KING ARTHUR.

FOOTNOTES[A]Talma.[B]Certainly the sculptor of the Farnese Hercules well conceived that ideal character of the demi-god, which makes Aristotle (Prob. 30) class the grand Personification of Labour amongst the Melancholy. It is the union of mournful repose with colossal power, which gives so profound a moral sentiment to that masterpiece of art.[C]"Aus den Saiten, wie aus ihren Himmeln,Neugebor'ne Seraphim."—Schiller.[D]Libitina, the Venus who presided over funerals.[E]Mary Stuart—"the soft Medusa" is an expression strikingly applied to her in her own day.[F]See the correspondence maintained by Francis Bacon and Robert Cecil (the sons of Elizabeth's most faithful friends) with the Scottish court, during the Queen's last illness.[G]"It was after labouring for nearly three weeks under a morbid melancholy, which brought on a stupor not unmixed with some indications of a disordered fancy, that the Queen expired."—Aikin's translation of a Latin letter (author unknown) to Edmund Lambert.Robert Carey, who was admitted to an interview with Elizabeth in her last illness, after describing the passionate anguish of her sighs, observes, "that in all his lifetime before, he never knew her fetch a sigh but when the Queen of Scots was beheaded." Yet this Robert Carey, the well-born mendicant of her bounty, was the first whose eager haste and joyous countenance told James that the throne of the Tudors was at last vacant.[H]"When she (Elizabeth) was conducted through London amidst the joyful acclamations of her subjects, a boy, who personated Truth, was let down from one of the triumphal arches, and presented to her a copy of the Bible. She received the book with the most gracious deportment, placed it next her bosom," &c.—Hume.[I]Robert Dudley, afterwards the Leicester of doubtful fame, attended Elizabeth in her passage to the Tower. The streets, as she passed along, were spread with the finest gravel; banners and pennons, hangings of silk, of velvet, of cloth of gold, were suspended from the balconies; musicians and singers were stationed amidst the populace, as she rode along in her purple robes, preceded by her heralds, &c.[J]The customary phrase was "Laissez aller."[K]"The Life of Sir Philip Sidney," as Campbell finely expresses it, "was Poetry put in action." With him died the Provençal and the Norman—the Ideal of the Middle Ages.[L]"I know I have but the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart of a king, and of a king of England, too."She rode bareheaded through the ranks, a page bearing her helmet, mounted on a war-horse, clad in steel, and wielding a general's truncheon in her hand.[M]"Sextus Quintus, the present Pope, famous for his capacity and his tyranny, had published a crusade against England, and had granted plenary indulgences to every one engaged in the present invasion."—Hume.This Pope was, nevertheless, Elizabeth's admirer as well as foe, and said, "If a son could be born from us two, he would be master of the world."[N]Λαϐε, λαϐε, λαϐε, λαϐε, (seize, seize, seize).—Æschyl. Eumen., 125.[O]The farm of St. Ives, where Cromwell spent three years, which he afterwards recalled with regret—though not unafflicted with dark hypochondria and sullen discontent. Here, as Mr. Forster impressively observes, "in the tenants that rented from him, in the labourers that served under him, he sought to sow the seeds of his after troop of Ironsides....All the famous doctrines of his later and more celebrated years were tried and tested in the little farm of St. Ives....Before going to their field-work in the morning, they (his servants) knelt down with their master in the touching equality of prayer; in the evening they shared with him again the comfort and exaltation of divine precepts."—Forster'sCromwell.[P]Prince Rupert.[Q]Henrietta Maria was the popular battle-cry of the Cavaliers.[R]The reader will recall the well-known story of Cromwell opening the coffin of Charles with the hilt of a private soldier's sword, and, after gazing on the body for some time, observing calmly, that it seemed made for long life,—"Had Nature been his executioner,He would have outlived me!"—Cromwell, a MS. tragedy.[S]King Alfred's crown was actually sold after the execution of Charles the First.[T]When Cromwell came down (leaving his musketeers without the door) to dissolve the Long Parliament, Vane was in the act of urging, through the last stage, the Bill that would have saved the republic—See Forster's spirited account of this scene,Life of Vane, p. 152.

[A]Talma.

[B]Certainly the sculptor of the Farnese Hercules well conceived that ideal character of the demi-god, which makes Aristotle (Prob. 30) class the grand Personification of Labour amongst the Melancholy. It is the union of mournful repose with colossal power, which gives so profound a moral sentiment to that masterpiece of art.

[C]"Aus den Saiten, wie aus ihren Himmeln,Neugebor'ne Seraphim."—Schiller.

[C]

"Aus den Saiten, wie aus ihren Himmeln,Neugebor'ne Seraphim."—Schiller.

[D]Libitina, the Venus who presided over funerals.

[E]Mary Stuart—"the soft Medusa" is an expression strikingly applied to her in her own day.

[F]See the correspondence maintained by Francis Bacon and Robert Cecil (the sons of Elizabeth's most faithful friends) with the Scottish court, during the Queen's last illness.

