Idylls of the King and a New Selection of Poems Read online

  Ulfius, and Brastias, and Bedivere,

  Back to the court of Arthur answering yea.

  Then Arthur charged his warrior whom he loved And honor’d most, Sir Lancelot, to ride forth And bring the Queen, and watch’d him from the gates;

  And Lancelot past away among the flowers—

  For then was latter April—and return’d

  Among the flowers, in May, with Guinevere.

  To whom arrived, by Dubric the high saint,

  Chief of the church in Britain, and before

  The stateliest of her altar-shrines, the King

  That morn was married, while in stainless white,

  The fair beginners of a nobler time,

  And glorying in their vows and him, his knights

  Stood round him, and rejoicing in his joy.

  Far shone the fields of May thro’ open door,

  The sacred altar blossom’d white with May,

  The sun of May descended on their King,

  They gazed on all earth’s beauty in their Queen,

  Roll’d incense, and there past along the hymns

  A voice as of the waters, while the two

  Sware at the shrine of Christ a deathless love.

  And Arthur said, “Behold, thy doom is mine.

  Let chance what will, I love thee to the death!”

  To whom the Queen replied with drooping eyes,

  “King and my lord, I love thee to the death!”

  And holy Dubric spread his hands and spake:

  “Reign ye, and live and love, and make the world

  Other, and may thy Queen be one with thee,

  And all this Order of thy Table Round

  Fulfil the boundless purpose of their King!”

  So Dubric said; but when they left the shrine

  Great lords from Rome before the portal stood.

  In scornful stillness gazing as they past;

  Then while they paced a city all on fire

  With sun and cloth of gold, the trumpets blew,

  And Arthur’s knighthood sang before the King:—

  “Blow trumpet, for the world is white with May!

  Blow trumpet, the long night hath roll’d away!

  Blow thro’ the living world—‘Let the King reign!’

  “Shall Rome or Heathen rule in Arthur’s realm?

  Flash brand and lance, fall battle-axe upon helm,

  Fall battle-axe, and flash brand! Let the King reign!

  “Strike for the King and live! his knights have heard

  That God hath told the King a secret word.

  Fall battle-axe, and flash brand! Let the King reign!

  “Blow trumpet! he will lift us from the dust.

  Blow trumpet! live the strength, and die the lust!

  Clang battle-axe, and clash brand! Let the King reign!

  “Strike for the King and die! and if thou diest,

  The King is king, and ever wills the highest.

  Clang battle-axe, and clash brand! Let the King reign!

  “Blow, for our Sun is mighty in his May!

  Blow, for our Sun is mightier day by day!

  Clang battle-axe, and clash brand! Let the King reign!

  “The King will follow Christ, and we the King,

  In whom high God hath breathed a secret thing.

  Fall battle-axe, and clash brand! Let the King reign!”

  So sang the knighthood, moving to their hall.

  There at the banquet those great lords from Rome,

  The slowly-fading mistress of the world,

  Strode in and claim’d their tribute as of yore.

  But Arthur spake: “Behold, for these have sworn

  To wage my wars, and worship me their King;

  The old order changeth, yielding place to new,

  And we that fight for our fair father Christ,

  Seeing that ye be grown too weak and old

  To drive the heathen from your Roman wall,

  No tribute will we pay.” So those great lords

  Drew back in wrath, and Arthur strove with Rome.

  And Arthur and his knighthood for a space

  Were all one will, and thro’ that strength the King

  Drew in the petty princedoms under him,

  Fought, and in twelve great battles overcame

  The heathen hordes, and made a realm and reign’d.

  THE ROUND TABLE

  GARETH AND LYNETTE THE MARRIAGE OF GERAINT GERAINT AND ENID BALIN AND BALAN MERLIN AND VIVIEN

  LANCELOT AND ELAINE THE HOLY GRAIL PELLEAS AND ETTARRE THE LAST TOURNAMENT GUINEVERE

  GARETH AND LYNETTE

  THE last tall son of Lot and Bellicent,

  And tallest, Gareth, in a showerful spring

  Stared at the spate. A slender-shafted pine

  Lost footing, fell, and so was whirl’d away.

  “How he went down,” said Gareth, “as a false

  knight

  Or evil king before my lance, if lance

  Were mine to use—O senseless cataract,

  Bearing all down in thy precipitancy—

  And yet thou art but swollen with cold snows

  And mine is living blood. Thou dost His will,

  The Maker’s, and not knowest, and I that know,

  Have strength and wit, in my good mother’s hall

  Linger with vacillating obedience,

  Prison’d, and kept and coax’d and whistled to—

  Since the good mother holds me still a child!

  Good mother is bad mother unto me!

  A worse were better; yet no worse would I.

