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 THE COURT OF KING ARTHUR
 
 BY THE SAME AUTHOR 
 
 Each I vol., I2itio, Illustrated by SIDNEY R. 
 BURLEIGH. Price, $1.50 
 
 THE KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND TABLE 
 
 THE COURT OF KING ARTHUR 
 
 THE WAGNER STORY BOOK
 
 LIKE THE HALO OF A SAINT."
 
 THE COURT 
 OF KING ARTHUR 
 
 STORIES FROM THE LAND OF 
 THE ROUND TABLE 
 
 BY 
 
 HENRY: FRGST 
 
 ILLUSTRATED BY SYDNEY RICHMOND BURLEIGH 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 1897
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1896, BY 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
 
 TZ 
 
 " 
 
 A t 
 
 MY AUNT 
 
 TTofiefiefb CofRns 
 
 MY EARLIEST OOXPAXION AND 
 
 GUIDE IN LANDS OF 
 
 WONDERS
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 MCI 
 How WE CAME TO LONDON i 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 THE NEW KING AT ST. PAUL'S. 7 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 THE ROUND TABLE 
 
 ' 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 OT GALAHAD, BUT LANCELOT 64 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 THE KITCHEN BOY 83 
 
 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 THE SPARROW-HAWK iao 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 Ox THE WRONG SIDE OF THE SEVERN 145
 
 viii Contents 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE PATHS THAT ENID RODE, 171 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 A LITTLE JOURNEY IN CORNWALL, 192 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 WHO THE KING REALLY WAS, 206 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 SOME LITTLE ADVENTURES OF LANCELOT, . . . 222 
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 THE CHIME OF THE SEA 239 
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 How THE SCABBARD WAS LOST 251 
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 KING ARTHUR'S GRAVESTONE, ...... 272
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 "LIKE THE HALO OF A SADPT,* 1 
 
 " THE GREATEST CHURCH OF LOXDOS. 
 
 PAUL'S OK KOT." 7 
 
 THE FIELD OF THE ROCSD TABLE, ... 37 
 
 THE ESGUSH AKD THE f^*tarr_ ..... 64 
 
 "NOT AH HOTEL," 83 
 
 " FOR A WHOLE TEAK HE WAS THERE Of THE ETTCHEX," 
 
 Fmdmg go 
 
 THE BRIDGE AT CARDIFF, 120 
 
 THE FIGHT FOR THE SPARROW-HAWK, . . Facing 138 
 
 " THERE WE SAT OR RAGS AKD COILS OF ROPE," . . 145 
 
 " BESIDE HIM WAS A DOG AS BIG AS A HORSE," Facing 156 
 
 In DEVONSHIRE. 171 
 
 Is CORNWALL, 192 
 
 THE CASTLE OF TDFTAGEL, 206 
 
 "THEY CAME NEARER TO us AKD GATHERED AROGXD 
 
 - RAMPARTS LIKE A FLIGHT OF STAIRS,'* ... 222 
 
 THE SILEXT TOWER. 239 
 
 THE ROCKS OF TCCTAGEL, .... Facing 242 
 
 THE KEEPER OF THE KEY, 251 
 
 Krsc ARTHUR'S GRAVESTONE, 272
 
 THE COURT OF KING ARTHUR 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 HOW WE CAME TO LONDON 
 
 HELEN'S mother said that I might go, too, 
 if I liked, and Helen said that I most go, too. 
 
 This Helen is a very young woman, with an 
 extravagant fondness for stories. If you ever 
 chance to meet her or anybody like her, never 
 let her find out that yon can tell stories or 
 that yon know anything about stories. That 
 is, if your time is worth anything and if you 
 do not enjoy telling stories for a very large 
 part of it. Because, if you do let her know, 
 yon will never have any more peace. As for 
 me, my time is not worth anything and I en- 
 joy telling stories to any extent, so it doesn't 
 matter. 
 
 But about this question of my going, too.
 
 2 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Helen and her mother had taken it into their 
 sensible heads to go abroad for the summer. 
 By listening carefully to all they said, when- 
 ever I got a chance, I could not find out that 
 they had any particular plans beyond that. 
 Neither of them had ever been abroad before, 
 and they seemed to have a sort of notion that 
 abroad meant Europe, and not any part of it, 
 but the whole of it. I heard them talking now 
 and then of the Scotch Highlands, of the Al- 
 hambra, of the Rhine, of the Irish lakes, of the 
 Alps, and of seeing Naples and then dying, 
 and I felt sure that I should die before I saw 
 Naples if I tried to go to half the places where 
 they thought they were going. 
 
 That was why I did not care to say that I 
 would go till I knew just how much trouble 
 I was likely to get into. It was not an easy 
 thing, by any means, for me to pretend that I 
 did not care much whether I went or not. 
 The memory of that glorious Rhine, with its 
 towering banks green and gray with vines and 
 castles, and of those calm, white-topped, giant 
 hills of Switzerland, so restful in their majesty, 
 stirred up longings in me that I should not 
 have wished Helen and her mother to know, 
 till I had quite made up my mind to go with 
 them. Still more than these, the grassy hill- 
 side pastures, the fields full of scarlet poppies, 
 the deep green hedges, and the smooth rivers
 
 How We Came to London 3 
 
 of England drew me toward them. They 
 called to me and said : " Come to us again 
 and be glad that you are here to see us and 
 that we are here to be seen." 
 
 I can never think of these lands as real lands, 
 where real people live and work, and are weary, 
 and have real cares and troubles. They are 
 all story lands, poet lands, fairy lands to me. 
 I never saw them and I am very glad of it 
 till I had known them long in books of old 
 tales and in songs and in books of newer tales. 
 And so the}- came to be to me, and they will 
 always be, the countries of dim old kings, of 
 knights with flashing arms and streaming 
 plumes, of ladies who looked down on them 
 from the walls of castles, of giants and of 
 dwarfs ; of stranger creatures still, of wizards 
 and witches, of men who changed to wolves and 
 women who changed to swans, of misty gods 
 who rode on the storm winds, and heroes whom 
 no sword could wound. Of course I know 
 that the people there are real, and of course I 
 have seen them working and playing and buy- 
 ing and selling and quarrelling together, but 
 they did not look real only like a part of the 
 stories. 
 
 And not the least charm of these countries 
 to me was that they were across the ocean and 
 that we must make a voyage to reach them. 
 For of all the people and the things that I love,
 
 4 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 I love none, except a few of my friends, better 
 than ships. I count ships among the people 
 that I love, not among the things. Ships are 
 noble, strong, beautiful, happy, living beings. 
 It is absurd to think that they are anything 
 else. When one of them has taken hundreds 
 of us into herself and is bearing us from land 
 to land, when she is driving along with us, find- 
 ing her way alone through the darkness, with 
 nothing but the stars above her and nothing 
 but endless water all around don't tell me 
 that she is nothing but a dead machine! I 
 have waked up in the night and felt the creat- 
 ure's great, hot heart beating, and I know. 
 And when she is rushing on and on, by day 
 and night, trying to cross the sea quicker than 
 any other ship has ever crossed it ; when she 
 is trying to bring two great countries nearer 
 together than they have ever been before, do 
 you want me to believe that she does not know 
 what she is doing, that only the captain on the 
 bridge and the man at the wheel and the man 
 at the engine know ? Not a bit of it. I have 
 stood at her prow and have seen her joy in her 
 plunging and rising and sweeping through the 
 waves; I have seen her dash the water into 
 pearls by day and into glowing flame by night. 
 Oh, she knows what she is doing better than 
 anybody could tell her. 
 
 So you see I really wanted to go very much
 
 How We Came to London 5 
 
 indeed. And when I happened to overhear 
 some little remark about the Parthenon I 
 thought that the time had come to decide. 
 "Could you give me any sort of notion," I 
 asked, " whether you are really going to the 
 Parthenon or to Ultima Thule, or where? Be- 
 cause it might help me to tell whether I can go 
 with you." 
 
 " We don't know in the least where we are 
 going," Helen's mother answered ; " we only 
 talk about what happens to come into our 
 heads. If you will come with us, we will go 
 just wherever you like." 
 
 " Wherever I like ? Do you know what sort 
 of promise you are making ? " 
 
 Why, it doesn't make any difference to us 
 where we go," said Helen's mother, again, " and 
 if you have any choice, we may as well go where 
 you want to go as anywhere else. Only, of 
 course, you must let me go to Paris. If you 
 will say that I may go to Paris just when I 
 like, you may plan everything else yourself." 
 
 " I say so, then, since you have given me this 
 sudden authority." 
 
 " Then it is agreed, and you will go with us ? " 
 
 " I will go with you." 
 
 I don't know why it is that Americans who 
 go to England always make a straight line for 
 London. There are plenty of other beautiful 
 and interesting places that they ought to see
 
 6 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 and that they mean to see. Often, indeed, they 
 leave London again and go straight back on 
 their own tracks. It seems strange, but it was 
 not for us to break through so firmly fixed a 
 custom. 
 And so we came to London.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE NEW KING AT ST. PAUL'S 
 
 THERE are many good books that will tell 
 you all sorts of useful and delightful things 
 about London, if you care to know them. 
 You will not find them here, for they have all 
 been told much better than I could tell them. 
 We saw as much of London as we could ; it 
 would take nothing less than a lifetime to see it 
 all. It happened one day that we had been 
 wandering around and about and up and down 
 in St. Paul's Cathedral. We had been along 
 the aisles and down into the crypt and had 
 seen the tombs of great men till we were tired 
 of them. We had climbed up to the Whis- 
 pering Gallery and the Stone Gallery and 
 the Golden Gallery, and we had gone higher 
 still, till we were not sure whether we were in 
 the ball or the cross. We have never been 
 quite sure since. We were sure, when we 
 came down, that we felt a trifle tired after so
 
 8 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 much climbing, and that we wanted to rest for 
 a few minutes on one of the benches outside 
 the church, where we could watch the streams 
 of carriages and carts and omnibuses and peo- 
 ple going past, and, nearer to us, the fountain 
 and the flocks of doves all about the walks. 
 
 "And now that we have nothing better to 
 do," I said, " do you want to hear a little his- 
 tory and then a story?" 
 
 " I don't care about the history," Helen an- 
 swered. 
 
 " But you must hear the history before you 
 can hear the story. You can't have any cake 
 till you eat your bread." 
 
 " Then I will eat my bread. There isn't very 
 much of it, is there?" 
 
 " No, only a little. Very well, then. There 
 was a time, more than a thousand years ago, 
 when this London and this England were not 
 by any means the good places to live in that 
 they are now. There was no good queen up 
 the river at Windsor, and there was no castle 
 for her to live in if she had been there. Worse 
 than this, there was no Parliament at West- 
 minster. Worst of all, there were plenty of 
 lords, who did little but misrule the people and 
 fight among themselves. There was no one 
 above the lords ; no one could rule the whole 
 country, though there were many who would 
 have liked to try. There was a King of Scot-
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 9 
 
 land, and there was a King of Ireland, and there 
 was a King of North Wales, and a King of 
 Cornwall, and one of Cameliard, wherever that 
 was, and one of the Out Isles, wherever they 
 were. There were a dozen or twenty more 
 kings, perhaps, scattered about, one here and 
 one there, but they were no better and no more 
 powerful than the lords. Indeed, the more 
 power any of them had the worse it was for 
 their people ; and of all England together 
 there was no king at alL 
 
 " There had been kings of England once, 
 but the last of them had been dead for a long 
 time and he had left nobody to take his place. 
 Uther Pendragon was far from being a good 
 man, but he was not a bad sort of king, for 
 those times. The most of the kings and lords 
 were robbers, and the people expected it, but 
 when there was one robber greater than all the 
 rest he kept the others down a little, and it was 
 better for the people than when there were a 
 hundred robbers, each one plundering them 
 for himself. That was the way after Uther 
 Pendragon died. Every lord tried to be a 
 greater thief than every other lord, and every 
 one of them, secretly or openly, hoped that he 
 might grow great enough to make himself king. 
 
 " There were not many cities then, and the 
 people lived in little towns and villages, far 
 away from one another, where the lords and
 
 io The Court of King Arthur 
 
 their armed men could do with them what they 
 pleased. So they made the poor people work 
 at building their castles. They gave them no 
 pay and they left them no time to keep their 
 shops or till their fields, so that while the men 
 worked their wives and their children starved. 
 Then they would take the land itself and drive 
 the people away from it to die of hunger or to 
 steal and be hanged for it. If they heard that 
 any common man had saved a little money, 
 they put him in a dungeon where there were 
 snakes and toads, and kept him there till he 
 promised to show them where he had hidden 
 it. Then the lords fought with one another, 
 and brought bands of armed men into one an- 
 other's lands, and trampled down the fields of 
 grain, and burned the houses, and killed the 
 people. And perhaps that was the best thing 
 for them. 
 
 " So the people loved to remember Uther 
 Pendragon, and wished, but scarcely hoped, 
 that there might be another king as good as 
 he. They sat by their poor fires in the winter 
 nights, and perhaps some of the old men told 
 them how, long ago, the Romans came from far 
 over the sea and over the land and conquered 
 the country and kept it for many years. ' They 
 were cruel fighters, the Romans,' the old men 
 said, ' but they kept some kind of order in the 
 land, and it was better than this.'
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 1 1 
 
 " Then they told how the heathen Saxons 
 came, after the Romans had gone. Sometimes 
 they drove the people out of their houses, and 
 sometimes they made peace with the kings, 
 who were strong men in those days. They 
 were usually bad men, too, but it was better than 
 this. And then the old men told of Uther Pen- 
 dragon. He was the best of them all,' they 
 said. Some of you younger men can remem- 
 ber him ; it was not so many years ago that he 
 died. But he left us no son to rule as he had 
 ruled, and there is no hope now.' And they 
 wiped their eyes with the backs of their hard 
 hands, though it was long since there had been 
 any such frivolous things as tears there. 
 
 " There were some of the lords, no doubt, who 
 were not so bad as the others, but it was not 
 easy in those days to be a good man and a lord 
 at the same time. You see, if a lord happened 
 to be a good man, he would not steal from the 
 others, but they would all steal from him just 
 the same as from anybody else. So he always 
 lost as much as the others and never got so 
 much back, and in that way he was likely to 
 grow poor pretty fast 
 
 Yet there were a few such men. And so, 
 in the bright summer days, as they worked to- 
 gether in the fields, the poor people would now 
 and then talk a little more hopefully. They 
 felt more cheerful in the summer, I suppose,
 
 12 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 because then they were only hungry, instead 
 of hungry and cold both, as they were in the 
 winter. 
 
 " ' There is old Sir Ector riding by, with his 
 two sons,' one of the younger men would say ; 
 ' if all the lords were like them, it would be bet- 
 ter for all of us.' 
 
 "'Yes,' some old man would answer, 'Sir 
 Ector was one of Uther Pendragon's men. The 
 old King gave him all those lands that he has 
 around London ; he is rich enough ; he does 
 not need to steal from the poor.' The old 
 men, you see, who remembered the better days, 
 were the ones who were most hopeless and 
 bitter. 
 
 " ' Does not need to steal from the poor ! ' one 
 of the women would say ; ' he would not steal. 
 He is a good man, and his wife is a good wom- 
 an. When my mother was sick last winter 
 our house was so cold and damp that she would 
 have died, but Sir Ector's wife heard about her 
 and she let me bring her to the castle, and the 
 servants took care of her till she got well.' 
 
 "'Yes,' the old man might say again, 'and 
 what happened then? When your own lord 
 heard of it he went to Sir Ector and said that 
 he must pay him money for taking one of his 
 people off his land, and, when Sir Ector called 
 his men and drove him away, your lord sent 
 his men to burn your house for revenge. What
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 13 
 
 good did it do you or your mother to save her 
 life?' 
 
 "Nobody could answer such a question as 
 this, but still somebody else would say that 
 there might be better times if only such a man 
 as Sir Ector could be King of England, and 
 one of his sons after him. And the old man 
 would growl again and say: 'Which of his 
 sons? It would be Kay, because he is the 
 older, and Kay is a harsh, surly boy ; he would 
 be as bad as any of these lords are now/ 
 
 " ' Yet they say Kay is strong and brave/ one 
 of the younger men would answer, * and he is 
 to be made a knight next Hallowmas. But I 
 like his brother Arthur better. He is as kind 
 and generous as his father. And I have seen 
 him playing with the village boys, just as if he 
 were not a lord's son, and he could run faster 
 than any of them and throw a stone and shoot 
 an arrow farther and straighter than any of 
 them/ 
 
 " What is the use to talk about them ? ' the 
 old man would say at last. ' They can do noth- 
 ing against these robbers that build their cas- 
 tles all over the land, and they do not try to do 
 anything. And there is that old fool Merlin. 
 Why does he never do anything for the peo- 
 pie?' 
 
 " ' How do you make out Merlin a fool ? They 
 say he knows more than any one else in the
 
 14 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 world, and he can do wonderful things by 
 magic.' 
 
 " That is just why I call him a fool. He can 
 do wonderful things, and yet he never does 
 anything. Is he not a fool, if he knows so 
 much and could do so much for the people and 
 for the country, and yet does nothing at all ?' " 
 
 " Is this the story or the history ? " Helen 
 asked. 
 
 " This is the story." 
 
 " I thought it sounded more like a story. 
 Where did the history leave off?" 
 
 " I am afraid I can't tell you exactly. You 
 see, the history and the story are so mixed up 
 together in the most of this that I have been 
 telling you that it might not be quite safe to 
 say that any of it was entirely history. But 
 there is this strange thing about many of these 
 old tales that I am just beginning to tell you: 
 the people who like history better than stories 
 generally think that they are all stories and 
 nothing else, and the people who like stories 
 better try to believe that there is a good deal 
 of history in them. When you have heard 
 them I am sure you will want to believe that 
 they are all true. That is because you like 
 stories better than history. 
 
 " But now for the story. It was this same 
 Merlin this old fool, who could do so much 
 and did so little who had scarcely thought of
 
 The New King at SL PanTs 15 
 
 anything all these long, terrible years but of 
 helping England and the poor people in it. He 
 was a strange man, this Merlin. He was an 
 old man, and people said that he knew every- 
 thing that ever had been and everything that 
 ever should be. Nobody knew who his father 
 was. There was nothing so very wonderful 
 about that, but some said that he never had 
 any father, and there was something wonderful 
 about that. Others said that his father was 
 not a man, but a spirit of the air, and that that 
 was why he knew so much. He could take any 
 shape he chose, they said. Now and then some, 
 body would tell how he had met a child or a 
 young man or a beggar, and how the child or 
 the young man or the beggar had told him of 
 strange things that were soon to happen, and 
 then had vanished. Then he knew that it was 
 Mertin, who had chosen to take some other 
 shape than his own, and always the things that 
 Merlin said proved to be true. 
 
 Merlin had been the friend of Uther Pen- 
 dragon. The people could remember wonder- 
 ful things that he had done for the old King, 
 and that was why they thought it strange that 
 he did nothing now. But Merlin had his own 
 reasons for waiting. He knew what he had to 
 do when the time came. And now he knew 
 that the time had come. Just when another of 
 those cruel, cold, hungry winters was coming
 
 1 6 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 upon the people, Merlin went to the Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury. 
 
 " The Archbishop of Canterbury was a wise 
 and good man. He was at the head of the 
 Church for all England, and he was the only 
 man who was at the head of anything for all 
 England. No doubt that was why Merlin went 
 to him. ' It is time,' said Merlin, ' to find a 
 king for England.' 
 
 " ' Merlin,' the Archbishop answered, ' these 
 wicked lords are killing all the people and 
 spoiling all the land. What can we do ? How 
 shall we find a king ? ' 
 
 " * It is you who must find him,' said Merlin. 
 ' Will you do exactly what I tell you and not 
 ask me why ? ' 
 
 " People who know everything never like to 
 answer questions. It is most unfortunate, too. 
 The rest of the world might learn so much 
 from them. 
 
 " ' Merlin,' said the Archbishop, ' some say 
 that you are the son of an evil spirit. Yet you 
 come into my church and you are not afraid of 
 the cross, or the holy water, or any of the holy 
 things. That is not like the son of an evil 
 spirit, and I have never known you to do any- 
 thing but good. I will do what you tell me, 
 and if you do not wish me to know why, I will 
 not ask.' 
 
 " ' Then,' said Merlin, * send to all the great
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 17 
 
 lords of England and bid them come together 
 in London at Christmas. Tell them that when 
 they are met it shall be shown to them who is 
 their rightful king/ 
 
 "As soon as Merlin had said this he was 
 gone. The Archbishop did not see him go. 
 He only looked at the place where Merlin had 
 been and saw that there was nobody there. 
 People who knew Merlin were used to little 
 things like this, and they did not mind them 
 much. Still the Archbishop felt that Merlin 
 had told him a great deal less than he should 
 like to know. Perhaps you would like to hear 
 where Merlin went, and when you have heard 
 you will know more about it than the Arch- 
 bishop did. He travelled faster than the wind, 
 and he went away up into the north of England 
 to visit an old man named Bleys. Bleys was 
 much older than Merlin himself, and he was 
 very wise. It was said that he was Merlin's 
 master when Merlin was a child. Why he 
 needed a master I don't know, for Merlin knew 
 more the day he was born than Bleys ever knew 
 in his life. But now Bleys was writing a book, 
 a sort of history of England, and he never 
 wrote anything in it except just what Merlur 
 told him. And when Merlin was missing, as 
 he was pretty often, he was usually up there 
 in the North, telling Bleys what to write in his 
 book. I am sorry the book got lost, for it
 
 1 8 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 might have settled a good many things that 
 have since been in doubt. Still it never would 
 have settled anything at all if it were as hard 
 to understand as a certain long prophecy of 
 Merlin's which did not get lost. 
 
 " But the Archbishop believed that whatever 
 Merlin told him to do must be right, so he sent 
 messengers to all the lords and told them to 
 come to London on Christmas to find out who 
 was to be king. Then there was a mighty stir 
 among the lords, you may be sure. Every one 
 of them, secretly or openly, wanted to be king, 
 and I suppose at least every other one secretly 
 thought that he might be. One thought that 
 the Archbishop would be his friend and would 
 choose him. Another thought that he could 
 bribe the rest and get them to choose him. 
 Another thought he could scare the people into 
 choosing him. Probably none of them felt so 
 completely puzzled about what was to happen 
 as the Archbishop himself. 
 
 " So when Christmas came all the lords met 
 in a church here in London. Some of the little 
 kings were there too. They were all ready to 
 cut one another's throat at a second's notice, 
 and they all looke-d very meekly and very 
 reverently at the Archbishop to see what he 
 was going to do first. Now, this story that I 
 am telling you is one that I have read in sev- 
 real books, but only one of them all says any-
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 19 
 
 thing about what church it was where the 
 lords met. That one, the one I like best of all, 
 says : ' The greatest church of London, 
 whether it were Paul's or not the French book ' 
 maketh no mention.' Now, if the good old 
 knight who wrote this book did not feel sure 
 ' whether it were Paul's or not,' I shall take the 
 liberty of believing that it was Paul's. So I 
 tell you that they met here in this very church 
 where we are, and that it was just over there, 
 near where Powle's Cross was afterwards, that 
 they discovered such a wonderful thing. 
 
 " I know very well that the little book about 
 the Cathedral that we bought of the verger says 
 that ' In 610, Ethelbert, King of Kent, under- 
 took the building of the Cathedral of St. Paul.' 
 I know very well, too, that that was some hun- 
 dred years or so after the time I am telling 
 you about, but that makes no difference to me. 
 There are two ways of believing things. You 
 may believe them with your head, or you may 
 believe them with your heart, and if you al- 
 ways like stories as well as you do now, you 
 will often find it pleasant to believe things with 
 your heart that you may not be quite able to 
 believe with your head. So I believe that it 
 was Paul's. 
 
 " When the}- were all met the Archbishop 
 had not the faintest notion of what he was to 
 do with them, but he thought that a good, safe
 
 20 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 thing to do in any case would be to say mass. 
 So he said mass. When the mass was over 
 some of the lords, finding that nothing was 
 likely to happen inside the church, came out- 
 side. And then, as they walked about, they 
 found the wonderful thing that had appeared 
 all of itself, just over there near the end of the 
 choir. It was this: First there was a big 
 square block of stone ; then on the top of the 
 stone there was an anvil ; and then there was 
 a sword stuck straight through the anvil and 
 the stone. The sword had a beautiful jewelled 
 hilt, and on it there were letters of gold which 
 said: 'He who can draw this sword is the 
 rightful King of England.' 
 
 " ' Ah/ said every one of the lords to himself, 
 ' now it will be very easy for me to show that 
 I am to be King of England.' 
 
 " Some one had run to tell the Archbishop 
 about the stone and the anvil and the sword, 
 and he came to see them for himself. When 
 he had looked at them he told the lords that 
 all of them who liked might try to draw the 
 sword. Of course every one of them wanted 
 to try, and every one of them did try, but not 
 one of them could move the sword. At that 
 every one of them was greatly surprised and 
 the Archbishop was greatly pleased, for there 
 was irot one among them who he thought was 
 just the right man to be King of England.
 
 The New King at St. Parts 21 
 
 44 Then the Archbishop said : * The true king 
 is not here, but I know that he will come soon, 
 and that we shall see him. So I bid you all 
 to come here again on Twelfth Day, and then 
 you may all try again to draw the sword, if you 
 will, and any man in the whole land may try 
 who will' 
 
 M So he had a tent set over the stone and he 
 chose ten good knights to guard it, night and 
 day. I don't know why he thought it ought to 
 be guarded. Anybody except the rightful 
 King of England might as well try to steal the 
 church as try to steal that sword. But I am 
 only telling yon just what happened. 
 
 " Well, to amuse themselves while they were 
 waiting for Twelfth Day, the lords and the 
 knights decided to have a tournament on New 
 Year's Day, in the fields outside the town. Do 
 you know what a tournament was? It was a 
 sham fight a play battle. It was almost as 
 dangerous as a real battle, for knights were 
 often killed in tournaments. Indeed, I think 
 the real difference between a battle and a tour- 
 nament was that in a battle they usually fought 
 about something, and in a tournament they 
 usually fought about nothing. 
 
 " Now, among all the rest who had come to 
 London, old Sir Ector had come, and he had 
 brought Kay and Arthur with him. And on 
 New Year's Day, as the three were riding to
 
 22 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 the fields to see the tournament, Kay found 
 that he had forgotten to bring his sword. He 
 told Arthur to go back to the house where 
 they were staying and get it, and Arthur, like 
 a dutiful younger brother, went. But when he 
 got to the house it was locked up and deserted, 
 because everybody had gone to the tourna- 
 ment. Then Arthur remembered that he had 
 seen a sword sticking in an anvil in St. Paul's 
 Churchyard, and he at once thought that he 
 would go and get that for his brother Kay. I 
 can't think how a bright boy like Arthur could 
 have been in London for an hour without hear- 
 ing that that sword was for nobody but the 
 King of England. But I am only telling you 
 what happened, and it seems he knew noth- 
 ing about it. So Arthur, being the only per- 
 son in London who did not know that nobody 
 but the King could take that sword, just went 
 to the tent and took it and carried it to Kay. 
 The ten knights were not guarding it, for they 
 had all gone to the tournament too. 
 
 " But Kay knew all about the sword, you 
 may be sure. As soon as he saw it he took it 
 to his father and said : ' See ; here is the 
 sword that was in the anvil ; I am to be King 
 of England.' 
 
 " But Sir Ector knew his son Kay quite as well 
 as Kay knew the sword, and he ordered him to 
 come straight back to the church, and he told
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 23 
 
 Arthur to come, too. Then he said : ' Tell me, 
 on your honor, Kay, how you got this sword.' 
 
 " And Kay, who, I think, was not such a bad 
 fellow after all, answered : * My brother Arthur 
 brought it to me.' 
 
 " ' And how did you get it ? ' Sir Ector said 
 to Arthur. 
 
 "'Kay sent me for his sword,' Arthur an- 
 swered, ' and I could not get it, because the 
 house was locked, so I drew this sword out of 
 the anvil to bring it to him instead.' 
 
 " ' Arthur/ said Sir Ector, * if what you say 
 is true, you are to be King of England.' 
 
 " ' I,' said Arthur, ' King of England ? Why ? * 
 
 "'Because God has chosen you,' said Sir 
 Ector. ' Now see if you can put the sword 
 back in the anvil.' 
 
 " There was no hole in the anvil where the 
 sword had come out, but as soon as Arthur 
 touched the point to the iron it sank deep into 
 it and into the stone. Then Sir Ector and Sir 
 Kay both tried to draw it out, but they could 
 not, and then Arthur drew it again as easily as 
 he would have drawn a common sword from 
 its sheath. And when he had done that Sir 
 Ector and Sir Kay knelt down on the ground 
 before him. ' Why do you kneel to me, my 
 father and my brother?' said Arthur; * surely 
 I am not better than you just because I can 
 draw this sword.'
 
 24 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " ' I am not your father,' Sir Ector answered, 
 'and I do not know who your father was. 
 Surely he was a greater man than I, and surely 
 you are better than we, for God has chosen 
 you to be King of England.' 
 
 " ' But I do not want to be King of England,' 
 said Arthur, ' if I must lose you for my father. 
 And my mother is she not my mother?' 
 
 " ' I do not know who your mother was,' Sir 
 Ector answered, ' but my wife is not your 
 mother. But, oh, Arthur, we have always 
 loved you as if you were our own son as 
 much as we loved Kay, who is our own son. 
 And so, Arthur, promise me now that when 
 you are King you will do one thing that I ask 
 of you.' 
 
 " ' I will do all that you can ask ot me, my 
 father.' 
 
 "'Then promise me,' said Sir Ector, 'that 
 when you are King you will make Kay senes- 
 chal of all your lands and of all your castles. 
 And if he is ever rough or rude for I know he 
 is not like you, my own Arthur promise me 
 that you will forgive him, and remember that 
 he was your foster-brother.' 
 
 " ' Father,' said Arthur, ' if I am to be King, 
 none but Kay shall ever be my seneschal as 
 long as we both live.' 
 
 "Now Sir Ector hurried to tell the Arch- 
 bishop what Arthur had done. 'Leave the
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 25 
 
 sword where it was/ said the Archbishop, 
 ' and say nothing- about it till Twelfth Day. 
 Come then, and Arthur shall draw the sword 
 before all the people.' 
 
 " So on Twelfth Day the lords all came 
 to St. Paul's again, and the Archbishop stood 
 up before them and said : ' To-day it shall be 
 shown to you who is to be your King. Swear, 
 now, all of you, here before God and before 
 me, His priest, that, whoever draws this sword, 
 you will obey him, honor him, guard him, 
 and be faithful to him as your true and only 
 King.' 
 
 " And when they had all taken this oath the 
 Archbishop said : ' Now let every one try to 
 draw this sword who will.' And they all 
 pulled and tugged at it, as they had done be- 
 fore, and not one of them could move it. Then 
 the Archbishop led Arthur to the stone, and he 
 drew out the sword and held it up before them 
 alL And the Archbishop said : ' This is Arthur, 
 your King.' 
 
 "The Archbishop thought that the lords 
 would all kneel before the King at once, and 
 swear again to be his true subjects, but not one 
 of them moved. Then they began to mutter 
 one to another ; then they talked angrily and 
 said : ' We cannot take this boy for our King, 
 Who is he? Only old Sir Ector's son. Why 
 should we obey him ? '
 
 26 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " ' He is not my son,' said Sir Ector ; ' he is 
 of a better blood than any of us.' 
 
 " ' Of what blood, then ?' they all asked. 
 
 " ' I do not know,' said Sir Ector ; ' but he has 
 drawn the sword. Is not that enough? ' 
 
 " 'No,' they all cried again, ' he is nobody's 
 son ; he shall not be our King." 
 
 " Then one of them asked the Archbishop to 
 wait till Candlemas, and to let them all try the 
 sword again. And the Archbishop said that 
 it should be so. And on Candlemas they all 
 came back and tried again, and again none of 
 them could draw the sword but Arthur. Still 
 the lords said that Arthur should never be 
 their King, and they said that they would try 
 again at Easter. And when Easter came it was 
 just as before, and they said again that they 
 would wait till PentecostX Then the Arch- 
 bishop feared that some of the lords would try 
 to do some harm to Arthur, so he put a guard 
 around him, to be with him always. He chose 
 knights whom he could trust for this guard. 
 They were knights, the most of them, who had 
 been Uther Pendragon's men, and had been 
 faithful to him. Ulfius and Brastias were two 
 of them. I tell you their names because I may 
 have more to say about them some time. 
 
 " All this time nobody in London heard any- 
 thing about Merlin. But I do not believe that 
 he spent all these months in telling Bleys what
 
 The New King at St. Panfs 27 
 
 to write in his book. I think that he iras going 
 about among the common people, talking with 
 them, telling them about this Arthur, this new 
 King whom they were to hare, and urging 
 them to come to London at Pentecost and help 
 to choose him. H an j of the people, I dare sa j, 
 were willing enough, for they hated the cruel 
 lords who ruled them, and they thought that 
 any change must be good. But there were 
 others who had suffered so much that they did 
 not believe there could eTer be good times any 
 more. There were some, too, who feared their 
 lords even more than they hated them, and 
 with these Merlin had a harder task. 'I do 
 not want any new king,' said one of these; 
 my lord up there in the castle is good enough 
 for me.* He did not know who Merlin was. 
 
 " Your lord is good enough for you ?" asked 
 Merlin. Is he kind to you ? Does he rule 
 you wen?' 
 
 *** He rules wefl enough," the man said ; * I 
 wfll not say anything or do anything against 
 
 "'He rules weO enough?' Merlin repeated. 
 Yon saved a little money once, to use when 
 you were old or sick; where is that money ?" 
 
 *"I never saved any money," the man an- 
 swered. 
 
 "What is that deep scar across your fore- 
 head?" Merlin asked.
 
 28 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " I got it in a fight with clubs, when I was 
 a boy,' the man answered. 
 
 " ' You are telling me lies,' said Merlin. 
 ' You did save some money. Your good lord 
 heard of it and he sent his men to drag you up 
 there to the castle. They put a strong cord 
 around your head and tied it in a knot behind ; 
 they put a stick through the knot and twisted 
 the cord with the stick and tightened it till it 
 almost cut the top of your head off. It would 
 have cut the top of your head off if you had 
 not told them where you had buried your 
 money. And you love this lord ! Go and tell 
 your lies to him ; do not tell them to me. You 
 hate him in your heart. You would like 
 to murder him if you thought you would not 
 be hanged for it. Will you come to Lon- 
 don now and help to choose Arthur for your 
 King?' 
 
 " The man had fallen on his knees. ' Yes, 
 yes/ he cried ; I know now that you are Mer- 
 lin ; all that you have said is true ; I will do 
 whatever you say.' 
 
 " ' Then come to London at Pentecost.' 
 
 " There was an old man who told Merlin that 
 a new king could do no good. * He would be 
 as bad as the rest ; each of them is worse than 
 the others.' 
 
 '"Would he be worse than the lord you have 
 now?' Merlin asked.
 
 The New King at SL PauTs 29 
 
 "'No, he could not be worse than that. Do 
 you know what this lord did ? ' 
 
 "'Yes,' said Merlin, 'I know what he did, 
 but YOU may tell me.' 
 
 "' He robbed me of everything I had/ said 
 the old man, ' and then, when I had nothing 
 else left, he said I must give my daughter to 
 be married to one of his men who wanted her. 
 He said he had a right to marry her to whom 
 he pleased. I do not know. They have all 
 the rights and we have no rights. I was away 
 in the fields when they came to get her, but 
 my son was here, and he knocked down the 
 man who tried to touch his sister. For that 
 they carried him to the castle and locked him 
 in a dungeon. That was a year ago. I do not 
 know whether he is alive now or not. I hope 
 he is dead ; it is better for him if he is." 
 
 " Merlin made no answer to all this. He 
 only said : ' You are an old man ; do you re- 
 member Uther Pendragon ? " 
 
 " ' Remember him ? ' the other cried. ' Re- 
 member Uther Pendragon? Did I not fight 
 for him in the last of all his battles ? The King 
 was sick and could not ride with his knights. 
 We had no leader and the Saxons always 
 drove us before them. We could not stand 
 against them. Then it was told that we should 
 never beat them till the King himself came to 
 the battle. And they brought him in a litter
 
 30 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 and carried him among his knights. He passed 
 close to me, and when I saw how pale he 
 looked I said to the man who stood next to 
 me : " The King is weak : we must be his. 
 strength to-day." And he passed the word 
 along the line and all the men gripped their 
 bows harder. And when the King, lying there 
 almost dying, called out and cheered us on, 
 his knights fought like furies, and we all shot 
 our arrows farther and faster than we had ever 
 shot them before. And how the Saxons ran 
 before us! Ran away, all of them all but 
 those who were left lying on the field ! And 
 those three great leaders of theirs, Octa, and 
 Ebissa, and Ossa they were left lying on the 
 field with the rest. Yes, I remember Uther 
 Pendragon.' 
 
 " The old man had got quite excited, but 
 Merlin looked at him sternly. ' When they 
 told you,' he said, 'that you would win the bat- 
 tle if the King came, did you believe it?' 
 
 " ' No,' said the old man, ' none of us believed 
 it would make any difference, but when we saw 
 him and when ' 
 
 " ' Yes, yes,' said Merlin, looking sterner still, 
 'and who was it whom you did not believe? 
 Who was it that said that the King must come 
 to the battle ? ' 
 
 " The old man stared at Merlin for an instant 
 in a startled way and then dropped his eyes
 
 The New King at Si. Paul's 31 
 
 before his fierce look and trembled. 'Oh, I 
 had forgotten, I had forgotten, 1 he cried; 'it 
 was you.' 
 
 " ' Yes,' said Merlin, ' it was I. You did not 
 believe me then, just as you do not believe me 
 now. But what I said then was true, and what 
 I say now is true. I tell you that this Arthur 
 will be a better king than Uther Pendragon. I 
 will tell you more : your son, up there in the 
 dungeon of the castle, is not dead. But it is a 
 year since he saw the light of day, and they are 
 starving him, besides. He will not live much 
 longer if he stays there. Will you help us to 
 choose the new King? ' 
 "' I will do whatever you say.* 
 " Then come to London at Pentecost.' 
 "And when Pentecost came they were all 
 here at St. Paul's again. Over there by the 
 end of the choir stood the Archbishop, beside 
 the stone and the anvil and the sword. Close 
 to him was Arthur. Around them were the 
 lords, and all the rest of the ground about the 
 church was filled with the common people. 
 They had not come merely to look on this time. 
 They were weary of the quarrels of the lords, 
 and they were resolved they, the common 
 people that this time they would have a 
 king. 
 
 "And the lords all came, one at a time, and 
 tugged at the sword again, and when they were
 
 32 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 all tired Arthur drew it out and held it up be- 
 fore them. 
 
 " Then they all said, as they had said before, 
 that they would put off the choice and would 
 try again. But the Archbishop said that there 
 should be no more delay ; and Sir Ector and Sir 
 Kay and Sir Ulfius and Sir Brastias stood 
 around Arthur and called upon the Archbishop 
 to make him King. 
 
 " While they and the lords were wrangling 
 about it two strange men came along the road 
 to the outer edge of the crowd. They looked 
 so strange and fierce that those who first saw 
 them were frightened. They were covered 
 with dust, as if they had travelled far on foot. 
 Their clothes were torn, their hair hung tan- 
 gled about their faces, and they stared around 
 them with wild, eager eyes. Some of the peo- 
 ple thought that they were madmen and tried 
 to get out of their path. But one of them 
 cried : ' Where is this new King ? We want 
 to see him ! " 
 
 " ' There is no king yet,' somebody answered ; 
 ' be still ; the Archbishop is going to speak.' 
 
 " But the man with the wild eyes would not 
 be still. 'What do we care for the Arch- 
 bishop ? ' he cried. ' We want a king. We 
 have come from the seashore, down beyond 
 the mouth of the river. Two days ago a ship 
 full of pirates came there. They burned our
 
 The New King at St. Paul's 33 
 
 houses and carried away our wives to sell for 
 slaves, and our children oh, I cannot think of 
 what they did with the children! We could 
 not help them, there were so many of the 
 pirates. And they went away in their ship 
 and left us with the ashes of our houses. But 
 \ve had heard that you up here in London 
 were choosing a new king. They told us that 
 there had been a miracle to show who was the 
 King. So we came to see him. We want to 
 tell him what the pirates do to his people. We 
 want to know if he can protect them better 
 than these little lords. Where is he? If he 
 can, we are for him.' 
 
 " ' There he is,' said some one, pointing, * there 
 beside the Archbishop ; the one with the sword 
 in his hand Arthur.' 
 
 "'What, the boy who stands there so still and 
 looks so pale? Well, he may be good and 
 brave for all that. We have seen brave men 
 turn pale, down there by the sea. What are 
 they quarrelling about? Arthur, did you call 
 him? Is he the one that did the miracle? 
 Then we want him for our King ! Shout with 
 us, all of you, and say that we will have him 
 and that we will kill anybody who says he shall 
 not be King ! I can shoot an arrow straight to 
 'any mark, and I will shoot all the arrows he 
 will give me for this Arthur if he will be a real 
 King and protect his people.'
 
 34 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " The men from the sea were so much excited, 
 and they had such good reason to be, that those 
 around them began to get excited, too. Then 
 those farther off caught up the cry and in a 
 moment all the people were shouting that Ar- 
 thur should be King and that nobody should 
 put him off any longer. But the lords, for one 
 last time, cried out : ' We will try again ; put 
 the sword back in the anvil.' And then the 
 Archbishop raised his hands and silenced 
 them all, and said to Arthur, so that all 
 could hear : ' Do not put the sword back ; it 
 is yours now ; keep it, guard your people with 
 it, and drive out their enemies. And now fol- 
 low me.' 
 
 " Then he took Arthur by the hand and led 
 him into the church and up the steps of the 
 altar, where Arthur laid the sword. And the 
 lords came in and the people followed them 
 and filled the church, and still there was a 
 great crowd outside, where the people pushed 
 and struggled to get near the doors and 
 called to those within to tell them what was 
 done. 
 
 " When there was silence again the Arch- 
 bishop said : ' My lords and people ; here be- 
 fore this altar, all last night, Arthur watched 
 his arms. He is ready now to be made a 
 knight.' Then Arthur knelt before him and 
 the Archbishop said : ' Do you swear to me
 
 Tke New King at St. Pa*Ts 35 
 
 that you will love God and keep His laws; 
 that you will be always loyal and upright ; that 
 the good and brave deeds you do shall be your 
 glory, and that you will do none for other glory 
 or for gain ? Do you swear that you will be 
 faithful, gentle, and merciful; that you will 
 ever fight for the right of the poor and the 
 weak, and that you will fear shame more than 
 death?' 
 
 " And Arthur answered : I swear it.' 
 " The Archbishop took the sword from the 
 altar and touched Arthur's neck with the blade. 
 
 Rise, Sir Arthur/ he said, ' and may God make 
 you a good knight.* Then he fastened the 
 sword upon Arthur's side. 
 
 - And now the Archbishop made all the lords 
 take again the oath, that they had kept so badly 
 since Twelfth Day, that they would be faithful 
 to the King and would obey him, honor him, and 
 guard him. And the lords, seeing that it was 
 of no use to do anything else, took the oath. 
 
 " Then the Archbishop said to Arthur again : 
 
 * Do yon swear that you will keep and guard 
 your people from their enemies, as God shall 
 help yon; that you will strive for peace and 
 justice in your land; that you will rule poor 
 and rich alike, and that you will give right to 
 all? Do you swear that you will be in all 
 things a true King to your people and a true 
 servant to the King of Kings?'
 
 36 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " And Arthur said : ' I swear it.' 
 
 " Then at last the Archbishop set the crown 
 upon his head, and the people in the church 
 shouted, and the people outside caught up the 
 shout, and it rang for the first time, ' Long live 
 King Arthur ! ' that shout that was to ring so 
 many times and so long and never quite die 
 away. 
 
 " And when it was all over and they came 
 out into the churchyard, the stone and the an- 
 vil were gone."
 
 CHAPTER HI 
 
 THE ROUXD TABLE 
 
 JUST what I said about London I wffl say 
 again about the beautiful places in the Mid- 
 lands of England. The books will tefl you a 
 great deal that is pleasant and useful of Oxford, 
 with its spires and domes and towers; of KeniL 
 worth, with its fine old ruined castle walls ; of 
 Warwick, with its fine old castle walls that are 
 not mined; of Stratford-on-Avon, where every- 
 body talks about Shakespeare all day and 
 dreams about Shakespeare all night; of Wor- 
 cester, where they make cups and saucers and 
 gloves and sauce. But if we leave all these be- 
 hind and I try to tell you something about Caer- 
 leon-upon-Usk, perhaps I may not do it in quite 
 the same way as the books. 
 
 I think very few people go to Caerieon-upon- 
 Usk. The ticket-seller at the railway station 
 in Newport looked surprised when we told 
 him we wanted to go there. Still, he made no
 
 38 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 objection. The one or two people about the 
 station at Caerleon-upon-Usk looked surprised 
 when we got off the train there. But they 
 asked no questions. The three or four whom 
 we met as we walked up the street looked sur- 
 prised to see us. I had been told that to find 
 King Arthur's Round Table we must walk for a 
 few minutes along the road opposite the mu- 
 seum. The museum had columns on its front 
 that made it look as if it belonged to a Greek 
 town, instead of an English one, but the ram- 
 bling church, with the square tower, close by it, 
 looked English enough. It was not far to a 
 broad green field, with a low mound in the 
 middle of it, covered with grass like the rest. 
 This mound was in the form of a ring, with 
 a hollow in the middle and a gap at one side 
 for an entrance. Some children were playing 
 in the hollow. At one side of the field there 
 was a low stone wall, and in the middle of it 
 a gate, with a pointed arch of the same kind 
 of stone above it. The wall came only a little 
 way up the sides of the arch, and in the arch 
 itself there was just enough stone to hold to- 
 gether. It all looked very old. A little boy 
 sat on the stile that we had to cross to get 
 into the field, and when we spoke to him he 
 was more surprised than any of the other 
 people we had met. "Is this what they call 
 King Arthur's Round Table?" I asked.
 