[G]"It was after labouring for nearly three weeks under a morbid melancholy, which brought on a stupor not unmixed with some indications of a disordered fancy, that the Queen expired."—Aikin's translation of a Latin letter (author unknown) to Edmund Lambert.Robert Carey, who was admitted to an interview with Elizabeth in her last illness, after describing the passionate anguish of her sighs, observes, "that in all his lifetime before, he never knew her fetch a sigh but when the Queen of Scots was beheaded." Yet this Robert Carey, the well-born mendicant of her bounty, was the first whose eager haste and joyous countenance told James that the throne of the Tudors was at last vacant.

Robert Carey, who was admitted to an interview with Elizabeth in her last illness, after describing the passionate anguish of her sighs, observes, "that in all his lifetime before, he never knew her fetch a sigh but when the Queen of Scots was beheaded." Yet this Robert Carey, the well-born mendicant of her bounty, was the first whose eager haste and joyous countenance told James that the throne of the Tudors was at last vacant.

[H]"When she (Elizabeth) was conducted through London amidst the joyful acclamations of her subjects, a boy, who personated Truth, was let down from one of the triumphal arches, and presented to her a copy of the Bible. She received the book with the most gracious deportment, placed it next her bosom," &c.—Hume.

[I]Robert Dudley, afterwards the Leicester of doubtful fame, attended Elizabeth in her passage to the Tower. The streets, as she passed along, were spread with the finest gravel; banners and pennons, hangings of silk, of velvet, of cloth of gold, were suspended from the balconies; musicians and singers were stationed amidst the populace, as she rode along in her purple robes, preceded by her heralds, &c.

[J]The customary phrase was "Laissez aller."

[K]"The Life of Sir Philip Sidney," as Campbell finely expresses it, "was Poetry put in action." With him died the Provençal and the Norman—the Ideal of the Middle Ages.

[L]"I know I have but the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart of a king, and of a king of England, too."She rode bareheaded through the ranks, a page bearing her helmet, mounted on a war-horse, clad in steel, and wielding a general's truncheon in her hand.

[L]"I know I have but the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart of a king, and of a king of England, too."

She rode bareheaded through the ranks, a page bearing her helmet, mounted on a war-horse, clad in steel, and wielding a general's truncheon in her hand.

[M]"Sextus Quintus, the present Pope, famous for his capacity and his tyranny, had published a crusade against England, and had granted plenary indulgences to every one engaged in the present invasion."—Hume.This Pope was, nevertheless, Elizabeth's admirer as well as foe, and said, "If a son could be born from us two, he would be master of the world."

[N]Λαϐε, λαϐε, λαϐε, λαϐε, (seize, seize, seize).—Æschyl. Eumen., 125.

[O]The farm of St. Ives, where Cromwell spent three years, which he afterwards recalled with regret—though not unafflicted with dark hypochondria and sullen discontent. Here, as Mr. Forster impressively observes, "in the tenants that rented from him, in the labourers that served under him, he sought to sow the seeds of his after troop of Ironsides....All the famous doctrines of his later and more celebrated years were tried and tested in the little farm of St. Ives....Before going to their field-work in the morning, they (his servants) knelt down with their master in the touching equality of prayer; in the evening they shared with him again the comfort and exaltation of divine precepts."—Forster'sCromwell.

[P]Prince Rupert.

[Q]Henrietta Maria was the popular battle-cry of the Cavaliers.

[R]The reader will recall the well-known story of Cromwell opening the coffin of Charles with the hilt of a private soldier's sword, and, after gazing on the body for some time, observing calmly, that it seemed made for long life,—"Had Nature been his executioner,He would have outlived me!"—Cromwell, a MS. tragedy.

"Had Nature been his executioner,He would have outlived me!"—Cromwell, a MS. tragedy.

[S]King Alfred's crown was actually sold after the execution of Charles the First.

[T]When Cromwell came down (leaving his musketeers without the door) to dissolve the Long Parliament, Vane was in the act of urging, through the last stage, the Bill that would have saved the republic—See Forster's spirited account of this scene,Life of Vane, p. 152.

In prefixing to this poem a brief explanation of its design, I feel myself involuntarily compelled to refer to the more popular distinctions of Epic Fable, though I do not thereby presume to arrogate to my work that title of Epic which Time alone has the prerogative to confer.

Pope has, accurately and succinctly, defined the three cardinal divisions of Epic Fable to consist in the Probable, the Allegorical, and the Marvellous. For the Probable is indispensable to the vital interest of the action, the Marvellous is the obvious domain of creative invention, and the Allegorical is the most pleasing mode of insinuating some subtler truth, or clothing some profounder moral.

I accept these divisions, because they conform to the simplest principles of rational criticism; and though their combination does not form an Epic, it serves at least to amplify the region and elevate the objects of Romance.

It has been my aim so to blend these divisions, that each may harmonize with the other, and all conduce to the end proposed from the commencement. I have admitted but little episodical incident, and none that does not grow out of what Pope terms "the platform of the story." For the marvellous agencies I have not presumed to make direct use of that Divine Machinery which the war of the Christian Principle with the form of Heathenism might have suggested to the sublime daring of Milton, had he prosecuted his original idea of founding an heroic poem upon the legendary existence of Arthur;—and, on the other hand, the Teuton Mythology, however imaginative and profound, is too unfamiliar and obscure, to permit its employment as an open and visible agency;—such reference to it as occurs, is therefore rather admitted as an appropriate colouring to the composition, than made an integral part of the materials of the canvas: and, not to ask from the ordinary reader an erudition I should have no right to expect, the reference so made is in the simplest form, and disentangled from the necessity of other information than a few brief notes will suffice to afford.

