This page has been validated.
The Green Knight
339

dungeon were to come and pluck healing plants in the fields, and boil them in sweet milk, and wash him with them thrice."

Then he went on reckoning up the plants that were needful before he could get well again.

All this the princess heard, and she kept it in her head; and when the rain was over the two men went away, nor did she bide there long either.

So when they got home to the house in which they lived, out they went at once to get all kinds of plants and grasses in the field and wood, she and the maid, and they plucked and gathered early and late till she had got all that she was to boil. Then she bought her a doctor's hat and a doctor's gown, and went to the king's castle, and offered to make the prince well again.

"No, no; it is no good," said the king. So many had been there and tried, but he always got worse instead of better. But she would not yield, and gave her word he should be well, and that soon and happily. Well, then, she might have leave to try, and so she went into the Green Knight's bedroom and washed him the first time. And when she came the next day he was so well he could sit up in bed; the day after he was man enough to walk about the room, and the third he was as well and lively as a fish in the water.

"Now he may go out hunting," said the doctor.

Then the king was as overjoyed with the doctor as a bird in broad day. But the doctor said he must go home.

Then she threw off her hat and gown, and dressed herself smart, and made a feast, and then she unclasped