{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_35598/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_35598","id":"gutenberg_35598","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35598","summary":null,"tags":["Arthur, King -- Juvenile fiction","Category: British Literature","Category: Children & Young Adult Reading","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Children's stories","Chivalry -- Juvenile fiction","Knights and knighthood -- Juvenile fiction","Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron, 1809-1892 -- Adaptations"],"text":"</pre>\n\n\n\nProduced by D Alexander, Peter Vickers, Juliet Sutherland\nand the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at\nhttp://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: THREE TIMES THEY BROKE SPEARS]\n\n   TALES FROM TENNYSON\n\n   BY\n   MOLLY K. BELLEW\n\n   EDITOR OF\n   \"TALES FROM LONGFELLOW\"\n   \"DICKENS' CHRISTMAS STORIES FOR CHILDREN\"\n   ETC., ETC.\n\n   ILLUSTRATED BY H. S. CAMPBELL\n\n   NEW YORK AND BOSTON\n   H. M. CALDWELL CO.\n   PUBLISHERS\n\n\n\n\n   COPYRIGHT, 1902\n   BY\n   JAMIESON-HIGGINS CO.\n\n\n\n\n   CONTENTS.\n\n\n   The Coming of King Arthur               9\n\n   Gareth and Lynette                     29\n\n   The Marriage of Geraint                46\n\n   Geraint's Quest of Honor               64\n\n   Merlin and Vivien                      85\n\n   Balin and Balan                        95\n\n   Lancelot and Elaine                   104\n\n   The Holy Grail                        119\n\n   Pelleas and Ettarre                   132\n\n   The Last Tournament                   142\n\n   The Passing of Arthur                 150\n\n\n\n\nTo my Young Readers.\n\n\nAlfred Lord Tennyson was the typically English poet, and none, perhaps\nnot even Shakespeare, has appealed so keenly to the human heart. No\nother man's poems have caused as many readers to shed tears of sympathy\nnor have awakened higher sentiments in the human heart. The critics\nagree in pronouncing him the ideal poet laureate. In his \"Idylls from\nthe King\" are found the loftiest and proudest deeds of English history\nand even in the retelling of these in prose the high spirit that is an\ninspiration to the noblest deeds cannot fail to be preserved.\n\n                                         MOLLY K. BELLEW.\n\n\n\n\nTHE COMING OF KING ARTHUR.\n\n\nOver a thousand years ago everybody was talking about the wonderful King\nArthur and his brilliant Knights of the Round Table, who everywhere were\npursuing bold quests, putting to rout the band of outlaws and robbers\nwhich in those days infested every highway and by-way of the country,\ngoing to war with tyrannical nobles, establishing law and order among\nthe rich, redressing the wrongs of women, the poor and the oppressed,\nand winning glorious renown for their valor and their successes.\n\nThat was in England which at that time was not England as it is today,\nall one kingdom under a single ruler, but was divided into many bits of\nkingdoms each with its own king and all warring against each other.\nArthur's kingdom was the most unpeaceful of all. This was because for\ntwenty years or more, ever since the death of old King Uther, the\ncountry had been without a ruler. Old King Uther had died about a score\nof years before without leaving an heir to the throne, and all the\nnobles of the realm had immediately gone to war with one another each\ntrying to get the most land and each trying to get the throne for\nhimself.\n\n[Illustration: OLD MERLIN APPEARS.]\n\nSuddenly, however, old Merlin, the wizard who had been King Uther's\nmagician, appeared one day in the royal council hall with a handsome\nyoung man, Arthur, and declared him to be the king of the realm. Arthur\nwas crowned and for a time the nobles were quiet, for he ruled with a\nstrong hand of iron, put down all the evils in his kingdom and\neverywhere gave it peace and order. People in every part of the island\nsent for him and his knights, begging him to come to help them out of\ntheir difficulties. But presently the nobles became troublesome again;\nthey said that Arthur was not the true king, that he was not the son of\nUther and that, therefore, he had no right to reign over them. So there\nwas fighting and unrest again, and in the midst of it Leodogran, the\nking of the Land of Cameliard, asked Arthur to come with his knights and\ndrive away the enemies besetting him on every side. The country of\nCameliard had gone to waste and ruin, because of the continual warfare\nthat was waged with the kings that lived in the little neighboring\ncountries and a mass of wild-eyed foreign heathen peoples who invaded\nthe land. And so it happened that Cameliard was ravaged with battles,\nits strong men were cut down with the sword and wild dogs, wolves, and\nbears from the tangled weeds came rooting up the green fields and\nwallowing into the palace gardens. Sometimes the wolves stole little\nchildren from the villages and nursed them like their own cubs, until\nfinally these children grew up into a race of wolf-men who molested the\nland worse than the wolves themselves. Then another king fought\nLeodogran, and at last the heathen hordes came swarming from over the\nseas and made all the earth red with his soldiers' blood, and they made\nthe sun red with the smoke of the burning homes of his people.\n\nLeodogran simply did not know which way to turn for help until at last\nhe thought of young Arthur of the Round Table who recently had been\ncrowned king. So Leodogran sent for Arthur beseeching him to come and\nhelp him, for between the men and the beasts his country was dying.\n\n[Illustration: PRINCESS GUINEVERE.]\n\nKing Arthur and his men welcomed the chance and went at once into the\nLand of Cameliard to drive away the heathen marauders. As he marched\nwith his men past the castle walls, pretty Princess Guinevere stood\noutside to watch the glittering soldiers go by. Among so many richly\ndressed knights she did not particularly notice Arthur, for he wore\nnothing to show that he was king, although his kingly bearing and brave\nforehead might suggest leadership. But no royal arms were engraved upon\nhis helmet or his shield, and he carried simple weapons not nearly so\ngorgeously emblazoned as those of some of the others.\n\n[Illustration: HE LED HIS WARRIORS BOLDLY.]\n\nAlthough Guinevere did not see the fair young King, Arthur spied her\nbeside the castle wall; he felt the light of her beautiful eyes\nglimmering out into his heart and setting it all aflame with a fire of\nlove for her.\n\nHe led his warriors boldly to the forests where they pitched their\ntents, then fought all the heathen until they scampered away to their\nown territories, he slew the frightful wild beasts that had plundered\nthe fields, cut down the forest trees so as to open out roads for the\npeople of Cameliard to pass over from one part of their land to the\nother, then he traveled quietly away with his men, back to fight his own\nbattles in his own country. For there was fighting everywhere in those\ndays. But all the time in Arthur's heart, while he was doing those\nwonderful things for Leodogran, he was thinking still, not of Leodogran,\nbut of the lovely Guinevere, and yearning for her.\n\nIf only she could be his queen he thought they two together could rule\non his throne as one strong, sweet, delicious life, and could exert a\nmighty power over all his people to make them good and wise and happy.\nEach day increased his love until he could not bear even to think for a\nmoment of living without her. So from the very field of battle, while\nthe swords were flashing and clashing about him, as he fought the barons\nand great lords who had risen up against him, Arthur dispatched three\nmessengers to Leodogran, the King of Cameliard.\n\nThese three messengers were Ulfius, Brastias and Bedivere, the very\nfirst knight Arthur had knighted upon his throne. They went to Leodogran\nand said that if Arthur had been of any service to him in his recent\ntroubles with the heathen and the wild beasts, he should give the\nPrincess Guinevere to be Arthur's wife as a mark of his good will.\n\n[Illustration: ARTHUR DISPATCHED THREE MESSENGERS TO LEODOGRAN.]\n\nWell, when they had said this, Leodogran did not know what to do any\nbetter than when the heathen and the beasts had come upon him. For while\nhe thought Arthur a very bold soldier and a very fine man, and, although\nhe felt very grateful indeed to him for all the great things he had\ndone, still he was not certain that Guinevere ought to marry him. For,\nas Guinevere was the daughter of a king she should become the wife of\nnone but the son of a king. And Leodogran did not know precisely who\nthis King Arthur was; but he did know that the barons of Arthur's court\nhad burst out into this uproar against him because they said he was not\ntheir true king and not the son of King Uther who had reigned before\nhim. Some of them declared him to be the child of Gerlois, and others\navowed that Sir Anton was his father.\n\nAs poor, puzzled Leodogran knew nothing about the matter himself, he\nsent for his gray-headed trusty old chamberlain, who always had good\ncounsel to give him in any dilemma; and he asked the chamberlain whether\nhe had heard anything certainly as to Arthur's birth. The chamberlain\ntold him that there were just two men in all the world who knew the\ntruth with respect to Arthur and where he had come from, and that both\nthese men were twice as old as himself. One of them was Merlin the\nwizard, the other was Bleys, Merlin's teacher in magic, who had written\na book of his renowned pupil's wonders, which probably related\neverything regarding the secret of Arthur's birth.\n\n\"If King Arthur had done no more for me in my wars than you have just\nnow in my present trouble,\" the king answered the chamberlain, \"I would\nhave died long ago from the wild beasts and the heathen. Send me in\nUlfius and Brastias and Bedivere again.\"\n\nSo the chamberlain went out and Arthur's three men came into Leodogran\nwho spoke to them this way: \"I have often seen a big cuckoo chased by\nlittle birds and understood why such tiny birds plagued him so, but why\nare the nobles in your country rebelling against their king and saying\nthat he is not the son of a king. Tell me whether you yourselves think\nhe is the child of King Uther.\"\n\n[Illustration: SIR KING, THERE ARE ALL SORTS OF STORIES ABOUT THAT.]\n\nUlfius and Brastias answered immediately \"yes,\" but Bedivere, the first\nof all Arthur's knights, became very bold when anyone slandered his\nsovereign and he replied: \"_Sir King, there are all sorts of stories\nabout that_; some of the nobles hate him just because he is good and\nthey are wicked; they cry out that he is no man because his ways are\ngentler than their rough manners, while others again think he must be\nan angel dropped from heaven. But I will tell you the facts as I know\nthem, King Uther and Gerlois were rivals long ago; they both loved\nYgerne. And she was the wife of Gerlois and had no sons, but three\ndaughters, one of them the Queen of Orkney who has clung to Arthur like\na sister. The two rivals, Gerlois and Uther went to war with each other\nand Gerlois was killed in battle; then Uther quickly married the winsome\nYgerne, the widow of Gerlois, for he loved her dearly and impatiently.\nIn a few months Uther died, and on that very night of his death Arthur\nwas born. And as soon as he was born they carried him out by a secret\nback gateway to Merlin the magician, to be brought up far away from the\ncourt so that no one would hear about him until he was grown up ready to\nsit upon Uther's, his father, throne.\n\n\"For those were wild lords in those years just like these of today,\nalways struggling for the rule, and they would have shattered the\nhelpless little prince to pieces had they known about him. So Merlin\ntook the baby and gave him over to old Sir Anton, a friend of Uther's,\nand Sir Anton's wife tended Arthur with her own little ones so that\nnobody knew who he was or where he had come from. But while the prince\nwas growing up the kingdom went to weed; the great lords and barons were\nfighting all the time among themselves and nobody ruled. But during this\npresent year Arthur's time for ascending the throne had come, so Merlin\nbrought him from out of his hiding place, set him in the palace hall and\ncried out to all the lords and ladies, 'This is Uther's heir, your\nking!' Of course, none of them would have that. A hundred voices cried\nback immediately: 'Away with him! he is no king of ours, that's the son\nof Gerlois, or else the child of Anton, and no king.'\n\n\"In spite of this opposition Merlin was so crafty and clever he won the\nday for the people, who were clamoring for a king and were glad to see\nArthur crowned. But after it all was over the lords banded together and\nbroke out in open war against Arthur. That is the whole story of this\nwar.\"\n\nAlthough pleased with Bedivere's good account of Arthur, yet when it was\nended Leodogran scarcely felt satisfied. Was Bedivere right, he thought\nto himself, or were the barons right? As he sat pondering over\neverything in his palace, _three great visitors came to the castle_;\nthese were the Queen of Orkney, the daughter of Gerlois and Ygerne, with\nher two sons, Gawain and Modred. Leodogran made a great feast for them\nand while entertaining them at table remembered what Bedivere had said\nabout Arthur and this queen. So he turned to the queen and remarked:\n\n[Illustration: THREE VISITORS TO THE CASTLE.]\n\n\"An insecure throne is no better than a mass of ice in a summer's sea;\nit all melts away. You are from Arthur's court; tell me, do you think\nthis king with his few loyal Knights of the Round Table can triumph over\nthe rebellious lords, and keep his throne?\"\n\n\"O King, they are few indeed,\" the Queen of Orkney cried, \"but so bold\nand true, and all of one mind with him. I was there at the coronation\nwhen the savage yells of the nobles died away, and Arthur sat crowned\nupon the dais with all his knights gathered round him to do his service\nfor him forever. Arthur in low, deep tones, with simple words of great\nauthority bound them to him with such wonderfully rigid vows that when\nthey rose from their knees one after the other, some of them looked as\npale as if a ghost had passed by them, others were flushed in their\nfaces, and yet others seemed dazed and blind with their awe as if not\nfully awake. Then he spoke to them, cheering them with divine words that\nare far more than my tongue can ever tell you, and while he spoke every\nface flashed, for just a moment with his likeness, and from the crucifix\nabove, three rays in green, blue, scarlet, streamed across upon the\nbright, sweet faces of the three tall fair queens, his friends who stood\nsilently beside his throne, and who will always be ready to help him if\nhe is in need.\n\n\"Merlin, the magician, came there too, with his hundred years of art\nlike so many hands of vassals to wait upon the young king. Near Merlin\nstood the mystical, marvelous Lady of the Lake, who knows a deeper magic\nthan Merlin's own, dressed in white. A mist of incense curled all about\nher and her face was fairly hidden in the dim gloom. But when the holy\nhymns were sung a voice like flowing waters sounded through the music.\nIt was the voice of the Lady of the Lake who lives in the lowest waters\nof the lake where it is always calm, no matter what storms may blow over\nthe earth and who when the waves tumble and roll above her can walk out\nupon their crests just as our Lord did.\n\n\"_It was she who gave Arthur his remarkable sword_ Excalibur, with its\nhilt like a cross wherewith he drove away the heathen for you. That\nstrange sword rose up from out the bosom of the lake, and Arthur rowed\nover in a little boat and took it. The sword is incrusted with rich\njewels on the hilt, with a blade so bright that men are blinded by it.\nOn one side the words 'Take me' are graven upon it in the oldest\nlanguage of the world, while on the other side the words 'Cast me away'\nare carved in the tongue that you speak.\n\n[Illustration: SHE GAVE ARTHUR HIS REMARKABLE SWORD]\n\n\"Arthur became very sad when he saw the second inscription, but Merlin\nadvised him to take the beautiful blade and use it; he told him that now\nwas the time to strike and that the time to cast away was very, very far\noff. So Arthur took the tremendous sword and with it he will beat down\nhis enemies, King Leodogran.\"\n\nLeodogran was pleased with the queen's words, but he wished to test the\nstory Bedivere had told him, so he looked into her eyes narrowly as he\nobserved, with a question in his tones, \"The swallow and the swift are\nvery near kin, but you are still closer to this noble prince as you are\nhis own dear sister.\"\n\n\"I am the daughter of Gerlois and Ygerne,\" she answered.\n\n\"Yes, that is why you are Arthur's sister,\" the king returned still\nquestioningly.\n\n\"These are secret things,\" the Queen of Orkney replied, and she motioned\nwith her hand for her two sons to leave her alone in the room with the\nking.\n\nGawain immediately skipped away singing, his hair flying after and\nfrolicked outside like a frisky pony, _but cunning Modred laid his ear\nclose beside the door to listen_, so that he half heard all the strange\nstory his mother told the king. This is what the queen said in the\nbeginning to the king.\n\n[Illustration: CUNNING MODRED BESIDE THE DOOR TO LISTEN]\n\n\"What should I know about it? For my mother's hair and eyes were dark,\nand so were the eyes and hair of Gerlois, and Uther was dark too, almost\nblack, but the King Arthur is fairer than anyone else in Britain.\nHowever, I remember how my mother used often to weep and say, 'O that\nyou had some brother, pretty little one, to guard you from the rough\nways of the world.\"\n\n\"Yes? She said that?\" Leodogran rejoined, \"but when did you see Arthur\nfirst?\"\n\n\"O king, I will tell you all about it,\" cried the Queen of Orkney. \"Once\nwhen I was a little bit of a girl and had been beaten for some childish\nfault that I had not committed, I ran outside and flung myself on a\ngrassy bank and hated all the world and everything in it, and wished I\nwere dead. But all of a sudden little Arthur stood by my side. I don't\nknow how he came or anything about it. Perhaps Merlin brought him, for\nMerlin, they say, can walk about and nobody see him, if he will, but any\nrate, Arthur was there by my side, comforting me and drying my tears.\nAfter that Arthur came very often without anybody knowing it and we were\nchildren together, and in those golden days I felt sure he would be\nking.\n\n\"But now I must tell you about Bleys, the old wizard who taught the\nmagician Merlin. You know they both served King Uther, and just a little\nwhile ago when Bleys died he sent for me. He said he had something to\ntell me that I must know before he left the world. He said that they\ntwo, Merlin and he, sat beside the bed of King Uther on the night when\nthe king passed away, moaning and wailing because he left no heir to his\nthrone. After the king's death as Merlin and Bleys walked out from the\ncastle walls into the dismal misty night, they saw a wonderful\nfairy-ship shaped like a winged dragon sailing the heavens, with shining\npeople collected on its decks; but in the twinkling of an eye the ship\nwas gone.\n\n\"Then Merlin and Bleys passed down into the cove by the seashore to\nwatch the billows, one after the other, as they lapped up against the\nbeach. And as they looked at last a great wave gathered up one-half of\nthe ocean and came full of voices, slowly rising and plunging, roaring\nall the while. Then all the wave was in a flame; and down in the wave\nand in the flame they saw lying a naked babe that was carried by the\nwater to Merlin's very feet.\n\n\"'The king!' cried Merlin. 'Here's an heir for Uther.'\n\n\"Then as old Merlin spoke the fringe of that terrible great flaming\nbreaker lashed at him as he held up the baby; it rose up round him in a\nmantle of fire so that he and the child were clothed in fire. Then\nsuddenly there was a calm, the stars looked out and the sky was open.\n\n\"'And this same child,' Bleys whispered to me, 'is the young king who\nreigns. And I could not die in peace unless the story had been told.'\nThen Bleys passed away into the land where nobody can question him.\n\n\"So I came to Merlin to ask him whether that was all true about the\nshining dragon-ship and the tiny bare baby floating down from heaven\nover on the glory of the seas; but Merlin just laughed, as he always\ndoes, and answered me in the riddles of the old song, this way:\n\n    \"'Rain, rain and sun! a rainbow in the sky!\n    A young man will be wiser by and by;\n    An old man's wit may wander ere he die.\n    Rain, rain and sun! a rainbow on the lea!\n    And truth is this to me and that to thee;\n    And truth or clothed or naked let it be.\n    Rain, sun and rain! and the free blossom blows;\n    Sun, rain and sun! and where is he who knows.\n    From the great deep to the great deep he goes!'\n\n\"It vexed me dreadfully to have Merlin be so tantalizing; but you must\nnot be afraid, king, to give your only child Guinevere to this King\nArthur. For great poets will sing of his brave deeds in long years after\nthis; and Merlin has said, and not joking, either, that even although\nArthur's enemies may wound him in battle he will never, never die, but\nwill only pass away for a time, for a little while, and then will come\nto us again. And Merlin says too, that sometime Arthur is going to\ntrample all the heathen kings under his feet until all the nations and\nall the men will call him their king.\"\n\nIt pleased Leodogran tremendously to hear what the Queen of Orkney told\nhim of Arthur, and when she had ended he lay thinking over it all, still\npuzzled as to whether he should say \"yes\" or \"no\" to the ambassadors\nwhom Arthur had sent. As he lay buried in his thoughts he grew very,\nvery drowsy and dreamy, and at last, he fell asleep. And while he slept\nhe saw a wonderful vision in a dream.\n\nThere was a strange, sloping land, rising before his eyes, that ascended\nhigher and higher, field after field, to a very great height and at the\ntop there was a lofty peak hidden in the heavy, hazy clouds; and on the\npeak a phantom king stood. One moment the king was there, and the next\nmoment he was gone, while everything below him was in a frightful\nconfusion, a battle with swords, and the flocks of sheep and cattle\nfalling back, and all the villages burning and their smoke rolling up in\nstreams to the clouded pinnacle of the peak where the king stood in the\nfog, hiding him the more. Now and then the king spoke out through the\nhaze, and some one here or there beneath would point upward toward him,\nbut the rest all went on fighting. They cried out, \"He is no king of\nours, no son of Uther's, no king of ours.\" Then in a twinkling the dream\nall changed; the mists had quite blown away, the solid earth below the\npeak had vanished like a bubble and only the wonderful king remained,\ncrowned with his diadems, standing in the heavens.\n\nThen Leodogran while still looking at him woke from his sleep. He called\nfor Ulfius and Brastias and Bedevere, and when they had come into this\npresence he told them that Arthur should marry the fair Princess\nGuinevere, and he sent them galloping back to Arthur's court.\n\nThat was a joyful day for King Arthur when the three knights delivered\nKing Leodogran's message. He made ready at once for his sweet queen. He\npicked out Lancelot, his favorite Knight of the Round Table, whom he\nloved better than any other man in all the world, to ride over into the\nLand of Cameliard and bring back Guinevere for his bride. And as\nLancelot mounted his dancing steed and rode away _Arthur watched him\nfrom the palace gates_, thinking of the lovely lady who would ride by\nhis side when he returned.\n\n[Illustration: LANCELOT MOUNTED HIS DANCING STEED.]\n\nLancelot's horse trampled away among the flowers; for it was April when\nhe left the court of Arthur, and just one month later he came riding\nback among the flowers of the May-time. Guinevere was with him on her\ngraceful palfrey.\n\nThen Dubric, the head of the whole church in Britain, went out to meet\nher. Happy Arthur was there too. They were married in the greatest and\nnoblest church in the land before the stately altar, with all the\nKnights of the Round Table dressed in stainless white clothes, gathered\nabout them. And all the knights were as delighted as they could be\nbecause their king was so glad. Holy Dubric spread out his hands above\nthe King and the lovely Queen to call down the blessings of heaven, and\nhe said:\n\n[Illustration: KING ARTHUR AND THE LOVELY QUEEN.]\n\n\"Reign, King, and live and love, and make the world better, and may your\nqueen be one with you, and may all the Knights of the Order of the Round\nTable fulfill the boundless purposes of their king.