In taking my subject from chivalrous romance, I take, then, those agencies from the Marvellous which chivalrous romance naturally and familiarly affords—the Fairy, the Genius, the Enchanter: not wholly, indeed, in the precise and literal spirit with which our nursery tales receive those creations of Fancy through the medium of French Fabliaux, but in the larger significations by which, in their conceptions of the Supernatural, our fathers often implied the secrets of Nature. For the Romance from which I borrow is the Romance of the North—a Romance, like the Northern mythology, full of typicalmeaning and latent import. The gigantic remains of symbol-worship are visible amidst the rude fables of the Scandinavians, and what little is left to us of the earlier and more indigenous literature of the Cymrians, is characterized by a mysticism profound with parable. This fondness for an interior or double meaning is the most prominent attribute in that Romance popularly called The Gothic, the feature most in common with all creations that bear the stamp of the Northern fancy: we trace it in the poems of the Anglo-Saxons; it returns to us, in our earliest poems after the Conquest; it does notoriginatein the Oriental genius (immemorially addicted to Allegory), but it instinctivelyappropriatesall that Saraconic invention can suggest to the more sombre imagination of the North—it unites to the Serpent of the Edda the flying Griffin of Arabia, the Persian Genius to the Scandinavian Trold,—and wherever it accepts a marvel, it seeks to insinuate a type. This peculiarity, which distinguishes the spiritual essence of the modern from the sensual character of ancient poetry, especially the Roman, is visible wherever a tribe allied to the Goth, the Frank, or the Teuton, carries with it the deep mysteries of the Christian faith. Even in sunny Provence it transfuses a subtler and graver moral into the lays of the joyous troubadour,[A]—and weaves "The Dance of Death" by the joyous streams, and through the glowing orange-groves, of Spain. Onwards, this under-current of meaning flowed, through the various phases of civilization:—it pervaded alike the popular Satire and the dramatic Mystery;—and, preserving its thoughtful calm amidst all the stirring passions that agitated mankind in the age subsequent to the Reformation, not only suffused the luxuriant fancy of the dreamy Spenser, but communicated to the practical intellect of Shakspere that subtle and recondite wisdom which seems the more inexhaustible the more it is examined, and suggests to every new inquirer some new problem in the philosophy of Human Life. Thus, in taking from Northern Romance the Marvellous, we are most faithful to the genuine character of that Romance, when we take with the Marvellous its old companion, the Typical or Allegorical. But these form only two divisions of the three which I have assumed as the components of the unity I seek to accomplish; there remains the Probable, which contains the Actual. To subject the whole poem to allegorical constructions would be erroneous, and opposed to the vital principle of a work of this kind, which needs the support of direct and human interest. The inner and the outer meaning of Fable should flow together, each acting on the other, as the thought and the action in the life of a man. It is true that in order clearly to interpret the action, we should penetrate to the thought. But if we fail of that perception, the action, though less comprehended, still impresses its reality on our senses, and make its appeal to our interest.

I have thus sought to maintain the Probable through that chain of incident in which human agencies are employed, and through those agencies the direct action of the Poem is accomplished; while theAllegorical admits into the Marvellous the introduction of that subtler form of Truth, which if less positive than the Actual, is wider in its application, and ought to be more profound in its significance.

For the rest, it may perhaps be conceded that this poem is not without originality in the conception of its plot and the general treatment of its details. I am not aware of any previous romantic poem which it resembles in its main design, or in the character of its principal incidents;—and, though I may have incurred certain mannerisms of my own day, I yet venture to trust that, in the pervading form or style, the mind employed has been sufficiently in earnest to leave its own peculiar effigy and stamp upon the work. For the incidents narrated, I may, indeed, thank the nature of my subject, if many of them could scarcely fail to be new. The celebrated poets of chivalrous fable—Ariosto, Tasso, and Spenser, have given to their scenery the colourings of the West. The Great North from which Chivalry sprung—its polar seas, its natural wonders, its wild legends, its antediluvian remains—(wide fields for poetic description and heroic narrative)—have been, indeed, not wholly unexplored by poetry, but so little appropriated, that even after Tegner and Oehlenschläger, I dare to hope that I have found tracks in which no poet has preceded me, and over which yet breathes the native air of our National Romance.

For the Manners preserved through this poem, I naturally reject those which the rigid Antiquary would appropriate to the date of that Historical Arthur, of whom we know so little, and take those of the age in which the Arthur of Romance, whom we know so well, revived into fairer life at the breath of Minstrel and Fabliast. The anachronism of chivalrous manners and costume for the British chief and his Knighthood, is absolutely required by all our familiar associations. On the other hand, without affecting any precise accuracy in details, I have kept the country of the brave Prince of the Silures (or South Wales) somewhat more definitely in view, than has been done by the French Romance writers; while in portraying his Saxon foes, I have endeavoured to distinguish their separate nationality, without enforcing too violent a contrast between the rudeness of the heathen Teutons and thepolished Christianity of the Cymrian Knighthood.[B]

May I be permitted to say a word as to the metre I have selected?—One advantage it has,—that while thoroughly English, and not uncultivated by the best of the elder masters, it has never been applied to a poem of equal length, and has not been made too trite and familiar, by the lavish employment of recent writers.[C]Shakspere has taught us its riches in the Venus and Adonis,—Spenser in The Astrophel,—Cowley has sounded its music amidst the various intonations of his irregular lyre. But of late years, if not wholly laid aside, it has been generally neglected for the more artificial and complicated Spenserian stanza, which may seem, at the first glance, to resemble it, but which to the ear is widely different in rhythm and construction.

