The great ship flew past us on the wind as the barge had done, but when she was about half a mile aloof we saw her canvass fall to shivering and her yards swaying round, and Arthur cried out: St. Nicholas! the play beginneth again! she is coming about! Even so it was, and presently she was bearing on us, and was ere long so close aboard that we could see her every spar and rope, and her folk all gathered to the windward, knights, sergeants, archers, and mariners, to gaze at us and mock us; and huge and devilish laughter arose from amongst them as she ploughed the water so close beside us, that one might well-nigh have cast a morsel of bread aboard her; for clear it was presently that she had no mind to run us down. Spake Arthur then: There will be a fresh play presently, my mates, but ye sit fast, for meseemeth this show is no more perilous than the other, though it be bigger. Scarce were the words out of his mouth, ere there was a stir amongst the men gathered in the waist, and lo, amidst a knot of big and fierce mariners, three women standing, pale, with flying hair, and their hands bound behind them, and one was clad in gold and another in green and the third in black; and their faces were as the faces of Aurea and Viridis and Atra. Then there came forth from that ship a huge cruel roar blent with mocking laughter that shamed our very hearts, and those evil things in the form of mariners took hold of each one of the ladies and cast them overboard into the gulf of the waters, first Aurea, next Viridis, and then Atra; and we two stood up with our useless swords brandished and would have leapt over into the deep, but that Arthur arose also and took hold of an arm of each of us and stayed us, and said: Nay, then, if ye go, take me with you, and let all the Quest sink down into the deep, and let our lovelings pine in captivity, and Birdalone lose all her friends in one swoop, and we be known hereafter as the fools of lovers, the unstable. So we sat us down, but huge shrieking laughter rose up unblended from the keel of the evil thing, and then they let her go down the wind, and she went her way with flashing of arms, and streaming of banners and pennons, and blowing of horns, and the sun was setting over the wide water. But Arthur spake: Cheer up, brethren! see ye not how this proud witch is also but an eyeless fool to send us such a show, and the second time in one day to show us the images of our dearlings, who hours ago flitted past us in the stripe-sailed boat? Where, then, did they of the ship meet with them? Nay, lords, let not the anguish of love steal all your wits. We saw we had been fools to be so overcast by guile, and yet were we exceeding ill at ease, and over-long the time seemed unto us until we should be come to the Isle of Increase Unsought, and find our lovelings there.