"
"In fact, I am puzzled, King, to see you made a saint of by its being
expected of you."
"But, Count, that ought to grieve nobody, so long as I do not complain,
and it is of something graver you are thinking."
"I think, sir, that it is not right to rob anybody of anything, and I
reflect that absolute righteousness is a fine feather in one's cap."
Then Manuel went into the chicken-yard behind the red-roofed palace of
King Ferdinand, and caught a goose, and plucked from its wing a feather.
Thereafter the florid young Count of Poictesme rode east, on a tall
dappled horse, and a retinue of six lackeys in silver and black liveries
came cantering after him, and the two foremost lackeys carried in
knapsacks, marked with a gold coronet, the images which Dom Manuel had
made. A third lackey carried Dom Manuel's shield, upon which were
emblazoned the arms of Poictesme. The black shield displayed a silver
stallion which was rampant in every member and was bridled with gold,
but the ancient arms had been given a new motto.
"What means this Greek?" Dom Manuel had asked.
"_Mundus decipit_, Count," they told him, "is the old pious motto of
Poictesme: it signifies that the affairs of this world are a vain
fleeting show, and that terrestrial appearances are nowhere of any
particular importance.
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