  Heaven yield her for it, but in me put force

  To weary her ears with one continuous prayer,

  Until she let me fly discaged to sweep

  In ever-highering eagle-circles up

  To the great Sun of Glory, and thence swoop

  Down upon all things base, and dash them dead,

  A knight of Arthur, working out his will,

  To cleanse the world. Why, Gawain, when he came

  With Modred hither in the summertime,

  Ask’d me to tilt with him, the proven knight.

  Modred for want of worthier was the judge.

  Then I so shook him in the saddle, he said,

  ‘Thou hast half prevail’d against me,’ said so—he—

  Tho’ Modred biting his thin lips was mute,

  For he is always sullen—what care I?”

  And Gareth went, and hovering round her chair

  Ask’d, “Mother, tho’ ye count me still the child,

  Sweet mother, do ye love the child?” She laughed,

  “Thou art but a wild-goose to question it.”

  “Then, mother, an ye love the child,” he said,

  “Being a goose and rather tame than wild,

  Hear the child’s story.” “Yea, my well-beloved,

  An ’t were but of the goose and golden eggs.”

  And Gareth answer’d her with kindling eyes:

  “Nay, nay, good mother, but this egg of mine

  Was finer gold than any goose can lay;

  For this is an eagle, a royal eagle, laid

  Almost beyond eye-reach, on such a palm

  As glitters gilded in thy Book of Hours.

  And there was ever haunting round the palm

  A lusty youth, but poor, who often saw

  The splendor sparkling from aloft, and thought,

  ‘An I could climb and lay my hand upon it,

  Then were I wealthier than a leash of kings.’

  But ever when he reach’d a hand to climb,

  One that had loved him from his childhood caught

  And stay’d him, ‘Climb not lest thou break thy neck,

  I charge thee by my love,’ and so the boy,

  Sweet mother, neither clomb nor brake his neck,

  But brake his very heart in pining for it,

  And past away.”

  To whom the mother said,

  “T
rue love, sweet son, had risk’d himself and climb’d,

  And handed down the golden treasure to him.”

  And Gareth answer’d her with kindling eyes:

  “Gold? said I gold?—ay then, why he, or she,

  Or whosoe’er it was, or half the world

  Had ventured—had the thing I spake of been

  Mere gold—but this was all of that true steel

  Whereof they forged the brand Excalibur,

  And lightnings play’d about it in the storm,

  And all the little fowl were flurried at it,

  And there were cries and clashings in the nest,

  That sent him from his senses. Let me go.”

  Then Bellicent bemoan’d herself and said:

  “Hast thou no pity upon my loneliness?

  Lo, where thy father Lot beside the hearth

  Lies like a log, and all but smoulder’d out!

  For ever since when traitor to the King

  He fought against him in the barons’ war,

  And Arthur gave him back his territory,

  His age hath slowly droopt, and now lies there

  A yet-warm corpse, and yet unburiable,

  No more; nor sees, nor hears, nor speaks, nor knows.

  And both thy brethren are in Arthur’s hall,

  Albeit neither loved with that full love

  I feel for thee, nor worthy such a love.

  Stay therefore thou; red berries charm the bird,

  And thee, mine innocent, the jousts, the wars,

  Who never knewest finger-ache, nor pang

  Of wrench’d or broken limb—an often chance

  In those brain-stunning shocks, and tourney-falls,

  Frights to my heart. But stay; follow the deer

  By these tall firs and our fast-falling burns;

  So make thy manhood mightier day by day.

  Sweet is the chase; and I will seek thee out

  Some comfortable bride and fair, to grace

  Thy climbing life, and cherish my prone year,

  Till falling into Lot’s forgetfulness

  I know not thee, myself, nor anything.

  Stay, my best son! ye are yet more boy than man.”

  Then Gareth: “An ye hold me yet for child,

  Hear yet once more the story of the child.

  For, mother, there was once a king, like ours.

  The prince his heir, when tall and marriageable,

  Ask’d for a bride; and thereupon the king

  Set two before him. One was fair, strong, arm’d—

  But to be won by force—and many men

  Desired her; one, good lack, no man desired.

  And these were the conditions of the King:

  That save he won the first by force, he needs

  Must wed that other, whom no man desired,

  A red-faced bride who knew herself so vile

  That evermore she long’d to hide herself,

  Nor fronted man or woman, eye to eye—

  Yea—some she cleaved to, but they died of her.

  And one—they call’d her Fame; and one—O mother,

  How can ye keep me tethered to you?—Shame.

  Man am I grown, a man’s work must I do.

  Follow the deer? follow the Christ, the King,

  Live pure, speak true, right wrong, follow the King—

  Else, wherefore born?”

  To whom the mother said:

  “Sweet son, for there be many who deem him not,

  Or will not deem him, wholly proven king—

  Albeit in mine own heart I knew him King

  When I was frequent with him in my youth,

  And heard him kingly speak, and doubted him

  No more than he, himself; but felt him mine,

  Of closest kin to me. Yet—wilt thou leave

  Thine easeful biding here, and risk thine all,

  Life, limbs, for one that is not proven king?