\"\n\nThere was spread a glorious marriage feast. Great lords came thither\nfrom far away Rome, which once was the mistress of all the world, but\nnow was slowly fading away. These Roman lords called for the tribute\nfrom Arthur that they had always received from Britain ever since Caesar\nwith his Roman legions had conquered it long years before.\n\nBut Arthur, the king and bridegroom, pointed to his snowy knights and\nsaid: \"These knights of mine have sworn to fight for me in all my wars\nand to worship me as their king. The old order of things has passed away\nand a new order will take its place. We are fighting for our fair father\nChrist, while you have been growing so feeble and so weak and so old\nthat you cannot even drive away the heathen from your Roman walls any\nmore. So we will not pay tribute to you nor be your slaves. This is to\nbe our own free country which we will defend and maintain.\"\n\n_The great lords from Rome drew back very angrily_ and went home and\ntold their king all about what Arthur had said. So Arthur had to battle\nwith Rome, but he won in the end.\n\nArthur trained his Knights of the Round Table so that they all felt like\none great, vast strong man, all of one will. Thus he became mightier\nthan any of the other kings in any part of Britain. And when he fought\nwith them he always conquered them. In that way he drew in all the\nlittle kingdoms under him, so that he was the one king of the land, and\nthey all fought together for him.\n\nThere were twelve great battles against the heathen hordes that had\nmolested them from across the terrible seas, and each of these battles\nhe won. So he made one great realm and he reigned over it, the king.\n\n[Illustration: THE GREAT LORDS FROM ROME DREW BACK.]\n\n\n\n\nGARETH AND LYNETTE.\n\n\nOld King Lot and good Queen Bellicent had three sons. Gawain and Modred\nwere Knights of the Round Table at Arthur's court, and young Gareth, who\nwas his mother's pet, sighed to think he had to stay home and be cuddled\nand fondled like a baby boy instead of riding off like a venturesome\nsoldier fighting gloriously for the king and winning a great name.\n\n\"There!\" he cried impatiently, one chilly spring day as he stood by the\nbrink of a rivulet and saw a bit of a pine tree caught from the bank by\nthe dashing, swollen waters of the stream and whirled madly away.\n\"That's the way the king's enemies would fall before my spear, if I had\na spear to use! That stream can do no more than I can, even although it\nis merely icy water all cold with the snows while I'm tingling with hot\nblood and have strong arms. When Gawain came home last summer and asked\nme to tilt with him and Modred was the judge, didn't I shake him so in\nhis saddle that he said I had half overcome him? Humph! and mother\nthinks I'm still a child!\"\n\n_Gareth went in to the queen_ and said: \"Mother, if you love me listen\nto a story I will tell. Once there was an egg which a great royal eagle\nlaid high above on the rocks somewhere almost out of sight and there was\na lad which saw the splendor sparkling from it, and the lightnings\nplaying around it and the little birds crying and clashing in the nest.\nThe boy thought if he could only reach that egg he would be richer than\na houseful of kings, and he was nearly driven from his sense with his\ndesire for it. But whenever he reached to clamber up for it some one who\nloved him restrained him saying, 'If you love me do not climb, lest\nyou break your neck.' So the boy did not climb, mother, and he did not\nbreak his neck, but he broke his heart pining for the glorious egg. How\ncan you keep me tethered here, Mother? Let me go!\"\n\n[Illustration: MOTHER, IF YOU LOVE ME LISTEN TO A STORY I WILL TELL.]\n\n\"Have you no pity for me?\" Queen Bellicent asked. \"Stay here by your\npoor old father and me; chase the deer in our fir trees and marry some\nlovely bride I will get for you. You're my best son and so young.\"\n\n\"Mother, a king once showed his son two brides and told him that he must\neither win the beautiful one, or, if he failed, wed the other. The\npretty one was Fame and the other was Shame. Why should I follow the\ndeer when I can follow the king? Why was I born a man if I cannot do a\nman's work?\"\n\n\"But some of the barons say he isn't the true king.\"\n\n\"Hasn't he conquered the Romans and driven off the heathen and made all\nthe people free? Who has a right to be king if not the man who has done\nthat? He is the true king.\"\n\nWhen Bellicent found that she could not turn Gareth from his purpose,\nshe said that if he was determined he must do one thing before he asked\nthe king to make him a knight.\n\n\"Anything,\" cried Gareth. \"Give me a hundred proofs. Only be quick.\"\n\nThe queen looked at him very slowly and said: \"You are a prince, Gareth,\nbut before you are fit to serve the king you must go into Arthur's court\ndisguised and hire yourself to serve his meats and drink among the\nscullions and kitchen knaves. And you must not tell your name to anyone\nand you must serve that way for a year and a day.\"\n\nThe queen made this condition, thinking that Gareth would be too proud\nto play the slave. But he thought a moment, then answered: \"A slave may\nbe free in his soul, and I can see the jousts there. You are my mother\nso I must obey you and I will be a scullion in King Arthur's kitchen and\nkeep my name a secret from everyone, even the king.\"\n\nSo Bellicent grieved and watched Gareth every moment wherever he went,\ndreading the time when he should leave. And he waited until one windy\nnight when she slept, then called two servants and slipped away with\nthem, all three dressed like poor peasants of the field.\n\nThey walked away towards the south and as they came to the plain\nstretching to the mountain of Camelot, they saw the royal city upon its\nbrow. Sometimes its spires and towers flashed in the sunlight; sometimes\nonly the great gate shone out before their eyes, or again the whole fair\ntown vanished away. Then the servants said:\n\n\"Let us go no further, Lord. It's an enchanted city, and all a vision.\nThe people say anyway, that Arthur isn't the true king, but only a\nchangeling from fairyland, and that Merlin won his battles for him with\nmagic.\"\n\nGareth laughed and replied that he had magic enough in his blood and\nhopes to plunge old Merlin into the Arabian sea. And he pushed them on\nto the gate. There was no other gate like it under heaven. The Lady of\nthe Lake stood barefooted on the keystone and held up the cornice. Drops\nof water fell from either hand and above were the three queens who were\nArthur's friends, and on each side Arthur's wars were pictured in weird\ndevices with dragons and elves so intertwined that they made men dizzy\nto look at them. The servants cried out, \"Lord, the gateway is alive!\"\nThen a blast of music pealed out of the city, and the three queens\nstepped aside while an old man with a long beard came out and asked:\n\n\"Who are you, my sons?\"\n\n\"We are peasants,\" answered Gareth, \"who have come to see the glories of\nyour king, but the city looked so strange through the morning mist that\nmy men are wondering whether it is not a fairy city or perhaps no city\nat all. So tell us the truth about it.\"\n\n\"Oh, it's a fairy city,\" the old man answered, \"and a fairy king and\nqueen came out of the mountain cleft at sunrise with harps in their\nhands and built it to music, which means it never was built at all, and\ntherefore built forever.\"\n\n\"Why do you mock me so?\" Gareth cried angrily.\n\n\"I am not mocking you so much as you are mocking me and every one who\nlooks at you, for you are not what you seem, still I know what you truly\nare.\"\n\nThen the old man turned away and Gareth said to his men: \"Our poor\nlittle white lie stands like a ghost at the very beginning of our\nenterprise. Blame my mother's love for it and not her nor me.\"\n\nSo they all laughed and came into the city of Camelot with its shadowy\nand stately palaces. Here and there a knight passed in or out, his arms\nclashing and the sound was good to Gareth's ears. Or out of a casement\nwindow glanced the pure eyes of lovely women. But Gareth made at once\nfor the hall of the king where his heart fairly hammered into his ears\nas he wondered whether Arthur would turn him aside because of the half\nshadow of a lie he had told the old man by the gate about being a\npeasant. There were many supplicants coming before the king to tell him\nof some hurt done them by marauders or the wild beasts, and each one was\ngiven a knight by the king to help them.\n\nWhen Gareth's turn came, he rested his arms, one on each servant, and\nstepped forward saying: \"A boon, Sir King! Do you see how weak I seem,\nleaning on these men? Pray let me go into your kitchen and serve there\nfor a year and a day, and do not ask me my name. After that I will fight\nfor you.\"\n\n\"You are a handsome youth,\" said the king, \"and worth something better\nfrom the king, but if that is what you wish, go and serve under the\nseneschal, Sir Kay, Master of the Meats and Drinks.\"\n\nSir Kay thought the boy had probably run away from the farm belonging to\nsome Abbey where he had not had enough to eat, and he promised that if\nGareth would work well he would feed him until he was as plump as a\npigeon.\n\nBut Lancelot, the king's favorite, said to Kay: \"You don't understand\nboys as well as dogs and cattle. Can't you see by this lad's broad fair\nforehead and fine hands that he is nobly born? Treat him well or he may\nshame you.\"\n\n\"Fair and fine, forsooth,\" cried Kay. \"If he had been a gentleman he\nwould have asked for a horse and armor.\"\n\nSo he hustled and harried Garreth, _set him to draw water_, _hew wood_\nand labor harder than any of the grimy and smudgy kitchen knaves. Gareth\ndid all with a noble sort of ease and graced the lowliest act, and when\nthe knaves all gathered together of an evening to tell stories about\nArthur on the battlefields or of Lancelot in the tournament, Gareth\nlistened delightedly or made them all, with gaping mouths, listen\ncharmed, to some prodigious tale of his own about wonderful knights\ncutting their scarlet way through twenty folds of twisted dragons. When\nthere was a Joust and Sir Kay let him attend it, he went half beside\nhimself in an ecstasy watching the warriors clash their springing\nspears, and the sniffing chargers reel.\n\nAt the end of the first month, lonely Queen Bellicent felt sorry for her\npoor, dear son, toiling and moiling among pots and pans, so she sent a\nservant to Camelot with the beaming armor of a knight and freed him from\nhis vow. Gareth colored redder than any young girl and went alone in to\nthe king and told him all.\n\n[Illustration: SET HIM TO DRAW WATER, HEW WOOD.]\n\n\"Make me your knight in secret,\" he begged Arthur, \"and give me the very\nnext quest from your court!\"\n\n\"Son,\" answered the king, \"my knights are sworn to vows of utter\nhardihood, of utter gentleness, of utter faithfulness in love and of\nutter obedience to the king.\"\n\nGareth sprang lightly from his knees: \"My king, I can promise you for my\nhardihood; respecting my obedience, ask Sir Kay, and as for love I have\nnot loved yet, but God willing some day I will, and faithfully.\"\n\nThe reply so pleased the great king, he laid his hand on Gareth's arm\nand smiled and knighted him.\n\nA few days later _a noble maiden_ with a brow like a May-blossom and a\nsaucy nose _passed into the king's hall with her page_ and told Arthur\nthat her name was Lynette, and that her beautiful sister, the Lady\nLyonors lived in the Castle Perilous which was beset with bandit\nknights.\n\n[Illustration: A NOBLE MAIDEN WITH HER PAGE.]\n\n\"A river courses about the castle in three loops,\" said she, \"each loop\nhas a bridge and every bridge is guarded by a wicked outlaw warrior, Sir\nMorning-star, Sir Noon-sun and Sir Evening-star, while a fourth called\nDeath, a huge man-beast of boundless savageries, is besieging my sister\nin her own castle so as to break her will and make her wed with him.\nThey are four fools,\" cried the maiden disdainfully, \"but they are\nmighty men so I have come to ask for Lancelot to ride away with me to\nhelp us.\"\n\nGareth was up in a twinkling with kindled eyes. \"A boon, Sir King, this\nquest,\" he cried. \"I am only a knave from your kitchen, but I can\ntopple over a hundred such fellows. Your promise, king.\"\n\n\"You are rough and sudden and worthy to be a knight. Therefore go,\" said\nArthur to the great amazement of the court.\n\n\"Fie on you, King!\" exclaimed Lynette in a fury. \"I asked you for your\nbest knight, Lancelot, and you give me a slave from your kitchen,\" and\nshe scampered down the aisle, leaped to her horse and flitted out of the\nweird white gate. \"A kitchen slave!\" she sputtered as she flew. \"Why\ndidn't the king send me a knight that fights for love and glory?\"\n\nGareth in the meantime had strode to the side doorway of the royal hall\nwhere he saw a war-horse awaiting him, the gift of Arthur and worth half\nthe price of a town. His two servants stood by with his shield and\nhelmet and spear. Dropping his coarse kitchen cloak to the floor, he\ninstantly harnessed himself in his armor, leaped to the back of his\nbeautiful steed and flashed out of the gateway while all his kitchen\nmates threw up their caps and cried, \"God bless the king and all his\nfellowship!\"\n\n\"Maiden, the quest is mine,\" he said to Lynette as he overtook her,\n\"Lead and I follow.\"\n\n\"Away with you!\" she cried, nipping her slender nose. \"You smell of\nkitchen grease. See there, your master is coming!\"\n\nIndeed she told the truth, for Sir Kay, infuriated with Gareth's\nboldness in the king's hall was hounding after them. \"Don't you know\nme?\" he shouted.\n\n\"Yes, too well,\" returned Gareth. \"I know you to be the most ungentle\nknight in Arthur's court.\"\n\n\"Have at me, then,\" cried Kay, whereupon Gareth pounced upon him with\nhis gleaming lance and struck him instantly to the earth, then turned\nfor Lynette and said again, \"Lead and I follow.\"\n\nBut Lynette had hurried her galloping palfrey away and would not stop\nthe beast until his heart had nearly burst with its violent throbbing.\nThen she turned and eyed Gareth as scornfully as ever. As he pranced to\nher side she observed:\n\n\"Do you suppose scullion, that I think any more of you now that by some\ngood luck you have overthrown your master. You dishwasher and\nwater-carrier, you smell of the kitchen quite as much as before.\"\n\n\"Maiden,\" Gareth rejoined gently, \"Say what you will, but whatever you\nsay, I will not leave this quest until it is ended or I have died for\nit.\"\n\n\"O, my, how the knave talks! But you'll soon meet with another knave\nwhom in spite of all the kitchen concoctions ever brewed, you'll not\ndare look in the face.\"\n\n\"I'll try him,\" answered Gareth with a smile that maddened Lynette. And\naway she darted again far into the strange avenues of the limitless\nwoods.\n\nGareth plunged on through the pine trees after her and a serving-man\ncame breaking through the black forest crying out, \"They've bound my\nmaster and are throwing him into the lake!\"\n\n\"Lead and I follow,\" cried Gareth to Lynette, and she led, plunging into\nthe pine trees until they came upon a hollow sinking away into a lake,\nwhere six tall men up to their thighs in reeds and bulrushes were\ndragging a seventh man with a stone about his neck toward the water to\ndrown him.\n\nGareth sprang upon three and stilled them with his doughty blows, but\nthree scurried away through the trees; then Gareth loosened the stone\nfrom the gentleman and set him on his feet. He proved to be a baron and\na friend of Arthur and asked Gareth what he could do to show his\ngratitude for the saving of his life. Gareth said he would like a\nnight's shelter for the lady who was with him. So they rode over toward\nthe graceful manor house where the baron lived, and as they rode he said\nto Gareth.\n\n\"I believe you are of the Table,\" meaning that Gareth was a Knight of\nthe Round Table.\n\n\"Yes, he is of the table after his own fashion,\" Lynette laughed, \"for\nhe serves in Arthur's kitchen.\" And turning toward Gareth she added, \"Do\nnot imagine that I admire you the more for having routed these miserable\ncowardly foresters; any thresher with his flail could have done that.\"\n\nAnd when they were seated at the baron's table, Gareth by Lynette's\nside, she cried out to their host, \"It seems dreadfully rude in you,\nLord Baron, to place this knave beside me. Listen to me: I went to King\nArthur's court to ask for Sir Lancelot to come to help my sister, and as\nI ended my plea, up bawls this kitchen boy: 'Mine's the quest.' And\nArthur goes mad and sends me this fellow who was made to kill pigs and\nnot redress the wrongs of women.\"\n\nSo Gareth was seated at another table and the baron came to him and\nasked him whether it might not be better for him to relinquish his\nquest, but the lad replied that the king had given it to him and he\nwould carry it through. The next morning he said again to proud Lynette,\n\"Lead and I follow.\"\n\nBut the maiden responded, \"We are almost at the place where one of the\nknaves is stationed. Don't you want to go home? He will slay you and\nthen I'll go back to Arthur and shame him for giving me a knight from\nhis kitchen cinders.\"\n\n\"Just let me fight,\" cried Gareth, \"and I'll have as good luck as little\nCinderella who married the prince.\"\n\nSo they came to the first coil of the river and on the other side saw a\nrich white pavilion with a purple dome and a slender crimson flag\nfluttering above. The lawless Sir Morning-star paced up and down\noutside.\n\n\"Damsel, is this the knight you've brought me?\" he shouted.\n\n\"Not a knight, but a knave. The king scorned you so he sent some one\nfrom his kitchen.\"\n\n\"Come Daughters of the Dawn and arm me!\" cried Sir Morning-star, and\nthree bare-footed, bare-headed maidens in pink and gold dresses brought\nhim a blue coat of mail and a blue shield.\n\n\"A kitchen knave in scorn of me!\" roared the blue knight. \"I won't fight\nhim. Go home, knave! It isn't proper for you to be riding abroad with a\nlady.\"\n\n\"Dog, you lie! I'm sprung from nobler lineage than you,\" and saying\nthis, Gareth sprang fiercely at his adversary who met him in the middle\nof the bridge. The two spears were hurled so harshly that both knights\nwere thrown from their horses like two stones but up they leaped\ninstantly. Gareth drew forth his sword and drove his enemy back down the\nbridge and laid him at his feet.\n\n\"I yield,\" Sir Morning-star cried, \"don't kill me.\"\n\n\"Your life is in the hands of this lady,\" Gareth replied. \"If she asks\nme to spare you I will.\"\n\n\"Scullion!\" Lynette cried, reddening with shame. \"Do you suppose I will\nask a favor of you?\"\n\n\"Then he dies,\" and Gareth was about to slay the wounded knight when\nLynette screamed and told him he ought not to think of killing a man of\nnobler birth than himself. So Gareth said, \"Knight, your life is spared\nat this lady's command. Go to King Arthur's court and tell him that his\nkitchen knave sent you, and crave his pardon for breaking his laws.\"\n\n\"I thought the smells of the odors of the kitchen grew fainter while you\nwere fighting on the bridge,\" Lynette remarked to Gareth as he took his\nplace behind her and told her to lead, \"but now they are as strong as\never.\"\n\nSo they rode on until they arrived at the second loop of the river where\nthe knight of the Noonday-Sun flared with his burning shield that blazed\nso violently that Gareth saw scarlet blots before his eyes as he turned\naway from it.\n\n\"Here's a kitchen knave from Arthur's hall who has overthrown your\nbrother,\" Lynette called across the river to him.\n\n\"Ugh!\" returned Sir Noonday-Sun, raising his visor to reveal his round\nfoolish face like a cipher, and with that he pushed his horse into the\nfoaming stream.\n\nGareth met him midway and struck him four blows of his sword. As he was\nabout to deal the fifth stroke the horse of the Noonday-Sun slipped and\nthe stream washed his dazzling master away. Gareth plucked him out of\nthe water and sent him back to King Arthur.\n\n\"Lead and I follow,\" he said to Lynette.\n\n\"Do not fancy,\" she rejoined, as she guided him toward the third passing\nof the river, \"that I thought you bold or brave when you overcame Sir\nNoonday-Sun; he just slipped on the river-bed. Here we are at the third\nfool in the allegory, Sir Evening-star. You see he looks naked but he is\nonly wrapped in hardened skins that fit him like his own. They will turn\nthe blade of your sword.\"\n\n\"Never mind,\" Gareth said, \"the wind may turn again and the kitchen\nodors grow faint.\"\n\nThen Lynette called to the Evening-star:\n\n\"Both of your brothers have gone down before this youth and so will you.\nAren't you old?\"\n\n\"Old with the strength of twenty boys,\" said Sir Evening-star.\n\n\"Old in boasting,\" Gareth cried, \"but the same strength that slew your\nbrothers can slay you.\"\n\nThen the Evening-star blew a deadly note upon his horn and a\nstorm-beaten, russet, grizzly old woman came out and armed him in a\nquantity of dingy weapons. The two knights clashed together on the\nbridge and Gareth brought the Evening-star groveling in a minute to his\nfeet on his knees. But the other vaulted up again so quickly that Gareth\npanted and half despaired of winning the victory.\n\nThen Lynette cried: \"Well done, knave; you are as noble as any knight.\nNow do not shame me; I said you would win. Strike! strike! and the wind\nwill change again.\"\n\nGareth struck harder, he hewed great pieces of armor from the old\nknight, but clashed in vain with his sword against the hard skin, until\nat last he lashed the Evening-star's sword and broke it at the hilt. \"I\nhave you now!\" he shouted, but the cowardly knight of the Evening-star\nwrithed his arms about the lad till Gareth was almost strangled. Yet\nstraining himself to the uttermost he finally _tossed his foe headlong\nover the side of the bridge_ to sink or to swim as the waves allowed.\n\n\"Lead and I follow,\" Gareth said to Lynette.\n\n\"No, it is lead no longer,\" the maiden replied. \"Ride beside me the\nknightliest of all kitchen knaves. Sir I am ashamed that I have treated\nyou so. Pardon me. I do wonder who you are, you knave.\"\n\n\"You are not to blame for anything,\" Gareth said, \"except for your\nmistrusting of the king when he sent you some one to defend you. You\nsaid what you thought and I answered by my actions.\"\n\nAt that moment he heard the hoofs of a horse clattering in the road\nbehind him. \"Stay!\" cried a knight with a veiled shield, \"I have come to\navenge my friend, Sir Kay.\"\n\nGareth turned, and in a thrice had closed in upon the stranger, but when\nhe felt the touch of the stranger knight's magical spear, which was the\nwonder of the world he fell to the earth. As he felt the grass in his\nhands he burst into laughter.\n\n[Illustration: TOSSED HIS FOE OVER THE SIDE OF THE BRIDGE.]\n\n\"Why do you laugh?\" asked Lynette.\n\n\"Because here am I, the son of old King Lot and good Queen Bellicent,\nthe victor of the three bridges, and a knight of Arthur's thrown by no\none knows whom.\"\n\n\"I have come to help you and not harm you,\" said the strange knight,\nrevealing himself. It was Lancelot, whom King Arthur had sent to keep a\nguardian eye upon young Gareth in this his first quest, to prevent him\nfrom being killed or taken away.\n\n\"And why did you refuse to come when I wanted you, and now come just in\ntime to shame my poor defender just when I was beginning to feel proud\nof him?\" asked Lynette.\n\n\"But he isn't shamed,\" Lancelot answered. \"What knight is not overthrown\nsometimes? By being defeated we learn to overcome, so hail Prince and\nKnight of our Round Table!\" \"You did well Gareth, only you and your\nhorse were a little weary.\"\n\n[Illustration: SHE TENDED HIM AS GENTLY AS A MOTHER.]\n\nLynette led them into a glen and a cave where they found pleasant drinks\nand meat, and where Gareth fell asleep.\n\n\"You have good reason to feel sleepy,\" cried Lynette. \"Sleep soundly and\nwake strong.\" _And she tended him as gently as a mother_, and watched\nover him carefully as he slept.\n\nWhen Gareth woke Lancelot gave him his own horse and shield to use in\nfighting the last awful outlaw, but as they drew near Lynette clutched\nat the shield and pleaded with him: \"Give it back to Lancelot,\" said\nshe. \"O curse my tongue that was reviling you so today. He must do the\nfighting now. You have done wonders, but you cannot do miracles. You\nhave thrown three men today and that is glory enough. You will get all\nmaimed and mangled if you go on now when you are tired. There, I vow you\nmust not try the fourth.\"\n\nBut Gareth told her that her sharp words during the day had just spurred\nhim on to do his best and he said he must not now leave his quest until\nhe had finished. So Lancelot advised him how best to manage his horse\nand his lance, his sword and his shield when meeting a foe that was\nstouter than himself, winning with fineness and skill where he lacked in\nstrength.\n\nBut Gareth replied that he knew but one rule in fighting and that was to\ndash against his foe and overcome him.