Page:Tales from Chaucer.djvu/179

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THE LADY CONSTANCE.
153

up on the coast of Northumberland, and her vessel remained so fixed in the sand that the flood-tide could not move it.

The constable of the castle came down to view the wreck, and having searched it over, found this solitary and woe-worn woman, together with the treasure she had brought away. In her language, which was a corrupted sort of Latin, she besought him to have pity upon her misery. The constable understood her speech, and brought her to shore; when she knelt down upon the sand, and thanked the Being who had preserved her through all her trials. By no means, however, could she be brought to tell who she was. Yet the constable and his wife took pity on her, and wept over the story of her sufferings. Moreover, so desirous was she to serve and please every one around her, that all loved her who had once looked in her face.

The constable and Dame Hermegild, his wife, with all the inhabitants of that country, were Pagans; but Hermegild had a deep affection for Constance; and Constance, so long and so earnestly prayed, with tears and bit-