Tales of King Arthur and the Round Table 20

Tales of King Arthur and the Round Table 20

"You have not dealt truly with me," said the King. "Go back, and do my

command; spare not, but throw it in." But again Sir Bedivere's heart

failed him, and he hid the sword, and returned to tell the King he had

seen nothing but the wan water.

 

"Ah, traitor!" cried King Arthur, "this is twice you have betrayed me.

If you do not now fulfil my bidding, with mine own hands will I slay

you, for you would gladly see me dead for the sake of my sword." Then

Sir Bedivere was shamed at having disobeyed the King, and drew forth the

sword from its hiding-place, and carried it to the water-side, and with

a mighty swing threw it far into the water. And as it flew through the

air, an arm and hand lifted itself out of the water, and caught the

hilt, and brandished the sword thrice, and vanished with it beneath the

water. So Sir Bedivere came again unto the King, and told him what he

saw.

 

"Alas!" said the King, "help me hence, for I have tarried overlong;" and

Sir Bedivere took him on his back, and bare him to the water-side. And

when they stood by the bank, a little barge containing many fair ladies

and a Queen, all in black hoods, drew near, and they wept and shrieked

when they beheld King Arthur.

 

"Now put me into the barge," said the King, and Sir Bedivere laid him

softly down, and the ladies made great mourning, and the barge rowed

from the land.

 

"Ah, my lord Arthur!" cried Sir Bedivere, "what shall become of me now

you go from me, and I am left here alone with my enemies?"

 

[Illustration: EXCALIBVR RETVRNS TO THE MERE]

 

"Comfort yourself," replied the King, "and do as well as you may, for I

go unto the valley of Avilion, to be healed of my grievous wound. And if

you never more hear of me, pray for my soul." But Sir Bedivere watched

the barge till it was beyond his sight, then he rode all night till he

came to a hermitage. Now when Queen Guenevere heard of the battle, and

how that King Arthur was slain and Sir Mordred and all their Knights,

she stole away, and five ladies with her, and rode to Amesbury; and

there she put on clothes of black and white, and became a nun, and did

great penance, and many alms deeds, and people marvelled at her and at

her godly life. And ever she wept and moaned over the years that were

past, and for King Arthur.

 

As soon as the messenger whom the King had sent with Sir Gawaine's

letter reached Sir Lancelot, and he learned that Sir Mordred had taken

for himself the crown of England, he rose up in wrath, and, calling Sir

Bors, bid him collect their host, that they should pass at once over the

sea to avenge themselves on that false Knight. A fair wind blew them to

Dover, and there Sir Lancelot asked tidings of King Arthur. Then the

people told him that the King was slain, and Sir Mordred, and an hundred

thousand men besides, and that the King had buried Sir Gawaine in the

chapel at Dover Castle. "Fair Sirs," said Sir Lancelot, "show me that

tomb;" and they showed it to him, and Sir Lancelot kneeled before it,

and wept and prayed, and this he did for two days. And on the third

morning he summoned before him all the great lords and leaders of his

host, and said to them, "Fair lords, I thank you all for coming here

with me, but we come too late, and that will be bitter grief to me as

long as I shall live. But since it is so, I will myself ride and seek my

lady Guenevere in the west country, where they say she has gone, and

tarry you here, I entreat you, for fifteen days, and if I should not

return take your ships and depart into your own country."

 

Sir Bors strove to reason with him that the quest was fruitless, and

that in the west country he would find few friends; but his words

availed nothing. For seven days Sir Lancelot rode, and at last he came

to a nunnery, where Queen Guenevere was looking out from her lattice,

and was ware of his presence as he walked in the cloister. And when she

saw him she swooned, and her ladies and gentlewomen tended her. When she

was recovered, she spoke to them and said, "You will marvel, fair

ladies, why I should swoon. It was caused by the sight of yonder Knight

who stands there, and I pray you bring him to me." As soon as Sir

Lancelot was brought, she said to her ladies, "Through me and this man

has this war been wrought, for which I repent me night and day.

Therefore, Sir Lancelot, I require and pray you never to see my face

again, but go back to your own land, and govern it and protect it; and

take to yourself a wife, and pray that my soul may be made clean of its

ill doing."

 

"Nay, Madam," answered Sir Lancelot, "that shall I never do; but the

same life that you have taken upon you, will I take upon me likewise."

 

"If you will do so," said the Queen, "it is well; but I may never

believe but that you will turn to the world again."

 

"Well, Madam," answered he, "you speak as it pleases you, but you never

knew me false to my promise, and I will forsake the world as you have

done. For if in the quest of the Sangreal I had forsaken its vanities

with all my heart and will, I had passed all Knights in the quest,

except Sir Galahad my son. And therefore, lady, since you have taken you

to perfection, I must do so also, and if I may find a hermit that will

receive me I will pray and do penance while my life lasts. Wherefore,

Madam, I beseech you to kiss me once again."

 

"No," said the Queen, "that I may not do," and Sir Lancelot took his

horse and departed in great sorrow. All that day and the next night he

rode through the forest till he beheld a hermitage and a chapel between

two cliffs, and heard a little bell ring to Mass. And he that sang Mass

was the Bishop of Canterbury, and Sir Bedivere was with him. After Mass

Sir Bedivere told Sir Lancelot how King Arthur had thrown away his sword

and had sailed to the valley of Avilion, and Sir Lancelot's heart almost

burst for grief. Then he kneeled down and besought the Bishop that he

might be his brother. "That I will gladly," said the Bishop, and put a

robe upon him.

