The Orlando Innamorato

by Matteo Maria Boiardo

She had accordingly obtained a boon from the monarch; and this was, that no one should have her to wife, who had not previously vanquished her in the foot-race. By this, she considered herself as secure of success; but Folderico countermined her stratagem. Being paired with her in the course, he had recourse to the expedient of dropping three golden apples, and the damsel was distanced by the same means as Atalanta. Thus the old man won his wife; who, however, determined on taking such vengeance as was in her power.

Here the lady, who was her own historian, observed Brandimart's distraction; who being charged with it, confessed that he had neither eyes nor ears but for Flordelis, and that he should never regain possession of himself, till she was found. On this the damsel and Orlando, who was mounted on Bayardo, and had resigned his Brigliadoro to Brandimart, as before related, offer to accompany him in an attempt to recover her, and they immediately proceed upon their search.

Flordelis, in the interval, had been carried off by the hermit to a cave; where she woke at the moment that a lion, who harboured there, sprang forth to punish the intrusion of the ravisher: who instantly dropt his plunder and fled. The beast, however, passing-by the proffered prey, follows and tears in pieces the hermit who had cast it down. Flordelis, while he is thus employed, escapes.

She, however, only gains a present respite from misfortune; for, flying at random, she falls into the hands of a hairy savage in the forest, who binds her to a tree with twigs; and then, gazing stupidly upon her, casts himself down at a little distance.

Brandimart was this while in pursuit of her, in the same wood, accompanied by Orlando and the damsel of the golden apples, who was seated upon his courser's croup. Orlando now entreats that she will finish her story, which she continues.

Folderico who had won the damsel, carried her to a tower, which he possessed upon the sea-shore, called Altamura, where he kept her, together with his treasure, under lock and key, and utterly secluded from the sight of man.*

* As the author is indebted to Greek fable for the beginning, so he is to Norman story for this subsequent adventure, which is taken, with some variation, from an old fabliau. See Barbasan's or Le Grand's fabliaux. The story would seem to be of Eastern origin.

But what will not love? Ordauro who was also rich, though not so wealthy as Folderico, purchased a sumptuous palace in the immediate neighbourhood of Altamura, and at an immense cost made a subterraneous passage from his palace to the damsel's prison; by which he visited and enjoyed her without danger. At last, however, the lovers, tired of the restraint under which they carried on their intercourse, and emboldened by success, determined to make a desperate effort to escape.

With this view Ordauro communicates to Folderico news of his approaching nuptials with another daughter of Monodontes; for so was called the king of the Distant Isles; and invites him, as his brother-in-law, to the marriage feast. Folderico having carefully secured the gates of his tower, goes thither, and finding his wife installed as bride, becomes ferocious at the sight. Ordauro, however, with great difficulty, succeeds in appeasing him, by the assurance that she was a twin-sister of his own wife, to whom she bore a perfect resemblance; and, by bidding him return to his tower and satisfy himself of the fact. The means of proof appeared decisive, and accordingly Folderico accepts them. He finds his locks as they were left, and his wife, (who had returned by the subterraneous passage and changed her dress,) alone and overcome with melancholy. He again takes the way, which was somewhat circuitous, to the palace of Ordauro, and again finds her there, shining in all the festivity of a bride. He can no longer resist the conviction that the two persons, whom he had seen, were different women; lays aside his distrust, and even offers to convoy the bridegroom and his bride on a part of their journey towards Ordauro's natural home, to which he was returning.

A certain advantage was thus gained; since Folderico never left his tower, though locked, for above an hour, and consequently would have soon discovered his loss, if the lovers had eloped in secret.