\n\n\"Heaven help you,\" cried Lynette, and she made her palfrey halt.\n\"There!\" They were facing the camp of the Knight of Death.\n\nThere was a huge black pavilion, a black banner and a black horn. Gareth\nblew the horn and heard hollow tramplings to and fro and muffled voices.\nThen on a night-black horse, in night-black arms rode forth the dread\nwarrior. A white breast-bone showed in front. He spoke not a word which\nmade him the more fearful.\n\n\"Fool!\" shouted Gareth sturdily. \"People say that you have the strength\nof ten men; can't you trust to it without depending on these toggeries\nand tricks?\"\n\nBut the Knight of Death said nothing. Lady Lyonors at her castle window\nwept, and one of her maids fainted away, and Gareth felt his head\nprickling beneath his helmet and Lancelot felt his blood turning cold.\nEvery one stood aghast.\n\nThen the chargers bounded forward and Gareth struck Death to the ground.\nDrawing out his sword he split apart the vast skull; one half of it fell\nto the right and one half to the left. Then he was about to strike at\nthe helmet when out of it peeped the face of a blooming young boy, as\nfresh as a flower.\n\n\"O Knight!\" cried the laddie. \"Do not kill me. My three brothers made me\ndo it to make a horror all about the castle. They never dreamed that\nanyone could pass the bridges.\"\n\nThen Lady Lyonors with all her house had a great party of dancing and\nrevelry and song and making merry because the hideous Knight of Death\nthat had terrified them so was only a pretty little boy. And there was\nmirth over Gareth's victorious quest.\n\nAnd some people say that Gareth married Lynette, but others who tell the\nstory later say he wedded with Lyonors.\n\n\n\n\nTHE MARRIAGE OF GERAINT.\n\n\nKing Arthur had come to the old city of Caerleon on the River Usk to\nhold his court, and was sitting high in his royal hall when a woodman,\nall bedraggled with the mists of the forests came tripping up in haste\nbefore his throne.\n\n\"O noble King,\" he cried, \"today I saw a wonderful deer, a hart all\nmilky white running through among the trees, and, nothing like it has\never been seen here before.\"\n\nThe king, who loved the chase, was very pleased and immediately gave\norders that the royal horns should be blown for all the court to go a\nhunting after the beautiful white deer the following morning. Queen\nGuinevere wished to go with them to watch the hounds and huntsmen and\ndancing horses in the chase. She slept late, however, the next day with\nher pleasant dreams, and Arthur with his Knights of the Round Table had\nsped gloriously away on their snorting chargers when she arose, called\none of her maids to come with her, mounted her palfrey and forded the\nRiver Usk to pass over by the forest.\n\n[Illustration: A WOODMAN ALL BEDRAGGLED CAME IN HASTE BEFORE HIS\nTHRONE.]\n\nThere they climbed up on a little knoll and stood listening for the\nhounds, but instead of the barking of the king's dogs they heard the\nsound of a horse's hoofs trampling behind them. It was Prince Geraint's\ncharger as he flashed over the shallow ford of the river, then galloped\nup the banks of the knoll to her side. He carried not a single weapon\nexcept his golden-hilted sword and wore, not his hunting-dress, but gay\nholiday silks with a purple scarf about him swinging an apple of gold at\neither end and glancing like a dragon-fly. He bowed low to the sweet,\nstately queen.\n\n\"You're late, very late, Sir Prince,\" said she, \"later even than we.\"\n\n\"Yes, noble queen,\" replied Geraint, \"I'm so late that I'm not going to\nthe hunt; I've come like you just to watch it.\"\n\n\"Then stay with me,\" the queen said, \"for here on this little knoll, if\nanywhere, you will have a good chance to see the hounds, often they dash\nby at its very feet.\"\n\nSo Geraint stood by the queen, thinking he would catch particularly the\nbaying of Cavall, Arthur's loudest dog, which would tell him that the\nhunters were coming. As they waited however, along the base of the\nknoll, came a knight, a lady and a dwarf riding slowly by on their\nhorses. The knight wore his visor up showing his imperious and very\nhaughty young face. The dwarf lagged behind.\n\n\"That knight doesn't belong to the Round Table, does he?\" asked the\nqueen. \"I don't know him.\"\n\n\"No, nor I,\" replied Geraint.\n\nSo the queen sent her maid over to the dwarf to find out the name of his\nmaster. But the dwarf was old and crotchety and would not tell her.\n\n\"Then I'll ask your master himself,\" cried the maid.\n\n\"No, indeed, you shall not!\" cried the dwarf, \"you are not fit even to\nspeak of him,\" and as the girl turned her horse to approach the proud\nyoung knight, the misshapen little dwarf of a servant struck at her with\nhis whip, and she came scampering back indignantly to the queen.\n\n[Illustration: HE STRUCK OUT HIS WHIP AND CUT THE PRINCE'S CHEEK.]\n\n\"I'll learn his name for you,\" Geraint exclaimed, and he rode off\nsharply.\n\nBut the impudent dwarf answered just as before and when Prince Geraint\nmoved on toward his master he struck out his whip and cut the prince's\ncheek so that the blood streamed upon the purple scarf dyeing it red.\nInstantly Geraint reached for the hilt of his sword to strike down the\nvicious little midget but then remembering that he was a prince and\ndisdaining to fight with a dwarf, he did not even say a word, but\ncantered back to Queen Guinevere's side.\n\n\"Noble Queen,\" he cried fiercely. \"I am going to avenge this insult that\nhas been done you. I'll track these vermin to the earth. For even\nalthough I am riding unarmed just now, as we go along I will come to\nsome place where I can borrow weapons or hire them. And then when I have\nmy man I'll fight him, and on the third day from today I'll be back\nagain unless I die in the fight. So good-bye, farewell.\"\n\n\"Farewell, handsome prince,\" the queen answered. \"Good fortune in your\nquest and may you live to marry your first love whoever that may be. But\nwhether she will be a princess or a beggar from the hedgerows, before\nyou wed with her bring her back to me and I will robe her for her\nwedding day.\"\n\nPrince Geraint bowed and with that he was off. One minute he thought he\nheard the noble milk-white deer brought to bay by the dogs, the next he\nthought he heard the hunter's horn far away and felt a little vexed to\nthink he must be following this stupid dwarf while all the others were\nat the chase. But he had determined to avenge the queen and up and down\nthe grassy glades and valleys pursued the three enemies until at last at\nsundown they emerged from the forest, climbed up on the ridge of a hill\nwhere they looked like shadows against the dark sky, then sank again on\nthe other side.\n\nBelow on the other side of the ridge ran the long street of a clamoring\nlittle town in a long valley, on one side a new white fortress and on\nthe other, across a ravine and a bridge, a fallen old castle in decay.\nThe knight, the lady and the dwarf rode on to the white fortress, then\nvanished within its walls.\n\n\"There!\" cried Geraint, \"now I have him! I have tracked him to his hole,\nand tomorrow when I'm rested I'll fight him.\"\n\nThen he turned wearily down the long street of the noisy village to look\nfor his night's lodging, but he found every inn and tavern crowded, and\neverywhere horses in the stables were being shod and young fellows were\nbusy burnishing their master's armor.\n\n\"What does all this hubbub mean?\" asked Geraint of one of these youths.\n\nThe lad did not stop his work one instant, but went on scouring and\nreplied, \"It's the sparrow-hawk.\"\n\nAs Prince Geraint did not know what was meant by the sparrow-hawk he\ntrotted a little farther along the street until he came to a quiet old\nman trudging by with a sack of corn on his back.\n\n\"Why is your town so noisy and busy to-night, good old fellow?\" he\ncried.\n\n\"Ugh! the sparrow-hawk!\" the old fellow said gruffly.\n\nSo the prince rode his horse yet a little farther until he saw an\narmor-maker's shop. The armor-maker sat inside with his back turned, all\ndoubled over a helmet which he was riveting together upon his knee.\n\n\"Armorer,\" cried Geraint, \"what is going on? Why is there such a din?\"\n\nThe man did not pause in his riveting even to turn about and face the\nstranger, but said quickly as if to finish speaking as rapidly as he\ncould, \"Friend, the people who are working for the sparrow-hawk have no\ntime for idle questions.\"\n\nAt this Geraint flashed up angrily.\n\n\"A fig for your sparrow-hawk! I wish all the bits of birds of the air\nwould peck him dead. You imagine that this little cackle in your baby\ntown is all the noise and murmur of the great world. What do I care\nabout it? It is nothing to me. Listen to me, now, if you are not gone\nhawk-mad like the rest, where can I get a lodging for the night, and\nmore than that, where can I get some arms, arms, arms, to fight my\nenemy? Tell me.\"\n\nThe hurrying armor-maker looked about in amazement to see this gorgeous\ncavalier in purple silks standing before his bit of a shop.\n\n\"O pardon me, stranger knight,\" said he very politely. \"We are holding a\ngreat tournament here tomorrow morning and there is hardly any time to\ndo one-half the work that has to be finished before then. Arms, did you\nsay? Indeed I cannot tell you where to get any; all that there are in\nthis town are needed for to-morrow in the lists. And as for lodging, I\ndon't know unless perhaps at Earl Yniol's in the old castle across the\nbridge.\" Then he again picked up his helmet and turned his back to the\nprince.\n\nSo Geraint, still a wee mite vexed, rode over the bridge that spanned\nthe ravine, to go to the ruined castle. There upon the farther side sat\nthe hoary-headed Earl Yniol, dressed in some magnificent shabby old\nclothes which had been fit for a king's parties when they were new.\n\n\"Where are you going, son?\" he queried of Geraint, waking from his\nreveries and dreaminess.\n\n\"O friend, I'm looking for some shelter for the night,\" Geraint replied.\n\n\"Come in then,\" Yniol said, \"and accept of my hospitality. Our house was\nrich once and now it is poor, but it always keeps its door open to the\nstranger.\"\n\n\"Oh, anything will do for me,\" cried Geraint. \"If only you won't serve\nme sparrow-hawks for my supper I'll eat with all the passion of a whole\nday's fast.\"\n\nThe old earl smiled and sighed as he rejoined, \"I have more serious\nreason than you to curse this sparrow-hawk. But go in and we will not\nhave a word about him even jokingly unless you wish it.\"\n\nWhereupon Geraint passed into the desolate castle court, where the\nstones of the pavement were all broken and overgrown with wild plants,\nand the turrets and walls were shattered. As he stood awaiting the Earl\nYniol, the voice of a young girl singing like a nightingale rang out\nfrom one of the open castle windows.\n\nIt was the voice of Enid, Earl Yniol's daughter as she sang the song of\nFortune and her Wheel:\n\n    \"Turn, Fortune, thy wheel with smile or frown,\n    With that wild wheel we go not up or down;\n    Our hoard is little, but our hearts are great.\"\n\n\"The song of that little bird describes the nest she lives in,\" cried\nEarl Yniol approaching. \"Enter.\"\n\nGeraint alighted from his charger and stepped within the large dusky\ncobwebbed hall, where an aged lady sat, with Enid moving about her, like\na little flower in a wilted sheath of a faded silk gown.\n\n\"Enid, the good knight's horse is standing in the court,\" cried the\nearl. \"Take him to the stall and give him some corn, then go to town and\nbuy us some meat and wine.\"\n\n[Illustration: GERAINT STEPPED WITHIN THE DUSKY COBWEBBED HALL.]\n\nGeraint wished that he might do this servant's work instead of this\npretty young lady, but as he started to follow her the old gray earl\nstopped him.\n\n\"We're old and poor,\" he said, \"but not so poor and old as to let our\nguests wait upon themselves.\"\n\nSo Enid fetched the wine and the meat and the cakes and the bread; and\nshe served at the table while her mother, father and Geraint sat around.\nGeraint wished that he might stoop to kiss her tender little thumb as it\nheld the platter when she laid it down.\n\n[Illustration: ENID FETCHED THE WINE AND THE MEAT AND THE CAKES.]\n\n\"Fair host and Earl,\" he said after his refreshing supper, \"who is this\nsparrow-hawk that everybody in the town is talking about? And yet I do\nnot wish you to give me his name, for perhaps he is the knight I saw\nriding into the new fortress the other side of the bridge at the other\nend of the town. His name I am going to have from his own lips, for I\nam Geraint of Devon. This morning when the queen sent her maid to find\nout his name he struck at the girl with his whip, and I've sworn\nvengeance for such a great insult done our queen, and have followed him\nto his hold, and as soon as I can get arms I will fight him.\"\n\n\"And are you the renowned Geraint?\" cried Earl Yniol beaming. \"Well, as\nsoon as I saw you coming toward me on the bridge I knew that you were no\nordinary man. By the state and presence of your bearing I might have\nguessed you to be one of Arthur's Knights of the Round Table at Camelot.\nPray do not suppose that I am flattering you foolishly. This dear child\nof mine has often heard me telling glorious stories of all the famous\nthings you have done for the king and the people. And she has asked me\nto repeat them again and again.\n\n\"Poor thing, there never has lived a woman with such miserable lovers as\nshe has had. The first was Limours, who did nothing but drink and brawl,\neven when he was making love to her. And the second was the\n'sparrow-hawk,' my nephew, my curse. I will not let his name slip from\nme if I can help it. When I told him that he could not marry my daughter\nhe spread a false rumour all round here among the people that his father\nhad left him a great sum of money in my keeping and that I had never\npassed it over to him but had retained it for myself. He bribed all my\nservants with large promises and stirred up this whole little old town\nof mine against me, my own town. That was the night of Enid's birthday\nnearly three years ago. They sacked my house, ousted me from my earldom,\nthrew us into this dilapidated, dingy old place and built up that grand\nnew white fort. He would kill me if he did not despise me too much to\ndo so; and sometimes I believe I despise myself for letting him have his\nway. I scarcely know whether I am very wise or very silly, very manly or\nvery base to suffer it all so patiently.\"\n\n\"Well said,\" cried Geraint eagerly. \"But the arms, the arms, where can I\nget arms for myself? Then if the sparrow-hawk will fight tomorrow in the\ntourney I may be able to bring down his terrible pride a little.\"\n\n\"I have arms,\" said Yniol, \"although they are old and rusty, Prince\nGeraint, and you would be welcome to have them for the asking. But in\nthis tournament of tomorrow no knight is allowed to tilt unless the lady\nhe loves best come there too. The forks are fastened into the meadow\nground and over them is placed a silver wand, above that a golden\nsparrow-hawk, the prize of beauty for the fairest woman there. And\nwhoever wins in the tourney presents this to the lady-love whom he has\nbrought with him. Since my nephew is a man of very large bone and is\nclever with his lance he has always won it for his lady. That is how he\nhas earned his title of sparrow-hawk. But you have no lady so you will\nnot be able to fight.\"\n\nThen Geraint leaned forward toward the earl.\n\n\"With your leave, noble Earl Yniol,\" he replied, \"I will do battle for\nyour daughter. For although I have seen all the beauties of the day\nnever have I come upon anything so wonderfully lovely as she. If it\nshould happen that I prove victor, as true as heaven, I will make her my\nwife!\"\n\nYniol's heart danced in his bosom for joy, and he turned about for Enid,\nbut she had fluttered away as soon as her name had been mentioned, so\nhe tenderly grasped the hands of her mother in his own and said:\n\n\"Mother, young girls are shy little things and best understood by their\nown mothers. Before you go to rest to night, find out what Enid will\nthink about this.\"\n\nSo the earl's wife passed out to speak with Enid, and Enid became so\nglad and excited that she could not sleep the entire happy night long.\nBut very early the next morning, as soon as the pale sky began to redden\nwith the sun she arose, then called her mother, and hand in hand,\ntripped over with her to the place of the tournament. There they awaited\nfor Yniol and Geraint. Geraint came wearing the Earl's rusty, worn old\narms, yet in spite of them looked stately and princely.\n\nMany other knights in blazing armor gathered there for the jousts, with\nmany fine ladies, and by and by the whole town full of people flooded\nin, settling in a circle around the lists. Then the two forks were fixed\ninto the earth, above them a wand of silver was laid, and over it the\ngolden sparrow-hawk. The trumpet was blown and Yniol's nephew rose and\nspoke:\n\n\"Come forward, my lady,\" he cried to the maiden who had come with him.\n\"Fairest of the fair, take the prize of beauty which I have won for you\nduring the past two years.\"\n\n\"Stay!\" Prince Geraint cried loudly. \"There is a worthier beauty here.\"\n\nThe earl's nephew looked round with surprise and disdain to see his\nuncle's family and the prince.\n\n\"Do battle for it then,\" he shouted angrily.\n\nGeraint sprang forward and the tourney was begun. Three times the two\nwarriors clashed together. _Three times they broke their spears._ Then\nboth were thrown from their horses. They now drew their swords; and\nwith them lashed at one another so frequently and with such dreadfully\nhard strokes that all the crowd wondered. Now and again from the distant\nwalls came the sounds of applause, like the clapping of phantom hands.\nThe perspiration and the blood flowed together down the strong bodies of\nthe combatants. Each was as sturdy as the other.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\"Remember the great insult done our queen!\" Earl Yniol cried at last.\n\nThis so inflamed Geraint that he heaved his vast sword-blade aloft,\ncracked through his enemy's helmet, bit into the bone of his head,\nfelled the haughty knight, and set his feet upon his breast.\n\n\"Your name!\" demanded Geraint.\n\n\"Edryn, the son of Nudd,\" groaned the fallen warrior.\n\n\"Very well, then Edryn, the son of Nudd,\" returned Geraint, \"you must do\nthese two things or else you will have to die. First, you with your lady\nand your dwarf must ride to Arthur's court at Caerleon and crave their\npardon for the insult you did the queen yesterday morning, and you must\nbide her decree in the punishment she awards you. Secondly, you must\ngive back the earldom to your uncle the Earl of Yniol. You will do these\ntwo things or you die.\"\n\n\"I will do them,\" cried Edryn. \"For never before was I ever overcome.\nBut now all of my pride is broken down, for Enid has seen me fall.\"\n\nWith that Edryn rose from the ground like a man, took his lady and the\ndwarf on their horses to Arthur's court. There receiving the sweet\nforgiveness of the queen, he became a true knight of the Round Table,\nand at the last died in battle while he fought for his king.\n\nBut Geraint when the tourney was over and he had come back to the\ncastle, drew Enid aside to tell her that early the next morning he would\nhave to start for Caerleon and that she should be ready to ride away\nwith him to be married at the court with tremendous pomp. For that would\nbe three days after the King's chase, when the prince had promised Queen\nGuinevere he would be back. But of that he did not speak to Enid, who\nwondered why he was so bent on returning immediately, and why she could\nnot have time at home to prepare herself some pretty robes to wear.\n\nImagine, she thought, such a grand and frightful thing as a court, the\nqueen's court, with all the graceful ladies staring at her in that faded\nold silk dress! And although she promised Geraint that she would go as\nhe wished, when she woke to the dread day for making her appearance at\ncourt, she still yearned that he would only stay yet a little while so\nthat she could sew herself some clothes, that she had the flowered silk\nwhich her mother had given her three years ago for her birthday and\nwhich Edryn's men had robbed from her when they sacked the house and\nscattered everything she ever owned to all the winds. How she wished\nthat handsome Geraint had known her then, those three years ago when she\nwore so many pretty dresses and jewels!\n\nBut while she lay dreamily thinking, softly in trod her mother bearing\non her arm a gorgeous, delicate robe.\n\n\"Do you recognize it, child?\" she cried.\n\nIt was that self-same birthday dress, three years old, but as beautiful\nas new and never worn.\n\n\"Yesterday after the jousts your father went through all the town from\nhouse to house and ordered that all sack and plunder which the men had\ntaken from us should be brought back, for he was again to be in his\nearldom. So last evening while you were talking with the prince some one\ncame up from the town and placed this in my hands. I did not tell you\nabout it then for I wished to keep it as a sweet surprise for you this\nmorning. And it is a sweet surprise, isn't it? For although the prince\nyesterday did say that you were the fairest of the fair there is no\nhandsome girl in the world but looks handsomer in new clothes than in\nold. And it would have been a shame for you to go to the court in your\npoor old faded silk which you have worn so long and so patiently. The\ngreat ladies there might say that Prince Geraint had plucked up some\nragged robin from the hedges.\"\n\n[Illustration: BEARING A GORGEOUS ROBE.]\n\nSo Enid was put into the fine flowered robe.\n\nHer mother said that after she had gone to the queen's court, she, the\npoor old mother at home, who was too feeble to journey so far with her\ndaughter, would think over and over again of her pretty princess at\nCamelot. And the old gray Earl Yniol went in to tell Geraint of Enid's\nfanciful apparel.\n\nBut Geraint was not delighted with the magnificence.\n\n\"Say to her,\" he answered the earl, \"that by all my love for her,\nalthough I give her no other reason, I entreat Enid to wear that faded\nold silk dress of hers and no other.\"\n\nThis amazing and hard message from Geraint made poor little Enid's face\nfall like a meadowful of corn blasted by a rainstorm. Still she\nwillingly laid aside her gold finery for his sake, slipped into the\nfaded silk, and pattered down the steps to meet Geraint. He scanned her\nso eagerly from her tip to her toe that both her rosy cheeks burned like\nflames. Then as he noted her mother's clouded face he said very kindly:\n\n\"My new mother don't be very angry, or grieved with your new son because\nof what I have just asked Enid to do. I had a very good reason for it\nand I will explain it all to you. The other day when I left the queen at\nCaerleon to avenge the insult done her by Edryn, the son of Nudd, she\nmade me two wishes. The one was that I should be successful with my\nquest and the other was that I should wed with my first love. Then she\npromised that whoever my bride should be she herself with her own royal\nhands would dress her for her wedding day, splendidly, like the very sun\nin the skies. So when I found this lovely Enid of yours in her shabby\nclothes I vowed that the queen's hands only should array her in handsome\nnew robes that befitted her grace and beauty. But never mind, dear\nmother, some day you will come to see Enid and then she will wear the\ngolden, flowered birthday dress which you gave her three years ago.\"\n\nThen the earl's wife smiled through her tears, wrapped Enid in a mantle,\nkissed her gentle farewells, and in a moment saw her riding far, far\naway beside Geraint.\n\nThe queen Guinevere that day had three times climbed the royal tower at\nCaerleon to look far into the valley for some sign of Geraint, who had\npromised to be back that day, if he did not fall in battle, and who\nwould certainly come now, since Edryn had been vanquished and had come\nto the court. At last when evening had fallen she spied the prince's\ncharger pacing nobly along the road, and Enid's palfrey at his side.\nInstantly Queen Guinevere sped down from the small window in the high\nturret, tripped out to the gate to greet him and embrace the lovely Enid\nas a long-loved friend.\n\nThe old City of Caerleon was gay for one whole week, over the wedding\nweek of Geraint and Enid. The queen herself dressed Enid for her\nmarriage like the very sunlight, Dubric, the highest saint of the\nchurch, married them, and they lived for nearly a year at the court with\nArthur and sweet Guinevere.\n\nAnd so the insult done the queen was avenged, and her two wishes were\nfulfilled. For Geraint overcame his enemy and wedded with his\nfirst-love, dressed for her marriage by the queen.\n\n\n\n\nGERAINT'S QUEST OF HONOR.