 

After the fifteen days were ended, and still Sir Lancelot did not

return, Sir Bors made the great host go back across the sea, while he

and some of Sir Lancelot's kin set forth to seek all over England till

they found Sir Lancelot. They rode different ways, and by fortune Sir

Bors came one day to the chapel where Sir Lancelot was. And he prayed

that he might stay and be one of their fellowship, and in six months six

other Knights were joined to them, and their horses went where they

would, for the Knights spent their lives in fasting and prayer, and kept

no riches for themselves.

 

In this wise six years passed, and one night a vision came to Sir

Lancelot in his sleep charging him to hasten unto Amesbury. "By the time

that thou come there," said the vision, "thou shalt find Queen Guenevere

dead; therefore take thy fellows with thee and fetch her corpse, and

bury it by the side of her husband, the noble King Arthur."

 

Then Sir Lancelot rose up and told the hermit, and the hermit ordered

him to make ready and to do all as the vision had commanded. And Sir

Lancelot and seven of the other Knights went on foot from Glastonbury to

Amesbury, and it took them two days to compass the distance, for it was

far and they were weak with fasting. When they reached the nunnery Queen

Guenevere had been dead but half an hour, and she had first summoned her

ladies to her, and told them that Sir Lancelot had been a priest for

near a twelvemonth. "And hither he cometh as fast as he may," she said,

"to fetch my corpse, and beside my lord King Arthur he shall bury me.

And I beseech Almighty God that I may never have power to see Sir

Lancelot with my bodily eyes." "Thus," said the ladies, "she prayed for

two days till she was dead." Then Sir Lancelot looked upon her face and

sighed, but wept little, and next day he sang Mass. After that the Queen

was laid on a bier drawn by horses, and an hundred torches were carried

round her, and Sir Lancelot and his fellows walked behind her singing

holy chants, and at times one would come forward and throw incense on

the dead. So they came to Glastonbury, and the Bishop of Canterbury sang

a Requiem Mass over the Queen, and she was wrapped in cloth, and placed

first in a web of lead, and then in a coffin of marble, and when she was

put into the earth Sir Lancelot swooned away.

 

"You are to blame," said the hermit, when he awaked from his swoon, "you

ought not make such manner of sorrow."

 

"Truly," answered Sir Lancelot, "I trust I do not displease God, but

when I remember her beauty, and her nobleness, and that of the King, and

when I saw his corpse and her corpse lie together, my heart would not

bear up my body. And I remembered, too, that it was through me and my

pride that they both came to their end."

 

From that day Sir Lancelot ate so little food that he dwined away, and

for the most part was found kneeling by the tomb of King Arthur and

Queen Guenevere. None could comfort him, and after six weeks he was too

weak to rise from his bed. Then he sent for the hermit and to his

fellows, and asked in a weary voice that they would give him the last

rites of the Church; and begged that when he was dead his body might be

taken to Joyous Gard, which some say is Alnwick and others Bamborough.

That night the hermit had a vision that he saw Sir Lancelot being

carried up to heaven by the angels, and he waked Sir Bors and bade him

go and see if anything ailed Sir Lancelot. So Sir Bors went and Sir

Lancelot lay on his bed, stark dead, and he smiled as he lay there. Then

was there great weeping and wringing of hands, more than had been made

for any man; but they placed him on the horse bier that had carried

Queen Guenevere, and lit a hundred torches, and in fifteen days they

reached Joyous Gard. There his body was laid in the choir, with his face

uncovered, and many prayers were said over him. And there, in the midst

of their praying, came Sir Ector de Maris, who for seven years had

sought Sir Lancelot through all the land.

 

"Ah, Lancelot," he said, when he stood looking beside his dead body,

"thou wert head of all Christian Knights. Thou wert the courtliest

Knight that ever drew sword, and the faithfulest friend that ever

bestrode a horse. Thou wert the goodliest Knight that ever man has seen,

and the truest lover that ever loved a woman."

 

 

 

 

NOTES

 

 

Page 2, l. 16. tourney, tournament; a fight in which many knights

joined.

 

Page 3, l. 31. Arthur's parentage. Uther Pendragon was King Arthur's

father. In Malory's "Morte d'Arthur," it is explained how he, when King

of all England, marched into Cornwall against the powerful Duke of

Tintagil. In the siege that followed the Duke of Tintagil was killed,

and his lady, the dame Igraine, afterwards became the wife of King

Uthur. It is also explained how, on the advice of Merlin, their son

Arthur was fostered by the wife of a certain Sir Ector, and brought up

with his son Kay. Uther Pendragon died two years after this, and on his

deathbed Merlin asked if Arthur should not be proclaimed his successor.

To this Uther Pendragon replied, "I give him my blessing, and

righteously may he claim the crown on forfeiture of my blessing." Merlin

had to provide some other means therefore to enable Arthur to succeed to

his heritage, and this we have in the tale of the "Drawing of the Sword."