All forms of human agony and doom were known to this people; but now they were promised an unfamiliar sight, that of Frankish knights slaying each other in single combat beneath the silent moon, tilting at full gallop upon a narrow place where many might hesitate to walk, and—oh, joy!—falling perchance, horse and rider together, into the depths below. So they were happy, for to them this was a night of festival, to be followed by a morrow of still greater festival, when their sultan and their god took to himself this stranger beauty as a wife. Doubtless, too, he would soon weary of her, and they would be called together to see her cast from some topmost tower and hear her frail bones break on the cruel rocks below, or—as had happened to the last queen—to watch her writhe out her life in the pangs of poison upon a charge of sorcery. It was indeed a night of festival, a night filled full of promise of rich joys to come. On rode the brethren, with stern, impassive faces, but wondering in their hearts whether they would live to see another dawn. The shouting crowd surged round them, breaking through the circle of their guards. A hand was thrust up to Godwin; in it was a letter, which he took and read by the bright moonlight. It was written in English, and brief: “I cannot speak with you. God be with you both, my brothers, God and the spirit of my father. Strike home, Wulf, strike home, Godwin, and fear not for me who will guard myself. Conquer or die, and in life or death, await me. To-morrow, in the flesh, or in the spirit, we will talk—Rosamund.” Godwin handed the paper to Wulf, and, as he did so, saw that the guards had caught its bearer, a withered, grey-haired woman. They asked her some questions, but she shook her head. Then they cast her down, trampled the life out of her beneath their horses’ hoofs, and went on laughing. The mob laughed also. “Tear that paper up,” said Godwin. Wulf did so, saying: “Our Rosamund has a brave heart. Well, we are of the same blood, and will not fail her.” Now they were come to the open space in front of the narrow bridge, where, tier on tier, the multitude were ranged, kept back from its centre by lines of guards. On the flat roofed houses also they were crowded thick as swarming bees, on the circling walls, and on the battlements that protected the far end of the bridge, and the houses of the outer city. Before the bridge was a low gateway, and upon its roof sat the Al-je-bal, clad in his scarlet robe of festival, and by his side, the moonlight gleaming on her jewels, Rosamund. In front, draped in a rich garment, a dagger of gems in her dark hair, stood the interpreter or “mouth” Masouda, and behind were _daïs_ and guards. The brethren rode to the space before the arch and halted, saluting with their pennoned spears. Then from the further side advanced another procession, which, opening, revealed the knight Lozelle riding on his great black horse, and a huge man and a fierce he seemed in his armour.