Page:The Chronicle of Clemendy.pdf/71

 this matter, some saying one thing and some another; and this was Sir Jenkin's first act of malice, the rumour of which went not beyond the Convent walls.

And his second foul practice was done in this wise. You must know that the then Lord of Abergavenny had a daughter, Isabella by name, who at this time was in her sixteenth year, of a most beautiful and exquisite feature, a woman in all but age, and (so says the old Chronicle) evidently made for Love. And in the castle was a young gentleman who bore on a very noble coat, the baton sinister, the same having been from his youth in the service of the Baron, who had trained him in arms and in all that it becomes a gentleman to learn. Who being now seventeen years of age was, it is conceived, pricked and stung * * * * by the adorable and ravishing beauty of the Lady Isabella, in such wise that he was quite unable to contain himself, and finding the lady aforesaid to look not unkindly on him, became against all honour and religion her lover par amours. And so it fell out on a hot afternoon in May, they two being together in a retired arbour hard by the castle, were terribly and fearfully surprised by the Knight of the Tower, standing after an enraged and malevolent sort over against them, having his axe uplifted in the air. So the lover and his mistress became as dead for fear, thinking the Knight was come to kill them both their souls and their bodies, for their outrecuidance and impudency; and were found as they lay by the Baron, the young gentleman having his arms about the