Did but for David's righteous sake permit; David, the monarch after heav'n's own mind, Who loved our sex, and honoured all our kind. Well, I'm a woman, and as such must speak; Silence would swell me, and my heart would break. 695 Know then, I scorn your dull authorities, Your idle wits, and all their learned lies. By heav'n, those authors are our sex's foes, Whom, in our right, I must and will oppose. Nay, quoth the king, dear madam, be not wroth: 700 I yield it up; but since I gave my oath, That this much injured knight again should see, It must be done--I am a king, said he, And one whose faith has ever sacred been. And so has mine, she said, I am a queen: 705 Her answer she shall have, I undertake; And thus an end of all dispute I make. Try when you list; and you shall find, my lord, It is not in our sex to break our word.[65] We leave them here in this heroic strain, 710 And to the knight our story turns again; Who in the garden, with his lovely May, Sung merrier than the cuckoo or the jay: This was his song; "Oh kind and constant be, Constant and kind I'll ever prove to thee." 715 Thus singing as he went, at last he drew By easy steps, to where the pear-tree grew: The longing dame looked up, and spied her love, Full fairly perched among the boughs above. She stopped, and sighing: Oh, good gods, she cried, 720 What pangs, what sudden shoots distend my side? Oh for that tempting fruit, so fresh, so green; Help, for the love of heav'n's immortal queen; Help, dearest lord, and save at once the life Of thy poor infant, and thy longing wife![66] 725 Sore sighed the knight to hear his lady's cry, But could not climb, and had no servant nigh: Old as he was, and void of eye-sight too, What could, alas! a helpless husband do? And must I languish then, she said, and die, 730 Yet view the lovely fruit before my eye? At least, kind sir, for charity's sweet sake, Vouchsafe the trunk between your arms to take; Then from your back I might ascend the tree; Do you but stoop, and leave the rest to me. 735 With all my soul, he thus replied again, I'd spend my dearest blood to ease thy pain. With that, his back against the trunk he bent, She seized a twig, and up the tree she went. Now prove your patience, gentle ladies all! 740 Nor let on me your heavy anger fall: 'Tis truth I tell, though not in phrase refined, Though blunt my tale, yet honest is my mind. What feats the lady in the tree might do, I pass as gambols never known to you; 745