The reader may perhaps remember that Dryden has spoken with emphatic praise of the "quatrain, or stanza of four in alternate rhyme." He says indeed, "that he had ever judged it more noble, and of greater dignity, both for the sound and number, than any other verse in use amongst us." That metre, in its simple integrity, is comprised in the stanza selected, ending in the vigour and terseness of the rhyming couplet, with which, for the most part, the picture should be closed or the sense clenched. And whatever the imperfection of my own treatment of this variety in poetic form, I hazard a prediction that it will be ultimately revived into more frequent use, especially in narrative, and that its peculiar melodies of rhythm and cadence, as well as the just and measured facilities it affords to expression, neither too diffuse nor too restricted, will be recognized hereafter in the hands of a more accomplished master of our language.

Here ends all that I feel called upon to say respecting a Poem which I now acknowledge as the child of my most cherished hopes, and to which I deliberately confide the task to uphold, and the chance to continue, its father's name.

To this work, conceived first in the enthusiasm of youth, I have patiently devoted the best powers of my maturer years;—if it be worthless, it is at least the worthiest contribution that my abilities enable me to offer to the literature of my country; and I am unalterably convinced, that on this foundation I rest the least perishable monument of those thoughts and those labours which have made the life of my life.

E. BULWER LYTTON.

Of the notes inserted in the first edition I have retained only those which appeared to me absolutely necessary in explanation of the text. Among the notes omitted, was one appended to Book I., which defended at some length, and by numerous examples, two alleged peculiarities of style or mannerism:—I content myself here with stating briefly—

1st.—That in this work (as in my later ones generally) I have adopted what appears to me to have been the practice of Gray (judging from the editions of his Poems revised by himself), in the use of the capital initial. I prefix it—

First, to every substantive that implies a personification; thus War, Fame, &c., may in one line take the small initial as mere nouns, and in another line the capital initial, to denote that they are intended as personifications. This rule is clear—all personifications may be said to represent proper names: love, with a small l, means but a passion or affection; with a large L, Love represents some mythological power that presides over the passion or affection, and is as much a proper name as Venus, Eros, Camdeo, &c.

Secondly, I prefix the capital in those rare instances in which an adjective is used as a noun; as the Unknown, the Obscure,[D]&c. The capital here but answers the use of all printed inventions, in simplifying to the reader the author's meaning. If it be printed "he passed through the obscure," the reader naturally looks for the noun that is to follow the adjective; if the capital initial be used, as "He passed through the Obscure," the eye conveys to the mind without an effort the author's intention to use the adjective as a substantive.

Thirdly, I prefix the capital initial where it serves to give an individual application to words that might otherwise convey only a general meaning; for instance—

"Or his who loves the madding Nymphs to leadO'er the Fork'd Hill.

that is, the Forked Hill,par emphasis,—Parnassus.

The use of the capital in these instances seems to me warranted by common sense, and the best authorities in the minor niceties of our language.

With regard to the other point referred to in the omitted note, I would observe, that I have deliberately used the freest licence in the rapid change of tense from past to present, orvice versâ; as a privilege essential to all ease, spirit, force, and variety, in narrative poetry; and warranted by the uniform practice of Pope, Dryden, and Milton. I subjoin a few examples:—

"Soprayedthey, innocent, and to their thoughtsFirm peace recover'd soon and wonted calm;On to their morning's rural work theyhaste,Among sweet dews and flowers, where any rowOf fruit-trees over-woody reach'd too farTheir pamper'd boughs, and needed hands to checkFruitless embraces; or theyledthe vineTo wed the elm."

Milton'sParadise Lost, Book v., from line 209 to 216.

Here the tense changes three times.

Again:—

"Straightknewhim all the bandsOf angels under watch, and to his stateAnd to his message high in honourrise,For on some message high theyguess'dhim bound."

Ibid., Book v., from line 288 to 291.

"Thus while he spoke, the virgin from the groundUpstartedfresh; already closed the wound;And unconcern'd for all she felt before,Precipitatesher flight along the shore:The hell-hounds as ungorged with flesh and bloodPursuetheir prey and seek their wonted food;The fiend remounts his courser, mends his pace,And all the visionvanish'dfrom the place."

Dryden'sTheod. and Honor.

Pope—not without reason esteemed for verbal correctness and precision—far exceeds all in his lavish use of this privilege, as one or two quotations will amply suffice to show.

"She said, and to the steeds approaching nearDrewfrom his seat the martial charioteer;The vigorous Power[E]the trembling carascends,Fierce for revenge, and Diomedattends:The groaning axlebentbeneath the load," &c.

Pope'sIliad, Book v.

"Pierced through the shoulder first Decopisfell,Next Eunomus and Thoonsunkto Hell.Chersidamas, beneath the navel thrust,Fallsprone to earth, andgraspsthe bloody dust;Cherops, the son of Hipposus,wasnear;Ulysses reach'd him with the fatal spear;But to his aid his brother Socusflies,Socus the brave, the generous, and the wise;Near as hedrewthe warrior thusbegan," &c.

