§10 NURSERY RH\ MES.

 

the King’s daughter took a secret inclination to him, and the
Marquis of Carabas had no sooner cast two or three respectful
and tender glances, but she fell in love with him to distraction ;
and the King would have him come into his coach. The cat,
overjoyed to see his project begin to succeed, marched on before,
and meeting with some countrymen who were mowing a meadow,
he said to them, “Good people, if you do not tell the King that
the meadow you mow belongs to the Marquis of Carabas, you
shall be chopped as small as herbs for the pot.”

The King did not fail to ask the mowers to whom the meadow
they were mowing belonged.

“To my Lord Marquis of Carabas,” answered they all together
—for the cat’s threats had made them terribly afraid.

“You see, sir,” said the Marquis, “this is a meadow that never
fails to yield a plentiful harvest every year.”

The cat, who still went on before, met with some reapers, and
said to them, “Good people, you who are reaping, if you do not
tell the King that all this corn belongs to the Marquis of Carabas,
you shall be chopped as small as herbs for the pot.”

The King, who passed by a moment after, would needs know
to whom all that corn did belong.

“To my Lord Marquis of Carabas,” replied the reapers ; and
the King was very well pleased with it, as well as the Marquis,
whom he congratulated thereupon.

The master cat went always before, saying the same words to
all he met; and the King was astonished at the vast estates of
my Lord Marquis of Carabas. Monsieur Puss came at last to a
stately castle, the master of which was an ogre, the richest that