.'

'O fair and gracious knight, suffer me not to die for love of you,'
cried Elaine, and looked most piteously and wanly upon him. 'Oh, I
would have none but you to be my husband.'

'Fair damsel,' replied Sir Lancelot, 'heavy is my grief to refuse you,
but I have not turned my mind to marriage.'

'Alas,' said Elaine, and smiled sadly, 'then there is no more to be
said.'

'Fair maid, I would that you will seek some knight more worthy of you,'
said Sir Lancelot. 'When I am gone, do you set your heart upon some
friend or kinsman; and for all the kindness ye have shown me, I will
settle upon you a thousand pounds yearly.'

'Oh, of all this,' said the Lily Maid, 'I will have none; for if ye
will not love me, wit ye well, Sir Lancelot, my happy days are done.'

'Say it not, fair maid,' said the knight, 'for many years and much love
should be yours.'

But with a cry Elaine fell to the ground in a swoon, and her
gentlewomen bore her into her chamber and sorrowed over her.

In great heaviness Sir Lancelot would depart, and went to his horse to
mount it; and Sir Lavaine went with him.

'What would you do?' asked Sir Lancelot of him.

'What should I do,' said Sir Lavaine, 'but follow you, unless you drive
me from you?'

'I cannot do that, so come with me,' said Sir Lancelot.

Then came Sir Bernard unto the knight and said, lifting his grey head
and wrinkled and reverend face to Sir Lancelot as he bestrode his
horse:

'Sir, I think my daughter Elaine will die for your sake. For ever was
she quiet, but strong in mood and of a very fond heart.'

'It must not be,' said Sir Lancelot, 'but do thou cheer her, and when I
am gone she will forget me. Never did I do or say aught but what a good
knight should, and never made as if I cared for her. But I am right
sorry for her distress, for she is a full fair maid, good and gentle,
and sweet of voice and mood.'

'Father,' said Sir Lavaine, 'my sister Elaine doeth as I do. For since
I first saw my lord Lancelot, I could never depart from him, nor never
will if I may follow him.'

Night and day did the fair maid Elaine sorrow in silence, so that she
never slept, ate or drank. At the end of ten days her ghostly father
bade her leave such grief and change her thoughts.

'Nay,' she said, 'I may not, and I would not if I could. And I do no
sin to love the most peerless knight in all the world, the most gentle
and courteous of men, and the greatest in all nobility. Therefore, a