Ibid.

"Behind, unnumber'd multitudesattendTo flank the navy and the shores defend.Full on the front the pressing Trojans bear,And Hector firstcametowering to the war.Phœbus himself the rushing battleled,A veil of clouds involves his radiant head—The Greeksexpectthe shock; the clamours riseFrom different parts andminglein the skiesDirewasthe hiss of darts by heaven flung,And arrows, leaping from the bowstring,sung:Thesedrinkthe life of generous warrior slain—Those guiltlessfallandthirstfor blood in vain."

Pope'sOdyssey.

In the last quotation, brief as it is, the tense changes six times.

I ask indulgence of the reader if I take this occasion to add a very short comment upon three objections to this poem which have been brought under my notice:—

1—that it contains too much learning; 2—that it abounds too much with classical allusions; 3—that it indulges in rare words or archaisms.

I wish I could plead guilty to the honourable charge that it contains too much learning. A distinguished critic has justly observed, that the greatest obstacle which the modern writer attempting an Epic wouldhave to encounter, would be, in his utter impossibility to attain the requisite learning. For an Epic ought to embody the whole learning of the period in which it is composed; and in the present age that is beyond the aspiration of the most erudite scholar or the profoundest philosopher. Still, any attempt at an Heroic Poem must at least comprise all the knowledge which the nature of the subject will admit, and we cannot but observe that the greatest narrative poems are those in which the greatest amount of learning is contained. Beyond all comparison the most learned poems that exist, in reference to the age in which they are composed, are the "Iliad" and "Odyssey;" next to them, the "Paradise Lost;" next to that, the "Æneid," in which the chief charm of the six latter books is in that "exquisite erudition," which Müller so discriminately admires in Virgil; and after these, in point of learning, come perhaps the "Divine Comedy," and the "Fairy Queen." So that I have only to regret my deficiency of learning, rather than to apologize for the excess of it.

With regard to the classical allusions which I have permitted myself, I might shelter my practice under the mantles of our great masters in heroic song—Milton and Spenser; but in fact such admixture of the Classic with the Gothic muse is so essentially the characteristic of the minstrelsy of the middle ages, that without a liberal use of the same combination, I could not have preserved the colouring proper to my subject. And, indeed, I think the advice which one of the most elegant of modern critics has given to the painter, is equally applicable to the poet:—

"Non te igitur lateant antiqua numismata, gemmæ,Quodque refert specie veterum post sæcula mentem;Splendidior quippe ex illis assurgit imagoMagnaque se rerum facies aperit meditanti."[F]

Lastly, the moderate use of archaisms has always been deemed admissible in a narrative poem of some length, and rather perhaps an ornament than a defect, where the action of the poem is laid in remote antiquity. And I may add that not only the revival of old, but the invention of new words, if sparingly resorted to, is among the least contestable of poetic licences—a licence freely recognized by Horace, elaborately maintained by Dryden, and tacitly sanctioned, age after age, by the practice of every poet by whom our language has been enriched. I have certainly not abused either of these privileges, for while I have only adopted three new words of foreign derivation, I do not think there are a dozen words in the whole poem which can be considered archaisms: and in the three or four instances in which such words are not to be found in Milton, Shakspere, or Spenser, they are taken from the Saxon element of our language, and are still popularly used in the northern parts of the island, in which that Saxon element is more tenaciously preserved.

If these matters do not seem to the reader of much importance, in reference to a poem of this design and extent, I will own to him confidentially, that I incline to his opinion. But I have met with no objections to the general composition of this work, more serious than those to which the above remarks are intended to reply. Some objections to special lines or stanzas which appeared to me prompted by a juster criticism, or which occurred to myself in reperusal, I have carefully endeavoured in this edition to remove.

FOOTNOTES[A]Rien n'est plus commun dans la poésie provençale que l'allégorie; seulement elle est un jeu-d'esprit an lieu d'être une action.... Une autre analogie me parait plus spoutanée qu'imitée—la poésie des troubadours qu'on suppose frivole, a souvent retracée des sentiments graves et touchants," &c.—Villemain,Tableau du Moyen Age.[B]In the more historical view of the position of Arthur, I have, however, represented it such as it really appears to have been,—not as the sovereign of all Britain, and the conquering invader of Europe (according to the groundless fable of Geoffrey of Monmouth), but as the patriot Prince of South Wales, resisting successfully the invasion of his own native soil, and accomplishing the object of his career in preserving entire the nationality of his Welsh countrymen. In thus contracting his sphere of action to the bounds of rational truth, his dignity, both moral and poetic, is obviously enhanced. Represented as the champion of all Britain against the Saxons, his life would have been but a notorious and signal failure; but as the preserver of the Cymrian Nationality—of that part of the British population which took refuge in Wales, he has a claim to the epic glory of success.It is for this latter reason that I have gone somewhat out of the strict letter of history, in the poetical licence by which the Mercians are represented as Arthur's principal enemies (though, properly speaking, the Mercian kingdom was not then founded): the alliance between the Mercian and the Welsh, which concludes the Poem—is at least not contrary to the spirit of History—since in very early periods such amicable bonds between the Welsh and the Mercians were contracted, and the Welsh, on the whole, were on better terms with those formidable borderers than with the other branches of the Saxon family.[C]Southey has used it in the "Lay of the Laureate" and "The Poet's Pilgrimage,"—not his best-known and most considerable poems.[D]So Pope, "Spencer himself affects the Obsolete."[E]In the corrupt and thoughtless mode of printing now in vogue, Power is of course printed with a small p, and the sense of the clearest of all English poets instantly becomes obscure."The vigorous power the trembling car ascends."It is not till one has read the line twice over that one perceives "the power" means "the God," which, when printed "the Power," is obvious at a glance.[F]Du Fresnoyde Arte Graphicâ.

