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Margaret, Queen of Navarre, 1492-1549

"The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. I. (of V.)"


1 In the French text Boaistuau invariably refers to the
author as a personage of the masculine sex, with the evident
object of concealing the real authorship of the work.
Feminine pronouns have, however, been substituted in the
translation, as it is Queen Margaret who is referred to.
--Ed.
Therefore, my Lady, as this work is about to be exposed to the doubtful
judgment of so many thousands of men, may it please you to take it under
your protection and into your safe keeping; for, whereas you are the
natural and legitimate heiress of all the excellencies, ornaments, and
virtues which enriched the author while she adorned by her presence the
surprise of the earth, and which now by some marvellous ray of divinity
live and display themselves in you, it is not possible that you should
be defrauded of the fruit of the labour which justly belongs to you, and
for which the whole universe will be indebted to you now that it comes
forth into the light under the resplendent shelter of your divine and
heroic virtues.


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