the high prowess of a lady as beautiful as she is brave. It is the
fair and illustrious Bradamante who has won from you the honors of
victory."

At these words the courier rode on his way, leaving Sacripant more
confounded and mortified than ever. In silence he mounted the
horse of Angelica, taking the lady behind him on the croup, and
rode away in search of a more secure asylum. Hardly had they
ridden two miles when a new sound was heard in the forest, and
they perceived a gallant and powerful horse, which, leaping the
ravines and dashing aside the branches that opposed his passage,
appeared before them, accoutred with a rich harness adorned with
gold.

"If I may believe my eyes, which penetrate with difficulty the
underwood," said Angelica, "that horse that dashes so stoutly
through the bushes is Bayard, and I marvel how he seems to know
the need we have of him, mounted as we are both on one feeble
animal." Sacripant, dismounting from the palfrey, approached the
fiery courser, and attempted to seize his bridle, but the
disdainful animal, turning from him, launched at him a volley of
kicks enough to have shattered a wall of marble. Bayard then
approached Angelica with an air as gentle and loving as a faithful
dog could his master after a long separation. For he remembered
how she had caressed him, and even fed him, in Albracca. She took
his bridle in her left hand, while with her right she patted his
neck. The beautiful animal, gifted with wonderful intelligence,
seemed to submit entirely. Sacripant, seizing the moment to vault
upon him, controlled his curvetings, and Angelica, quitting the
croup of the palfrey, regained her seat.