THE INVISIBLE PRINCE. 323

wasto redress public wrongs, and relieve the oppressed, he flew to
the temple, where he saw the young virgin, crowned with flowers,
clad in white, and with her dishevelled hair flowing about her
shoulders. Two of her brothers led her by each hand, and her
mother followed her with a great crowd of men and women.
Leander being invisible, cried out, “Stop, stop, wicked brethren;
stop, rash and inconsiderate mo-

ther; if you proceed any farther,
you shall be squeezed to death
like so many frogs.” They looked
about, but could not conceive from
whence these terrible menaces
came. The brotherssaid it wasonly
their sister’s sweetheart, who had
hidhimself insome hole. At which.
Leander, in wrath, took a long
cudgel, and they had no reason to
say the blows were not well laid on,
he multitude fled, the vestals ran away, and Leander was left
alone with the victim ; immediately he pulled off his red cap,
and asked the virgin wherein he might serve her. She answered
him, with a confidence rarely to be expected from a virgin of her
age, that there was a certain gentleman whom she would be glad
to marry, but that he wanted an estate. Leander then shook his
rose so long, that he supplied them with ten millions; after which
they married and lived happily together. But his last adventure
was the most agreeable ; for entering into a wide forest, he heard
the lamentable cries of a young person, as if some violence were
offered to her. Looking about him every way, at length he spied
four men well armed, that were carrying away by force a young
lady, thirteen or fourteen years of age; upon which, making up
to them as fast as he could, ‘ What harm has that virgin dant,”

cf