at the youth Almeryl and the damsel Bhanavar abode in the
city they had come to weeks and months, and life to either of them as the
flowing of a gentle stream, even as brother and sister lived they,
chastely, and with temperate feasting. Surely the youth loved her with a
great love, and the heart of Bhanavar turned not from him, and was won
utterly by his gentleness and nobleness and devotion; and they relied on
each other's presence for any joy, and were desolate in absence, as the
poet says:

When we must part, love,
Such is my smart, love,
Sweetness is savourless,
Fairness is favourless!
But when in sight, love,
We two unite, love,
Earth has no sour to me;
Life is a flower to me!

And with the increase of every day their passion increased, and the
revealing light in their eyes brightened and was humid, as is sung by him
that luted to the rage of hearts:

Evens star yonder
Comes like a crown on us,
Larger and fonder
Grows its orb down on us;
So, love, my love for thee
Blossoms increasingly;
So sinks it in the sea,
Waxing unceasingly.

On a night, when the singing-girls had left them, the youth could contain
himself no more, and caught the two hands of Bhanavar in his, saying,
'This that is in my soul for thee thou knowest, O Bhanavar! and 'tis
spoken when I move and when I breathe, O my loved one! Tell me then the
cause of thy shunning me whenever I would speak of it, and be plain with
thee.'

For a moment Bhanavar sought to release herself from his hold, but the
love in his eyes entangled her soul as in a net, and she sank forward to
him, and sighed under his chin, ''Twas indeed my very love of thee that
made me.'

The twain embraced and kissed a long kiss, and leaned sideways together,
and Bhanavar said, 'Hear me, what I am.'

Then she related the story of the Serpent and the Jewel, and of the death
of her betrothed. When it was ended, Almeryl cried, 'And was this
all?--this that severed us?' And he said, 'Hear what I am.'

So he told Bhanavar how Rukrooth, the mother of Ruark, had sent
messengers to the Prince his father, warning him of the passage of Ruark
through the mountains with one a Queen of Serpents, a sorceress, that had
bewitched him and enthralled him in a mighty love for her, to the ruin of
Ruark; and how the Chief was on his way with her to demand her in