" The gentlewoman said, "Lady, cannot you bear up a little
until help cometh?" Thereupon the Lady Elizabeth fell to weeping very
piteously, and said, "Nay, I cannot bear up any longer, for the cold hath
entered into my heart." (Yea, even at that time death was upon her because
of the cold at her heart.)
Then by and by in the midst of her tears and in very sore travail a
man-child was born to the Queen, and when that came to pass a great peace
fell suddenly upon her.
[Sidenote: How Tristram is born in the forest] Then she said, speaking to
the nurse like one in great weariness, "What child is it that I have given
unto the world?" The nurse said, "It is a man-child." The Queen said to
her, "Hold him up until I see him." Thereupon the nurse held the child up
and the Queen looked at him, though she could hardly see him because it was
as though a mist lay upon her eyes which she could not clear away from her
sight; for at that time she was drawing deep draughts of death. Then, when
she had seen the child and had beheld that he was very strong and lusty and
exceedingly comely, she said: "Behold, this is my child, born in the midst
of sore travail and great sorrow; wherefore his name shall be called
Tristram because he hath caused so many tears to be shed.
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