black; and
all the trappings and furniture of the armor and of the horse were black,
so that from top to toe he was altogether as black and as forbidding as
Death himself.

[Sidenote: Sir Nabon rides forth to meet Sir Tristram] So when Sir Nabon
was thus in all wise prepared for battle, the portcullis of the castle was
lifted up, and he rode forth to meet Sir Tristram; and his young son rode
with him as his esquire. Then all the people of the castle gathered
together upon the walls to see that battle that was to be, and not one of
those several score of folk thought otherwise than that Sir Tristram would
certainly be overcome in that encounter.

Sir Nabon rode straight up to Sir Tristram and he said very fiercely,
"Sirrah, what is it brings you hither to this land?"

"As to that," said Sir Tristram, "the messenger whom I have sent to you
hath, I believe, told you what I come for, and that it is to redeem this
island from your possession, and to restore it to the Lady Loise, to whom
it belongeth. Likewise that I come to punish you for all the evil you have
done."

"And what business is all this of yours?" quoth Sir Nabon, speaking with
great fury of voice.

"Messire," quoth Sir Tristram, "know ye not that it is the business of
every true knight to rid the world of all such evil monsters as you be?"

"Ha!" quoth Sir Nabon, "that was very well said, for whatever mercy I
should have been willing before this to show you hath now been forfeited
unto you. For now I shall have no mercy upon you but shall slay you."

"Well," quoth Sir Tristram, "as for that, meseems it will be time enough to
offer me mercy after you have overcome me in battle."

[Sidenote: Sir Tristram does battle with Sir Nabon] So thereupon each
knight took his place for assault, and when they were in all ways prepared,
each set spurs to his horse and dashed the one against the other, with a
dreadful, terrible fury of onset. Each smote the other in the very midst of
his shield, and at that blow the lance of each was altogether shivered into
pieces to the very truncheon thereof. But each knight recovered his horse
from the fall and each leaped to earth and drew his sword, and each rushed
against the other with such fury that it was as though sparks of pure fire
flew out from the oculariums of the helmets. Therewith they met together,
and each lashed and smote at the other such fell strokes that the noise
thereof might easily have been heard several fur