“I would ask,” said the peasant, recollecting himself, “whether what I have heard from the domestics is true, that the Princess is missing from the castle?”
“What imports it to thee to know?” replied Matilda. “Thy first words bespoke a prudent and becoming gravity. Dost thou come hither to pry into the secrets of Manfred? Adieu. I have been mistaken in thee.” Saying these
words she shut the casement hastily, without giving the young man time to reply.
“I had acted more wisely,” said the Princess to Bianca, with some sharpness, “if I had let thee converse with this peasant; his inquisitiveness seems of a piece with thy own.”
“It is not fit for me to argue with your Highness,” replied Bianca; “but perhaps the questions I should have put to him would have been more to the purpose than tho
