pomp and reverence due to so good and fair a lady, and long and
bitterly he mourned her loss and all the people with him.

But at the end of seven years, King Meliodas took another wife.
Then, when the Queen had sons of her own, it angered her to think
that in the days to come, her stepson Tristram, and none other,
should rule the fair land of Liones. The more she thought of it,
the more she hated him till, at the last, she was resolved to do
away with him. So she filled a silver goblet with a pleasant drink
in which she had mixed poison, and she set it in the room where
Tristram played with the young princes, his half-brothers. Now the
day was hot, and presently, being heated with his play, the young
prince, the Queen's eldest son, drank of the poisoned goblet; and
immediately he died. Much the Queen grieved, but more than ever she
hated her stepson Tristram, as if, through him, her son had died.
Presently, again she mixed poison and set it in a goblet; and that
time, King Meliodas, returning thirsty from the chase, took the cup
and would have drunk of it, only the Queen cried to him to forbear.
Then the King recalled to mind how his young son had drunk of a
seeming pleasant drink and died on the instant; and seizing the
Queen by the hand, he cried: "False traitress! tell me at once what
is in that cup, or I will slay thee!" Then the Queen cried him
mercy and told him all her sin. But in his wrath the King would
have no mercy, but sentenced her to be burnt at the stake, which,
in those days, was the doom of traitors. The day having come when
the Queen should suffer for her fault, she was led out and bound to
a stake in the presence of all the court, and the faggots were
heaped about her. Then the young prince Tristram kneeled before the
King and asked of him a favour: and the King, loving him much,
granted him his request. "Then," said Tristram, "I require you to