I only ask of you a guide to steer
Me to the place where for the exchange they meet:
I even in this place will make you hear
Their cries, who for that evil bargain threat.”
He said; nor to one listener of the twain,
That had helped his actions, spake in vain.
The other heard him not, or heard at most
As we great talkers hear, who little do:
But Richardetto took aside their host
And told, “how him he from the fire withdrew;
And how he was assured, beyond his boast,
He would in time and place his prowess shew.”
’Twas now that better audience than before
Aldigier lent, and set by him great store;
And at the feast, where Plenty for the three
Emptied her horn, him honoured as his lord.
Here they conclude they can the brethren free
Without more succour from their gaoler’s ward.
This while Sleep seized on lord and family,
Save young Rogero: no repose afford
To him the thoughts, which evermore molest,
And, rankling in his bosom, banish rest.
The siege of Agramant, to him that day
Told by the messenger, he has at heart.
He well discerns that every least delay
Will he dishonour. “What a ceaseless smart
Will scorn inflict, what shame will him appay,
If he against his sovereign lord take part?
Oh! what foul cowardice, how foul a crime
His baptism will appear at such a time!”
That true religion had the stripling swayed
Men might at any other time conceive:
But now, when needed was the warrior’s aid
From siege the Moorish monarch to relieve,
That Fear and Baseness had more largely weighed,
In his designs, would every one believe,
That any preference of a better creed:
This thought makes good Rogero’s bosom bleed.
Nor less to quit his Queen, her leave unsought,
Did with Rogero’s other griefs combine:
Now this and now that care upon him wrought;
Which diversely his doubtful heart incline:
The unhappy lover fruitlessly had thought
To find her at the abode of Flordespine;
Whither together went (as told whilere),
To succour Richardetto, maid and peer.
He next bethinks him of the promise plight
To meet at Vallombrosa’s sanctuary,
Deems her gone thither, and that ’twill excite
Her wonderment himself not there to see.
“Could he at least a message send or write,
That he with reason might not censured be,
Because not only he had disobeyed,
But was departing hence, and nothing said!”
He, having thought on many things, in the end
Resolves on writing what behoves; and, though
He knows not how his letter he shall send,
In the assurance it will safely go,
This hinders not; he thinks that, as they wend,
Chance in his way some faithful Post may throw;
Nor more delays: up leaps the restless knight,
And calls for pen and paper, ink and light.
That which is needed, in obedience meet,
Aldigier’s valets bring, a careful band,
The youth begins to write; and, first, to greet
The maid, as wonted courtesies demand;
Next tells, “how Agramant has sent to entreat,
In his dispatches, succour at his hand;
And, save he quickly to his comfort goes,
Must needs be slain or taken by his foes.”
Then adds, “his sovereign being so bested,
And praying him for succour in his pain,
She must perceive what blame upon his head
Would light, if Agramant applied in vain;
And, since with her he is about to wed,
’Tis fitting he should keep him with stain;
For ill he deems a union could endure
Between aught foul and her to passing pure.
“And if he erst a name, renowned and clear,
Had laboured to procure by actions fair,
And having gained it thus, he held it dear,
—If this had sought to keep—with greater care
He kept it now—and with a miser’s fear
Guarded the treasure she with him would share;
Who, though distinct in body and in limb,
When wedded, ought to be one soul with him;”
And, as he erst by word, he now explained
Anew by writing, “that the period o’er,
For which he was to serve his king constrained,
Unless it were his lot to die before,
He would in deed a Christian be ordained,
As in resolve he had been evermore;
And of her kin, Rinaldo and her sire,
Her afterwards in wedlock would require.
“ ‘I would,’ he said, ‘relieve, with your good will,
My king, besieged by Charlemagne’s array,
That the misjudging rabble, prone to ill,
Might never, to my shame and scandal,’ say;
Rogero, in fair wind and weather, still
Waited upon his sovereign, night and day,
And now that Fortune to King Charles is fled,
Has with that conquering lord his ensign spread.”
“I fifteen days or twenty ask, that I
Yet once again may to our army speed;
So that, by me from leaguering enemy
The African cantonments may be freed:
I will some fit and just occasion spy,
Meanwhile, to justify my change of creed,
I for my honour make this sole request;
Then wholly yours for life, in all things, rest.”
Rogero is such words his thoughts exposed,
Which never could by me be fully showed;
And added more, nor from his task reposed,
Until the crowded paper overflowed:
He next the letter folded and enclosed,
And sealed it, and within his bosom stowed;
In hopes to meet next morning by the way
One who might covertly that writ convey.
When he had closed the sheet, that amorous knight
His eyelids closed as well, and rest ensued:
For Slumber came and steeped his wearied might
In balmy moisture, from a branch imbued
With Lethe’s water; and he slept till—white
And red—a rain of flowers the horizon strewed,
Painting the joyous east with colours gay;
When from her golden dwelling broke the day:
And when the greenwood birds ’gan, far and wide,
Greet the returning light with gladsome strain,
Sir Aldigier (who wished to be the guide,
Upon that journey, of the warlike twain,
Who would in succour of those brethren ride,
To rescue them
