To fight for a lady! a benedicite! 
  It were a lusty sight for to see.

It was an argument, seriously urged by Sir John of Heinault, for making war upon Edward II., in behalf of his banished wife, Isabella, that knights were bound to aid, to their uttermost power, all distressed damsels, living without council or comfort.

[Footnote A:  Such an oath is still taken by the Knights of the Bath; but, I believe, few of that honourable brotherhood will now consider it quite so obligatory as the conscientious Lord Herbert of Cherbury, who gravely alleges it as a sufficient reason for having challenged divers cavaliers, that they had either snatched from a lady her bouquet, or ribband, or, by some discourtesy of similar importance, placed her, as his lordship conceived, in the predicament of a distressed damozell.]

An apt illustration of the ballad would have been the combat, undertaken by three Spanish champions against three Moors of Granada, in defence of the honour of the queen of Granada, wife to Mohammed Chiquito, the last monarch of that kingdom.  But I have not at hand Las Guerras Civiles de Granada, in which that atchievement is recorded.  Raymond Berenger, count of Barcelona, is also said to have defended, in single combat, the life and honour of the Empress Matilda, wife of the Emperor Henry V., and mother to Henry II. of England.—­See ANTONIO ULLOA, del vero Honore Militare, Venice, 1569.

A less apocryphal example is the duel, fought in 1387, betwixt Jaques le Grys and John de Carogne, before the king of France.  These warriors were retainers of the earl of Alencon, and originally sworn brothers.  John de Carogne went over the sea, for the advancement of his fame, leaving in his castle a beautiful wife, where she lived soberly and sagely.  But the devil entered into the heart of Jaques le Grys, and he rode, one morning, from the earl’s house to the castle of his friend, where he was hospitably received by the unsuspicious lady.  He requested her to show him the donjon, or keep of the castle, and in that remote and inaccessible tower forcibly violated her chastity.  He then mounted his horse, and returned to the earl of Alencon within so short a space, that his absence had not been perceived.  The lady abode within the donjon, weeping bitterly, and exclaiming, “Ah Jaques! it was not well done thus to shame me! but on you shall the shame rest, if God send my husband safe home!” The lady kept secret this sorrowful deed until her husband’s return from his voyage.  The day passed, and night came, and the knight went to bed; but the lady would not; for ever she blessed herself, and walked up and down the chamber, studying and musing, until her attendants had retired; and then, throwing herself on her knees before the knight, she shewed him all the adventure.  Hardly would Carogne believe the treachery of his companion; but, when convinced, he replied, “Since it is so, lady, I pardon you; but the knight shall