FOOTNOTES

[A]Rien n'est plus commun dans la poésie provençale que l'allégorie; seulement elle est un jeu-d'esprit an lieu d'être une action.... Une autre analogie me parait plus spoutanée qu'imitée—la poésie des troubadours qu'on suppose frivole, a souvent retracée des sentiments graves et touchants," &c.—Villemain,Tableau du Moyen Age.

[B]In the more historical view of the position of Arthur, I have, however, represented it such as it really appears to have been,—not as the sovereign of all Britain, and the conquering invader of Europe (according to the groundless fable of Geoffrey of Monmouth), but as the patriot Prince of South Wales, resisting successfully the invasion of his own native soil, and accomplishing the object of his career in preserving entire the nationality of his Welsh countrymen. In thus contracting his sphere of action to the bounds of rational truth, his dignity, both moral and poetic, is obviously enhanced. Represented as the champion of all Britain against the Saxons, his life would have been but a notorious and signal failure; but as the preserver of the Cymrian Nationality—of that part of the British population which took refuge in Wales, he has a claim to the epic glory of success.It is for this latter reason that I have gone somewhat out of the strict letter of history, in the poetical licence by which the Mercians are represented as Arthur's principal enemies (though, properly speaking, the Mercian kingdom was not then founded): the alliance between the Mercian and the Welsh, which concludes the Poem—is at least not contrary to the spirit of History—since in very early periods such amicable bonds between the Welsh and the Mercians were contracted, and the Welsh, on the whole, were on better terms with those formidable borderers than with the other branches of the Saxon family.

It is for this latter reason that I have gone somewhat out of the strict letter of history, in the poetical licence by which the Mercians are represented as Arthur's principal enemies (though, properly speaking, the Mercian kingdom was not then founded): the alliance between the Mercian and the Welsh, which concludes the Poem—is at least not contrary to the spirit of History—since in very early periods such amicable bonds between the Welsh and the Mercians were contracted, and the Welsh, on the whole, were on better terms with those formidable borderers than with the other branches of the Saxon family.

[C]Southey has used it in the "Lay of the Laureate" and "The Poet's Pilgrimage,"—not his best-known and most considerable poems.

[D]So Pope, "Spencer himself affects the Obsolete."

[E]In the corrupt and thoughtless mode of printing now in vogue, Power is of course printed with a small p, and the sense of the clearest of all English poets instantly becomes obscure."The vigorous power the trembling car ascends."It is not till one has read the line twice over that one perceives "the power" means "the God," which, when printed "the Power," is obvious at a glance.

[E]In the corrupt and thoughtless mode of printing now in vogue, Power is of course printed with a small p, and the sense of the clearest of all English poets instantly becomes obscure.

"The vigorous power the trembling car ascends."

It is not till one has read the line twice over that one perceives "the power" means "the God," which, when printed "the Power," is obvious at a glance.

[F]Du Fresnoyde Arte Graphicâ.

Opening—King Arthur keeps holiday in the Vale of Carduel—Pastimes—Arthur's sentiments on life, love, and mortal change—The strange apparition—The King follows the Phantom into the forest—His return—The discomfiture of his knights—the Court disperses—Night—The restless King ascends his battlements—His soliloquy—He is attracted by the light from the Wizard's tower—Merlin described—The King's narrative—The Enchanter's invocation—Morning—The Tilt-yard—Sports, knightly and national—Merlin's address to Arthur—The Three Labours enjoined—Arthur departs from Carduel—His absence explained by Merlin to the Council—Description of Arthur's three friends, Caradoc, Gawaine, and Lancelot—The especial love between Arthur and the last—Lancelot encounters Arthur—The parting of the friends.