 The Round Table 39 
 
 " Yes, sir," he said ; " and they call it the 
 dingle." 
 
 "The dingle?" 
 
 " Yes, sir, they say it's that." 
 
 " But you have heard people call it King 
 Arthur's Round Table, have you ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir, I've heard that, too." 
 
 "What is that arch for?" I said, pointing 
 across to the gateway in the walL 
 
 " I don't know, sir." 
 
 "How old is it?" 
 
 "I don't know, sir; it's thirteen years old, 
 anyway." 
 
 I was the one who was surprised at this. 
 "Ah, is it?" I said; ""it looks as much as a 
 hundred. You never heard anybody say how 
 old it was?" 
 
 "No, sir; it was there before I was born, and 
 I'm eleven." 
 
 We gave the boy two or three pennies, and 
 he hurried off to find some other boys and 
 show them how much money there was in the 
 world. I wondered, as we walked across the 
 field and sat down on the mound, if King 
 Arthur, with all the castles, and towers, and 
 treasures that were his once here at Caerleon, 
 ever felt as rich as this boy. 
 
 " For it was here," I said, " that Arthur lived, 
 after they made him King, more than anywhere 
 else, except at Camelot. Here he fought bat-
 
 40 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 ties ; here many times he held his court, with 
 his knights around him ; from here the knights 
 rode away to find adventures ; back here they 
 came to tell their stories to the King and the 
 Queen ; and here now, they say, down under 
 the ground, just under this very spot where 
 we sit, in a great hall, with high pillars and 
 arches that hold up this green field, King Ar- 
 thur sits sleeping, with all his knights around 
 him. The knights are asleep and their horses 
 are all there beside them, asleep too. They 
 wear their armor and their swords, and their 
 spears are ready. And some time, they say, 
 when the people of England are in great need, 
 King Arthur and his knights will awake and 
 will come and save the people, just as Arthur 
 saved them before, so many hundred years ago. 
 You see this is a very pretty story, but I am 
 sorry to say that I cannot quite believe it." 
 
 "But you asked the boy," said Helen, "if 
 that was King Arthur's Round Table, and he 
 said it was ; but I don't see any table." 
 
 "Neither do I, but what they call the Round 
 Table is this very mound that we are sitting 
 on." 
 
 " But this isn't a table," Helen insisted ; " it 
 looks more like a place for a circus." 
 
 " You are such a horribly clever child," I 
 said, " that there is really no doing anything 
 with you. That is probably just what it is, or
 
 The Round Table 41 
 
 was a place for a circus. Long before Arthur's 
 time the Romans held Caerleon. It was one 
 of the greatest cities of all England then. And 
 the Romans were always about as fond of cir- 
 cuses as the boys and girls in New York are 
 now, so I have no doubt that they had one here, 
 and that this is it. Still, King Arthur certainly 
 lived at Caerleon and he certainly had a won- 
 derful Round Table. Arthur must have been 
 pleasanter for the people to remember, I sup- 
 pose, than the Romans, and so, when they had 
 forgotten all about what this mound really was, 
 they began to call it the Round Table, and you 
 see they call it so still. 
 
 " I have no doubt that it really was here at 
 Caerleon that ^Merlin made^the Round _Table, 
 for it was Merlin wHo~made~IE But it did not 
 always stay here. This great pile of earth 
 looks as if it would be rather hard to move, yet 
 Arthur and his knights sat at the Round Table, 
 sometimes here, sometimes at Camelot or West- 
 minster, and once, the stories say, in Rome. It 
 must have been rather a big and heavy affair, 
 whatever it was, for there were places around 
 it for a hundred and fifty knights. But one of 
 the old stories says that, by the magic that 
 Merlin put into it, it could be folded up and 
 carried about, as easily as the cloth of an ordi- 
 nary table. And that was not all of the magic. 
 Merlin made the Round Table for Uther Pen-
 
 42 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 dragon, who used to live here at Caerleon, too. 
 And Merlin made seats around it for the 
 knights, and when they were done he said to 
 Uther : * All these seats you may fill with your 
 knights, except this one next your own. This 
 is the Siege Perilous. Nobody must ever sit 
 here except the best knight of all the world, 
 and he will not come to sit here till long after 
 you are dead/ 
 
 " Now, it was a strange thing that people usu- 
 ally did just about what Merlin told them as 
 long as he was looking. But when he went 
 away for a little while they began to find that 
 they never believed much of what he said, and 
 that they themselves knew quite as much as he. 
 And so, once, when Merlin was away, King 
 Uther's knights decided that it was all nonsense 
 about the Siege Perilous and the best knight of 
 all the world. The seat looked just like the 
 others, they said, and it was none too good for 
 any of them. Then one of them said that he 
 would sit in it himself, just to show that he 
 could. And he did sit in it, and that was the 
 last that was ever seen of him. All the rest 
 were watching, and they saw him sit down, and 
 then they saw that the seat was just as empty 
 as it was before. Nobody could see where he 
 went or what had become of him. Only there 
 was the empty seat, and the knight never came 
 back to tell where he had been. It was a long
 
 The Round Table 43 
 
 time before anybody sat in the Siege Perilous 
 again. 
 
 "After Uther Pendragon's time a certain 
 king named Leodogran had the Round Table. 
 He was King of Cameliard. I don't' know 
 what or where Cameliard was, but I have a 
 dim sort of notion that it was somewhere far 
 up in the North. I don't know, either, how 
 King Leodogran got the Round Table. But 
 he had it, and he kept it till Arthur but that 
 is getting ahead of the story. 
 
 "It was here to Caerieon that Arthur came, 
 after he had been crowned at St. Paul's, and 
 after he had put things straight around Lon- 
 don and had arranged affairs so that they could 
 go on a little better than they had been going 
 before. And the Round Table was not here 
 then. And here he invited all the great lords 
 and all the little kings to a feast. But when 
 the guests were all here he found that the kings 
 had not come to eat and drink with him and 
 to talk with him of what was best for the coun- 
 try, as he had thought they would, but to fight 
 and to try to kill him. 
 
 " They made a great camp around the castle 
 that stood not far from where we are sitting, 
 and Arthur and his men went out and attacked 
 them and drove them back. Many of the lords 
 and knights were true to their promise now, and 
 were on Arthur's side, and so were all the com-
 
 44 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 mon people, except some that were under one 
 or another of the little kings and had to fight 
 for them, whether they liked it or not. Yet 
 Merlin thought it was not safe to try any great 
 battle yet, so he said to Arthur: 'Over in 
 France there are two good kings. They are 
 brothers, Ban and Bors. They are strong, 
 brave, and true men, but now another king v 
 Claudas, is making war upon them, and he is 
 so powerful that, strong and brave as they are, 
 they need help against him. Send word to 
 them that, if they will come to England and 
 help you against your enemies, you will go 
 back to France with them and fight against 
 King Claudas.' 
 
 " This seemed a good plan, and whether it 
 had seemed good or not Arthur would have 
 done whatever Merlin advised. So Merlin 
 himself went over to the two kings and told 
 them how Arthur had been made King of Eng- 
 land, and how he was surely to be a greater 
 King than Uther Pendragon, and what a good 
 friend Arthur would always be to them, if they 
 would help him now. Then Merlin came back, 
 in less time than it would have taken anybody 
 else to go half-way to France, and told Arthur 
 that Ban and Bors would come. 
 
 "And when they came Merlin said that it 
 would be better to hide them and their knights 
 in the woods and let Arthur and his knights
 
 The Round Table 45 
 
 fight with the kings alone for a while. That 
 would make the enemy bolder, when they saw 
 onlj a few coming against them, and would 
 lead them on to the fight, and then King Ban 
 and King Bors could come out of the woods 
 and fall upon them. I don't know enough 
 about battles myself to be quite certain whether 
 this would do any good or not, but Merlin was 
 always fond of surprises, and of course they 
 did what Merlin said. He told Arthur, too, 
 not to use the sword that he drew out of the 
 stone till he got into the very thickest of the 
 fight and really needed it. 
 
 " And the kings were all good fighters, and 
 they had brave knights with them, and there 
 were so many of them that when they saw the 
 few knights of Arthur before them they 
 thought that they could easily have the battle 
 their own way. And so, indeed, it did look, 
 for when their great crowd of horses and of 
 men, with lances down, came rushing on to- 
 ward the little band that Arthur had, it looked 
 as if it could never stand against them. But 
 if Arthur's knights were few they were as good 
 as any in the world. (There were Sir Ulfius 
 and Sir Brastias and old Sir Ector, who had 
 been Uther's men, and there were Sir Kay 
 and Sir Lucan, King Arthur's butler, and many 
 more who would be true to him as long as 
 they lived. And if for one moment Arthur
 
 46 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 himself thought that his foes were too many 
 and too strong for him, his next thought was : 
 ' It is for my people ; they have suffered wrong 
 from these men too long and too much, and 
 they shall suffer it no more.' 
 
 " And he and his knights charged with their 
 spears into the midst of their enemies. And 
 after the spears were broken they drew their 
 "* swords and struck to right and left. And 
 when he saw his enemies all around him Ar- 
 thur drew his sword that he took from the 
 stone, and the good old fellows who wrote 
 these stories hundreds of years ago say that it 
 shone with a light like thirty torches. ' Look 
 at him,' said one of the old knights to an- 
 other, ' he fights as if he were Uther come 
 back again.' 
 
 " ' No,' the other answered, ' he fights better 
 than Uther ever did.' 
 
 " The rebel kings were beginning to find it 
 out, too, old soldiers as they were. They 
 thought that Merlin must be helping with his 
 magic, but he was not; it was only Arthur's 
 own hard fighting. A strong young arm, with 
 something good to fight for, is a bad thing to 
 fight against, even for men who are older and 
 better trained. And when Ban and Bors burst 
 out of the woods, with all their men, and fell 
 upon the enemy too, they simply turned and 
 ran, those of them who could run. And still
 
 The Round Table 47 
 
 the blood of Arthur's men was up and they 
 felt that they had not had half fighting enough, 
 when Merlin called to them all to come back, 
 for the rebel kings were beaten and there was 
 no more to do. 
 
 " But in those dear old days nobody ever 
 suffered long for want of a good fight. And 
 so, almost before Arthur had done thanking 
 Ban and Bors for the help they had given him, 
 a messenger came to him from King Leodo- 
 gran, of Cameliard. And this messenger said 
 that a giant named Ryence, who was King 
 of North Wales, was coming against Leodo- 
 gran with a great army. He had sent to Leo- 
 dogran to say that he had a mantle trimmed 
 with kings' beards and he wanted Leodo- 
 gran's beard to go with the rest. Leodogran 
 must send him his beard or he would come 
 and take it for himself, and then he would kill 
 him and destroy everything in his country. 
 Now Leodogran, the messenger said, did not 
 like the notion at all of having to give his 
 beard to another king to trim his clothes with, 
 but he never in the world could fight Ryence 
 alone and he begged Arthur to come and help 
 him. When this message had been given Ar- 
 thur looked around upon his knights. They 
 were all still and all leaning forward to hear 
 his answer, and the eyes of every one of them 
 seemed to say to him ' Let us go.' And Ar-
 
 48 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 thur looked at Ban and Bors, and the look in 
 their faces said ' We will go too.' And he 
 looked at Merlin and Merlin nodded, and Ar- 
 thur said : ' Tell your King that I will come, 
 I and my friends, King Ban and King Bors.' 
 
 " So, as soon as they could make ready, they 
 all marched away up into the North. And one 
 evening, just as the sun was setting, they came 
 to the city of King Leodogran, and the gate 
 opened to let them in. And Arthur, riding at 
 the head of his knights, looked through the gate- 
 way ; and all along the street, before the houses 
 and at the windows, there were lines of faces, 
 half pale with fear, half flushed with hope. For 
 the people seemed scarcely to know whether 
 the gate was opened for their friends or for 
 their foes; whether these long lines of horse- 
 men, these bright armors, and these banners 
 brought them life or death. The King's castle 
 was just inside the wall of the town, and on 
 the battlement stood a crowd of ladies to see 
 the three kings and their knights go by. 
 
 " Arthur looked up at them and one among 
 them all caught his eye. The low sun was behind 
 her, so that he could not see her face well, but it 
 was young and he thought that it was the most 
 beautiful he had ever seen. Her hair was the 
 color of gold and it fell down upon her shoul- 
 ders, and there were light waves of it all about 
 her head, and the low sun shone through it and
 
 The Round Table 49 
 
 made it look to Arthur like the halo of a saint. 
 And he saw no more of the many frightened 
 and hopeful faces and none of the other ladies 
 on the battlement, but only that one face. 
 * Who is she?' he said to Merlin, who rode by 
 his side. 
 
 " And the wise old Merlin knew just where 
 Arthur was looking, and he answered : ' She is 
 the King's daughter, the Princess Guinevere.' 
 
 " They turned an angle of the castle wall and 
 she was gone. Arthur saw the anxious faces in 
 the street again. But he saw them dimly, for 
 still that one face was before his eyes, the face 
 darkened, with the sun behind it, but around it 
 the halo of the saint He did not know whether 
 she had seen him or not. 
 
 u The next day Ryence and his army were 
 before the town, and the four kings, Arthur and 
 Ban and Bors and Leodogran, with all their 
 knights, went out against them. Every one had 
 all the fighting he wanted that day, for Ryence 
 had more men than the other four kings put to- 
 gether, and he thought he saw a chance to get 
 four beards for his mantle, instead of one. Be- 
 sides that, Ryence was more than twice as tall 
 as an ordinary man and some of his knights 
 were giants too. They were not easy fellows 
 to fight against. 
 
 " Merlin carried Arthur's banner, and it was 
 a very wonderful banner, that he had made
 
 50 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 himself. It had a dragon on it breathing fire 
 out of its mouth. There was nothing strange 
 about that, of course, and sometimes people 
 looked at it and saw nothing about it any more 
 wonderful than any other banner. But in the 
 crowd that stood in the streets to see them all 
 go out through the gate to the battle there was 
 a woman who held up a child to see the horses 
 and the armors. ' Oh, look at the banner ! ' the 
 child cried ; ' what is it doing? ' 
 
 " ' Yes,' the woman said, ' a pretty banner, 
 isn't it? ' She had seen it a minute before and 
 now she was looking at the bright, painted 
 shields and the plumes on the helmets. 
 
 " ' But look at it,' the child cried again ; ' it's 
 all on fire.' 
 
 " The woman looked at it again and then she 
 almost dropped the child. ' Look, look,' she whis- 
 pered to another woman who stood next to her ; 
 ' the dragon on the banner is breathing real fire ! ' 
 
 " And so it was ; instead of the little spots of 
 gold that they had seen before, real sparks 
 floated from the jaws of the dragon on the ban- 
 ner and went out in the air just above it. The 
 whisper the woman had started grew and ran 
 all through the crowd and everybody looked at 
 the banner. ' It is Merlin carrying it,' said an 
 old man ; < we may beat them yet, with Merlin 
 on our side.' 
 
 " And then the battle began, and the fiercer it
 
 The Round Table 51 
 
 grew the more the dragon on the banner spouted 
 fire. Always Merlin kept the banner beside 
 Arthur, and so always it was in the thickest 
 part of the fight. And when Arthur's men saw 
 that great torch blazing higher and brighter, 
 it made them feel that their side was growing 
 stronger ; and when the men of Ryence saw it, 
 they feared more and more, because it made 
 them feel that some power they did not under- 
 stand was against them. 
 
 "And Arthur fought that day as he had 
 never fought before. He had come because 
 he wanted to help the good King Leodogran 
 against the cruel tyrant Ryence, but now he 
 had something more to fight for. He looked 
 straight at the helmet that he charged against 
 with his spear, or at the shield that he struck 
 with his sword, or he glanced sharply around 
 him, that no enemy might come upon him un- 
 awares, but always, beyond the charging hel- 
 met and above the shield and through all the 
 dust of the battle he saw that face that he 
 had seen last night upon the castle walL And 
 always when he saw it plainest, he struck 
 harder with his spear or sword, and every one 
 of his enemies went down before him. He was 
 not the first man or the last who ever struck 
 harder because he saw such a face as that 
 always before him. 
 
 " And all day the battle went on, the crowds
 
 52 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 of fighting- men and horses now surging up 
 close to the city wall, now drifting away from 
 it across the plain, and all the women and the 
 children and the old men who could find 
 places stood on the wall to watch. And once 
 they saw a sight that made them all tremble and 
 turn pale. For Ryence and half a dozen of his 
 giant knights charged down upon King Leo- 
 dogran and threw him from his horse and 
 seized him and were dragging him away as 
 their prisoner. And Arthur was resting for 
 a moment, when Merlin cried out to him : ' Do 
 not stop now ; go on ; there is more work for 
 you ; look ! ' 
 
 "And Arthur looked and saw Leodogran 
 and Ryence and the rest. But he saw more 
 than that, for there, upon the castle rampart, 
 looking out over the city wall, she stood again 
 the Princess Guinevere. She saw her father, 
 and her face was full of terror and she tried to 
 turn away, but she could not, and still she 
 gazed at him and at the giants who were drag- 
 ging him away. Just for an instant Arthur 
 looked at her and thought : ' This time she 
 shall see me.' Then he spurred his horse and 
 charged straight against King Ryence. And 
 Merlin kept by his side, and the flame from the 
 mouth of the dragon on his banner was high- 
 er and fiercer than it had ever been before. 
 ' What did I say to you in that other battle ? '
 
 The Round Table 53 
 
 said one of Arthur's knights to another. ' Did 
 Uther ever fight like that?' And before the 
 other could answer they both wheeled their 
 horses and dropped the points of their spears 
 and charged against two of the knights of 
 Rjence and threw them from their saddles. 
 Their armors clashed as the horses of Arthur's 
 knights struck them with their hoofs, and they 
 dashed on against more of their enemies. 
 
 " And Arthur and Ryence were fighting the 
 most terrible fight of all that day. For Ryence 
 was big and strong, and Arthur, thinking of the 
 eyes that were on him, felt himself grow bigger 
 and stronger than Ryence. The giant had a 
 beautiful, bright, sharp sword. It was said that 
 Vulcan had made it for Hercules and that 
 Ryence was his descendant And Arthur 
 thought : ' If I could only win that sword, it 
 would be the finest thing that I could carry 
 off this field of battle. And as they fought 
 Ryence struck a savage blow at Arthur and 
 hit his shield and cut it half in two ; and there 
 his sword stuck and he could not draw it out. 
 Then Arthur gave Ryence a deep wound, and 
 he turned and fled and left his sword sticking 
 in Arthur's shield. 
 
 " There was none of Ryence's men left in 
 that place now. Arthur found a horse that 
 had belonged to one of them and brought it 
 to King Leodogran and helped him to mount.
 
 54 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Next he drew the sword of Ryence out of his 
 shield, and then he and his knights followed 
 Ryence and his men, who were all fleeing now. 
 They followed them till they were all broken 
 up and scattered, and then they knew that the 
 battle was won and they turned to go back to 
 the town. The gate was opened for them and 
 they all passed in, Arthur and Merlin and Leo- 
 dogran and Ban and Bors and all their knights ; 
 and the people crowded to the gate to meet 
 them and filled the streets and cheered and 
 wept and laughed, and the dragon on Merlin's 
 banner breathed a stream of fire high up into 
 the air, above the very towers of the castle. 
 
 " That night Leodogran made a feast in his 
 castle hall. And there sat the four kings and 
 all the best of their knights and Merlin. And 
 the Princess Guinevere served them, as prin- 
 cesses did in those days. But there were two 
 in the hall who ate and drank nothing. One of 
 them was Arthur. After all the work and the 
 heat of that day he could not eat. He only sat 
 and watched the Princess, as she moved about 
 the hall. He did not think that the others 
 might be watching him, and I believe that all 
 that he thought was : ' I must look well at her 
 now, for if I leave this place to-morrow I may 
 never see her again.' 
 
 " I suppose Merlin knew all this, because he 
 knew everything, but of all the rest only one
 
 The Round Table 55 
 
 was watching Arthur. That was Leodogran, 
 and when he saw that Arthur's eyes followed 
 Guinevere everywhere she went, he too could 
 not eat. And his thought was : ' He is as brave 
 as my child is beautiful.' Then the Princess 
 herself came and knelt before Arthur and 
 offered him a gold cup full of wine and said : 
 ' My Lord, drink this ; why should you be 
 afraid to eat and drink ? You are not afraid to 
 fight.' 
 
 " And Arthur gazed at her still, and when he 
 tried to answer her he scarcely knew what he 
 said, but it seemed to him that it had been un- 
 mannerly in him to sit there without eating 
 as he had, and he took the wine and said : ' I 
 thank you, and I will repay you if I ever have 
 the power.' 
 
 " ' You have done more for me already, my 
 Lord,' she said, ' than I can ever deserve of 
 you. You have saved my father's country and 
 his people and you saved my father's life too. 
 I saw you and I saw it all, there before the 
 gate, and you might have lost your own life.' 
 
 " Do you think that Arthur ate or drank 
 any more after that ? But Leodogran tried to 
 laugh and to cheer on the others and to make 
 the night a happy one, but still his eyes were 
 on those two and still his one thought was ' He 
 is as brave as my child is beautiful.' 
 
 "The next day Arthur and Ban and Bors,
 
 56 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 with all their knights, began their march home, 
 for Merlin said : ' It is time for you to fight 
 King Claudas, in France^ They came to 
 Camelot, where Arthur had another castle, 
 even greater and more beautiful than the one 1 
 here at Caerleon. And there, as they entered 
 the hall of the castle, four young men came to 
 meet them and knelt before Arthur. ' My 
 Lord,' said one of them, ' I am Gawain, and 
 these two are my brothers, Gaheris and Agra- 
 vain; we are the sons of King Lot, and this 
 other is Uwain, our cousin, the son of King 
 Urien. We have come to be your men. Our 
 father, King Lot, fought against you with the 
 other kings, but we have tried to make him 
 your friend, and he has promised us that he 
 will be so now and will be faithful to you, if you 
 will be his friend and will forgive him.' 
 
 " Arthur looked around upon his knights. 
 They were all silent, and two or three of them 
 shook their heads. Then he looked again at 
 the young men before him. They had fresh, 
 glowing young faces and big bodies and strong 
 arms, and their bright young eyes looked eag- 
 erly into his" for their answer. He turned to 
 his knights once more. ' Old friends,' he said, 
 'your hearts are all true to me, I know, as true 
 to me as they were to Uther when you were 
 his men. You are tried and brave and faithful, 
 but how long can I depend on you ? I must
 
 The Round Table 57 
 
 have men Eke these to help me build up m j 
 kingdom. They are such as I am myself. I will 
 forgive King Lot; we have enemies enough; 
 we need friends.* 
 
 " Arthur had not spoken to Merlin, though 
 he stood close at his side had not looked at 
 him. But now Merlin whispered: 'Oh, my 
 King, it is only a little while longer that I can 
 be with you, but now when the time comes I 
 can leave yon and you will not need me ; you 
 are the King.' 
 
 *"My Lord,' said Gawain, 'will yon make us 
 knights? 1 
 
 "And Arthur drew his sword and touched 
 the shoulder of each of them with it and said: 
 Rise, Sir Gawain, Sir Gaheris, Sir Agravain, 
 and Sir Uwain, and may God make you good 
 knights.' 
 
 " Then they all marched on again and crossed 
 over into France and fought with King Clau- 
 das, the enemy of Ban and Bors. And when 
 they had beaten him and driven him back to 
 his own country, Arthur said to the brother 
 kings : We do not need each other any more. 
 You have helped me more than I could help 
 you, for I needed help more than you. So I 
 have not repaid you for all that yon have done. 
 I must go back now to my own people, but if 
 I can ever do more than I have done to show 
 you how grateful I am, tell me of it, now or
 
 58 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 when the time comes, and nothing will please 
 me so much as helping you.' 
 
 " Bors answered first and said : ' One thing 
 I have thought already that I would ask of you. 
 We have never seen such a court before as 
 that you keep. Your knights are the bravest 
 we have ever found. You are always generous 
 and just to them, and to all your people. In 
 their battles and dangers you are one of them. 
 They love you as no other men in the world 
 love their king. These things will soon be 
 told all through the world, and then the brav- 
 est and noblest everywhere will want to come 
 to you and be your knights. Now this is what 
 I ask: I have a son whose name is Bors, like 
 mine. When he is old enough I wish that he 
 might be made a knight by you and live at 
 your court, for there he will learn all that is 
 truest and noblest and gentlest and best for a 
 good knight to know.' 
 
 " ' Let him come,' said Arthur, ' but again the 
 favor and the help will be to me, not to you.' 
 And then he looked at King Ban. 
 
 " ' I cannot ask anything,' said Ban. ' My 
 brother has asked the best gift of you that 
 any king could ask. I would ask the same, but 
 my son is lost my Galahad. Shall I tell you 
 how? Once this same Claudas came against 
 my castle with such a force that I could not re- 
 sist him. To save my wife and my child I took
 
 The Round Table 59 
 
 them and one servant with me and we left the 
 castle at night No one saw us till we had 
 gone far through the woods. Then we met two 
 of Claudas's knights and I and my servant went 
 forward to fight with them. I fell and the 
 Queen thought that I was wounded. She put 
 the child down on the ground and ran to help 
 me. When she saw that I was not hurt she 
 went back to find the child. A woman sat un- 
 der a tree, holding him in her arms. She arose 
 when the Queen came near her, went to the 
 edge of a lake that was near, and jumped in with 
 the child. Both of them sank out of sight and 
 we have never seen our child since then. Some 
 have told us that it was the Lad}- of the Lake 
 who took him. They say that he is not dead, 
 but that she is still keeping him with her and 
 is teaching him all that a young knight ought 
 to know. It ma}* be true, but I do not hope to 
 see him again. My brother has asked of you 
 the best of gifts for his son, but I can ask noth- 
 ing for Galahad.' 
 
 " When Ban had told this story no one spoke 
 at first, and then Merlin said : ' My lord, the 
 best knight who will ever come to your court 
 will be Galahad.' 
 
 Arthur and Ban both looked at him with 
 the same question in their eyes : ' Then he was 
 not drowned, and he will come ! ' But Merlin 
 would say no more. He only repeated : ' The
 
 60 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 best knight who will ever come to your court 
 will be Galahad.' 
 
 " And Arthur said to Ban : ' If your son 
 lives and comes to me, I shall welcome him 
 gladly for your sake, and it will make me glad- 
 dest of all if my best knight hereafter shall 
 remind me always of you, who are my best 
 friend now.' 
 
 " It was not long after Arthur had come 
 back to England when he began to find himself 
 disturbed in a new way. He said to Merlin 
 one day : ' My knights and my lords keep com- 
 plaining to me. They say it is not right that 
 such a court as mine should have only a king 
 at the head of it, and that it ought to have a 
 queen, too.' 
 
 " Now of course I don't say that it was 
 really the knights and the lords who were most 
 anxious about this : I only say that that was 
 what Arthur told Merlin. You know very 
 well who in all that court probably thought 
 most about a queen. If Arthur thought that 
 he could deceive such persons as you and Mer- 
 lin and I, he was very much mistaken. 
 
 " But Merlin looked very serious and asked 
 Arthur, just if he did not know what was 
 coming, if he had thought of anybody for his 
 queen. 
 
 " ' Yes,' said Arthur, ' Guinevere, the daugh- 
 ter of King Leodogran.'
 
 The Round Table 61 
 
 - Merlin did not look so glad as Arthur 
 thought he ought to look. It most be very 
 uncomfortable, I think, to know as much as 
 Merlin knew. "Will yon go to her father; 
 Arthur went on, * and ask him to give her to 
 me, and will you bring her back with you to 
 Camelot?' 
 
 44 Merlin still looked grave and sad, but he 
 only said: Yes, I wfll go." 
 
 " And, so, not many days after, a splendid 
 procession came through the gate of Camelot 
 and up the street to the castle of the King. 
 There were many knights of King Arthur and 
 many knights of King Leodogra~,an with their 
 gayest armor and their brightest shields and 
 their tallest plumes, and in the midst of them 
 all rode King Arthur himself and the Princess 
 Guinevere, for he and his knights had gone 
 out to meet her. And Merlin rode before them 
 and carried his banner, with the fire-breathing 
 dragon. 
 
 "So Guinevere was married to Arthur in 
 the Church of St. Stephen, at Camelot. And 
 when they came from the church to the great 
 hall of the castle they saw a strange sight. 
 For there, in the middle of the hall, stood that 
 wonderful Round Table that Merlin had made 
 f or Uther Pendragon so long ago. All around 
 it were the seats for the knights, and there was 
 one seat, higher and wider than the rest, for
 
 62 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 the King. It had a canopy of silk above it and 
 great golden dragons all around, with jew- 
 elled eyes, that shone like fire. 
 
 " Then Merlin said : ' King Arthur, this is 
 the wedding-gift that King Leodogran has sent 
 to you. It was the Round Table of Uther, 
 but now forever all the world shall know it as 
 the Round Table of Arthur. Jjlere are s.eats 
 for a Eufrdrod and^fty^kmgHts. King Leodo- 
 gran has sent you a hundred knights ; the other 
 seats you must fill yourself, all but this one 
 next your own. This is the Siege Perilous. 
 While you live and reign the greatest knights 
 of the world shall sit at this table, but in the 
 Siege Perilous no one shall sit till the one best 
 knight of all the world comes to take it.' 
 
 " Then, as they looked at the seats, they saw 
 that the name of some knight was in each one 
 of them, in letters of gold. And always after 
 that, when any new knight was to sit at the 
 Round Table, his name came of itself in letters 
 of gold in the seat that he was to have. And 
 now Merlin made them all take their places 
 and hold up their swords, with their cross- 
 shaped hilts high above their heads, and take 
 the oath of the Knights of the Round Table. 
 ' Do you swear,' he said, ' that you will help 
 the King to guard his' people and to keep peace 
 and justice in his land; that you will be faith- 
 ful to your fellows ; that you will do right to
 
 The Round Table 63 
 
 poor and rich alike? Do you swear that in all 
 things you will be true and loyal to God and 
 to the King?' 
 
 ** And every one of them said : * I swear it.' 
 
 * And there were the hundred knights that 
 Leodogran had sent, and there were Gawain 
 and U wain and Gaheris and Agra vain and Ec- 
 tor and Kay and Lucan and Ulfius and Bras- 
 tias and many more of Arthur's best knights. 
 And as long as Arthur lived, to be a knight 
 of the Round Table was the greatest honor 
 that a knight could have, And knights and 
 lords and even kings came from other coun- 
 tries to sit at that table. And some who might 
 have been kings in their own countries stayed 
 here always to be Arthur's knights. For they 
 thought it was a greater thing to be called a 
 knight of that Round Table than to be called 
 a king in another land ; and so it was." 
 
 "And yon don't believe, after all,"* Helen 
 asked, "that this is really the Round Table, 
 here where we are sitting?"* 
 
 ** No," I said ; "just while we sit here we can 
 make believe that we believe that it is, but I 
 don't believe it really.*"
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 NOT GALAHAD, BUT LANCELOT 
 
 WE left the field of the Round Table and 
 walked back toward the museum, and then 
 down to the river and across the bridge and 
 back. As we looked away down the Usk we 
 wondered if the view was much changed from 
 the one that Arthur and Guinevere and Mer- 
 lin used to see. A pretty view it was, with 
 hills rising from the river in gentle slopes and 
 all covered with green woods. It would have 
 been prettier still if the water had looked clearer 
 and if there had been less mud on the banks. 
 
 " There is one little story that I think you 
 ought to hear," I said, " before I tell you any 
 others, though it has nothing to do with Caer- 
 leon. It belongs to Camelot, where you know 
 I told you King Arthur lived even more of the 
 time than here." 
 
 "Are we going to Camelot, too?" Helen 
 asked.
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 65 
 
 * I am not quite sure about that," I said. 
 " We will try to. The trouble is that there is 
 no such place as Camelot now, or, at any rate, 
 no such city, and nobody knows just where it 
 was. When nobody knows, of course anybody 
 has a right to guess. So one says that Came- 
 lot was here and another says that it was there. 
 We will do our best to find it, but the worst 
 of it will be that we shall never really know 
 whether we have found it or not. 
 
 " Well, wherever it was, it was a beautiful 
 city, with high walls around it and great gates 
 in them, and with fine houses and splendid 
 churches. And Arthur had a castle there even 
 greater and more beautiful than the one here 
 at CaerleoD. And once the ladies of the castle 
 stood on the ramparts, just as they had stood 
 on those of the castle of King Leodogran when 
 Arthur came to Cameliard, and looked down 
 to see the people who passed. And they saw 
 a strange little procession coming slowly along 
 the road toward the castle. It was very different 
 from that other procession, when Arthur and 
 Ban and Bors and their knights marched into 
 the city up in the North to save the old King 
 and his people. There were knights here, too, 
 and squires, and they rode handsome horses 
 and wore rich clothes. And two of the 
 squires led the most beautiful horse of all. 
 It was pure white, with flowing mane and tail
 
 66 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 and great dark, flashing eyes. On its back 
 it carried an armor that gleamed in the sun 
 as if it were made all of silver, and a shield. 
 Another squire carried a shining helmet, 
 that matched the armor, and another car- 
 ried a sword in a scabbard set all over with 
 jewels. 
 
 " Behind these rode a young squire and a 
 woman. The young squire was so big and 
 well formed, and he had a face that was so 
 handsome and looked so brave and strong, and 
 yet so kind and sunny, too, that I am sure all 
 the girls in the streets of Camelot must have 
 stared at him and at nothing else, as he passed 
 along. And I am just as sure that the men 
 Avere staring at the woman who rode beside 
 him. For she was young or she looked 
 young, and that is the same thing for a wom- 
 an and she was beautiful, too. They could 
 not see much of her face, because she kept it 
 turned toward the young squire, but they 
 could see the curve of her neck and her dark 
 masses of hair, that fell almost down to the 
 horse's back, all twisted full of pearls. She 
 wore a wonderful, long silk gown, that seemed 
 always changing its color from white to pale 
 blue and back to white again. Sometimes it 
 shone almost like the steel and the silver of 
 the armors, but still it fluttered in the little 
 breezes and looked as soft as any other silk. I
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 67 
 
 suppose, after all, the women noticed this more 
 than the men did. 
 
 "The young squire and the woman rode 
 close together, and they seemed to be talking. 
 But the woman could not talk much, because 
 there were so many tears in her voice, though 
 there were few in her eyes. * What makes you 
 so sorry, Fairy Mother ? " the young man said. 
 ' Am I not to be a knight and go on adven- 
 tures and do brave things, as you have told 
 me, and does not that make you glad and 
 proud?' 
 
 " ' Oh, yes,' the woman answered, I am glad 
 and proud of all that, but I am sorry that I 
 must lose you. Perhaps I shall not see you 
 any more, and surely I shall not see you every 
 day, as I have all these years.' 
 
 "The young man himself looked sorry at 
 that. *I wish I could stay with yon, Fairy 
 Mother,' he said ; * but it would not be right, 
 would it, for a strong man like me to stay at 
 home always and never do anything good or 
 great or brave, like other men ? ' 
 
 "'No, no, dear Lancelot, no/ she said; 'it 
 would not be right. I know that yon must 
 come to the King now, and stay with him, or 
 go where he sends you, and belong to him and 
 to all the world, and not to me any more.' 
 
 "Though the squire was talking with the 
 woman by his side, yet all the while he was
 
 68 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 looking at the streets and the houses and the 
 people, as if he had never seen such things be- 
 fore. And just now the little procession turned 
 a corner, and he came where he could see the 
 castle of the King, its big, strong, graceful 
 towers, its high walls and battlements, and the 
 ladies standing there and looking down at him 
 and the others. And when he saw the whole 
 castle suddenly before him, looking so grand 
 and stately, his first thought was : ' Can it be 
 that the great King, who owns all this, will let 
 me stay here with him and be his knight? If 
 he only will, it will make me happy all my life 
 to say " I am King Arthur's knight." And that 
 Round Table ! Can I hope ever to sit there, 
 too, among the best of all his knights ? ' Then 
 his eyes grew brighter and his whole face 
 glowed with the joy of this great hope. 
 
 " It was just then that he saw the ladies on 
 the wall, and he looked at one who stood 
 among them, and after that he scarcely saw the 
 rest. The evening sun was behind her and 
 her face was darkened, but he could see it a 
 little, and he thought: 'I did not know be- 
 fore that any one could be more beautiful 
 than my Fairy Mother.' And as he saw the 
 soft, low, level light of the sun shining 
 through the gold of her hair, he thought 
 again : ' She wears the halo of a saint.' He 
 could not look away from her, but he touched
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 69 
 
 the hand of the woman beside him and whis- 
 pered : ' Who is she ? ' 
 
 " And she answered : ' She is the King's wife, 
 Queen Guinevere.' Then suddenly all the 
 light went out of the young man's face, and he 
 looked down at his horse's neck, and he did 
 not speak again till they came to the castle 
 gate. 
 
 " The news of the coming of the strangers 
 had run through the castle, and the King him- 
 self came down to the gate to meet them. 
 The young squire and the woman dismounted 
 from the horses and knelt before him. ' My 
 lord,' she said, ' I have come to ask a gift of 
 you. It is one that will not cause you any 
 loss.' 
 
 "You know in those days kings and lords 
 and knights had a way of promising gifts to 
 people before they knew what was to be asked, 
 and they were as honorable about keeping 
 these promises as they were stupid about mak- 
 ing them. But Arthur had a way of promis- 
 ing that he would give what was asked, if it 
 were in reason and if it were not against his 
 honor or his kingdom. And some such answer 
 as this he made to this woman. 
 
 " ' My lord,' she said, ' here is a young squire, 
 brave and of high birth ; here are his sword, 
 his armor, and his horse ; I ask you to make 
 him a knight whenever he shall ask it of you.'
 
 70 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " Then Arthur smiled and said : ' You told 
 me that your gift should be no loss to me. 
 When I make a young man a knight I like to 
 give him myself his horse, his armor, and his 
 sword. Is it not a loss to me if you give them 
 to him instead ? ' 
 
 " ' Yet, let me do it,' the woman answered. 
 ' Since he was a little child all that he has had 
 has been from me, and these things are the last 
 that I can give him.' 
 
 " ' It shall be as you wish,' said the King. 
 
 "-'Then,' said the woman, 'I must go.' She 
 stooped and kissed the forehead of the squire, 
 who still knelt before the King ; then she 
 "turned away, sprang upon her horse, with no 
 one to help her, hid her face in her veil, and 
 rode away from the gate. For a moment the 
 King scarcely knew what she was doing. 'Do 
 not go yet,' he said ; ' the feast of St. John is 
 coming ; stay and keep it with us and see your 
 good young squire made a knight.' 
 
 " But she was gone already. The young 
 man still kneeling, the horse with the armor 
 on its back, the two squires who led it, and the 
 others who carried the helmet and the sword 
 stayed inside the gate. All the rest followed 
 the strange woman down the long street and 
 out from the gate of Camelot and away, no- 
 body knew where. 
 
 " The King took the young man's hand,
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 71 
 
 raised him up, and led him to the great hall of 
 the castle. There the Queen came to meet 
 them and stood beside the King. * And now,' 
 the King said, ' tell us who you are.' 
 
 " * My lord,' the young man answered, * my 
 Fairy Mother has told me that I am King Ban's 
 son.' 
 
 " * King Ban's son ! ' cried the King ; ' then 
 you are a thousand times welcome here ! You 
 are that Galahad who was promised to me as 
 the best of all my knights.' 
 
 " No, my lord,' said the squire, * I do not 
 hope to be that, and I am not Galahad.' 
 
 " But,' said the King again, ' are not you that 
 son of King Ban whom some woman stole from 
 his wife and carried down into the lake and 
 kept ? His name was Galahad, and Merlin said 
 that Galahad should be my best knight." 
 
 " I can say nothing of that, my lord,' said 
 the squire. ' If Merlin told you the truth, let 
 him make his own words good. It would 
 make me very proud if I could be counted the 
 greatest of your knights. If I am never that, 
 then I shall be glad that you have better 
 knights than I. But for my name I never 
 knew my real father or mother, and I do not 
 know what name they called me by. ^\ knaw 
 oaly.jnj_gairy Mother, an^I ndU^keep the 
 name she ggve me Lancelot of he LaTceT* 
 Was that your Fairy Mother, as you call
 
 72 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 her,' said the King, ' who came with you just 
 now? You are disobedient, both of you. She 
 would not let me give you arms and you will 
 not let me give you a name. But you may 
 keep whatever name you like. And now tell 
 me about this Fairy Mother. Who is she ? 
 Was it she who stole you from your real 
 mother? And what has she done with you all 
 the years since then ? ' 
 
 " * I will tell you all that I can,' the young man 
 answered, ' but I do not like to hear you talk 
 about her stealing me. She is the only mother 
 I have ever known. Her name is Nimue, and 
 they call her the Lady of the Lake. I cannot 
 tell you just what that means. I have never 
 seen the lake but once in all the years that I 
 have been with her. I have heard it said some- 
 times that there was no lake really, but only 
 an enchantment, an image of a lake, to keep 
 strangers away from the place where she lived. 
 
 " ' I do not know how I came to her first, but 
 as long ago as I can remember she took care 
 of me and taught me. I was her page, and I 
 learned to serve her and her maidens as a good 
 page ought to serve ladies, and I learned to sing 
 and to play the harp a little. The place where 
 we lived was not like this. It was a beautiful 
 place, but not so beautiful as this. There were 
 fine castles and gardens and a river, but they 
 did not look like these. We could not see far
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 73 
 
 away to where the sky comes down and 
 touches the hills, as we can here. From our 
 tower we could look out over the woods, but 
 not very far away it all seemed to stop, and we 
 could see no more. The sun shone warmer 
 than here, yet it did not shine so bright. The 
 air was not clear, like the air here. It was 
 light, but it was all misty, and the sun shone 
 dim. 
 
 " We had many knights and ladies with us, 
 and other knights and ladies came often to 
 visit us. We had great feasts in the hall of 
 our castle and we had hunts and tournaments. 
 As soon as I could hold a bow and arrow they 
 began to teach me to shoot with them. As 
 soon as I could sit upon a horse I began to 
 learn to ride, and when I was old enough I 
 rode hunting with the knights and the young 
 squires. Then my Fairy Mother gave me a 
 master, who taught me to hold a spear and 
 how to run with it against a quintain, and then 
 against another man on another horse. Day 
 after day and month after month he taught me, 
 till I could use my spear better than he could 
 use his. He taught me to fight with the sword, 
 too, and still I practised with both till none of 
 the knights who lived about us and none of 
 the knights who came to visit us could stand 
 against me in a fight with either. And when 
 in some trial I had beaten all the rest, my Fairy
 
 74 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Mother would take off my helmet and kiss me 
 and say that I should be the best knight of the 
 world some day. I only tell you what she 
 said ; you know, my lord, she loved me so 
 much. 
 
 44 ' Once, not very long ago, when some of us 
 were hunting, I rode far away from the rest, 
 and farther away from where we lived than I 
 had ever been before. And suddenly it seemed 
 to me that I was in a more beautiful place than 
 I had ever seen. There was sunlight all around 
 me, brighter than I had ever known, sunlight 
 like this around us here. The sun itself was so 
 bright that I could not look at it not dusky, 
 as it was where we lived. I could look far 
 away and see the blue sky everywhere, as you 
 can here. It was all so lovely that I stayed for 
 a long time to look, and then, when I thought 
 that it was time for me to go back to my 
 friends, I could not find the way. I turned the 
 way that it seemed to me I ought to go, and 
 there was nothing there but a broad lake, with 
 that strange, clear sunlight shining on it. 
 Then, as I came near the lake, I saw my Fairy 
 Mother coming from its bank. 44 Give me 
 your hand," she said, and she sprang on my 
 horse's back behind me. She put her arms 
 around me, just as she used to do when I first 
 learned to sit upon a horse, and took the reins 
 out of my hands, and we rode toward the lake.
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 75 
 
 And then, all at once, I cannot tell you how, 
 the lake was gone, and soon we were in places 
 that I knew, and all the beautiful sunlight was 
 gone, and then we were at home. 
 
 "'That night, I do not know whether I 
 was awake or dreaming, but I thought that my 
 Fairy Mother came and stood beside me. She 
 wept and said : " My little Lancelot my great 
 Lancelot you have grown too big to stay here 
 with me any more. I cannot keep you here 
 and love you all alone any longer. You must 
 go out into the world, where the King and the 
 Queen and every one will love you, where you 
 can live and fight with other knights and be 
 the best of them all." I only tell you what she 
 said, my lord. 
 
 " * And I do not know whether she had told 
 me of you before, my lord, or whether I had 
 heard of you from the knights and ladies who 
 came to visit us, but somehow I knew that 
 your court was the finest and that your 
 knights were the bravest and the greatest in 
 the world. And so, when she told me that I 
 must come to Arthur's court, I knew that I 
 was to serve the noblest of kings. So here 
 I have come, my lord, to ask that I may be 
 your knight.' 
 
