Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/268

for herself. Now early in the morning, the lady castellan went to her devotions. In the mean time Julian returning home, hastened, according to custom, to the chamber of his wife, imagining that she had not yet risen. Fearful of awaking her, he softly entered the apartment, and perceiving two persons in bed, instantly concluded that his wife was disloyal. Without a moment's pause, he unsheathed his sabre, and slew both. Then in the greatest agitation and bitterness of heart, he hurried from the chamber, and accidentally took the direction in which the church lay, and by which his wife had proceeded not long before. On the threshold of the sacred building he distinguished her, and struck with the utmost amazement, enquired whom they were that had taken possession of his bed. She replied, that they were his parents; who after long and wearisome search in pursuit of him, arrived at his castle the last evening. The intelligence was as a thunderbolt to Julian; and unable to contain himself he burst into an agony of tears. "Oh!" he exclaimed, "lives there in the world so forlorn a wretch