And knows her lover has not force and breath
To save her from Sir Gryphon, threatening death:
But like most cunning and audacious quean,
Although she quakes from head to foot with fear,
Her voice so strengthens, and so shapes her mien,
That in her face no signs of dread appear.
Having already made her leman ween
The trick devised, she feigns a joyous cheer,
Towards Sir Gryphon goes, and for long space
Hangs on his neck, fast-locked in her embrace.
She, after suiting with much suavity
The action to the word, sore weeping, cried:
“Dear lord, is this the guerdon due to me,
For love and worship? that I should abide
Alone one livelong year, deprived of thee,
—A second near—and, yet upon thy side
No grief?—and had I borne for thee to stay,
I know not if I should have seen that day.
“When I from Nicosià thee expected
(When thou wast journeying to the plenar court)209
To cheer me—left with fever sore infected,
And in the dread of death—I heard report
That thou wast gone to Syria; and dejected
By that ill tiding, suffered in such sort,
I, all unable to pursue thy quest,
Had nigh with this right-hand transfixt my breast.
“But Fortune, by her double bounty, shows
She guards me more than thou: me to convey
She sent my brother here, who with me goes,
My honour safe in his protecting stay;
And this encounter with thee now bestows,
Which I above all other blessings weigh,
And in good time; for hadst thou longer stayed,
My lord, I should have died of hope delayed.”
The wicked woman, full of subtlety
(Worse than a fox in crafty hardihood)
Pursues, and so well shapes her history,
She wholly throws the blame on Gryphon good;
Makes him believe that other not to be
Her kin alone, but of her flesh and blood,
Got by one father;—and so puts upon
The knight, that he less credits Luke and John.
Nor he the fraud of her, more false than fair,
Only forbore with just reproach to pay;
Nor only did the threatened stranger spare,
Who was the lover of that lady gay;
But deemed to excuse himself sufficient were,
Turning some portion of the blame away;
And as the real brother she profest,
Unceasingly the lady’s knight carest;
And to Damascus, with the cavalier
Returned, who to Sir Gryphon made report,
“That Syria’s wealthy king, with sumptuous cheer,
Within that place would hold a splendid court;
And who, baptised or infidel, appear
There at his tourney (of whatever sort),
Within the city and without, assures
From wrong, for all the time the feast endures.”
Yet I of Origilla’s treachery
Shall not so steadfastly pursue the lore,
Who, famed not for one single perfidy,
Thousands and thousands had betrayed before,
But that I will return again to see
Two hundred thousand wretched men or more
Burnt by the raging wildfire, where they spread,
About the walls of Paris, scathe and dread.
I left you where king Agramant prepared
To storm a gate, and to the assault was gone:
This he had hoped to find without a guard;
And work elsewhere to bar the way was none.
For there, in person, Charles kept watch and ward
With many, practised warriors every one;
Two Angelines, two Guidos, Angelier,
Avino, Avolio, Otho, and Berlinghier.
One and the other host its worth, before
Charles and king Agramant, desire to show,
Where praise, where riches are, they think, in store
For those that do their duty on the foe.
But such were not the atchievements of the Moor
As to repair the loss; for, to his woe,
Full many a Saracen the champaign prest;
Whose folly was a beacon to the rest.
The frequent darts a storm of hail appear,
Which from the city-wall the Christians fling;
The deafening clamours put the heavens in fear,
Which, from our part, and from that other, ring.
But Charles and Agramant must wait; for here
I of the Mars of Africa will sing,
King Rodomont, that fierce and fearful man,
That through the middle of the city ran.
I know not, sir, if you the adventure dread
Of that so daring Moor to mind recall,
The leader, who had left his people dead,
Between the second work and outer wall;
Upon those limbs the ravening fire so fed,
Was never sight more sad!—I told withal,
How vaulting o’er that hindrance at a bound,
He cleared the moat which girt the city round.
When he was known the thickening crowd among,
By the strange arms he wore and scaly hide,
There, where the aged sires and feebler throng,
Listened to each new tale on every side;
Heaven-high groan, moan, and lamentation rung,
And loud they beat their lifted palms and cried:
While those who had the strength to fly aloof,
Sought safety not from house or temple’s roof.
But this the cruel sword concedes to few,
So brandished by that Saracen robust;
And here, with half a leg dissevered, flew
A foot, there head divided from the bust:
This cleft across, and that behold him hew,
From head to hips, so strong the blow and just.
While, of the thousands wounded by the Moor,
Is none that shows an honest scar before.
What by weak herd, in fields of Hircany,
The tiger does, or Indian Ganges near,
Or wolf, by lamb or kid, on heights which lie
On Typheus’ back, the cruel cavalier210
Now executes on those, I will not, I
Call phalanxes or squadrons, but a mere
Rabble, that I should term a race forlorn,
Who but deserved to die ere they were born.
Of all he cuts, and thrusts, and maims, and bleeds,
There is not one who looks him in the face.
Throughout that street, which in a straight line leads
Up to St. Michael’s bridge, so thronged a space,
Rodomont, terrible and fearful, speeds,
Whirling his bloody brand, nor grants he grace,
In his career, to servant or to lord;
And saint and sinner