 " Now, all the time that the young squire 
 had been telling this story he had been looking 
 first at the King and then at the Queen, as
 
 76 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 they stood together before him, listening to 
 every word that he said. He could see the 
 Queen's face clearly now, of course, and as she 
 stood there so near him, listening and looking 
 into his face with her beautiful, kind eyes, he 
 almost forgot what he was telling, and he 
 thought : ' I shall never see any other woman 
 like her, and, since she is the King's and can 
 never be mine, will it be well for me to stay 
 here ? Shall I not be happier if I go away and 
 try to forget her?' But when he looked at the 
 King again and met his eyes, which were just 
 as kind, and saw how strong and noble and 
 gentle he looked, he thought again : ' I will 
 not be such a coward as to run away. I will 
 stay and be her knight and the King's, and in 
 all my battles I will remember her and think 
 that I am fighting for her.' 
 
 " ' It is a strange story that you have told 
 us,' said the King. ' Indeed your Fairy 
 Mother kept you and taught you well, and it 
 is right that you should hold to the name she 
 gave you, if you will. We will call you Lance- 
 lot, then, and still, for your father's sake, you 
 shall sit at my Round Table as soon as you 
 are a knight.' 
 
 "And Lancelot only bowed and kissed the 
 King's hand, but to himself he said : ' Yes, I 
 will stay and live and fight for both of them. 
 It will be glory and happiness enough to be
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 77 
 
 the greatest or the least of the knights of such 
 a king.' 
 
 " I sometimes think that it would have been 
 better if Lancelot had left Camelot then and 
 left England and had never come back. Some- 
 times the bravest men would prove themselves 
 braver if they would only dare to be afraid. 
 And yet, I cannot think what the court of 
 King Arthur would have been without Lance- 
 lot. Of one thing I am sure : there would not 
 have been so many good stories. 
 
 "'And when,' said the King, 'shall I make 
 you a knight?' 
 
 "'May it be to-morrow, my lord?' said 
 Lancelot 
 
 " ' Yes,' said the King, ' if you wish it ; come 
 here again at noon.' 
 
 " Then Lancelot went to the Church of St. 
 Stephen, and there, all night, before the altar, 
 he watched his armor. There were others 
 there, who were to be made knights to-mor- 
 row, doing the same. Lancelot scarcely saw 
 them. He scarcely saw his armor there before 
 him. What he did see, all through that night, 
 was the lovely face of the Queen, with the 
 sweet, kind eyes bent on him, as he had seen 
 them when he told his story. The candles on 
 the altar seemed shining through her hair, as 
 the sun had shone through it when she stood 
 on the castle wall. And when the early sum-
 
 78 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 mer sun lighted the windows of the church and 
 the candles began to look dim, he saw her still. 
 He was thinking of her when he left the church 
 and went to make ready to meet the King. 
 
 " He was thinking of her when he came into 
 the great hall of the castle, and he scarcely 
 more than noticed all the people who were 
 there. The hall was filled with ladies and 
 knights, and squires who were to be knights 
 to-day. The King came and stood at the far 
 end of the hall. He was ready for those to 
 whom he was to give knighthood. And then, 
 all at once, Lancelot noticed a terrible thing. 
 He had no sword. He had not thought of it 
 before, and he had left it in the church. Now 
 indeed he saw the people about him. They 
 were all looking at him, he thought, and he 
 saw all their faces dance and swim and whirl 
 around him and all their eyes fixed upon him. 
 He was ready to turn and run from the place, 
 for he thought : ' How they will all laugh at 
 me when they see that I have no sword ! And 
 the King will say that 1 am not worthy to be 
 a knight.' 
 
 " And just at that moment he heard a voice 
 behind him, and the voice said : ' Young man, 
 do not turn to look at me or some one may see 
 us. I have brought you your sword. It is 
 here in the fold of my gown. Take it as I pass 
 you, but do not turn your head/
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 79 
 
 " The swarming faces around him were 
 gone, and he scarcely understood what the 
 voice behind him had said, because the voice 
 itself was so sweet. And his heart gave a 
 great leap, as he thought : ' That voice is as 
 lovely as the face of the Queen. Are there 
 more of them, then ? Is this court of Arthur 
 full of such women as she ? ' But as the wom- 
 an whp__had spoken passed him he took tEe 
 sword from her hand, and he did not turn his 
 head, butwEen^ she had passed and was in 
 front of him he looked at her. She was the 
 Queen. 
 
 "Tle^could not think any more now. It was 
 time, and he passed forward through the hall, 
 knelt down and laid his sword at the feet of the 
 King. Dimly he heard the King speaking to 
 him the oath for a new knight that he should 
 be faithful, gentle, and merciful that he should 
 fight for the poor that he should fear shame 
 more than death. But he knew what the oath 
 was and they all heard him when he said : ' I 
 swear it.' 
 
 "Then two old knights fastened his spurs, 
 and the Queen herself came and belted on his 
 sword. As she did it the new knight gazed 
 into her face again, and, a moment later, when 
 the King gave him the oath of the Round 
 Table and he swore to be true and loyal in all 
 things to God and to the King, he added, in
 
 8o The Court of King Arthur 
 
 his own mind : ' and to the Queen.' But he 
 did not see her then. His eyes looked straight 
 into the King's. And it seemed to Arthur 
 that he saw in those eyes something great and 
 wonderful, that he had never seen before in 
 any knight who had sworn this oath. He 
 could not tell what it was, but it was something 
 that made him say: 'Oh, Galahad or Lance- 
 lot, I know that you will be my best knight. 
 Come and take the place that has been made 
 for you.' 
 
 " And he led him straight to the Siege Peril- 
 ous and said : ' Sit here ; it is your place.' 
 Yet, when the new knight would have taken 
 the seat, the King himself held him back, for 
 he looked and there were no letters in it. The 
 King looked and wondered and paused. It 
 seemed to him that the magic of the seats must 
 be sleeping and that soon the letters must ap- 
 pear. But no letters came, and the King 
 turned and led the way to the next seat, at the 
 right of the Siege Perilous. It was blank too, 
 and the King looked in the next, and so was 
 that. But when he came to the fourth seat, he 
 and the knight saw in it the name, in new let- 
 ters of bright gold not ' Galahad,' but ' Lance- 
 lot of the Lake.' 
 
 "And Lancelot took the seat, and in that 
 seat he sat for many years, whenever he was in 
 Arthur's court. And the fame of Lancelot
 
 Not Galahad, but Lancelot 8 1 
 
 grew all through those many years, with the 
 fame of Arthur's court. For all over the world 
 it was said that there was no other court like 
 Arthur's, and that there was no other knight 
 like Lancelot. He was the bravest knight in 
 battle, they said, and in the tournament the 
 strongest, and everywhere he was the truest, 
 the noblest, and the gentlest. All good knights 
 wished that they might be like him, and the 
 King and the Queen loved him more than any 
 other. 
 
 "And often in those years Arthur would 
 gaze and gaze at him, and then at the Siege 
 Perilous, and would think : Why does he not 
 take his place ? Why can I not read his name 
 in that seat? What better knight than he can 
 I ever have? Who can ever sit there if he 
 canapt?' 
 
 "But no gold letters came in the Siege 
 Perilous. And after a time there came to the 
 court a strong young man, Bors, Lancelot's 
 cousin, the son of King Bors. And when Ar- 
 thur made him a knight and led him to the 
 Round Table, his name was found in the seat 
 next to Lancelot's and nearer to the Siege 
 Perilous, nearer to the throne. Then Arthur 
 wondered more, for though Bors was strong 
 and brave and noble, he never seemed so 
 good a knight as Lancelot, in the battle or the 
 tournament. So knights came and went and
 
 82 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 knights were killed in battle and new knights 
 came. And seats were left empty at the Round 
 Table and other names came in them and 
 other knights sat in them. Yet no name came 
 in the Siege Perilous."
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 THE KITCHEN BOY 
 
 WE still had an hour or more to wait, be- 
 fore the train would come that was to take us 
 away from Caerleon. It was luncheon-time, 
 too, and so, if we could find the luncheon, we 
 did not mind the waiting. There was a little 
 house near the railway station, and a lantern 
 with a picture of an angel hung over the door. 
 We thought that we might find something to 
 eat in it. A woman stood behind the bar and 
 two men stood in front of it, drinking and 
 talking with the woman. Of all the people 
 who had wondered at our coming to Caerleon 
 not one had yet been so astonished as that wom- 
 an was when we asked her if we could have 
 luncheon. She could not speak for a minute, 
 and then she said that she was afraid she could 
 not give us anything, and that this was not an 
 hotel. 
 
 If we had been English people we should
 
 84 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 probably have said something meant to be very 
 cutting about the word " Hotel " being on the 
 lantern over the door, in very plain letters. 
 But, being only common Americans, we took 
 it very mildly and asked her if she could not 
 possibly find anything at all ; some bread and 
 cheese and tea would do. Oh, yes, we could 
 have those, she said, and she led us into a little 
 room behind the bar, where there were some 
 chairs and a table. The two men drank up 
 their beer as fast as they could and hurried 
 away to call the rest of the people of the town 
 together by telling them that three strangers 
 had come to the Angel and asked for luncheon. 
 Probably the rest of the people refused to be- 
 lieve it, for none of them came to look at us. 
 I may as well say now, because I may forget 
 it by and by, that the luncheon cost us four- 
 pence each. 
 
 " There was a time,' I said, as we sat in the 
 little room behind the bar, " when strangers 
 who came to Caerleon and asked for something 
 to eat and drink were treated better than this. 
 There was the kitchen boy, for instance." 
 
 Of course Helen must have known, when 
 she heard that, that there was some sort of 
 story about the kitchen boy, and she ought to 
 have asked what it was. But I suppose she 
 thought that I would tell it any way and there 
 was no need of her asking me to. So she went
 
 The Kitchen Boy 85 
 
 on drinking her tea, into which her mother 
 had put a great deal of hot water, because that 
 is the right way to make tea for little girls, and 
 all she said was that she would take a little 
 more butter, please. Now of course this was 
 wrong. Children should be heard as well as 
 seen, when they really have anything to say. I 
 knew she was dying to hear that story, still she 
 ought to have said so. I had half a mind not 
 to tell it at all, but then, nobody ever began to 
 tell a story and then stopped just because the 
 other people kept still and listened. 
 
 So I waited a little, to show how hurt I felt, 
 and then I said : " You see, King Arthur and 
 his knights had a good deal of fighting to do 
 at first. They had to beat the rebels all around 
 them ; they had to drive away the Saxons, 
 who were trying to win the land and destroy 
 the people ; and once, the old books say, the 
 Emperor of Rome sent ambassadors to Arthur 
 to demand of him the tribute that the Emperor 
 said was due from England to Rome. Arthur 
 gave the ambassadors a fine banquet and costly 
 presents for themselves, but no tribute for the 
 Emperor. Then he and his army crossed the 
 channel and beat the Emperor in a great battle 
 and went on to Rome, and there Arthur him- 
 self was crowned Emperor. You may believe 
 this story or not, as you like. I don't more 
 than half believe it myself. But in all Arthur's
 
 86 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 battles, and in all adventures, when there were 
 no battles, Lancelot was counted the best of 
 his knights. And of the others there was none 
 who grew more famous than Gawain. You 
 will hear much of him some time, and so I 
 should like to make you understand what sort 
 of a man he was. 
 
 " He was a king's son, and he lived first at 
 his father's court and then at Arthur's. And 
 so he learned all that could be learned to make 
 a good knight. He was brave and he was 
 strong and skilful with his spear and his sword. 
 It was said that he was the most courteous 
 knight of Arthur's court, though I do not be- 
 lieve that any one could be more courteous 
 than Lancelot. Some of the old books say, 
 too, that he could speak so well that nobody 
 could ever refuse him anything that he asked. 
 He knew all that belonged to true knighthood 
 and he loved justice and right and truth and 
 courtesy, when they were on his side, or when 
 he had no side. For I believe that his own 
 real nature was not great and generous, like 
 Lancelot's. No one knew what was brave and 
 right better than he, but he was selfish and 
 hasty and he often forgot what was right, or 
 else saw the right and chose the wrong, be- 
 cause it suited his purpose better. And so he 
 often did things that made him sorry after- 
 ward. Still, he did so much that was good,
 
 The Kitchen Boy 87 
 
 too, that he was always counted one of the best 
 of Arthur's knights. 
 
 " Well, if King Arthur and his army really 
 went to Rome, they soon came back, and if 
 they did not go, of course they did not have 
 to come back. And wherever they went and 
 whenever they came, King Arthur almost al- 
 ways managed to keep the great feast of Pente- 
 cost here at Caerleon. You have found out, 
 long before this, what queer notions some of the 
 people had in those days. Even King Arthur 
 had a few of them, and one of his was that he 
 would never go to dinner on Pentecost till he 
 had seen some wonderful thing. And won- 
 derful things were so common then that, as 
 far as I have ever heard or read, he did not 
 lose a Pentecost dinner in his whole reign, and 
 only once was he even late for dinner. 
 
 " So, one Pentecost, King Arthur and Queen 
 Guinevere and the knights of the court sat in 
 the great hall of the castle and waited for some- 
 thing to happen, so that they could go to din- 
 ner. They would all have been delighted if 
 somebody had run in and had told them that 
 there was a snake a mile long coiled three 
 times around some castle somewhere, and that 
 the lady in the castle wanted a knight to come 
 and kill the snake, so that she could get out. 
 Every one of them would have wanted to go, 
 and nothing but their politeness would have
 
 88 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 kept them from saying so all at once. But 
 they did not like to have any delay about din- 
 ner. 
 
 " And just a few minutes before dinner-time 
 three men came into the hall and stood before 
 the King. One of them was taller than the 
 others, but young no more than a boy, as it 
 seemed. He stood between the other two and 
 leaned on their shoulders, as if he could not 
 walk alone. Then, when they were before the 
 King, he pushed them from him, and said : ' My 
 lord, I have come to ask three gifts of you 
 easy gifts for you to grant. One of them I will 
 ask now and the other two I will ask a year 
 from this day.' 
 
 " When Arthur looked in the boy's face he 
 saw that flush of frank, free courage, and that 
 fine, glad light in the eyes that he loved so 
 much in his younger knights. ' Surely,' he 
 thought, ' I have none of a better look than he, 
 unless Lancelot or Gawain.' And he said: 
 'Ask what you will.' 
 
 '"It is only,' said the boy, 'that you will 
 give me all I need to eat and drink for a year. 
 At the end of the year I will ask my other 
 gifts.' 
 
 " If the boy had asked for a castle or a city 
 or two, King Arthur might not have been sur- 
 prised, but now he was surprised. ' Can I not 
 give you more than that ? ' he said. ' I would
 
 The Kitchen Boy 89 
 
 give that to any beggar, but you look like one 
 who will be a great and brave man some day. 
 Ask something more of me. What is your 
 name?' 
 
 " ' I will not tell you my name now/ said the 
 boy, ' and I will ask nothing more.' 
 
 " ' Let it be as you please/ said the King, 
 ' but your gift is one for Sir Kay to give you, not 
 for me.' Then he called Sir Kay, his seneschal, 
 and said : ' Take the boy and give him every- 
 thing he needs, as if he were a lord's son. 1 
 
 "'There will be no need of that,' Kay an- 
 swered ; ' he is no doubt some common fellow. 
 If he were a lord's son he would ask for a 
 horse or armor or something else worth hav- 
 ing. But he shall have enough to eat and he 
 shall work with the other boys in the kitchen. 
 He wants to get his food and drink for noth- 
 ing, I suppose. Look at his big, white hands. 
 If he will not tell us his name I will give him 
 one. We will call him Fairhands.' 
 
 " Now King Arthur thought that all this was 
 quite as wonderful as anything he was likely to 
 see, so he felt that he had a right to go to din- 
 ner. The two men who had come with the 
 boy went away, and Fairhands, as Kay called 
 him, was sent down to the far end of the hall, 
 among the other boys. There he ate his din- 
 ner, and when it was over, Kay sent him to the 
 kitchen and he was set to work.
 
 90 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 11 And every day for a whole year he was 
 there in the kitchen. He built fires and brought 
 water and scoured pots and pans. He ate 
 what the other boys ate, and never complained 
 that he had too much work or too little play. 
 He did have some play, for the boys had games 
 of strength and skill among themselves, and he 
 was the best at all of them. And always, when 
 he was not at work, he liked to be where he 
 could see the knights. He always tried to see 
 the tournaments. He almost held his breath 
 when the knights clashed together, and he 
 threw up his cap and cheered when Lancelot 
 and Gawain did best among the knights, as 
 they always did. 
 
 " For Lancelot and Gawain were his friends. 
 They had seen him when he came into the hall 
 and asked the King for food and drink. They 
 did not believe, like the sharp-tongued Kay, that 
 he was some common fellow. They saw his 
 fine, clear eyes, and the courage in his face and 
 the strong, graceful, easy way in which he 
 bore himself. They wondered why he would 
 not tell his name, but they believed that some 
 time he would make it known all through the 
 world. So they would call him often from 
 among the other boys and take him to their 
 own rooms in the castle. They asked him his 
 name many times, but he would never tell 
 them. They offered him better things to eat
 
 The Kitchen Boy 91 
 
 than the boys in the kitchen had, but he would 
 take nothing. He would have nothing, he 
 said, but what Kay gave him, till the time 
 came for him to ask his other gifts of the King. 
 
 " And when Pentecost came again the court 
 was here at Caerleon, and the King and the 
 Queen and the knights sat in the great hall of 
 the castle, waiting again for something wonder- 
 ful to happen, so that they could have dinner. 
 Then, as they waited, they heard a horse's 
 hoofs in the court-yard, and in a moment a girl 
 ran into the hall and went straight toward the 
 King. She knelt before him and cried : ' My 
 lord, a wicked knight is keeping my sister 
 prisoner, and she has sent me to ask that you 
 will send some one of your knights to fight 
 with him and free her.' 
 
 " ' Where is your sister ? ' the King asked. 
 'How does the knight keep her a prisoner? 
 What is her name and what is yours? ' 
 
 " * I must not tell you her name or mine,' the 
 girl answered, ' but she lives in the Castle Per- 
 ilous, and she is a great lady. The knight is 
 called the Red Knight of the Red Plains. He 
 stays before the gate of the castle and fights 
 with all the knights that come to free her, and 
 kills them, and he will not let anybody come 
 into the castle or go out of it, unless he chooses. 
 But we heard that the best knights of the world 
 were in your court, and my sister told me to
 
 92 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 say that if one of them would come and kill 
 the wicked knight she would marry him and 
 he should have her castle and all her lands.' 
 
 " Of all the strange notions of those days I 
 think that pretty nearly the strangest were 
 those that some people had about keeping their 
 names secret. There was no reason in the 
 world, that I can see, why this girl should not 
 tell her name, yet I suppose she would rather 
 let her sister stay shut up in her castle for the 
 rest of her life than tell it, when she had made 
 up her mind not to. 
 
 " ' I have knights here, no doubt,' said the 
 King, ' who could beat the Red Knight of the 
 Red Plains and free your sister, but I cannot 
 send any of them unless you tell me your name 
 and hers.' 
 
 " ' Then I must look for a knight somewhere 
 else,' said the girl, and she turned to go out of 
 the hall. 
 
 "Then, from among those who stood far 
 down the hall, away from the King and the 
 girl, came a voice that cried : ' My lord, my 
 lord, a year ago you promised me two gifts; 
 the time has come for me to ask them.' 
 
 " The King looked to see whose voice it was, 
 and saw the kitchen boy. He remembered 
 what had passed a year ago, and said : ' Yes, 
 the time has come ; ask your gifts.' 
 
 " The kitchen boy knelt before the King and
 
 The Kitchen Boy 93 
 
 said : ' My lord, send me with this damsel to 
 free her sister. This is the first gift I ask.' 
 
 " You always ask things that are hard for 
 me to give,' the King answered. * This is not 
 an adventure for you to try. Did you not 
 hear her say that this Red Knight of the Red 
 Plains had killed other knights who had come 
 to free her sister ? You are little more than a 
 boy yet. Leave such hard fighting for harder 
 and older men. Stay here at my court ; leave 
 the kitchen ; practise with the young squires ; 
 learn how to sit upon your horse and how to 
 use your spear and your shield and your 
 sword. Then you can fight as well as the 
 bravest. Do not try too much now and make 
 me lose such a good knight as you might grow 
 to be.' 
 
 "'Perhaps, my lord,' said the kitchen boy, 
 ' I know more of these things already than you 
 think, and it is this that I ask. It is not against 
 your honor to give it to me, and you cannot 
 deny me my two gifts. Let me go to free this 
 lady.' 
 
 " Then, as the King gazed into the boy's 
 eyes, that were looking straight into his, it 
 seemed to him that he lost sight of the poor 
 kitchen garments and saw only the bright 
 young face and the frank, free courage, as he 
 had seen it before, and again he thought : * I 
 have none of a better look than he, unless
 
 94 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Lancelot or Gawain.' And still the eyes 
 begged of him : ' Let me go,' and the King 
 nodded and answered them : ' Go, if you will.' 
 
 "'And my other gift, my last one,' said the 
 boy ; ' it is this : I have long wished that Sir 
 Lancelot might make me a knight Sir Lance- 
 lot, and no one else. Let him follow me, as I 
 go away with the damsel, and let him make 
 me a knight whenever 1 ask him.' 
 
 " ' That gift I will give you,' said the King, 
 ' most gladly of all,' and he turned and nodded 
 toward Lancelot. And Lancelot looked more 
 proud to hear the boy ask this than he would 
 have looked if he had fought and beaten the 
 greatest knight of all the world except him- 
 self. I do not believe that anything can be 
 more delightful to a simple, honest, brave man, 
 than the admiration of a simple, honest, brave 
 boy. 
 
 " But the girl came back and stood before 
 the King she did not kneel this time and she 
 said : ' We heard that at your court, King 
 Arthur, we could find the truest kindness and 
 justice and courtesy in all the world ; but it is 
 not so. You insult women who come to you 
 for help. I asked you for a knight to free my 
 sister, and you give me a kitchen boy, one who 
 knows how to turn a spit or clean a pot, but 
 not how to ride a horse or use a spear.' She 
 turned and walked away again, down the hall,
 
 The Kitchen Boy 95 
 
 and Arthur made DO answer, bat let her go 
 oat and take her horse and ride off along the 
 road and out of sight. 
 
 " The kitchen bo j had left the hall too, and 
 at the gate of the castle he found a big, strong 
 horse, that was led bj a dwarf. And on the 
 horse's back was a beautiful suit of armor, and 
 the dwarf carried a sword. The kitchen boy 
 knew the dwarf and he knew that the horse 
 and the armor had been sent for him. There 
 was no shield and no spear. I can't think wh j 
 anybody should send a present of a horse and 
 armor without any spear or shield, but I have 
 to tell yon the story just as it happened. The 
 dwarf helped the boy to put on the armor and 
 then he mounted his horse and rode away 
 after the girL 
 
 * Now the King thought that all that he had 
 just seen was so wonderful that he was never 
 likely to have a better right to eat dinner in his 
 life. So he sat down at the table with the 
 Queen and all the knights, except two, and the 
 dinner began. One of the two who did not 
 sit down was Lancelot. He went to put on 
 his armor, so that he could follow the kitchen 
 boy. The other was Sir Kay. Kay was al- 
 ways doing some silly thing or other. It was 
 he, you know, who had laughed at the boy, and 
 named him Fairhands, and had set him to work 
 in the kitchen. He had always hated him, and
 
 g6 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 now he too resolved to ride after him and 
 punish him. He put on his armor, found a 
 fast horse, and rode quickly along the way that 
 the girl and Fairhands had taken. And just 
 as the kitchen boy came up with the girl he 
 heard Kay's voice behind him. * Kitchen boy/ 
 he cried, ' come back ! Do you not know me ? 
 Why have you run away from me? Do you 
 not know that I am your master? ' 
 
 " ' I know you,' the boy answered ; ' you are 
 Sir Kay, but you are not my master any more. 
 Will you fight with me and prove whether you 
 are or not ? ' 
 
 " Now this would have been a good chance 
 for the girl to run away from Fairhands, if she 
 really wanted to, but she thought that she was 
 going to see him nicely punished for the im- 
 pudence of following her, so she stayed to see 
 the fight. You see what Kay was doing was 
 worse than silly. He had his long spear and 
 his shield and Fairhands had neither. It was 
 unknightly to fight with a man who was so 
 much worse armed than himself, unless he had 
 done some great wrong. Kay knew this just as 
 well as anybody, and so I am glad that the 
 fight came out just as it did. 
 
 " For when Kay spurred his horse and 
 charged against Fairhands, the boy was not a 
 bit afraid, but galloped straight at him, with 
 his sword drawn and no other weapon. With
 
 The Kitchen Boy 97 
 
 this he struck the point of Kay's spear away 
 from him and then wounded him in the side, 
 so that he fell down off his horse and lay on 
 his back in the road. Now when one knight 
 beat another in a fair fight he had a right to 
 take his horse and all his arms, if he wanted 
 them. So the kitchen boy took Kay's shield 
 and spear, which he needed, and mounted his 
 horse again to ride on with the girl. Kay got 
 up and went back toward the castle, and the 
 girl, who was a good deal disappointed not to 
 have seen Fairhands soundly beaten, rode on 
 very sulkily. 
 
 " But Lancelot had been riding after them, 
 and had seen the whole of the fight with Kay, 
 and now he came up with them. ' My lord, Sir 
 Lancelot,' cried the boy, ' will you try a joust 
 with me ? ' Lancelot said nothing, but closed 
 his helmet and put his spear in rest, and the 
 girl stopped again to look. 
 
 " But this time the boy charged against an- 
 other sort of knight For Lancelot's spear 
 struck the middle of his shield and bore him 
 back over the tail of his horse, and he fell in 
 the dust of the road. But his own spear had 
 struck well too, and even the great Lancelot 
 had almost fallen from his saddle. The boy 
 sprang to his feet and cried : ' Will you fight 
 with me now on foot ? ' 
 
 " In an instant Lancelot was off his horse and
 
 98 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 had his sword drawn, and then they fought for 
 a long time, and each of them fought his best. 
 And Lancelot was thinking all the while : 
 ' Who can this boy be, and where did he learn 
 to fight so well? It is all that I can do to 
 guard myself against him. I know the ways of 
 all the best knights, and Gawain might fight 
 like this, but who else?' And then he said 
 aloud : ' Is not this enough, young man? We 
 have no quarrel, and you have proved yourself 
 a strong fighter.' 
 
 " ' Have 1 proved myself so ? ' said the 
 kitchen boy, and his voice trembled with 
 happiness and pride. ' It did me good to fight 
 with you, to feel how strong you were, and to 
 feel that I was strong too, to stand against 
 you. And do you think that I shall some time 
 be a good knight ? ' 
 
 " ' I know you will,' Lancelot answered, ' if 
 you live, and now I am not afraid, as I was, to 
 see you go to fight this Red Knight of the Red 
 Plains.' 
 
 " ' Then, my lord, Sir Lancelot/ said the 
 young man, ' will you give me the order of 
 knighthood?' 
 
 " ' Gladly,' said Lancelot ; ' but you must tell 
 me your name first. I will tell it to no one 
 else if you wish it to be a secret.' 
 
 " ' It is not a secret from you, Sir Lancelot,' 
 said the boy, ' but do not tell any others yet
 
 The Kitchen Boy 99 
 
 not till I have done something to make them 
 remember my name. J-am~ Gareth oLQfkaey. 
 King Lot is my father and I am Gawain's 
 txFofteSrimtnd^ ffiere at King Arthur's court 
 even he did not know me, I was so small when 
 he left us. It was my mother, Queen Bellicent, 
 who sent me this horse and this armor.' 
 
 " Then Lancelot looked in his face again and 
 understood it all, his strength, his courage, 
 his beauty, his noble bearing; but he said: 
 * Why did you let them keep you in the kitchen 
 all that year, and never tell the King or Gawain 
 or me who you were? ' 
 
 " ' I scarcely know, ' said Gareth, * why I 
 did it. But when I came I asked only for food 
 and drink at first, because I wanted to see what 
 the court was like. I wanted to see the King 
 and you and my brother Gawain. I feared 
 that I was not old enough to be a knight, yet 1 
 wanted to be near the King and near you, my 
 lord. And then, when they put me in the 
 kitchen and made me work there, I would not say 
 that I was afraid to do it, so I stayed there and 
 waited for my time. Was it not right for me to 
 do so, and will you not make me a knight now? ' 
 
 " ' Kneel down, then,' said Lancelot, and he 
 touched Gareth's shoulder with his sword and 
 said : ' Rise, Sir Gareth, and may God make 
 you a good knight.' 
 
 " And Sir Gareth rose and spoke not another
 
 ioo The Court of King Arthur 
 
 word, but mounted his horse and was ready to 
 follow the girl. And Lancelot mounted too 
 and rode back. Then the girl said : ' Kitchen 
 boy, go away from me, and do not dare to fol- 
 low me. I cannot bear to have you near me, 
 for your clothes are greasy and you smell of the 
 kitchen. And do not think that I will let you 
 come with me because you threw that poor 
 knight off his horse and wounded him. That 
 was only an unlucky chance, and often the 
 worst of men can kill the best in that way. 
 And as for your seeming to fight so well with 
 this Lancelot, he let you do it, I have no doubt, 
 just for a spite to me. For he is one of those 
 lazy knights that sit about this Arthur and help 
 him insult ladies who come to him for aid. 
 We beg him to send us knights, and he sends 
 us kitchen boys, and then these brave men stay 
 there in their big castle all together, and eat 
 and drink and laugh at us, and tell one another 
 how mighty they are, and then go to sleep. 
 Keep away from me. I would not have a 
 knight from that court now, and surely not a 
 kitchen boy.' 
 
 " ' Say what you will to me,' Gareth an- 
 swered ; ' I will try not to come too near to you, 
 but my horse is as fast as yours, and I shall fol- 
 low you. My King has sent me to free your 
 sister, and I shall free her or I shall die in try- 
 ing to do it.'
 
 The Kitchen Boy 101 
 
 *** Yon had better go back while you can,' 
 the girl said again. ' If you go on with me you 
 will meet two knights not far from here and 
 you will have to fight with them. They are 
 real knights, and they will make yon wish that 
 yon were back washing dishes. Perhaps you 
 know how to kill pigs with that sharp-pointed 
 pole of yours, but yon do not know how to kill 
 knights or how to keep them from killing yon 
 vrith that platter of a shield.* Then she rode 
 away quickly and Gareth rode after her and 
 answered not a word. 
 
 " Soon the road led through a forest, and then 
 they came to a river, with a shallow place 
 where they must cross. And on the other side 
 of the river were two knights, armed and on 
 horseback, and one of them called out : * Knight, 
 yon cannot cross here unless you fight with us.' 
 
 " * Will you go back now/ said the girl, 'or 
 will you let them butcher you, like a stupid ox? ' 
 
 M< I would not turn back if there were six of 
 them,' said Gareth, and he spurred his horse and 
 rode into the river. And just in the middle of 
 the river one of the knights met him. Each, 
 with his spear, struck the middle of the other's 
 shield, and both the spears were broken. Then 
 they drew their swords and struck at each 
 other, till Gareth gave the knight a blow on 
 the helmet that stunned him, and he fell off his 
 horse into the river, and the swift-flowing water
 
 IO2 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 rolled him over and over, and the weight of his 
 armor made him sink into a deeper place, and 
 he was drowned. 
 
 " Then Gareth rode on through the river and 
 met the other knight on the farther bank. He 
 had no spear now, but the other knight's spear 
 was broken against his shield, and again they 
 both drew their swords and fought, till a stroke 
 of Gareth's sword cut through the other 
 knight's helmet and he fell and lay upon the 
 ground. And Gareth took another spear, that 
 had belonged to the knight, because he had 
 broken his own, and rode on after the girl. 
 
 " ' Keep away from me,' she cried again ; 
 ' you smell of the kitchen and I cannot bear it. 
 Coward ! Coward ! One of those two poor 
 knights was drowned because his horse slipped 
 in the river ; then you came behind the other 
 and struck him like a traitor. Do not come 
 near me.' 
 
 " I hope you see, without my telling you, 
 how foolish and false and cruel this girl was. 
 Some silly people think that only men need to 
 be brave, and therefore that only men can be 
 insulted by being called cowards. It is not 
 true. It is a woman's duty to be strong and 
 brave, just as much as a man's. Many women 
 are brave, of course most women, perhaps 
 but some are not, and of all those who are not, 
 those who are like this girl are among the very
 
 The Kitchen Boy 103 
 
 worst. Do you see why ? If any man had said 
 to this kitchen boy what she said, he would have 
 had to fight him, but she knew that he was too 
 good and brave a man to harm a woman. So 
 she dared to call him a coward just because she 
 knew he was not one. I can scarcely think of 
 anything that is more wicked and cruel and 
 heartless for a woman to do than to wrong a 
 man because she knows that he is too brave to 
 take revenge. And if anyone ever tells you 
 that Gareth afterward married this girl but 
 I will tell you about that by and by. She did 
 not deserve ever to see the face of a brave, true 
 man, much less be married to one. 
 
 "It was getting a little dark now, partly be- 
 cause it was late in the day by this time and 
 partly because they were riding into a thicker 
 part of the forest. The girl had to let her horse 
 go more carefully and more slowly and Gareth 
 easily kept near her. ' There is time still for 
 you to go back,' she said ; ' I see that all you 
 do is by chance and not because you know how 
 to fight. If you keep on you will be killed.' 
 
 " ' I may be killed,' Gareth answered again, 
 ' but I will go with you, and if I am not killed I 
 will win your sister.' I think, after all, that the 
 bravest thing about Gareth was that he was so 
 ready to win a woman and marry her, when all 
 he knew about her was that she was the sister 
 of such a girl as this.
 
 IO4 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " Then, all at once, they came to an open 
 space in the woods. There was more light to 
 see by, and yet what they saw seemed gloomier 
 and darker than all that they had seen before. 
 For all the ground was black, as if a fire had 
 been over it, and there was a black thorn tree, 
 and on it hung a black banner and a black 
 shield. A black spear leaned against the black 
 tree, and near by stood a big black horse, all 
 covered with trappings of black silk. And near 
 by too sat a knight, and all his armor was black. 
 The girl drew her rein and almost hissed at 
 Gareth : ' It is the Black Knight of the Black 
 Plain ; run, run ! You have time yet ; he is 
 not on his horse ! ' 
 
 " Then the Black Knight saw them and said : 
 ' Damsel, is this a knight of Arthur's court that 
 you have brought to be your champion ? ' 
 
 " ' No,' she answered, ' it is Arthur's kitchen 
 boy.' 
 
 " ' And why does he come on a horse and in 
 armor ? You are of high birth, and it is a 
 shame to you to ride with such an one as he.' 
 
 " ' He will not leave me,' she answered again ; 
 ' and indeed I wish that you could rid me of 
 him. Kill him or drive him away ; it is noth- 
 ing to me which you do.' 
 
 " ' There is no need of killing him,' said the 
 Black Knight. ' I will take his horse and 
 armor and let him go.'
 
 The Kitchen Boy 105 
 
 " ' You are too ready,' said Gareth, ' to tell 
 us what you will do with my horse and my 
 armor. I mean to pass this place in spite of 
 you, and you will never get my horse or my 
 armor unless you win them of me in a fair fight, 
 so let us see what you can do.' 
 
 " Then the Black Knight got on his horse 
 and they rode together with a mighty crash. 
 And the Black Knight's spear shivered against 
 Gareth's shield, and Gareth's spear pierced the 
 Black Knight through the side and then broke 
 off and left a piece of it sticking in the wound. 
 Yet he drew his sword, and so did Gareth, and 
 they fought with the swords till the Black 
 Knight fainted and fell down off his horse. 
 Then Gareth took off the Black Knight's 
 armor, because it was better than his own, and 
 dressed himself in it. He took his shield too, 
 and he got upon his horse again and rode after 
 the girl. 
 
 " ' Keep farther from me,' she cried ; ' I can- 
 not bear the smell of your dirty kitchen clothes. 
 You have killed another poor knight, by some 
 bad luck. But you will meet one soon who 
 will not let you go so easily. You had better 
 go back now, while you can.' 
 
 " ' You say that always,' Gareth answered ; 
 ' every time that I overthrow a knight you tell 
 me that the next one will kill me. I may be a 
 bad fighter, as you say, yet always when you
 
 io6 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 say so, somehow my enemy goes down before 
 me, and I ride on with you. And so I will ride 
 on with you till I am killed or till I free your 
 sister.' 
 
 " Almost as he said this a knight came riding 
 toward them as fast as his horse could run. The 
 way through the woods was growing darker yet, 
 but by the light that was left Gareth saw that 
 the armor and the shield of the knight were all 
 green, and his horse had green trappings. The 
 knight stopped when he saw them and shouted : 
 ' Are you my brother, the Black Knight of the 
 Black Plain? Why do you come here with 
 this damsel?' 
 
 " ' This is not your brother,' the girl an- 
 swered ; ' this is a boy from King Arthur's 
 kitchen, who has killed your brother the Black 
 Knight and has taken his armor and his shield.' 
 
 " ' Then I will kill him for killing my brother ! ' 
 the green knight cried. And without any more 
 words they rushed together and both their 
 spears were broken. Then they drew their 
 swords and fought till the green knight's horse 
 slipped and fell. The knight was on his feet 
 in a moment and Gareth sprang off his horse 
 to the ground and they fought again. Then 
 the girl cried : ' Green knight, why do you 
 fight so long with a coward of a boy ? Beat 
 him quickly, a% a knight like you ought to beat 
 such a boy, and let me go on my way.'
 
 The Kitchen Boy 107 
 
 " And it made the knight ashamed to think 
 that it was only a boy who was fighting so 
 hard against him, and he struck a great stroke 
 with his sword at Gareth and split his shield, 
 so that it fell in two pieces to the ground. 
 But Gareth had heard what the girl said, too, 
 and he thought : ' I would rather die ten times 
 than let her see me beaten.' And he struck a 
 great blow, too, and it fell on the helmet of the 
 green knight and brought him down upon his 
 knees. Then Gareth sprang upon him and 
 caught him by the helmet, and pulled him flat 
 upon the ground, and began to cut the lacing 
 of his helmet, so that he could cut off his head. 
 And the green knight cried : * You have con- 
 quered ! The fight is yours ! Do not kill me ! ' 
 
 " ' It is not for me to give you your life,' 
 Gareth answered ; * I am riding with this dam- 
 sel to save her sister and you stood in our 
 way ; she hates me, but I am her knight till I 
 come where her sister is. If she asks me to 
 spare you, I will spare you.' 
 
 " ' I ask you to spare him ? ' she said ; ' never, 
 never ! How should I ask anything of a poor, 
 dirty kitchen boy ? ' 
 
 " ' You hear what she says,' said Gareth ; ' 1 
 must kill you.' 
 
 " But the green knight cried again : ' Save 
 me and I will give myself up fo you, with all 
 the knights that are under me. There are thirty
 
 io8 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 of them, and we will always fight for you, and 
 go where you wish, and do what you will.' 
 
 " ' I cannot give you your life,' said Gareth 
 again, ' unless she asks it of me,' and he pulled 
 off the knight's helmet and raised his sword, as 
 if he would strike off his head. 
 
 " ' Do not dare to kill him ! ' the girl cried ; 
 'how should a wretched boy like you kill a 
 good knight ? ' 
 
 " ' Damsel,' Gareth answered, ' you have 
 asked his life of me ; he shall have it. Rise, sir 
 knight, and thank the damsel for saving you.' 
 
 " But the green knight only rose upon his 
 knee. ' Sir,' he said, ' I do not know what you 
 are. I do not know why this damsel who rides 
 with you calls you what she does. But I know 
 that you are a better knight than I ; you have 
 spared my life and I am your servant. It is 
 almost night and you cannot go much farther. 
 My castle is near here. Come to it with me 
 and stay till morning.' 
 
 " Now this is one thing that I like about 
 those old fellows. After they were done fight- 
 ing about nothing they never had any hard 
 feelings. The one who was beaten acknowl- 
 edged it and there was nothing that he could 
 do for the one who had beaten him that he 
 would not do. And whatever he was told to 
 do, no matter how unpleasant it was, he did it if 
 it took him ten years, as if it were the only thing
 
 Tke Kitchen Boy 109 
 
 he had to live for. And there was many a 
 knight of the worse sort who would plunder 
 and rob and murder, but who would never 
 break a promise that he had made to a knight 
 who had beaten him in a fair fight. 
 
 " So Gareth and the girl went to the green 
 knight's castle. But when it was time for sup- 
 per and the knight led them to the table, the 
 girl said : 'I cannot sit and eat with a com- 
 mon, mean servant like him. It is not court- 
 eous of you, sir knight, to put him at the ta- 
 ble with one of high birth like me.* 
 
 "And the knight answered: 'It is not 
 courteous of you, damsel, to speak so of this 
 noble knight. I do not know who he is, but 
 I never fought with a better knight, and I 
 dare say he is as well born as you or L* 
 Then he led Gareth to a little side-table and 
 told him to sit there. And he came and sat 
 with him himself and the girl was left to sit 
 and eat her supper alone at the long table in 
 the middle of the halL And when it was time 
 to go to bed the green knight set many good 
 knights to watch around Gareth, to see that no 
 harm was done to him while he slept. 
 
 44 And in the morning, when they were ready 
 to leave the castle, the knight said to Gareth : 
 4 My lord, I and my thirty knights are all your 
 servants ; what shall we do? ' 
 
 " ' Go with your thirty knights," said Gareth,
 
 I io The Court of King Arthur 
 
 ' to King Arthur, and tell him that his kitchen 
 boy sent you. Then do whatever he com- 
 mands you.' 
 
 " ' I shall go, my lord,' the green knight an- 
 swered. ' But now tell me, damsel,' he said, 
 turning to the girl, ' where are you leading this 
 young knight? ' 
 
 " ' He is going with me,' she said, ' to the 
 siege of the Castle Perilous, to free my sister 
 from the knight that keeps her shut up there.' 
 
 " ' I know him,' said the green knight. ' He 
 is the Red Knight of the Red Plains, is he not ? 
 He is one of the strongest knights of the 
 world, for they say he has the strength of seven 
 men. And you are Lynette, are you not, and 
 your sister is the Lady Lyonors ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes,' she answered, ' I am Lynette and my 
 sister is the Lady Lyonors.' 
 
 " And so Gareth and Lynette rode on their 
 way. But the girl rode for a long time with- 
 out looking at Gareth or saying a word. Then 
 she stopped her horse and waited for him to 
 come up. But he stopped, too, because she had 
 told him so often not to ride too near her, and 
 then she turned and called to him to come. 
 And when he was by her side she did not look at 
 him, but turned her face away and kept her eyes 
 fixed upon the ground on the other side of her 
 horse. And she said : ' We are not far now 
 from my sister's castle. This Red Knight of
 
 The Kitchen Boy HI 
 
 the Red Plains, whom yon must fight, is one 
 of the greatest knights of all the world. I do 
 not know whether anyone could beat him, ex- 
 cept Sir Lancelot or Sir Gawain. But I see 
 now that you are a good knight. I cannot 
 guess who you are, but 1 haTe seen that you 
 were stronger than any of the knights we haTe 
 met. And all the time 1 hare said harsh and 
 cruel things to you and you hare ncYer an- 
 swered me with any unkind wonL And I 
 know from that that you are as gentle and as 
 patient as you are strong. I believe now that 
 you are of some noble blood, and I long to know 
 who you are, but I will not ask you, if you do 
 not wish to tell me. I only ask yon now to for- 
 give me, if you can, and to come and fight with 
 this Red Knight of the Red Plains. And 
 when you meet him, be as brave as I have seen 
 you before. Forget me then, and forget how 
 wicked and cruel I was, and think only that you 
 are fighting for my sister. She is not like me." 
 " ' Damsel,' said Garetn, * I should not be the 
 good knight that you say I am, if I could not 
 bear all that you have said to me and more. 
 What you said did not make me angry with 
 you, but it made me angry with the enemy 
 who was before me. For, after all that you had 
 said, I could bear anything rather than let you 
 see me beaten. And now that 1 have made 
 you think me brave, it seems to me that there
 
 H2 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 is no knight living whom I could not fight. 
 And now I will tell you my name, too, since you 
 wish it. I am Gareth of Orkney. My father 
 is the King of Orkney, and Gawain is my 
 brother.' 
 
 " Perhaps, after you have been a girl for a 
 few years longer than you have already, you 
 may understand something about girls, but I 
 never shall. I shall never understand why this 
 Lynette should be purposely cruel and heart- 
 less to this poor, brave Gareth, and then all at 
 once so sweet and honest. Was it because the 
 green knight had treated him so well, or be- 
 cause she was afraid he would not fight for her 
 sister ? Or was it for some other reason, or no 
 reason ? What do you think ? For myself, 1 
 believe that if there ever lived an arrant cow- 
 ard of a girl it was this Lynette on the first day 
 that she rode with Gareth. Yet on this second 
 day, if another knight had knocked him off his 
 horse and left him wounded, she would not 
 have screamed and fainted, as many better 
 girls than she would do. She would have gone 
 to him and taken off his armor and dressed his 
 wounds and taken care of him as well as a sur- 
 geon and a nurse together could have done. I 
 know she would have done it, because she did 
 do just such things afterward. I don't like 
 her, but there was some good in her, and, once 
 more, I don't understand her.
 
