At the foot of a crystal cliff, on the opposite side of the river, which he cannot cross, he sees a maiden sitting, clothed and crowned with pearls, and wearing one pearl of surpassing wonder and spotlessness upon her breast.  I now make the spelling and forms of the words as modern as I may, altering the text no further.

“O pearl,” quoth I, “in perles pight,           pitched, dressed.
Art thou my pearl that I have plained?          mourned.
Regretted by myn one, on night?                 by myself.
Much longing have I for thee layned             hidden.
Since into grass thou me a-glyghte;             didst glide from me.
Pensive, payred, I am for-pained,[25]           pined away.
And thou in a life of liking light              bright pleasure.
In Paradise-earth, of strife unstrained!        untortured with strife.
What wyrde hath hither my jewel vayned,         destiny:  carried off.
And done me in this del and great danger?       sorrow.
Fro we in twain were towen and twayned,         since:  pulled:  divided.
I have been a joyless jeweller.”

  That jewel then in gemmes gente, gracious.
  Vered up her vyse with even gray, turned:  face.
  Set on her crown of pearl orient,
  And soberly after then gan she say: 

  “Sir, ye have your tale myse-tente, mistaken.
  To say your pearl is all away,
  That is in coffer so comely clente clenched.
  As in this garden gracious gay,
  Herein to lenge for ever and play, abide.
  There mys nor mourning come never—­here, where:  wrong.
  Here was a forser for thee in faye, strong-box:  faith.
  If thou wert a gentle jeweller.

  “But jeweller gente, if thou shalt lose
  Thy joy for a gem that thee was lef, had left thee.
  Me thinks thee put in a mad purpose,
  And busiest thee about a reason bref. poor object.
  For that thou lostest was but a rose,
  That flowered and failed as kynd hit gef. nature gave it.
  Now through kind of the chest that it gan close, nature.
  To a pearl of price it is put in pref;[26]
  And thou hast called thy wyrde a thef, doom, fate:  theft.
  That ought of nought has made thee, clear! something of nothing.
  Thou blamest the bote of thy mischef:  remedy:  hurt.
  Thou art no kynde jeweller.” natural, reasonable.

When the father pours out his gladness at the sight of her, she rejoins in these words: