s: and I need nothing else save brains; whereof, I
thank the saints, I have enough and to spare. And indeed, it is as well
I should, for in this world--I say not, in this house--there be folks
who have none too many. But I reckon, before I begin my tale, I had
best say who and what I am, else shall those who read my book be like
men that walk in a mist, which is not pleasant, as I found this last
summer, when for a time I lost my company--and thereby, myself--on the
top of a Welsh mountain.

I, then, who write, am Agnes de Hastings, Countess of Pembroke and Lady
of Leybourne: and I am wife unto the Lord Lawrence de Hastings, Earl and
Baron of the same. My father and mother I have already named, but I may
say further that my said mother is a Princess born, being of that great
House of Joinville in France--which men call Geneville in England--that
are nobles of the foremost rank in that country. These my parents had
twelve children, of whom I stand right in the midst, being the seventh.
My brother Edmund was the eldest of us; then came Margaret, Joan, Roger,
Geoffrey, Isabel, and Katherine; then stand I Agnes, and after me are
Maud, John, Blanche, and Beatrice [Note 1]. And of them, Edmund and
Margaret have been commanded to God. He died young, my poor brother
Edmund, for he set his heart on being restored to the name and lands
which our father had forfeited, and our Lord the King thought not good
to grant it; so his heart broke, and he died. Poor soul! I would not
say an unkind word over his grave; where the treasure is, there will the
heart be; but I would rather set my heart on worthier treasure, and I
think I should scarce be so weak as to die for the loss. God assoil
him, poor soul!

I was born in the Castle of Ludlow, on the morrow of the Translation of
Saint Thomas, in the year of King Edward of Caernarvon the eleventh
[Note 2], so that I am now thirty years of age. I am somewhat elder
than my lord, who was born at Allesley, by Coventry town, on Saint
Cuthbert's Day, in the fourteenth year of the same [March 20th, 1321].
I might say I was wiser, and not look forward to much penance for lying;
for I should be more likely to have it set me if I said that all the
wits in this world were in his head. Howbeit, there is many a worse man
than he: a valiant knight, and courteous, and of rarely gentle and
gracious ways; and maybe, if he were wiser, he would give me more
trouble to rule him, which is easy enough