 The Kitchen Boy 113 
 
 "They rode side by side now, and in the 
 afternoon they came to a hermit's celL We 
 are near the castle/ said Lynette, and she spoke 
 low, as if she were afraid the Red Knight of 
 the Red Plains would hear her, but they were 
 not near enough for that. A holy man lives 
 here, and here my sister sends bread and meat 
 and wine for any knight who may come to fight 
 for her/ 
 
 "They left their horses and went into the 
 celL The hermit brought them food and drink, 
 and said: 'Sir knight, do not go farther to- 
 day. You hare ridden long and your horse is 
 weary. Perhaps you are so, too. Rest here 
 to-night, and to-morrow you can fight the 
 better/ 
 
 " So they stayed all night with the hermit, 
 and the next day they rode on again. It was not 
 far now that they rode through the woods, and 
 then, with a turn of the road, they saw all at 
 once an open space, with many tents, and 
 across it the walls and towers of the castle. 
 And Lynette whispered : f The Red Knight of 
 the Red Plains and his men live in those tents. 
 Do you see that horn, made of an elephant's 
 tusk, hanging on the tree? Yon must blow 
 that to tell him that you have come to fight with 
 him. But do not blow it yet. Every morning 
 he grows stronger and stronger till noon, and 
 then he has the strength of seven men. And
 
 1 14 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 after noon he grows weaker again, so wait till 
 noon is past before you blow the horn. He 
 will be strong enough then.' 
 
 " ' No,' said Gareth, ' I do not care how strong 
 he is ; I will fight with him now,' and he rode 
 up to where the horn was and blew a great 
 blast on it, so that the walls of the castle sent 
 back the sound, and all the woods rang with it. 
 And in an instant the place was alive with men. 
 The Red Knight of the Red Plains came from his 
 tent and some of the men put on his armor, while 
 others brought his shield and his spear and his 
 horse, and saddled the horse and held him 
 ready. But Gareth scarcely saw him, for Ly- 
 nette touched his arm and pointed to the castle, 
 and there, at a window, stood the Lady Lyo- 
 nors. She saw him and waved her hand to 
 him, and he saw the paleness of her face, and 
 yet a little flush of hope in it, he thought, as she 
 looked at him, and it made him feel stronger 
 for the fight. 
 
 " But he could not look at her long, for the 
 Red Knight was on his horse, and his spear was 
 down. And Gareth closed his helmet and put 
 his spear in the rest and was ready too. And 
 when they ran together there was such a crash 
 of the spears upon the shields, and of the shields 
 against the armor, that it seemed to those who 
 heard it that they themselves could feel the 
 shock, and the Lady Lyonors turned away her
 
 T/u Kitchen Boy 115 
 
 head and did not dare to look. But Lynette 
 looked, and she saw both the knights and both 
 the horses fall and roll upon the ground. In a 
 moment both the men were up and had drawn 
 their swords, and then Lynette and the Lady 
 Lyonors and all the rest looked and held their 
 breath while the sword strokes showered upon 
 the shields and the helmets. 
 
 " Gareth had had no such fight as this be- 
 fore. There was something to fight for now 
 fame and honor and life and the Lady Lyo- 
 nors. Yet he remembered what he had heard 
 of this knight's strange strength. Hard as he 
 fought, he fought carefully too, for it was not 
 noon yet. If he could only bear up and defend 
 himself for a little while, he thought, he should 
 afterwards have the better of the fight. So he 
 used his shield and his sword to keep off the 
 blows that the Red Knight rained upon him, and 
 he struck few himself. He tried to save all his 
 strength till his own time should come, and all 
 the while he felt the strokes of the Red Knight's 
 sword fall heavier and faster and sharper, 
 and pieces of his shield were hewn off, and the 
 rivets of his armor were loosened, and links of 
 his mail were cut and hung useless. And when 
 it seemed to him that he could stand no more 
 and that he must sink down under the very 
 weight and fury of that terrible, fierce sword, 
 suddenly he felt the force of it grow less. It
 
 n6 The Court of King Artlmr 
 
 fell no longer so quick or so hard on his shield 
 and his helmet as before. It was noon, and the 
 Red Knight was losing that magic strength 
 that had been growing all this time. Soon it 
 would all leave him and the fight would be a 
 fair one. The new hope made Gareth stronger 
 and he rushed upon his enemy and drove him 
 backward across the field, till the Red Knight 
 cried out : ' Sir knight, we have fought too 
 long ! Let us both rest a little and then we 
 can fight better.' 
 
 " So they both sat down and took off their 
 helmets and breathed the fresh air. And as he 
 rested Gareth looked up at the castle window 
 and saw again the Lady Lyonors looking down 
 at him. And it seemed to him that the look 
 in her face was not as it had been at first. It 
 was almost hopeless before, and yet there was 
 no fear in it. But now he thought that there 
 were hope and fear both. 'What has she to 
 fear ? * he thought ; 'if I am killed nothing 
 worse will come to her than has come already ; 
 can it be that the fear is for me ? ' 
 
 " And with that thought he cried out : 
 ' Come, Red Knight of the Red Plains, let us 
 go on with our fight and have it done ! I am 
 ready for you ! ' 
 
 " And they rushed together and fought 
 again till the woods and the castle echoed with 
 the blows of their swords and the clatter of
 
 The Kitchen Boy 117 
 
 their armor. And the Red Knight was still 
 strong and Gareth was weary with guarding 
 himself as he had done against that mighty 
 power that he had before noon, so that his head 
 began to swim and his eyes grew dim and the 
 Red Knight seemed to rise taller and bigger 
 and to tower over him like a giant. And not 
 the knight alone, but everything around him 
 seemed red like blood, and it all floated and 
 twisted and curled before his eyes, and Gareth 
 reeled and almost fell, and then he heard the 
 voice of Lynette, as if it came out of that 
 strange, whirling, bloody mist, and it cried : 
 *Oh, Sir Gareth, where are the courage and 
 the strength that I have seen you show ? My 
 sister stands there at the window and weeps to 
 see you beaten by this cruel knight.' 
 
 "And when he heard those words the red 
 mist was gone from before Gareth's eyes, and 
 he made a last rush upon his foe. He struck 
 one fierce blow upon the Red Knight's sword 
 and drove it out of his hand, and then another 
 upon his helmet and felled him to the ground. 
 Then he sprang upon him and cut the lacings of 
 his helmet and tore it off and stood ready to 
 strike off his head. And the Red Knight 
 cried : ' You have won ; you are a better 
 knight than I ; give me my life ! * 
 
 "'Why should I let you live?' Gareth an- 
 swered. ' You have killed many knights, they
 
 ii8 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 say, who came here to help this lady; it is 
 your turn now. Yet, before I kill you, tell me 
 why you came here and shut her up so in her 
 own castle.' 
 
 " ' I will tell you,' said the Red Knight ; 
 ' once I loved a lady ; she had a brother, and a 
 knight of Arthur's court killed him. It was 
 Lancelot or Gawain, we did not know which. 
 Then the lady whom I loved told me to kill 
 Lancelot or Gawain or both of them to avenge 
 her brother. And I came here and besieged 
 this castle, because I thought that the lady of 
 the castle would send to King Arthur for help, 
 and that Lancelot or Gawain would come and 
 fight with me. But now I am punished enough, 
 because I am beaten in a fight, yet not by 
 Lancelot or Gawain.' 
 
 ' It was all wrong that you did,' said 
 Gareth, ' for if Lancelot or Gawain killed your 
 lady's brother I know that he did it in a fair 
 fight, and any knight may chance to be killed 
 so. Yet 1 will spare you now, if the lady of 
 this castle forgives you.' And he looked up 
 at the window of the castle again, and the 
 Lady Lyonors made a sign to him to give the 
 Red Knight his life. ' Live, then,' Gareth 
 said, 'and go to the court of King Arthur, 
 with all your men. Find Lancelot and Ga- 
 wain both, and beg them to forgive you for 
 all the ill-will you have had toward them.
 
 The Kitchen Boy 119 
 
 Then do whatever they and the King com- 
 mand you." 
 
 " So the Red Knight of the Red Plains rose 
 from the ground where he lay and stood before 
 Gareth with bowed head, and he said: " You 
 have made me ashamed of all that I hare done. 
 For if I had beaten you in this fight I should 
 not have spared you as yon have spared me. I 
 should have killed you. If Lancelot and Ga- 
 wain and the rest at King Arthur's court are 
 like you it was wrong for me ever to be against 
 them.' 
 
 M And the story says that the Red Knight of 
 the Red Plains went to the court, as Gareth 
 told him to do. And there he stayed for a 
 long time and lived and fought well, and after 
 a time he came to be a knight of the Round 
 Table. 
 
 "And now there is only a word more. 
 Some time, I hope, you will learn to love the 
 greatest poet of our time as much as I love 
 him. He has told this story better than it ever 
 was told before or will be told again. Yet, 
 when you read the story as he tells it, and he 
 says at the end of it that Gareth married 
 Lynette, remember what I tell you now, he 
 did not marry her. I learned the story from 
 the same book where he learned it, and I tell 
 you that Gareth married the Lady Lyonors."
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE SPARROW-HAWK 
 
 " WHAT are we going to Cardiff for?" Hel- 
 en's mother asked. We were in a train on our 
 way there, and it puzzled her greatly. She 
 had known many people who had travelled 
 much, but she had never heard of anybody go- 
 ing to Cardiff before. 
 
 " We are going to Cardiff," I said, " just be- 
 cause Geraint went there." 
 
 " Who was Geraint ? " said Helen ; " and 
 how do you know he went to Cardiff?" said 
 her mother; "and what did he go there for?" 
 said Helen; "and what if he did?" said her 
 mother. 
 
 You know how hopeless it is to answer peo- 
 ple who ask questions like this, so I only said, 
 with all the dignity that I thought I could 
 make them believe in, " Ladies, with the per- 
 fect understanding that you have no right at 
 all to question where we go, since you have
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 121 
 
 left this journey all to me, I will tell you some- 
 thing about Geraint and why he went to Car- 
 diff. As for ourselves, I can only say again 
 that we are going there because Geraint did." 
 
 They did not seem a bit frightened at seeing 
 how firm I was, but Helen could not help show- 
 ing that she saw a story coming. " Still," her 
 mother said, " you had better keep right on 
 looking out of the window, because you might 
 miss seeing something, and you can hear just 
 as well." 
 
 " I have told you before," I began, " that 
 King Arthur usually kept the feast of Pente- 
 cost at Caerleon. This that I am going to tell 
 you about happened on the Tuesday after 
 Pentecost, just to be exact. The King and the 
 Queen and the knights were dining in the great 
 hall of the castle, when there came in a tall, 
 fair-haired young man. He came and stood 
 before the King and said : ' My lord, I am one 
 of your foresters, in the Forest of Dean. To- 
 day I saw a great stag in the forest. It was 
 pure white, and it was so beautiful and proud 
 that it would not go with any of the other ani- 
 mals, but kept by itself. And I came to ask 
 you if anything should be done. 1 
 
 '" You have done well,' said the King; 'to- 
 morrow we will all hunt this stag. Let the 
 word be given to all in the castle, and we will 
 start at daybreak.'
 
 122 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " And the Queen said : ' Will you let me go, 
 my lord, to see the hunting of this wonderful 
 stag ? ' 
 
 " ' Gladly,' the King answered, ' if you will 
 be ready with the rest at daybreak.' 
 
 " And Gawain said : ' My lord, will it not be 
 well if you command that whoever may kill 
 the stag shall have its head to keep or to give 
 to whom he pleases ? ' 
 
 " ' It shall be so,' the King answered. 
 
 "And so at daybreak the King and his 
 knights and attendants and squires and pages 
 were up and ready for the hunt. But the 
 Queen was still asleep. Some of them wanted 
 to wake her, but Arthur said : ' No ; if she 
 would rather sleep than see the hunt, let her 
 sleep.' 
 
 " But when they were all gone the Queen 
 awoke. Then she called some of her maidens 
 and told them to go to the stable and bring 
 horses, so that they could follow the hunters. 
 But they could find only two horses, so the 
 Queen and one of her maidens took these and 
 rode away toward the Usk. They came to the 
 river, I suppose, not far from where the bridge 
 is, where we stood this morning. But there 
 was no bridge then, and their horses had to 
 wade through the river. Then they followed 
 the track of the hunters through the woods on 
 the other side.
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 123 
 
 " In a few moments they heard the galloping 
 of a horse, and a young knight rode up to them. 
 He was a tall, handsome fellow. He wore a 
 robe of silk, and around his body was a purple 
 scarf, with a gold apple at each corner, and by 
 his side was a sword with a gold hilt This 
 was Geraint. His father was Erbin, the King 
 of Devon. 
 
 " ' Why did you not go with the others to 
 the hunt, Geraint ? * the Queen asked. 
 
 " ' Because I did not know when they went,' 
 he answered. 
 
 " ' It was so with me,' said the Queen, ' for I 
 was asleep, but perhaps we can hear something 
 of the hunt from where we are now ; we can 
 at least hear the horns and the dogs.' 
 
 " And, as they stood waiting, there came past 
 them a knight, all in armor, on a big horse, and 
 a lady on another horse, and a dwarf on a third 
 horse. ' Geraint,' said the Queen, do you 
 know who that knight is ? ' 
 
 " Geraint did not know and the Queen sent 
 her maiden to ask the dwarf what was his mas- 
 ter's name. ' I will not tell you his name,' the 
 dwarf answered. 
 
 " Then I will go and ask the knight himself,' 
 said the maiden. 
 
 " ' You shall not ask him,' said the dwarf ; 
 'you are not of high enough rank to speak to 
 mv lord.'
 
 124 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " Then, as the maiden turned her horse to 
 go toward the knight, the dwarf struck her 
 with his whip across the face, and she rode 
 away from him and came back to the Queen. 
 
 " ' I will go now and ask him myself who his 
 master is,' said Geraint. But the dwarf gave 
 him the same answer that he had given to the 
 maiden. 
 
 " ' Then,' said Geraint, ' I will go and ask the 
 knight himself.' 
 
 " ' You shall not ask him,' said the dwarf ; 
 ' you are not of high enough rank to speak to 
 my lord.' 
 
 " And as Geraint turned away from the 
 dwarf and toward the knight, the dwarf struck 
 him across the face, just as he had struck the 
 maiden. For an instant Geraint had his hand 
 on the hilt of his sword, and he could have 
 killed the dwarf with one stroke of it. Then 
 he thought that it would be unworthy of a man 
 like him to kill such a weak, wretched creature 
 as the dwarf, and he thought, too, that it would 
 be of no use for him to fight with the knight, 
 because the knight was fully armed and he 
 had only his sword. So he rode back to the 
 Queen and said : ' With your leave, I will fol- 
 low this knight, and when he comes to any 
 place where I can get arms I will try to avenge 
 the insult to you which his dwarf did in strik- 
 ing your maiden.'
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 125 
 
 " ' Go, then, Geraint,' the Queen answered, 
 ' and I shall be grateful for your service to me. 
 Do not try to fight with him till you have good 
 arms. I shall be anxious till I hear from you.' 
 
 " If I can,' said Geraint, ' 1 will let you hear 
 from me by to-morrow afternoon.' 
 
 "'And one thing more, Geraint,' said the 
 Queen, * if you avenge this insult to me I shall 
 never forget it, and when you bring a bride to 
 our court, as such a noble young knight as you 
 must do some time, I will dress her for her 
 marriage as no bride in England was ever 
 dressed before.' 
 
 " Then Geraint left the Queen and followed 
 the knight and the woman and the dwarf. 
 They crossed the Usk and passed King 
 Arthur's castle, and then rode along at an easy 
 pace for many miles. And at last they came to 
 a town and they rode through the street. 
 And as the knight and the woman and the 
 dwarf passed along all the people ran out of 
 their shops and houses to look at them. They 
 waved their hats, those of them who had hats, 
 and cheered till the knight had gone by, and 
 then they all went back to their work, for 
 they were all busy. Geraint saw that they 
 were polishing swords and cleaning armor 
 and shoeing horses, and acting quite as if they 
 were getting ready for a war and were afraid 
 of being too late. Geraint followed the knight
 
 126 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 up the street till he came now what is all this 
 trouble about ?" 
 
 The train had stopped and a guard came up 
 to our window. " This is Cardiff, sir," he 
 said. 
 
 Now when you are getting out of a train 
 and are telling a porter where he is to take 
 your luggage and whether this is all of your 
 luggage or whether there is some in the van, 
 and if so, how much, you don't have a great 
 deal of time left to tell stories to little girls. So 
 the story was interrupted, and it stayed inter- 
 rupted till we had gone to an hotel and given 
 warning that we should want some dinner after 
 awhile, and then had started out to take a little 
 walk and to see the town. 
 
 After all there did seem to be some sense in 
 Helen's mother's question about why we came 
 to Cardiff. I don't mean any disrespect to the 
 good town of Cardiff, only if we had been set 
 down in St. Mary's Street without knowing 
 how we came there, we should scarcely have 
 known that we were not in New York. Car- 
 diff is a fine city, a rich and a prosperous city ; 
 it is growing fast ; there are good shops and 
 houses, and the people look contented ; but we 
 did not need to come three thousand miles to 
 see a street that looked like New York. 
 
 "And wasn't it most remarkable," I said, 
 "that we should get to Cardiff just as I was
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 127 
 
 telling you that Geraint got to Cardiff ? And 
 he had come all the way from Caerleon on 
 horseback, too, and we came by train. But 
 what a difference between the two towns! 
 Then Caerleon was a great city, with castles 
 and churches and strong walls and towers, and 
 now it is a poor little country village, almost 
 hidden and hardly known. Then Cardiff was 
 a poor little town, perhaps not very much 
 larger than Caerleon is now, and it has grown 
 up while Caerleon has grown down, till it is 
 this big handsome city, with shops and hotels 
 and banks and railways and a harbor full of 
 ships. I don't know whether Geraint rode up 
 this same street where we are or not, but at 
 any rate, as he followed the knight and the 
 woman and the d warf, he saw them ride into a 
 castle. Now did you ever see anything so re- 
 markable in your life ? " 
 
 " ' So remarkable as what ? ' said Helen. 
 
 " Why, don't you see this beautiful place in 
 front of us ? Isn't it remarkable that we should 
 come to Cardiff Castle just at the very minute 
 that 1 was telling you that Geraint came to it? 
 I suppose the castle that Geraint saw and the 
 one that we see would look about as different 
 as any two buildings could and both be Car- 
 diff Castle. Geraint did not go into the castle, 
 but took the road toward the river, as we will 
 do now, for the story has nothing to do with
 
 128 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 the inside of the castle. Yet there is another 
 story that has something to do with it, and 
 Geraint might have thought of it as he passed 
 the gate and" went on his way to find a place to 
 stay for the night. But I don't suppose he 
 did, because he does not seem to have known 
 much about Cardiff. He probably did not 
 know that this castle once belonged to Uther 
 Pendragon, before King Arthur's time. I have 
 read somewhere that it belonged to Arthur 
 himself afterward and that Caerleon-upon-Usk 
 was really Cardiff. But that is nonsense, be- 
 cause Caerleon was and is Caerleon. 
 
 "But Cardiff Castle did belong to Uther 
 Pendragon, without any doubt. And in those 
 same days there was a good old knight named 
 Sir Clegea. He was rich once, but he enter- 
 tained his friends so handsomely and gave so 
 much to the poor that he found at last that he 
 had scarcely anything left. He did not care 
 for this so much for himself, but it made him 
 sorrowful that he could not give any more to 
 the poor. 
 
 "One Christmas Eve he was feeling more 
 sad than usual, because that was the time in 
 the year when he used to give the most and 
 when he used to have the most of his friends 
 about him. But his wife tried to cheer him 
 and told him that he ought to be grateful that 
 they still had enough for themselves to eat,
 
 The Sfarrom-ffawt 129 
 
 though they had not modi more. So Sir 
 Oeges and his wife and their children sat 
 down and ate what they had, and tried to be 
 as merry as they could, and then they all went 
 to bed. 
 
 " The next day they went to church. When 
 they came home Sir Oeges went into his gar- 
 den and knelt down under a cherry-tree and 
 prayed and thanked God for all He had given 
 him, whether it was much or little. Then, as 
 he was an old man, he took hold of a low branch 
 of the tree to help him in rising, and as soon as 
 he took hold of it he saw that the branch was 
 covered with leaves and cherries. 
 
 "He called his wife and showed her the 
 wonder, and she told him that he ought to take 
 the cherries to Cardiff Castle and give them to 
 the King. Ton know there were no hothouses 
 in those days, to raise fruits out of season, and 
 there were no fast ships to bring tropical fruits 
 to England. So at Christmas even a king 
 might look at cherries as a good deal of a lux- 
 ury. 
 
 " Sir Oeges took his wife's advice, picked 
 the cherries, and carried them it a basket to 
 the. castle. He dressed himself like a poor 
 man, as indeed he was. At the door of the 
 castle stood a porter, who would not let him 
 in at first. You would know just by that that 
 it was not in King Arthur's time. Mo porter
 
 130 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 would ever turn any poor man away from King 
 Arthur's castle. But when the porter saw the 
 cherries in the basket he knew that the King 
 would be likely to give something handsome 
 for them. So he told Sir Cleges that he would 
 let him in if he would promise to pay him a 
 third of what the King gave him for the cher- 
 ries. 
 
 " There was nothing for Sir Cleges to do but 
 promise, so he promised. When he got to the 
 door of the great hall he found an usher, and 
 the usher told him he could not come in. Then 
 the usher saw the cherries too, and, being just 
 as good and faithful a servant as the porter, he 
 also told Sir Cleges that he would let him in 
 if he would promise him a third of what he got 
 from the King for the cherries. And again Sir 
 Cleges had to promise. Then he went into the 
 hall, and the King's steward stopped him and 
 would not let him go near the King, till he too 
 saw the cherries and made Sir Cleges promise 
 him a third of the pay for them. That made 
 three thirds, so you see the prospect was that 
 whatever the pay turned out to be, he was not 
 going to have much of it left for himself. 
 
 " But now, at last, he came before the King 
 and offered him the cherries. And the King 
 was so much pleased that he promised to give 
 him just whatever he should ask in payment. 
 You see Uther Pendragon was not so careful
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 131 
 
 about making that kind of promise as Arthur 
 was. ' My lord,' said Sir Cleges, ' what I ask 
 is that you will let me strike twelve blows 
 wherever I like.' 
 
 " That is a very foolish thing to ask,' said 
 the King ; ' I am sorry I let you choose ; think 
 again; let me give you money or land, or a 
 horse or something that will do you some 
 good.' 
 
 " ' You have promised, my lord,' Sir Cleges 
 answered, ' to give me whatever I ask. These 
 twelve blows are what I ask and you must 
 give them to me.' 
 
 " ' If you will be a fool, then,' said the King, 
 ' have your own way and go.' 
 
 " Now while this little talk had been going 
 on the steward had been turning all sorts of 
 colors and wishing he was out of his bargain. 
 And as soon as the King had told Sir Cleges 
 that he might have what he had asked, he 
 turned and struck the steward four good 
 blows with his staff. Then he went to the 
 door of the hall and treated the usher to his 
 four blows, and then to the door of the cas- 
 tle, where he gave the porter his third of the 
 pay. 
 
 " Then he started away from the castle, but 
 he had not gone far when a page came running 
 after him, to tell him that the King commanded 
 him to come back. Sir Cleges went back to
 
 132 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 the hall and there he found an old minstrel 
 playing on a harp and singing about him to 
 the King. The minstrel had recognized Sir 
 Cleges at the very first, because he was one 
 of the many to whom he had been kind when 
 he was rich. So as soon as he had gone the 
 minstrel began to sing this song, which he was 
 clever enough to make up on the spot, to tell 
 the King who he was and what good things he 
 had done. 
 
 "So the King had sent for Sir Cleges to 
 come back, and when he saw him again he 
 too remembered his old knight. He made him 
 tell the whole story about the porter and the 
 usher and the steward, and he enjoyed the 
 story so much that he gave him Cardiff Castle 
 and a good deal more besides. Kings do 
 often enjoy jokes on other people. So Sir 
 Cleges was rich again, and I hope that this 
 time he did not give away everything that he 
 had, but I am afraid he did, for when Geraint 
 came here Cardiff Castle did not belong to Sir 
 Cleges or to anybody of his family, and it had 
 not in a long time. 
 
 " Speaking about Geraint brings me back to 
 the story. He rode along, as I said, toward 
 the river this very road, I suppose, and cer- 
 tainly this very river and he crossed a bridge, 
 just where this bridge is that we are crossing, 
 no doubt. And on the other side of the river
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 133 
 
 he saw an old palace. It was falling to pieces 
 then, and it must have fallen all to pieces hun- 
 dreds of years ago, so we cannot see it. An 
 old man in poor clothes, that had once been 
 rich, sat at the door. The old man rose and 
 welcomed Geraint, and asked him why he 
 came there. 'I am looking for a place to 
 spend the night,' Geraint answered. 
 
 " ' It is but a poor place that you will find 
 with us,' the old man answered ; ' but, such as 
 it is, you are welcome to it. Come in.' 
 
 " And the old man led Geraint into the hall, 
 and then into an upper chamber. And in the 
 chamber was an old woman, dressed, like the 
 man, in poor clothes that had once been 
 rich. And beside her sat a young girl, in poor 
 clothes too, but Geraint thought that he had 
 never seen one more beautiful. 
 
 "Now I am sure I don't know what made 
 me say 'but* just then. Her being in poor 
 clothes was no reason why she should not 
 look beautiful to Geraint or to anybody else. 
 And I will stop right here to tell you a secret. 
 It is a secret, because there are not half a dozen 
 girls in the world who know it. The others may 
 have heard it, but they do not believe it. It is 
 this : If a girl or a woman is really pretty, she 
 looks her very prettiest in the simplest and 
 plainest dress that she can wear. If all the 
 girls and the women in the world were to find
 
 134 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 that out all at once, it would ruin more people's 
 business than if the Bank of England should 
 fail. 
 
 " Well, while Geraint was looking at this 
 girl and thinking that he had never seen one 
 more beautiful, the old man said to her : ' Enid, 
 there is no one to attend to this young man's 
 horse but you,' and the girl went away to look 
 after the horse. 
 
 " Perhaps you think that Geraint might have 
 looked after his own horse, but that would 
 never have done at all. When Geraint was 
 their guest, this old man and his wife and 
 their daughter would as soon have thought of 
 turning him out of doors into a storm as of 
 letting him take care of his own horse. They 
 had no servant, and so one of themselves had 
 to do it. And when she had given the horse 
 corn to eat and straw for his bed, she came 
 back, and then her father sent her to the town 
 to get something for their dinner. By and by 
 she came back with a boy, bringing meat and 
 bread and wine. 
 
 "Then they cooked the meat and sat down 
 and ate. That is to say, the old man and his 
 wife and Geraint sat down, and Enid served 
 them. And when they were done eating Ge- 
 raint said : ' Tell me, if you will, who you are, 
 and why you live in this strange old palace, 
 and who owns it.'
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 135 
 
 "'I own it/ the old man answered, 'and I 
 am Yniol, and I once owned the whole of the 
 town yonder, and much more." 
 
 " ' Then might I ask you/ said Geraint, ' why 
 do you not own them now ? ' 
 
 "'A nephew of mine,' the Earl answered, 
 * made war against me and took them all from 
 me. They call him the Earl now, and he lives 
 in the castle that you saw across the river. 
 He has left me nothing but this one old house.' 
 
 "' And can you tell me/ Geraint asked, * any- 
 thing of the knight who rode into the town to- 
 day with the woman and the dwarf, and why 
 all the people in the town seemed so busy?' 
 
 " ' He came/ said Yniol, ' for the tournament 
 which they are to have to-morrow, and the 
 people of the town are busy making ready 
 for the tournament. They do this every year. 
 In the meadow near the town they set up two 
 forks, and across the forks they lay a silver rod, 
 and on the rod they place a sparrow-hawk. 
 The sparrow-hawk is the prize of the tourna- 
 ment. Every knight brings with him the lady 
 that he loves best, and it is for her that he tries 
 to win the sparrow-hawk. The knight whom 
 you saw won it the last year and the year be- 
 fore. If he wins it again to-morrow they will 
 send it to him every year, and he will not come 
 to fight for it any more. To-morrow, when the 
 sparrow-hawk is set up, he will say to the lady
 
 136 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 who is with him that she is the most beautiful 
 there and the most worthy to have it, and he 
 will tell her to take it. Then, if any other 
 knight wishes to fight with him for it, he will 
 say that the lady with him is more beautiful 
 and that it belongs to her. And then they will 
 fight to see who can win it.' 
 
 " You have noticed perhaps that these old 
 knights used to fight, sometimes, about very 
 small things. If one of them refused to tell 
 another who he was or where he was going, 
 that was quite enough to make a fight. If one 
 of them simply wanted to fight, for no reason 
 at all, the other was usually very obliging. If 
 they both chanced to love the same woman, of 
 course they fought about that, and if they loved 
 different women, they fought about that too. 
 That was one of the commonest reasons of all. 
 One said that his lady was the most beautiful 
 in the world, and the other said that his was. 
 Then they fought. And the queerest part of it 
 was that when they were done fighting both of 
 them felt sure that the lady whose knight had 
 beaten was really more beautiful than the other. 
 And it was this kind of fight, it seems, that 
 they had for the sparrow-hawk. 
 
 " Then Geraint told Yniol of the insult to 
 Queen Guinevere and asked him to advise him 
 what to do. ' It is not easy to advise you," 
 said the old man. ' It would be well if you
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 137 
 
 could fight with him in this tournament. I 
 would gladly lend you such armor as I have 
 and my horse, if you like him better than your 
 own. Yet I do not know how you can fight in 
 the tournament, because nobody can challenge 
 him except for the lady whom he loves best, 
 and she must be there with him.' 
 
 " Then Geraint said : ' I will take your armor 
 gladly, but I will ride my own horse, for we 
 know each other. And when the time comes, 
 if you will let me challenge for this maiden 
 here, your daughter, I will promise that if I 
 am not killed in the tournament, I will love her 
 as long as I live, and if I am killed she will be 
 free, and no harm will have been done to her.' 
 
 " And the old man answered : ' I know that 
 you are an honorable knight, and if the maiden 
 herself is pleased, 1 shall be pleased too.' And 
 the mother looked as glad as her husband, and 
 Enid turned away her head and did not say no. 
 
 " In the morning they were all in the meadow 
 outside the town, and all the people of the 
 town were there too. And the knight whom 
 Geraint had followed the day before rode out 
 in front of them all and told the woman who 
 was with him to take the sparrow-hawk, be- 
 cause she was the most beautiful of all who 
 were there and the best deserving of it. But 
 as soon as he said it Geraint rode forward and 
 cried : ' Do not take it ; there is one here who
 
 138 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 is more beautiful than you and more worthy to 
 have the prize ! ' 
 
 " And the other knight cried : ' If you think 
 your lady more worthy of the prize than mine, 
 fight with me to prove it ! ' 
 
 " Then they took their places far apart. 
 Geraint wore Yniol's armor, and it was old- 
 fashioned and rusty, and some of it was broken, 
 and the other knight had the newest and best 
 of armor, but Geraint remembered how the 
 dwarf had struck him in the face with his whip, 
 and he thought that he could fight the man in 
 any armor or in none. So they rushed to- 
 gether and broke both their spears. Then 
 Yniol gave Geraint a new spear and the dwarf 
 gave one to the other knight. And they 
 broke those too and many more. But at last 
 one of Geraint's spears held, and his enemy 
 was thrown from his horse's back upon the 
 ground. 
 
 "Then Geraint sprang off his horse and 
 drew his sword, and the other knight was up 
 and ready for him. And now the old and poor 
 and worn armor that Geraint had on was 
 against him. When they were on horseback 
 it was not so much matter, for then he caught 
 the point of the spear on his shield. But now 
 the armor was so heavy and rusty that he 
 could not move and work in it easily, and it 
 cracked with the blows of his enemy's sword,
 
 THE FIGHT FOR THE SPARFOW-HAWK.
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 139 
 
 and links of the mail broke and fell off. He 
 fought the harder because he knew this, and 
 when he seemed to have a little the better of 
 the fight, the old man called out to him and 
 cheered him on. Then the other knight 
 seemed to be fighting a little the better, and 
 the cheers came from the young Earl and his 
 friends. 
 
 " And both of them got little wounds, and 
 blood and sweat ran down into their eyes, till 
 they could scarcely see. They were both 
 striking wildly, when the old man came to 
 Geraint and said to him : ' Remember the in- 
 sult to your Queen ! You promised to avenge 
 it ! Do not let her hear that you were beaten 
 and could not do it ! ' 
 
 " And when he heard that it seemed to Ger- 
 aint that the Queen and her maiden, whom the 
 dwarf had struck, were looking at him. They 
 would soon know and be ashamed if he failed, 
 and it was as if they were there to see him fail. 
 And a stronger thought than this was that 
 Enid really saw him, and he must not fail. 
 And with all the strength that he had left 
 he struck the knight upon the head and broke 
 through his helmet, so that he fell to the 
 ground with a great wound. Then the knight 
 begged mercy of Geraint, and Geraint said to 
 him : ' Your dwarf would not tell me who you 
 were ; tell me now yourself.'
 
 140 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " And the knight answered : ' I am Edyrn, 
 the son of Nudd.' 
 
 " ' You shall have mercy/ said Geraint, ' if 
 you will go to Queen Guinevere and make 
 whatever atonement she shall ask for the insult 
 to her. Go now, and do not get off your horse 
 till you are at the court of Arthur.' 
 
 " And Edyrn answered : ' I will go.' 
 
 " Now whether there was any more of the 
 tournament after that I do not know. I don't 
 see how there could be, unless some knight 
 thought that his lady was more beautiful than 
 Enid, and wanted to fight it out with Geraint. 
 And surely no one of them did that. And yet 
 it seems to me that, as it was, there was a pretty 
 small tournament. If the knights came there 
 intending to fight, why did they not fight with 
 Geraint ? And if they did not intend to fight, 
 why was all that mighty polishing of swords 
 and cleaning of armors and shoeing of horses 
 that Geraint had seen in the town the night 
 before? You see I mean always to tell you 
 these stories so that you can understand them 
 just as well as I do myself. But if the dear old 
 poets and story-tellers, whom I never can love 
 enough, told them in the first place so that no- 
 body could understand them, it isn't my fault, 
 is it? And so all that I can tell you now is 
 that Edyrn, the son of Nudd, and his lady and 
 his dwarf rode gloomily away toward Caerleon,
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 141 
 
 and that the young Earl came to Geraint and 
 begged him to come to his castle. 
 
 " But Geraint said that he would go nowhere 
 in that town but to the house of the old man, 
 where he had stayed the night before. So he 
 went home with Yniol and his wife and Enid, 
 and in the evening the young Earl came there 
 to visit him. And the young Earl brought 
 many of his knights with him and provisions 
 to make a gret feast for all of them. And 
 when it was over the young Earl begged 
 Geraint again to come and visit him the next 
 day. And Geraint answered : ' No ; to-mor- 
 row I must go back to the court of King 
 Arthur. And one reason why I must go is to 
 ask King Arthur to get back this old man's 
 possessions for him.' 
 
 " ' You need not go back to him for that,' 
 said the young Earl. ' I will give him back 
 everything, if you ask it.' 
 
 "'I do ask it, then,' said Geraint, and the 
 young Earl kept his promise and gave back to 
 Yniol everything that he had taken from him. 
 Oh, they did love a good fighter in those days, 
 and there was nothing that he could ask of 
 them that they would not do. 
 
 " The next morning Geraint was ready to go 
 to Caerleon. And he asked where Enid was, 
 for of course she was to go with him. ' Her 
 mother,' said Yniol, ' is dressing her the best
 
 142 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 she can, so that she may look fit to go to the 
 court.' 
 
 " ' Tell her,' said Geraint, ' to wear only the 
 gown that I first saw her in. For the Queen 
 promised me that whenever I should bring a 
 bride to the court, she herself would dress her 
 for her marriage as no bride in England was 
 ever dressed before.' 
 
 " So Enid came in her old, simple gown, and 
 she and Geraint rode away. 
 
 " And now the story goes back to the morn- 
 ing when King Arthur and his knights hunted 
 the stag. They had scarcely let the dogs loose 
 and begun the hunt when the stag ran close 
 to where Arthur was, and Arthur himself killed 
 it and cut off its head. Now you remember 
 that before the hunt the King had commanded 
 that the head of the stag should be given to 
 the one who killed it, to keep or to give to 
 whom he pleased. As nearly as I can make 
 out, this was an old rule, which counted only 
 when one of the knights or squires killed the 
 stag, and not when the King himself killed it. 
 So on the way home they got into a little dis- 
 pute about the stag's head and who should have 
 it. I don't know why the King should not set- 
 tle for himself who should have it, but it seems 
 he did not, and they were still talking of it 
 when they came to the castle. 
 
 " Then the Queen told them of the insult that
 
 The Sparrow-Hawk 143 
 
 had been done to her and how Geraint had 
 gone to avenge it. And she said : ' Let us 
 wait till Geraint comes back, before we give 
 the head of the stag to any one. It may be 
 that he will deserve to have it better than 
 any here.' 
 
 " And the^all agreed. And the next day the 
 Queen set a watch on the ramparts of the castle 
 to look for Geraint. And in the afternoon the 
 watchmen saw a dwarf riding toward the cas- 
 tle, and after him a woman, and last of all a 
 knight, with his armor broken and covered 
 with dust, riding slowly and hanging his head, 
 as if in shame and grief. And one of the watch- 
 men went to tell the Queen. * It must be the 
 knight whom Geraint followed,' she said ; ' he 
 has overtaken him and beaten him and sent 
 him here.' 
 
 " Then Edyrn, the son of Nudd, came to the 
 gate and into the hall. And he told the Queen 
 and the King all that had happened at Cardiff 
 and how Geraint had done and how he had 
 sent him to offer atonement to the Queen. 
 Then they gave Edyrn a room in the castle 
 and sent the King's physician to cure his 
 wounds, and again the men on the rampart 
 watched for the coming of Geraint 
 
 "And the next day the watchmen saw 
 Geraint and Enid coming. And they told the 
 Queen, and she called all her women and went
 
 144 ^The Court of King Arthur 
 
 down to meet Geraint and to welcome him. 
 But when she thanked Geraint for fighting for 
 her and defending her honor, he said : ' Thank 
 this maiden here ; I could not have fought for 
 you if it had not been for her. I fought for 
 you and for her together, and she is the bride 
 whom you said that I should some time bring 
 to the court.' 
 
 " ' She is as welcome as you,' said the Queen, 
 'and I thank you both.' 
 
 " Then they all went to the hall, where the 
 King was waiting for them, and he welcomed 
 them and thanked them, too. And everybody 
 said that Enid must have the head of the stag. 
 And when Enid was married to Geraint, the 
 Queen, as she had promised, dressed her as no 
 bride in England was ever dressed before. 
 Yet, if Geraint was the sensible fellow that I 
 think he was, I believe that he thought her 
 more beautiful in the poor and simple gown 
 that she wore when he first saw her, and when 
 he fought for her and won the sparrow-hawk, 
 and when she rode with him from Cardiff and 
 the poor old house of her father to Caerleon 
 and the castle of the King."
 
 CHAPTER VTI 
 
 ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE SEVERN 
 
 "WHAT did we go to Cardiff for?" said 
 Helen's mother. 
 
 "I have explained all that before,** I said. 
 " The mistake was not in going to Cardiff, bat 
 in choosing the wrong way to come from it." 
 
 The way that I had chosen to come from 
 Cardiff was by a little steamer that was now 
 talcing us up the river Severn and across it to 
 Bristol I chose this way because of one of my 
 rules for travelling. It is a good rule, too, and 
 it is this: never go anywhere by land when you 
 can go by water. But the best rules fail some- 
 times, and this time this one had failed utterly. 
 For the steamer was small and not over-clean, 
 it had no cabin and nothing to sit on but boards 
 and boxes and barrels, and the water was so 
 rough that the boat danced about in the most 
 unpleasant way. As we got farther from the 
 shore the water grew rougher still, and when-
 
 146 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 ever the boat plunged into a wave the spray 
 dashed high up and came down all over the 
 deck. And it got worse and worse. Then we 
 found a little spot right in the middle of the 
 boat, behind the funnel and a pile of freight, 
 and there we sat on bags and coils of rope. It 
 was selfish in us, no doubt, to stay there, for it 
 was the only spot on the steamer where the 
 flying spray did not fall, and it was just big 
 enough for us three. But we thought that 
 since we had been lucky enough to discover 
 the place we might as well have it as anybody, 
 and it was not comfortable after all, only a lit- 
 tle less uncomfortable than the rest of the boat. 
 
 " The trouble is," I said, " that we are on the 
 wrong side of the Severn." 
 
 " I don't know what you mean by that," said 
 Helen's mother; " I wish that we were safe on 
 either side. The trouble is that we are in the 
 middle of it." 
 
 " Not at all," I answered ; " I mean that we 
 are on the top side of it, when we ought to be 
 on the bottom side." 
 
 " Ought to be on the bottom side ! I am 
 afraid we shall be if it gets a little rougher." 
 
 " Yes, madam, I am told that there is a very 
 good tunnel under the river and that that is 
 one way to get from Cardiff to Bristol. I de- 
 cided to come this way because I thought that 
 there would probably be more to see above the
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 147 
 
 river than under it. I am sorry now, because, 
 though the bottom of the river may be darker 
 than the top, it is probably smoother." 
 
 " Then it wasn't necessary to come on this 
 horrible little boat?" 
 
 " No ; it was a dreadful mistake. Still I do 
 not think it was my fault that the larger boat 
 needed repairing just at this particular time, so 
 that they had to use this one." 
 
 " Oh, no, I suppose it wasn't; but only to 
 think of all we are going through, and it wasn't 
 even necessary ! " 
 
 " Madam," I said, " I feel what a wrong I 
 have done much more than you can. To prove 
 it, if you like, I will not try to guide you any 
 more. I will give up our first agreement ; you 
 shall take charge of the whole journey, and I 
 will go wherever you say." 
 
 And now I have a chance to show you what 
 a truly great and good woman Helen's mother 
 is, for she only answered: "Don't be silly; 
 everybody makes mistakes sometimes." 
 
 " But it's too bad," Helen said, " to have to 
 sit here and get bobbed up and down, with 
 nothing but this dirty yellow water all around, 
 and not even any places to tell stories about." 
 
 Then I began to cheer up, for such a direct 
 challenge as this seemed really good and old- 
 fashioned. 
 
 " Do you dare to think, my child," I said,
 
 148 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " after all the years that you have known me, 
 that I cannot tell you a story anywhere I 
 choose, by land or sea? And do you think 
 that only the hills and the towns and the fields 
 here in England have stories, and that the 
 rivers have none ? Why, how do you suppose 
 this river came to be called the Severn at all ?" 
 
 Helen did not seem to have any particular 
 thoughts about it, but she looked at the river 
 with a little more favor. " Once, long, long be- 
 fore King Arthur's time," I said, " there was a 
 king of England named Locrin. It was not 
 called England then. It was called Logris, 
 after him, and when you are old enough to 
 read very old books you will find it called 
 Logris often. Now this Locrin was lucky 
 enough once to conquer a king named Humber. 
 While Humber was running away he got 
 drowned in a river. Then they thought they 
 could not do better than to name the river 
 after him, and there it is, up in the other end 
 of England now, name and all. So Humber 
 fought and ran away, but did not live to fight 
 another day. 
 
 " And besides some other things that Locrin 
 captured from Humber he took a prisoner. 
 This was a beautiful German princess, whom 
 Humber had carried off, after he had conquered 
 her father's country, and her name was Estril- 
 dis. Locrin straightway fell in love with her
 
 On He Wrong SuU of ike Severn 149 
 
 and wanted to marry her, but he had already 
 promised to marry the daughter of the Duke 
 ofCorawalL Probably this promise would not 
 hare disturbed him much, but the Duke was 
 very particular about it. The old priest who 
 wrote this story and called it history, says that 
 he brought a battle-axe with him when became 
 to talk with the King about it. Of course Loc- 
 rin liked to have his own way as well as most 
 people, but he was ready to listen to good argu- 
 ments. So, when the Duke of Cornwall placed 
 the matter clearly before him, he said he would 
 marry the Duke's daughter, and he did. 
 
 " But the King had a palace made for Estril- 
 dis, all underground, so that she could never 
 be found by the Duke of Cornwall or anybody 
 else who might want to harm her. And after 
 seven years the Duke died, and then the King 
 divorced the Duke's daughter, brought Estril 
 dis up out of the ground, and made her his wife 
 and his Queen. And Locrin and Estrildis had 
 a daughter, whom they named Sabre. Now of 
 course the Duke's daughter did not like the 
 way things were going, and after awhile she 
 resolved to do something about it. She went 
 back to Cornwall and told the people there 
 how badly she had been treated, and she raised 
 an army to go and fight the King of England. 
 They did fight, and Locrin was killed. 
 
 "Then the Duke's daughter made herself
 
 150 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Queen again and ordered poor Estrildis and 
 her daughter Sabre to be thrown into this 
 great river that we are crossing. Then, from 
 the name of Sabre, they called the river Sabren, 
 and by some twisting or other that name has 
 got turned into Severn." 
 
 " I don't think that is much of a story," said 
 Helen. 
 
 " Perhaps it isn't," I admitted ; " but you 
 know we are not in a very good place to enjoy 
 stories. Now what if I were to tell you a 
 rather livelier story, with plenty of things in it 
 that are hard to believe ? Perhaps trying to 
 believe them will make you forget how uncom- 
 fortable you are. At any rate I will try it. 
 
