r Dinadan, a knight of the Table Round, made
this song, and made me to sing it afore you. Thou sayest well, said King
Mark, and because thou art a minstrel thou shalt go quit, but I charge
thee hie thee fast out of my sight. So the harper departed and went to
Sir Tristram, and told him how he had sped. Then Sir Tristram let make
letters as goodly as he could to Launcelot and to Sir Dinadan. And so he
let conduct the harper out of the country. But to say that King Mark was
wonderly wroth, he was, for he deemed that the lay that was sung afore
him was made by Sir Tristram's counsel, wherefore he thought to slay him
and all his well-willers in that country.

CHAPTER XXXII. How King Mark slew by treason his brother Boudwin, for
good service that he had done to him.

NOW turn we to another matter that fell between King Mark and his
brother, that was called the good Prince Boudwin, that all the people
of the country loved passing well. So it befell on a time that the
miscreant Saracens landed in the country of Cornwall soon after these
Sessoins were gone. And then the good Prince Boudwin, at the landing,
he raised the country privily and hastily. And or it were day he let put
wildfire in three of his own ships, and suddenly he pulled up the sail,
and with the wind he made those ships to be driven among the navy of the
Saracens. And to make short tale, those three ships set on fire all the
ships, that none were saved. And at point of the day the good Prince
Boudwin with all his fellowship set on the miscreants with shouts and
cries, and slew to the number of forty thousand, and left none alive.

When King Mark wist this he was wonderly wroth that his brother should
win such worship. And because this prince was better beloved than he
in all that country, and that also Boudwin loved well Sir Tristram,
therefore he thought to slay him. And thus, hastily, as a man out of
his wit, he sent for Prince Boudwin and Anglides his wife, and bade them
bring their young son with them, that he might see him. All this he did
to the intent to slay the child as well as his father, for he was the
falsest traitor that ever was born. Alas, for his goodness and for his
good deeds this gentle Prince Boudwin was slain. So when he came with
his wife Anglides, the king made them fair semblant till they had dined.
And when they had dined King Mark sent for his brother and said thus:
Brother, how sped you when the miscreants arrived by you? meseem