CV.
“And if it be your usage, that the dame
“Who yields in beauty, from your tower must wend,
“Here to remain I my design proclaim,
“Should my resolve have good or evil end.
“Hence I infer, unequal were the game,
“If she and I in beauty should contend:
“For if such strife ’twixt her and me ensues,
“Nought can the damsel gain, and much may lose;
CVI.
“And save the gain and loss well balanced be
“In every match, the contest is unfair.
“So that by right, no less than courtesy,
“May she a shelter claim in your repair.
“But are there any here that disagree,
“And to impugn my equal sentence dare,
“Behold me prompt, at such gainsayer’s will,
“To prove my judgment right, his judgment ill!”
CVII.
Bradamant—grieved that maid of gentle kind
Should from that castle wrongfully be sped,
To bide the raging of the rain and wind,
Where sheltering house was none, nor even shed—
With reasons good, in wary speech combined,
Persuades that lord; but mostly what she said
On ending, silences the knight; and he
Allows the justice of that damsel’s plea.
