Cant. I.
the Faery Queene
201
With feeble hands then stretched forth on hye,As heuen accusing guilty of her death,And with dry drops congealed in her eye,In these sad wordes she spent her vtmost breath:Heare then, O man, the sorrowes that vneathMy tong can tell, so far all sence they pas:Loe this dead corpse, that lies here vnderneath,The gentlest knight, that euer on greene grasGay steed with spurs did pricke, the good Sir Mortdant was.
Was, (ay the while, that he is not so now)My Lord my loue; my deare Lord, my deare loue,So long as heuens iust with equall brow,Vouchsafed to behold vs from aboue,One day when him high corage did emmoue,As wont ye knightes to seeke aduentures wilde,He pricked forth his puissaunt force to proue,Me then he left enwombed of this childe,This luckles childe, whom thus ye see with blood defild.
Him fortuned (hard fortune ye may ghesse)To come, where vile Acrasia does wonne,Acrasia a false enchaunteresse,That many errant knightes hath fowle fordonne:Within a wandring Island, that doth ronneAnd stray in perilous gulfe, her dwelling is,Fayre Sir, if euer there ye trauell, shonneThe cursed land where many wend amis,And know it by the name; it hight the Bowre of blis.
Her blis is all in pleasure and delight,Wherewith she makes her louers dronken mad,And then with words & weedes of wondrous might,On them she workes her will to vses bad:
My
