Now one day
Sir Tristram came wandering thus into that pleasance and, the day being
warm, he sat under the shade of an appletree beside a marble fountain of
water; and the appletree above his head was all full of red and golden
fruit. So Sir Tristram sat there, striving to remember how it was that he
had once aforetime beheld that fountain and that garden and that appletree
beneath which he sat.
So whilst he sat there pondering in that wise, there came the Lady Belle
Isoult into the garden of that pleasance and her lady, the dame Bragwaine,
was with her, and the hound, hight Houdaine, which Sir Tristram had sent to
her by Gouvernail, walked beside her on the other side. Then Belle Isoult
perceived that there was a man sitting under the appletree, and she said to
dame Bragwaine: "Who is yonder man who hath dared to come hither into our
privy garden?" Unto this, dame Bragwaine replied: "That, lady, is the
gentle madman of the forest whom Sir Launcelot brought hither two days
ago."
Then the Lady Belle Isoult said, "Let us go nearer and see what manner of
man he is"; and so they went forward toward where Sir Tristram sat, and the
dog Houdaine went with them.
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