“I was somewhat afflicted,” he said, “to see the grief of the Queen of Love and Beauty, whose sovereignty of a day this event has changed into mourning. I am not a man to be moved by a woman’s lament for her lover, but this same Lady Rowena suppressed her sorrow with such dignity of manner, that it could only be discovered by her folded hands, and her tearless eye, which trembled as it remained fixed on the lifeless form before her.”

“Who is this Lady Rowena,” said Prince John, “of whom we have heard so much?”

“A Saxon heiress of large possessions,” replied the Prior Aymer; “a rose of loveliness, and a jewel of wealth; the fairest among a thousand, a bundle of myrrh, and a cluster of camphire.”

“We shall cheer her sorrows,” said Prince John, “and amend her blood, by wedding her to a Norman. She seems a minor, and must therefore be at our royal disposal in marriage.⁠—How sayst thou, De Bracy? What thinkst thou of gaining fair lands and livings, by wedding a Saxon, after the fashion of the followers of the Conqueror?”