A long trailing robe of costly brocade, blue on the left side and yellow on the right, now floated around her tall figure.

When the knight returned she had looked radiant in her gold and gems, like a princess.
Now, crushed and feeble, she presented a pitiable image of powerless yet offensively hollow splendour.

It would have required too much exertion to assail her son-in-law with invectives, like her energetic mother; but when she saw her daughter, to whom she had already appealed several times in a tone of anguished entreaty, rest her proud head so tenderly on her husband's broad breast, as she had done during the first weeks of their marriage, but never since, the unhappy woman clearly perceived that the knight's incredible demand was meant seriously.

What she had believed an idle boast he actually requested.

Yonder hated intruder expected her to part with her only daughter, who was far more to her than her unloved husband, her exacting mother, or the son who restricted her wishes, whom she had never understood, and against whom her heart had long been hardened.