 " I have told you before that there used to 
 be a great many little kings scattered all over 
 England. One of these kings had a wife, with 
 a hard name to pronounce, and a son. The 
 story is not about the King or his wife, so their 
 names do not matter. It is about the son, and 
 his name was Kilhooch. When Kilhooch was 
 still a child his mother fell sick and felt sure 
 that she was going to die. She feared that 
 after she was dead the King would marry 
 again, and that her son would have a step- 
 mother who would not treat him kindly. So 
 she made the King promise that he would not 
 marry till he should see a briar with two blos- 
 soms growing on her grave. Then she died.
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 1 5 1 
 
 " Seven years after the King rode hunting 
 one day and passeA near the Queen's grave, and 
 saw that there was a briar with two blossoms 
 growing on it. So, as he was getting rather 
 tired of living alone, he at once found another 
 wife, as kings never seem to have any trouble 
 in doing. Kilhooch was getting to be a fine 
 young man by this time, and almost the first 
 thing that his step-mother said to him was that 
 he ought to have a wife too. Kilhooch an- 
 swered that he thought he was too young to 
 marry. Then the step-mother said : ' I believe 
 that you will never be pleased with any woman 
 for your wife except Olwen, the daughter of 
 Yspaddaden Penkawr.' 
 
 "Now I don't know why Kilhooch's step- 
 mother told him this. It was not at all easy for 
 a young man to get Olwen, the daughter of 
 Yspaddaden Penkawr, and perhaps his step- 
 mother hoped that he would be killed in trying 
 to do it. You know step-mothers are almost 
 always wicked, in stories. But then, she knew, 
 too, how sweet and lovely Olwen was, and per- 
 haps when she saw what a beautiful and brave- 
 looking boy Kilhooch was, she thought that he 
 was just the one who deserved such a wife, and 
 that he would prize her all the more if he had a 
 little trouble in getting her. I am quite will- 
 ing to believe that this was her reason, because 
 I never heard of her doing anything else that
 
 152 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 was bad. At any rate Kilhooch fell so deeply 
 in love with the very thought of Olwen that 
 his father asked him what was the matter. ' My 
 step-mother says,' he answered, ' that I shall 
 never find any one to please me for my wife 
 except Olwen, the daughter of Yspaddaden 
 Penkawr, and I do not know how I am to get 
 her.' 
 
 " ' That will be easy enough,' said his father ; 
 ' go to King Arthur and ask him to help you.' 
 
 " I don't suppose you would believe me if I 
 told you how Kilhooch dressed himself and 
 equipped himself and his horse and his dogs 
 to go to the court of King Arthur. And yet 
 you may as well believe whatever you hear 
 about the way a very young man dresses when 
 he is very much in love. There was gold 
 pretty nearly everywhere, except where there 
 was something better. The hilt of his sword 
 was of gold, and around his body he wore a 
 cloth of purple, with a gold apple at each cor- 
 ner, and each of them was worth a hundred 
 cattle. His horse had a saddle of gold and his 
 dogs had collars of rubies. He had two spears 
 of silver, so sharp that they could wound the 
 wind and make blood flow. And his horse 
 stepped so lightly that it did not bend a blade 
 of grass under its hoofs. 
 
 " When he came to Arthur's court he rode 
 straight into the hall on his horse and said :
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 1 53 
 
 ' King Arthur, I am Prince Kilhooch, and I 
 have come to ask a gift of you.' 
 
 "'You shall have any gift,' said Arthur, 
 ' that is in reason and is not against my hon- 
 or or my kingdom.' 
 
 " * I ask of you,' said the young man, ' that 
 you help me to get Olwen, the daughter of 
 Yspaddaden Penkawr, for my wife. And I 
 ask it, too, of all your knights.' 
 
 " Now this young Kilhooch was really a re- 
 markable boy, for he knew the names of all 
 Arthur's knights, and when he asked them to 
 help him he named them all. I am not going 
 to name the knights for you, partly because it 
 would take too long and partly because I can't, 
 but Kilhooch named them till I am sure 
 everybody must have been tired of hearing 
 him. And the old book where this story is 
 written tells some remarkable things about 
 some of the knights. I don't suppose you 
 would believe them if I should repeat them for 
 you. There was one of them who walked on 
 his head, to save his feet. There was one who 
 was so beautiful that in battle no one touched 
 him with a spear, because all thought he was 
 an angel, and there was another who was so 
 ugly that no one touched him, because they 
 thought he was a devil. There was one who 
 could walk across a wood on the tops of the 
 trees. Another could jump over three hun-
 
 154 The Court of King ArtJmr 
 
 dred acres of ground, and still another could 
 stand on one foot all day. There was one who 
 could beat a barn with an iron flail till all that 
 was left of it was as fine as the oats on the floor. 
 One could spread his beard over the eight and 
 forty rafters in Arthur's hall. Two, the attend- 
 ants of Guinevere, had feet as swift as their 
 thoughts when they bore a message. But the 
 story does not say how swift their thoughts 
 were. Another had ears so good that he could 
 hear an ant fifty miles off rise from its nest in 
 the morning, and one had eyes so good that he 
 could see a mote in a sunbeam the whole length 
 of England. You can do just as you like about 
 believing all these things. You know I told 
 you in the first place that some things in this 
 story might be rather hard. I don't more than 
 half believe in these wonderful knights of 
 Arthur's myself, particularly because I never 
 heard of them except in this one story. 
 
 " But when Kilhooch had called on all of 
 them, together and separately, to help him to 
 get Olwen, the daughter of Yspaddaden Pen- 
 kawr, the King answered him : ' I have never 
 heard of the maiden of whom you speak, but 
 I will gladly send men to search for her and 
 they shall find her for you if they can.' 
 
 " Then Kay said to the young man : ' Go 
 with us and we will not part till we find her, 
 and you shall have her.'
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 155 
 
 " Then Arthur called Sir Bedivere, one of 
 his best knights, and Kyndelig, the guide, and 
 told them to go with Kilhooch and Kay. This 
 Kyndelig was just as good a guide in a coun- 
 try that he had never seen before as he was in 
 his own. You see he was much better at the 
 business than I am. He would never have 
 brought you out in this little jumping boat on 
 this dingy Severn, just because he had never 
 seen it before. And Arthur told Gawain to go 
 with them, and Goorhyr, who understood all 
 languages, even those of animals and birds. 
 And he sent Menoo with them, who could cast 
 very useful spells over things. 
 
 "So, all together, they set out, and when 
 they had travelled a long way they came to a 
 great plain, and across it they saw a great, 
 beautiful castle. It was morning when they 
 saw it first and they thought that it was not 
 far off, yet they went toward it till evening and 
 then it looked no nearer than at first. And all 
 the next day they went on, and all the next, 
 and it was not till the evening of that third day 
 that they found they were really near the cas- 
 tle. 
 
 " Then they came to a flock of sheep that 
 covered the whole plain, as far as they could 
 see, and on a mound sat a herdsman. His dress 
 was made of skins, and beside him was a dog as 
 big as a horse. Menoo cast a spell upon the
 
 156 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 dog, so that he could not hurt them, and then 
 they went forward. ' Herdsman/ said Kay, 
 ' whose castle is this ? ' 
 
 " You are stupid not to know that,' the 
 herdsman answered ; ' all the world knows that 
 this is the castle of Yspaddaden Penkawr.' 
 
 " ' And who are you, herdsman ? ' 
 
 " I am Custennin, the brother of Yspaddaden 
 Penkawr, and he treats me cruelly because I 
 have great possessions, and he wants them. 
 And who are you ? ' 
 
 " ' We are the men of Arthur,' Kay answered, 
 ' and we have come with this young man, Kil- 
 hooch, to find Olwen, the daughter of Yspad- 
 daden Penkawr, that she may be his wife.' 
 . " ' Then go back to Arthur,' said Custennin, 
 4 for no one who came here to seek Olwen ever 
 went away again alive.' 
 
 " Then Custennin rose to go away, and Kil- 
 hooch gave him a ring, and he took it home 
 and gave it to his wife. ' Where did you get 
 this ring ? ' she asked. 
 
 " ' From Kilhooch,' he answered, ' who has 
 come to find Olwen and to marry her.' 
 
 " Then the knights themselves came to Cus- 
 tennin's house, and Custennin's wife ran out to 
 meet them. And she was so glad to see them 
 that she wanted to embrace Kay, who came 
 first. But Kay, who was not usually very 
 clever, happened to have a wonderfully happy
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 157 
 
 thought just then. He picked up a log from a 
 pile that lay near and put it in the woman's 
 arms and she hugged it till the wood was all in 
 shreds. ' If you had squeezed me like that,' 
 said Kay, ' nobody would ever have loved me 
 again.' 
 
 " Then the woman opened a chest, and out 
 of it came a handsome young man. ' Why do 
 you hide this boy so ? ' asked Goorhyr. 
 
 '"I hide him,' the woman said, 'because he 
 is the only one that is left of my twenty-four 
 sons. Yspaddaden Penkawr has killed all the 
 rest, and I know he will find this one and kill 
 him too, some time, in spite of all that I can 
 do.' 
 
 "'Then let him come with me,' said Kay, 
 ' and he shall not be killed unless I am killed 
 too.' 
 
 " ' Why do you come here ? ' the woman 
 asked, though she knew already. 
 
 " ' We come to seek Olwen,' Kay answered. 
 
 " * Then,' said the woman, ' go away before 
 any one in the castle knows that you are here, 
 or you will all be killed. They have all been 
 killed who ever came before to seek her.' 
 
 " ' We will not go,' said Kay again, ' till we 
 see Olwen. Will she come here, if you send 
 for her ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes,' said the woman, ' but I will not be- 
 tray her when she trusts me. I will not send
 
 158 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 for her unless you promise that you will do her 
 no harm.' 
 
 " ' We promise,' they all said, so the woman 
 sent for Olwen and she came. Now I know 
 just exactly how beautiful Olwen was, but I 
 am not going to tell you, because you would 
 only laugh at me and tell me that the loveliest 
 girl in the world is always the one that I hap- 
 pen to be telling a story about. Well, what of 
 it? Isn't that the way to tell stories? I will 
 only tell you that clover grew up wherever 
 Olwen stepped on the ground, and that as soon 
 as Kilhooch saw her he loved her even more 
 than he did before he saw her. And, having 
 no time to waste, he told her so at once and 
 asked her to come away with him. 
 
 " She did not seem at all surprised to hear 
 him say that he loved her. I dare say she was 
 quite used to it, though nobody had ever loved 
 her before and lived. But she said : ' I cannot 
 go with you yet, because I have promised my 
 father that I will never be married till he says 
 I may. You must go to my father and ask 
 him, and whatever he tells you to do, you must 
 do it. If you do not, you will never get me, 
 and you will scarcely save your own life.' 
 
 " Now the reason why Yspaddaden Penkawr 
 made his daughter promise never to be mar- 
 ried without his leave was that it had been 
 prophesied that he should die on the day when
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 159 
 
 his daughter was married. That was why he 
 set tasks that he thought were impossible for 
 all the lovers who came to seek her, and that 
 was why he killed them when they failed in the 
 
 " So they all went to the castle and stood be- 
 fore Yspaddaden Penkawr. 'We have come/ 
 they said, to ask your daughter Olwen for this 
 young man, Prince Kilhooch/ 
 
 " Yspaddaden Penkawr could not see them, 
 because his eyebrows were so heavy that they 
 had fallen down over his eyes. Where are my 
 servants ? ' he said. * Raise up the forks under 
 my eyebrows, so that I may see what my son- 
 in-law looks like. Is it you who want my 
 daughter? 1 
 
 - And Kilhooch answered : It is I.* 
 
 " You must promise then,' said Yspaddaden 
 Penkawr, 'to do everything that I ask, and 
 when you have done all that I ask you shall 
 have her/ 
 
 " ' I promise/ said Kilhooch. 
 
 " Do you see the land out yonder ? ' said 
 Yspaddaden Penkawr. 4 When I first met the 
 mother of this maiden nine bushels of flax were 
 sown there, and none of it ever grew. I re- 
 quire you to get back all the seed, so that it 
 may be sown in new ground, that a wimple may 
 be made from the flax for my daughter to wear 
 on the day when she is married to you.'
 
 160 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " ' That will be easy to do,' said Kilhooch. 
 
 "'Though you do this/ said Yspaddaden 
 Penkawr, ' there is something else which you 
 cannot do. For my daughter's wedding my 
 hair must be cut and combed, and I must be 
 shaved. My hair and my beard are so stiff 
 and strong that this cannot be done except 
 with the scissors and the comb and the razor 
 that are between the ears of the wild boar 
 Toorch Trooyth. He was a king who was 
 turned into a wild boar for his wickedness. 
 He will not give up the scissors and the comb 
 and the razor of himself and you cannot take 
 them from him.' 
 
 " ' That will be easy to do,' said Kilhooch. 
 
 " ' You cannot hunt Toorch Trooyth,' said 
 Yspaddaden Penkawr, ' without the help of 
 Mabon, the son of Modron. He was taken 
 from his mother when he was only three days 
 old and no one knows where he is now/ 
 
 " ' It will be easy to find him/ said Kilhooch. 
 
 " ' No one can find him/ said Yspaddaden 
 Penkawr, 'except his cousin Eidoel. You must 
 find Eidoel first and you cannot do that.' 
 
 " ' That will be easy to do/ said Kilhooch. 
 
 " ' Though you do this, there is something 
 else which you cannot do. You must have the 
 sword of the giant Goornach. He will not 
 give it or sell it, and you cannot take it from 
 him.'
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 161 
 
 " ' It will be easy for me to get it' 
 
 " In all these things you will have labor and 
 trouble. You will never do them and you will 
 never win my daughter.' 
 
 "'King Arthur will help me in all these 
 things and I shall win your danghter.' 
 
 " * Go, then,' said Yspaddaden Penkawr, 
 * and when you have done all these things come 
 back to me and you shall have her.' 
 
 " Then Kilhooch and the knights who were 
 with him and the son of Custennin left the 
 castle of Yspaddaden Penkawr and travelled 
 far, till they came before the largest castle 
 they had ever seen. They went to the gate 
 and knocked. ' Whose castle is this ? ' said 
 Goorhyr. 
 
 " ' It is the castle of the giant Goornach,' the 
 porter answered. 
 
 " ' Can we come in ? ' said Goorhyr. 
 
 " ' No,' said the porter, ' the knife is in the 
 meat and the drink is in the horn and there is 
 revelry in the hall, and no one can come in 
 to-night except a craftsman who brings his 
 craft.' 
 
 " ' Then I am a craftsman,' said Kay. 
 
 "' What is your craft?' 
 
 " ' I am a burnisher of swords.' 
 
 I will tell the giant Goornach,' said the 
 porter, ' and bring you an answer.' 
 
 " So the porter went to the giant and told
 
 1 62 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 him that there were some men at the gate who 
 wanted to come in, and that one of them said 
 that he could burnish swords. ' Bring him in,' 
 said the giant ; ' I have wanted some one for 
 a long time to burnish my sword.' 
 
 " So Kay was let in and the giant's sword 
 was brought to him. And Kay took out a 
 whetstone and polished half the sword. Then 
 he gave it to the giant and asked if it pleased 
 him. ' It is well done,' said the giant; 'make 
 the rest of it like this.' 
 
 " And when Kay had finished polishing the 
 sword he said : 'It is the scabbard that has 
 rusted the sword. Give it to me, so that I can 
 take out the old wooden sides and put in new 
 ones.' 
 
 " And the giant gave him the scabbard, 
 and as he stood close to the giant, as if he 
 were about to put the sword into the scab- 
 bard, suddenly he struck the giant with it and 
 cut off his head with one blow. Then Kay left 
 the castle, and he and Kilhooch and the others 
 went to King Arthur and carried the sword 
 of the giant Goornach with them. 
 
 " They told Arthur all that they had done, 
 and when he had heard the story he said : 
 ' Which of these things that we must do for 
 Prince Kilhooch will it be best to try first? ' 
 
 " ' We cannot hunt Toorch Trooyth,' they 
 said, ' without the help of Mabon, the son of
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 163 
 
 Modron, and we cannot find him without his 
 cousin Eidoel.' 
 
 " Now Eidoel was a prisoner in the castle of 
 Glivi. But Glivi gave him up to Arthur as 
 soon as he asked for him, and then Arthur went 
 back to his own castle and left the rest of them 
 to find Mabon, the son of Modron. And why 
 they should go first of all to the Blackbird of 
 Cilgoori I don't know, but they did. And 
 Goorhyr, who understood all languages, you 
 know, said : ' Blackbird of Cilgoori, do you 
 know anything of Mabon, the son of Modron, 
 who was taken from his mother when he was 
 three days old ? ' 
 
 " And the Blackbird answered : ' There was 
 an anvil here when I first came, and I was a 
 young bird then. Nothing has touched that 
 anvil since then except my beak, with which I 
 have pecked at it every morning. And now 
 there is scarcely so much left of it as the size 
 of a walnut Yet in all that time I have never 
 heard anything of Mabon, the son of Modron. 
 But I will lead you to the Stag of Redynvre. 
 He is older than I.' 
 
 " And when they found the Stag Goorhyr 
 said : ' Stag of Redynvre, we are an embassy 
 from King Arthur. Tell us if you know any- 
 thing of Mabon, the son of Modron.' 
 
 " Then the stag answered : ' When I came 
 to this place there was no tree here, but only
 
 164 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 an oak sapling. That sapling grew to be a 
 great oak, and it lived its life and died, and now 
 there is nothing left of it but a stump, yet in 
 all that time I have never heard of Mabon, the 
 son of Modron. But I will lead you to one who 
 is older than I.' 
 
 "So they went with the Stag and he led 
 them to the Owl of Coom Cawlwyd. And 
 Goorhyr said : ' Owl of Coom Cawlwyd, we 
 are an embassy from King Arthur. Tell us if 
 you know anything of Mabon, the son of Mo- 
 dron.' 
 
 " ' When I came to this place,' said the Owl, 
 ' this wide valley which you see was covered 
 with a wood. Men came and rooted it up and 
 another wood grew, and the one which is here 
 now is the third, yet in all that time I have 
 never heard of Mabon, the son of Modron. 
 But I will take you to the oldest animal in the 
 world, the Eagle of Gwern Abwy.' 
 
 " So the Owl led the way, and again Goor- 
 hyr said : ' Eagle of Gwern Abwy, we are an 
 embassy from King Arthur. Tell us if you 
 know anything of Mabon, the son of Modron.' 
 
 " And the Eagle answered : ' When I came to 
 this place there was a rock here so high that I 
 could perch on the top of it and peck at the 
 stars. It has been worn away now till it is 
 scarcely a span high, and I have never heard 
 of Mabon, the son of Modron. Yet, once, when
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 165 
 
 I was looking for food, I saw a great Salmon. 
 I tried to catch him, but he dragged me under 
 the water and I scarcely saved my life. Then 
 I and many other eagles went to attack the 
 Salmon and to destroy him, but he made peace 
 with me and I took fifty fish spears out of his 
 back. He travels much, and he may have 
 heard of Mabon, the son of Modron.' 
 
 " Then they all followed the Eagle, and he 
 led them to this same river Severn, and they 
 found the Salmon of Llyn Llyw. And the 
 Eagle said : * Salmon of Llyn Llyw, I have 
 brought to you an embassy from King Arthur, 
 to ask if you know anything of Mabon, the son 
 of Modron.' 
 
 " And the Salmon answered : ' Sometimes I 
 go up this river as far as Gloucester. There 
 stands a great castle, and in a dungeon I have 
 heard wailing and groaning. Let two of you 
 stand on my shoulders and I will take you 
 there, and you can see and hear for yourselves/ 
 
 " So Kay and Goorhyr stood on the Salmon's 
 shoulders and he swam with them up the Sev- 
 ern to Gloucester. And there they found the 
 castle, and from the dungeon, just as the Sal- 
 mon had said, came a sound of some one groan- 
 ing and lamenting. Then Goorhyr called out 
 and asked who it was in the dungeon, and the 
 voice in the dungeon answered : ' I am Mabon, 
 the son of Modron.'
 
 i66 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " ' And can you be released from this prison,' 
 Goorhyr asked, * for money or for gifts or by 
 fighting ? ' 
 
 "'If I am ever released,' the voice answered, 
 'it must be by fighting.' 
 
 " Then Kay and Goorhyr went back to their 
 companions, and they all went to King Arthur 
 and told him where Mabon, the son of Modron, 
 was. Then Arthur called his warriors and they 
 went and laid siege to the castle. And while 
 the men of the castle were busy fighting with 
 the army in front, the Salmon took Kay and 
 Bedivere to the back, and they broke through 
 the wall and took Mabon, the son of Modron, 
 out. Then, as they wanted nothing more, 
 Arthur and his army went home." 
 
 " And what did that cousin of Mabon's have 
 to do with it ? " Helen asked. " I thought he 
 had to help them somehow." 
 
 " I am sure I don't know," I had to admit. 
 " Yspaddaden Penkawr told them that they 
 could not find Mabon, the son of Modron, un- 
 less they found Eidoel first, and so they found 
 him. But the story does not say that he did 
 anything afterward, more than all the rest of 
 them did. I rather think that Yspaddaden 
 Penkawr tried to think of as many things as 
 he could for his son-in-law to do, just to make 
 his task long and hard. And I am not sure 
 that they could not have hunted Toorch
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 167 
 
 Trooyth just as well without Mabon, the son 
 of Modron, himself." 
 
 " I shouldn't think," Helen suggested, " that 
 he would be any better hunter than anybody 
 else, if he had been in prison ever since he was 
 three days old." 
 
 " I shouldn't think so either. But perhaps 
 there was some sort of magic, some charm, 
 about having Eidoel and Mabon, the son of 
 Modron, with them, whether they really did 
 anything or not. All I am sure about is that 
 the story says they had to have them and they 
 did have them. And about the time that they 
 got Mabon, the son of Modron, out of prison, 
 another very lucky thing happened. One of 
 Arthur's knights saved a hill of ants from being 
 burned, and the ants were so grateful that they 
 said they would do something for him that no 
 man could do. So they went and picked out 
 of the ground the nine bushels of flax-seed that 
 Yspaddaden Penkawr had told Kilhooch he 
 must get for him. The ants came and piled up 
 the flax-seed till there was only one seed miss- 
 ing, and a lame ant brought that one before 
 night. 
 
 "It was time now to begin the hunt of the 
 wild boar Toorch Trooyth. He was said to be 
 somewhere in Ireland, and Arthur first sent 
 Menoo, the man who could cast spells, to see 
 if he really had the razor and the comb and
 
 1 68 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 the scissors that Yspaddaden Penkawr wanted 
 between his ears. Menoo, it seems, could 
 cast spells upon himself just as well as upon 
 anybody else, so he changed himself into a 
 bird. Then he found the den where Toorch 
 Trooyth lived, and there, sure enough, he saw 
 the razor and the comb and the scissors be- 
 tween his ears. Menoo hovered over him and 
 tried to snatch away one of them, but he only 
 got one of the long, stiff bristles, and then the 
 boar got up angrily and shook himself, and 
 Menoo flew away and went back to tell Arthur. 
 
 " Then Arthur called all his warriors to- 
 gether and they crossed over to Ireland to 
 hunt Toorch Trooyth. It may have been a 
 great punishment for this wicked king to turn 
 him into a wild boar, but it does not seem to 
 have made him any less wicked or any less 
 dangerous, for the first day that they hunted 
 him, the story says that he laid waste the fifth 
 part of Ireland. They hunted him and fought 
 with him there for eleven days altogether, and 
 then he ran into the sea and started to swim 
 across the channel toward England. And he 
 swam straight toward the mouth of this same 
 river Severn, and came to land somewhere in 
 Devonshire, where we are going as fast as we 
 can get there. 
 
 " Now it would do no good for me to tell 
 you, even if I could remember, all the places
 
 On the Wrong Side of the Severn 169 
 
 where Toorcb Trooyth led Arthur and his 
 men in their hunt. It lasted for many days* 
 and the wild boar rushed through the coun- 
 try, trampling down and destroying the crops, 
 killing cattle and dogs and killing some of Ar- 
 thur's men too. And at last Arthur resolved 
 that he would surround him with as many of 
 his knights as he could and force him into the 
 Severn. So they came up with him and 
 pressed upon him all around, and forced him 
 into the river, and while he was there Mabon, 
 the son of Modron, who was on one side of 
 him, snatched the razor from between his ears, 
 and a knight of Arthur's, on the other side, 
 seized the scissors. But before they could get 
 the comb the boar broke away from them and 
 grot back to the land. 
 
 "Then he ran and none of them could over- 
 take him again till he came into Cornwall 
 There they did overtake him, but just here the 
 story-teller gives it up and does not try to tell 
 us what happened Tn the fight. But he does 
 tell us that all that had gone before was mere 
 play compared with it. But they got the 
 comb and then they drove the boar into the 
 sea, and he swam away, and after that nobody 
 ever knew what became of him. 
 
 " Then Kilhooch took the razor and the scis- 
 sors and the comb to Yspaddaden Penkawr, and 
 he could not deny that Kilhooch had done
 
 170 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 everything that he had told him to do, so he 
 had to give him his daughter Olwen for his 
 wife. And on the day when they were mar- 
 ried Yspaddaden Penkawr died, as it had been 
 foretold that he would, and nobody was sorry, 
 because he had killed so many young men who 
 had come to marry his daughter that every- 
 body thought it was time for him to die. And 
 yet I am afraid that Kilhooch was never truly 
 sorry for all the young men who had been 
 killed because they could not do the things 
 that Yspaddaden Penkawr asked of them. And 
 they might have done them, too, just as well as 
 he, if they had had King Arthur to help them, 
 like him." 
 
 The water all around us had grown wonder- 
 fully smooth and the boat was going along 
 quietly and right side up. We stood up to 
 look around and see what had made the 
 change. " How narrow the river is here ! " 
 Helen said. 
 
 " Yes," I said, " we must be off the Severn 
 now and on the Avon ; not the Stratford Avon, 
 but the Bristol Avon."
 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE PATHS THAT ENID RODE 
 
 I AM glad that mj fathers of two hundred 
 and fifty years ago came from Devonshire. If 
 I could have chosen the place for them to come 
 from, I could not have found a better one. It 
 does not matter just where we went on our 
 way through Devon. One part of it is as beau- 
 tiful as another. Everywhere you see the same 
 gentle slopes of hillsides, covered with the 
 same rich, green depth of velvet grass. Every- 
 where the same contented-looking sheep are 
 feeding in the sunny pastures or lying sleepily 
 in the shade. On the hills and in the fields of 
 grain are scattered the same red and yellow 
 flowers. Along all the roads are the same 
 green hedges, higher than your head on both 
 sides, often, as you walk, as high as your head 
 even, sometimes, when you ride. All these 
 things are the same in their sweet and peaceful 
 loveliness, and yet they are all different, always
 
 172 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 fresh, always new. You never get tired of 
 these scenes. The more you see of them the 
 more you feel rested and refreshed and grate- 
 ful. 
 
 And then they feed you so well in Devon- 
 shire. For those sheep are just as good to eat 
 as they are to look at, and there are other 
 things equally good to eat that do not show so 
 much in the landscape. But the cows help the 
 landscape, and the table too, because you owe 
 all your clotted cream to them. When you 
 are in Devonshire you get clotted cream with 
 your orange marmalade or your strawberry 
 jam, or whatever you have for breakfast ; you 
 get it again with your gooseberry tart for 
 luncheon, and again with whatever comes at 
 the end of your dinner. If you want to eat it 
 on your bread at any time of the day, when 
 you have bread, you can. In Devonshire they 
 would no more think of asking you to eat a 
 meal without clotted cream than without a 
 knife and fork. 
 
 And while we were in Devonshire I don't 
 remember just where, but somewhere and 
 somehow I happened to say : " This Devon 
 was Geraint's country. His father, Erbin, was 
 the ruler of it, under King Arthur. But when 
 Geraint had been at the court of Arthur for 
 some three years, Erbin began to feel that he 
 was getting too old to keep such order and
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 173 
 
 peace as Arthur wanted everywhere. The 
 great lords all about him knew that he was get- 
 ting old too, and they thought that he would 
 soon be too weak to defend his lands, and that 
 then they could get some of them for them- 
 selves. So he sent messengers to Arthur to 
 ask him to let his son Geraint come back and 
 help him to defend the country and learn to 
 rule it after him. 
 
 "Arthur was sorry to lose Geraint, for he 
 had come to be one of the best knights of the 
 court, but he knew that he was needed more 
 in Devon, and he told him to go. So Geraint 
 and Enid left Oaerleon, and many of Arthur's 
 best knights went with them to the Severn, and 
 crossed over to the other side, and there Erbin's 
 knights met them. Then they all went together 
 to Erbin's court, and there was great rejoicing 
 over Geraint's arrival. And as soon as it was 
 over Geraint began to help his father in the 
 ruling of the country. And with a strong and 
 vigorous and resolute young man like Geraint 
 at the head of affairs, one who could tell a 
 troublesome lord what to do and then make 
 him do it, things were soon in better order 
 than they had been, and there was no part of 
 Arthur's kingdom that was better governed 
 than Devon. 
 
 " Then, since there was no more real fight- 
 ing to do, Geraint began to fight in tourna-
 
 174 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 ments, as he had done at Arthur's court, and to 
 hunt with the other knights. He was the best 
 of them all in these things, and his fame spread 
 all about the country. But after a time Ge- 
 raint began to get a little tired of tipping other 
 knights over in sham fights. It was not at all 
 strange that he should, I think. The wonder 
 to me is that they did not all get tired to death 
 of knocking one another over their horses' tails 
 and denting one another's helmet, and splitting 
 one another's shield. And Geraint was sensi- 
 ble enough to care more for his wife than he 
 did for punching holes in his friends' armors, 
 so he stayed with her a good deal and began 
 to neglect the tournaments. 
 
 " But a good many people have got into 
 trouble by knowing more and being more 
 sensible than the people around them, and so 
 it was with Geraint. For the knights were not 
 content with knowing that Geraint was the 
 best of all of them ; they wanted him to be 
 proving it all the time. They got to saying 
 that he was losing his courage, and that it was 
 a shame for him to stay at home with his wife 
 instead of winning more fame in the hunt and 
 the tournament. Now this was just the way 
 that pretty nearly a hundred people out of a 
 hundred in those days would look at it, and it 
 was just the way that Erbin looked at it when 
 he heard this kind of talk about the court. So
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 175 
 
 he told Enid of it, and asked her if it was she 
 who had made Geraint give up all the sports 
 in which he had been so famous and lead such 
 a lazy life at home. 
 
 " And Enid looked at it just as Erbin did, 
 and she said : ' No, indeed, I would never keep 
 him away from any honor that he could win. 
 I do not know why he does not go to the 
 tournaments any more, but I am as sorry for 
 it as you.' 
 
 "Now you know very good people are al- 
 ways getting it into their heads that they have 
 done something dreadfully wrong, and it was 
 just so with Enid. The more she thought 
 about it the more she was afraid that it was her 
 fault after all. She liked to have Geraint with 
 her, of course, and so she feared that she had 
 kept him with her when he ought to have been 
 with the other knights. And one morning Enid 
 sat watching by Geraint while he slept. She 
 was gazing at him and thinking how beautiful 
 and strong he was. Then she thought so hard 
 that she thought out loud, and some tears came 
 into her eyes, and one of them dropped on his 
 face, and she said : ' Have I been doing so very 
 wrong, and is it my fault that all his strength 
 is wasted and that they do not call him the 
 bravest of all the knights any more?' 
 
 " And the tear that fell on his face awakened 
 him, and he heard a part of what she said. And
 
 176 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 what he heard and the tears that he saw made 
 him think one of the most insane things that 
 such a good, sensible fellow as he could possi- 
 bly think. I am afraid I cannot tell you ex- 
 actly what it was, because I don't think either 
 of us is insane enough to understand it. But, 
 as nearly as I can tell you what he thought, it 
 was like this : seeing the tears made him think 
 that Enid was unhappy ; then he concluded 
 that she must be tired of staying with him at 
 his lonely little court of Devon, away from the 
 great court of Arthur; and hearing her say 
 something about doing wrong made him think 
 that she had done something very dreadfully 
 wrong, and as she was crying over him, he 
 thought that the whole wrong and unhappiness 
 must be about something that concerned him. 
 Now did you ever hear of anything more ab- 
 surd? If he had been fully awake I don't 
 believe that he would ever have thought of 
 any such nonsense. But as it was these mad 
 notions got into his head while he was only 
 half awake. Then they stayed there, and it 
 was a long time before he got fully waked up, 
 as you will see presently. 
 
 " But just now, being only half awake, as I 
 prefer to believe, he ordered his horse and he 
 ordered Enid's horse, and he put on his armor. 
 Then he said to Enid : ' Put on your worst rid- 
 ing-dress and come and ride with me, and you
 
 T/u Paths that Enid Rode 177 
 
 shall not come back here till you see whether 
 I am as weak and as cowardly as you think.' 
 
 " I don't wonder that poor Enid was sur- 
 prised, and that she answered : I do not know 
 what you mean or why you ask me to do this.' 
 
 " It is not time for you to know yet,' Ge- 
 raint said. 
 
 "And when they were on their horses he 
 said: 'Ride forward and keep a long way 
 ahead of me. Do not turn back and do not 
 speak to me unless I speak to you first.' 
 
 "And so they rode away. It was a different 
 sort of ride from that one they took side by 
 side on that day when they came toward Caer- 
 leon, and the watchers on the rampart saw them 
 far off, and Queen Guinevere came down to 
 welcome them, and King Arthur waited to 
 meet them. Now Enid was sad and perplexed 
 with wondering what it all meant. She could 
 not think where they were going, or why, and 
 she could not understand why Geraint would 
 not let her speak to him. And Geraint was 
 more troubled than she, for he himself, I be- 
 lieve, did not know just why he was doing this 
 silly thing. He must have known that his own 
 thoughts were all wrong, even though he was 
 only half awake. 
 
 " They must have ridden, I think, in some of 
 the very places where we have been. They 
 did not look the same then, perhaps, but the
 
 178 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 story says that in one place the road was be- 
 tween two hedges. That was like what we 
 have seen, surely ; yet in most places I think 
 that the ways were rougher then and that , 
 there were more woods. The woods were 
 dangerous, too, because there were a good 
 many thieves in them, in spite of all that King 
 Arthur and Geraint had done to drive them 
 out. 
 
 " And as Enid rode along so far ahead, she 
 saw four armed horsemen come out of the 
 woods near her. And she heard one of them 
 say : ' Here is a chance to get two horses and 
 an armor ; that glum-looking knight there can 
 do nothing against us.' 
 
 "Then Enid tried to think what she ought 
 to do. Geraint Had. told her not to speak to 
 him, yet she feared that if she did not warn 
 him the four men would set upon him all at 
 once and kill him. Of course she did the only 
 sensible thing that anybody could do. She 
 turned back and warned him. And what do 
 you think he said ? ' I told you,' he said, ' not 
 to speak to me. No doubt you would like to 
 see these men kill me, but I am not afraid of 
 them.' No.w do you believe, Helen, that Ge- 
 raint could -ever have said that if he had been 
 more than half awake ? 
 
 " But he was awake enough to run his spear 
 through the fii*st' of the four men who came
 
 Tke Paths that Enid Rode 179 
 
 against him. And then he served each of the 
 other three in the same way in his torn. Then 
 he took off the armors of the four men and 
 bound them on the backs of the four horses. 
 And he tied the bridles of the horses together 
 and mounted his own horse again and said to 
 Enid : ' Drive these horses before you and 
 keep far ahead of me, and do not dare to speak 
 to me again unless I speak to you first.' 
 
 " So they rode on again, but Enid did not 
 have so much time now to wonder what it all 
 meant, because she had to attend to driving 
 the horses. And by and by they came out of 
 the wood and began crossing a plain. In the 
 middle of it was a clump of trees, and out of 
 this came three men, armed and on horseback. 
 As Enid came near them she heard one of them 
 say : This is lucky ; here are four good horses 
 and four good armors and that knight there 
 with the hangdog look cannot prevent our tak- 
 ing them.' 
 
 " Then Enid thought, just as she had thought 
 before, of what she ought to do, and she did 
 just what she had done before and warned Ge- 
 raint. And he, being still, as I believe, only 
 half awake, was angry with her again for speak- 
 ing. Yet he charged against the men and over- 
 threw them all, as he had done before. And 
 then, just as he had done before, he took the 
 armors and bound them on the backs of the
 
 180 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 horses and fastened the bridles together and 
 told Enid to drive the horses before her with 
 the others. 
 
 " Then on they went across the plain till they 
 came near another wood. And this time five 
 horsemen came out against them. And just 
 the same things happened that had happened 
 twice before. Enid warned Geraint and he 
 was angry with her for speaking, yet he over- 
 threw the men. And this time Enid had five 
 more horses to drive before her, so that there 
 were twelve in all." 
 
 Just here Helen, who had been looking doubt- 
 ful for some time, refused to believe any more. 
 " How could she drive twelve horses," she 
 asked, " without any reins or anything at all to 
 drive them with ? " 
 
 " It is not very easy to understand," I said, 
 "but we must remember that they had good 
 horses in those days and they were well trained. 
 They must have been, or they would not have 
 done their parts in those jousts and tourna- 
 ments. The horses often got knocked down, 
 as well as the men, and the horses must have 
 known it. So it must have taken good train- 
 ing to make one of them charge straight 
 against another with a knight on his back, 
 knowing that there was going to be a dreadful 
 shock and a crash, and that as likely as not he 
 and his rider were both going to be thrown over
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 181 
 
 backward. And it is said that those horses 
 used to be trained so that they would gallop 
 straight against a stone wall, if their riders 
 told them to do it. So you see horses in those 
 days were taught to go just where they were 
 told to go. No doubt Enid did have hard 
 work to drive these twelve, and the story says 
 that she did, but it was not so hard as you 
 might think. If they had been as unreasonable 
 as Geraint was, I am sure she could not have 
 done anything with them at all. But horses 
 are almost always more reasonable than men. 
 
 " Well, riding in this way, they came into the 
 wood, and before they were through the wood 
 it was night. So they turned out of the road 
 and tied their horses to trees and slept. And 
 very early in the morning they awoke and 
 mounted and started again on their way. Soon 
 they were out of the wood and in an open 
 country. There was a great meadow, with 
 mowers, on one side, and before them they saw 
 a town. Then they met a boy who carried a 
 basket and a large pitcher. ' Whence do you 
 come ? ' said Geraint to the boy. 
 
 " ' From the town yonder,' the boy answered ; 
 ' and whence are you ? ' 
 
 " ' We have just come through the wood,' 
 answered Geraint. 
 
 " ' But you cannot have come through the 
 wood this morning,' said the boy.
 
 1 82 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " ' No,' said Geraint ; ' we were in the wood 
 all night.' 
 
 " ' Then you have had nothing to eat this 
 morning,' said the boy ; * will you take what I 
 have here ? It is the breakfast for the mowers, 
 bread and meat and wine, but I can bring more 
 for them.' 
 
 " Then Geraint thanked the boy and got off his 
 horse. And the boy helped Enid off her horse, 
 and then he served them while they ate. They 
 must have been really hungry, for, as far as the 
 story shows, they had eaten nothing that morn- 
 ing or the day before. ' And now,' said the boy, 
 ' I must go and get something for the mowers.' 
 
 " ' As you go to the town,' said Geraint, ' find 
 the best lodging for me that you can, and take 
 any one of these horses that you like and the 
 armor on his back, to pay you for your trouble.' 
 
 " So the boy went to the town and found the 
 best lodging he could. But it did not seem to 
 him that it was good enough for such a great 
 lord as Geraint must be, so he went to the 
 palace of the Earl, who was the lord of the 
 place, and asked him what he should do. ' Tell 
 the knight,' said the Earl, ' to come here to my 
 palace, and I shall be glad to welcome him.' 
 
 " But when the boy brought the message to 
 Geraint, he would not go to the Earl's palace, 
 but only to the lodgings that the boy had found 
 for him. And when they were there Geraint
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 183 
 
 told Enid to stay on one side of the room and 
 not to cross to the other side, where he was. 
 You see he had waked up this morning only 
 about as far as he did yesterday morning. 
 
 " Then the Earl sent word to Geraint that 
 he would come to visit him, and in the even- 
 ing he came. And the Earl asked Geraint why 
 he was making this journey. ' To seek advent- 
 ures,* said Geraint, ' and to go where I please.' 
 
 " And when the Earl saw how Enid stayed 
 on the other side of the room, all alone, he 
 could not understand it, any more than you 
 and I do, or any more than Enid and Geraint 
 themselves did. But the Earl was fully awake 
 and he saw how absurd it looked better than 
 Geraint. And since she kept so far away from 
 Geraint and neither of them spoke to the other, 
 the Earl thought that she must be going with 
 him for some reason against her wilL So the 
 Earl said to Geraint: 'May I speak to the 
 maiden yonder, for I see she is not with you ? * 
 
 - Speak to her, if you like,' said Geraint. 
 
 " Then the Earl crossed the room to where 
 Enid was and said to her : ' It must be unpleas- 
 ant to yon to ride through the country with 
 this man. You have no house and yon must 
 sleep in such places as you can find. You have 
 no servants and you must grow weary of rid- 
 ing all day, with no company but him. My 
 men are here with me. If you say the word
 
 184 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 we can kill him in an instant, and then I will 
 marry you and you shall come to my palace 
 and you shall have everything that you want 
 as long as you live.' 
 
 " But Enid answered : ' No ; I would rather 
 be on the roads and in the woods with that 
 man than in your palace with you.' 
 
 " ' Take care, then,' said the Earl ; ' you are 
 both here in my town, and here are my men. 
 If I like I can kill him without your leave, and 
 then I can make you marry me.' 
 
 " Then Enid was afraid that he would do as 
 he said, so she answered him : ' Do not touch 
 him yet ; go away now, but come back to-mor- 
 row and kill him, if you will, and take me away, 
 as if it were by force.' 
 
 " So the Earl went away and took all his 
 men with him. And after awhile Geraint lay 
 down and went to sleep. But Enid kept awake 
 and watched. And by and by she took all 
 Geraint's armor and placed it together, so that 
 it should be ready for him to put on. Then 
 she watched again till midnight. And at mid- 
 night she went to Geraint and spoke to him 
 and woke him and told him all that the Earl 
 had said. And again he was angry with her 
 for speaking to him, but he called the man of 
 the house and said to him : ' Take the eleven 
 horses and the eleven suits of armor for your 
 pay, and show us the way out of the town.'
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 185 
 
 " So they mounted their horses again and the 
 man showed them the way and they left the 
 town. And they rode on through the dark 
 woods and between the dark fields till morn- 
 ing. And Enid still rode far ahead, as she had 
 done on the first day. And when it began to 
 grow light they saw a wide valley before them, 
 and a river, with a bridge across it, and a town 
 beyond. Soon they met a knight, and Geraint 
 asked him whose town it was before him. * It 
 belongs,' said the knight, to the Little King.' 
 
 " You know I have told you something about 
 some little kings before. I called them little 
 kings because they amounted to so little. This 
 one was called the Little King because his 
 body was so little. 
 
 " Geraint kept on his way and soon he met 
 another knight. His horse was big, but Geraint 
 thought that the knight was the smallest man 
 he had ever seen on a horse. What are you 
 doing here,' the knight cried out to Geraint, 
 and why do you come into a place that be- 
 longs to me?" 
 
 " I did not know that this road was forbid- 
 den," said Geraint. Who are you, and why 
 should I not come here ? ' 
 
 Ul I am the Little King,' the other answered, 
 and I let no one pass here unless he fights 
 with me," 
 
 " It was not at all uncommon in those days,
 
 1 86 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 when a knight could not possibly find any- 
 thing else to fight about, for him to take up 
 his stand somewhere and declare that no other 
 knight should pass without fighting him. Wan- 
 dering knights always expected to find such 
 fixed knights as these, now and then, and they 
 were always ready for them. So Geraint said 
 no more, but closed his helmet and put his 
 spear in rest. Then they fought for a long 
 time, first on horseback and then on foot. And 
 Geraint thought that he had never had a 
 harder fight, not even with Edyrn, the son of 
 Nudd. For the Little King was so small that 
 it was hard to hit him, but he struck back as 
 often and as strongly as any knight. Yet at 
 last Geraint drove his sword out of his hand 
 and brought him to the ground, and the Little 
 King begged him to spare his life. * I will give 
 you your life,' Geraint answered, ' if you will 
 promise never to fight against me again, but 
 to be ready always to come and fight for me, 
 if you hear that I am in trouble.' 
 
 " And the Little King promised, and Geraint 
 and Enid rode on their way. And still Enid 
 rode ahead and wondered what this long, 
 dreadful journey was for and why she might 
 not ask. And as they came to another wood 
 they heard a sound of someone crying, and 
 Geraint said : ' Wait here till I see what is the 
 matter.'
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 187 
 
 "And when he left the road and went into 
 the wood he found a woman sitting beside a 
 knight who lay dead upon the ground. And 
 when Geraint asked her what had happened, 
 she told him that the knight was her hus- 
 band and that three giants had killed him. 
 * And which waj did they go ? " Geraint 
 asked. 
 
 "'They went yonder,' said the woman, 'by 
 the high road ; bat do not try to follow them, 
 or they will kill you as they killed my husband." 
 
 "Then Geraint went back to Enid and told 
 her to go to the woman and to stay with her, 
 while he followed the giants. And Enid went, 
 and she forgot all her other sadness and her 
 wonder about the journey that she was on, 
 in her fear that Geraint would not come 
 back. 
 
