The gentle earl he doometh to his death,
And greets his daughter with her lover's heart.
Gismunda fills the goblet with her tears,
And drinks a poison which she had distill'd,
Whereof she dies, whose deadly countenance
So grieves her father, that he slew himself.


ANOTHER OF THE SAME, MORE AT LARGE, IN PROSE.[14]

Tancred, King of Naples and Prince of Salerne, gave his only daughter
Gismund (whom he most dearly loved) in marriage to a foreign prince,
after whose death she returned home to her father, who having felt great
grief of her absence whilst her husband lived, immeasurably esteeming
her, determined never to suffer any second marriage to bereave him of
her. She, on the other side, waxing weary of that her father's purpose,
bent her mind to the secret love of the County Palurin: to whom (he
being likewise inflamed with love of her) by a letter subtly enclosed in
a cloven cane, she gave to understand a convenient way for their desired
meetings, through an old ruinous vault, whose mouth opened directly
under her chamber floor. Into this vault when she was one day descended
(for the conveyance of her lover), her father in the mean season (whose
only joy was in his daughter) came to her chamber, and not finding her
there, supposing her to have been walked abroad for her[15] disport, he
threw him down on her bed, and covered his head with a curtain, minding
to abide and rest there till her return. She, nothing suspecting this
her father's unseasonable coming, brought up her lover out of the cave
into her chamber, where her father espied their secret love: and he (not
espied of them) was upon this sight stricken with marvellous grief; but
either for that the sudden despite had amazed him, and taken from him