French fiction -- Translations into English; Italian fiction -- Translations into English
I should loue that vnfaithfull Knighte, for whom thou hast
committed and done this acte, that so longe as thou liuest shal
blot and blemish thy renoume, and shal be so wel fixed in my
mind, and the wounds shal cleaue so neare my heart, vntill at my
pleasure I be reuenged of this wrong? No, no, I assure thee no
force done vnto mee, shall neuer make mee otherwyse dysposed,
than a mortall Enimy both to thee which art a Theefe and
rauisher of an other man’s wife, and also to thy desperate frend
Dom Diego, which is the cause of this my losse: and now not
satisfied with the former wrong done vnto me, thou goest about
to deceiue me vnder the Colour of good and pure Friendship. But
sith wicked Fortune hath made me thy Prysoner, doe with me what
thou wylt, and yet before I suffer and endure that that Traytor
Dom Diego doe enioy my Virginity, I will offer vp my lyfe to the
shadowes and Ghostes of my faythful fryend and husband, whome
thou hast so trayterously murdred. And therefore (if honestlye I
may or ought entreate mine Enimy) I pray thee that by doynge thy
duety, thou suffer vs in peace, and gyue lycence to mee, thys
Page, and my two pore Maydens to depart whether we lyst.”
“God forbid” (quod Roderico) “that I should doe a Trespasse so
shamefull, as to depryue my dearest fryend of his ioy and
contentation, and by falsifiing my faith be an occasion of hys
death, and of your losse, by leauing you without company,
wandring amids this wildernesse.” And thus he continued his
former discourse and talk, to reclaime thys cruell Damosell to
haue pity vpon hir poore penytent, but he gained as mutch
thereby, as if he had gone aboute to number the Sands alongs the
Sea Coastes of the maine Ocean. Thus deuising from one talke to
an other, they arryued neare the Caue, which was the stately
house of Dom Diego: where Gineura lyghted, and saw the pore
amorous Knight, humbly falling downe at hir feete, all forworne,
pale, and disfigured, who weeping with warme teares, said vnto
hir: “Alas, my deare Lady, the alone and onely mistresse of my
heart, do you not thinke that my penaunce is long inoughe for
the sinne which ignorauntly I haue committed, if euer I haue don
any fault at al? Behold [I beseech you (good ladie deare) what
ioy] I haue conceiued in your absence, what pleasures haue
nursed mine hope, and what consolation hath entertained my life:
which truely had it not bene for the continual remembraunce of
your diuine Beauty, I had of long time abreuiated the pains
which do renew in me so many times the pangs of death: as
oftentimes I think vpon the vnkindnes shewed vnto me by making
so litle accompt of my fidelity: whych can nor shal receiue the
same in good part, wer it so perfect as any assuraunce were able
to make it.” Gineura swelling with sorrow and full of feminine
rage, blushing with fury, hir eyes sparcklinge forth hir
chollerick conceypts, vouchsafed not so mutch as to giue him one
word for aunswere, and bicause she would not looke vppon him,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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