So she made him go to supper; but herself sat late that night alone in the Chamber of the Moon, that was in the donjon keep above the inner court in Krothering. This was Lord Brandoch Daha’s banquet chamber, devised and furnished by him in years gone by; and here he and she commonly sat at meat, using not the banquet hall across the court save when great company was present. Round was that chamber, following the round walls of the tower that held it. All the pillars and the walls and the vaulted roof were of a strange stone, white and smooth, and yielding such a glistering show of pallid gold in it as was like the golden sheen of the full moon of a warm night in midsummer. Lamps that were milky opals self-effulgent filled all the chamber with a soft radiance, in which the bas-reliefs of the high dado, delicately carved, portraying those immortal blooms of amaranth and nepenthe and moly and Elysian asphodel, were seen in all their delicate beauty, and the fair painted pictures of the Lord of Krothering and his lady sister, and of Lord Juss above the great open fireplace with Goldry and Spitfire on his left and right. A few other pictures there were, smaller than these: the Princess Armelline of Goblinland, Zigg and his lady wife, and others; wondrous beautiful. Here a long while sat the Lady Mevrian. She had a little lute wrought of sweet sandalwood and ivory inlaid with gems. While she sat a-thinking, her fingers strayed idly on the strings, and she sang in a low sweet voice: There were three ravens sat on a tree, They were as black as they might be. _With a downe, derrie down._ The one of them said to his make, Where shall we our breakefast take? Downe in yonder greene field, There lies a knight slain under his shield. His hounds they lie downe at his feete, So well they can their master keepe. His haukes they flie so eagerly, There’s no fowle dare him come nie. Downe there comes a fallow doe As great with yong as she might goe. She lift up his bloudy hed, And kist his wounds that were so red. She gat him up upon her backe, And carried him to earthen lake. She buried him before the prime; She was dead herselfe ere even-song time. God send every gentleman Such haukes, such hounds, and such a leman. _With a downe, derrie down._ With the last sighing sweetness trembling from the strings, she laid aside the lute, saying, “The discord of my thoughts, my lute, doth ill agree with the harmonies of thy strings. Put it by.”