She fell asleep on the green, and when she awoke it was in a state of frenzy which frightened her virgins away, and they ran back to alarm the whole palace. She was borne from the orchard to her bed by a long train of knights and ladies, and was visited by the distressed king, whom she informed, amidst great lamentations, that she must go from him— As Ich lay this under tide, And slepe under an orchard side, There come to me to fair knightes Wele y armed al to rightes, And bad me comen an heighing, And speke with her lord the king; And Ich answered at wordes bold, Y durst nought, no y nold: Thai pinkd oghain as thai might driue, Ther com her king also bliue, With an hundred knightes and mo, And damissels an hundred al so; Al on snowe white stedes, As white as milke were her wedes, Y no seighe yete bifore So fair creatours y core! The king hadde a crown on hed, It nas of silver, no of gold red, Ac it was of a precious ston; As bright as the sonne it schon: And as son as he to me cam, Wold Ich, nold Ich, he me nam, And made me with him ride, Opon a palfrey by his side, And brought me to his pallays, Wele attired in ich ways; And schewd me castels and tours, Rivers, forestes, frith with flours; And his riche stedes ichon, And sith then me brought oghain hom, Into an owhen orchard, And said to me afterward: Loke dame! to morowe that av be Right here under this ympe tree; And than thou schalt with ous go, And live with us ever mo, And yif thou makest ous y let, Where thou be, thou worst y set, And to tore thine limes al, That nothing help the no schal, And thei thou best so torn, Yete thou worst with ous y born. The power of the Fairy King over the royal lady of earth appears to have been given him in virtue of her slumber beneath an elvish tree, which, though growing in her husband’s orchard, made the surrounding grass-plot the property of the elvish world. Orfeo repaired on the morrow to the “ympe-tree,” accompanied by a thousand knights, resolved one and all to die, if it were necessary, ere the queen should go from home; but on reaching the fay-bound place Heurodis, in the midst of the whole company, was spirited suddenly away. The king in his misery vowed never again to look upon the face of a woman, and retired into the wilderness with his harp, which subdued by its magical melody the fierce beasts that abounded on every side. This wilderness eventually proves to be a summer resort of the Fairy King, where Orfeo beholds distant visions of elfin hunters, elfin knights, and ladies at the dance, and then on a certain day of supreme election he falls into the hands of a joyous bevy of elfin damsels, among whom he recognises his own Heurodis. Their mutual emotion betrays him, and she is carried swiftly away by her companions. Orfeo pursues the bright band with lyre and lamentations; a rock opens before them; he follows them into it, and thus reaches Fairy Land.