\n\n\nOne morning Prince Geraint went into Arthur's hall and said:\n\n\"O King, my princedom is in danger. It lies close to the territory which\nis infested with bandits, earls and caitiff knights, assassins and all\nsorts of outlaws. Give me your kind good leave and I will go there to\ndefend my lands.\"\n\nThe king said the prince might go, and sent fifty armed knights to\nprotect him and pretty Enid as they traveled away on their horses across\nthe Severn River into their own country, the Land of Devon.\n\nAfter Geraint had come into Devon he forgot what he had said to the king\nof ridding his princedom of outlawry, he forgot the chase where he had\nalways been so clever in tracking his game, forgot the tournament where\nhe had won victory after victory, forgot all his former glory and his\nname, forgot his lands and their cares, forgot everything he ever did,\nand did nothing at all but lie about at home and talk with Enid. At last\nall his people began to gossip about their fine prince who once had been\nillustrious everywhere and now had become an idle stay-at-home who spent\nhis time in making love to his wife.\n\n[Illustration: ENID HEARD OF GERAINT FROM HER HAIR-DRESSER.]\n\nEnid heard of the tattling about Geraint from her hair-dresser, and one\nmorning as he lay abed, she went over it all to herself, talking aloud.\nShe wished, that he would not abandon all his knightly pursuits but\nwould hunt and fight again and add to his lustre. She felt very bashful\nabout mentioning the matter to him as she was very shy by nature and\nlived in a time when wives were altogether over-ruled by their husbands,\nyet to say nothing she thought would not be showing herself a true wife\nto Geraint. All this and more Enid went over to herself.\n\nThe drowsy prince, half awake, just half heard her and quite\nmisunderstood her meaning. When she said that in keeping quiet about the\ngossip she was not a true wife to him he supposed she meant that she no\nlonger cared for him, that he was not a handsome and strong enough man\nto suit her. This grieved him deeply and made him very angry with her,\nfor Geraint had really given up all the glory of the king's court just\nto be alone with Enid, although no one knew it. And the thought that now\nshe looked down upon him infuriated all his heart. A word would have\nmade everything right but he didn't say it.\n\nSpringing up quickly from his bed he roused his squire and said, \"Get\nready our horses, my charger and the princess' palfrey. And you,\"\nturning a frowning face to the princess, \"put on the worst looking,\nmeanest, poorest dress you have and come away with me. We are going on a\nquest of honor and then you will see what sort of soldier I am.\"\n\nEnid wondered why her lord was so vexed with her and replied, \"If I have\ndispleased you surely you will tell me why.\"\n\nBut Geraint would not say; he could not bear to speak of it. So Enid\nhurried after her poor old faded silk gown with the summer flowers among\nits folds, which she had worn to ride from her old home to Caerleon, and\nhastily dressed.\n\n\"Do not ride at my side,\" Geraint said as they both mounted their horses\nto start away. \"Ride ahead of me, a good way ahead of me, and no matter\nwhat may happen, do not speak a word to me, no not a word.\"\n\nEnid listened, wondering what had come over her lord.\n\n\"There!\" he cried as they were off, \"we will make our way along with our\niron weapons, not with gold money.\" So saying, he loosed the great purse\nwhich dangled from his belt and tossed it back to his squire who stood\non the marble threshold of the doorway where the golden coins flashed\nand clattered as they scattered every which-way over the floor. \"Now\nthen, Enid, to the wild woods!\"\n\nAt that they made for the swampy, desolated forest lands that were\nfamous for their perilous paths and their bandits, Enid with a white\nface going before, Geraint coming gloomily nearly a quarter of a mile\nafter.\n\nThe morning was only half begun when the white princess became aware\nthat behind a rock hiding in the shadow stood three tall knights on\nhorseback, armed from tip to toe, bandit outlaws lying in wait to fall\nupon whoever should pass. She heard one saying to his comrades as he\npointed toward Geraint:\n\n\"Look here comes some lazy-bones who seems just about as bold as a dog\nwho has had the worst of it in a fight. Come, we will kill him, and then\nwe will take his horse and armor and his lady.\"\n\nEnid thought, \"I'll go back a little way to Geraint and tell him about\nthese ruffians, for even if it will madden him I should rather have him\nkill me than to have him fall into their hands.\"\n\nShe guided her palfrey backward and bravely met the frowning face which\ngreeted her, saying timidly:\n\n\"My lord, there are three bandit knights behind a rock a little way\nbeyond us who are boasting that they will slay you and steal your horse\nand armor and make me their captive.\"\n\n\"Did I tell you,\" cried Geraint angrily, \"that you should warn me of any\ndanger. There was only one thing which I told you to do and that was to\nkeep quiet; and this is the way you have heeded me! a pretty way! But\nwin or lose, you shall see by these fellows that my vigor is not lost.\"\n\nThen Enid stood back as the three outlaws flashed out of their ambush\nand bore down upon the prince.\n\nGeraint aimed first for the middle one, driving his long spear into the\nbandit's breast and out on the other side. The two others in the\nmeanwhile had dashed upon him with their lances, but they had broken on\nhis magnificent armor like so many icicles. He now turned upon them with\nhis broadsword, swinging it first to the right and then to the left,\nfirst stunning them with his blows, then slaying them outright. And when\nall three had fallen he dismounted, and like a hunter skinning the wild\nbeasts he has shot, he stripped the three robber knights of their gay\nsuits of armor, and leaving the bodies lie, bound each man's sword,\nspear and coat of arms to his horse, tied the three bridle reins of the\nthree empty horses together and cried to Enid.\n\n\"Drive these on before you.\"\n\nEnid drove them on across the wastelands, Geraint following after. As\nshe passed into the first shallow shade of the forest she described\nthree more horsemen partly hidden in the gloom of three sturdy\noak-trees. All were armed and one was a veritable giant, so tall and\nbulky, towering above his companions.\n\n[Illustration: THE THREE OUTLAWS BORE DOWN UPON THE PRINCE.]\n\n\"See there, a prize!\" bellowed the giant and set Enid's pulses in a\nquiver. \"Three horses and three suits of armor, and all in charge\nof--whom? A girl! Isn't that simple? Lay on, my men!\"\n\n\"No,\" cried the second, \"behind is coming a knight. A coward and a fool,\nfor see how he hangs his head.\"\n\nThe giant thundered back gaily.\n\n\"Yes? Only one? Wait here and as he goes by make for him.\"\n\n\"I will go no farther until Geraint comes,\" Enid said to herself\nstopping her horse. \"And then I will tell him about these villains. He\nmust be so weary with his other fight and they will fall upon him\nunawares. I shall have to disobey him again for his own sake. How could\nI dare to obey him and let him be harmed? I must speak; if he kills me\nfor it I shall only have lost my own life to save a life that is dearer\nto me than my own.\"\n\nSo she waited until the prince approached when she said with a timid\nfirmness, \"Have I your leave to speak?\"\n\n\"You take it without asking when you speak,\" he replied, and she\ncontinued:\n\n\"There are three men lurking in the woods behind some oaks and one of\nthem is larger than you, a perfect giant. He told them to attack you as\nyou passed by them.\"\n\n\"If there were a hundred men in the wood and each of them a giant and if\nthey all made for me together I vow it would not anger me so as to have\nyou disobey me. Stand aside while we do battle and when we are done\nstand by the victor.\"\n\nAt this, while Enid fell back breathing short fits of prayer but not\ndaring to watch, Geraint proceeded to meet his assailants. The giant was\nthe first to dash out for him aiming his lance at Geraint's helmet, but\nthe lance missed and went to one side. Geraint's spear had been a\nlittle strained with his first encounter, but it struck through the\nbulky giant's corselet and pierced his breast, then broke, one-half of\nit still fast in the flesh as the giant knight fell to the earth. The\nother two bandits now felt that their support and hero was gone, and\nwhen Geraint darted rapidly on them, uttering his terrible warcry as if\nthere were a thousand men behind him to come to his aid, they flew into\nthe woods. But they were soon overtaken and pitilessly put to death.\nThen Geraint, selecting the best lance, the brightest and strongest\namong their spears to replace the one he had broken on the giant, he\nplucked off the gaudy armor from each brigand's body, laid it on the\nbacks of the three horses, tied the bridle reins together and handed\nthem to Enid with the words, \"Drive them on before you.\"\n\nSo Enid now followed the wild paths of the gloomy forest with two sets\nof three horses, each horse laden with his master's jingling weapons and\ncoat of mail. Geraint came after. As they passed out of the wood into\nthe open sky they came to a little town with towers upon a rocky hill,\nand beneath it a wide meadowland with mowers in it, mowing the hay. Down\na stony pathway from the town skipped a fair-haired lad carrying a\nbasket of lunch for the laborers in the field.\n\n\"Friend!\" cried Geraint, as the lad trotted past him, for he saw that\nEnid looked very white, \"let my lady have something to eat. She is so\nfaint.\"\n\n\"Willingly,\" the youth answered, \"and you too, my lord, even although\nthis feed is very coarse and only fit for the mowers.\"\n\nHe set down his basket and Enid and Geraint alighted and put all the\nhorses to graze, while they sat down on the green sward to have some\nbread and barley. Enid felt too faint at heart, thinking of the\nprince's strange conduct, to care a great deal for food, but Geraint was\nhungry enough and had all the mowers' basket emptied almost before he\nknew it.\n\n\"Boy,\" he cried half-ashamed, \"everything is gone, which is a disgrace.\nBut take one of my horses and his arms by way of payment, choose the\nvery best.\"\n\nThe poor lad, who might as well have had a kingdom given him, reddened\nwith his extreme surprise and delight.\n\n\"My lord, you are over-paying me fifty times,\" he cried.\n\n\"You will be all the wealthier then,\" returned the prince, gaily.\n\n\"I'll take it as free gift, then,\" the lad answered. \"The food is not\nworth much. While your lady is resting here I can easily go back and\nfetch more, some more for the earl's mowers. For all these mowers belong\nto our great earl, and all these fields are his, and I am his, too. I'll\ntell him what a fine man you are, and he will have you to his palace and\nserve you with costly dinners.\"\n\n\"I wish no better fare than I have had,\" Geraint said, \"I never ate\nbetter in my life than just now when I left your poor mowers dinnerless.\nAnd I will go into no earl's palace. If he desires to see me, let him\ncome to me. Now you go hire us some pleasant room in the town, stall our\nhorses and when you return with the food for these men tell us about\nit.\"\n\n\"Yes, my kind lord,\" the glad youth cried, and he held his head high and\nthought he was a gorgeous knight off to the wars as he disappeared up\nthe rocky path leading his handsome horse.\n\nThe prince turned himself sleepily to watch the lusty mowers laboring\nunder the sun as it blazed on their scythes, while Enid plucked the long\ngrass by the meadows' edge to weave it round and round her wedding\nring, until the boy returned and showed them the room he had got in the\ntown.\n\n\"If you wish anything, call the woman of the house,\" Prince Geraint said\nto Enid as the door closed behind them. \"Do not speak to me.\"\n\n\"Yes, my lord,\" returned Enid, still marvelling at his cold ways.\n\nSilently they sat down, she at one end, he at the other, as quiet as\npictures. But suddenly a mass of voices sounded up the street, and heel\nafter heel echoing upon the pavement. In a twinkling the door to their\nroom was pushed back to the wall while a mob of boisterous young\ngentlemen tumbled in led by the Earl of Limours, the wild lord of the\ntown, and Enid's old suitor whom her father had rejected long ago, a man\nas beautiful as a woman and very graceful. He seized the prince's hand\nwarmly, welcomed him to the town and stealthily, out of the corner of\nhis eye, caught a glimpse of unhappy Enid nestled all alone at the\nfarther end of the room.\n\nThe prince immediately sent for every sort of delicious things to eat\nand drink from the town, told the earl, to bid all his friends for a\nfeast and soon was gaily making merry with the men, drinking, laughing,\njoking.\n\n\"May I have your leave, my lord,\" cried Earl Limours, \"to cross the room\nand speak a word with your lady who seems so lonely?\"\n\n\"My free leave,\" cried the merry Prince Geraint, who did not know the\nearl, \"Get her to speak with you; she has nothing to say to me.\"\n\nAs Limours stepped to Enid's side he lifted his eyes adoringly, bowed at\nher side and said in a whisper:\n\n\"Enid, you pilot star of my life, I see that Geraint is very unkind to\nyou and loves you no longer. What a laughing stock he is making of you\nwith that wretched old dress you have on! But I, I love you still as\nalways. Just say the word and I will have him put into the keep and you\nwill come with me. I will be kind to you forever.\"\n\nThe tears fluttered into the earl's eyes as he spoke.\n\n\"Earl,\" replied Enid, \"if you love me as you used to do in the years\nlong ago, and are not joking now, come in the morning and take me by\nforce from the prince. But leave me tonight. I am wearied to death.\"\n\nSo the earl made a low bow, brandishing his plumes until they brushed\nhis very insteps, while the stout prince bade him a loud good night, and\nhe moved away talking to his men.\n\n[Illustration: THE EARL MADE A LOW BOW.]\n\nBut as soon as he was gone Enid began to plan how she could escape with\nGeraint before Earl Limours should come after her in the morning. She\nwas too afraid of Geraint to speak with him about it, but when he had\nfallen asleep she stepped lightly about the room and gathered the pieces\nof his armor together in one place ready for an early departure on the\nmorrow. Then she dropped off into slumber. But suddenly she heard a loud\nsound, the earl with his wild following blowing his trumpet to call her\nto come out, she thought. But it was only the great red cock in the\nyard below crowing at the daylight which had begun to glimmer now across\nthe heap of Geraint's armor. She rose immediately in her fright to see\nthat all was well, went over to examine the weapons and unwittingly let\nthe casque fall jangling to the floor. This woke Geraint, who started up\nand stared at her.\n\n\"My lord,\" began Enid, and then she told him all that Earl Limours had\nsaid to her and how she had put him off by telling him to come this\nmorning.\n\n\"Call the woman of the house and tell her to bring the charger and the\npalfrey,\" Geraint cried angrily. \"Your sweet face makes fools of good\nfellows.\" Geraint loved Enid still and he was in as great perplexity as\nshe, for after misunderstanding what she had said he no more knew\nwhether she cared for him truly than she knew what was troubling him and\nmaking him act in this unaccountable manner.\n\nEnid slipped through the sleeping household like a ghost to deliver the\nprince's message to the landlord, hurried back to help Geraint with his\narmor and came down with him to spring upon her palfrey.\n\n\"What do I owe you, friends?\" the prince asked his host, but before the\nman could reply he added \"take those five horses and their burdens of\narms.\"\n\n\"My lord, I have scarcely spent the price of one of them on you!\" cried\nthe landlord astonished.\n\n\"You'll have all the more riches then,\" the prince laughed, then turning\nto Enid, \"today I charge you more particularly than ever before that\nwhatever you may see, hear, fancy or imagine, do not speak to me, but\nobey.\"\n\n\"Yes, my lord,\" answered Enid, \"I know your wish and should like to\nobey, but when I go riding ahead, I hear all the violent threats you do\nnot hear and see the danger you cannot see, and then not to give you\nwarning seems hard, almost beyond me. Yet, I wish to obey you.\"\n\n\"Do so, then,\" said he. \"Do not be too wise, seeing that you are\nmarried, not to a clown but a strong man with arms to guard his own head\nand yours, too.\"\n\nThe broad beaten path which they now took passed through toward the\nwasted lands bordering on the castle of Earl Doorm, the Bull, as his\npeople called him, because of his ferocity.\n\nIt was still early morning when Enid caught the sound of quantities of\nhoofs galloping up the road. Turning round she saw cloudsful of dust and\nthe points of lances sparkling in it. Then, not to disobey the prince,\nyet to give him warning, she held up her finger and pointed toward the\ndust. Geraint was pleased at her cunning, and immediately stopped his\nhorse. The moment after, the Earl of Limours dashed in upon him on a\ncharger as black and as stormy as a thunder-cloud.\n\nGeraint closed with the earl, bore down on him with his spear, and in a\nminute brought him stunned or dead to the ground. Then he turned to the\nnext-comer after Limours, overthrew him and blindly rushed back upon all\nthe men behind. But they were so startled at the flash and movement of\nthe prince that they scrambled away in a panic, leaving their leader\nlying on the public highway. The horses also of the fallen warriors\nwhisked off from their wounded masters and wildly flew away to mix with\nthe vanishing mob.\n\n\"Horse and man, all of one mind,\" remarked Geraint, smiling, \"not a hoof\nof them left. What do you say, Enid, shall we strip the earl and pay for\na dinner or shall we fast? Fast? Then go on and let us pray heaven to\nsend us some Earl of Doorm's men so that we can earn ourselves something\nto eat.\"\n\nEnid sadly eyed her bridle-reins and led the way, Geraint coming after,\nscarcely knowing that he had been pricked by Limours in his side, and\nthat he was bleeding secretly beneath his armor. But at last his head\nand helmet began to wag unsteadily, and at a sudden swerving of the road\nhe was tossed from his horse upon a bank of grass. Enid heard the\nclashing of the fall, and too terrified to cry out, came back all pale.\nThen she dismounted, loosed the fastenings of his armor and bound up his\nwounds with her veil. Then she sat down desolately and began to cry,\nwondering what ever she should do.\n\n[Illustration: ENID SAT DOWN DESOLATELY AND BEGAN TO CRY.]\n\nMany men passed by but no one took any notice of her. For in that\nlawless, turbulent earldom no one minded a woman weeping for a murdered\nlover than they now mind a summer shower. One man scurrying as fast as\never he could travel toward the bandit earl's castle, drove the sand\nsweeping into her poor eyes, and another coming in the opposite\ndirection from out the earl's castle park in seeming hot haste, turned\nall the long dusty road into a column of smoke behind him, and\nfrightened her little palfrey so that it scoured off into the coppices\nand was lost. But the prince's charger stood beside them and grieved\nover the mishap like a man.\n\nAt noon a huge warrior with a big face and russet beard and eyes rolling\nabout in search of prey, came riding hard by with a hundred spearmen at\nhis back all bound for some foray. It was the frightful Earl Doorm.\n\n\"What, is he dead?\" cried the earl loudly to Enid, as he spied her on\nthe wayside.\n\n\"No, no, not dead,\" she quickly answered. \"Would some of your kind\npeople take him up and bear him off somewhere out of this cruel sun? I\nam very sure, quite sure that he is not dead.\"\n\n\"Well, if he isn't dead, why should you cry for him so? Dead or not\ndead, you just spoil your pretty face with idiotic tears. They will not\nhelp him. But since it is a pretty face, come fellows, some of you, and\ntake him to our hall. If he lives he will be one of our band, and if\nnot, why there is earth enough to bury him in. See that you take his\ncharger, too, a noble one.\"\n\nAnd so saying, the rude earl passed on, while two brawny horsemen came\nforward growling to think they might lose their chance of booty from the\nmorning's raid all for this dead man. They raised the prince upon a\nlitter, laying him in the hollow of his shield, and brought him into\nthe barren hall of Doorm, while Enid and the gentle charger followed\nafter. They tossed him and his litter down on an oaken settle in the\nhall, and then shot away for the woods.\n\nEnid sat through long hours all alone with Geraint besides the oaken\nsettle, propping his head and chafing his hands, but in the late\nafternoon she saw the huge Earl Doorm returning with his lusty spearmen\nand their plunder. Each hurled down a heap of spoils on the floor, threw\naside his lance and doffed his helmet, while a tribe of brightly gowned\ngentle-women fluttered into the hall and began to talk with them. Earl\nDoorm struck his knife against the table and bellowed for meat, and\nwine. In a moment the place fairly steamed and smoked with whole roast\nhogs and oxen, and everybody sat down in a hodge-podge and ate like\ncattle feeding in their stalls, while Enid shrank far back startled,\ninto her nook.\n\nBut suddenly, when Earl Doorm had eaten all he would, and all he could\nfor the moment, he revolved his eyes about the bare hall and caught a\nglimpse of the fair little lady drooping in her niche. Then he\nrecollected how she had crouched weeping by the roadside for her fallen\nlord that morning. A wild pity filled his gruff heart.\n\n\"Eat, eat!\" he shouted. \"I never before saw any thing so pale. Be\nyourself. Isn't your lord lucky, for were I dead who is there in all the\nworld who would mourn for me? Sweet lady, never have I ever seen a lily\nlike you. If there were a bit of color living in your cheeks there is\nnot one among my gentle-women here who would be fit to wear your\nslippers for gloves. But listen to me and you will share my earldom with\nme, girl, and we will live like two birds in a nest and I will bring you\nall sorts of finery from every part of the world to make you happy.\"\n\nAs the earl spoke his two cheeks bulged with the two tremendous morsels\nof meat which he had tucked into his mouth.\n\nEnid was more alarmed than ever.\n\n\"How can I be happy over anything,\" replied she, \"until my lord is well\nagain?\"\n\nThe earl laughed, then plucked her up out of the corner, carried her\nover to the table, thrust a dish of food before her and held a horn of\nwine to her lips.\n\n\"By all heaven,\" cried Enid, \"I will not drink until my lord gets up and\ndrinks and eats with me. And if he will not rise again I will not drink\nany wine until I die.\"\n\nAt this the earl turned perfectly red and paced up and down the hall,\ngnawing first his upper and then his lower lip.\n\n\"Girl,\" shouted he, \"why wail over a man who shames your beauty so, by\ndressing it in that rag? Put off those beggar-woman's weeds and robe\nyourself in this which my gentle-woman has brought you.\"\n\nIt was a gorgeous, wonderful dress, colored in the tints of a shallow\nsea with the blue playing into the green, and gemmed with precious\nstones all down the front of it as thick as dewdrops on the grass. But\nEnid was harder to move than any cold tyrant on his throne, and said:\n\n\"Earl, in this poor gown my dear lord found me first and loved me while\nI was living with my father; in this poor gown I rode with him to court\nand was presented to the queen; in this poor gown he bade me ride as we\ncame out on this fatal quest of honor, and in this poor gown I am going\nto stay until he gets up again, a live, strong man, and tells me to put\nit away. I have griefs enough, pray be gentle with me, let me be. O God!\nI beg of your gentleness, since he is as he is, to let me be.\"\n\nThen the brutal earl strode up and down the hall and cried out:\n\n\"It is of no more use to be gentle with you than to be rough. So take my\nsalute,\" and with that he slapped her lightly on her white cheek.\n\nEnid shrieked. Instantly the fallen Geraint was up on his feet with the\nsword that had laid beside him in the hollow of the shield, making a\nsingle bound for the earl, and with one sweep of it sheared through the\nswarthy neck. The rolling eyes turned glassy, the russet-bearded head\ntumbled over the floor like a ball, and all the bandit knights and the\ngentle-women in the hall flitted, scampering pell-mell away, yelling as\nif they had seen a ghoul. Enid and Geraint were left alone.\n\n[Illustration: THE RUSSET-BEARDED HEAD TUMBLED OVER THE FLOOR LIKE A\nBALL.]