bones at home, and he proposes to Gawain a playful compact that they shall exchange each evening whatever they have won during the day. (Fit II .)
On each of the three days while the lord is afield Gawain lies late in bed and is visited by the lady in his chamber, where she does all she can to get him to make love to her. Though hard pressed, he resists her wiles and will only consent to allow her to kiss him, once on the first day, twice on the second, and three times on the last. These kisses he faithfully delivers to the lord, but without telling him where he won them, and he receives in exchange the lord’s winnings afield, venison, a boar’s head, and a fox-skin. On the third day, however, Gawain has accepted from the lady a green lovelace, or girdle, which she tells him will protect anyone wearing it from being wounded, and this part of his winnings, at her request but contrary to his compact, he conceals from the lord. (Fit III .)
On New Year’s morning Gawain is escorted by a squire to the head of a wild valley, where he is given directions for finding the Green Chapel. After some search he finds it, a green mound or barrow; and on the hillside he hears a sound as of an axe being sharpened. The Green Knight appears, and after greeting Gawain bids him prepare for the stroke. As the axe descends Gawain shrinks, and the Knight checks the blow and pauses to reprove him. The second stroke is a feint, but at the third he lets the axe come down fair. Gawain, however, suffers no hurt except a little cut on his neck; having kept his bargain he is preparing to defend himself when the Green Knight changes his note and speaks to him friendly words. The first two strokes (he tells him) were intended only as feints because Gawain had kept troth in the matter of his winnings on the first two days; at the third stroke he had wounded him because on the third day he had a little failed in lealty by keeping back the girdle. Gawain, who now sees that the Green Knight and his host are one, is overwhelmed with shame. The Knight, however, comforts him and tells him that the wooing at the castle was a temptation wrought by himself