While they were looking for a fourth comrade, there arrived a handsome
and honourable lord who was ten years younger than the others. He
was invited to the banquet, but although he accepted with a cheerful
countenance, in his heart he had no desire for it. For on the one part
he had a wife who was the mother of handsome children, and with whom he
lived in great happiness, and in such peacefulness that on no account
would he have had her suspect evil of him. And on the other hand he was
the lover of one of the handsomest ladies of her time in France, whom
he loved and esteemed so greatly that all other women seemed to him ugly
beside her.
In his early youth, before he was married, he had found it impossible to
gaze upon and associate with other women, however beautiful they might
be; for he took more delight in gazing upon his sweetheart, and in
perfectly loving her, than in having all that another might have given
him.
This lord, then, went to his wife and told her secretly of the
enterprise that his master had in hand, saying that he would rather die
than do what he had promised. For (he told her) just as there was no
living man whom he would not venture to attack in anger, although he
would rather die than commit a causeless and wilful murder unless his
honour compelled him to it; even so, unless driven by extreme love, such
as may serve to blind virtuous men, he would rather die than break his
marriage vow to gratify another.
Pages:
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135