Cant. IX.
the Faerie Queene.
129
Whose carcases were scattred on the greene,And throwne about the clifts. Arriued there,That bare-head knight for dread and dolefull teene,Would faine haue fled, ne durst approchen neare,But th'other forst him staye, and comforted in feare.
That darkesome caue they enter, where they findThat cursed man, low sitting on the ground,Musing full sadly in his sullein mind;His griesie lockes, long growen, and vnbound,Disordred hong about his shoulders round,And hid his face; through which his hollow eyneLookt deadly dull, and stared as astound;His raw-bone cheekes through penurie and pine,Were shronke into his iawes, as he did neuer dyne.
His garment nought but many ragged clouts,With thornes together pind and patched was,The which his naked sides he wrapt abouts;And him beside there lay vpon the grasA dreary corse, whose life away did pas,All wallowd in his own yet luke-warme blood,That from his wound yet welled fresh alas;In which a rusty knife fast fixed stood,And made an open passage for the gushing flood.
Which piteous spectacle, approuing trewThe wofull tale, that Trevisan had told,When as the gentle Redcrosse knight did vew,With firie zeale he burnt in courage bold,Him to auenge, before his blood were cold,And to the villein sayd, Thou damned wight,The authour of this fact, we here behold,What iustice can but iudge against thee right,With thine owne blood to price his blood, here shed in sight.
What
