THE CHRONICLE OF CLEMENDY
tha down with such a complete and icy courtesy that several knowing winks were nipped short, and mouths were opened instead of eyes being shut; for they were simple men and unversed in stratagems and deceits. And all the evening Sir Symon clung to the skirts of a nice girl with yellow hair and long fingers, whom he entertained with ballads, canzonets, little stories, and odd questions, and, I am afraid, rather turned her head; for his manners, it must be confessed, were extremely pleasing. And using some caution and looking out for brambles in his path Sir Symon contrived to live as joyously as any knight could desire for the next week or two; for how pleasant are the beginnings of love and the various wandering byways which all lead to the same place. Byways, do I say? Rather ladders, graduals to the Mount Marvellous and the Castle beyond Conceit, mounting through deep blossoming orchards, flowery closes, and boskages of solemn scent; and the way now illuminate and radiant, now dim and mystical; but all most lovely, sweet, unearthly, quite passing all compare. Here we cannot climb alone, to the solitary the gate is barred, and the bridge drawn up across the deep blackness of the moat of melancholy; but hither maiden hands do guide us, red lips entice, and a girl's eyes are lamps before us. From what I have said before of my Bertha, you know that she was one whom the stars had shapen marvellously, and choicely well, and Sir Symon found that she led him by sweeter paths to bliss than any that his dreaming soul had trodden; or any that he had fashioned
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