It happened that an Isosceles of a low type, with a brain little if at all above four degrees⁠—accidentally dabbling in the colours of some tradesman whose shop he had plundered⁠—painted himself, or caused himself to be painted (for the story varies) with the twelve colours of a Dodecagon. Going into the Market Place he accosted in a feigned voice a maiden, the orphan daughter of a noble Polygon, whose affection in former days he had sought in vain; and by a series of deceptions⁠—aided, on the one side, by a string of lucky accidents too long to relate, and on the other, by an almost inconceivable fatuity and neglect of ordinary precautions on the part of the relations of the bride⁠—he succeeded in consummating the marriage. The unhappy girl committed suicide on discovering the fraud to which she had been subjected.