Time nor yet Death from me shall take away;
And it behoved our Lord, of whom I bore
Such testimony, so my paints to pay.
It grieves me much for them, on whom her door
Courtesy closes on a stormy day;
Who meagre, pale, and worn with hopeless suit,
Knock night and day, and ever without fruit.
“So that continuing what erewhile was said,
Poets and scholars in small number:
For, where they are unsheltered and unfed,
Even beasts desert the inhospitable lair.”
As thus the blessed ancient ended, red
As two fierce fires, his eyes appeared to glare:
Then, sagely smiling on the duke, his mien
He changed anew from troubled to serene.
Henceforth with that apostle let the peer
Remain; for I have now to make a spring
As far as ’tis from heaven to earth; for here
I cannot hang for ever on the wing.
I to the dame return, who was whilere
Wounded by jealousy with cruel sting.
I left her where, successively o’erthrown,
Three kings she quickly upon earth had strown;
And afterwards arriving in a town,
At eve, which on the road to Paris lay,
Heard tidings of Rinaldo’s victory blown;
And how in Arles the vanquished paynim lay.
—Sure, her Rogero with the king is gone—
As soon as reappears the dawning day,
Towards fair Provence, whither (as she hears)
King Charlemagne pursues, her way she steers.
She towards Provence, by the nearest road,
So journeying, met a maid of mournful air;
Who, though her cheeks with tears were overflowed,
Was yet of visage and of manners fair.
She was it, so transfixed with Love’s keen goad,
Who sighed for Monodante’s valiant heir,441
Who at the bridge had left her lord a thrall,
When with King Rodomont he tried a fall.
She sought one of an otter’s nimbleness,
By water and by land, a cavalier
So fierce, that she that champion—to redress
Her wrongs—might match against the paynim peer.
When good Rogero’s lady, comfortless,
To that fair dame, as comfortless, drew near,
Her she saluted courteously, and next
Demanded by what sorrow she was vext.
Flordelice marked the maid, that, in her sight,
Appeared a warrior fitted for her needs;
And of the bridge and river ’gan recite,
Where Argier’s mighty king the road impedes;
And how he had gone nigh to slay her knight;
Not that more doughty were the monarch’s deeds;
But that the wily paynim vantage-ground
In that streight bridge and foaming river found.
“Are you (she said) so daring and so kind,
As kind and daring you appear in show,
Venge me of him that has my lord confined,
And makes me wander thus, opprest with woe,
For love of Heaven; or teach me where to find
At least a knight who can resist the foe,
And of such skill that little boot shall bring
His bridge and river to the pagan king.
“Besides that so you shall achieve an end,
Befitting courteous man and cavalier,
You will employ your valour to befriend
The faithfullest of lovers far and near.
His other virtues I should ill commend,
So many and so many, that whoe’er
Knoweth not these, may well be said to be
One without ears to hear or eyes to see.”
The high-minded maid, to whom aye welcome are
All noble quests, by which she worthily
May hope a great and glorious name to bear,
Straight to the paynim’s bridge resolves to hie;
And now so much the more—as in despair—
Wends willingly, although it were to die:
In that she, ever with herself at strife,
Deeming Rogero lost, detested life.
“O loving damsel (she made answer), I
Offer mine aid, for such as ’tis, to do
The hard and dread adventure, passing by
Causes beside that move me, most that you
A matter of your lover testify,
Which I, in sooth, hear warranted of few;
That he is constant; for i’faith I swear,
I well believed all lovers perjured were.”
With these last words a sigh that damsel drew,
A sigh which issued from her heart; then said:
“Go we;” and, with the following sun, those two
At the deep stream arrived and bridge of dread:
—Seen of the guard, that on his bugle blew
A warning blast, when strangers thither sped—
The pagan arms him, girds his goodly brand,
And takes upon the bridge his wonted stand;
And as the maid appears in martial scale,
The moody monarch threatens her to slay,
Unless her goodly courser and her mail,
As an oblation to the tomb she pay.
Fair Bradamant who knew the piteous tale,
How murdered by him Isabella lay,
The story gentle Flordelice had taught;
Replied in answer to that paynim haught.
“Wherefore, O brutish man, for your misdeed
Should penance by the innocent be done?
’Tis fitting to appease her you should bleed;
You killed her, and to all the deed is known.
So that, of trophied armour or of weed
Of those so many, by your lance o’erthrown,
Your armour should the blest oblation be,
And you the choicest victim, slain by me;
“And dearer shall the gift be from my hand;
Since I a woman am, as she whilere;
Nor save to venge her have I sought this strand;
In this desire alone I hither steer:
But first, ’tis good some pact we understand,
Before we prove our prowess with the spear:
You shall do by me, if o’erthrown, what you
By other prisoners have been wont to do.
“But if, as I believe and trust, you fall,
I will your horse and armour have (she cried),
And taking down all others from the wall,
Hang on the tomb alone those arms of pride;
And will that you release each warlike thrall.”
—“The pact is just (King Rodomont replied),
But those, my prisoners, are not here confined,
And therefore cannot be to you consigned.
“These have I sent into mine Afric reign;
But this I promise thee, and pledge my fay;
If, by strange fortune, thou thy seat