\n\nNow Geraint had come out of his swoon before the earl had returned, and\nhe had lain perfectly silent and immovable because he wished to test\nEnid and see what she would do when she thought he was sleeping or\nfainted away, or perhaps dead. So he had listened to all that had taken\nplace and had heard everything that Earl Doorm had said to her and all\nthat Enid had replied, so now he knew that she loved him as ever and\nthat she stood steadfast by him. All his heart filled with pity and\nremorse that he had brought her away on this hard, hard quest, and had\nmade her suffer so much and had been so rough and cold.\n\n\"Enid,\" said the prince tenderly, very tenderly. \"I have used you worse\nthan that big dead brute of a man used you. I have done you more wrong\nthan he. I misunderstood you. Now, now you are three times mine.\"\n\nGeraint's kindness burst upon Enid so abruptly and was so unforeseen\nthat she could not speak a word only this:\n\n\"Fly, Geraint, they will kill you, they will come back. Fly. Your horse\nis outside, my poor little thing is lost.\"\n\n\"You shall ride behind me, then, Enid.\"\n\nSo they slipped quickly outside, found the stately charger and mounted\nhim, first Geraint, then Enid, climbing up the prince's feet, and\nthrowing her arms about him to hold herself firm as they bounded off.\n\nBut as the horse dashed outside of the earl's gateway there before them\nin the highroad stood a knight of Arthur's court holding his lance as if\nready to spring upon Geraint.\n\n\"Stranger!\" shrieked Enid, thinking of the prince's wound and loss of\nblood, \"do not kill a dead man!\"\n\n\"The voice of Enid!\" cried the stranger knight.\n\nThen Enid saw that he was Edryn, the son of Nudd, and feeling the more\nterrified as she remembered the jousts, cried out:\n\n\"O, cousin, this is the man who spared your life!\"\n\n[Illustration: BEFORE THEM IN THE HIGHROAD STOOD A KNIGHT OF ARTHUR'S\nCOURT.]\n\nEdryn stepped forward. \"My lord Geraint,\" he said, \"I took you for some\nbandit knight of Doorm's. Do not fear, Enid, that I will attack the\nprince. I love him. When he overthrew me at the lists he threw me\nhigher. For now I have been made a Knight of the Round Table and am\naltogether changed. But since I used to know Earl Doorm in the old days\nwhen I was lawless and half a bandit myself, I have come as the\nmouthpiece of our king to tell Doorm to disband all his men and become\nsubject to Arthur, who is now on his way hither.\"\n\n\"Doorm is now before the King of Kings,\" Geraint replied, \"And his men\nare already scattered,\" and the prince pointed to groups in the\nthickets or still running off in their panic. Then back to the people\nall aghast whom they could see huddling, he related fully to Edryn how\nhe had slain the huge earl in his own hall.\n\n[Illustration: TO THE ROYAL CAMP WHERE ARTHUR CAME OUT TO GREET THEM.]\n\n\"Come with me to the king,\" astonished Edryn said.\n\nSo they all traveled off to the royal camp where Arthur himself came out\nto greet them, lifted Enid from her saddle, kissed her and showed her a\ntent where his own physician came in to attend to Geraint's wound. When\nthat was healed he rode away with them to Caerleon for a visit with\nQueen Guinevere, who dressed Enid again in magnificent clothes. Then\nfifty armed knights escorted Enid and the prince as far as the banks of\nthe Severn River, where they crossed over into the land of Devon. And\nall their people welcomed them back.\n\nGeraint after that never forgot his princedom or the tournament, but was\nknown through all the country round as the cleverest and bravest\nwarrior, while his princess was called Enid the Good.\n\n\n\n\nMERLIN AND VIVIEN.\n\n\nVivien was a very clever, wily and wicked woman, who wanted to become a\ngreater magician than even the great Merlin, who was the most famous man\nof all his times, who understood all the arts, who had built the king's\nharbors, ships and halls, who was a fine poet and who could read the\nfuture in the stars in the skies.\n\nHe had once told Vivien of a charm that he could work to make people\ninvisible. Whenever he worked it upon anyone that person would seem to\nbe imprisoned within the four walls of a tower and could not get out.\nThe person would seem dead, lost to every one, and could be seen only by\nthe person who worked the charm. Vivien yearned to know what the charm\nwas, for she wanted to cast its spell on Merlin so that no one would\nknow where he was and she could become a great enchantress in the realm,\nas she foolishly thought. And she planned very cleverly so as to find\nout the wise old man's secret.\n\nShe wanted him to think that she loved him dearly. At first she played\nabout him with lively, pretty talk, vivid smiles, and he watched and\nlaughed at her as if she were a playful kitten. Then as she saw that he\nhalf disdained her she began to put on very grave and serious fits,\nturned red and pale when he came near her, or sighed or gazed at him, so\nsilently and with such sweet devotion that he half believed that she\nreally loved him truly.\n\n[Illustration: HE LAUGHED AT HER.]\n\nBut after a while a great melancholy fell over Merlin, he felt so\nterribly sad that he passed away out of the kings' court and went down\nto the beach. There he found a little boat and stepped into it. Vivien\nhad followed him without his knowing it. She sat down in the boat and\nwhile he took the sail she seized the helm of the boat. They were driven\nacross the sea with a strong wind and came to the shores of Brittany.\nHere Merlin got out and Vivien followed him all the way into the wild\nwoods of Broceliande. Every step of the way Merlin was perfectly quiet.\n\nThey sat down together, she lay beside him and kissed his feet as if in\nthe deepest reverence and love. A twist of gold was wound round her\nhair, a priceless robe of satiny samite clung about her beautiful limbs.\nAs she kissed his feet she cried:\n\n\"Trample me down, dear feet which I have followed all through the world\nand I will worship you. Tread me down and I will kiss you for it.\"\n\nBut Merlin still said not a word.\n\n[Illustration: MERLIN FELT SO TERRIBLY SAD.]\n\n\"Merlin do you love me?\" at last cried Vivien, with her face sadly\nappealing to him. And again, \"O, Merlin, do you love me?\" \"Great Master,\ndo you love me?\" she cried for the third time.\n\nAnd then when he was as quiet as ever she writhed up toward him, slid\nupon his knee, twined her feet about his ankles, curved her arms about\nhis neck and used one of her hands as a white comb to run through his\nlong ashy beard which she drew all across her neck down to her knees.\n\n\"See! I'm clothing myself with wisdom,\" she cried. \"I'm a golden summer\nbutterfly that's been caught in a great old tyrant spider's web that's\ngoing to eat me up in this big wild wood without a word to me.\"\n\n\"What do you mean, Vivien, with these pretty tricks of yours?\" cried\nMerlin at last. \"What do you want me to give you?\"\n\n\"What!\" said Vivien, smiling saucily, \"have you found your tongue at\nlast? Now yesterday you didn't open your lips once except to drink. And\nthen I, with my own lady hands, made a pretty cup and offered you your\nwater kneeling before you and you drank it, but gave me not a word of\nthanks. And when we stopped at the other spring when you lay with your\nfeet all golden with blossoms from the meadows we passed through you\nknow that I bathed your feet before I bathed my own. But yet no thanks\nfrom you. And all through this wild wood, all through this morning when\nI fondled you, still not a word of thanks.\"\n\nThen Merlin locked her hand in his and said, \"Vivien, have you never\nseen a wave as it was coming up the beach ready to break? Well, I've\nbeen seeing a wave that was ready to break on me. It seemed to me that\nsome dark, tremendous wave was going to come and sweep me away from my\nhold on the world, away from my fame and my usefulness and my great\nname. That's why I came away from Arthur's court to make me forget it\nand feel better. And when I saw you coming after me it seemed to me that\nyou were that wave that was going to roll all over me. But pardon me,\nnow, child, your pretty ways have brightened everything again, and now\ntell me what you would like to have from me. For I owe you something\nthree times over, once for neglecting you, twice for the thanks for your\ngoodness to me, and lastly for those dainty gambols of yours. So tell me\nnow, what will you have?\"\n\nVivien smiled mournfully as she answered:\n\n\"I've always been afraid that you were not really mine, that you didn't\nlove me truly, that you didn't quite trust me, and now you yourself have\nowned it. Don't you see, dear love, how this strange mood of yours must\nmake me feel it more than ever? must make me yearn still more to prove\nthat you are mine, must make me wish still more to know that great charm\nof waving hands and woven footsteps that you told me about, just as a\nproof that you trust me? If you told that to me I should know that you\nare mine, and I should have the great proof of your love, because I\nthink that however wise you may be you do not know me yet.\"\n\n\"I never was less wise, you inquisitive Vivien,\" said Merlin, \"than when\nI told you about that charm. Why won't you ask me for another boon?\"\n\nThen Vivien, as if she were the tenderest hearted little maid that ever\nlived, burst into tears and said:\n\n\"No, master, don't be angry at your little girl. Caress me, let me feel\nmyself forgiven, for I have not the heart to ask for another boon. I\ndon't suppose that you know the old rhyme, 'Trust not at all or all in\nall?'\"\n\nThen Merlin looked at her and half believed what she said. Her voice was\nso tender, her face was so fair, her eyes were so sweetly gleaming\nbehind her tears.\n\nHe locked her hand in his again and said, \"If you should know this charm\nyou might sometimes in a wild moment of anger or a mood of overstrained\naffection when you wanted me all to yourself or when you were jealous\nin a sudden fit, you might work it on me.\"\n\n\"Good!\" cried Vivien, as if she were angry, \"I am not trusted. Well,\nhide it away, hide it, and I shall find it out, and when I've found it\nbeware, look out for Vivien! When you use me so it's a wonder that I can\nlove you at all, and as for jealousy, it seems to me this wonderful\ncharm was invented just to make me jealous. I suppose you have a lot of\npretty girls whom you have caged here and there all over the world with\nit.\"\n\nThen the great master laughed merrily.\n\n\"Long, long years ago,\" he said, \"there lived a King in the farthest\nEast of the East. A tawny pirate who had plundered twenty islands or\nmore anchored his boat in the King's port, and in the boat was a woman.\nFor, as he had passed one of the islands the pirates had seen two cities\nfull of men in boats fighting for a woman on the sea; he had pushed up\nhis black boat in among the rest, lightly scattered every one of them\nand brought her off with half his people killed with arrows. She was a\nmaiden so smooth, so white, so wonderful that a light seemed to come\nfrom her as she walked. When the pirate came upon the shore of the\nEastern King's island the King asked him for the woman, but he would not\ngive her up. So the King imprisoned the pirate and made the woman his\nqueen.\n\n\"All the people adored her, the King's councilmen and all his soldiers,\nthe beasts themselves. The camels knelt down before her unbidden, and\nthe black slaves of the mountains rang her golden ankle bells just to\nsee her smile. So little wonder that the King grew very jealous. He had\nhis horns blown through all the hundred under-kingdoms which he ruled,\ntelling the people that he wanted a wizard who would teach him some\ncharm to work upon the queen and make her all his own. To the wizard who\ncould do this he promised a league of mountain land full of golden\nmines, a province with a hundred miles of coast, a palace and a\nprincess. But all the wizards who failed should be killed and their\nheads would be hung on the city gates until they mouldered away.\n\n\"So there were many, many wizards all through the hundred kingdoms who\ntried to work the charm, but failed; many wizard heads bleached on the\nwalls, and for weeks a troupe of carrion crows hung like a cloud above\nthe towers of the city gateways. But at last the king's men found a\nlittle glassy headed, hairless man who lived alone in a great wilderness\nand ate nothing but grass. He read only one book, and by always reading\nhad got grated down, filed away and lean, with monstrous eyes and his\nskin clinging to his bones. But since he never tasted wine or flesh--the\nwall that separates people from spirits became crystal to him. He could\nsee through it, perceive the spirits as they walked and hear them\ntalking; so he learned their secrets. Often he drew a cloud of rain\nacross a sunny sky, or when there was a wild storm and the pine woods\nroared he made everything calm again.\n\n\"He was the man that was wanted. They dragged him to the king's court by\nforce, he didn't want to go. There he taught the king how to charm the\nqueen so that no one could see her again, and she could see no one\nexcept the king as he passed about the palace. She lay as if quite dead\nand lost to life. But when the king offered the magician his league of\ngolden mines, the province with a hundred miles of sea coast, the palace\nand the princess, the old man turned away, went back to his wilderness\nand lived on grass and vanished away. But his book came down to me.\"\n\n\"You have the book!\" cried Vivian smiling saucily. \"The charm is written\nin it. Good, take my advice and let me know the secret at once, for if\nyou should hide it away like a puzzle in a chest, if you should put\nchest upon chest, and lock and padlock each chest thirty times and bury\nthem all away under some vast mound like the heaps of soldiers on the\nbattle-field, still I should hit upon some way of digging it out, of\npicking it, of opening it and reading the charm. And _then_ if I tried\nit on you who would blame me?\"\n\n\"You read the book, my pretty Vivien?\" cried Merlin. \"Well, it's only\ntwenty pages long, but such pages! Every page has a square of text that\nlooks like a blot, the letters no longer than fleas' legs written in a\nlanguage that has long gone by, and all the borders and margins\nscribbled, crossed and crammed with notes. You read that book! No one,\nnot even I can read the text, and no one besides me can make out the\nnotes on the margins. I found the charm in the margin. Oh, it is simple\nenough. Any child might work it and then not be able to undo it. Don't\nask me again for it, because even although you would love me too much to\ntry it on me, still you might try it on some of the knights of the Round\nTable.\"\n\n\"O, you are crueller than any man ever told of in a story, or sung about\nin song!\" cried Vivien. She clapped her hands together and wailed out a\nshriek. \"I'm stabbed to the heart! I only wished that prove to you that\nwere wholly mine, that you loved me and now I'm killed with a word.\nThere's nothing left for me to do except crawl into some hole or cave,\nand if the wolves won't tear me to pieces, just to weep my life away,\nkilled with unutterable unkindness!\"\n\nShe paused, turned away, hung her head while the hair uncoiled itself.\nThen she wept afresh.\n\nThe dark wood grew darker with a storm coming over the sky.\n\nMerlin sat thinking quietly and half believed that she was true.\n\n\"Come out of the storm,\" he called over to her, \"come here into the\nhollow old oak tree.\"\n\nThen since she didn't answer, he tried three times to calm her but quite\nin vain. At last, however, she let herself be conquered, came back to\nher old perch, and nestled there, half falling from his knees. Gentle\nMerlin saw the slow tears still standing in her eyes and threw his arms\nkindly about her. But Vivien unlinked herself at once, rose with her\narms crossed upon her bosom and fled away.\n\n\"No more love between us two,\" she cried, \"for you do not trust me. Oh,\nit would have been better if I had died three times over than to have\nasked you once! Farewell, think gently of me and I will go. But before I\nleave you let me swear once more that if I've been planning against you\nin all this, may the dark heavens send one great flash from out the sky\nto burn me to a cinder!\"\n\nJust as she ended a bolt of lightning darted across the sky, and sliced\nthe giant oak tree into a thousand splinters and spikes.\n\n\"Oh, Merlin, save me! save me!\" cried Vivien, terrified lest the heavens\nhad heard her oath and were going to kill her. And she flew back to his\narms. She called him her dear protector, her lord and liege, her seer,\nher bard, her silver star of evening, her God, her Merlin, the one\npassionate love of her life, and hugged him close.\n\nAll the time overhead the tempest bellowed, the branches snapped above\nthem in the rushing rain. Her glittering eyes and neck seemed to come\nand go before Merlin's eyes with the lightning. At last the storm had\nspent its passion, the woodland was all in peace again, and Merlin,\novertalked and overworn had told all of the charm and had fallen asleep.\n\n[Illustration: IN THE HOLLOW OF THE OLD OAK TREE LEFT HIM LYING DEAD.]\n\nThen in a moment Vivien worked the charm with woven footsteps and waving\narms, and in the hollow of the old oak tree left him lying dead to all\nlife, use and fame and name.\n\n\"I have made his glory mine! O fool!\" she shrieked, and she sprang down\nthrough the great forest, the thicket closed about her behind her and\nall the woods echoed, \"Fool!\"\n\n\n\n\nBALIN AND BALAN.\n\n\nKing Pellam owed Arthur some tribute money so Arthur told three of his\nknights to go see about it and collect it for him.\n\n\"Very well,\" said one of the knights, \"but listen, on the way to King\nPellam's country, near Camelot, there are two strange knights sitting\nbeside a fountain. They challenge and overthrow every knight that\npasses. Shall I stop to fight them as we go by and send them back to\nyou?\"\n\nArthur laughed, \"No, don't stop for anything; let them wait until they\ncan find some one stronger themselves.\"\n\nWith that the three men left. But after they had gone Arthur, who loved\na good fight himself, started away early one morning for the fountain\nside of Camelot. On its right hand he saw the knight Balin sitting under\nan alder tree, with his horse beside him, and on the left hand under a\npoplar tree with his horse at his side sat the knight Balan.\n\n\"Fair sirs,\" cried Arthur, \"why are you sitting here?\"\n\n\"For the sake of glory,\" they answered. \"We're stronger than all\nArthur's court. We've proved that because we easily overthrow every\nknight that comes by here.\"\n\n\"Well, I'm of Arthur's court, too,\" replied the king, \"although I've\nnever done so much in jousts as in real wars. But see whether you can\noverthrow me so easily too.\"\n\nSo the two brothers came out boldly and fought with Arthur, but he\nstruck them both lightly down, then softly came away and nobody knew\nanything about it.\n\nBut that evening while Balin and Balan sat very meekly by the bubbling\nwater a spangled messenger came riding by and cried out to them: \"Sirs,\nyou are sent for by the King.\"\n\nSo they followed the man back to the court. \"Tell me your names,\"\ndemanded Arthur, \"and why do you sit there by the fountain?\"\n\n[Illustration: TWO STRANGE KNIGHTS.]\n\n\"My name is Balin,\" answered one of the men, \"and my brother's name is\nBalan. Three years ago I struck down one of your slaves whom I heard had\nspoken ill of me, and you sent me away for a three years' exile. Then I\nthought that if we would sit by the well and would overcome every knight\nwho passed by you would be a more willing to take me back. But today\nsome man of yours came along and conquered us both. What do you wish\nwith me?\"\n\n\"Be wiser for falling,\" Arthur said. \"Your chair is in the hall vacant.\nTake it again and be my knight once more.\"\n\nSo Balin went back into the old hall of the Knights of the Round Table,\nand they all clashed their cups together drinking his welcome, and sang\nuntil all of Arthur's banners of war hanging overhead began to stir as\nthey always did on the battlefield.\n\nMeanwhile the men who had gone to collect the taxes from King Pellam\nreturned.\n\n\"Sir King,\" they cried to Arthur, \"We scarcely could see Pellam for the\ngloom in his hall. That man who used to be one of your roughest and most\nriotous enemies is now living like a monk in his castle and has all\nsorts of holy things about him, and says he has given up all matters of\nthe world. He wouldn't even talk about the tribute money and told us\nthat his heir Sir Garlon, attended to his business for him, so we went\nto Garlon and after a struggle we got it. Then we came away, but as we\npassed through the deep woods we found one of your knights lying dead,\nkilled by a spear. After we had buried him, we talked with an old\nwoodman who told us that there's a demon of the woods who had probably\nslain the knight. This demon, he said, was once a man who lived all\nalone and learned black magic. He hated people so much that when he died\nhe became a fiend. The woodman showed us the cave where he has seen the\ndemon go in and out and where he lives. We saw the print of a horse's\nhoof, but no more.\"\n\n\"Foully and villainously slain!\" cried Arthur thinking of his poor\nkilled knight in the woods. \"Who will go hunt this demon of the woods\nfor me?\"\n\n\"I!\" exclaimed Balan, ready to dart instantly away, but first he\nembraced Balin, saying, \"Good brother, hear; don't let your angry\npassions conquer you, fight them away. Remember how these knights of the\nRound Table welcomed you back. Be a loving brother with them and don't\nimagine that there is hatred among them here any more than there is in\nheaven itself.\"\n\nWhen bad Balan left, Balin set himself to learn how to curb his wildness\nand become a courteous and manly knight. He always hovered about\nLancelot, the pattern knight of all the court, to see how he did, and\nwhen he noticed Lancelot's sweet smiles and his little pleasant words\nthat gladdened every knight or churl or child that he passed, Balin\nsighed like some lame boy who longed to scale a mountain top and could\nscarcely limp up one hundred feet from the base.\n\n\"It's Lancelot's worship of the queen that helps to make him gentle,\"\nsaid he to himself. \"If I want to be gentle I must serve and worship\nlovely Queen Guinevere too. Suppose I ask the King to let me have some\ntoken of hers on my shield instead of these pictures of wild beasts with\nbig teeth and grins. Then whenever I see it I'll forget my wild heats\nand violences.\"\n\n\"What would you like to bear on your shield?\" asked the king when Balin\nspoke to him about his wish.\n\n\"The queen's own crown-royal,\" replied Balin.\n\nThen the queen smiled and turned to Arthur. \"The crown is only the\nshadow of the king,\" she said, \"and this crown is the shadow of that\nshadow. But let him have it if it will help him out of his violences.\"\n\n\"It's no shadow to me, my queen,\" cried Balan, \"no shadow to me, king.\nIt's a light for me.\"\n\nSo Balin was given the crown to bear on his shield and whenever he\nlooked at it, it seemed to make him feel gentle and patient.\n\nBut one morning as he heard Lancelot and the queen talking together on\nthe white walk of lilies that led to Queen Guinevere's bower, all his\nold passions seemed to come back and filled him and he darted madly away\non his horse, not stopping until he had passed the fount where he had\nsat with his brother Balan and had dived into the skyless woods beyond.\nThere the gray-headed woodman was hewing away wearily at a branch of a\ntree.\n\n[Illustration: BALIN WAS GIVEN THE CROWN TO WEAR ON HIS SHIELD.]\n\n\"Give me your axe, Churl,\" cried Balin, and with one sharp cut he struck\nit down.\n\n\"Lord!\" cried the woodman, \"you could kill the devil of this woods if\nany one can. Just yesterday I saw a flash of him. Some people say that\nour Sir Garlon has learned black magic too and can ride armed unseen.\nJust look into the demon's cave.\"\n\nBut Balin said the woodman was foolish, and rode off through the glades\nwith a drooping head. He did not notice that on his right a great cavern\nchasm yawned out of the darkness. Once he heard the mosses beneath him\nthud and tremble and then the shadow of a spear shot from behind him and\nran along the ground. The light of somebody's armor flashed by him and\nvanished into the woods.\n\nBalin dashed after this but he was so blinded by his rage that he\nstumbled against a tree, breaking his lance and falling from his horse.\nHe sprang to his feet and darted off again not knowing where he was\ngoing until the massy battlements of King Pellam's castle appeared.\n\n\"Why do you wear the crown royal on your shield?\" Pellam's men asked him\nas soon as they saw him.\n\n\"The fairest and best of ladies living gave it to me,\" Balin replied, as\nhe stalled his horse and strode across the court to the banquet hall.\n\n\"Why do you wear the royal crown?\" Sir Garlon asked him as they sat at\ntable.\n\n\"The queen whom Lancelot and we all worship as the fairest, best and\npurest gave it to me to wear,\" said Balin.