“And true,” replied she who had broach’d it: “for, pray, observe that a lover is generally dissatisfied, before he becomes indiscreet, and therefore tempted to be revenged by exaggerating everything: whereas a Toy talks without passion, and adds nothing to the truth.”

“For my part,” said Zelmaida, “I am not of that opinion. In this case it is not so much the importance of the depositions, as the strength of the evidence, that ruins the criminal. A lover, who by his discourse dishonours the Altar, on which he has sacrificed, is a kind of impious person, who deserves no credit: but if the altar lifts up its voice, what answer can be made.”

“That the altar knows not what it says,” replied the second. Monima, hitherto mute, broke silence, in order to say in a dragging, lazy tone: “Ah! let my Altar, since you call it so, speak or be silent, I fear nothing from its talk.”