Now leave we him here, said the good man, and go we to our harbour till
to-morrow; we will come here again to do him service. Sir, said Bors,
be ye a priest? Yea forsooth, said he. Then I pray you tell me a dream
that befell to me the last night. Say on, said he. Then he began so
much to tell him of the great bird in the forest, and after told him of
his birds, one white, another black, and of the rotten tree, and of the
white flowers. Sir, I shall tell you a part now, and the other deal
to-morrow. The white fowl betokeneth a gentlewoman, fair and rich,
which loved thee paramours, and hath loved thee long; and if thou warn
her love she shall go die anon, if thou have no pity on her. That
signifieth the great bird, the which shall make thee to warn her. Now
for no fear that thou hast, ne for no dread that thou hast of God, thou
shalt not warn her, but thou wouldst not do it for to be holden chaste,
for to conquer the loos of the vain glory of the world; for that shall
befall thee now an thou warn her, that Launcelot, the good knight, thy
cousin, shall die. And therefore men shall now say that thou art a
manslayer, both of thy brother, Sir Lionel, and of thy cousin, Sir
Launcelot du Lake, the which thou mightest have saved and rescued
easily, but thou weenedst to rescue a maid which pertaineth nothing to
thee. Now look thou whether it had been greater harm of thy brother’s
death, or else to have suffered her to have lost her maidenhood. Then
asked he him: Hast thou heard the tokens of thy dream the which I have
told to you? Yea forsooth, said Sir Bors, all your exposition and
declaring of my dream I have well understood and heard. Then said the
man in this black clothing: Then is it in thy default if Sir Launcelot,
thy cousin, die. Sir, said Bors, that were me loath, for wit ye well
there is nothing in the world but I had liefer do it than to see my
lord, Sir Launcelot du Lake, to die in my default. Choose ye now the
one or the other, said the good man.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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