 M But Geraint followed the giants. In a hi. 
 tie while he came upon one of them and thrust 
 him through with his spear, so that he fell 
 down dead. And so he served the second, 
 when he came up with him, but the third 
 struck him with a dub that he carried and 
 split his shield and crushed his shoulder. Yet 
 Geraint killed him, too, and then turned back 
 toward the place where he had left Enid. The 
 pain in his shoulder was so great that he could 
 scarcely bear it till he came where Enid and 
 the other woman were, and when he did reach
 
 1 88 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 the spot he fell down off his horse in a 
 swoon. 
 
 "Just then the Earl who was lord of that 
 part of the country was passing with some of 
 his men, and the women called to them for 
 help. And the Earl came and ordered a few 
 of his men to bury the dead knight, but he did 
 not know whether Geraint was dead or not, so 
 he had him carried to his castle, and he took 
 the two women there too. They put Geraint 
 on a couch in the hall, but they did no more 
 for him, for the table was there, spread with 
 food and wine, and they cared more about 
 that. 
 
 " They were a rough crew, the Earl and his 
 men, and they shouted and laughed and ate 
 and drank, as if there had been no one near 
 who felt any sorrow. And as soon as Enid 
 came into the hall the Earl dragged her to 
 the table and told her to eat too. ' I cannot 
 eat,' she answered, ' and I will never eat 
 till that man who lies there shall rise and eat 
 too.' 
 
 "' Drink, then,' said the Earl, and he poured 
 some wine for her. 
 
 " ' I will not drink/ she answered, ' till he 
 rises and drinks, too.' 
 
 " * Do not be so sad and silly,' said the Earl, 
 ' about one man. You were his wife, were 
 you ? Well, then, he is dead, and that is the
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 189 
 
 end of him. You shall stay with me now and 
 be my wife. Drink now.' 
 
 " ' I shall always be sad,' said Enid, ' if he is 
 dead, and I cannot eat or drink.' 
 
 " ' I have tried to be gentle with you,' the 
 Earl cried out, ' and it is of no use ; now I 
 must be rough with you ; you shall eat when I 
 tell you and drink when I tell you ! ' and then 
 he struck her on the face. 
 
 " Then Enid gave a great cry. It was not 
 so much because she was hurt, but because she 
 thought that Geraint must be really dead. 
 For she thought that if he had been alive the 
 Earl would not have dared to strike her. Now 
 I don't know whether Geraint had heard any- 
 thing of what the Earl and Enid had said. I 
 hope so, for it was just what he ought to hear. 
 But he surely heard her cry and he waked up 
 then. He waked up fully, too, not half. And 
 he either heard or saw exactly how things 
 were, and he seized his sword, which had been 
 left near him, and rushed upon the Earl and 
 struck him dead with one blow. And all the 
 rest of the men in the hall were frightened and 
 ran away, for they thought that a dead man 
 had risen up to punish them. 
 
 " And Geraint, as I said, was all awake now. 
 He looked at Enid and saw and felt how faith- 
 ful and good she was, how little she could do 
 any wrong, and how much she loved him And
 
 190 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 he felt ashamed of himself for being so foolish 
 and so cruel. He did not say a word, but he 
 took her hand and led her out of the hall. He 
 found their horses and they mounted and rode 
 away, and now they ride side by side. 
 
 " And soon they saw spears over the hedges 
 that hid the road, where it curved, and then 
 they heard horses and knew that armed men 
 were coming. They waited, and in a moment 
 they saw many men on horseback and a knight 
 at the head of them. When he came a little 
 nearer they knew him, and it was the Little 
 King. ' Is it Geraint ? ' he cried. ' I heard 
 that you were in trouble, and I was coming to 
 help you.' 
 
 " Then, when the Little King found that 
 Geraint was wounded, he made him and Enid 
 come to the castle of a baron near by who was 
 his friend. There they all stayed till Geraint 
 was well, and then he and Enid went home, and 
 the Little King went with them. And Geraint 
 went back to the tournaments and the hunts, 
 and as long as he lived there were few knights 
 so good or so famous as he. But there was 
 something better about Geraint than that. For 
 he had learned how foolish it was, when he 
 might wake up and find that everything was 
 right, to stay half-asleep and dream that every- 
 thing was wrong. And Enid was so happy to 
 see him as he used to be that she never asked
 
 The Paths that Enid Rode 191 
 
 him why he made her take that long, weary 
 ride and keep ahead of him and never speak to 
 him. And Geraint was so happy, too, and he 
 knew so well that Enid could do no wrong, 
 that he never asked her what she had said or 
 what she had meant or why she was so sad on 
 that morning when her tears fell and half- 
 awoke him."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 A LITTLE JOURNEY IN CORNWALL 
 
 IT is not easy to remember just where you 
 have been in Cornwall. It does not matter 
 where we started, and I could not possibly tell 
 you what way we went on the day that I mean 
 to tell you what I can about. My memory is 
 all confused. I do know that I asked the man 
 who sold us our railway tickets whether we 
 should have to change anywhere. He said 
 that we must change at Such-a-place. I don't 
 dare to say how many times it turned out that 
 we had to change before we got to Such-a- 
 place, or how many times after we left it. I 
 will not tell you a lie, and if I told you the truth 
 you would not believe me. 
 
 But I remember that we saw many of those 
 pretty slopes of pastures, such as we had seen 
 in Devon, and I remember that we saw some- 
 thing else that was not so pretty. This was a 
 tall, narrow, dingy house, like a house in a toy
 
 A Little Journey in Cornwall 193 
 
 Tillage, and a tall chimney. We saw these 
 over and over again, and somebody told us that 
 wherever we saw them there was a mine. 
 There were mines in Cornwall hundreds of 
 years before King Arthur's time. The Phoeni- 
 cians knew of them long before the Romans 
 came. And the Romans knew how rich they 
 were, and that was one reason why they liked 
 England. Now they are rather neglected and 
 many of them are not worked at all. 
 
 " I don't know at all where we are," I said, 
 as we got into a new train, after one of our 
 many changes, " but if we have not passed it I 
 think that there is a strange little lake not far 
 from here. We shall not see it to-day, for I 
 think there is no railway very near it. It is a 
 lake that has wonderful stories about it. 
 
 " It happened once that Arthur had left the 
 court and had gone out alone to fight with a 
 knight who had taken his place at a certain 
 well and made every other knight who passed 
 fight with him. You know I told you that 
 they sometimes did that. In the fight Arthur's 
 sword had been broken. It was not the sword 
 that he drew out of the stone to prove himself 
 the true King. That one he had given to Ga- 
 wain, if I remember rightly. 
 
 "Then Merlin met him, and when Merlin 
 saw that he had no sword he said to him : ' My 
 lord, I know where there is a sword near here
 
 194 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 that you may have, if you will come and take 
 it.' 
 
 " So Arthur followed Merlin. He led him a 
 little way to the foot of a hill and then up the 
 hill. It was a steep place to climb, and when 
 Arthur came to what he thought was the top, 
 there was as much more of the hill still before 
 him. Higher and higher he went, till he saw 
 the very crest of the hill just ahead and noth- 
 ing beyond it but the sky. He could not guess 
 where Merlin was leading him, but just as he 
 reached the highest place and thought that 
 there would be a gentle slope for him to go 
 down on the other side, he stood still in won- 
 der. For there before him was no slope of a 
 hillside, but a broad lake. He stood upon the 
 very edge of it when he saw it first, and he 
 heard the little waves plashing on the shore at 
 his very feet. 
 
 " It was strange enough to find a lake like 
 this on the very top of a hill, but about this 
 one there were yet stranger things. Some peo- 
 ple said that there were fairies who lived in 
 this lake, and some said that there were evil 
 spirits. There are people who say so still. 
 Arthur did not know of this, yet he might 
 have guessed it for himself. No one could 
 look out upon this water, as he did, and not 
 feel that it was something wonderful. He 
 could not see the other side or tell how broad
 
 A Little Journey in Cornwall 195 
 
 it was, though it was clear day all around. 
 For there were strange, bright, silvery mists 
 floating upon the water. They were moving 
 and shifting, so that for an instant the King 
 thought that he could catch just a glimpse of a 
 shore beyond, and then they closed across it 
 and he saw nothing but the shining, vapory 
 veil. Now the bright fog seemed rising and 
 growing thinner, till he looked at the ripples 
 of the water far from where he stood, and now 
 again it dropped down and he could see scarce- 
 ly more than the waves that came against the 
 bank at his feet The sun shone over it and 
 through it all, and the water, wherever he could 
 see it, gleamed like a polished armor, and the 
 mist dazzled his eyes like a light cloud with the 
 sun behind it at noon. He could see nothing 
 that was alive but Merlin, standing by his side, 
 and a bird like a sea-gull wheeling in circles 
 above the lake. 
 
 " Merlin said nothing, but pointed out upon 
 the lake, and the King looked that way. Then, 
 through a rift in the mist, he saw something 
 rising from the water. He could not make out 
 the form of it at first, but in a moment a little 
 puff of wind blew the vapors away from it and 
 he could see it better. Then he saw that an 
 arm rose out of the lake. The arm was cov- 
 ered with white silk and the hand held a sword 
 in a scabbard. The hilt of the sword was set
 
 196 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 with big, rich jewels. As the sunshine touched 
 them, they shot out little rays of changing 
 light, red and purple, and green and orange, 
 and, when the fog closed around it a little more, 
 the sun still made the beautiful hilt glow and 
 light up a little of the cloud around it like a 
 dim torch. 
 
 " The King was still gazing at this wonder 
 when Merlin touched him and pointed again 
 out upon the lake in another direction. There 
 Arthur saw another form, and this one moved. 
 It came nearer to them and he saw that it was 
 the form of a woman walking on the water. 
 Merlin whispered to him : ' She is the Lady of 
 the Lake ; the sword is hers, but she will give 
 it to you if you ask it.' 
 
 " So, when she came near them, Arthur said : 
 ' Lady, is that your sword out there upon the 
 lake?' 
 
 " ' Yes,' she answered, 'it is mine.' 
 
 " * You see I have no sword,' said Arthur ; 
 4 will you give me that ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes,' she answered again ; ' go into the boat 
 there and row out and take it.' 
 
 " Then Arthur saw a little boat by the shore 
 close to him, though he had not seen it before. 
 He got into it, and so did Merlin. Merlin took 
 an oar, but he scarcely seemed to touch the 
 water with it, and the boat went quickly away 
 from the shore and stopped close to the sword,
 
 A Little Journey in Cornwall 197 
 
 Then Arthur took the sword, and the arm and 
 the hand that held it went down under the 
 water. Merlin just dipped his oar again and 
 the boat went back to the shore. They stepped 
 out of the boat and Merlin said : * Draw the 
 sword and look at it.' 
 
 " So Arthur drew the sword and the blade 
 of it shone like a mirror. ' The name of the 
 sword is Excalibur,' said Merlin ; ' but tell me 
 now whether you like the sword or the scab- 
 bard better.' 
 
 " * It is a beautiful scabbard/ the King an- 
 swered ; but surely anybody must like a sword 
 better than a scabbard.' 
 
 " You are wrong in that," said Merlin ; ' it is 
 a wonderful sword indeed the best sword in 
 the world yet the scabbard is better. For the 
 man who has that scabbard by him can never 
 be killed in battle, and, though he may be 
 wounded, his wounds will never bleed and he 
 will lose none of his strength. So guard them 
 both, but more than anything else that you 
 have guard this scabbard.' 
 
 " As they turned to go down the hill again 
 Arthur looked back once more at the lake. All 
 the mist was gone from it and it looked like any 
 other lake. The water sparkled in the sunlight 
 that shone all over it, and Arthur could plainly 
 see the other shore across it and not very far 
 off, and away beyond it a mountain with two
 
 198 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 peaks. The Lady of the Lake was gone and 
 there was no boat. Everything about it was 
 changed except the bird like a sea-gull, that 
 wheeled in great circles high up in the air, and 
 the soft lapping of the little waves against the 
 bank and the strangeness of the lake's being 
 there on the hilltop." 
 
 Have you ever travelled in a strange country, 
 with nothing to guide you but books and maps 
 and time-tables ? If you never have I advise 
 you to try it. If the strange country happens 
 to be Cornwall, I advise you also to stick to 
 your books and maps and time-tables and not 
 to trouble yourself about what the people 
 of the hotels and the railways tell you. If the 
 way you want to go happens to be the way 
 they want you to go, it is all very well. But 
 if it doesn't, then they will tell you that the 
 way they want you to go is the only way there 
 is. I have said that I do not know just where 
 we went in Cornwall that day, but I do know 
 that after a time we got to Wadebridge. I 
 know, too, that it was luncheon-time. 
 
 We were trying to find Tintagel, and one of 
 my books said that a stage-coach went there 
 from Wadebridge every other day. I had 
 asked a railway man if there was a coach from 
 Wadebridge to Tintagel and he said that there 
 was not, but I did not believe him. He said
 
 A Little Jomnuy in Cornwall 199 
 
 there was one from Bod m in. But I was re- 
 solved to go from Wadebridge. It might not 
 be the right day for the coach, but we could 
 stay tffl it was. If it proved that there was no 
 coach at all we could get a carriage. So, 
 against all advice, we came to Wadebridge. 
 The first man we saw was a railway man a 
 porter. " Is there a coach from here to Tin- 
 tagelP-Iaskedhim. 
 "No.sir/'he said; "there BOM from Bod- 
 
 I hated Bodmin by this time, so I made up 
 my mind that we would go by carriage. We 
 walked out of the station and there stood an 
 omnibus from an hotel. I thought I would try 
 once more. " Is there a coach that runs from 
 here to Tintagel?" I asked the ! 
 driver. 
 
 "Yes, sir," he said. 
 
 I cheered up at once, " Does it go to-day or 
 to-morrow?" 
 
 " Every day, sir." 
 
 "Ah, indeed, and at what time?" 
 
 " You've just about time to catch it, sir." 
 
 This was luck indeed. "And where does it 
 start from?" 
 
 "From our hotel, sir; get right in and 111 
 take you there." 
 
 When we got to the hotel the coach had not 
 come and the proprietor thought that
 
 2OO The Court of King Arthur 
 
 have time for luncheon. We thought it was 
 worth trying, so they brought us the cold lamb 
 and the bread and the marmalade and the Dev- 
 onshire cream, for there is as much Devon- 
 shire cream in Cornwall as there is in Devon- 
 shire. Before we were done with these we 
 heard the coach-horn outside. But there was 
 plenty of time, they said, for the coach did not 
 go on again at once, and so it proved. 
 
 The coach was pretty full already, but the 
 guard found places for us up behind, near his 
 own seat. We were rather glad afterward that 
 we could not get any better places, because the 
 guard proved to be very pleasant company. I 
 asked him why it was that the railway men had 
 told us that there was no coach from Wade- 
 bridge to Tintagel. " Why, you see," he said, 
 "this coach is owned by the other railway. 
 The Bodmin coach belongs to their railway." 
 
 I have told you all this so that when you go 
 to Cornwall you may have your eyes open. 
 Yet, after all that I have said, you must not ex- 
 pect to find any coach running between Wade-, 
 bridge and Camelford. The guard told us 
 that they were building a railway to take 
 the place of it, and no doubt it was done long 
 before this time. I ought to say, too, right 
 here, that the most of the people whom we 
 met in Cornwall treated us honestly and most 
 kindly. They did all that they could to make
 
 A Little Journey in Cornwall 201 
 
 our visit among them pleasant, and we shall 
 always remember them most happily and grate- 
 fully. 
 
 Here was this very guard, for instance, try- 
 ing to amuse us with stories. " Do you see 
 those two rocks off there?" he asked. 
 
 Yes, we saw them. 
 
 " They call those the Devil's Jump," he said. 
 "They tell the story that the devil tried to 
 jump over them once, and couldn't do it So 
 he never got any farther into Cornwall than 
 that. And that is why there are so many 
 saints in Cornwall, for all the parishes from 
 here to the Land's End are named for saints." 
 
 " I have heard a different reason," I said, 
 " for the devil's keeping out of Cornwall." 
 
 " Yes, sir ? " he said, with an upward turn of 
 his voice that meant : " I should be glad to 
 hear the reason, if you care to tell me, sir." 
 
 " Why, I have heard," I said, " that the people 
 in Cornwall make pies out of so many differ- 
 ent things that the devil will never come here, 
 for fear they should make a pie out of him." 
 
 I knew that Cameiford, near where we were 
 going now, pretended to be the real Camelot, 
 and I tried to find out if the guard had any- 
 thing to tell us about King Arthur. He did 
 have something to tell that surprised me. 
 
 " Oh, yes," he said, " King Arthur lived here 
 at Cameiford, and the battle where he was
 
 202 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 killed was fought here. There is a bridge that 
 they call Slaughter Bridge, where they say he 
 was killed, and there is a stone near by, with 
 some letters on it, where they say he was 
 buried." 
 
 All this was so new to me that I did not 
 know at all what to say. " Was King Arthur 
 killed in a battle, then ? " Helen asked. 
 
 " Really," I answered, " I don't quite know. 
 He fought a great battle at last and was 
 wounded, and some said that he was killed. 
 Others believed that he was carried away to 
 the beautiful island of Avalon, to be cured of 
 his wounds. And there the old story-tellers 
 said that he was living still, and that some- 
 time, when England was in great danger, he 
 would come back to fight again and to save his 
 people. But I did not think that that last 
 great battle was here." 
 
 " Yes, sir," said the guard again, " they will 
 show you Slaughter Bridge, where he was 
 killed, and the gravestone close by." 
 
 We did not go to Camelford village that 
 day. The coach took us to the Camelford rail- 
 way station, and the guard told us that the vil- 
 lage was two miles off. Neither did we have 
 time to find Slaughter Bridge and King Ar- 
 thur's gravestone, but we resolved to look for 
 them some other time. At the station we had 
 to leave the coach and take a carriage for
 
 A Little Journey in Cornwall 203 
 
 Tintagel. It was a big, long affair, of the sort 
 that we call a drag. I don't know what they 
 call it in England, but I rather think they call 
 it a drag too. 
 
 As soon as we had left the station everything 
 around us seemed to change. Before the roads 
 had looked like the Devon roads. There were 
 the same green hedges along both sides of them, 
 so high, sometimes, that sitting there on the 
 top of the coach we could not see over them. 
 Now. instead of the green hedges, there were 
 gray walls of slate. But they were almost as 
 pretty as the hedges prettier, sometimes, we 
 thought, for a change. For their color was a 
 soft, warm gray, and grass and little flowers, 
 yellow and blue, grew in the chinks between 
 the stones, and now and then a scarlet poppy, 
 glowing like a big ruby in the sunlight, stood 
 straight up on the top of a wall, as if it wanted 
 to catch the fresh breeze blowing in from the 
 ocean better than it could down in the field. 
 
 The whole country about here is made of 
 slate. Sometimes our way was between two 
 great piles of it, built up with smooth sides 
 toward the road, so that we seemed to be rid- 
 ing between two huge castles. They were so 
 high that we could see nothing over them and 
 nothing beyond them where the road curved. 
 Here the coach-horn was no mere ornament or 
 toy. As the carriage went dashing along the
 
 204 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 narrow road and whirling around the curves 
 the driver blew clear notes on the horn to warn 
 anybody ahead of us that we were coming. 
 For if another carriage, going at the same rate 
 as ours, had met us without warning as we 
 turned one of those quick corners, it would 
 have been worse than the crash of two lines of 
 knights in a tournament. For we had no iron 
 clothes on, and we were not used to it. There 
 were some other things, too, that looked just 
 dangerous enough to make us feel a little hap- 
 pier. These were the great holes filled with 
 water, where slate had been taken out. There 
 was one of them by the side of the road that 
 looked like a harmless sort of puddle where the 
 children might sail their boats, but the driver 
 told us that it was a hundred feet deep. 
 
 And so it was a pleasant ride, but it was not 
 long, and in a little while we were rather sorry 
 to get to Tintagel. It is a bit of a village, just 
 a few houses ranged along the two sides of a 
 street. There are three or four large houses 
 and two of them are hotels. To be more ex- 
 act, they are two parts of the same hotel the 
 Wharncliffe Arms. It was something of a sur- 
 prise and much of a pleasure to us to find in 
 such a tiny place as Tintagel that the hotel was 
 large and well kept, and good in every way. 
 
 But there was something else that made me 
 like Tintagel as soon as I saw it. For it is
 
 A Little Journey in Cornwall 205 
 
 perched on a high plain, with the strong, sweet 
 air of the sea blowing freshly and freely over 
 it. I always feel a gladness when I come near 
 the ocean, for I feel that I am with an old 
 friend. I feel more at home when I am near it, 
 and I am sure we were all at home there at Tin- 
 tagel as soon as we caught the sweep of that 
 wind coming off the water and over the cliffs 
 and over the fields. And had we not good 
 cause to feel at home here ? Was not this the 
 same ocean that we had loved so long, the 
 same by the side of which we had sat so many 
 times, Helen and I, telling and hearing stories? 
 The same ocean, but different sides. The ris- 
 ing sun shines on our side of it, and the setting 
 sun on this. That is alL
 
 CHAPTER X 
 WHO THE KING REALLY WAS 
 
 WE did not go to see the castle of Tintagel 
 till evening. There were two or three reasons. 
 It was getting a little late in the afternoon 
 when we reached the village, and we were a 
 little tired after our journey. But the best 
 reason was that it is always better, when you 
 can, to see ruins for the first time by moonlight. 
 There was a good moon to-night and I knew 
 that our first view of the castle would be a 
 good one. " Many people who come here," 
 some one had said to us at the hotel, "are dis- 
 appointed because there is so little left of the 
 ruins. They seem to expect to see something 
 like Kenilworth. They ought to remember 
 that this castle has been going to ruin a good 
 deal longer than Kenilworth, and that it has to 
 stand the terrible storms of this rough coast." 
 
 " I don't believe we shall be disappointed in the 
 least," I said, as we walked through the village
 
 Who the King Really Was 207 
 
 toward the shore and the castle. " I feel here 
 more than I have felt anywhere else that we 
 are in King Arthur's own country. I don't 
 think that he ever lived at Tintagel at all, 
 though they call it King Arthur's castle. Be- 
 fore his time Tintagel Castle belonged to the 
 Duke of Cornwall. And so it does now, only 
 now the Duke of Cornwall is the Prince of 
 Wales, too, and then he was not. And after 
 that it belonged to Mark, the King of Cornwall, 
 who was as false and crafty and cowardly as 
 Arthur was true and noble and brave. Yet 
 this really was Arthur's country, and it seems 
 to me that this rugged coast and these cliffs 
 that for thousands of years have stood against 
 the power and the fury of the ocean, and this 
 free, open sky, are more worthy of King Arthur 
 than anything else that I have ever seen in 
 England. 
 
 " Everything here can remind you of him, if 
 you look at it rightly. Why, look up into 
 the sky itself. At home we see the same stars 
 that we see here, but some of them have differ- 
 ent names. Those up there above our heads 
 we call the Lyre, but here they are Arthur's 
 Harp. And there is our old friend the Dipper, 
 but here we must call it Arthur's Chariot" 
 
 We had left the village by this time and were 
 going up over a grassy hillside. In a few min- 
 utes our path brought us to the gate of the
 
 208 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 castle. We stopped to look at it a moment be- 
 fore we went in. Before us was a piece of low, 
 ruined wall, with a gate-way in it. It had been 
 arched once, but now one side of the arch was 
 all gone and there was just enough left of the 
 other side to show what the shape of it had 
 been. Right up above this, and above us, on 
 our left hand, rose a high rock, and on that a 
 wall, worn and battered and beaten away in- 
 deed, and still crumbling, but even now heavy 
 and thick and strong-looking, even now scowl- 
 ing down at us, as if it would have us know 
 that it cared nothing for war or storm or time. 
 " Do you see," I said, " what a strong place 
 this must have been? See how that piece of 
 wall stands up above everything and looks out 
 over everything. Try to think of it as higher 
 still, with a rampart on its top, and then think of 
 a tower above that. The castle has only this one 
 little gate on the side toward the land. If any 
 enemy came against it, it must be by this road 
 that we have come, and from the top of that 
 wall every one who came could be seen I don't 
 know how far off. They had no big guns then 
 to shoot at a castle miles away. They had ma- 
 chines to throw stones, and they could shoot ar- 
 rows, but it was easier to shoot them down than 
 up, and I think the men on the walls of a castle 
 like this must have been a good deal better off 
 than any men down below who might happen
 
 Who the King Really Was 209 
 
 to be attacking them. Then, if the enemy got 
 near enough, they had only to drop stones, in- 
 stead of throwing them. They used to pour 
 down boiling water from the walls of castles, 
 too, and drop other things that made it un- 
 pleasant for anybody who happened to be in 
 their way. 
 
 " Now let us come in through the gate and 
 see how the castle looks on the side toward 
 the water. No, I don't think anybody would 
 ever try to attack it on this side. Look across 
 this chasm and see the other part of the castle, 
 up there on the rocks. That is all but an island 
 over there. See how the rocks stand almost 
 straight up out of the ocean, and how high 
 above it the castle is. Hear the waves crash- 
 ing and pounding away down below there, and 
 then try to think whether any one would have 
 an easy time coming against Tintagel by sea. 
 They say that this chasm was narrower once, 
 and there was a bridge across from this pan of 
 the castle where we are to the other part, over 
 there on the island. Suppose, then, that the 
 enemy should batter down this wall. All that 
 the people of the castle would have to do would 
 be to cross over to the island and throw down 
 the bridge, and what could any army in the 
 world, without cannon, do against them then ? 
 As long as food held out I would much rather 
 try to hold this castle than try to take it.
 
 2io The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " Do you think this is too long a lecture 
 about old-fashioned war? Well, you see, I want 
 to make you feel what a wonderful castle this 
 is as much as I feel it. And yet its strength is 
 not what makes it seem so wonderful to me. It 
 is the stories about it. Those are the wonder- 
 ful places, after all, I think the ones that have 
 wonderful stories about them. It was so many 
 years ago that I heard of Tintagel first, and I 
 have read so much about it since then, that I 
 can scarcely believe that at last I am really 
 standing in Tintagel Castle. I have to stop 
 and tell myself that it was just here here 
 where we are this moment, that Arthur but I 
 have not told you that story yet, have I ? 
 
 " Do you remember how, long ago, when we 
 used to see stories in the fire, we sat on the 
 shore one .night and looked at a moon just like 
 this one, and at a sea very different from this 
 one ? Do you remember how we saw a ship 
 coming from the island away off in the dark- 
 ness toward us and toward a eastle on the 
 shore ? Do you remember, too, the knight who 
 was on the ship and the princess whom he was 
 bringing to be the wife of his King, and how 
 they drank the magic love-potion together and 
 always loved each other as long as they lived ? 
 Well, it was this very castle of Tintagel that 
 we saw that night. This was the very sea that 
 they sailed across. The island, which we could
 
 Who the King Really Was 211 
 
 see then, being three thousand miles away, but 
 which we cannot see, now that we are here, 
 was Ireland. The knight was Tristram and 
 the princess was Isolt The King was King 
 Mark, of Cornwall, Tristram's uncle, who lived 
 here at Tintagel. I told you then that King 
 Mark seemed to me as kind and generous 
 a man as you could wish, but I told you, too, 
 that some time you might find out that he was 
 a very wicked man mean, cruel, and treach- 
 erous. You see, I sometimes disagree with 
 myself a little, because I am telling different 
 stories. You can believe whichever story you 
 like. As for myself, I find no trouble in be- 
 lieving both of them. 
 
 " Now look along this shore, there to the 
 southwest, as far as you can see. The shore 
 reaches down there, a good deal farther than 
 you can see, to the Land's End. It was not the 
 Land's End in those days, for out beyond it a 
 rocky country stretched into the sea, as far as 
 where the Sciily Islands are now. That was 
 Lyonnesse, Tristram's country. Tristram's 
 father was the King of Lyonnesse and his 
 mother was the sister of King Mark. Now 
 Lyonnesse is all gone sunk under the ocean 
 and lost all but those rocks standing out there 
 alone, far off from any other land, the Sciily 
 Islands. Tristram was one of those knights 
 whom I have told you of who would rathtr be
 
 212 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 knights of Arthur than kings in their own 
 lands. Yet at the time I am telling you about 
 now, Tristram was not a knight of the Round 
 Table or of Arthur's court, but he was after- 
 ward, and while he lived he was the best 
 knight of the world after Lancelot." 
 
 There is a carpet of grass, with patterns of 
 blue and yellow flowers, all over the court-yard 
 and in all the halls and rooms of Tintagel 
 Castle. We sat down on the carpet, in a spot 
 where a piece of wall sheltered us a little from 
 the wind, and listened to the restless rumbling 
 and dashing of the waves down in the little bay 
 below us. Yes, ruins are best by moonlight. 
 In the clear, sharp light of day they are like 
 the skeletons of old, long-dead times. The} 7 
 are seen too plainly. It is so easy to know 
 what they are that it is hard to think what they 
 were. But in the dim half-light of the moon 
 they are not the bones any longer, but the spir- 
 its, the ghosts of other days. Then your 
 fancy can build up the walls and halls and 
 towers again and bring back their people to 
 them. To-morrow, here where we sit, there 
 will be people laughing and talking and mak- 
 ing sketches and taking photographs, and there 
 will be every-day sights and sounds. To-night 
 we have the place to ourselves, and there are 
 no voices but our own and no other sounds but 
 those of the sea, which were here always.
 
 Who the King Really Was 213' 
 
 And so, for me, these walls rose around us 
 again, higher and stronger and statelier. Again 
 there were towers above them that looked far 
 over the land and over the sea. The grass 
 was gone and the court-yard had a floor of 
 stone. The castle spread out wider, too, as 
 well as higher. Even old rocks of the coast, 
 that long ago fell, with the wear of the wind 
 and the waves, down into that boiling depth, 
 came back and stood fast to hold the castle 
 walls. The gorge was narrower and the bridge 
 that led over to the island was in its place 
 again. Then, all at once, the court-yard filled 
 with armed men. The little door where we 
 had come in was barred and barricaded against 
 an enemy. There was a sound of horses' hoofs 
 on the pavement, and men were watching from 
 the ramparts and the tower. There was a 
 woman, too the Duchess of Cornwall. She 
 climbed up to the tower and looked out 
 over the land to see if the Duke, her hus- 
 band, was coming. And even before she 
 looked for him he had been killed in battle 
 and he would never come back. Yet she saw 
 three figures coming toward the castle that 
 were so like the Duke and two of his men 
 that she ran down to meet them and the gate 
 was opened for them. But it was all enchant- 
 ment, their looking like the Duke and his 
 men, and so the gate, that they never could
 
 214 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 have opened for themselves, was opened for 
 them 
 
 " What makes them call it King Arthur's 
 castle," Helen asked, " if he never lived in it ?" 
 
 " Well, that is a story that I suppose I must 
 tell you. Once, when Arthur was at Caerleon- 
 upon-Usk, there came to visit him Queen 
 Ygerne. She had been the wife of Uther Pen- 
 dragon when he was King of England. And 
 she brought her daughter, Morgan - le - Fay. 
 ' Le Fay ' means ' the fairy/ and they called her 
 that because she knew so much about magic. 
 She did not know anywhere near so much 
 about it as Merlin did, of course, but she knew 
 a great deal. She was the wife of King Urien 
 and the mother of Uwain, who, you know, was 
 one of King Arthur's knights. She was very 
 beautiful, and, I am sorry to say, very wicked. 
 
 " But the story is not about her. Arthur re- 
 ceived Ygerne and Morgan-le-Fay, of course, 
 as he ought to receive a queen and a princess 
 who was the wife of a king and so a queen too. 
 But there was one knight in his court who did 
 not like to see such honors paid to Ygerne, 
 even though she had been Queen of England. 
 This was Ulfius, and he spoke to the King, be- 
 fore all the people in the hall, and said that it 
 was wrong to do honor to this woman, for she 
 was not worthy of it. ' Ulfius,' said the King, 
 ' do you know what you say ? Do you not re-
 
 Who the King Really Was 215 
 
 member that this woman was King Uther's 
 wife and that you were his knight ? Have you 
 no more loyalty than this? ' 
 
 " * I know, my lord,' said Ulfius, ' what I say, 
 and I tell you that this woman is not worthy 
 to come into your hall. When she was King 
 Uther's wife she had a child, a son, who would 
 have been King of England after Uther died. 
 But she deserted her child sent him away 
 from her as soon as he was born. She never 
 knew whether he lived or died never cared 
 and so all those years before you came to us, 
 my lord, England had no king. Was not this 
 wickedness enough ? I will prove what I say 
 against any one who cares to fight for her.' 
 
 " Then the King looked at Ygerne and she 
 answered : ' What he says is partly true, my 
 lord, but not all. I did lose my child and 
 never knew whether he lived or died, but I did 
 care. How does he dare to say that I did not 
 care? Does he think it was easy for me to let 
 my child go away from me and never come 
 back? I am a woman and I cannot fight with 
 him, but there must be some brave man here 
 in your court who will fight for me. I will 
 swear to him that I did nothing wicked in this 
 that Sir Ulfius charges.' 
 
 " You know that was another of their queer 
 ways. I have surely told you about it before. 
 Anybody could accuse anybody else of any-
 
 216 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 thing he liked, as long as he was willing to 
 'prove' it, as they called it, by fighting. Then 
 the one who was accused, or someone else for 
 him, must fight with the accuser, and the whole 
 question was settled, guilty or not guilty, by 
 the way the fight went. 
 
 " ' There shall be no fighting yet,' said the 
 King, ' but Ulfius shall tell us more of what he 
 has to say against you and you shall answer 
 him. Ulfius, you have always been a good 
 knight to Uther Pendragon and to me. You 
 would not say these things, I know, if you did 
 not believe that they were true. So tell us all 
 that you know, that I may judge between you 
 and this woman.' 
 
 " ' My lord,' said Ulfius, ' long ago this 
 Ygerne was the wife of Gorlois, the Duke of 
 Cornwall. Once she came to King Uther's 
 court with him, and the King loved her. He 
 loved her so much that he made war against 
 Gorlois, so that he might kill him and marry 
 his wife, this Ygerne. Then Gorlois, to keep 
 his wife and himself safe from King Uther, 
 shut her up in the castle of Tintagel and shut 
 himself up in another castle that he had, called 
 Terrabil. Uther laid siege to the castle of Ter- 
 rabil. Gorlois came out to fight with him and 
 was killed in the battle. Still his wife was in 
 the castle of Tintagel, and we could not hope 
 to take that. It was too strong and there were
 
 Who the King Really Was 217 
 
 too many good knights in it with her. Merlin 
 was King Other's friend then and I went to 
 find him to ask if he would help the King. I 
 found him and brought him and he went into 
 the King's tent. I do not know what he said 
 to the King. " 
 
 "' Then do not try to tell," said the voice of 
 some one close to King Arthur. It was Mer- 
 lin himself. He came before the King and 
 stood there and looked at Ulfius, in the way 
 he had when he meant to manage things him- 
 self just as he pleased. And yon know that 
 when Merlin meant to manage things he al- 
 ways did it. ' I will tell you what I said to 
 King Uther/ he went on. ' I said to him that 
 he should have Ygerne for his wife, if he 
 would grant me one thing. He promised that 
 he would grant me anything. * Then promise 
 me," I said, "that when you and your new 
 Queen have a child, yon will give him to me to 
 bring up as I choose," and he promised it. 
 Then I told him that I would make him look 
 likeGorlois; that I would make Ulfius look like 
 Brastias, who was one of the Duke's knights 
 then, and myself like Jordans, another of the 
 Duke's knights ; that so we would go to Tin- 
 tagel and they would let us in. Now, Ulfius, 
 tell us what was done next.' 
 
 " What was done next ?' said Ulfius ; ' why, 
 by some of your enchantment, Merlin, yon
 
 2i8 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 changed us as you have said. You made King 
 Uther look like Gorlois, and me like Brastias, 
 and yourself like Jordans. We came to Tin- 
 tagel and they opened the gate for us and 
 then 
 
 '"Let Queen Ygerne tell the King what 
 then,' said Merlin. ' It is time for her story 
 now.' 
 
 " ' My lord,' Ygerne said, ' it is hard for me 
 to tell you. I thought that he was my husband, 
 Gorlois, at first, and when I heard that Gorlois 
 was dead I scarcely knew or cared what hap- 
 pened. But King Uther's men and the Duke's 
 men my men said that it would be best for 
 me to be married to him. My own men said 
 that if I was not he would still make war on us, 
 and it was nothing to me then what happened. 
 And so we were married. And what must I 
 tell you now, my lord?' 
 
 " ' Tell now about the child,' said Merlin. 
 
 " ' The child ? Yes,' Ygerne answered. ' He 
 was taken away from me as soon as he was 
 born, as Ulfius has said. But it was King 
 Uther himself who took him away, and he gave 
 the child to a servant and told him to go to 
 the gate of the castle and give him to the poor 
 man who was waiting there. And the servant 
 came back and said that the poor man had 
 taken the child away. I do not know why 
 they took him.'
 
 Who the King Really Was 219 
 
 " ' They took him, 1 said Merlin, ' because I 
 told them to do it. King Uther had promised 
 the child to me. And now, Sir Ulfius, what if 
 this young prince had been left with his 
 mother? King Uther died soon after that. 
 You know what the lords and the kings were 
 in those days. What would have happened to 
 a baby King of England? Would they not 
 have killed him before his mother's eyes? 
 You know they would. But I saved him 
 from that.* 
 
 " Then Merlin turned to the King and said : 
 'My lord, I was that poor man who stood at 
 the gate. I took the child away with me. We 
 left the shadow of the castle walls and came 
 out into the clear moonlight. We came out 
 into the sea wind too. We could hear it hum- 
 ming and whistling around the castle. But it 
 was not a common wind. For I could hear 
 something more. I could hear sweet little 
 voices in it. They came nearer to us and 
 gathered around us. They were the voices of 
 fairies. I could hear what they said, and so 
 .could the baby in my arms. But the baby for- 
 got it all. Babies always forget what they hear 
 and see and think. If they did not, grown up 
 men would know some strange things. But I 
 remembered. One of the fairy voices said: 
 "Let us watch around this baby and guard 
 him and help him to grow up to be a good
 
 220 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 man." And another said: "He shall be the 
 truest of knights some day ; this gift I give 
 him." And another said: "This gift I give 
 him : he shall be the noblest of kings." And 
 another said : " He shall be generous .and 
 brave; these are my gifts to him." And at 
 last a fairy voice said : " He shall live till he 
 has made many better and happier ; and after 
 he is dead they shall bless him." And the 
 wind died away and the voices died away. 
 
 " ' And I carried the child, my lord, and 
 gave him to a faithful knight of Uther's, Sir 
 Ector, and told him to keep him and to care for 
 him as if he were his own son.' 
 
 " When the King heard the name of Sir 
 Ector it surprised him more than anything else 
 he had heard. 'Where is Sir Ector?' he 
 said. 
 
 " ' I am here, my lord,' Sir Ector answered, 
 coming and standing before him. 
 
 "'What did you do with this child?' the 
 King asked. 
 
 " ' I kept him, my lord,' the old knight an- 
 swered, ' as Merlin told me, and I cared for 
 him as if he had been my own son.' 
 
 " ' Sir Ector,' said the King, ' I have always 
 known you for the truest man in England, and 
 I have known you as if you were my own 
 father. Yet how can this be ? I have been 
 with you all these years and there were no
 
 Who the King Really Was 221 
 
 sons in your house but Kay, who is now my 
 seneschal, and I. What did you do with that 
 child ? Where is he now ? ' 
 
 " ' He sits there, my lord, 1 Sir Ector answered, 
 'on the throne before me.' 
 
 " Then at last Arthur saw it all, as you saw 
 it, no doubt, some time ago. He was the baby 
 who heard the fairy voices and forgot them. 
 He was the son of old King Uther Pendragon 
 and Queen Ygerne. He came down from his 
 seat and took his mother in his arms, and then 
 he led her to the throne and made her sit down 
 upon it by his side. And Ulfius came and 
 knelt before them and said : ' Forgive me, 
 my lord; I thought that what I said was 
 right* 
 
 " And Arthur answered : ' We know you 
 thought that you were right, but guard well 
 what you think and what you say. My 
 mother and I forgive you/ 
 
 " I have never read of anything that Ygerne 
 did or of anything that happened to her after 
 that. But you see that the castle of Tintagel 
 is called King Arthur's castle, not because he 
 lived here, but because he was bora here."
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 SOME LITTLE ADVENTURES OF LANCELOT 
 
 WE went to the castle the next morning 
 to see how it looked by daylight. " I sup- 
 pose I ought to tell you before we get any 
 farther," I said, as we took the road toward 
 the shore again, " that when King Arthur 
 found out that he was the son of King Uther 
 Pendragon, he found out one or two other 
 things. Queen Bellicent, the wife of King 
 Lot, of Orkney, was the daughter of Gorlois 
 and Ygerne, Arthur's mother. Perhaps you 
 remember and perhaps you have forgotten that 
 Queen Bellicent was the mother of Gawain, 
 Gaheris, Agravain, and Gareth, so that all 
 these were King Arthur's nephews. Theji 
 Queen Morgan-le-Fay, the wife of King Urien, 
 was the daughter of Ygerne, too, and so Uwain 
 was King Arthur's nephew. These are just 
 some little family affairs that it may be conven- 
 ient to know."
 
 Some Little Adventures of Lancelot 223 
 
 When we reached the castle we went in 
 again through the broken doorway and stood 
 looking out upon the sunny sea and away 
 along the rocky coast, with its steep headland 
 after headland, and down into that pit below 
 us, where the waves seem to be always rolling 
 and tumbling over the rough, broken rocks, 
 even when they look calm out at sea. " There 
 are wonderful things about this castle," I said, 
 " besides that King Arthur was born here and 
 that King Mark lived here and that Tristram 
 brought Isolt here. The castle was built by 
 giants, it was said, and when it stood here in 
 all its strength and glory it used to be in- 
 visible on two days of every year. One of 
 these days was Christmas and the other was 
 in the summer. It was Midsummer Day, I 
 suppose, though the story does not say so. 
 Perhaps you think the most of the castle is 
 invisible now. Perhaps you are right, but 
 every stone of it disappeared then, and the only 
 way the people who lived near it could tell 
 where it was on those days was by certain 
 other things that they knew were in a line with 
 it, just as a fisherman knows how to find a 
 spot on the water where he has found good 
 fishing." 
 
 We had not gone close to the other part of 
 the castle, over on the island, yet, and we 
 thought that it was time we did. So we
 
 224 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 scrambled down the steep side of the hill, half- 
 walking and running, and half -slipping and 
 sliding, till we got into the road at the bottom 
 of the ravine. Then we had to go to the 
 house where they kept the key of the castle 
 and borrow it. This keeping of keys to lend 
 is a beautiful plan. They lend one to anybody 
 who asks for it, and so you may not see at first 
 why they should not leave the door open and 
 let everybody go in without the key. It is be- 
 cause when you bring the key back there is a 
 very good chance for you to give a little tip 
 to the old woman who keeps it, and so, I sup- 
 pose, she gets a fair living, and goodness knows 
 how she would get it if she did not have the 
 key of the castle to lend to people. 
 
 We knocked at the door of the old woman's 
 house and asked her if she had the key, just as if 
 we had not read the sign outside that said she 
 had. She gave us the key and told us to put 
 it into the lock upside down, to lock the door 
 again after we had gone in, and not to bother 
 about the people who were already there, be- 
 cause they had another key. Then we went 
 down the narrow path along the rocks, across 
 the little neck of land to what they call the 
 island, and up the rocks on the other side till 
 we came to a wall, with ramparts and a little 
 door, where we had to use our key. It was a 
 beautiful, old, romantic-looking wall, and we
 
 Same LitlU Adventures of Lancelot 225 
 
 stopped to admire it before we went in. We 
 thought that it was by far the finest part of the 
 castle that we had seen jet. We found out af- 
 terward that it was built only about fifty years 
 ago. They built it just so that they could 
 have a door in it, so that they could put a lock 
 on the door, so that they could have a key to 
 the lock, so that somebody could keep the 
 key to lend, so that anybody who borrowed 
 it could give a little tip when he brought it 
 back. 
 
 Before I go any further I want to explain 
 one little thing. This Tintagel Head, where 
 we were now, is a great, dome-like mass of 
 rock, standing up out of the sea, with just the 
 narrow, rocky ridge that I spoke of before to 
 hold it to the mainland. Everybody at Tin- 
 tagel calls it " the island," and I call it so some- 
 times, because that is an easy name for it. But 
 it is not really an island, and I explain this to 
 you, because, when you go to Tintagel your- 
 self, I don't want you to say that I deceived 
 you about it. 
 
 We thought that the part of the castle that 
 we found here was even more interesting than 
 the part over on the mainland. In some places 
 the walls had been levelled to the ground, but 
 we could trace their foundations and see where 
 rooms had been. Tiny rooms they must have 
 been, too, some of them. Then we found what
 
 226 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 seemed to have been a court-yard. There was 
 a beautiful bit of old wall at one side of it, with 
 ramparts like a flight of stairs. On another 
 side the wall was the natural rock of the island. 
 Far down below us, close to the edge of the 
 water, there was another wall, with a door in 
 it. We felt sure that this must have been 
 where Tristram and Isolt landed, when they 
 came from Ireland. We did not dare to go 
 down to it. The hill was so steep that we were 
 afraid that if we once started down it we could 
 not stop, and then we might miss our aim and 
 go into the water, instead of against the wall. 
 