  Stay, till the cloud that settles round his birth

  Hath lifted but a little. Stay, sweet son.”

  And Gareth answer’d quickly: “Not an hour,

  So that ye yield me—I will walk thro’ fire,

  Mother, to gain it—your full leave to go.

  Not proven, who swept the dust of ruin’d Rome

  From off the threshold of the realm, and crush’d

  The idolaters, and made the people free?

  Who should be king save him who makes us free?”

  So when the Queen, who long had sought in vain

  To break him from intent to which he grew,

  Found her son’s will unwaveringly one,

  She answer’d craftily: “Will ye walk thro’ fire?

  Who walks thro’ fire will hardly heed the smoke.

  Ay, go then, an ye must; only one proof,

  Before thou ask the King to make thee knight,

  Of thine obedience and thy love to me,

  Thy mother,—I demand.”

  And Gareth cried:

  “A hard one, or a hundred, so I go.

  Nay—quick! the proof to prove me to the quick!”

  But slowly spake the mother looking at him:

  “Prince, thou shalt go disguised to Arthur’s hall,

  And hire thyself to serve for meats and drinks

  Among the scullions and the kitchen-knaves,

  And those that hand the dish across the bar.

  Nor shalt thou tell thy name to any one.

  And thou shalt serve a twelvemonth and a day.”

  For so the Queen believed that when her son

  Beheld his only way to glory lead

  Low down thro’ villain kitchen-vassalage,

  Her own true Gareth was too princely-proud

  To pass thereby; so should he rest with her,

  Closed in her castle from the sound of arms.

  Silent awhile was Gareth, then replied:

  “The thrall in person may be free in soul,

  And I shall see the jousts. Thy son am I,

  And, since thou art my mother, must obey.

  I therefore yield me freely to thy will;

  For hence will I, disguised, and hire myself

  To serve with scullions and with kitchen-knaves;

  Nor tell my name to any—no, not the King.”

  Gareth awhile linger’d. The mother’s eye

  Full of wistful fear that he would go,

  And turning toward him wheresoe’er he turn’d,

  Perplext his outward purpose, till an hour

  When, waken’d by the wind which with full voice

  Swept bellowing thro’ the darkness on to dawn,

  He rose, and out of slumber calling two

  That still had tended on him from his birth,

  Before the wakeful mother heard him, went.

  The three were clad like tillers of the soil.

  Southward they set their faces. The birds made

  Melody on branch and melody in mid air.

  The damp hill-slopes were quicken’d into green,

  And the live green had kindled into flowers,

  For it was past the time of Easter-day.

  So, when their feet were planted on the plain

  That broaden’d toward the base of Camelot,

  Far off they saw the silver-misty morn

  Rolling her smoke about the royal mount,

  That rose between the forest and the field.

  At times the summit of the high city flash’d;

  At times the spires and turrets halfway down

  Prick’d thro’ the mist; at times the great gate shone

  Only, that open’d on the field below;

  Anon, the whole fair city had disappear’d.

  Then those who went with Gareth were amazed,

  One crying, “Let us go no further, lord;

  Here is a city of enchanters, built

  By fairy kings.” The second echo’d him,

  “Lord, we have heard from our wise man at home
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  To northward, that this king is not the King,

  But only changeling out of Fairyland,

  Who drave the heathen hence by sorcery

  And Merlin’s glamour.” Then the first again,

  “Lord, there is no such city anywhere,

  But all a vision.”

  Gareth answer’d them

  With laughter, swearing he had glamour enow

  In his own blood, his princedom, youth, and hopes,

  To plunge old Merlin in the Arabian sea;

  So push’d them all unwilling toward the gate.

  And there was no gate like it under heaven.

  For barefoot on the keystone, which was lined

  And rippled like an ever-fleeting wave,

  The Lady of the Lake stood; all her dress

  Wept from her sides as water flowing away;

  But like the cross her great and goodly arms

  Stretch’d under all the cornice and upheld.

  And drops of water fell from either hand;

  And down from one a sword was hung, from one

  A censer, either worn with wind and storm;

  And o’er her breast floated the sacred fish;

  And in the space to left of her, and right,

  Were Arthur’s wars in weird devices done,

  New things and old co-twisted, as if Time

  Were nothing, so inveterately that men

  Were giddy gazing there; and over all

  High on the top were those three queens, the friends

  Of Arthur, who should help him at his need.

  Then those with Gareth for so long a space

  Stared at the figures that at last it seem’d

  The dragon-boughts and elvish emblemings

  Began to move, seethe, twine, and curl. They call’d

  To Gareth, “Lord, the gateway is alive.”

  And Gareth likewise on them fixt his eyes

  So long that even to him they seem’d to move.

  Out of the city a blast of music peal’d.

  Back from the gate started the three, to whom

  From out thereunder came an ancient man,