heart, and after a while he said: "What you
tell me is true, and so I shall take another Queen, even though it is not
in me to love any other woman in all of the world but that dear one who is
dead and gone." So a while after that he took to wife the Lady Moeya, who
was the daughter of King Howell of Britain.

Now Queen Moeya had been married to an Earl of Britain, and by him she had
a son who was about the age of Tristram. So she brought this son to
Lyonesse with her, and he and Tristram were very good companions.

But the Lady Moeya took great hatred of Tristram, for she said in her
heart: "Except for this Tristram, mayhap my son might be King and overlord
of this land." And these thoughts brooded with her, so that after a while
she began to meditate how she might make away with Tristram so that her own
son might come into his inheritance.

Now at that time Tristram was about thirteen years of age and very large
and robust of form and of extraordinary strength of body and beauty of
countenance. But the son of Queen Moeya was not of such a sort, so the more
beautiful and noble Tristram was the more the Queen hated him. So one day
she called to her a very cunning chemist and she said to him: "Give me a
drink of such and such a sort, so that he who drinks thereof shall
certainly die, maugre help of any kind." And the chemist gave her what she
desired, and it was in a phial and was of a golden color.

[Sidenote: The Lady Moeya devises mischief against Tristram] Now Tristram
and the son of the Lady Moeya were wont to play ball in a certain court of
the castle, and when they would play there they would wax all of a heat
with their sport. This the Lady Moeya was well aware of; so one day she
took that phial of poison and she poured a part of it into a chalice and
she filled the chalice with clear water and she set the chalice upon a
bench where those two would play at ball. For she said to herself: "When
they grow warm with their play, Tristram will certainly drink of this water
to quench his thirst, and then my son will maybe enter into his
inheritance."

[Sidenote: The son of the Queen drinks of the poison] So the two youths
played very fiercely at their game, and they waxed exceedingly hot and
presently were both very violently athirst. Then Tristram said, "I would I
had somewhat to drink," and his stepbrother said, "Look, yonder is a
chalice of water; drink! and when thou hast quenched thy thirst, then I
will drink