\n\nBut Sir Garlon only hissed at him and made fun of what he said, and\nBalin reached for a wonderful goblet embossed with a sacred picture to\nhurl it at Garlon, but the thought of the gentle queen about whom he\nwas talking soothed his temper. The next morning, however, in the court\nSir Garlon mocked him again and Balin's face grew black with anger. He\ntore out his sword from its shield and crying out fiercely, \"Ha! I'll\nmake a ghost of you!\" struck Garlon hard on the helmet.\n\nThe blade flew and splintered into six parts which clinked upon the\nstones below while Garlon reeled slowly backward and fell. Balin dragged\nhim by the banneret of his helmet and struck again, but in a minute\ntwenty warriors with pointed lances were making for him from the castle.\nBalin dashed his fist against the foremost face then dipped through a\nlow doorway out along a glimmering gallery until he saw the open portals\nof King Pellam's chapel. He slipped inside this and crept behind the\ndoor while the others howled past outside.\n\nBefore the golden altar he noticed lying the brightest lance he had ever\nseen with its point painted red with blood. Seizing it he pushed it out\nthrough an open casement, leaned on it and leaped in a half-circle to\nthe ground outside. Running along a path he found his horse, mounted him\nand scudded away. An arrow whizzed to his right, another to his left and\na third over his head while he heard Pellam crying out feebly, \"Catch\nhim, catch him! he mustn't pollute holy things!\"\n\nBut Balin quickly dove beneath the tree boughs and raced through miles\nof thick groves and open meadowland until his good horse, at last\nwearied and uncertain in his footsteps, stumbled over a fallen oak and\nthrew Balin headlong.\n\nAs Balin rose to his feet he looked at the Queen's crown on his shield\nand then drew the shield from off his neck. \"I have shamed you,\" he\ncried. \"I won't carry you any more,\" and he hung it up on a branch and\nthrew himself on the ground in a passionate sleep.\n\nWhile he slept there the beautiful wicked Vivien came riding by through\nthe woodland alleys with her squire, warbling a song.\n\n\"What is this?\" she cried as she noticed the shield on the tree, \"a\nshield with a crown upon it. And there's a horse. Where's the rider? Oh!\nthere he is sleeping. Hail royal knight, I'm flying away from a bad king\nand the knight I was riding with was hurt, and my poor squire isn't of\nmuch use in helping me. But you, Sir Prince, will surely guide me to the\nWarrior King Arthur, the Blameless, to get me some shelter.\"\n\n\"Oh, no, I'll never go to Arthur's court again,\" cried Balin. \"I'm not a\nprince any more, or a knight. I have brought the Queen's crown to\nshame.\"\n\nThen Vivien laughed shrilly, and told Balin a wicked story about the\nQueen which she just imagined in her wicked mind. But she told it so\ncunningly and smiled so sunnily as she talked that Balin believed her\nand he flew into the more passionate rage because he thought he had been\ndeceived in the Queen whom he had worshipped.\n\nHe ground his teeth together, sprang up with a yell, tore the shield\nfrom the branch and cast it on the ground, drove his heel _into the\nroyal crown_, stamped and trampled upon it until it was all spoiled,\nthen hurled the shield from him out among the forest weeds and cursed\nthe story, the queen and Vivien.\n\nHis weird yell had thrilled through the woods where Balan was lurking\nfor his foe. \"There! that's the scream of the wood-devil I'm looking\nfor,\" he thought. \"He has killed some knight and trampled on his shield\nto show his loathing of our order and the queen. Devil or man,\nwhichever you are, take care of your head!\"\n\n[Illustration: HE DROVE HIS HEEL INTO THE ROYAL CROWN.]\n\nWith that he made swiftly for his poor brother whom he did not\nrecognize. Sir Balin spoke not a word but snatched the buckler from\nVivien's squire, vaulted on his horse and in a moment had clashed with\nhis brother's armor. King Pellam's holy spear reddened with blood as it\npricked through Balan's shield to his flesh. Then Balin's horse, wearied\nto death, rolled back over his rider and crushed him inward and both men\nfell and swooned away.\n\n\"The fools!\" cried Vivien to her young squire. \"Come, you Sir Chick,\nloosen their casques and see who they are. They must be rivals for the\nsame woman to fight so hard.\"\n\n\"They are happy,\" her gentle squire answered, \"if they died for love.\nAnd Vivien, though you beat me like your dog I would die for you.\"\n\n\"Don't die, Sir Boy,\" cried Vivien, \"I'd rather have a live dog than a\ndead lion. Come away, I don't like to look at them,\" and she made her\npalfrey leap off over the fallen oak tree.\n\nBalin was the first to wake from his swoon. As soon as he saw his\nbrother's face he crawled over to his side moaning. Then Balan faintly\nopened his eyes and seeing who was with him kissed Balin's forehead.\n\n\"O Balin,\" he cried, \"why didn't you carry your own shield which I knew,\nand why did you trample all over this one which bears the queen's own\ncrown which I know?\"\n\nSo Balin slowly gasped out the whole story of his shield. Then they each\nsaid good-night to the other and closed their eyes, locked in each\nother's arms.\n\n\n\n\nLANCELOT AND ELAINE.\n\n\nLong before Arthur was crowned king while he was roving one night over\nthe trackless realms of Lyonesse he came upon a glen with a gray boulder\nand a lake. As he rode up the highway in the misty moonshine he suddenly\nstepped upon a white skeleton of a man with a crown of diamonds upon its\nskull. The skull broke off from the body and rolled away into the lake.\nArthur alighted, reached down and picked up the crown and set it on his\nhead murmuring to himself, \"_You too shall be king some day_,\" for the\nskeleton was the bones of a king who had fought with his brother there\nand been killed.\n\n[Illustration: YOU TOO SHALL BE KING SOME DAY.]\n\nWhen Arthur was crowned he plucked the nine gems out of the crown he had\nfound on the skeleton and showed them to his knights with the words:\n\n\"These jewels belong to the whole kingdom for everybody's use and not to\nthe king. Hereafter there is to be joust for one of them every year and\nin that way in nine years time we will learn who is the mightiest in the\nkingdom and we will race with each other to become skilful in the use\nof arms until at last we shall be able to drive away the heathen horde\nfrom the land.\"\n\nEight years had now passed and there had been eight jousts. Lancelot had\nwon the diamond every year and intended when he had been victorious in\nall the jousts, to give the nine gems to the queen. When the ninth year\ncame Arthur proclaimed the tournament for the central and largest\ndiamond to be held at Camelot, where he was holding his court. But the\nqueen became ill as the time for the tour jousts drew near and he asked\nher whether she was too feeble to go to see Lancelot in the lists.\n\n\"Yes, my lord,\" replied Guinevere, \"and you know it,\" and she looked up\nlanguidly to Lancelot who stood near.\n\nLancelot thinking that she would rather have him near while she was ill\nthan to receive all the diamonds of the crown, said:\n\n\"Sir King, that old wound of mine is not quite healed so I can hardly\nride in my saddle.\"\n\nSo the king went, excused Lancelot, and rode away alone to the lists\nwhile Lancelot remained, but as soon as Arthur was gone the _queen told\nLancelot that he ought by all means go too and fight_.\n\n\"But how can I go now,\" replied Lancelot, \"after what I have said to the\nking.\"\n\n\"I will tell you what to do,\" said Guinevere. \"Everybody says that men\ngo down before your spear just because of your great name. They are\nafraid as soon as you appear and of course, they are conquered. Go in\ntoday entirely unknown and win for yourself, then after all is over the\nking will be pleased with you for being so clever.\"\n\n[Illustration: THE QUEEN TOLD LANCELOT THAT HE OUGHT BY ALL MEANS\nFIGHT.]\n\nLancelot quickly got his horse and leaving the beaten thoroughfare,\nchose a green path among the downs to take him to the lists. It was a\nnew road to him however and he lost his way and did not know where to go\nuntil at last he came upon a faintly traced pathway that led to the\ncastle of Astolat far away on a hill. He went thither, blew the horn at\nthe gate where a _dumb, wrinkled old man came to let him in_. In the\ncastle court he met the lord of Astolat with his two young sons, Sir\nTorre and Sir Lavaine and behind them the lily maiden Elaine, Astolat's\ndaughter. They were jesting and laughing as they came.\n\n[Illustration: A WRINKLED OLD MAN CAME AND LET HIM IN.]\n\n\"Where do you come from, my guest, and what is your name?\" asked\nAstolat. \"By your state and presence I would guess you to be the chief\nof Arthur's court, for I have seen him although the other knights of the\nRound Table are strangers to me.\"\n\nLancelot, Arthur's chief knight replied, \"I am of Arthur's court and I\nam known, and my shield which I have happened to bring with me, is known\ntoo. But as I am going to joust for the diamond at Camelot as a\nstranger do not ask me my name. After it is over you shall know me and\nmy shield. If you have some blank shield around, or one with a strange\ndevice, pray lend it to me.\"\n\n\"Here is Torre's,\" the Lord of Astolat replied. \"He was hurt in his\nfirst tilt and so his shield is blank enough, God knows. You can have\nhis.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" added Sir Torre simply, \"since I can't use it you may have it.\"\n\nHis father laughed. \"Fie, Churl, is that an answer for a noble knight?\nYou must pardon him, but Lavaine, my younger boy, is so full of life he\nwill ride in the lists, joust for the diamond, win and bring it in one\nhour to set upon his sister's golden hair and make her three times as\nwilful as before.\"\n\n\"Oh, no, good father! don't shame me before this noble knight. It was\nall a joke. Elaine dreamed that some one had put the diamond into her\nhand and it was so slippery it dropped into a pool of water. Then I told\nher that if I fought and won it for her she must keep it safer than\nthat. But it was all in fun. However, if you'll give me your leave, I'll\nride to Camelot with this noble knight. I shall not win but I'll do my\nbest to win.\"\n\nLancelot smiled a moment. \"If you'll give me the pleasure of your\ncompany over the downs where I lost myself I'll be glad to have you as a\nfriend and guide. You shall win the diamond if you can and then give it\nto your sister if you wish.\"\n\n\"Such diamonds are for queens and not for simple little girls,\" said Sir\nTorre.\n\nElaine flushed at this and Lancelot said, \"If beautiful things are for\nbeautiful people this maiden may wear as fine jewels as there are in the\nworld.\"\n\nThen the lily maid lifted her eyes and thought that Lancelot was the\ngreatest man that had ever lived. She loved his bruised and bronzed face\nseamed across with an old sword-cut.\n\nThey took the pet knight of Arthur's court into the rude hall of Astolat\nwhere they entertained him with their best meats, wines and minstrel\nmelodies. They told him about the dumb old man at the gate, how ten\nyears ago he had warned Astolat of the heathen fighters coming, and how\nthey had all escaped to the woods and lived in a boatman's hut by the\nriver while the old man had been caught and had his tongue cut off.\n\n\"Those were dull days,\" said the Lord of Astolat, \"until Arthur came and\ndrove the heathen away.\"\n\n\"O, great Lord!\" cried Lavaine to Lancelot, \"you fought in those\nglorious wars with Arthur. Tell us about them!\"\n\nSo Lancelot told him all about the fight all day long at the white mouth\nof the river Glenn, the four loud battles on the shore of Duglas where\nthe glorious king wore on his cuirass an emerald carved into Our Lady's\nhead. \"On the mount of Badon,\" he said, \"I saw him charge at the head of\nall of his Round Table and break the heathen hosts. Afterward he stood\non a heap of the killed, all red, from his spurs to the plumes of his\nhelmet, with their blood, and he cried to me: 'They are broken! they are\nbroken!' In this heathen war the fire of God filled him, I never saw\nanyone like him, there is no greater leader.\"\n\n\"Except yourself,\" thought the lily maid Elaine. All through the night\nshe saw his dark, splendid face living before her eyes and early in the\nmorning she arose as if to bid goodbye to Lavaine, stole step after step\ndown the long tower stairs and passed out to the court where Lancelot\nwas smoothing the glossy shoulders of his horse. She drew nearer and\nstood in the dewy light, studying his face as though it was a god. He\nhad never dreamed she was so beautiful.\n\n[Illustration: \"FAIR LORD,\" SAID ELAINE.]\n\n\"Fair lord,\" said Elaine, \"I don't know your name but I believe it is\nthe noblest himself of them all. Will you wear a token of me at the\ntournament today?\"\n\n\"No, pretty lady,\" said he, \"for I've never worn a token of any woman in\nthe lists; as every one who knows me knows.\"\n\n\"Then by wearing mine you'll be less likely to be found out this time.\"\n\n\"That's true, my child, well, I'll wear it. Fetch it out to me. What is\nit?\"\n\n\"A red sleeve bordered with pearls,\" replied Elaine, and she went in and\nbrought it out to him.\n\nThen he wound it round his helmet and said he had never before done so\nmuch for any girl in the world. The blood sprang to Elaine's face as he\nsaid that, and filled her with delight, although she grew all the paler\nas Lavaine came out and handed Sir Torre's shield to Lancelot. Lancelot\ngave his own shield to Elaine saying, \"Do me this favor, child, keep my\nshield for me until I come back.\"\n\n\"It's a favor to me,\" she replied smiling, \"I'll be your squire.\"\n\n\"Come, Lily Maid,\" cried Lavaine, \"you'll be a lily maid in earnest if\nyou don't get to bed and have some sleep,\" and he kissed her good-bye.\n\nLancelot kissed her hand as they moved away. She watched them at the\ngateway until their sparkling arms dipped below the downs, then climbed\nup to her tower with the shield and there she studied it and mused over\nit every day.\n\nMeanwhile Lancelot and Lavaine passed far over the long downs until they\nreached an old hermit who lived in a white rock. Here they spent the\nnight. The next morning as they rode away Lancelot said, \"Listen to me,\nbut keep what I say a secret, you're riding with Lancelot of the Lake.\"\n\n\"The great Lancelot?\" stammered Lavaine, catching his breath with\nsurprise. \"There is only one other great man to see, and that is\nBritain's king of kings, Arthur. And he's going to be at the tournament,\ntoo.\"\n\nAs soon as they reached the lists in the meadows by Camelot, Lancelot\npointed out the king who, as he sat in the peopled gallery was very easy\nto recognize because of his five dragons. A golden dragon clung to his\ncrown, another writhed down his robe while two others in gilded carved\nwood-work formed the arms of his chair. The canopy above him blazed with\nthe last big diamond.\n\n\"You call me great,\" cried Lancelot, \"I'm not great, there's the man.\"\n\nLavaine gaped at Arthur as if he were something miraculous. Then the\ntrumpets blew. The two sides, those who held the lists and those who\nattacked them, set their lances in rest, then struck their spurs, moved\nout suddenly and shocked in the center of the field. The ground shook\nand there was a low thunder of arms. Lancelot waited a little until he\nsaw which was the weaker side, then sprang into the fight with them. In\nthose days of his glory, whomever he struck he overthrew, whether they\nwere kings, dukes, earls, counts or barons. But that day in the field\nsome of his relatives were holding the lists who did not know him and\nwho could not bear the idea that any stranger knight should out do the\nfeats of their own Lancelot.\n\n\"Who is this?\" one of them asked, \"Isn't it Lancelot?\"\n\n\"When has Lancelot ever worn a lady's token?\" the others replied.\n\n\"Who is it then?\" they cried, furious to guard the name of Lancelot.\nThey pricked their steeds and moving all together bore down upon him\nlike a wild wave that upsets a ship. One spear lamed Lancelot's charger\nand another pierced through Lancelot's side, snapped there and stuck.\nLavaine now did splendidly for he brought a famous old knight down by\nLancelot's side. Lancelot in the meantime rose to his feet in all his\nagony and by a sort of miracle as it seemed to those who were on his\nside, drove all his opponents back to the barrier. Then the trumpet blew\nand proclaimed that the knight who wore the scarlet sleeve with pearls\nwas victor.\n\n\"Go up and get your diamond,\" his men said to him.\n\n\"Don't give me any diamonds,\" said Lancelot. \"My prize is death, I'll\nleave and don't follow.\"\n\nThen he vanished into the poplar grove where he told Lavaine to draw out\nthe lance head.\n\n\"I'm afraid you'll die, if I do,\" cried Lavaine.\n\n\"I'm dying now with it,\" said Lancelot, so Lavaine drew it out and\nLancelot gave a wonderful shriek and swooned away.\n\nThen the old hermit came out, carried him into the white rock and\nstanched his wound.\n\nImmediately after he had left the field the men of his side went to the\nking and said that the knight who had won the day had left without\nreceiving his prize.\n\n\"Such a knight as that must not go uncared for,\" said the king. \"Gawain,\nride out and find him and since he didn't come for his diamond we will\nsend it to him. Don't leave your quest until you have him.\"\n\nGawain the courteous was a good young knight but he didn't like it that\nhe had to leave the banquet and the king's side to look for a stranger\nknight, so he mounted his horse rather crossly. He rode all round the\ncountry to every place except the right one, poplar grove, and at last\nvery late reached the Castle of Astolat.\n\n\"What news from Camelot?\" cried Elaine as soon as she saw him, \"What\nabout the knight with the red sleeve?\"\n\n\"He won.\"\n\n\"I knew it,\" she said.\n\n\"But he left the jousts wounded in his side.\"\n\nThen Elaine almost swooned away. When the Lord of Astolat came out and\nheard about Gawain's quest, \"Stay with us, noble prince,\" said he. \"For\nthe knight was here and left his shield with us, so he will certainly\ncome back or send for it. Besides my son is with him.\"\n\nGawain thought he would have a pleasant time with Elaine so he stayed.\nBut Elaine rebelled against his pretty love-making and asked him why he\nneglected the king's quest and why he didn't ask to see the knight's\nshield.\n\n\"I've lost my quest in the light of your blue eyes,\" said Gawain, \"but\nlet me see the shield. Ah! the king was right!\" he cried out when Elaine\nshowed it to him. \"It was our Lancelot.\"\n\n\"I was right too,\" Elaine said merrily, \"for I dreamed that my knight\nwas the greatest of them all.\"\n\n\"And suppose that I dreamed that you love this greatest knight?\"\nreturned Gawain.\n\n\"What do I know?\" Elaine answered simply. \"I don't know whether I know\nwhat love is, but I do know that if I do not love him there isn't\nanother man whom I can love.\"\n\n\"Yes, you love him well,\" said Gawain. \"And I suppose you know just\nwhere your greatest knight is hidden, so let me leave my quest with you.\nIf you love him it will be sweet to you to give him the diamond and if\nhe loves you it will be sweet to him to receive it from you, while even\nif he doesn't love you, a diamond is always a diamond. Farewell a\nthousand times. If he loves you I may see you at court after while.\"\n\nThen Gawain lightly kissed her hand as he laid the diamond in it, and,\nwearied of his quest, leaped on his horse and carrolling a love-ballad\nairily rode away to the court where it was soon buzzed abroad that a\nmaid of Astolat loved Lancelot and that Lancelot loved a maid of\nAstolat.\n\nThe maid meanwhile crept up to her father one day and received his leave\nto take the diamond to Sir Lancelot. Sir Torre went with her to the\ngates of Camelot where they saw Lavaine capering about on a horse.\n\n\"Lavaine!\" she cried, \"how is it with my lord Sir Lancelot?\" and she\ntold him about the diamond. Then Sir Torre went on into the city while\nLavaine guided Elaine to the hermit's cave. As she saw her handsome\nknight on the floor, a sort of skeleton of himself, she gave a little\ntender dolorous cry.\n\n\"Your prize, the diamond, sent you by the king,\" said she, as she put it\ninto his hand and explained how she had received it from Gawain. Then he\nkissed her as a father would kiss a dear little daughter and she went\nback to the dim, rich city of Camelot for the night. But the next\nmorning she was back in the cave, and day after day she came, caring for\nhim more mildly, tenderly and kindly than any mother could with a child,\nuntil at last the old hermit said she had nursed him back to life, then\nall three rode back together one morning to Astolat where Lancelot asked\nElaine to tell him the dearest wish of her heart so that he could grant\nit to her. Elaine turned as pale as a ghost when he first spoke but at\nlast one day she told him. She said she wanted him to love her, she\nwanted to be his wife.\n\n\"If I had chosen to wed,\" Lancelot replied, slowly, \"I would have been\nmarried long before this. But now I shall never marry, sweet Elaine.\"\n\n\"No, no,\" cried Elaine, \"it won't matter if I can't be your wife, if I\ncan only go with you always and go round the world with you and serve\nyou.\"\n\nBut Lancelot said that would be a poor way for him to requite the love\nand kindness her father and brothers had shown him. \"Noble maid,\" he\nwent on, \"this is only the first flash of love with you. After awhile\nyou will smile at yourself about it when you find a knight who is fitter\nfor you to marry and not three times older than you as I am, and then I\nwill give you broad lands and territories even to a half of my kingdom\nacross the seas and I'll always be ready to fight for you in your\ntroubles. I'll do this, dear girl, but more I cannot.\"\n\n\"Of all this I care for nothing,\" Elaine said growing deathly pale and\nfalling in a swoon.\n\nThat evening Lancelot sent for his shield from the tower where Elaine\nsat with it, and as his horse's hoofs clattered off upon the stone of\nthe highway she looked down from her tower, but he did not glance back.\n\nAfter that Elaine dreamed her time sadly away in the tower and only\nwished that she could die. She begged her father to send for the priest\nto confess her and asked Lavaine to write a letter for her to Lancelot.\nThen she arranged it that when she died the dumb old man at the gate was\nto take her in the barge down the river to the king's palace. Eleven\ndays later this was done. Elaine was dressed like a little sleeping\nqueen and floated along the stream with her letter in one hand and a\nlily in the other.\n\nThat day Lancelot was with the queen and as he looked out of the\ncasement upon the river he saw the barge hung with rich black samite,\nthe dumb old man and the lily maid of Astolat gliding up to the palace\ndoor.\n\n\"What is it?\" cried everybody streaming round. \"A pale fairy queen come\nto take Arthur to fairy land?\"\n\nThen the king bade meek Sir Percival and pure Sir Galahad carry her\nreverently into the hall where the fine Gawain came and wondered at her\nand Lancelot came and mused over her, and the queen came and pitied her.\nBut King Arthur spied a letter, opened it and read it aloud to all the\nlords and ladies. It was Elaine's goodbye to Lancelot.\n\n[Illustration: A PALE FAIRY QUEEN CAME TO TAKE ARTHUR TO FAIRY LAND.]\n\nThen Sir Lancelot told them everything about Elaine and how he had\npromised to give her his lands and riches when she should be ready to\nmarry some knight of her own age. The king said that he should see that\nshe was buried very grandly. So they had a procession with all the pomp\nof a queen, with gorgeous ceremonies, mass and rolling music while all\nthe Order of the Round Table followed her to the tomb. Then they laid\nthe shield of Lancelot at her feet and put a lily in her hand.\n\n\n\n\nTHE HOLY GRAIL.\n\n\nOne day a new monk came into the abbey beyond Camelot. There was\nsomething about him different from all the other monks there. He was so\npolished and clever that old Ambrosious who had lived in the old\nmonastery for fifty years and had never seen a bit of the world guessed\nin a minute that the new brother had come from King Arthur's court. And\none windy April morning as Ambrosious stood under the yew tree with this\ngentle monk he asked him why he left the Knights of the Round Table.\n\nThen Sir Percival answered:\n\n\"It was the sweet vision of the Holy Grail.\"\n\n[Illustration: \"THE HOLY GRAIL,\" CRIED AMBROSIOUS.]\n\n\"The Holy Grail,\" cried Ambrosious. \"Heaven knows I don't know much, but\nwhat is that, the phantom of a cup that comes and goes?