ed lived poor Ganymede, while on a day, sitting
with Aliena in a great dump,[1] she cast up her eye, and saw where
Rosader came pacing towards them with his forest bill on his neck. At
that sight her color changed, and she said to Aliena:

"See, mistress, where our jolly forester comes."

[Footnote 1: despondency.]

"And you are not a little glad thereof," quoth Aliena, "your nose
bewrays what porridge you love: the wind cannot be tied within his
quarter, the sun shadowed with a veil, oil hidden in water, nor love
kept out of a woman's looks: but no more of that, _Lupus est in
fabula_."

As soon as Rosader was come within the reach of her tongue's end,
Aliena began thus:

"Why, how now, gentle forester, what wind hath kept you from hence?
that being so newly married, you have no more care of your Rosalynde,
but to absent yourself so many days? Are these the passions you
painted out so in your sonnets and roundelays? I see well hot love is
soon cold, and that the fancy of men is like to a loose feather that
wandereth in the air with the blast of every wind."

"You are deceived, mistress," quoth Rosader; "'twas a copy[1] of
unkindness that kept me hence, in that, I being married, you carried
away the bride; but if I have given any occasion of offence by
absenting myself these three days, I humbly sue for pardon, which you
must grant of course, in that the fault is so friendly confessed with
penance. But to tell you the truth, fair mistress and my good
Rosalynde, my eldest brother by the injury of Torismond is banished
from Bordeaux, and by chance he and I met in the forest."

[Footnote 1: quantity.]

And here Rosader discoursed unto them what had happened betwixt them,
which reconcilement made them glad, especially Ganymede. But Aliena,
hearing of the tyranny of her father, grieved inwardly, and yet
smothered all things with such secrecy, that the concealing was more
sorrow than the conceit; yet that her estate might be hid still, she
made fair weather of it, and so let all pass.

Fortune, that saw how these parties valued not her deity, but held her
power in scorn, thought to have a bout with them, and brought the
matter to pass thus. Certain rascals that lived by prowling in the
forest, who for fear of the provost marshal had caves in the groves
and thickets to shroud themselves from his trains, hearing of the
beauty of this fair shepherdess, Aliena, thought to steal her away,
and to give her to the king for