THE SCORPION
We have left our ladies, you and I,
My brothers
1
Το keep our castles, and to sigh |
Oh! could some holy hermit give
One short day’s dalliance fugitive!
Speed hither through the enchanted air
Our ladies, for our faith’s rewardl
Would it not sharpen every sword
And perfume every prayer?
Love sharp as holly and pure as snow,
And kisses
Beneath the moon for mistletoe!
SIR RAYMOND. Something ill sung, Jocelyn, and too sadly,
forsoothl
Here the hermits are foul and malicious.
I would
clear the land of them.
SIR JAMES. Spies, every one.
And enchanters to boot.
SIR EUSTACHE. The maids are worse, to my mind.
Think
of the gallant Florimond, as tall a knight of his hands as ever
swung sword or couched lance.
SIR RAYMOND. Netted like a fish
1
SIR JAMES. And now lives in the desert with the witch, a
wild man, and banned.
SIR RAYMOND. Little better than a robber.
And the word
goes that he hath apostatized from our holy faith.
[ALL cross themselves.
JOCELYN [πᾶς;]
Heighol Heighol the Crescent and Cross!
If the one is a bargain, the others a loss.
71