 So we climbed up, instead of down, and 
 strolled about the island. A little way from 
 the castle we found a place like a long, narrow 
 room, with a wall around it. The wall was no 
 higher than the ground outside, but inside the 
 ground was a little lower. There was a door 
 at one end, and at the other end there was a 
 flat stone, raised up like a table. This room 
 was the chapel of the castle, and the flat stone 
 was the altar. We stood before it and tried to 
 think how it looked here on that day when 
 King Uther Pendragon and Ygerne stood be- 
 fore this altar and were married. Here stood 
 Uther, a true king of those rough old days, not 
 a bit the less happy because he had killed this 
 woman's husband only a few days before. 
 Here stood Ygerne, thinking more about the
 
 Some Little Adventures of Lancelot 227 
 
 Duke who had been her husband than about 
 the King who was to be, letting herself be mar- 
 ried to him, just because her friends thought 
 that they should all be safer so, yet not seeing 
 anything so very strange in it all, because she 
 belonged to those same rough old days too. 
 And there were the King's men, glad of it all be- 
 cause it made the King happy, and the Duke's 
 men, ready, now that he was dead, to be just as 
 true to the King as they had ever been to the 
 Duke. 
 
 We found the graveyard of the castle, too, 
 and the place that they call King Arthur's Seat. 
 It is like a double throne, strangely hollowed 
 out of the rock, looking toward the land. It was 
 not a comfortable place to sit, and we found 
 a much better one on the other side of the 
 island. There we sat in the grass and looked 
 out over the bright sea, down toward the 
 Land's End and Lyonnesse again, and across to 
 the west, over the way that Tristram and 
 Isolt had sailed here together. And we sat so 
 still that the sheep came and fed near us, and 
 the sea-gulls circled about, with their queer, 
 sharp little cries, and shot past us so close, some- 
 times, that it seemed as if we could almost 
 reach out and touch them. 
 
 " Once upon a time," I said, " Lancelot rode 
 through the street of the village where we 
 walked a little while ago. As he passed, the
 
 228 The 'Court of King Arthur 
 
 people called to him and told him to turn back 
 and go no nearer to the castle. If he went 
 there, they said, he would surely be killed by 
 the two giants who lived there. 
 
 " I don't know how the castle happened to ! 
 belong to these giants. Long ago it belonged 
 to Gorlois, the Duke of Cornwall, and after 
 that to Uther Pendragon. Then King Mark 
 had it, and I can't quite make out when these 
 giants got it or how. But you see that there 
 are so many of these different stories that when 
 two of them are brought together they some- 
 times disagree as badly as the knights usually 
 did when they were brought together. 
 
 " Of course you know, without being told, 
 that Lancelot was not very likely to turn back 
 just because somebody told him that he would 
 get killed if he went on. The men who got on 
 well in those days were the ones who dashed 
 straight at things and went through them, with- 
 out thinking anything about getting killed or 
 not getting killed. 
 
 " So Lancelot rode on to the castle, and in at 
 the little arched gateway, over there on the 
 mainland. Then, as soon as he had passed it, 
 the gate fell behind him, and he could not have 
 gone back if he would. But he did not care 
 about going back. When Lancelot had any 
 fighting to do, what he wanted was a good 
 place to fight, not a good place to run away.
 
 Some Little Adventures of Lancelot 229 
 
 He thought that the court of the castle looked 
 like a good place, and he had no more than 
 made up his mind to that when he saw the 
 giants coming. 
 
 w Have you ever noticed, when people kill 
 giants in stories, what quick work they gener- 
 ally make of it? I suppose it has to be that 
 way. If the giant got a chance to strike one 
 or two fair blows at his enemy, no doubt that 
 would be the end of the fight and the giant 
 would not get killed at alL And giants seem 
 to depend on that, for yon must have noticed, 
 too, that they seldom fight like other men, and 
 they seldom use any weapon but a club. Gi- 
 ants are a stupid lot, and if they cannot crush 
 their enemies all at once they are done for. 
 Perhaps I might worry some sort of moral out 
 of that, but I won't bother you with it. 
 
 "So one of these two giants came upon Lan- 
 celot and aimed a blow at him with his club. 
 Lancelot caught it on his shield and then 
 struck the giant on the head with his sword 
 and killed him. When the other giant saw 
 that he ran away. Of course he could not run 
 far, and he must have wished that they had 
 not been in such a hurry about dropping the 
 gate so that Lancelot could not get out. As 
 it was, they were both shut in, and there was 
 nothing for Lancelot to do but to run after the 
 giant and kill him. And that he did.
 
 230 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 " Then he went into the hall of the castle, 
 and there he found sixty gentlewomen. They 
 told him that the giants had kept them prison- 
 ers there and had made them work for them. 
 Some of them had been there for seven years, 
 and often knights had come and had tried to 
 kill the giants and to set them free, but the 
 giants had killed them all. Lancelot told them 
 that they were all free now, and that they 
 could take all the treasure that the giants had 
 piled up and divide it among themselves. Of 
 course there is really no need of my telling 
 you that, because that was what people who 
 killed giants that had castles always did. 
 
 " Then Lancelot left Tintagel and rode for 
 many days through the woods and over hills 
 and valleys and across rivers. And one night 
 he came to a house where an old woman lived, 
 and he asked her to let him stay till morning. 
 She was glad to have him stay, and when it 
 was time to go to bed she took him to a room 
 above the gate. There Lancelot laid his armor 
 beside his bed and went to sleep. But he had 
 not slept long when he was awakened by a 
 great knocking at the gate. 
 
 " Lancelot jumped out of bed and went to 
 the window, and there, just below him, he saw 
 a knight knocking with the hilt of his sword, 
 and not far off came three other knights, riding 
 toward him. Then the three knights attacked
 
 Some Little Adventures of Lancelot 231 
 
 the one who was at the gate with their swords, 
 all at once, while he set his back Jgaia&i the 
 wall and fought with them the best he could. 
 
 "Now this was not at all Lancelot's notion 
 of a fair fight, so he quickly put on his armor, 
 took a sheet from the bed, fastened it at the 
 window, and let himself down by it out- 
 side, Then he called to the three knights to 
 leave the one knight and come and fight with 
 him. So instantly they all turned upon Lan- 
 celot, for they seemed to have no notion of 
 fighting with less than three men to one. But 
 fighting with Lancelot was a very different 
 matter from fighting with the other knight. 
 He was more than a match for all of them, and 
 when the other knight tried to help him Lan- 
 celot told him to keep away and let him fight 
 alone. And the other knight, seeing that Lan- 
 celot was doing very well without him, kept 
 away. 
 
 " Of course they were not very good fighters, 
 or they would fight a single enemy one at a 
 time, like good knights, and so it was not long 
 before Lancelot had them all down on the 
 ground and at his mercy. They all begged 
 him not to kill them and said that they would 
 give themselves up to him and do whatever he 
 told them. Lancelot had time now to look at 
 the knight whom he had helped, and he saw bj 
 his armor and his shield that he was Sir Kay.
 
 232 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 ' You shall not give yourselves up to me,' said 
 Lancelot, ' but to Sir Kay. Yield to him or I 
 will not spare your lives.' 
 
 " ' We cannot yield to him,' they said, ' for 
 we should have beaten him but for you. We 
 will give ourselves to you, but not to him.' 
 
 "'Yield to Sir Kay,' said Lancelot again, 
 ' or I shall not let you live.' 
 
 " So the three knights saw that there was 
 nothing to do but just what Lancelot said, and 
 they answered that rather than die they would 
 yield to Sir Kay. Then Lancelot commanded 
 them to go to the court of King Arthur and 
 say to Queen Guinevere that Sir Kay had sent 
 them to be her prisoners. 
 
 " The knights rode way and Lancelot and 
 Kay knocked again at the door till the old 
 woman came and opened it for them. She was 
 surprised enough to see Lancelot there, because 
 she had left him only a little while before in 
 his room and the door had not been opened 
 since. She led Lancelot back to the room over 
 the gate, and Kay with him, and there they 
 both went to sleep. In the morning Lancelot 
 was awake before Kay. He got up, dressed 
 himself in Kay's armor, took Kay's shield, 
 found his horse, and rode away, without say- 
 ing a word to anybody. 
 
 " Then Kay awoke and found that Lancelot 
 was gone, and that his own armor and shield
 
 Some Little Adventures of Lancelot 233 
 
 were gone, too, but there were Lancelot's lying 
 beside the bed. ' I see why he has done this,' 
 said Kay to himself. ' He is fonder of fighting 
 than I am, and when other knights see him in 
 my armor they will think that it is I and they 
 will all want to fight with him, and he will beat 
 them. And it will be all the better for me too, 
 for when they see me wearing his armor they 
 will think that I am Lancelot, and they will let 
 me alone, so that I can go safely wherever I 
 please.' 
 
 " It was just as Kay thought. Every knight 
 whom Lancelot met thought that he was Kay 
 and wanted to fight with him. And Lancelot 
 beat every one of them and ordered them to go 
 to the court of King Arthur and tell Queen 
 Guinevere that Sir Kay had sent them to be 
 her prisoners. And when one knight after an- 
 other kept coming to the court and saying that 
 Sir Kay had beaten him and sent him there, the 
 King and the Queen and everybody else began 
 to think that Kay must be a better fighter than 
 they had ever believed that he was. And all 
 the time the real Kay was riding about and 
 never having to fight at all, and everybody 
 was getting out of his way, because everybody 
 thought that he was Lancelot. 
 
 " And when Lancelot had ridden for many 
 days and was far away from the court, one day 
 in the woods he met a dog, which leaped about
 
 234 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 him and then ran away, and came back and 
 ran around him again and then away, as if it 
 wanted Lancelot to follow it. So Lancelot fol- 
 lowed, and the dog led the way through the 
 dark wood and across a boggy plain till they 
 came to a house. The house was old. The 
 stones of it were covered with moss and some 
 of them had fallen away, and the broken pieces 
 of them, covered with moss, too, lay around 
 the walls. There was a moat and there was a 
 bridge across it. The bridge was old, too, and 
 as Lancelot crossed it he heard it crack under 
 his horse's feet. 
 
 " He left his horse and went into the hall, 
 and there, in the middle of it, he saw a knight 
 lying dead. Then a woman came and said to 
 him : ' Oh, knight, you have done me great 
 wrong, for you have killed my husband ! ' 
 
 " ' Is this your husband who lies here ? ' said 
 Lancelot. ' I did not kill him, and I am sorry 
 that you have lost him.' 
 
 " ' Not you then, perhaps,' the woman an- 
 swered, ' but it was a knight of your Round 
 Table.' 
 
 " ' If it was any knight of the Round Table 
 who killed your husband,' Lancelot said, ' I am 
 sure that it was in a fair fight. I am sorry for 
 you, but any knight may chance to be killed so. 
 What was your husband's name?' 
 
 " ' He was Sir Gilbert,' she said, ' and one of 

 
 Some Little Adventures of Lancelot 235 
 
 the best knights in the world, and I do not 
 know the name of the knight who killed him.' 
 
 " Then Lancelot rode away, across the old, 
 shaking bridge again, across the wide bog and 
 into the forest. And there he met a girl who 
 said to him : ' Come, Sir Knight, and help my 
 brother, who is in a castle near here, wounded.' 
 
 " * Who is your brother,' Lancelot asked, 
 ' and how shall I help him ? ' 
 
 " ' He is a knight of the Round Table,' she 
 said. ' He fought with Sir Gilbert to-day a 
 fair battle and killed him ; but my brother was 
 wounded too, so that he will die if he does not 
 have help. There is a woman near here who 
 knows magic, and she says that his wounds 
 cannot be cured unless they are touched with 
 Sir Gilbert's sword and with a piece of the 
 bloody cloth that Sir Gilbert is wrapped in. 
 They are in the Chapel Perilous, where Sir 
 Gilbert's body lies, and my brother will die 
 soon unless some knight can go there and bring 
 them to him.' 
 
 " ' I will bring them,' said Lancelot ; ' where 
 is the Chapel Perilous ? ' 
 
 " She pointed the way and said : ' Bring them 
 quickly, Sir Knight, and meet me here, or my 
 brother will die.' 
 
 " So Lancelot rode away and came soon to 
 the Chapel Perilous. It stood in a yard with a 
 wall around it. Lancelot left his horse at the
 
 236 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 gate and went into the yard, and there, before 
 the door of the chapel, were thirty knights. 
 They were all giants, half as tall again as com- 
 mon men. The visors of their helmets were 
 open and Lancelot could see their faces. They 
 were hard, pale faces, with deep-sunken black 
 eyes and cruel mouths. Their armor was all 
 black, and they all had great black shields, and 
 drawn swords in their hands. 
 
 " Lancelot put his own shield before him and 
 drew his sword, and went straight toward the 
 door of the chapel. The giant knights rushed 
 toward him and struck at him with their swords, 
 but when he was close to them they all fell back 
 to right and left and let him pass, and not one 
 of their swords touched him. They were en- 
 chanted knights and they could harm only a 
 man who was afraid of them. You may find, 
 sometime, when troubles or dangers seem to be 
 all around you, that the best thing to do is to 
 throw your shield before you and take your 
 sword in your hand, and walk through them 
 and fear nothing. 
 
 " So Lancelot came into the chapel. There 
 was no light except from one little lamp, and 
 when his eyes had grown used to the darkness 
 he saw Sir Gilbert lying just as he had left him 
 lying in the old house. He could not guess 
 how he had come here, but everything here 
 seemed to be enchantment, and Lancelot felt
 
 Some Little Adventures of Lancelot 237 
 
 that he scarcely knew whether there had ever 
 been an}' Sir Gilbert really, or whether he was 
 some ghost or strange fairy, or perhaps nothing 
 at all but a part of the magic of the place. But 
 he went to the dead knight and cut off a piece 
 of the cloth that he was wrapped in, and as he 
 did it the earth shook under him. Then he 
 took the sword that lay beside the dead knight 
 and went out of the chapel. 
 
 " And as he came out all the giant knights 
 called to him : ' Sir Lancelot, Sir Lancelot, put 
 down that sword or you shall die ! ' 
 
 " And Lancelot answered : ' Take the sword 
 from me if you can ; I shall not give it to you 
 for asking.' And he walked safely among them, 
 as he had done before, and mounted his horse 
 and rode back to find the girl. 
 
 " And the girl cried with joy when she saw 
 him, and she led him quickly to the castle 
 where her brother was. The wounded knight 
 was so weak that he could scarcely speak, and 
 he was pale from the blood that he had lost, 
 but as soon as Lancelot saw him he knew him 
 a good knight whom he had seen often in King 
 Arthur's court. The knight knew him, too. 
 ' Sir Lancelot,' he said, ' can you help me ? I 
 feel that I cannot live much longer.' 
 
 " Then Lancelot touched the knight's wounds 
 with Sir Gilbert's sword and with the cloth, 
 and in an instant they were all healed. The
 
 238 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 color of his face and his strength came back, 
 too, and he rose from where he had been lying 
 and thanked Lancelot for saving his life. ' To- 
 night,' said Lancelot, ' I will stay here with 
 you ; to-morrow I must go farther on my way ; 
 but you go with your sister to the court and 
 tell the King and the Queen that I shall see 
 them and you there soon.' "
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 THE CHIME OF THE SEA 
 
 THE next day was Sunday. After break- 
 fast we found that we had time to take a little 
 stroll before going to church. We always felt 
 tempted to go toward the castle, and so we 
 did this time. But we did not go into it. 
 When we came near the shore we found that 
 the tide was out and we thought that it would 
 be worth while to explore the shore itself a 
 little. 
 
 We went down among the broken rocks in 
 the little bay on one side of the neck between 
 the mainland and the island, and we found noth- 
 ing there to interest us very much. Still, rocks 
 and waves are never dull, and it was something 
 to look up at the towering height above us and 
 see how the masses of slate must have fallen 
 away from it sometime long ago, carrying a 
 part of the castle with them. The giants, if 
 they were giants, who built the castle of Tinta-
 
 240 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 gel, built it so that it was safe from men. They 
 made it of the same stone that it stood upon, 
 and they made it so big and strong, and they 
 chose its place so well, that no army of their 
 days could ever take it. Yet all around it were 
 the water and the wind, and they could do 
 what the men could not. The men had not 
 time to take Tintagel, for they must rest and 
 sleep and die. But the water and the wind 
 never died, and they seldom slept or rested. 
 Time was nothing to them. The castle grew 
 old, and still they were as young as they were 
 at first. It was nothing to them that the castle 
 was built of the same rock that it stood upon. 
 The water beat and dashed against the rock it- 
 self, and the wind caught the water and hurled 
 it as high as the castle towers. Year after year 
 they wore them away by little and little, and 
 then all at once a great mass of the rock and 
 the castle would fall With a crash that must 
 have echoed for miles along the shore. And 
 so at last they have left them as we see them 
 now. No, not left them, for the wind and the 
 water are working at them still, and the time 
 will come when there will not be so much as a 
 heap of dust to show where this grand old cas- 
 tle stood. Do they call the rocks and the hills 
 eternal ? There is nothing eternal on earth but 
 the sea and the wind. 
 
 We clambered back over the rocky isthmus,
 
 The Chime of the Sea 241 
 
 and went down upon the little beach on the 
 other side, and into the big cave that is there. 
 This cave is a tunnel that goes clear through 
 Tintagel head, right under the castle. It is 
 one of the wonderful things that the wind 
 and the waves have done all along this coast. 
 The great winter storms come driving across 
 the Atlantic and strike with all their force 
 against Cornwall. If Cornwall had not this 
 wall of rock it would all go down under the 
 water as Lyonnesse did. As it is, the constant 
 beating and dashing of the waves and the 
 showering of the spray carve the rocks into 
 all sorts of strange and fine and fantastic shapes, 
 pillars and points and domes and cracks and 
 hollows and caves. We went into this one till 
 we came to a lake that spread clear across it, 
 and then, as we were not prepared to wade, we 
 turned back and found that it was time to go to 
 church. 
 
 The Tintagel church is worth seeing, too. 
 It is high up on a bluff, where it looks far out 
 over the sea and over the land. It is built as 
 strong as a castle and it has lasted better, for it 
 is a thousand years old. They have kept it in 
 repair, no doubt, but there is another reason 
 why it has stood firm while the castle has been 
 wasted and worn away. That reason is that 
 they did not try so hard to make U safe. They 
 thought that enemies would come against their
 
 242 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 castle, and so, to defend it more easily, they 
 perched it on the very edges of that deep, 
 steep chasm. But they feared no enemies for 
 their church, so they put it where the waves 
 and the wind did not harm it, all the time that 
 they were slowly grinding the castle to dust. 
 Yet they built it to last, for, though it is not 
 large, it has walls like a fortress and windows 
 that are only slits in the walls outside and 
 widen to the size of common windows inside. 
 They look as if they were made to shoot arrows 
 through, but they are built so only to give light 
 without any loss of strength. 
 
 " Firm was their faith, the ancient bands, 
 The wise of heart in wood and stone, 
 Who reared with stern and trusty hands 
 These dark gray towers of days unknown." 
 
 A priest who lived a sweet, simple, noble life 
 a few miles away on this coast, wrote these 
 lines about his own church, but they are just as 
 true of the church of Tintagel. 
 
 After church and after dinner we set out for 
 a real walk. We were going to Boscastle, five 
 miles up the shore. Everybody said that if we 
 were going to Boscastle we must walk there, 
 or we should lose all the beauty of the scenery 
 along the coast. It was not easy walking, for 
 the shore of Cornwall is shaped like the edge 
 of a saw, turned up. We were seldom on level
 
 *- 
 
 THE ROOtS OF TKVTAGEL
 
 The Chime of the Sea 243 
 
 ground, but always going down a hill and then 
 up another hill, so that we could go down again 
 on the other side, and so on for mile after mile. 
 And once we came to a wonderful, wide, deep 
 gorge, with a little brook running along the 
 bottom of it and all its sides covered with tall 
 ferns. There were high rocks, too, and we had 
 to get into the shelter of one of them while a 
 little shower passed over us. The place, as we 
 found out afterward, is called the Valley of 
 Rocks. 
 
 But I am not going to try to tell you much 
 about that walk. It takes a better writer than 
 I am to tell about scenery so as to do any good 
 to anybody who has not seen it. There were 
 the spires and the towers and the arches of the 
 rocks, and there were the soft, fresh green and 
 brown of the fields, after the little rain, and 
 again the bright blue and yellow and scarlet of 
 the flowers, and the shining blue and gray of 
 the sea. There were the pure, sweet air, and 
 the strong, free breeze, and it was all very 
 grand and very lovely. 
 
 Hundreds of sea-gulls flew around us, and 
 whirled, screaming, past us, and thousands of 
 sea-gulls whitened the rocks where they lived. 
 And now and then some ravens would flutter 
 above our heads for a moment and then sail 
 away again. " Look well at the ravens," I said, 
 " for you may be looking at King Arthur."
 
 244 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Instead of looking at the ravens Helen 
 looked at me. " You know the guard on the 
 coach told us," I said, " that King Arthur was 
 killed in battle at Slaughter Bridge, and you 
 know I told you that I did not know whether 
 he was killed or not. One of the old stories, 
 as you know, says that he and his knights are 
 sleeping down under the ground at Caerleon, 
 and that they will come back sometime to save 
 England when she needs them most. Then 
 there is the one that says that he is waiting for 
 his time in the happy valley of Avalon. But 
 another story says that instead of dying at last 
 King Arthur was changed into a raven, and 
 that he still lives and flies around this Cornish 
 coast. And just because of this it used to be 
 said that no Cornishman and no Englishman 
 would ever kill a raven, for fear that he might 
 kill King Arthur. 
 
 " Some people would call that a superstition, 
 no doubt, but if it is, then it is a very good 
 and pretty and harmless one. And could you 
 believe it, if I told you that these same people 
 once believed one of the wickedest and cruel- 
 est of superstitions one that often made them 
 act like cowards and almost thieves? It was 
 not so very long ago, either. 
 
 " Look out on that ocean. See how high 
 the waves are. Hear them dashing and 
 breaking down there at the foot of the cliffs.
 
 The Chime of the Sea 245 
 
 See how they throw their spray over the 
 broken rocks. And see how jagged and sharp 
 and rough the rocks themselves are. Feel 
 how strong this breeze is, that blows in from 
 the sea. And yet this is a warm, calm, bright 
 summer day. Now try to think of a cold, 
 rough day in winter, with a great storm blow- 
 ing in from the sea. Think of the waves a 
 dozen times as high. Think of them thunder- 
 ing on the cliffs and hurling their foam high 
 above them and over them. Think of them 
 pounding and crashing on these jagged, broken 
 rocks with a power that we cannot compare 
 with any other in the world. Think of the 
 wind rushing over this place where we are so 
 that we could not stand against it for a mo- 
 ment. Can you imagine what it would all be 
 like ? I am afraid neither of us can. 
 
 " But I do know that for the ships that pass 
 this is one of the most terrible coasts in the 
 world. Every winter there are wrecks, and 
 sometimes there are many of them. A ship 
 strikes among these rocks, she never can get 
 off again, and in a little while only a few 
 hours, perhaps she is ground to pieces. Un- 
 less the men on board get help from the shore 
 they may all be drowned and some of them 
 are almost sure to be. And yet, only a few 
 generations ago, the people of this shore used 
 to stand on these rocks and watch ships while
 
 246 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 they went to pieces, and men while they 
 drowned, and never lift a hand to help them. 
 And why, do you suppose ? Because of a be- 
 lief among them that a stranger saved from 
 the sea would sometime do an injury to those 
 who had saved him. It is all changed now, 
 and the men of Cornwall try to save ship- 
 wrecked sailors, and do save them, as if they 
 were their own brothers, and there are no 
 braver or hardier men in the world than they. 
 But there are men living near here to-day, I 
 have no doubt, who can remember when a ship 
 was wrecked only a few miles up this coast and 
 a rocket was fired over her, and a line secured, 
 and every one on board might have been saved, 
 when someone on the shore cut the line and 
 only one man from the ship was saved. 
 
 " Some say that this cruel belief was kept 
 alive because so many of the people made a 
 great part of their living by picking up things 
 that were washed ashore from the cargoes of 
 wrecked ships, and they did not want the men 
 to be kept alive to claim the goods. This may 
 be partly true ; but, horrible and wicked as the 
 superstition was, I think that they really be- 
 lieved it. And I think this and I think the 
 more kindly of them, because of that other 
 superstition that they must not kill a raven 
 lest they should kill King Arthur. They could 
 not have been wholly cruel at heart."
 
 The Chime of the Sea 247 
 
 There is not much that I need to tell you 
 about Boscastle. It is a queer-looking little 
 place, and pretty, too a few houses in a clus- 
 ter, struck down into a crack between two 
 cliffs, with a crooked little harbor. The best 
 thing about it is the walk to it from Tintagel. 
 But when we had walked through the village 
 and left it behind us, and came to the church 
 up on the higher ground of the road back to 
 Tintagel, I did think of something that I wanted 
 to say. 
 
 " I don't know," I began, " whether this 
 church is quite as old as the one at Tintagel, 
 where we were this morning, or not. I fancy 
 it is not, but it is pretty old. And there is an 
 old story about the two churches. You don't 
 happen to know, I suppose, that the church at 
 Tintagel has five bells in its tower. A peal of 
 bells, they are called, and they are said to be 
 very fine and sweet in tone. I can't say posi- 
 tively, because I have not heard them ring 
 yet. But the bells were there a long time ago, 
 and the Tintagel people were very proud ol 
 them, and they learned to love them, as people 
 do learn to love bells more than almost any- 
 thing else that is not alive. They called them 
 to church every Sunday; when they were 
 married, they rang for them and seemed to be 
 as glad and happy as anybody. When any of 
 them had been away at sea they heard the bells
 
 248 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 ring sometimes, as they came toward the 
 shore, and the music made them feel, more 
 than anything else, that they were near home 
 again. When they died, the bells -tolled for 
 them. And when they heard the bells tolling 
 for others, the thought might come to them 
 that even if all their other friends should go 
 before, yet, when their own time came, the 
 bells would still be as strong and sound as 
 ever and would be sorry that they were 
 gone. 
 
 " But in the tower of the church here at Bos- 
 castle there were no bells. Sometimes, when 
 the wind was the right way and the sea was 
 not too loud, they could hear the bells of Tin- 
 tagel, and then their own tower seemed all the 
 more silent and dull. So at last the people of 
 Boscastle resolved that they would have some 
 bells as good as those of Tintagel. They got 
 some money together and sent it to London to 
 have the bells made. The bells were made and 
 put on board a ship to be brought to Boscastle. 
 The ship sailed down the Thames and down 
 the Channel and around the Land's End and so 
 up the coast. 
 
 " The Tintagel bells were ringing as the ship 
 passed, and the men on board could hear them. 
 The pilot was a Tintagel man and the bells told 
 him that he was near home. They made him 
 think of his wife and his children, waiting for
 
 The Chime of the Sea 249 
 
 him up there in the little village on the hill, 
 and he said : * Thank God, we are near the har- 
 bor and shall soon be safe in and with our 
 friends again.' 
 
 " The captain of the ship heard him and he 
 said : * It will be time enough to thank God 
 when we get on shore ; while we are at sea 
 thank the good ship and the captain that rules 
 her, and your own skill that steers her.' 
 
 " ' No, no,' the pilot answered ; ' we must 
 thank God always ; whatever we do ourselves 
 is by His help.' 
 
 " ' When you are on my ship,' said the cap- 
 tain, ' thank me ; that is enough.' 
 
 " And just as the captain had said it, out of 
 the clear sky a great wind struck the ship and 
 she heeled over, and the water rushed over her 
 deck and she filled. There was a cry of the 
 men for help and one fierce jangle of the bells, 
 and the ship went down. The captain was 
 drowned, but the pilot was saved, and whether 
 the other men were drowned or saved I do not 
 know. 
 
 " And so the bells were never brought to Bos- 
 castle, and for many years the tower here was 
 silent Some one tells me that it has one little 
 bell now, but it has no peal like the one at Tin- 
 tagel. But they say that sometimes, when the 
 waves are high and the storm-wind is blowing 
 as it blew when that ship went down, the gale
 
 250 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 that comes in from the ocean brings a sound of 
 bells. And then the people of Boscastle listen 
 and say: 'Our bells are ringing down under 
 the water as they ought to have rung all these 
 years in our silent tower.' "
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 HOW THE SCABBARD WAS LOST 
 
 WHEN we had seen Boscastle we thought that 
 we had had enough of climbing np hills and 
 scrambling down on the other side, so we found 
 a carriage to take us back to TintageL The 
 road was back some waj from the shore, and 
 so it was reasonably smooth and even and level 
 for the most of the waj. As we passed near 
 the Valley of Rocks we saw a sign-board beside 
 the road. It said that if we wanted to see St. 
 Neighton's Kieve we must come in here and 
 go op to the other end of the meadow to a 
 house where the key was kept. Some one had 
 told as that we really ought to see St. Neigh, 
 ton's Kieve, so the next day we decided to go 
 and borrow the key and see ft. 
 
 An old man with a long white beard and 
 shaggy white eyebrows lived in the house 
 where the key was kept He asked us to sit 
 down and rest a little while before we went to
 
 252 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 see St. Neighton's Kieve, and he showed us 
 some queer old carved furniture that he had. 
 This old man's eyebrows reminded me of 
 Yspaddaden Penkawr's, that fell down over his 
 eyes so that he could not see, for this man did 
 not look as if he saw us at all. He sat before 
 us and close to us, but his eyes seemed to be 
 looking down at the floor all the time, and he 
 talked in a voice that sounded as if it came 
 from the next room. We tried to get him to 
 tell us some of the stories of the place, but he 
 seemed to know nothing about them. He did 
 not want to talk about Tintagel, or Boscastle, 
 or St. Neighton's Kieve. He wanted to talk 
 about America. He had a paper with pictures 
 of some buildings in America and he asked us 
 if they were really as beautiful as they looked 
 in the pictures. We told him that they were 
 much more so that he could not think how 
 beautiful they were unless he saw them. That 
 was really true, but he found it hard to believe. 
 He thought that America must be a wonderful 
 country, and we thought so too. 
 
 Then he gave us the key and a printed card 
 to tell us how to go, and we set out to discover 
 St. Neighton's Kieve. The path led us into the 
 Valley of Rocks and up the course of the little 
 brook that ran at the bottom of it. It was only 
 a little way, but one of the prettiest walks we 
 had ever seen. We felt grateful to the stranger
 
 How tJie Scabbard Was Lost 253 
 
 who had been kind enough to tell us we must 
 come here. We crossed the brook twice, 
 went up a little hill and came to a fence with a 
 locked door. This was where we needed the 
 key. We went through the gate and down the 
 hill to the brook again, and looked up at a 
 waterfall that came down in two leaps from 
 high above our heads and fell into a round 
 basin at our feet. I don't know much about 
 St. Neighton, but kieve is an old Cornish word 
 that means tub, so this was St Neighton's Tub. 
 When we had stood and looked at it for a 
 long time we turned away and went up the 
 hill again, locked the gate after us, and took 
 our way back through the Valley of Rocks. 
 And now we looked more at the valley than 
 we had done before. It was a strangely beau- 
 tiful place. Sometimes as we looked down the 
 valley we could see nothing but ferns on either 
 side, or perhaps just here and there a tree 
 steep, high banks on banks of ferns, and noth- 
 ing else in sight. The ferns that grew near us 
 were often as high as our heads, and sometimes 
 we could even stand under them, while they 
 bent the tips of their leaves above us b'ke trees. 
 Then, as we walked farther along, we could see 
 where there were great rocks, high up on the 
 side of the valley, yet even these were covered 
 with green vines, so that not a bit of the rock 
 itself could be seen. It was as if there had
 
 254 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 been some law in the making of the valley that 
 there must be nothing in it to look hard or 
 rough. 
 
 " I have never seen a place," I said, " except 
 the valley of our own Hudson, that looked so 
 much like a home for fairies. I should almost 
 think that King Arthur's sister, Queen Morgan- 
 le-Fay, might have lived here. I wonder if it 
 was not here that she came to learn that magic 
 which she knew so well. It would seem 
 strange that any one should learn such wicked 
 magic as hers in such a beautiful place as this. 
 But I think she must have been wicked in the 
 first place, so that any magic or anything else 
 that she could learn was bound to turn out 
 evil. I don't know why she did such dreadful 
 things, or why she hated her brother, King Ar- 
 thur, so. I suppose it was just because he was 
 good and she was bad." 
 
 " What dreadful things did she do ? " Helen 
 asked. 
 
 " Well, perhaps the very worst thing that 
 she ever did was to try to kill King Arthur 
 and steal his sword Excalibur. You remem- 
 ber Merlin told Arthur that he must guard the 
 scabbard of Excalibur more than anything else 
 that he had, because while he had it about him 
 he could lose no blood, no matter how much 
 he might be wounded. Now I can't think 
 what should put it into Arthur's head that the
 
 How the Scabbard Was Lost 255 
 
 best way to keep the scabbard safe was to give 
 it to his sister, Morgan-le-Fay, to keep for him. 
 Of course he did not know how wicked she 
 was or how much she hated him. Still I don't 
 know why he should not keep the scabbard 
 himself. Or, if he wanted somebody else to 
 look after it for him, why did he not give it to 
 Queen Guinevere ? But he didn't ; he gave it 
 to Morgan-le-Fay, and she set about studying 
 how she could get the sword as well, and how 
 she could kill King Arthur. 
 
 "There was one of King Arthur's knights 
 named Sir Accolon. He was a good knight 
 and he always meant to do what was right, I 
 suppose. But he was one of those silly fellows 
 with whom a beautiful woman can always do 
 just about what she likes. He saw Queen 
 Morgan-le-Fay, he saw how beautiful she was, 
 and so he took it for granted that everything 
 that she did or said or thought must be right. 
 So she just took hold of him and did what she 
 liked with him. And what she liked was to 
 use him for her own plans, without even letting 
 him know what she was doing or what he was 
 doing himself. If she had let him know what 
 he was doing I don't suppose he would have 
 done it. 
 
 .-Well, it happened one day that King Ar- 
 thur and some of his knights were hunting. 
 And King Arthur and this Sir Accolon and
 
 256 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 King Urien, the husband of Morgan-le-Fay, 
 followed a hart till they were far away from 
 the other knights. They rode so far and so 
 long that their horses grew tired and could not 
 carry them. Then they got off their horses 
 and went a little way on foot, till they saw the 
 hart, not far before them, lying on the bank of 
 a broad lake. But they saw something else 
 that made them wonder so much that they for- 
 got about the hart. 
 
 " Out on the lake there was a boat, all cov- 
 ered with silk canopies and hangings down to 
 the edge of the water. It was coming straight 
 toward them, and soon it touched the land close 
 to where they were. Then Arthur went to the 
 boat and looked in. The whole of it seemed 
 empty, and he called to the others to come and 
 look. The others came, and they all went into 
 the boat and looked around them, wondering 
 how it could have come there all by itself. All 
 about them there were rich and beautiful silk 
 curtains and cushioned seats and heavy, soft 
 carpets, but no people. They had ridden so 
 long in the hunt that evening was coming on 
 now, when all at once the whole of the place 
 where they were was lighted up, as if it had 
 been noon. Rows of torches, that they had 
 not seen before, all along the sides of the boat, 
 blazed up of themselves and burned with soft- 
 colored lights. And a thin smoke came from
 
 How the Scabbard Was Lost 257 
 
 them and spread about like incense and filled 
 the place with perfume. 
 
 " They had scarcely time to wonder at this 
 when there came twelve girls, who knelt be- 
 fore the King and called him by name and wel- 
 comed him and begged him to stay in the boat 
 all night Then they opened the curtains and 
 led the three knights into another part of the 
 boat, where there was a table richly spread 
 with gold and silver dishes and everything that 
 they could want to eat and drink. The twelve 
 girls served them while they ate, and then they 
 led each of them to a chamber, as rich and 
 beautiful as everything else had been, and told 
 them to sleep there till morning. And as soon 
 as each of the three knights was left alone the 
 light of the torches grew dimmer, and the 
 incense smoke from them grew heavier and the 
 smell of it sweeter, and they all slept. 
 
 44 What became of the boat after that nobody 
 ever knew, except Morgan-le-Fay and the twelve 
 girls who made up the crew. King Urien 
 awoke in the morning and found himself in his 
 own bed at Camelot. But King Arthur had no 
 such good fortune. When he awoke he was 
 lying on stone. It was all dark around him. 
 He felt the stone on which he lay with his 
 hands. It was smooth and it had lines in it, 
 where stones were fitted together. He knew 
 that it was a floor. Then he reached farther
 
 258 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 with his hands and touched a wall. He turned 
 his face, and up above him and a little way off 
 he saw a square spot of pale light. The spot 
 of light had black bars across it. He knew 
 from that the sort of place that he was in. It 
 was a prison. Then he heard sounds a groan 
 a deep, long sigh, and another groan. 
 ' Who are you,' he asked, ' and what is your 
 trouble ? ' 
 
 " There was no answer for a moment, and 
 then a voice not far from him said : ' Who are 
 you that you do not know ? We are knights 
 twenty of us. We have been here for years, 
 some of us. We are the prisoners of Sir Da- 
 mas, who owns this castle, and you must be his 
 prisoner too.' 
 
 " ' Why are you kept here,' the King asked, 
 ' and why have I been brought here ? ' 
 
 " ' You are here, it is likely,' the voice an- 
 swered, ' for the same cause as the rest of us. 
 We are kept here because we will not fight for 
 this Sir Damas. He is a coward and does not 
 dare to fight for himself. He has a brother, 
 Sir Onzlake, a good knight, and he keeps his 
 rightful possessions from him. He cannot keep 
 all, for Sir Onzlake is as brave as Sir Damas is 
 cowardly, and he has one good castle that Sir 
 Damas cannot take from him. And many 
 times Sir Onzlake has offered to fight with Sir 
 Damas for all that ought to be his without
 
 How tke Scabbard Was Lost 259 
 
 fighting. And Sir Damas does not dare to try 
 the battle, but he hopes to find some other 
 knight to fight it for him. Bat all the good 
 knights who know him hate him so that they 
 will not help him, so he and his men watch the 
 roads and take prisoners the knights that pass. 
 Then he tries to make them fight his brother 
 Sir Onzlake for him, and when they refuse he 
 puts them here in this prison. This is how we 
 have all come here, for we will die rather than 
 fight for such a traitor. And some of us have 
 died from hunger and from the cold and damp 
 of the dungeon. This is why you are here too, 
 no doubt. They will send for you by and by, 
 to ask you if you will fight for Sir Damas.' 
 
 " Then Arthur thought of what he ought to 
 do. ' If I say that I will not fight for this Sir 
 Damas,' he thought, * he will keep me and all 
 these poor knights here till we die. If I fight 
 with Onzlake for him and Onzlake kills me, it 
 will be no worse than dying in this prison, and 
 if I beat Onzlake I will not kill him, and then, 
 because I am the King, I can make Sir Damas 
 give his brother all that is rightly his, and I can 
 make him release these knights.' 
 
 " Then the little spot of light high up in the 
 wall was darkened, and Arthur looked up there 
 and saw the face of a girl, looking down into 
 the dungeon. 'Knight,* she said, 'you must 
 fight for Sir Damas with his brother Sir Onz-
 
 260 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 lake, or you will never come out of this prison. 
 Will you fight for him ? ' 
 
 " ' Tell Sir Damas/ Arthur answered, ' that I 
 will fight for him if he will promise me that, 
 whether I win or lose, all these knights who 
 are here in this prison shall be freed.' 
 
 " The girl went away, and in a little while 
 men came and led Arthur out of the dungeon 
 and up into the hall of the castle, where Sir Da- 
 mas was. And there Arthur promised to fight 
 the battle for Sir Damas, and Sir Damas prom- 
 ised to free all his prisoners, whether Arthur 
 should win or lose. 
 
 " Now the story goes back to Sir Accolon. 
 He went to sleep in the boat, just as King 
 Arthur and King Urien did. When he awoke 
 he was lying on the ground, in a forest, just on 
 the edge of a deep well. He was so near it 
 that he started quickly away when he saw it, 
 and as he turned, in getting away from the 
 dangerous place, he saw an ugly dwarf stand- 
 ing and staring at him. In his hand the dwarf 
 held a sword, in a beautiful scabbard, all cov- 
 ered with jewels. ' Sir Accolon,' said the 
 dwarf, ' I am sent to you by Queen Morgan-le- 
 Fay. She bade me tell you that to-morrow you 
 should fight with a knight. But you are to 
 have no fear of him, good knight though he is, 
 for she has sent you here King Arthur's sword, 
 Excalibur, to fight him with.'
 
 How the Scabbard Was Lost 261 
 
 "'And where am I to find the knight?* Sir 
 Accolon asked. 
 
 " ' Have no fear about that,' the dwarf an- 
 swered ; 'you will find him when the time 
 comes.' 
 
 " Then Sir Accolon thought that he under- 
 stood the whole plan, but he did not; he under- 
 stood only a little of it ' Was the boat where 
 we slept,' he asked, 'all an enchantment of 
 Queen Morgan-le-Fay's to get me here and to 
 get me King Arthur's sword to fight with ?' 
 
 " ' Yes,' said the dwarf. 
 
 " ' Then,' said Accolon, ' give my thanks to 
 Queen Morgan-le-Fay and tell her that I will 
 fight the battle for her/ 
 
 " The dwarf gave Sir Accolon the sword and 
 left him wondering how he was to know what 
 knight he was to fight and how he was to find 
 him. Soon a knight, with six squires, came 
 riding past, and when he saw Accolon he asked 
 him to come with him to his castle, which was 
 near. And Accolon, since he did not know at 
 all where he ought to go, thought that it would 
 be best to go wherever chance should lead him ; 
 so he went with the knight. And who should 
 this knight be but Sir Onzlake, and they had 
 scarcely reached his castle when a message 
 came from his brother, Sir Damas. It said that 
 Sir Damas had found a knight to fight for him, 
 and that Sir Onzlake must be ready to meet
 
 262 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 him early the next morning in the field beside 
 his brother's castle. 
 
 " ' What shall I do,' said Sir Onzlake, when 
 he had heard this message ; ' this is the battle 
 that I have wished for so long, and I was 
 wounded with a spear only a little while ago 
 and I arm not strong enough yet to fight.' 
 
 " ' I will tell you what you shall do,' said Ac- 
 colon ; ' you shall go to-morrow and see the 
 battle, and I will fight it for you. It was told 
 to me that I should fight with a knight to- 
 morrow, and I have King Arthur's sword, Ex- 
 calibur, and the scabbard. It is the best sword 
 in the world, and while I have the scabbard 
 about me I can lose no blood, so I shall win the 
 battle for you.' 
 
 " So Sir Onzlake sent back word that a good 
 knight would be ready to fight for him, and 
 early the next morning they rode to Sir Damas's 
 castle. They stayed in the field near the castle 
 and sent a squire to say that they were ready 
 and were waiting for his knight. Then Arthur 
 rode out from the castle with arms and a horse 
 that Sir Damas had given him. As he reached 
 the gate a girl on horseback met him and came 
 so close that nobody but himself could hear 
 what she said. And she said to him : ' My lord 
 Arthur, your sister, Queen Morgan-le-Fay, 
 sends you your sword, Excalibur, and its scab- 
 bard,' and she gave him a sword and a scabbard
 
 How the Scabbard Was Lost 263 
 
 that looked so like his own that he had never a 
 doubt that they were his. But they were a 
 poor sword and a worthless scabbard that 
 Morgan-le-Fay had made by enchantment to 
 deceive the King. 
 
 " Then, as Arthur took his place for the first 
 charge, he saw the prisoners, who had been 
 freed from the dungeon, coming out of the cas- 
 tle to see the battle. They were all pale and 
 thin and worn and hungry-looking. Some 
 of them those who had been in the prison 
 longest could not walk alone, and they leaned 
 on the others till they came to a place where 
 they could see well, and there they all sat down 
 upon the grass. Then they breathed the pure, 
 fresh, morning air, and gazed about at the 
 bright sunlight that was shining over every- 
 thing. They could scarcely bear the light at 
 first, but soon they could see better. And then 
 they looked at the levels and slopes of grass 
 and the green trees, and up at the bright sky, 
 with the light, white clouds floating in it, and 
 back at the walls of the castle that had been 
 their prison. These were beautiful, too, with 
 their soft colors and the morning sunshine on 
 them ; and the prisoners could scarcely believe 
 that they were really free at last and that now 
 they were to see such lovely things as these 
 every day. There was one of them who had 
 been in that dungeon for many years and yet
 
 264 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 was not old. He should have been a strong 
 knight, full of life and vigor, but he was so weak 
 that he could scarcely even sit. And when his 
 fellow-prisoner, on whom he had been leaning, 
 moved away from him, suddenly his head grew 
 dizzy and he fell forward upon the grass, and 
 there, close to his face, he saw a little white and 
 pink star of a daisy. He picked it and touched 
 the little rays and the yellow centre with his 
 fingers, and held it close to his eyes, till drops 
 of water came into them and he could not see 
 it any more. He had been shut in by those 
 black walls so long that he had come almost to 
 believe that there were no such things in the 
 world as blue sky and grass and daisies any 
 more. 
 
 " Then there was a sharp, clear note from a 
 herald's trumpet, and at the sound all the pris- 
 oners, who had been more like sick children a 
 minute before, were knights again. They 
 looked at the two who were to fight, at their 
 horses and their armor, which were as strange 
 to them as the daylight was. They remem- 
 bered the fine old battles which they them- 
 selves had seen and fought, and they tried to 
 judge which of these two would win. They 
 tried to judge, too, which of them they wanted 
 to see win, for one of these knights had set 
 them free, yet he was fighting for the coward 
 and the traitor and the tyrant who had kept
 
 How the Scabbard Was Lost 265 
 
 them in prison. And the other knight was 
 fighting for the right. If they had known, as 
 Arthur did, that in this strange battle the right 
 was fighting on both sides and must win, they 
 could have looked on more cheerfully. 
 
