should abide
Alone one live long 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.

XI
"When I from Nicosia thee expected
(When thou wast journeying to the plenar court)
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.

XII
"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."

XIII
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.

XIV
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;

XV
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, baptized 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.

XVI
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 wild-fire, where they spread,
About the walls of Paris, scathe and dread.

XVII
I left you where king Agramant prepared
To storm a gate, and to the ass