\"\n\n\"No, no,\" said Percival, \"what phantom do you mean? It's the cup that\nour Lord drank from at his sad last supper, and after he died Joseph of\nAramathea brought it to Glastonbury at Christmas time, and there it\nstayed a while and every one who looked at it or touched it was healed\nof their sicknesses. But the times grew so wicked that the cup was\ncaught up into heaven where nobody could see it.\"\n\n\"Yes, I remember reading in our old books,\" said Ambrosious, \"how Joseph\nbuilt a lonely little church at Glastonbury on the marsh, but that was\nlong ago. Who first saw the vision of the Holy Grail to-day?\"\n\n\"A woman,\" said Sir Percival, \"a nun, my sister who was a holy maid if\never there was one. The old man to whom she used to tell her sins (or\nwhat she called her sins), often spoke to her about the legend of the\nHoly Grail which had been handed down through six people, each of them a\nhundred years old, from the Lord's time. And when Arthur made the order\nof the Round Table and all hearts became clean and pure for a time this\nold man thought surely the Holy Grail would come back again. 'O Christ!'\nhe used to say to my sister, 'if only it would come back and help all\nthe world of its wickedness!' And then my sister asked him whether it\nmight come to her by prayer and fasting.\n\n\"'Perhaps,' said the father, 'for your heart is as pure as snow.'\n\n\"So she prayed and fasted until the sun shone and the wind blew through\nher and one day she sent for me. Her eyes were so beautiful with the\nlight of holiness that I did not know them.\n\n\"'Sweet Brother,' she said, 'I have seen the Holy Grail. I heard a sound\nlike a silver horn but sweeter than any music we can make, and then a\ncold silver beam of light streamed in through my cell, and down the beam\nstole the Holy Grail, rose red and throbbing as if it were alive. All\nthe walls of my cell grew rosy red with quivering rosy colors. Then the\nmusic faded away, the Holy Grail vanished and the colors died out in\nthe darkness. So now we know the Holy Thing is here again, Brother fast,\ntoo, and pray, and tell your brother-knights about it, then perhaps the\nvision may be seen by you all, and the whole world will be healed.'\n\n[Illustration: MY KNIGHT OF HEAVEN, GO FORTH.]\n\n\"So I told all the knights and we fasted and prayed for many weeks. Then\nmy sister cut off all her long streaming silken hair which used to fall\nto her feet and out of it braided a strong sword belt and with silver\nand crimson thread she wove into it a crimson grail in a silver beam.\nThen she bound it on our beautiful boy knight, Sir Galahad, and said:\n\n\"'My knight of heaven, go forth, for you shall see what I have seen and\nfar in the spiritual city you will be crowned king.' Then she sent the\ndeathless passion of her eyes through him and he believed what she said.\n\n\"Then came a year of miracles. In our great hall there stood a chair\nwhich Merlin had fashioned carved with strange figures like a serpent\nand in and out among the strange figures ran a scroll of strange letters\nin a language nobody knew like a serpent. Merlin called it the Seat\nPerilous, because he said if any one sat in it he would get lost. And\nGalahad said that if he got lost in it he would save himself. So one\nsummer night Sir Galahad sat down in the chair and all at once there was\na cracking of the roofs above us, and a blast and thunder, and in the\nthunder there was a cry and in the blast there was a beam of light seven\ntimes clearer than the daylight. Down the beam stole the Holy Grail all\ncovered over with a luminous cloud. Then it passed away but every knight\nsaw his brother knight's faces in a glory and we all rose and stared at\neach other until at last I found my voice and swore a vow.\n\n\"I swore that because I had not seen the Holy Grail behind the cloud I\nwould ride away a year and a day in quest of it until I could see it as\nmy sister saw it. Galahad swore too, and good Sir Bors, and Lancelot and\nmany others, knights, and Gawain louder than all the rest.\n\n\"The king was not in the hall that day for he had gone out to help some\npoor maiden, but as he came back over the plains beyond Camelot he saw\nthe roofs rolling in smoke and thought that his wonderfully dear,\nbeautiful hall which Merlin had built for him so wonderfully was afire.\nSo he rode fast and rushed into the tumult of knights and asked me what\nit all meant.\n\n\"'Woe is me!' cried the king when I told him. 'Had I been here you would\nnot have sworn the vows.'\n\n\"'My king,' I answered boldly, had you been here you would have sworn\nthe vows yourself.'\n\n\"'Yes, yes,' said he, 'are you so bold when you didn't see the Grail?\nYou didn't see farther than the cloud, and what can you expect to see\nnow if you go out into the wilderness?'\n\n\"'No, no, Lord, I didn't see the Grail, I heard the sound, I saw the\nlight and since I didn't see the holy thing I swore the vow that I would\nfollow it until I did see.'\n\n\"'Then he asked us, knight by knight, whether we had seen it and each\none said, 'No, no, Lord, that was why we swore our vows,' but suddenly\nGalahad called out, 'But I saw the Holy Grail, Sir Arthur, and heard the\ncry, \"O Galahad, follow me.\"'\n\n\"Ah, Galahad, Galahad,' said the king, 'the vision is for such as you\nand for your holy nun but not for these. Are you all Galahads or all\nPercivals? No, no, you are just men with the strength to right the\nwrongs and violences of the land. But now since one has seen, all the\nblind want to see. However, since you have made the vow, go. But oh, how\noften the distressed people of the kingdom will come into the hall for\nyou to help them and all your chairs will be vacant while you are out\nchasing a fire in the quagmire! Many of you, yes, most of you will never\ncome back again! But come to-morrow before you go, let us have one more\nday of field sports so that before you go I can rejoice in the unbroken\nstrength of the Order I have made.'\n\n\"So the next day there was the greatest tournament that Camelot had ever\nseen, and Galahad and I, with a strength which we had received from the\nvision, overthrew so many knights that all the people cheered hotly for\nSir Galahad and Sir Percival. The next morning all the rich balconies\nalong the streets of Camelot were laden with ladies and showers of\nflowers fell over us as we passed out and men and boys astride lions and\ndragons, griffins and swans at the street corners, called us all by name\nand cried, 'God Speed!' while many lords and ladies wept. Then we came\ndown to the gate of The Three Queens and there each one went on his own\nway.\n\n\"I was feeling glad over my victories in the lists and thought the sky\nnever looked so blue nor the earth so green. All my blood danced within\nme for I knew that I would see the Holy Grail. But after a while I\nthought of the dark warning of the king. I looked about and saw that I\nwas quite alone in a sandy thorny place, and I thought I would die of\nthirst. Then I came to a deep lawn with a flowing brook and apple trees\noverhanging it. But while I was drinking of the water and eating of the\napples they all turned to dust, and I was alone and thirsty again in\namong the sands and thorns. Next I saw a woman spinning beside a\nbeautiful house. She rose to greet me and stretched out her arms to\nwelcome me into her house to rest, but as soon as I touched her she fell\nto dust, and the house turned into a shed with a dead baby inside, and\nthen it fell to dust too.\n\n\"Then I rode on and found a big hill and on the top was a walled city,\nthe spires with incredible pinnacles reaching up to the sky, and at the\ngateway there was a crowd of people who cried out to me:\n\n\"Welcome, Percival, you mightiest and purest of men!\"\n\n\"But when I reached the top there was no one there. I passed through to\nthe ruined old city and found only one person a very, very old man.\n'Where is the crowd who called out to me?' I asked him.\n\n\"He could scarcely speak, but he gasped out, 'Where are you from and who\nare you?' and then fell to dust.\n\n[Illustration: NEXT I SAW A WOMAN SPINNING.]\n\n\"Then I was so unhappy I cried. I felt as though even if I should see\nthe Holy Grail itself and touched it it would crumble into dust. From\nthere I passed down into a deep valley, as low down as the city was\nhigh up, where I found a chapel with a hermit in a hermitage near by. I\ntold him about all these phantoms.\n\n\"'You haven't true humility,' he said, 'which is the mother of all\nvirtue. You haven't lost yourself to find yourself as Galahad did.'\n\n\"Just as he ended suddenly Sir Galahad shone before us in silver armor.\nHe laid his lance beside the chapel door and we all went in and knelt in\nprayer. Then my thirst was quenched. But when the mass was burned I saw\nonly the holy elements while Galahad saw the Holy Grail come down upon\nthe shrine.\n\n\"'The Holy Grail,' he said, 'has always been at my side ever since we\ncame away, fainter in the daytime, but blood-red at night. In its\nstrength I have overcome evil customs wherever I have gone, and have\npassed through Pagan lands and clashed with Pagan hordes and broken them\ndown everywhere. But the time is very near now when I shall go into the\nspiritual city far away where some one will crown me king. Come with me\nfor you will see the Holy Grail in a vision when I go.'\n\n\"At the close of the day I started away with him. We came to a hill\nwhich only a man could climb, scarred all over with a hundred frozen\nstreams, and when we reached the top there was a wild storm. Galahad's\narmor flashed and darkened again every instant with quick, thick\nlightnings which struck the dead old tree trunks on every side until at\nlast they blazed into a fire. At the base was a great black swamp partly\nwhitened with bones of dead men. A chain of bridges lead across it to\nthe great sea, and Galahad crossed them, one after the other, but each\none burned away as soon as he had passed over so that I had to stay\nbehind. When he reached the great sea the Holy Grail hung over his head\nin a brilliant cloud. Then a boat came swiftly by and when the sky\nbrightened again with the lightning I could see him floating away,\neither in a boat with full sails or a winged creature which was flying,\nI couldn't tell which. Above him hung the Holy Grail rosy red without\nthe cloud. I had seen the holy thing at last. When I saw Sir Galahad\nagain he looked like a silver star in the sky, and beyond the star was\nthe spiritual city with all her spires and gateways in a glory like one\npearl, no larger than a pearl. From the star a rosy red sparkle from the\nGrail shot across to the city. But while I looked a flood of rain came\ndown in torrents, and how I ever came away I don't know, but anyway at\nthe dawn of the next day I had reached the little chapel again. There I\ngot my horse from the hermit and rode back to the gates of Camelot.\n\n\"Just once I met one of the other knights. That was one night when the\nfull moon was rising and the pelican of Sir Bors' casque made a shadow\non it. I spurred on my horse, hailed him and we were both very glad to\nsee each other.\n\n\"'Where is Sir Lancelot,' he asked. 'Have you seen him? Once he dashed\nacross me very madly, maddening his horse. When I asked him why he rode\nso hotly on a holy quest he shouted, 'Don't keep me, I was a sluggard,\nand now I'm going fast for there's a lion in the way.' Then he vanished.\nWhen I saw how mad he was I felt very sad for I love him, and I cared no\nmore whether I saw the Holy Grail, or not; but I rode on until I came to\nthe loneliest parts of the country where some magicians told me I\nfollowed a mocking fire. This vexed me and when the people saw that I\nquarrelled with their priests they bound me and put me into a cell of\nstones. I lay there for hours until one night a miracle happened. One\nof the stones slipped away without any one touching it or any wind\nblowing. Through the gap it made I saw the seven clear stars which we\nhave always called the stars of the Round Table and across the seven\nstars the sweet Grail glided past. Close after a clap of thunder pealed.\nThen a maiden came to me in secret and loosed me and let me go.'\n\n[Illustration: ACROSS THE SEVEN STARS THE SWEET GRAIL GLIDED PAST.]\n\n\"Sir Bors and I rode along together and when we reached the city our\nhorses stumbled over heaps of ruined bits of houses that fell as they\ntrod along the streets. At last brought us to Arthur's hall.\n\n\"As we came in we saw Arthur sitting on his throne with just a tenth of\nthe knights who had gone out on the quest of the Holy Grail standing\nbefore him, wasted and worn, also the knights who had stayed at home.\nWhen he saw me he rose and said he was glad to see me back, that he had\nbeen worrying about me because of the fierce gale that had made havoc\nthrough the town and shaken even the new strong hall and half wrenched\nthe statue Merlin made for him.\n\n\"'But the quest,' the king went on, 'have you seen the cup that Joseph\nbrought long ago to Glastonbury?'\n\n\"Then when I told him all that you have been hearing just now and how I\nwas going to give up the tournament and tilt and pass into the quiet of\nthe life of the monk, he answered not a word, but turning quickly to\nGawain asked,\n\n\"'Gawain, was this quest for you?'\n\n\"'No, Lord,' replied Gawain, 'not for such as I. I talked with a saintly\nold man about that and he made me very sure that it wasn't for me. I was\nvery tired of it. But I found a silk pavilion in the field with a lot of\nmerry girls in it, then this gale tore it off from the tenting pin and\nblew my merry maidens all about with a great deal of discomfort. If it\nhadn't been for that storm my twelve months and a day would have passed\nvery pleasantly for me.'\n\n\"Then Arthur turned to Sir Bors, who had pushed across the throng at\nonce to Lancelot's side, caught him by the hand and held it there half\nhidden beside him until the king spied them.\n\n\"'Hail, Bors, if ever a true and loyal man could see the Grail you have\nseen it,' cried Arthur.\n\n\"'Don't ask me about it,' replied Sir Bors with tears in his eyes 'I may\nnot speak about it; I saw it.'\n\n\"The others spoke only about the perils of their storm, and then it was\nLancelot's turn. Perhaps Arthur kept his best for the last.\n\n\"'My Lancelot,' said the king, 'our Strongest, has the quest availed for\nyou?'\n\n\"'Our strongest, O King!' groaned Lancelot and as he paused I thought I\nsaw a dying fire of madness in his eyes. 'O King, my friend, a sin lived\nin me that was so strange that everything pure, noble and knightly in me\ntwined and clung around it until the good and the poisonous in me grew\ntogether, and when your knights swore to make the quest I swore only in\nthe hope that could I see or touch the Holy Grail they might be pulled\napart. Then I spoke to a holy saint who said that if they could not be\nplucked apart my quest would be all in vain. So I vowed to him that I\nwould do just as he told me, and while I was out trying to tear them\naway from each other my old madness came back to me and whipped me off\ninto waste fields far away.\n\n\"There I was beaten down by little knights whom at one time I would have\nfrightened away just by the shadow of my spear. From there I rode over\nto the sea-shore where such a blast of wind began to blow that you could\nnot hear the waves even although they were heaped up in mountains and\ndrove the sea like a cataract, while the sand on the beach swept by like\na river. A boat, half-swallowed by the seafoam, was moored to the shore\nby a chain. I said to myself that I would embark in the boat and lose\nmyself and wash away my sin in the great sea.\n\n\"For seven days I rode around over the dreary water and on the seventh\nnight I felt the boat striking ground. In front of me rose the enchanted\ntowers of Carbonek, a castle like a rock upon a rock, with portals open\nto the sea and steps that met the waves. A lion sat on each side of\nthem. I went up the steps and drew my sword. Suddenly flaring their\nmanes the lions stood up like men and gripped me on my shoulders. When I\nwas about to strike them a voice said to me, 'Don't be afraid, or the\nbeasts will tear you to pieces; go on.' Then my sword was dashed\nviolently from my hand and fell. Up into the sounding hall I passed but\nsaw not a bench, table, picture, shield or anything else except the moon\nover the sea through the oriel window, but I heard a sweet voice as\nclear as a lark singing in the topmost tower to the east. I climbed up a\nthousand steps with great pain. It seemed as though I was climbing\nforever but at last I reached a door with light shining through the\ncrannies and I heard voices singing 'Glory and joy and honor to our Lord\nand the Holy Vessel, the Grail.'\n\n\"'Then I madly tried the door, it gave way and through a stormy glare of\nheat that burned me and made me swoon away I thought I saw the Grail,\nall veiled with crimson samite and around it great angels, awful shapes\nand wings and eyes!'\n\n\"The long hall was silent after Lancelot was done, until airy Gawain\nbegan with a sudden.\n\n\"'O King, my liege, my good friend Percival and your holy nun have\ndriven men mad. By my eyes and ears I swear I'll be deeper than a\nblue-eyed cat and three times as blind as any owl at noon-time\nhereafter to any holy virgins in their ecstasies.'\n\n\"'Gawain,' replied the king, 'don't try to become blinder; you're too\nblind now to want to see. If a sign really came from heaven Bors,\nLancelot and Percival are blessed for they have each seen according to\ntheir sight.'\"\n\n\n\n\nPELLEAS AND ETTARRE.\n\n\nWhen his knights went after the Holy Grail Arthur made many new knights\nto fill the gaps made by their absence. As he sat in his hall one day at\nold Caerleon the high doors were softly parted and through these in came\na youth, and with him the outer sunshine and the sweet scent of meadows.\n\n\"Make me your knight, Sir King!\" he cried, \"because I know all about\neverything that belongs to a knight and because I love a maiden.\"\n\nThis youth was Sir Pelleas-of-the-Isles who had heard that the king had\nproclaimed a great tournament at Caerleon with a sword for the victor\nand a golden crown for the victor's sweetheart as the prize. He longed\nto win them, the circlet for his lady love, the sword for himself.\n\nJust a few days before, while riding across the Forest of Dean to find\nthe king's palace hall at Caerleon, Pelleas had felt the sun beating on\nhis helmet so sharply that he reeled and almost fell from his horse.\nThen, seeing a hillock near-by overgrown with stately beech trees and\nflowers here and there beneath, he tied his horse to a tree, threw\nhimself down and was very soon lost in sweet dreams about a maiden, not\nany particular maiden for he had no sweetheart at that time.\n\nBut suddenly he was wakened with a sound of chatter and laughing at the\noutskirts of the grove, and glancing through fern he saw a party of\nyoung girls in many colors like the clouds at sunset, all of them riding\non richly dressed horses. They were all talking together in a\nhodgepodge, some pointing this way, some that, for they had lost their\nway.\n\n[Illustration: WAS VERY SOON LOST IN SWEET DREAMS ABOUT A MAIDEN.]\n\nPelleas sprang up, loosed his horse and led him into the light.\n\n\"Just in time!\" cried the lady who seemed to be the leader of the party.\n\"See, our pilot-star! Youth, we are wandering damsels riding armed, as\nyou see, ready to tilt against the knights at Caerleon, but we've lost\nour way. To the right? to the left? straight on? forward? backward?\nwhich is it? tell us quickly.\"\n\nPelleas gazed at her and wondered to himself whether the famous Queen\nGuinevere herself was as beautiful as this maiden. For her violet eyes,\nscornful eyes, were large and the bloom on her cheeks was like the rosy\ndawn. Her beauty made Pelleas timid and when she spoke to him he could\nnot answer but only stammered, for he had come from far away waste\nislands where besides his sisters, he had scarcely known any women but\nthe tough wives of the islands who made fish nets.\n\nWith a slow smile the lady turned round to her companions the smile\nspreading to them all. For she was Ettarre, a very great lady in her\nland.\n\n\"O, wild man of the woods,\" she cried, \"don't you understand our\nlanguage, or has heaven given you a beautiful face and no tongue?\"\n\n\"Lady,\" he answered, \"I just woke from my dreams, and coming out of the\ngloomy woods I was dazzled by the sudden light, and beg your pardon. But\nare you going to Caerleon? I'm going too. Shall I lead you to the king?\"\n\n\"Lead,\" said she.\n\nSo through the woods they went together but his tender manner, his awe\nof her and his bashfulness bothered her. \"I've lighted on a fool,\" she\nmuttered to herself, \"so raw and yet so stale!\"\n\nBut since she wished to be crowned the Queen of Beauty in the king's\ntournament, and since Pelleas looked strong she thought perhaps he would\nfight for her, so she flattered him and was very pleasant and kind. Her\nthree knights and maidens were kind to him too, for she was a very\ngreat lady and they had to do as she did. When they reached Caerleon\nbefore she passed on to her lodgings she took Pelleas by the hand and\nsaid:\n\n[Illustration: SHE TOOK PELLEAS BY THE HAND.]\n\n\"O, how strong your hand is! See; look at my poor little weak one! Will\nyou fight for me and win me the crown, Pelleas, so that I may love you?\"\n\nPelleas' heart danced. \"Yes! Yes!\" he cried, \"and will you love me if I\nwin?\"\n\n\"Yes, that I will,\" answered Ettarre laughing and flinging away his hand\nas she peeped round to her knights and ladies until they all laughed\nwith her.\n\n\"O what a happy world!\" thought glad Pelleas, \"everybody seems happy and\nI am the happiest of all.\"\n\nHe couldn't sleep that night for joy and on the next day when he was\nknighted he swore to love one maiden only. As he came away from the\nking's hall the men who met him all turned around to look at his face,\nfor it flamed with happiness, and at the great banquets which Arthur\ngave to knights from all parts of the country Pelleas looked the noblest\nof the noble. For he dreamed that his lady loved him and he knew that he\nwas loved by the king.\n\nOn the morning when the jousts began the first that was called was the\ntournament of youth. Arthur wanted to keep the older, stronger men out\nof it so that young Pelleas might win his lady's love as she had\npromised, and be lord of the tourney. Down by the field along the river\nUsk where it was held the gilded parapets were crowned with faces and\nthe great tower filled with eyes up to its top. Then the trumpets blew\nfor the tournament to begin.\n\nAll day long Sir Pelleas held the field. At the close a shout rang round\nthe galleries as Ettarre caught the gold crown from his lance and\ncrowned herself before all the people. Her eyes sparkled as she looked\nat him, but that was the last time she was kind to her knight.\n\nShe lingered a few days at Caerleon, sunny to all the other people but\nalways frowning at him.\n\nStill when she left for home with her knights and maidens Sir Pelleas\nfollowed.\n\n\"Damsels,\" cried she as she saw him coming, \"I ought to be ashamed to\nsay it and yet I can't bear that Sir Baby. Keep him back with\nyourselves. I'd rather have some rough old knight who knows the ways of\nthe world to chatter and joke with; so don't let him come near me.\nTell him all sorts of baby fables that good mothers tell their little\nboys, and if he runs off for us--it doesn't matter.\"\n\n[Illustration: ETTARRE CROWNED HERSELF BEFORE ALL THE PEOPLE.]\n\nSo the young women didn't let him go near Ettarre but made him stay with\nthem, and as soon as they had all passed into Ettarre's castle gate up\nsprang the drawbridge, down rang the iron grating, and Sir Pelleas was\nleft outside all alone.\n\n\"These are only the ways of ladies with their lovers when the ladies\nwant to find out whether the lovers are true or not. Well, she can try\nme with anything, I'll be true through all.\"\n\nSo he stayed there until dark, then went to a priory not far off and the\nnext morning came back. Every day he did the same whether it rained or\nshone, armed on his charger, and stayed all the day beneath the walls,\nalthough nobody opened the gate for him.\n\nThis made Ettarre's scorn turn to anger. She told her three knights to\ngo out and drive him away. But when they came out Pelleas overthrew them\nall as they dashed upon him one after the other. So they went back\ninside and he kept his watch as before. This turned Ettarre's anger into\nhate. As she walked on top of the walls with her three knights about a\nweek later she pointed down to Pelleas and said:\n\n\"He haunts me, look, he besieges me! I can't breathe. Strike him down,\nput my hate into your blows and drive him away from my walls.\"\n\nSo down they went but Pelleas overthrew them all again so Ettarre called\ndown from the tower above, \"Bind him and bring him in.\"\n\nPelleas heard her say this so he did not resist, but let the men bind\nhim and take him into his lady love. \"See me, Lady,\" he said cheerily,\n\"your prisoner, and if you keep me in your dungeon here I'll be quite\ncontent if you'll just let me see your face every day. For I've sworn my\nvows and you've given me your promise and I know that when you've done\nproving me you will give me your love and have me for your knight.