ou of your great battle that shall befall
you."

"With whom," said Sir Percivale, "shall I fight?"

"With the most champion of the world," said the old man, "but, if ye
quit you well, ye shall lose no limb, even though vanquished and
seemingly shamed to the world's end."

Then the good man leaped over the board, and the ship and all went
away, Sir Percivale wist not whither. He abode there till midday, when
he saw a ship come rowing in the sea as if all the winds of the world
had driven it. It drove under the rock on which he sat; and when he
hied thither he found the ship covered with silk blacker than any bier,
and therein was a gentlewoman of great beauty, and she was clothed
richly that none might be better.

When she saw Sir Percivale, she said, "Who brought you in this
wilderness where ye be never like to pass hence? for ye shall die here
for hunger and mischief."

"Damsel," said Sir Percivale, "I serve the best man of the world, and
in His service He will not suffer me to die, for who that knocketh
shall enter, and who that asketh shall have, and from the man that
seeketh Him, He hideth Him not."

"And I came out of the waste forest where I found the red knight with
the white shield," said the damsel.

"Ah, damsel," said he, "with that knight would I meet passing fain."

"Sir," said she, "if ye will ensure me, by the faith that ye owe unto
knighthood, that ye will do my will what time I summon you, I shall
bring you unto that knight."

"Yea," said he, "I shall promise you to fulfil your desire. But what
are ye that proffereth me thus great kindness?"

"I am," said she, "a gentlewoman that am disherited, which was sometime
the richest woman of the world."

"Damsel," said Sir Percivale, "who hath disherited you? for I have
great pity of you."

"Sir," said she, "I dwell with the greatest man of the world, and he
made me so fair and so clear that there was none like me, and of that
great beauty I had a little pride, more than I ought to have had. Also
I said a word that pleased him not, and then he would not suffer me to
be any longer in his company. He drove me from mine heritage, and so
disowned me, and he had never pity for me, and would none of my council
nor of my court. Since, sir knight, it hath befallen me so, I and mine
have taken from him many of his men, and have made them to become my
men, for they ask never anything of me, but I give it them, that and
much more. Therefore I and my