But as a man to whom a dreadful loss Falls in a far land and he knows it not, But coming back he learns it, and the loss So pains him that he sickens nigh to death; So fared it with Geraint, who being pricked In combat with the follower of Limours, Bled underneath his armour secretly, And so rode on, nor told his gentle wife What ailed him, hardly knowing it himself, Till his eye darkened and his helmet wagged; And at a sudden swerving of the road, Though happily down on a bank of grass, The Prince, without a word, from his horse fell. And Enid heard the clashing of his fall, Suddenly came, and at his side all pale Dismounting, loosed the fastenings of his arms, Nor let her true hand falter, nor blue eye Moisten, till she had lighted on his wound, And tearing off her veil of faded silk Had bared her forehead to the blistering sun, And swathed the hurt that drained her dear lord’s life. Then after all was done that hand could do, She rested, and her desolation came Upon her, and she wept beside the way. And many past, but none regarded her, For in that realm of lawless turbulence, A woman weeping for her murdered mate Was cared as much for as a summer shower: One took him for a victim of Earl Doorm, Nor dared to waste a perilous pity on him: Another hurrying past, a man-at-arms, Rode on a mission to the bandit Earl; Half whistling and half singing a coarse song, He drove the dust against her veilless eyes: Another, flying from the wrath of Doorm Before an ever-fancied arrow, made The long way smoke beneath him in his fear; At which her palfrey whinnying lifted heel, And scoured into the coppices and was lost, While the great charger stood, grieved like a man. But at the point of noon the huge Earl Doorm, Broad-faced with under-fringe of russet beard, Bound on a foray, rolling eyes of prey, Came riding with a hundred lances up; But ere he came, like one that hails a ship, Cried out with a big voice, “What, is he dead?” “No, no, not dead!” she answered in all haste. “Would some of your people take him up, And bear him hence out of this cruel sun? Most sure am I, quite sure, he is not dead.”