Thereto they usde one most accursed order,
To eate the flesh of men, whom they mote fynde,
And straungers to devoure, which on their border
Were brought by errour or by wreckfull wynde :
A monstrous cruelty gainst course of kynde!
They, towards evening wandering every way
To seeke for booty, came by Fortune blynde
Whereas this Lady, like a sheepe astray,
Now drowned in the depth of sleepe all fearelesse lay.
Soone as they spide her, Lord! what gladfull glee
They made amongst themselves! but when her face
Like the faire Yvory shining they did see,
Each gan his fellow solace and embrace
For joy of such good hap by heavenly grace.
Then gan they to devize what course to take;
Whether to slay her there upon the place,
Or suffer her out of her sleepe to wake,
And then her eate attonce, or many meales to make.
The best advizement was, of bad, to let her
Sleepe out her fill without encomberment;
For sleepe, they sayd, would make her battill better:
Then, when she wakt, they all gave one consent
That, since by grace of God she there was sent,
Unto their God they would her sacrifize,
Whose share, her guiltlesse bloud they would present:
But of her dainty flesh they did devize
To make a common feast, and feed with gurmandize.
So round about her they themselves did place
Upon the grasse, and diversely dispose,
As each thought best to spend the lingring space :
Some with their eyes the daintest morsels chose;
Some praise her paps; some praise her lips and nose;
Some whet their knives, and strip their elboes bare :
The Priest himselfe a garland doth compose
Of finest flowers, and with full busie care
His bloudy vessels wash and holy fire prepare.
The Damzell wakes; then all attonce upstart,
And round about her flocke, like many flies,
Whooping and hallowing on every part,
As if they would have rent the brasen skies.
Which when she sees with ghastly griefful eies,
Her heart does quake, and deadly pallid hew
Benumbes her cheekes: then out aloud she cries,
Where none is nigh to heare, that will her rew,
And rends her golden locks, and snowy brests embrew.
But all bootes not; they hands upon her lay:
And first they spoile her of her jewels deare,
And afterwards of all her rich array;
The which amongst them they in peeces teare,
And of the pray each one a part doth beare.
Now being naked, to their sordid eyes
The goodly threasures of Natúre appeare:
Which as they view with lustfull fantasyes,
Each wisheth to himselfe, and to the rest envyes.
Her yvorie neck; her alablaster brest;
Her paps, which like white silken pillowes were
For Love in soft delight thereon to rest;
Her tender sides; her bellie white and clere,
Which like an Altar did itselfe uprere
To offer sacrifice divine thereon;
Her goodly thighes, whose glorie did appeare
Like a triumphall Arch, and thereupon
The spoiles of Princes hang'd which were in battel won.
Those daintie parts, the dearlings of delight,
Which mote not be prophan'd of common eyes,
Those Villeins vew'd with loose lascivious sight,
And closely tempted with their craftie spyes;
And some of them gan mongst themselves devize
Thereof by force to take their beastly pleasure :
But them the Priest rebuking did advize
To dare not to pollute so sacred threasure
Vow'd to the gods: Religion held even theeves in measure.
So, being stayd, they her from thence directed
Unto a litle grove not farre asyde,
In which an altar shortly they erected
His brode black wings had through the heavens wyde By this dispred, that was the tyme ordayned
For such a dismall deed, their guilt to hyde:
Of few greene turfes an altar soone they fayned, And deckt it all with flowres which they nigh hand obtayned.
Tho, whenas all things readie were aright,
The Damzell was before the Altar set,
Being alreadie dead with fearefull fright:
To whom the Priest with naked armes full net
Approching nigh, and murdrous knife well whet,
Gan mutter close a certain secret charme,
With other divelish ceremonies met :
Which doen, he gan aloft t' advance his arme,
Whereat they shouted all, and made a loud alarme.
Then gan the bagpypes and the hornes to shrill
And shrieke aloud, that, with the peoples voyce
Confused, did the ayre with terror fill,
And made the wood to tremble at the
noyce:
The whyles she wayld, the more they did rejoyce.
Now mote ye understand that to this grove
Sir Calepine, by chaunce more then by choyce,
The selfe same evening fortune hether drove,
As he to seeke Serena through the woods did rove.
Long had he sought her, and through many a soyle 47
Had traveld still on foot in heavie armes,
Ne ought was tyred with his endlesse toyle,
Ne ought was feared of his certaine harmes :
And now, all weetlesse of the wretched stormes
In which his Love was lost, he slept full fast;
Till, being waked with these loud alarmes,
He lightly started up like one aghast,
And catching up his arms streight to the noise forth past.
There by th' uncertaine glims of starry night,
And by the twinkling of their sacred fire,
He mote perceive a litle dawning sight
Of all which there was doing in that quire:
Mongst whom a Woman spoyled of all attire
He spyde lamenting her unluckie strife,
And groning sore from grieved hart entire :
Eftsoones he saw one with a naked knife
Readie to launch her brest, and let out loved life.
With that he thrusts into the thickest throng;
And, even as his right hand adowne descends,
He him preventing lays on earth along,
And sacrifizeth to th' infernall feends:
Then to the rest his wrathfull hand he bends;
Of whom he makes such havocke and such hew,
That swarmes of damned soules to hell he sends:
The rest, that scape his sword and death eschew,
Fly like a flocke of doves before a faulcons vew.
From them returning to that Ladie backe,
Whom by the Altar he doth sitting find
Yet fearing death, and next to death the lacke
Of clothes to cover what she ought by kind;
He first her hands beginneth to unbind,
And then to question of her present woe;
And afterwards to cheare with speaches kind:
But she, for nought that he could say or doe,
One word durst speake, or answere him a whit thereto.
So inward shame of her uncomely case
She did conceive, through care of womanhood,
That though the night did cover her disgrace,
Yet she in so unwomanly a mood
Would not bewray the state in which she stood:
So all that night to him unknown she past:
But day, that doth discover bad and good,
Ensewing, made her knowen to him at last :
The end whereof Ile keepe untill another cast.
CANTO IX.
Calidore hostes with Melibee,
And loves fayre Pastorell:
Coridon envies him, yet he,
For ill, rewards him well.
OW turne againe my teme, thou jolly swayne,
Backe to the furrow which I lately left;
I lately left a furrow one or twayne
Unplough'd, the which my coulter had not cleft;
Yet seem'd the soyle both fayre and frutefull eft,
As I it past; that were too great a shame,
That so rich frute should be from us bereft ;
Besides the great dishonour and defame,
Which should befall to Calidores immortall name.
Great travell hath the gentle Calidore
And toyle endured, sith I left him last
Sewing the Blatant Beast; which I forbore
To finish then, for other present hast.
Full many pathes and perils he hath past, [plaines,
Through hils, through dales, through forests, and through
In that same quest which Fortune on him cast,
Which he atchieved to his owne great gaines,
Reaping eternall glorie of his restlesse paines.
So sharply he the Monster did pursew,
That day nor night he suffred him to rest,
Ne rested he himselfe (but Natures dew)
For dread of daunger not to be redrest,
If he for slouth forslackt so famous quest.
Him first from court he to the citties coursed,
And from the citties to the townes him prest,
And from the townes into the countrie forsed,
And from the country back to private farmes he scorsed.
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