\"\n\nBut she made fun of his vows and told her knights to put him outside\nagain and \"if he isn't a fool to the middle of his bones,\" said she,\n\"he'll never come back.\" Then the three knights laughed and thrust him\nout of the gates.\n\nBut a week later Ettarre called them again, \"He's watching there yet. He\ncomes just like a dog that's been kicked out of his master's door. Don't\nyou hate him? Go after him, all of you at once, and if you don't kill\nhim bind him as you did before and bring him in.\"\n\nSo the three knights couched their spears all together, three against\none, ready to dash upon Pelleas, low down beneath the shadow of the\ntowers.\n\nGawain passing by on a lonely adventure saw them.\n\n\"The villains!\" he shouted to Pelleas, \"I'll strike for you!\"\n\n\"No,\" cried Pelleas, \"when one's doing a lady's will one doesn't need\nany help.\"\n\nGawain stood by quivering to fight while the three knights sprang down\nupon Pelleas, but Pelleas all alone beat the three of them together.\nThen they rose to their feet, and he stood still while they bound him\nand took him into their lady.\n\n\"You're scarcely fit to touch your victor, you dogs!\" she cried to her\nmen, \"far less bind him; but take him out as he is and let whoever wants\nto untie him. Then if he comes again--\"\n\nShe paused just a minute and Pelleas broke in at once with, \"Lady, I\nloved you and thought you very beautiful, but if you don't love me\ndon't trouble yourself about it; you won't see me again.\"\n\nAs soon as Pelleas was put outside the gate Gawain sprang forward,\nloosed his bonds, flung them over the walls and cried out:\n\n\"My faith, and why did you let those wretches tie you up so when you\nwere victor of all the jousts?\"\n\n\"O,\" said Pelleas, \"they were just obeying the wishes of my lady, and\nher wishes are mine.\"\n\nGawain laughed. \"Lend me your horse and armor,\" he said, \"and I'll tell\nher I've killed you. Then she'll let me in just to hear all about it and\nwhen I've made her listen I'll tell her all about you, what a great and\ngood fellow you are. Give me three days to melt her and on the third\nevening I'll bring you golden news.\"\n\n\"Don't betray me,\" cried Pelleas, as he handed over his horse and all\nhis weapons except his sword. \"Aren't you the knight they call\n'Light-of-love?'\"\n\n\"That is just because women are so light,\" Gawain rejoined, laughing.\n\nThen he rode up to the castle gate, and blew the bugle so musically that\nall the hidden echoes in the walls rang out.\n\n\"Away with you!\" cried Ettarre's maidens, running up to the tower\nwindow. \"Our lady doesn't love you.\"\n\n\"I'm Gawain from Arthur's court,\" cried Gawain, lifting his vizor so\nthat they could see his face. \"I've killed Pelleas whom you hate so.\nOpen the gates and I'll make you merry with my story.\"\n\nThe ladies ran down crying out to Ettarre, \"Pelleas is dead! Sir Gawain\nof Arthur's court has killed him and is blowing the bugle to come in to\ntell us.\"\n\n\"Let him in,\" said Ettarre.\n\nThen they opened the gates and Gawain rode inside.\n\nFor three days Pelleas wandered all about, doing nothing but thinking of\nGawain and Ettarre, and on the third night, when Gawain did not come, he\nwondered why Gawain lingered with his golden news. At last he rode up to\nEttarre's castle, tied his horse outside and walked in through the wide\nopen gates. The court he found all dark and empty, not a light\nglimmering from anywhere, so he passed out by the back gate, into the\nlarge gardens beyond of red and white roses, where he saw three\npavilions. In one he found the three knights with their squires, all red\nwith revelling, and all asleep, in the second he saw the girls with\ntheir scornful smiles frozen stiff in slumber, and in the third lay\nGawain with Ettarre, the golden crown he had won for her at the joust on\nher forehead, both sleeping.\n\nPelleas drew back as if he had touched a snake.\n\n\"I'll kill them just as they lie,\" he cried in a passion. \"O! to think\nthat any knight could be so false!\"\n\nBut he was too manly to kill anyone in sleep, so he just laid his sword\nacross their throats and passed out to his horse, crushed his saddle\nwith his thighs, clenched his hands together and groaned.\n\n\"I loathe her now just as much as I loved her!\" he cried, and dashing\nhis spurs into his horse he bounded out into the darkness and never came\nback.\n\nMeanwhile Ettarre, feeling the cold sword on her neck, awoke.\n\n\"Liar!\" she cried to Gawain, as she saw that it was the sword of\nPelleas, \"you haven't killed Pelleas, for he's been here and could have\nkilled us both just now.\"\n\nAnd ever after that, as those who tell the story say, the proud and\nscornful Ettarre sighed for Pelleas, the one true knight in the world,\nher only faithful lover, and at last pined away because he never came\nback.\n\n\n\n\nTHE LAST TOURNAMENT.\n\n\nOne day while King Arthur and Sir Lancelot were riding far, far beneath\na winding wall of rock they heard the wail of a child.\n\nA half-dead oak tree climbed up the sides of the rock and up in mid-air\nit held an eagle's nest. Through its branches rushed a rainy wind and\nthrough the wind came the voice of a little child. Lancelot sprang up\nthe crag and from the nest at the tree-top he brought down a baby girl.\nRound her neck was twined a necklace of rubies, wound round and round\nthree times.\n\nArthur took the baby and gave it to Queen Guinevere, who soon loved it\nvery tenderly and named her \"Nestling.\" But Nestling had caught a\nterrible cold in her strange little home in the wild eagle's nest and\ndied. And after that whenever the Queen looked at the ruby necklace it\nmade her very sad so she gave it to Arthur and said:\n\n\"Take these jewels of our Dead Innocence and make them a prize at a\ntournament.\"\n\n\"Just as you wish,\" cried the King, \"but why don't you wear the diamonds\nthat I found for you in the tarn, which Lancelot won for you at the\njousts?\"\n\n\"Don't you know that they slipped out of my hands the very day that he\ngave them to me, while I was leaning out of the window to see Elaine in\nthe barge on the river? But these rubies will bring better luck than\nthat to the lady who gets them, for they didn't come from a dead king's\nskeleton, but from the body of a sweet baby girl. Perhaps, who knows,\nthe purest of your knights will win them at the jousts for the purest of\nmy ladies.\"\n\nSo the great jousts were proclaimed with trumpets that blew all along\nthe streets of Camelot and out across the faded fields to the farthest\ntowers, and everywhere the knights armed themselves for a day of glory\nbefore the king.\n\nBut just the day before they were to be held, as King Arthur sat in his\ngreat hall, a churl staggered in through the door; his face was all\nstriped with the lashes of a dog whip, his nose was broken, one eye was\nout, a hand was off and the other hand dangled at his side with\nshattered fingers.\n\n\"My poor Churl,\" cried the king, full of indignant pity, \"what beast or\nfiend has been after you? Or was it a man who hurt you so?\"\n\n\"He took them all away,\" sputtered the churl, \"a hundred good ones. It\nwas the Red Knight. He--Lord, I was tending sheep, my pigs, a hundred\ngood ones, and he drove them all off to his tower. And when I said that\nyou were always kind to poor churls like me as well as gentle lords and\nladies, he made for me and would have killed me outright if he didn't\nwant me to bring you message and made me swear that I would tell you.\n\n\"He said, 'Tell the king that I have made a Round Table of my own in the\nNorth, and that whatever his knights swear not to do mine swear that\nthey will do; and tell him his hour has come, and that the heathen are\nafter him, and that his long lance is broken, and that his sword\nExcalibur is a straw.'\"\n\nThen Arthur turned to Sir Kay the Seneschal and said: \"Take this churl\nof mine and tend him very carefully as if he were the son of a king\nuntil all his hurts are healed,\" and as Sir Kay left the hall with the\nchurl the king went on to Lancelot: \"The heathen have been quiet for a\nlong, long time, but now they are rising again in the North, and I will\ngo with my younger knights to put them down, so as to make the whole\nisland safe from one shore to the other. And while I go away, you, Sir\nLancelot, will sit in my chair to-morrow at the tournament and be the\njudge there of the field. For why should you anyway care to go in again\nyourself, when you've already won the nine diamonds for the queen?\"\n\n\"Very well,\" replied Lancelot, \"if you wish, although it would be better\nif you would let me go off with the younger knights and you stay here\nwith the others and watch the tournament. But, if not, all is well?\"\n\n\"Is all really well?\" cried the king, \"or have I just dreamed that our\nknights are not quite so true and manly as they used to be and that my\nnoble realm which has been built up by noble deeds and noble vows is\ngoing to fall back into beastly roughness and violence again?\"\n\nHe gathered all the younger Knights of the Round Table together and\nstarted away with them down the hilly streets of Camelot, and at the\ngateway turned sharply North.\n\nThe next morning, the day of the Tournament, the Tournament of the Dead\nInnocence they called it, a wet wind blew. But the streets were hung\nwith white samite, the fountains were filled with wine, and round each\nfountain twelve little girls, all dressed in purest white sat with the\ncups of gold and gave drinks to all that passed. The stately galleries\nwere filled with white-robed ladies. Lancelot mounted the steps to the\nking's dragon-carved chair, the trumpets blew and the jousts began.\n\n[Illustration: TWELVE LITTLE GIRLS GAVE DRINK TO ALL WHO PASSED.]\n\nBut Lancelot did not think of the sport before him, he was dreaming over\nand over again the words of the king about the kingdom, and many rules\nof the tournament were broken, and he didn't say a word. Once one of the\nknights, who was overthrown cursed the little baby girl, the dead\ninnocence, and the king, and once one of the knight's helmets became\nunlaced and the wicked face of Modred peeped through like a vermin, but\nLancelot didn't see.\n\nAfter a while a roar of welcome shouted all round the galleries and\nlists as a new knight came in dressed from his head to his feet in green\narmor all trimmed with tiny silver deer, with holly berries on his\nhelmet crest. It was Sir Tristram of the Woods who had just crossed over\nthe seas from Brittany. Lancelot had fought with him long ago and\nconquered him, and now he saw him and longed to fight him again. As\nmany, many knights of the Round Table fell down before the new knight\nLancelot gripped the golden dragons on each side of his throne to keep\nhimself in his seat, and groaned with passion. \"Craven crests! oh,\nshame!\" he muttered, \"the glory of the Round Table is gone.\"\n\nSo Tristram won the jousts and Sir Lancelot gave him the jewels.\n\n\"The hands with which you take these rubies are red,\" he said as he put\nthe necklace in Tristram's hands.\n\nThen the thick rain began to fall, the plumes on the helmets of the\nknights drooped and the dresses of the ladies were mussed. When they\nwent inside to feast the ladies took off their pure white gowns and\nrobed themselves in all the colors of the rainbow and field flowers,\nlike poppies, blue-bells, kingcups, and one said she was glad the time\nto wear the pure innocent simple white was over. They grew so loud in\ntheir frolics that at last the queen, who was angry that Sir Tristram\nhad won the prize and angry with the lawless youths, broke up the\nbanquet.\n\nThe next morning as Sir Tristram stood before the hall little Dagonet,\nthe fool, came dancing along and Sir Tristram threw his rubies round\nthe little fool's neck as he skipped about like a withered leaf, asking\nhim why he danced.\n\n\"It's stupid to dance without music,\" Tristram said, and picked up his\nharp and began to twangle a tune on it; but as soon as Sir Tristram\nbegan to play Dagonet stopped his dance. \"And why don't you go on\nskipping, Sir Fool?\" asked Tristram.\n\n\"Because I'd rather skip twenty years to the music of my little brain\nthan skip a minute to the broken music you make.\"\n\n\"And what music have I broken?\" cried Sir Tristram. \"Arthur the King's\nmusic,\" cried little Dagonet, skipping again and again as Sir Tristram\nceased. Then down the city he danced all the way, while Sir Tristram\npassed out into the lonely avenues of the forests. He rode on toward\nLyonesse and the West, thinking of Isolt, the White, whom he loved, and\nhow he would put the rubies round her neck.\n\n[Illustration: LITTLE DAGONET SKIPPING AGAIN AND AGAIN.]\n\nArthur, meanwhile, with his hundred spearmen had gone far, far away,\nuntil at last over the countless reeds of marshes and islands he saw a\nhuge tower glaring in the wide-winged sunset of the West. As he drew\nnear he saw that the tower doors stood open and heard roars of rioting\nand wicked songs of ruffian men and women.\n\n\"Look,\" cried one of his knights, for there high on a grim dead tree\nbefore the tower, a brother of the Round Table was swinging by his neck,\nhis shield flowing with a shower of blood on a branch near by.\n\nAll the knights wanted to dash forward and blow the great horn that hung\nbeside the gate, but Arthur waved them back and went himself. He blew so\nhard that the horn roared until all the grasses of the marshes flared\nup, and out of the castle gate sallied a knight dressed from tip to toe\nin blood-red arms, the Red Knight.\n\n\"Aren't you the king?\" he bellowed, \"the king that keeps us all with\nsuch strict vows that we can't have any pleasures, a milky-hearted king?\nLook to your life now!\"\n\nArthur scorned to speak to so vile a man or to fight him with his sword.\nHe simply let the drunkard, stretching out from his horse to strike,\nfall head-heavy, over from the castle causeway to the swamp below.\n\nThen all the Round Table Knights roared and shouted, leaped down on the\nfallen man, trampled out his face in the mire, sank his head so that it\ncould not be seen, and, still shouting, sprang through the open doors\namong the people within. They hurled their swords right and left on men\nand women, hurled over the tables and the wines and slew and slew until\nall the rafters rang with yells and all the pavements streamed with\nblood. Then they set the tower all afire and half the night through it\nflushed the long low meadows and marshlands and lazily plunging sea with\nits flames. That was how Arthur made the ways of the island safe from\none shore to the other.\n\nSir Tristram, not many nights after, reached Tintagil, where Isolt, the\nWhite, lived in a crown of towers, where she now sat with the low\nsea-sunset glorying her hair and glossy throat, thinking of him and of\nMark, her Cornish lord.\n\nWhen Tristram's footsteps came grinding up the tower steps she flushed,\nstarted out to meet him and threw her white arms about him.\n\n\"Not Mark, not Mark!\" she cried. \"At first your footsteps fluttered me,\nfor Mark steals into his own castle like a cat.\"\n\n\"No, it's I,\" said Sir Tristram, \"and don't think about your Mark any\nmore, for he isn't yours any longer.\"\n\n\"But listen,\" she cried, \"to-day he went away for a three days' hunt, he\nsaid, and that means that he may be back in an hour for that's his way.\nMy God, my hate for him is as strong as my love for you. Let me tell you\nhow I sat here one evening thinking of you, one black midsummer night,\nall alone, dreaming of you, and sometimes speaking your name aloud, when\nsuddenly there Mark stood behind me, for that's his way to steal behind\none in the dark.\n\n\"'Tristram has married her!' he hissed out and then this tower shook\nwith such a roar that I swooned away.\"\n\n\"Come,\" cried Sir Tristram, laughing, \"never mind, I'm hungry, give me\nsome meat and wine.\"\n\nSo they ate and drank, talked and laughed about Mark with his long\ncrane-like legs, and Sir Tristram took a harp and sang a song. Then\nwhile the last light of the day glimmered away he swung the ruby\nnecklace before Isolt.\n\n\"It's the fruit of a magical oak-tree that grew mid air,\" he cried, \"and\nwas won by Sir Tristram as a tourney prize to bring to you.\"\n\nFlinging the rubies round her neck he had just touched her jeweled\nthroat with his lips when behind him rose a shadow and a shriek.\n\n\"Mark's way!\" cried Mark, the Cornish king, and he clove Tristram\nthrough the brain.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThat very night Arthur came back from the North, and as he climbed up\nthe tower steps to go to the queen, in the dark of the tower something\npulled at him. It was little Dagonet.\n\n\"Who are you?\" said the king.\n\n\"I'm little Dagonet, your fool,\" sobbed the little jester, \"and I cry\nbecause I can never make you laugh again.\"\n\n\n\n\nTHE PASSING OF ARTHUR.\n\n\nOne night King Arthur saw Sir Gawain in a dream, and Gawain, who had\nbeen killed, shrilly called out to him through the wind:\n\n\"Hail King! to-morrow you are going to pass away, and there's a land of\nrest for you. Farewell!\"\n\nBut when Arthur told his dream to Sir Bedivere, good old Sir Bedivere\nreplied, \"Don't mind what dreams tell you, but get your knights together\nand go out to the West to meet Sir Modred, who has stirred up against\nyou so many of the knights you love. They all know in their hearts that\nyou are king. Go and conquer them as of old.\"\n\nSo the king took his army by night and pushed upon Modred league after\nleague, until they reached the Western part of Lyonesse where the long\nmountains ended in the moaning sea. There Modred's men could flee no\nfarther, so on the waste lands by the barren sea they began that last\ndim weird battle of the West.\n\nA white chill mist slept over all the land and water so that even Arthur\nbecame confused since he could not see which were his friends and which\nwere his foes. Friends killed friends, some saw the faces of old ghosts\nlooking in upon the battle. Spears were splintered, shields were broken,\nswords clashed, helmets were shattered, men shrieked and looked up to\nheaven for help but saw only the white, white mists. There were cries\nfor light and moans.\n\nAt last toward the close of the day a hush fell over the whole shore; a\nbitter wind from the North blew the mist aside and the pale king looked\nacross the battlefield. But no one was there only the waves breaking in\namong the dead faces.\n\nBut bold Bedivere said: \"My King! the man who hates you stands there,\nModred, the traitor of your house!\"\n\n\"Don't call this traitor a person of my house,\" the king replied. \"The\nmen of my house are not those who have lived under one roof with me, but\nthose who always call me their king.\"\n\nWith that, Arthur dashed after Modred. Modred struck at the king's\nhelmet, which had grown thin with all his heathen wars. Arthur with his\nsword Excalibur struck Modred dead, then fell down himself almost killed\nwith the wound through his helmet.\n\nSir Bedivere lifted him up and carried him to a chapel near by.\n\n\"Take my sword, Excalibur,\" said the King, \"and fling it out into the\nmiddle of the sea, watch what happens to it and then come back at once\nand tell me.\"\n\n\"It doesn't seem right to leave you all alone here,\" said Sir Bedivere,\n\"when you are wounded and ill, but since you wish me to go, I will, and\nwill do all that you have told me.\"\n\nHe slipped away by zigzag paths, points and jutting rock to the shining\nlevel of the sea. There he drew out the sword Excalibur. The winter moon\nsparkled against its hilt and made it twinkle with its diamond sparks,\nwith myriads of topaz lights and fine jewelry work. Bedivere gazed so\nlong at it that both his eyes were dazzled as he stood, and he wondered\nwhether he ought to throw away so beautiful a thing. At last he decided\nto hide it away among the water-flags that grew along shore.\n\n\"Did you do as I said?\" asked the king, when he saw him. \"What did you\nsee?\"\n\n\"I heard the ripple washing in the reeds,\" said Sir Bedivere, \"and the\nwild water lapping on the rock.\"\n\n\"You are not giving me a true answer,\" said the king, faint and pale.\n\"It's shameful for men to lie. Quickly go again and as you are true and\ndear, do just as I bade you. Watch and bring me word.\"\n\nThen Sir Bedivere went the second time and paced up and down beside the\npebbly water, counting the dewey pebbles, but when he saw the wonderful\nsword he clapped his hands together and cried:\n\n\"If I threw that sword away, a precious thing will be lost forever. The\nKing is ill; he does not know what he is doing. His great sword ought to\nbe kept, then in long years hereafter people will look at it at the\ntournament and they will say: 'This was the great Arthur's sword\nExcalibur which was made by the lonely lady of the Lake, working in the\ndeep sea for nine years.'\"\n\nSo the second time he hid Excalibur and strode very slowly back to the\nking.\n\n\"What did you see or what did you hear?\" asked Arthur breathing very\nheavily.\n\n\"I heard the water lapping on the rock and the long ripples washing in\nthe reeds.\"\n\n\"Unkind! miserable! untrue! unknightly!\" cried Arthur, filled with\nanger. \"I see what you are, for you are the only one left me of all the\nknights, yet you would betray me for my sword, either to sell it or like\na girl, because you love its beauty. Go out now the third time and if\nyou do not throw out my sword Excalibur I'll get up and kill you with my\nhands.\"\n\nAt this Sir Bedivere sprang up like a flash and ran down leaping lightly\nover the ridges, plunged into the beds of bulrushes, clutched the sword,\nwheeled it round strongly and threw it as far as he could.\n\nExcalibur made lightning in the moonlight as it flashed round and round\nand whirled in an arch, shooting far out to the water. But before it\nquite dipped into the sea an arm robed in white samite, mystic and\nwonderful, rose out of the waves, caught it by the hilt, brandished it\nthree times and drew it under.\n\n\"Now I can see by your eyes that you have done it!\" cried the King.\n\"Speak out; what have you seen or heard?\"\n\n\"Sir King,\" cried Sir Bedivere, \"I closed my eyes when I picked it up so\nthat I would not be turned from my purpose of throwing it into the\nwater, for I could live three lives, Sir King, and I wouldn't again see\nsuch a wonderful thing as your sword. Sir, I threw it out with both\nhands, wheeling it round and when I looked an arm robed in white samite\nreached up out of the water and caught it by the hilt, brandished it\nthree times and drew it under.\"\n\n\"Carry me to the shore,\" said the king.\n\n[Illustration: AN ARM ROBED IN WHITE SAMITE.]\n\nSo Bedivere lifted him up and walked as swiftly as he could from the\nridge, heavily, heavily down to the beach. As they reached the shore\nthey saw a black barge beside the water filled with stately people all\ndressed in black. Among the people were three queens wearing crowns of\ngold.\n\n\"Put me into the barge,\" cried Arthur.\n\nSo they came to the barge and the three queens held out their hands and\ntook the king.\n\nThe tallest and fairest of them held his head upon her lap loosed his\nshattered helmet and chafed his hands, and moaned tenderly over him.\n\n\"Ah, my lord Arthur,\" cried Sir Bedivere, \"where shall I go now? For\nthe old times are past now and the whole Round Table is broken.\"\n\n\"Go and pray,\" cried the king. \"Farewell, for I am going a very long way\nto the lovely Island-valley of Avilion where it will never hail nor rain\nnor snow, and where the loud winds never blow. It lies in deep meadows,\nbeautiful with lawns and fruit trees and flowery glens.\"\n\nThen the barge set sail and oar, and moved away from the shore.\n\n\"The king is gone!\" groaned Bedivere.\n\nHe walked away from the shore and climbed up to the highest peaks and\nridges about him and looked far, far away. And from far away out beyond\nthe world he thought he heard sounds from a beautiful city as if every\none in it all together were welcoming a great King who had just come\nback from his wars.\n\nEND.\n\n\n\n\nTranscriber's Note:\n\nMinor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note.\nThere are inconsistencies with italicising text that refers to\nillustrations. I have left these as in the original text.\n\n   Corrections made include the following:\n   p34. ecstacy => ecstasy\n   p37. meaintime => meantime\n   p52. magnificientn => magnificent\n   p66. Springly => Springing\n   p75. Geriant => Geraint\n   p90. jealously => jealousy\n   p100. though => through\n   p101. passed => past\n   p101. musn't => mustn't\n   p106. heathern => heathen\n   p106. Gunievere => Guinevere\n   p117. to => that\n   p146. Mordred => Modred\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<pre id=\"pg-footer\">","title":"Tales from Tennyson","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":37131}