Our land's first legends, love and knightly deeds,1And wondrous Merlin, and his wandering King,The triple labour, and the glorious meedsSought in the world of Fable-land, I sing:Go forth, O Song, amidst the banks of old,And glide translucent over sands of gold.Now is the time when, after sparkling showers,2Her starry wreaths the virgin jasmine weaves;Now murmurous bees return with sunny hours;And light wings rustic quick through glinting leaves;Music in every bough; on mead and lawnMay lifts her fragrant altars to the dawn.Now life, with every moment, seems to start3In air, in wave, on earth—above, below;And o'er her new-born children, Nature's heartHeaves with the gladness mothers only know;On poet times the month of poets shone—May deck'd the world, and Arthur fill'd the throne.Hard by a stream, amidst a pleasant vale4King Arthur held his careless holiday:—The stream was blithe with many a silken sail,The vale with many a proud pavilion gay;While Cymri's dragon, from the Roman's hold,[1]Spread with calm wing o'er Carduel's domes of gold.Dark, to the right, thick forests mantled o'er5A gradual mountain sloping to the plain;Whose gloom but lent to light a charm the more,As pleasure pleases most when neighbouring pain;And all our human joys most sweet and holy,Sport in the shadows cast from Melancholy.Below that mount, along the glossy sward6Were gentle groups, discoursing gentle things;Or listening idly where the skilful bardWoke the sweet tempest of melodious strings;Or whispering love—I ween, less idle they,For love's the honey in the flowers of May.Some plied in lusty race the glist'ning oar;7Some, noiseless, snared the silver-scalèd prey;Some wreathed the dance along the level shore;And each was happy in his chosen way.Not by one shaft is Care, the hydra kill'd,So Mirth, determined, had his quiver fill'd.Bright 'mid his blooming Court, like royal Morn8Girt with the Hours that lead the jocund Spring,When to its smile delight and flowers are born,And clouds are rose-hued,—shone the Cymrian King.Above that group, o'er-arch'd from tree to tree,Thick garlands hung their odorous canopy;And in the midst of that delicious shade9Up sprang a sparkling fountain, silver-voiced,And the bee murmur'd and the breezes play'd:In their gay youth, the youth of May rejoiced—And they in hers—as though that leafy hallChimed the heart's laughter with the fountain's fall.Propped on his easy arm, the King reclined,10And glancing gaily round the ring, quoth he—"'Man,' say our sages, 'hath a fickle mind,And pleasures pall, if long enjoyed they be.'But I, methinks, like this soft summer-day,'Mid blooms and sweets could wear the hours away;—"Feel, in the eyes of Love, a cloudless sun,11Taste, in the breath of Love, eternal spring;Could age but keep the joys that youth has won,The human heart would fold its idle wing!If change there be in Fate and Nature's plan,Wherefore blame us?—it is in Time, not Man."He spoke, and from the happy conclave there12Echo'd the murmur, "Time is but to blame:"Each knight glanced amorous on his chosen fair,And to the glance blush'd each assenting dame:But thought had dimm'd the smile in Arthur's eye,And the light speech was rounded by a sigh.And while they murmur'd "Time is but to blame,"13Right in the centre of the silken ring,Sudden stood forth (none marking whence it came),The gloomy shade of some Phantasmal Thing;It stood, dim-outlined in a sable shroud,And shapeless, as in noon-day hangs a cloud.Hush'd was each lip, and every cheek was pale;14The stoutest heart beat tremulous and high:"Arise," it mutter'd from the spectral veil,"I call thee, King!" Then burst the wrathful cry,Feet found the earth, and ready hands the sword,And angry knighthood bristled round its lord.But Arthur rose, and, waiving back the throng,15Fronted the Image with a dauntless brow:Then shrunk the Phantom, indistinct, alongThe unbending herbage, noiseless, dark, and slow;And, where the forest night at noonday made,Glided,—as from the dial glides the shade.Gone;—but an ice-bound horror seemed to cling16To air; the revellers stood transfix'd to stone;While from amidst them, palely pass'd the King,Dragg'd by a will more royal than his own:Onwards he went; the invisible controlCompell'd him, as a dream compels the soul.They saw, and sought to stay him, but in vain,17They saw, and sought to speak, but voice was dumb:So Death some warrior from his armèd trainPlucks forth defenceless when his hour is come.He gains the wood; their sight the shadows bar,And darkness wraps him as the cloud a star.Abruptly, as it came, the charm was past18That bound the circle: as from heavy sleepStarts the hush'd war-camp at the trumpet's blast,Fierce into life the voiceless revellers leap;Swift to the wood the glittering tumult springs,And through the vale the shrillBON-LEF-HERrings.[2]From stream, from tent, from pastime near and far,19All press confusedly to the signal cry—So from theRock of Birds[3]the shout of warSends countless wings in clamour through the sky—The cause a word, the track a sign affords,And all the forest gleams with starry swords.As on some stag the hunters single, gaze,20Gathering together, and from far, the herd,So round the margin of the woodland-mazePale beauty circles, trembling if a birdFlutter a bough, or if, without a sound,Some leaf fall breezeless, eddying to the ground.An hour or more had towards the western seas21Speeded the golden chariot of the day,When a white plume came glancing through the trees,The serried branches groaningly gave way,And, with a bound, delivered from the wood,Safe, in the sun-light, royal Arthur stood.Who shall express the joy that aspect woke!22Some laugh'd aloud, and clapp'd their snowy hands:Some ran, some knelt, some turn'd aside and brokeInto glad tears:—But all unheeding standsThe King; and shivers in the glowing light;And his breast heaves as panting from a fight.Yet still in those pale features, seen more near,23Speak the stern will, the soul to valour true;It shames man not to feel man's human fear,It shames man only if the fear subdue;And