 " Both the men and both the horses were 
 thrown to the ground at the first charge. Both 
 the knights were on their feet in a moment 
 and had begun the fight with swords, and I 
 suppose there was never a stranger sword-fight 
 than that, for Arthur fought hard and well, and 
 yet there was no strength and no sharpness in 
 his sword. He struck his enemy with it, but it 
 would scarcely cut at all; and if it did give 
 some little wound, the knight seemed not to 
 mind it and he fought as well as before. But 
 wherever Sir Accolon* s sword struck, it bit into 
 the very steel of Arthur's armor and cut 
 through it and wounded the flesh; and the 
 blood flowed from the wounds and Arthur felt 
 himself growing weaker, and he touched the 
 scabbard by his side to find if it were still 
 there, and could not understand it. 
 
 "And when they had fought so for a long 
 time Arthur felt that he could stand only a lit- 
 tle longer. If he were to win the battle he 
 must win it now, and he rushed upon Accolon 
 and struck him a great blow on the helmet, and 
 with that his treacherous sword broke in pieces 
 and left him with only the handle in his hand.
 
 266 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Then Accolon struck at Arthur and wounded 
 him again, and Arthur saw that only one chance 
 was left for him. He put his shield in front of 
 him and rushed with a crash against Accolon 
 and at the same time he struck him, with all 
 the strength that he had left, upon the helmet 
 with the handle of the broken sword. Accolon 
 fell and the sword flew out of his hand. Ar- 
 thur caught up the sword from the ground and 
 the moment that he had it in his hand he knew 
 that it was his own Excalibur. He sprang 
 upon Accolon again, tore the scabbard from 
 his side and threw it far off in the field. Then 
 he struck Accolon one more blow with the 
 sword and the battle was ended. 
 
 " Then Arthur cut the lacings of his enemy's 
 helmet and took it off, and saw that the knight 
 he had been fighting was his own knight, Sir 
 Accolon. ' Accolon,' he said, ' where did you 
 get this sword ? ' 
 
 " ' It is King Arthur's sword,' said Accolon, 
 ' and his sister, Queen Morgan-le-Fay, gave it 
 to me to fight this battle. But you have won 
 in spite of it. Will you tell me who you are ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes, Accolon,' the King answered, ' I am 
 Arthur.' 
 
 " ' Oh, my lord, have mercy on me, then,' Ac- 
 colon cried, ' for I did not know you.' 
 
 " ' I believe that you did not,' said Arthur, 
 ' and you shall have mercy.'
 
 How the Scabbard Was Lost 267 
 
 " Then Arthur called the two brothers, Sir 
 Damas and Sir Onzlake. Sir Damas,' he said, 
 ' I have fought this battle for you and I have 
 won it. All the lands and castles and what- 
 ever else you and your brother have quarrelled 
 about are yours. I was your champion and I 
 have won them for you. But now the battle is 
 over and I am your champion no longer. I am 
 the King now. Sir Damas, you are a coward 
 and a tyrant, and you are not fit to be a knight. 
 This is what I command you : First you shall 
 give to each of these knights who have been 
 your prisoners the arms that he had when he 
 came here, or others as good, and you shall give 
 each of them a horse. After that you shall 
 give everything else that you have to your 
 brother, Sir Onzlake, and he shall give you 
 one house to live in and one horse to ride a 
 palfrey, not a war-horse. Such a man as you 
 should never ride a war-horse. And you, Sir 
 Onzlake I have heard such good report of 
 you that you shall come to my court, if you 
 will, and be one of my knights. And now, Sir 
 Onzlake, I am wounded and weary. Tell me 
 how far I am from CameloL' 
 
 " ' It is two days* journey, my lord,' said Sir 
 Onzlake ; ' but only a little way from here there 
 is an abbey where you can rest as long as you 
 wish and have what care you need.' 
 
 "So Arthur went with Sir Onzlake to the
 
 268 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 abbey, and the nuns took care of him, and he 
 stayed there while his wounds were healing. 
 
 "Now when Morgan-le-Fay heard that King 
 Arthur had not been killed, and that he had his 
 sword Excalibur and the scabbard, she began 
 to think how she should get them again. And 
 she was never slow at thinking. When she 
 had thought, she took forty of her own knights 
 and left Camelot and rode with them to the 
 abbey where King Arthur was. ' Is King Ar- 
 thur here?' she asked of the nuns. 
 
 u< Yes,' they answered, 'he is here.' 
 
 " ' Take me to him, then.' 
 
 " ' He is asleep now,' they answered ; ' you 
 cannot see him till he wakes.' 
 
 " ' I must see him now,' she said ; ' I am his 
 sister, Queen Morgan-le-Fay.' 
 
 " When they heard that they did not dare 
 to disobey her, so they led her to the room 
 where the King was. He was sleeping, but his 
 sword Excalibur was in his hand and the scab- 
 bard lay a little way off. It was the sword 
 that Morgan-le-Fay wanted, but she did not 
 dare to take it, for fear of waking the King, so 
 she took the scabbard, left the abbey quickly, 
 mounted her horse, and rode away with her 
 knights. 
 
 " She was scarcely gone when the King awoke 
 and missed the scabbard. He called some of 
 the nuns and asked who had taken it, and they
 
 the Scabbed Was Lost 269 
 
 told him that it was bis sister and that they 
 had not dared to disobey her commands. And 
 surely, when Arthur himself had trusted his 
 sister so long, he could not blame the poor 
 nuns for trusting her. His wounds were near! j 
 well bj this time, so he sent for his horse and 
 began to put on his armor, and he sent for Sir 
 Onzlake and told him to put on his armor and 
 be ready to ride with him. 
 
 " As soon as they were both ready they rode 
 the way that Morgan-le-Fay and her knights 
 had gone, and in a little while they saw them 
 far ahead. As fast as they could King Arthur 
 and Sir Onzlake followed, and the forty knights 
 of Morgan4e-Fay were such good, brave knights 
 that they thought of nothing but of getting 
 away from the two who were coming after them. 
 So they all rode on through a forest and then 
 out upon a plain, and all the time King Arthur 
 and Sir Onzlake were gaining. And Morgan- 
 le-Fay was passing near a little lake when she 
 looked back and saw that her brother would 
 soon overtake her. She could not hope to keep 
 the scabbard of Excalibur, but. rather than let 
 him have it, she threw it as far as she could out 
 into the lake. It whirled through the air in an 
 arch, and its Jewels made a rainbow in the sun- 
 light, and then it sank into the water and no- 
 body ever saw it again. 
 
 " But still King Arthur and Sir Onzlake fol-
 
 2/o The Court of King Arthur 
 
 lowed Morgan-le-Fay and her knights, and still 
 they gained on them. At last the Queen and 
 the knights rode down into a valley, and the 
 King and his knight were out of sight over 
 the brow of the hill. But the Queen knew 
 that before her company could climb the hill 
 on the other side her brother would come up 
 with them. Then, in an instant, by the magic 
 that she knew how to use, she changed herself 
 and all her knights and their horses into stone. 
 In a moment King Arthur and Sir Onzlake 
 were among them, and they looked about and 
 there was a statue of a queen on a horse and 
 there were statues of forty knights on horses. 
 ' See,' said Arthur, ' God has turned them all 
 into stone for their wickedness. There is 
 nothing for us to do.' 
 
 " And the King and the knight turned their 
 horses and rode back toward the abbey. Then, 
 when they were out of sight, the Queen turned 
 herself and her knights back to flesh again, and 
 the whole forty-one of them thanked their stars 
 that they were safe from the two who had 
 been following them. 
 
 " And so the scabbard of Excalibur was lost 
 forever. But I don't think that King Arthur 
 really cared very much. He always trusted to 
 his own strength and bravery more than to 
 magic when he was in a fight. He still had the 
 best sword in the whole world. He could get
 
 Haw the Scabbard Was Lost 271 
 
 another scabbard good enough to carry it in, 
 and a good sword, he thought, was better to 
 guard himself with than any scabbard.* 1 
 
 "If Morgan4e-Fay wanted to kill King 
 Arthur," said Helen, " why didn't she kill him 
 when she had him in the boat ? " 
 
 "I don't know," I said, "why she didn't. 
 People in stories, you know, always do things 
 the longest and the hardest ways. 1 suppose 
 they do so just to make the stories."
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 KING ARTHUR'S GRAVESTONE 
 
 THERE are some half-dozen places scattered 
 over the world that I always remember as 
 places of friendliness and rest and happiness. 
 I come back to them, if I am lucky enough to 
 see them for a second time, with a feeling of 
 getting home. I shall feel so, I am sure, if I 
 ever go again to Tintagel, though it was only a 
 little while that we were there. 
 
 We left it early in the morning, wishing to 
 have time to see a little of Camelford and 
 Slaughter Bridge and King Arthur's Grave, as 
 they called it, before taking our train. 
 
 We rode back along the way that we had 
 come, between those high, slate castle walls, 
 and past the dangerous, deep, harmless-look- 
 ing pools of water, and among the fields, with 
 their low slate walls and the yellow and scarlet 
 flowers growing on them, and so we came to 
 the Camelford railway station. We found a
 
 King Arthurs Gravestone 273 
 
 safe place to leave our luggage and asked the 
 porter to show us the way to Slaughter 
 Bridge, It was only across the track and 
 down the bank and a little way along the 
 muddy road, and we were there. It was just 
 a little stone bridge across a bit of a river, the 
 CameL Of course we had to stand on it and 
 look up and down the river and all around, and 
 try to think of the place full of fighting men 
 and charging horses. We tried to bring back 
 the picture of the battle, the rushing together 
 of the lines of knights, the shock of their meet- 
 ing, the clatter of the armor, the men and the 
 horses falling and rolling down and choking 
 up this little stream yet I had to declare once 
 more that I did not believe that the battle was 
 fought here at alL 
 
 Across the river and a little way along the 
 road there was a mill, and there was a black- 
 smith's shop next to it. The miller, a good- 
 looking young fellow, stood at his door look- 
 ing at us. We went up to the mill and asked 
 him where King Arthur's gravestone was. 
 Through the gate and just a little up the river 
 and down the bank, he said, we should find it. 
 We tried to go the way he said. We scram- 
 bled down the bank and over wet and slippery 
 places and among the bushes, and never a sign 
 of a gravestone could we find. We were quite 
 ashamed of ourselves, because the miller had
 
 274 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 told us it was so easy to find, but we had to 
 give it up and go back to ask again. 
 
 The miller was out of sight when we went 
 back, but the blacksmith was pounding on his 
 anvil and smoking his stump of a pipe and 
 talking to a neighbor who stood by. The black- 
 smith was an old man, with a thin, straggly, white 
 beard. We told him we could not find King 
 Arthur's gravestone. He began to tell us again, 
 then he stopped and thought fora moment, and 
 then he said : " Shall I go and show you ? " 
 
 " If you would, please, we should be ever so 
 much obliged." 
 
 The old man dropped his hammer, tossed his 
 hot iron back upon the forge, and started 
 briskly off along the road. He turned up the 
 river, plunged down the bank, dashed through 
 the bushes, and then stood still and looked 
 around. King Arthur's gravestone was not 
 where he thought it was, and he did not know 
 where to look for it. We were quite delighted 
 and thought a good deal better of ourselves 
 than we had before. If the blacksmith could 
 not find King Arthur's gravestone, how could 
 we expect to? But the blacksmith knew what 
 he was looking for and we did not, and so in a 
 few minutes he found it. 
 
 It was a flat stone, some seven feet long and 
 two wide, lying on the ground. " There are 
 some letters on it," said the old man.
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 275 
 
 The place was so shady, that, on this dull, 
 cloudy day, it was almost dark. We could 
 scarcely see the letters at all, but we could feel 
 them. We tried to read them, using partly 
 our eyes and partly our fingers, like a blind 
 man. I began : " L-A-T-I-N and then here 
 are two I's and then there are some things 
 that don't seem to be any letters that I ever 
 met with before, except now and then an A. 
 I^A-T-I-N spells ' Latin ' well enough, but the 
 rest of it doesn't seem to be Latin or anything 
 else." 
 
 " A good many 'as tried to read it," said the 
 old man, " but none of 'em can't make nothing 
 out of it" 
 
 " There seem to be a good many A's," I said. 
 
 The old man grinned. " Maybe they knawed 
 'ow to make A's best," he said. 
 
 After all, we could not think of any better 
 way to account for it, so we accepted that one. 
 "What I can't see," said the blacksmith, " is 
 'ow they ever got that stone 'ere ; it's so 'eavy." 
 
 It did not seem strange to me at alL I 
 thought that a yoke of oxen, with a good big 
 chain, could move it easily enough. But of 
 course I did not want to hurt the old man's 
 feelings by saying so. 
 
 It is lucky that this is a book of stories and 
 not a book of travels. Because I positively 
 cannot remember which side of the river that
 
 276 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 stone was on. I do not remember whether we 
 crossed the river on stepping-stones to get 
 back to the blacksmith's shop, or whether we 
 were already on the same side of it. Since this 
 is a book of stories it doesn't matter. I do re- 
 member that we went through grass that was 
 so tall and so wet that it did not seem to 
 make much difference whether we were in the 
 river or the grass. We asked the blacksmith 
 the way to Camelford village, he pointed along 
 the road, we gave him our thanks and a little 
 something else, and we set out for a two-mile 
 walk. 
 
 " Oh, I don't want this to be Camelot at all," 
 Helen said, as we walked through the street 
 of Camelford. 
 
 It was not a pretty place. All the houses 
 were small and poor, and the people looked 
 poor too. The street was not over-clean, and 
 neither were the houses or the people. " I 
 don't want it to be Camelot either," I said, 
 " and even that sign there, ' White Hart W. 
 Arthur,' shall not convince me that a descend- 
 ant of King Arthur is keeping an hotel here. 
 We will not even go to Mr. W. Arthur's house 
 for luncheon ; we will go to the King's Arms." 
 
 The King's Arms seemed to be a very good 
 hotel for such a village as Camelford to have. 
 In the coffee-room there was an account of 
 King Arthur, printed and framed and hung on
 
 King Arthur's Gravts'omc r-- 
 
 the wall. I read it while we were waiting for 
 them to bring our luncheon. If it was all true 
 it showed that the great battle was fought 
 somewhere near here, but it showed, too, that 
 King Arthur was not buried at Slaughter 
 Bridge. " But, after all," I said, " how can that 
 stone that we saw be the stone that the story is 
 about unless this is Camelot?" 
 
 "Then it really is King Arthur's grave- 
 stone?- Helen asked. 
 
 "I didn't say it was King Arthur's grave- 
 stone; I said 'the stone that the story is 
 about.' " 
 
 " Is it another story then? " 
 
 " Yes, it is another story, about a very won- 
 derful stone, and I think that the stone that we 
 saw this morning, with the letters on it, must 
 be the very one. But it cannot be unless this 
 Camelford is really Camelot." 
 
 "But you said you didn't believe it was 
 Camelot, and you didn't want to believe it." 
 
 "Yes, I did say so, but 1 think we might bet- 
 ter believe it, just for the sake of this story." 
 
 - But how can we believe it if it isn't so?" 
 
 "My child, you must learn my way of be- 
 lieving things whether they are so or not; of 
 believing them when you want to and not be- 
 lieving them when you don't want to. If you 
 can't believe yon must make believe. 
 
 "Yet the story does not begin here, but at
 
 278 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 Caerleon. Once, when King Arthur was hold- 
 ing his court there, a messenger came to him 
 from King Ryence, of North Wales. He was 
 the giant, you know, who was making war on 
 King Leodogran, of Cameliard, that time when 
 King Arthur went to help him. Well, it seems 
 that he was beginning to get over the whipping 
 that he got then, and he was still thinking 
 about that wonderful mantle that he had, that 
 was trimmed with kings' beards. So his mes- 
 senger, who was very polite about it, said that 
 Arthur must send his beard to Ryence to put 
 on his mantle, and, as Ryence really wanted it 
 very much, he should be glad to take it with 
 him. He said, too, that if Arthur would send it 
 peaceably and of his own accord King Ryence 
 would put it in the very best place on his man- 
 tle, where it would show much better than any 
 of the eleven kings' beards that he had already ; 
 but if Arthur would not send it, then King Ry- 
 ence would come with an army and take it, and 
 he would take Arthur's head at the same time. 
 
 "'Say to King Ryence,' Arthur answered, 
 ' that I am still so young that my beard is not 
 long enough to trim a mantle with. Say to 
 him, too, that, such as it is, if he wants it, he 
 must come and take it, and, if he does not come 
 against me soon I shall go against him, to see 
 which of us shall do homage to the other.' 
 
 "Then, as Arthur had a good many other
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 279 
 
 things to think about, he forgot about Ryence 
 for a time. And now the story comes here to 
 Camelot, for it was here that the King was 
 holding his court when more messengers came 
 to him to say that Ryence was coming with a 
 great army, and that Arthur must make ready 
 to meet him, or all his country would be laid 
 waste and he himself would be killed. Now 
 Arthur and his knights were always ready to 
 meet any enemy who might come, so they did 
 not feel much frightened. 
 
 " And at about the time that the King and all 
 the knights had heard this news, there came into 
 the hall a young girl. She went to the King 
 and threw off her mantle, and showed him that 
 she wore a big, beautiful sword. ' Why do you 
 wear that ? ' the King asked ; * it is strange to 
 see a girl like you wearing a sword.* 
 
 " 4 My lord,' she answered, ' I cannot take it 
 off. It has been put on me by enchantment. 
 And it was told me that nobody could draw 
 this sword out of its scabbard and free me from 
 it except the best knight in your court. So I 
 have come here to see which of your knights 
 can draw it for me.' 
 
 " So King Arthur commanded that every 
 one of his knights should try to draw the 
 sword. And they all tried, and they ail pulled 
 hard at the sword, and not one of them could 
 pull it out of its scabbard. ' You do not need
 
 280 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 to try so hard,' the girl said ; ' the knight who 
 can draw it at all can draw it easily.' 
 
 " I don't know where Lancelot and Gawain 
 and Gareth were. It seems as if one of them 
 ought to have been able to draw the sword. 
 I suppose they were away on some adventures. 
 But there was a poor knight in the hall whose 
 name was Balin. He was not one of Arthur's 
 knights. He had killed one of the King's 
 knights and the King had put him in prison for 
 it, but he had found out that it was in a fair fight 
 and not Balin's fault, and he had let him out, 
 but he had not yet left the court. And as the 
 girl was leaving the hall with her sword Balin 
 asked her to let him try to draw it. 
 
 " But the girl looked at his poor clothes and 
 said : ' No ; do not trouble me any more ; how 
 could you hope to do it when all these good 
 knights have failed.' 
 
 " ' Do not judge me so because I am poor/ 
 Balin answered ; ' many a good and brave man 
 may wear poor clothes ; let me try to draw the 
 sword.' 
 
 " So he took hold of the sword and easily 
 drew it out. And he held it up and looked at 
 it, and thought that he had never seen a finer 
 sword. ' Give it back to me now,' said the" 
 girl; 'if you keep it, it will bring you bad 
 luck.' 
 
 " ' No,' said Balin ; ' when a knight has won
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 281 
 
 a sword in such a way as this, it is his to keep. 
 I am not afraid of bad luck and I will keep it.* 
 
 M If you keep it,* said the girl, 'you will al- 
 ways have bad lack ; you will do great harm, 
 and you will kill the man that you love best in 
 all the world.' 
 
 - I am not afraid,' said Balin ; * I will keep 
 the sword.' 
 
 "So the girl went out of the hall and away, 
 and Balin, who meant to leave the court too, 
 went to King Arthur to take his leave of him. 
 Do not go/ said the King, "and do not be 
 angry with me because I put yon in prison. 
 I had heard false stories about you and I did 
 not know what a good knight yon were. Stay 
 with us now and be one of my own knights.' 
 
 "'I thank yon, my lord,' Balin answered, 
 ' but I must go now and find adventures and 
 prove myself the good knight that yon say I am. 
 When f have done that I will come back.' 
 
 " So Balin went out of the hall and put on 
 his armor and rode away. And Merlin said 
 to the King: My lord, there are few better 
 knights than this Balin, and he will do yon 
 good service, but his own life will be sad and 
 he will not live long.' 
 
 " Balin was not far from Camelot when he 
 saw a knight coming toward him along the road, 
 and he knew by the knight's shield and armor 
 that he was his brother Balan. And when
 
 282 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 they met Balan said : ' I heard that you were in 
 prison, and afterward I heard that you were 
 free, and I was coming to Camelot to meet 
 you.' 
 
 " And Balin said : ' I am going away from 
 Camelot now. King Arthur was kind to me 
 and begged me to stay, but I want to do some 
 great deed, something to show to King Arthur 
 that I deserve his kindness. You shall go with 
 me and help me now, and we will go against 
 King Ryence. They say he is at Castle Ter- 
 rabil.' 
 
 " So Balan turned and went with Balin. 
 They had not gone far when they met Merlin, 
 but they did not know him, because he was 
 disguised in some way or other. ' Knights,' 
 said Merlin, ' whither are you going?' 
 
 " ' Who are you,' said Balin, ' that we should 
 tell you ? ' 
 
 " ' I will not tell you who I am,' Merlin an- 
 swered, ' but I will tell you whither you are rid- 
 ing; you are seeking King Ryence, but you will 
 gain nothing by it, unless you have my advice.' 
 
 " ' I know who you are,' said Balin, * when 
 you talk like that. You are Merlin, and we 
 will take your advice and thank you for it.' 
 
 " Then Merlin led them into a wood and told 
 them to lie down and sleep and he would wake 
 them when it was time. So the two knights 
 lay down and slept till midnight and then Mer-
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 283 
 
 lin woke them. ' You most be read j now,' he 
 said, for King Rjence is coming. He is riding 
 through the wood with some of his knights. 
 Wait here till some of them are past and you 
 see the King himself, and then fall upon him 
 and take him prisoner.' 
 
 " It was not long that they had to wait be- 
 fore the company of knights came past. When 
 half of them had gone by Merlin pointed and 
 said : * There is the King : attack him now and 
 take him!' 
 
 " Then Balin and Balan rushed forward and 
 attacked the King and the knights that were 
 next to him. They were all surprised and none 
 of them was ready to fight. In a moment Balin 
 and Balan had wounded half a dozen of them. 
 Even very brave men sometimes get frightened 
 at such a time as this, as old soldiers will tell 
 you. In the darkness and the confusion these 
 knights could not see how few men were at- 
 tacking them. They knew only that some of 
 them were wounded, and they thought that 
 nothing less than a large company would dare 
 to attack them, as many as they were. They 
 did not know whether their enemies were on 
 one side or the other, or all around them, and 
 so they just turned and ran away. 
 
 " But the King did not run away. Giant as 
 he was, Balin and Balan had given him two or 
 three wounds before he knew what was going
 
 284 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 on at all, and now they took good care that he 
 should not get away. When his own knights 
 had left him he was in their hands, and they 
 had only to lead him where they would. They 
 brought him to Camelot, to the gate of the cas- 
 tle of King Arthur, and there they gave him 
 over to the porters and told them to take him 
 before the King. Then they rode away. 
 
 " King Ryence was led into the hall, not half 
 so glad to be there as King Arthur was to see 
 him there. King Arthur asked him how he 
 had come there, and Ryence told him all that 
 he knew about the little battle in the wood and 
 the two knights who had taken him prisoner 
 and brought him to Camelot. ' Who were the 
 knights?' King Arthur asked. 
 
 "'I do not know,' said Ryence. 
 
 "' My lord,' said Merlin, who stood near the 
 King, ' they were Balin, who drew the sword 
 that the girl carried, and his brother Balan.' 
 
 " Then Ryence, seeing that there was noth- 
 ing else to be done, swore to keep peace with 
 King Arthur and to be faithful to him as long 
 as he lived. So the King let him go, and he 
 thought himself very lucky to get away from 
 Camelot alive. 
 
 " The story does not tell how Balin and Balan 
 chanced to part, after they had left Camelot 
 again, but the next time that it tells of Balin 
 he was alone. As he rode on his way he came
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 285 
 
 up with a knight and a girl, who were riding 
 together. The knight looked so sorrowful 
 that Balin asked him what it was that made 
 him sad, but the knight would not tell him. ' 1 
 would help you if I could,' said Balin. 
 
 "'You cannot help me,' said the knight. 
 
 " May I ride with you ? ' Balin asked. 
 
 " ' Yes, 1 said the knight, ' if you wish it. 1 
 
 "So they rode on together, and they had 
 gone only a little way when, without any warn- 
 ing, a spear struck the knight from behind and 
 he fell down off his horse. ' I am killed,' he 
 cried, by a traitor knight named Garlon, who 
 rides invisible. Take my horse, Sir Knight ; he 
 is better than yours. Go with this maiden, find 
 this murderer Garlon, and avenge my death.' 
 
 " Then the knight died. Balin and the girl 
 rode on, and Balin was very silent and very 
 thoughtful, for, brave man as he was, he was 
 filled with horror at the thought that anyone 
 should have the power to ride without being 
 seen, and to kill men who did not know that 
 anyone was near. He wondered how it could 
 be and how he could find this invisible mur- 
 derer and punish him. And as they rode on 
 in this way they met another knight. It was 
 Balin who looked sad now, and the other knight 
 asked him why it was. A knight was riding 
 with me a little while ago,' said Balin, 'and 
 Garlon, who rides invisible, came behind him
 
 286 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 and killed him with a spear. I am seeking this 
 Garlon to punish him.' 
 
 " ' May I go with you and help you ? ' said 
 the other knight. 
 r " ' Yes/ said Balin, ' if you will.' 
 
 " But they had scarcely started on again when 
 another spear came from behind and struck the 
 knight, and he, too, fell down from his horse 
 and died. And Balin and the girl rode on 
 again, and Balin wondered more and more how 
 he could ever find and punish this murderer 
 who could not be seen. Toward night they 
 came to a castle and they thought that it would 
 be best to stay there till morning ; but as Balin 
 rode in through the gate ahead of the girl, sud- 
 denly the portcullis was dropped behind him 
 and she was left outside. Then, as he looked 
 back, he saw that men had surrounded her as 
 if they would make her a prisoner. He could 
 not get back through the gate to help her, so 
 he ran up to the top of the wall of the castle, at 
 a place where it was not too high, and jumped 
 over, and in a moment he was among the men 
 with his sword drawn. But they said to him : 
 ' We will not fight with you ; we mean to do 
 with this maiden only according to the custom 
 of our castle.' 
 
 " That was another of the grange ways that 
 they had in those days. Castles had the most 
 remarkable customs. Some of them were good,
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 287 
 
 and some of them were wicked and cruel, and 
 some of them were sill y. But the people of 
 the castle could do almost anything they liked 
 with strangers, and the strangers would not 
 complain if they only said : * It is the custom of 
 the castle.' 
 
 M< What is the custom of your castle?' Balin 
 asked. 
 
 44 ' The lady of the castle,' the men answered, 
 ' has been sick for a long time. It is said that 
 nothing can ever cure her except the blood of 
 a maiden in a silver dish. So it is the custom 
 of the castle that every maiden who comes this 
 way must give a little of her Mood to try 
 whether it will cure our lady. If she wfll give 
 it of her own accord, it is all the better ; if she 
 will not, we make her give it.' 
 
 " * If this maiden who is with me,' said Balin, 
 wishes to give you some of her blood for your 
 lady, she may give it; if she will not, you shall 
 not harm her.* 
 
 -'I will give it gladly,' she said ; and so she 
 did, and it did the lady of the castle no good 
 atalL. 
 
 " They rode on again the next day, and at 
 night they came to another castle, and the lord 
 of it asked them to stay till morning. While 
 they were at sr pper Balin thought that he 
 heard a groan, as of some one in great pain, 
 and he asked the lord of the castle who it was
 
 288 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 ' Not long ago,' he answered, ' I was at a tour- 
 nament, and twice I jousted with another 
 knight who was there, the brother of King 
 Pelles, and twice I threw him down. Then, to 
 be revenged on me, he wounded my son. It is 
 my son whose groan you heard, for his wound 
 is not well, and they say that it never can be 
 made well, except by the blood of the knight 
 who wounded him. And I cannot find the 
 knight, because he rides invisible, and I do not 
 know his name.' 
 
 " ' I know his name,' said Balin ; ' it is Garlon, 
 and I am seeking him, to punish him for kill- 
 ing two knights who were with me. If I can 
 find him and kill him, you shall have some of 
 his blood to heal your son's wound.' 
 
 " ' Then I will tell you,' the other said, ' how 
 you can find him. His brother, King Pelles, 
 will give a great feast at his castle a few days 
 from now. This Garlon will surely be at the 
 feast, and there he will not be invisible. Any 
 knight can come there who brings with him 
 his wife or his lady. I cannot go, for I have 
 no wife, but you can go with this maiden who 
 is with you. 1 
 
 " ' I will go, then,' said Balin, ' for I do not 
 know how else I can ever find him.' 
 
 " So in the morning they set out toward 
 the castle of King Pelles, and their host went 
 with them. It was a long way, and when they
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 289 
 
 came to the King's castle it was already the 
 first day of the feast. The knight whose son 
 was wounded could not go into the castle be- 
 cause he had no lady with him, but Balin and 
 the girl went in. The people of the castle led 
 Balin to a chamber and took off his armor, and 
 when it was time for him to go to the table 
 they asked him to leave his sword in the 
 chamber, too. But Balin said : No, it is the 
 custom of my country for a knight to wear his 
 sword always, and I must do so or I must leave 
 you and your castle and your feast' 
 
 " So they let him wear his sword. Then 
 they placed him at the table, and the girl who 
 had come with him sat next to him. Then 
 Balin said to some one who sat near him : ' Is 
 there not a knight in this court named Garlon ? ' 
 
 " ' Yes,' he answered, ' that is he yonder.' 
 
 " Then Balin looked at Garlon and thought : 
 'He is here among his friends; if I kill him 
 here they will surely kill me; I cannot es- 
 cape ; yet if I let him go now I may never have 
 another chance to kill him.' 
 
 " Then Garlon saw Balin- looking at him, and 
 he came up to him and struck him in the face 
 and said : ' Knight, why do you stare at me ? 
 Eat your meat and do what you came for!' 
 
 " * I will do what I came for,' said Balin, and 
 he sprang up and drew his sword and struck 
 off Garlon's head before anybody could raise
 
 290 The Coiirt of King Arthur 
 
 a hand to stop him. Then for an instant he 
 stood there with his sword in his hand, before 
 any one could move toward him. He whis- 
 pered to the girl : ' I have avenged your 
 knight ; take some ^of the blood of this man 
 quickly to our host of the castle to cure his 
 son's wound.' 
 
 " Then he set his back against the wall, ready 
 to guard himself against those who would at- 
 tack him. And they all started up and came 
 toward him at once, but King Pelles cried : 
 ' Let nobody tpuch him but me ! I will kill 
 him myself for killing my brother! ' 
 
 " So the King caught up a sword and rushed 
 upon Balin, and aimed a blow at his head. 
 Balin caught the blow on his own sword, but 
 his sword broke with the force of it, and fell 
 in pieces on the floor. Then Balin dashed at 
 the crowd of knights in front of him, and broke 
 through it, and ran into another room, and the 
 King followed him. And Balin went on into 
 another room, and so on from room to room, 
 hoping somewhere to find a weapon, and the 
 King followed close upon him to kill him. 
 
 " Then Balin came into a great chamber 
 that was half-darkened, but he could see that 
 it was hung all around with rich tapestries and 
 curtains. And there was a bed, and in the bed 
 lay an old man, with a long, white beard. He 
 lay as still as if he were dead, but there was
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 291 
 
 color in his cheeks and his lips were red. Be- 
 side the bed was a table, all of gold and silver, 
 put together in strange and beautiful patterns. 
 On the table stood a spear. A little stream of 
 blood flowed from the point of the spear and 
 ran down the shaft to the table. And where 
 the blood touched them the gold and the sil- 
 ver of the table shone brighter than anywhere 
 else. 
 
 " Balin had no time to think of all these 
 things, but he saw them, and afterward he re- 
 membered them. Most of all he saw the spear. 
 He ran to it and took it in his hand and turned 
 upon King Pelles, who was close behind him. 
 As the King came on Balin struck him with 
 the spear and gave him a deep wound in the 
 side, and the King fell down as if he were dead. 
 
 " But as he struck that stroke Balin felt the 
 floor tremble under him. It shook so that he 
 could scarcely stand upon it. He dropped 
 the spear and it fell with a noise like thunder. 
 He looked around him and the walls seemed 
 to be shaking and moving. Then he heard 
 noises of crashing and splitting, and he felt the 
 floor going away from under him. A great 
 burst of light came into the chamber through 
 the roof, that opened and fell apart. The 
 thick stone walls tottered and toppled, there 
 was a mighty roar and crash, as the whole 
 castle fell into a formless heap, and then
 
 292 The Coiirt of King Arthur 
 
 a great cloud of dust rose slowly in the air 
 and was borne far off by a hot wind that 
 blew across the pile of ruins where the castle 
 had stood. Balin felt the downward rush, as 
 he sank with the floor ; he saw the roof split 
 above him and the walls whirled and tumbled 
 about him, and he heard the crash of the 
 shattered stone and timbers, but he did not see 
 the cloud of dust or feel the hot wind. 
 
 " For three days Balin saw and heard and 
 felt nothing. Then he felt the touch of a hand 
 and heard a voice say to him softly : ' Balin.' 
 He opened his eyes and saw a face with a long 
 beard bending over him. It was Merlin. 
 ' Balin,' said Merlin again, ' it is time for you 
 to leave this place. I have brought a horse for 
 you. Get up and come away.' 
 
 " Balin was so sore and stiff from lying on 
 the stones for those three days that he could 
 scarcely move, but he rose and looked around. 
 ' Do you know,' said Merlin, ' what you have 
 done?' 
 
 " ' I know,' said Balin, ' that I killed a mur- 
 derer. Then King Pelles followed me through 
 the rooms of the castle, and I know that at last 
 I found a spear and took it and turned upon 
 him and wounded him with it. That is all that 
 I have done. After that the castle all fell down, 
 but surely I did not do that.' 
 
 " ' Yes,' Merlin answered, ' you did that and
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 293 
 
 more than that. Do you know what this place 
 is, and who King Pelles is ? Do you know who 
 that old man was who lay in the bed in that 
 chamber where you found the spear? That 
 was Joseph of Arimathaea. It was he who 
 buried the Christ after He was crucified. Long 
 after that he came into England and brought 
 with him the Holy Grail, the cup in which he 
 caught the blood of the Christ when He was on 
 the cross. If it had not been for the Holy 
 Grail Joseph would have been dead hundreds 
 of years ago. He is not seen among men any 
 more, but he still lives, and he will not go out 
 of the world till the coming of the best knight 
 of all the world. The Grail was here in this 
 castle, and it has kept Joseph alive all these 
 years. King Pelles is his descendant and he is 
 the keeper of the Grail. And that spear with 
 which you wounded his side was the very spear 
 of the Roman soldier who pierced the side of 
 the Saviour on the cross.' 
 
 "'Is he dead, then King Pelles?' Balin 
 asked. 
 
 " ' No/ Merlin answered, ' he is not dead, but 
 he will never be cured of that wound that you 
 gave him till the best knight of the world 
 comes. He will cure him with the blood that 
 flows from the point of the spear. It was be- 
 cause you struck him with that spear that the 
 tastiefell; and because you struck him with
 
 294 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 that spear, too, the whole land here is waste 
 and worthless, and it will be desolate and 
 worthless till the best knight of all the world 
 comes and heals the King's wound.' 
 
 " Then Balin left Merlin and rode on his way. 
 And as he passed along he saw that nothing 
 grew in the fields. If there were flowers they 
 were old and faded and dead, and they hung 
 down on their dead stalks. The earth looked 
 arid and hot, and where there was grass it was 
 shrivelled and brown and dried, as if the blaz- 
 ing sun of a whole summer had shone on it, 
 with never any rain or any dew. A hot wind 
 blew everywhere and caught up the fine, dry 
 dust and sand, so that they sometimes almost 
 hid the burning sun and made it look more red 
 and cruel ; and the dust and sand cut against 
 Balin's face and covered him and his horse till 
 they were of the color of the dead fields. There 
 was no water anywhere, and no shade, for the 
 same hot wind tore the brown, wrinkled leaves 
 off the trees and mixed them with the dust and 
 sand. Broken branches of the trees themselves 
 swayed in the wind, and other trees were split 
 down their trunks to the roots, or shone with a 
 ghostly white, where the bark had been torn 
 off, as if lightning had struck them. Balin saw 
 few people. Now and then an old man or an 
 old woman they all seemed to be old sat at 
 the door of a poor, shattered house. None of
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 295 
 
 them was doing anything, and they all looked 
 upon the ground with sad, worn, helpless, dull 
 faces. Yet some of them, as Balin passed, 
 looked up at him, and a little cold light, like 
 anger, came into their eyes, as if they knew 
 that it was he who had made them so wretched. 
 
 " You may believe that Balin did not care to 
 stay in this country, and that he rode through 
 it and out of it as fast as he could. When he 
 was away from it he rode more slowly. He 
 was thinking of all the strange things that he 
 had seen and done since he left King Arthur's 
 court. He could not see that he had done any 
 wrong in killing the murderer Garion, or in 
 wounding King Pelles, yet he felt sad because 
 of all the harm that had come because he 
 struck that blow with that spear. He could 
 not understand how that one blow could do so 
 much harm. Neither can you understand it, I 
 think, and neither can I. 
 
 " Yon must remember that it was the castle 
 of the Holy Grail where Balin had been, and 
 that King Pelles was the keeper of the Holy 
 GraiL Wherever you find the Holy Grail, 
 there you will always find wonder and mystery 
 things that you do not understand and things 
 that you will never understand. When we 
 think and talk and hear of the Holy Grail, it 
 seems to me always that we see through a mist 
 and hear from far off. We can see and hear a
 
 296 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 great deal, but we can clearly make out only 
 a little. 
 
 " So Balin rode on his way puzzled and sad. 
 And after a time he met an old man, who said 
 to him : ' Knight, if you ride this way you will 
 come to a castle where you will have trouble 
 and danger. It will be better for you if you 
 turn back.' 
 
 " And Balin answered : ' I can have no worse 
 trouble than I have had already, and I do not 
 fear danger. I will go on.' 
 
 " So he went on, and soon he came to the 
 castle. And a crowd of ladies came out to 
 meet him and to welcome him, and they led 
 him into the hall and put him at the table, and 
 there were feasting and singing and dancing, 
 and Balin began to wonder what danger it was 
 that he had to fear. Then the lady of the castle 
 said to him : ' Knight, before you go from here 
 you must fight with a knight who keeps an 
 island near by. Every knight must do so who 
 passes this way. It is the custom of the castle.' 
 
 " ' It is a bad custom,' said Balin, ' but I will 
 fight with your knight, if I must. If he kills 
 me, I am willing. I have done harm enough 
 and I have had sorrow and trouble enough. I 
 do not care much about my own life. And so, 
 if I am to fight with him, let me go and do it 
 now.' 
 
 " Then one of the ladies said : ' Sir Knight
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 297 
 
 jour shield is small, and it looks old and bat- 
 tered. Let me give you a larger and better 
 one." 
 
 "So Balin took the shield that she brought 
 him. and they led him to a place where there 
 was a boat. And he and his horse went into 
 the boat and were floated over to the island. 
 And when Balin had landed and was on his 
 horse he saw coming the knight with whom he 
 was to fight. They put their spears in rest and 
 dashed against each other and both of them 
 were thrown from their horses. Then they 
 rose and began the battle with swords. It was 
 a long and a hard battle. Balin had nerer 
 fought with so strong a knight as this before. 
 The fight when he and his brother Balan 
 caught King Ryence and drove away his men 
 seemed to him nothing compared with this. 
 He grew angry that the other knight should 
 stand against him so long, and he fought as he 
 had never fought before. The other knight 
 fought harder too, and each of them had many 
 wounds. 
 
 " At last the knight of the island sank down 
 upon the ground and said : Yon have beaten 
 me, Sir Knight. I cannot fight any more, and 
 I cannot live long with the wounds that yon 
 have given me. I do not care for that. I am 
 kept here by a cruel custom, and some knight 
 would kill me in the end. And more than that,
 
 298 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 I have lost my brother. I should never see 
 him again, kept here away from the world, and 
 without my brother I do not care to live.' 
 
 "Then Balin said: 'Sir Knight, you have 
 killed me, too. Tell me who you are, for I 
 have never fought before with so good a 
 knight.' 
 
 "And the other answered : ' I am Balan, the 
 brother of Sir Balin, one of the best knights of 
 the world.' 
 
 " And when Balin heard that, being weak 
 with his wounds and with long fighting, he 
 fainted and fell back upon the ground. Th':n 
 Balan crept up to him and took off his helmet 
 and saw that he was his brother. And when 
 Balin opened his eyes again Balan said to him : 
 ' Why did you carry this strange shield ? If 
 you had carried your own shield I should have 
 known you by it.' 
 
 " And Balin answered : ' They gave it to me 
 at the castle, because it was better than mine. 
 But tell me why you were here keeping this 
 island in this strange way ? ' 
 
 " ' Once,' Balan answered, ' the lady of this 
 castle had a husband, and she would never let 
 him go away from her to any battles or tourna- 
 menis. And he grew tired of rest and idleness, 
 and so they made this custom this law that 
 every knight who passed this way should fight 
 with him. And if ever any knight overcame
 
 King Arthur's Gravest*** 299 
 
 him, that knight was to hold the island instead 
 of him and keep up the custom. At last a 
 knight killed him and held the island. I killed 
 the knight who was here when I came, and so I 
 held the place, and so you would have held it 
 if jou had killed me and saved your own life.' 
 
 44 Then the lady of the castle came, and Balan 
 told her that they were brothers and that they 
 had killed each other, and he asked her to have 
 them buried there together. Then Balan died, 
 and Balin died not long after. 
 
 "In the morning Merlin came. He found 
 Balin's sword and took off its hilt and put an- 
 other hilt on it. The new hilt was rich and 
 beautiful, with gold and jewels on it, and when 
 Merlin had put it on the blade he said : ' There 
 is no sword in the world more wonderful than 
 this, except King Arthur's sword, Excalibur. 
 But no knight shall use it now, till the one best 
 knight of all the world comes to take it.' 
 
 44 Then Merlin drove the sword into a great 
 stone, and he wrote on the stone that no knight 
 should ever draw this sword out of the stone 
 except the one to whom it should belong, the 
 best knight of the world. Then he pushed the 
 stone out into the river and it floated like 
 wood. And for many years, the story says, 
 the stone floated on the river, and at last it 
 drifted down to CameloL 
 
 - Now //this is Camelot where we are, tluu
 
 300 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 I believe that the stone we saw this morning is 
 that very stone. And if that is the very stone, 
 then the letters on it, that we could not read, 
 are the letters that Merlin put there, which said 
 that no knight but the best knight of all the 
 world should ever draw this sword." 
 
 " And what about the sword ? " Helen asked. 
 
 " The best knight of all the world came and 
 drew it out and carried it away." 
 
 " But wasn't Lancelot the best knight in the 
 world, and couldn't he draw the sword?" 
 
 " Yes, for a long time Lancelot was the best 
 knight in the world ; but the letters on the 
 stone meant that the knight to draw the sword 
 'must be the best knight who ever was or ever 
 would be, and Lancelot was not that. It was 
 not till long afterward that a knight came who 
 could draw the sword." 
 
 When Balin had brought Ryence as a prison- 
 er to Camelot the last of the great enemies of 
 King Arthur stood helpless before him. There 
 was no one left to stand against him now and to 
 say that he should not be King. His lords and 
 his knights and his people all knew him now ; 
 yes, and his enemies knew him too. They knew 
 that he had the right to reign over England. 
 They knew that he had the right, first, because
 
 King Arthur's Gravestone 301 
 
 he, the new King, was the son of the old King, 
 Uther Pendragon. Better than this, they knew 
 that he had it because God had chosen him 
 when he drew the sword out of the stone at St. 
 Paul's long ago. Best of all, they knew that 
 he was the true King because he ruled faithfully 
 and justly and well. The wrongs that had 
 been before he came were ended, the poor lived 
 and worked in peace, the honest rich man knew 
 that his wealth was safe. If the peasant was 
 true to the King, the King cared for him and 
 guarded him as well as the lord. If the noble- 
 man did wrong he was judged and punished 
 as sternly as the peasant. Arthur's people 
 believed that there had never been before 
 such a great and noble King as theirs, and 
 they were right. In his time no knight was 
 thought to know what true knighthood was 
 till he had been at Arthur's court, and after 
 his time, for a thousand years, kings and 
 knights looked back to him and to his court 
 as to copies of all that was best for themselves 
 to be. 
 
 There are many more stories than these that 
 I have told you of King Arthur, of Queen 
 Guinevere, of Sir Lancelot, of Sir Gawain, 
 and of the other knights. There are enough 
 of them to fill many and many books such as 
 this. I should like to think that sometime I 
 might tell you more of them. If the reading
 
 3O2 The Court of King Arthur 
 
 of these proves half as pleasant to you as the 
 telling of them has been to me, 1 trust that I 
 may do so. Here, for the present, our jour 
 ney and the stories of it must pause. I have 
 done as well as I hoped to do if you turn away 
 from these stories with as much regret as we 
 felt when we turned away from the land of 
 King Arthur's birth and left behind us the 
 sweet air and the great, glorious rocks, the 
 cries of the sea - birds, the roar and the dash 
 of the water, and all the sights and the sounds 
 of the Cornish shore and the Cornish sea.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
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