where her parents were to lodge, which was half a league from the town where the combat was to take place, and that there she would await her bad or good fortune, according to Timbrio's. She bade me also, in order to shorten the anxiety she would feel to learn Timbrio's fortune, take with me a white kerchief which she gave me, and, if Timbrio conquered, bind it on my arm, and come back to give her the news; and, if he were vanquished, not to bind it, and so she would learn from afar by the token of the kerchief the beginning of her bliss or the end of her life. I promised her to do all she bade me, and taking the relics and the kerchief I took leave of her with the greatest sadness and the greatest joy I ever felt; my little fortune caused the sadness; Timbrio's great fortune the gladness. He learnt from me what I brought him from Nisida, whereat he was so joyous, happy, and proud, that the danger of the battle he awaited he counted as naught, for it seemed to him that in being favoured by his lady, not even death itself would be able to gainsay him. For the present I pass by in silence the exaggerated terms Timbrio used to show himself grateful for what he owed to my solicitude; for they were such that he seemed to be out of his senses while discoursing thereon. Being cheered, then, and encouraged by this good news, he began to make preparations for his departure, taking as seconds a Spanish gentleman, and another, a Neapolitan. And at the tidings of this particular duel countless people of the kingdom were moved to see it, Nisida's parents also going there, taking her and her sister Blanca with them. As it fell to Timbrio to choose weapons, he wished to show that he based his right, not on the advantage they possessed, but on the justice that was his, and so those he chose were the sword and dagger, without any defensive weapon. But few days were wanting to the appointed term, when Nisida and her father, with many other gentlemen, set out from the city of Naples; she, having arrived first, reminded me many times not to forget our agreement; but my wearied memory, which never served save to remind me of things alone that were unpleasing to me, so as not to change its character, forgot as much of what Nisida had told me as it saw was needful to rob me of life, or at least to set me in the miserable state in which I now see myself.' The shepherds were listening with great attention to what Silerio was relating, when the thread of his story was interrupted by the voice of a hapless shepherd, who was singing among some trees, nor yet so far from the windows of the dwelling where they were, but that all that he said could not fail to be heard. The voice was such that it imposed silence on Silerio, who in no wise wished to proceed, but rather asked the other shepherds to listen to it, since for the little there remained of his story, there would be time to finish it. This would have annoyed Thyrsis and Damon, had not Elicio said to them: