“The soul of Owain ap Urien,
May its Lord consider its exigencies!
Reged’s chief the green turf covers.”
In the course of this Elegy the bard, alluding to the incessant warfare with which this chieftain harassed his Saxon foes, exclaims:
“Could England sleep with the light upon her eyes!”
[61] The custom of riding into a hall while the lord and his guests sat at meat might be illustrated by numerous passages of ancient romance and history. But a quotation from Chaucer’s beautiful and half-told tale of “Cambuscan” is sufficient:
“And so befell that after the thridde cours,
While that this king sat thus in his nobley,
Herking his minstralles thir thinges play,
Beforne him at his bord deliciously,