Thy guilty wrong, or éls thee guilty yield."
The Sarazin, this hearing, rofe amain,
And, catching up in haft his three-fquare
fhield E

1

And fhining helmet, foone him buckled to the

field;

XLII.

And, drawing nigh him, faid; "Ah! misborn 1bElfe,

In evill houre thy foes thee hither fent
Anothers wrongs to wreak upon thy felfe:
Yet ill thou blameft me, for having blent
My name with guile and traiterous intent:
That Redcroffe Knight, perdie, I never flew ;
But had he beene, where earft his armes were
lent,

Th' Enchaunter vaine his errour fhould not

rew:

But thou his errour fhalt, I hope, now proven trew."

XLI. 8. - his three-fquare shield] The triangular shield is faid to be of very high antiquity, and to have been introduced into this country. See Holmes's Academy of Armory, 1680. p. 6; more especially the paragraphs numbered V and VI. and the correfponding engravings. This fhield was most commonly used by horfemen. TODD.

n XLII. 7. But had he beene, where earft his armes were lent,] But had he been in the place of Archimago, (fee C. iii. ft. 37, 38,) He, and not the Enchanter, fhould have rued for it.

UPTON.

XLII. 8. his errour] His own errour. In the next line, his alfo means the Enchanter's. CHURCH.

XLIII.

Therewith they gan, both furious and fell,
To thunder blowes, and fierfly to affaile
Each other, bent his enimy to quell ;

That with their force they perft both plate
and maile,

And made wide furrowes in their fleshes fraile, ...That it would pitty any living eie:

Large floods of blood adowne their fides did raile;

But floods of blood could not them fatisfie: Both hongred after death; both chofe to win,

or die.

XLIV.

So long they fight, and full revenge purfue, That, fainting, each themselves to breathen

"The purple blode eke fro the hartis vain
"Doune railid right fast

And G. Douglas, Virg. p. 390. ver. 43.

"Quhil al the blude heboundantly furth ralis."

UPTON.

XLIV. 1. and full revenge] So. Mr. Upton reads, with the first edition. Mr. Church follows the fecond and every other fubfequent edition, "fell revenge." But the original reading is perhaps to be preferred. The combatants fight long, and battell oft renue, determining to have full, complete, revenge. ..TODD.

And, ofte refreshed, battell oft renue.

As when two bores, with rancling malice mett,

Their gory fides fresh bleeding fiercely frett; Til breathleffe both themselves afide retire, Where, foming wrath, their cruell tuskes they whett,

And trample th' earth, the whiles they may refpire;

Then backe to fight againe, new breathed and

entire.

XLV.

So fierfly, when thefe Knights had breathed

once,

They gan to fight retourne; increasing more Their puiffant force, and cruell rage attonce, With heaped ftrokes more hugely then before; That with their drery wounds, and bloody gore,

They both deformed, fcarfely could bee known.

By this, fad Una fraught with anguish fore,

XLIV. 4. As when two bores,] This fame comparison the poet has introduced in F. Q. iv. iv. 29. But he feems to have borrowed it from Chaucer, where he describes the combat between Palamon and Arcite, Kn. Tale, 1160.

"As wild bores gan they to fight and fmite, "That frothen white as fome for ire wode; Up to the ancle fought they in ther blode." See also Euripides, Phani. v. 1402, and Statius, Theb. xi. 530.

66

UPTON.

Led with their noife which through the aire

was thrown,

Arriv'd, wher they in erth their fruitles blood had fown.

XLVI.

Whom all fo foone as that proud Sarazin
Efpide, he

gan

1

revive the memory Of his leud lufts, and late attempted fin; And lefte the doubtfull battel haftily, To catch her, newly offred to his eie; m But Satyrane, with ftrokes him turning, ftaid, And fternely bad him other business plie Then hunt the fteps of pure unfpotted Maid: Wherewith he al enrag'd thefe bitter fpeaches

faid;

XLVII.

“O foolish Faeries fonne, what fury mad Hath thee incenft to haft thy dolefull fate? Were it not better I that Lady had Then that thou hadft repented it too late? Moft fenceleffe man he, that himfelfe doth hate

To love another: Lo then, for thine ayd, Here take thy lovers token on thy pate.":

XLVII. 7. Here take thy lovers token on thy pate.] It was ufual for knights of romance to wear, on their helmets or fleeves, prefents or tokens of their miftreffes' favours. The Sarazin fays farcaftically he would give Sir Satyrane his lovers token to wear till his dying day. UPTON.

Compare Abdiel's reply to Satan, Par. Loft, B. vi. 186. "This greeting on thy impious creft receive." TODD.

So they to fight; the whiles the royall Mayd Fledd farre away, of that proud Paynim fore afrayd.

XLVIII.

But that falfe Pilgrim, which that leafing told,
Being in deed old Archimage, did stay
In fecret fhadow all this to behold;
And much reioyced in their bloody fray:
But, when he saw the Damfell paffe away,
He left his ftond, and her purfewd apace,
In hope to bring her to her laft decay.

XLVII. S. So they to fight;] Mr. Church, here deviating from his ufual accuracy, reads "So they two fight;" and makes no mention of any variation in other editions. But the first edition reads, "So they to fight;" which, as Mr. Upton obferves, is brought down to the lowest profe in the fubfequent editions, "So they two fight." I muft exempt Tonfon's edition of 1758, however, from mistake; as it rightly follows the first edition, with Mr. Upton. The remark of Mr. Upton alfo is just that to, in compofition with verbs, is augmentative. He cites indeed the fame expreffion as in Spenfer from Lydgate's Wars of Troy, B. i. C. ii.

66

Fyrfte he must of very force and myght
"Unto oultrance with these bulles to-fight."

Mr. Tyrwhitt, in his Gloffary to Chaucer, has illuftrated the
force of words, thus augmented, in a variety of inftances.
Thus, "The helmes they to-hewen and to-frede,” i. e. hewe
and cut to pieces. "To-dafhed," i. e. much bruifed.
fwinke," labour greatly, &c. TODD.

that leafing]

"To

XLVIII. 1. Lying. Ufed, as Mr. Upton observes, in the translation of Pfal. iv. 2. "How long will ye blafpheme mine honour, and have fuch pleasure in vanity, and feek after leafing ?" And thus, in Pierce the Ploughmans Crede, edit. 1553. fign. B. iii. b.

"he cafteth the lawes

"Nought lowly but lordly, and lefynges lyeth."

TODD.