The ladies came nigh him, and of them there was Queen Morgan le Fay, who was wife of King Lot, and an evil witch; the Queen of Northgales, a haughty lady; the Lady of the Out-Isles; and the Lady of the Marshes. And when the Lady of the Marshes saw the knight she cried: 'Now this is as good hap as ever could be, for this is he that slew my brother, Sir Caradoc of the Dolorous Tower; and for revenge of that, I would have this knight taken to my tower and torture him before I slay him.' 'That is well said,' said Morgan le Fay, 'for he bids fair to be one of the most strong knights of Arthur, whom I hate. This man, Sir Lancelot du Lake, is the favourite of all the ladies at that court, who hate me. So will I lay an enchantment on him, so that he shall sleep.' Then the evil queen laid her hands over the face of Sir Lancelot, and said strange words that none could understand, and then he was laid across the crupper of one of the knights' horses, and he did not wake. When in the twilight Sir Lancelot awoke, he found himself on a straw pallet in a strange room, and he leaped up and went to a narrow arrow-slit in the wall and looked out. Before him for a great distance was a black watery land, with the sun sinking far away on the very edge, and the pools of the marsh were as if they were of blood. Then he beat at the door and called, but none responded, and for wrath he could have dashed the door down, but it was too stout, and he had no weapon; for his arms had been taken from him. When it was dark, suddenly it seemed to Sir Lancelot that the room smelled foul, as if he had been carried into the midst of the quaking marsh, and was sunk deep in the slime and weeds of a pool. Then, through the arrow-slit, he saw many strange lights come, dim and blue like the wild lights that dance and flit over the lonely marshes by night; but that which made him marvel was that these lights were two together, as if they were the eyes of evil things. And they came up to him with a breath that was cold and dank, and they seemed to peer into his face, but he could see naught of their bodies. The hair upon his head rose, and his skin went cold. They pressed all about him, and to defend himself he struck at the eyes, but his blows beat only the air. Then suddenly Sir Lancelot felt sharp pains, as if small keen knives had been thrust into his flesh at many places. The stabs increased in number and in pain, and Sir Lancelot beat about himself and ran to and fro in the narrow chamber to escape the evil eyes and the stabs, but it was in vain, and thus all night in much misery he suffered. When for sheer weariness he lay down and tried to close his eyes, the evil things would not let him, but ever they tore at him and stabbed him. He was in anguish of mind more than he could bear, and for all his thought he could not think of any way to fight against the evil powers which followed and tortured him wherever he ran.