'For my sins and my greed,' said the old man sadly, 'and bitterly have I repented me of my wrong. I am Earl Inewl, but I have lost the lands that made my earldom. For I have a nephew, whom his father, on his deathbed, gave into my keeping, with all his lands. And I added his possessions to my own, and when the boy was a man he demanded them of me, and I would not give them up. So he made war upon me, and took everything from me except this ruined hall and one poor farm.' 'Since you are sorry for the greed that hath ruined you,' replied Geraint, 'I will do what I may to regain your possessions, if God gives me life. But first I would ask, why went that knight and the lady and the dwarf just now into the town, and why is there so much furbishing of arms there?' 'The preparations are for the jousting that is to be held to-morrow's morn in the level meadow beside the ford,' responded the old earl. 'And the prize is to be a falcon of pure gold. The knight thou sawest has won the falcon two years running, and if he wins it this time he will have it for his own, and will win the title of the Knight of the Golden Falcon. And to gain it from him all those knights in the town will essay. And with each will go the lady that he loveth best, and if a man takes not his lady with him he may not enter the lists.' 'Sir,' said Sir Geraint, 'I would willingly have to do with that knight, for he hath, by the hands of his dwarf page, most evilly insulted the queen of my dear lord, King Arthur; but I have no armour.' 'As for that,' said the old man, 'I have arms here that will fit thee; but if thou hast no maiden with thee, thou canst not do battle.' 'If, sir,' replied Sir Geraint, 'you and this maiden, your daughter, will permit me to challenge for her, I will engage, if I escape alive from the tournament, to be the maiden's knight while I shall live.' 'What say you, daughter?' said the old earl. 'Indeed, sir,' replied the maiden, gently flushing, 'I am in your hands. And if this fair knight will have it so, he may challenge for me.' This said Enid to hide her true thoughts; for indeed she felt that she had never before seen as noble a youth as Geraint, or one for whom her thoughts were so kind. 'Then so shall it be,' said Earl Inewl. On the morrow, ere it was dawn, they arose and arrayed themselves; and at break of day they were in the meadow. Before the seat of the young earl, who was Inewl's nephew, there was set up a post, and on it was the figure of a gyr-falcon, of pure gold, and marvellously wrought, with wings outspread and talons astretch, as if it were about to strike its prey. Then the knight whom Geraint had followed entered the field with his lady, and when he had made proclamation, he bade her go and fetch the falcon from its place, 'for,' said he, 'thou art the fairest of women, and, if any deny it, by force will I defend the fame of thy beauty and thy gentleness and nobleness.'