f his subjects,
to whom, as their story was known, she would be particularly obnoxious.
He gave her a ring, in virtue of which he assured her she would in
future escape the persecution, and even the jealousy of her husband. He
then put into her hands his sword, with directions that it should never
be touched by man till his son was dubbed a knight; when it must be
delivered to him with due solemnity, near the tomb of his father, at the
moment he should learn the secret of his birth, and the miseries
produced by it. She would then see the first use to which her boy would
put it. The prince had nearly spent his last breath in the service of
his beloved mistress; he could only instruct her by signs to put on a
magnificent robe which lay near him, and hasten her departure. She
staggered through the town, arrived in the solitary fields, heard the
distant knell announce her lover's death, and sunk exhausted to the
ground. At length the air revived her; she slowly renewed her journey,
and returned to her castle, which, by virtue of her ring, she entered
undisturbed. Till the birth of her son, and from that time to the
conclusion of his education, she lived in silent anguish, and in patient
expectation of the day of vengeance. The young Ywonec, by his beauty and
address, recalled to her mind the loved image of his father; and at
length she beheld him, with a throbbing heart, invested, amidst the
applause of all the spectators, with the dignity of knighthood. The hour
of retribution was now fast approaching. At the feast of St. Aaron, in
the same year, the baron was summoned with his family to Caerleon, where
the festival was held with great solemnity. In the course of their
journey they stopped for the night in a spacious abbey, where they were
received with the greatest hospitality. The good abbot, for the purpose
of detaining his guests another day, exhibited to them the whole of the
apartments, the dormitory, the refectory, and the chapter-house, in
which they beheld a vast sepulchral monument, covered with a superb
pall, fringed with gold, and surrounded by twenty waxen tapers in golden
candlesticks, while a vast silver censer, constantly burning, filled
the air with fumes of incense. The guests naturally inquired concerning
the name and quality of the person who reposed in that splendid tomb;
and were told it was the late king of that country; the best, the
handsomest, the wisest, the most courteous and liberal of mankind; t