful as that goddess herself. For, notwithstanding the fine tunic of the huntress, her round and delicate knee can be seen; and notwithstanding the sonorous quiver, her brown shoulders can be detected; whereas, in madame's case, a long white veil enveloped her, wrapping her round and round a hundred times, as she resigned herself into the hands of her female attendants, and thus was rendered inaccessible to the most indiscreet, as well as to the most penetrating gaze. When she ascended the ladder the poets who were present — and all were poets when madame was the subject of discussion — the twenty poets who were galloping about stopped, and with one voice exclaimed that pearls, and not drops of water, were falling from her person, to be lost again in the happy river. The king, the center of these effusions, and of this respectful homage, imposed silence upon those expatiators, for whom it seemed impossible to exhaust their raptures, and he rode away from fear of offending, even under the silken curtains, the modesty of the woman and the dignity of the princess. A great blank thereupon ensued in the scene, and a perfect silence in the boat. From the movements on board — from the flutterings and agitations of the curtains — the goings to and fro of the female attendants engaged in their duties could be guessed.
The king smilingly listened to the conversation of the courtiers around him, but it could easily be perceived that he gave but little, if any, attention to their remarks. In fact, hardly had the sound of the rings drawn along the curtain-rods announced that madame was dressed, and that the goddess was about to make her appearance, than the king, returning to his former post immediately, and run-