masking trouble with a noble guile,Soon the proud heart restores the kingly smile.But no account could anxious love obtain,24Nor curious wonder, of the portents seen:"Bootless his search," he lightly said, "and vainAs haply had the uncourteous summons been.Some mocking sport, perchance, of merry May."He ceased; and, shuddering, turn'd his looks away.Now back, alas! less comely than they went,25Drop, one by one, the seekers from the chace,With mangled plumes and mantles dreadly rent;—Sore bleed the Loves in Elphin's blooming face:Madoc, whose dancing scarcely brush'd the dew,O grief! limps, crippled by a stump of yew!In short, such pranks had brier and bramble play'd,26And stock and stone, with vest, and face, and limb,That had some wretch denied the place was madeFor sprites, a sprite had soon been made of him!And sure, nought less than some demoniac powerHad looks so sweet bewitch'd to lines so sour.But shame and anger vanish'd when they saw27Him whose warm smile a life had well repaid,For noble hearts a noble chief can drawInto that circle where all self doth fade;Lost in the sea a hundred waters roll,And subject natures merge in one great soul.Now once again quick question, brief reply,28"What saw, what heard the King?" Nay, gentles, whatSaw or heard ye?"—"The forest and the sky,The rustling branches,"—"And the Phantom not?No more," quoth Arthur, "of a thriftless chace.For cheer so stinted brief may be the grace."But see, the sun descendeth down the west,29And graver cares to Carduel now recall:Gawaine, my steed;—Sweet ladies, gentle rest,And dreams of happy morrows to ye all."Now stirs the movement on the busy plain;To horse—to boat; and homeward winds the train.O'er hill, down stream, the pageant fades away,30More and more faint the plash of dipping oar;Voices, and music, and the steed's shrill neigh,From the grey twilight dying more and more;Till over stream and valley, wide and far,Reign the sad silence and the solemn star.Save where, like some true poet's lonely soul,31Careless who hears, sings on the unheeded fountain;Save where the thin clouds wanly, slowly rollO'er the mute darkness of the forest mountain—Where, haply, busied with unholy rite,Still glides that Phantom, and dismays the night.Sleep, the sole angel left of all below,32O'er the lull'd city sheds the ambrosial wreaths,Wet with the dews of Eden; Bliss and WoeAre equals, and the lowest slave that breathesUnder the shelter of those healing wings,Reigns, half his life, in realms too fair for Kings.Too fair those realms for Arthur; long he lay33An exiled suppliant at the gate of dreams,And vex'd, and wild, and fitful as a rayQuivering upon the surge of stormy streams;Thought broke in glimmering trouble o'er his breast,And found no billow where its beam could rest.[4]He rose, and round him drew his ermined gown,34Pass'd from his chamber, wound the turret stair,And from his castle's steep embattled crownBared his hot forehead to the fresh'ning air.How Silence, like a god's tranquillity,Fill'd with delighted peace the conscious sky!Broad, luminous, serene, the sovereign moon35Shone o'er the roofs below, the lands afar—The vale so joyous with the mirth at noon;The pastures virgin of the lust of war;And the still river shining as it flows,Calm as a soul on which the heavens repose."And must these pass from me and mine away?"36Murmur'd the monarch; "Must the mountain homeOf those whose fathers, in a ruder day,With naked bosoms rush'd on shrinking Rome,Yield this last refuge from the ruthless wave,And what was Britain be the Saxon's slave?"Why hymn our harps high music in our hall?37Doom'd is the tree whose fruit was noble deeds—Where the axe spared the thunder-bolt must fall,And the wind scatter as it list the seeds!Fate breathes, and kingdoms wither at the breath;But kings are deathless, kingly if their death!"He ceased, and look'd, with a defying eye,38Where the dark forest clothed the mount with aweGazed, and then proudly turn'd;—when lo, hard by,From a lone turret in his keep, he sawThrough the horn casement, a clear steadfast light,Lending meek tribute to the orbs of night.And far, and far, I ween, that little ray39Sent its pure streamlet through the world of air:The wanderer oft, benighted on his way,Saw it, and paused in superstitious prayer;For well he knew the beacon and the tower,And the great Master of the spells of power.There He, who yet in Fable's deathless page40Reigns, compass'd with the ring of pleasing dread,Which the true wizard, whether bard or sage,Draws round him living, and commands when dead—The solemn Merlin—from the midnight wonThe hosts that bow'd to starry Solomon.Not fear that light on Arthur's breast bestow'd,41As with a father's smile it met his gaze;It cheer'd, it soothed, it warm'd him while it glow'd;Brought back the memory of young hopeful days,When the child stood by the great prophet's knee,And drank high thoughts to strengthen years to be.As with a tender chiding, the calm light42Seem'd to reproach him for secreted care,Seem'd to ask back the old familiar rightOf lore to counsel, or of love to share;The prompt heart answers to the voiceless call,And the step quickens o'er the winding wall.Before that tower precipitously sink43The walls, down-shelving to the castle base;A slender drawbridge, swung from brink to brink,Alone gives fearful access to the place;Now, from that tower, the chains the drawbridge raise,And leave the gulf all pathless to the gaze.But close where Arthur stands, a warder's horn,44Fix'd to the stone, to those who dare to winThe enchanter's cell, supplies the note to warnThe mighty weaver of dread webs within.Loud sounds the horn, the chain descending clangs,And o'er the abyss the dizzy pathway hangs;Mutely the door slides sullen in the stone,45And closes back, the gloomy threshold cross'd;There sate the wizard on a Druid throne,Where sateDuw-Iou,[5]ere his reign was lost;His wand uplifted in his solemn hand,And the weird volume on its brazen stand.O'er the broad breast the heavy brows of thought46Hang, as if bow'd beneath the load sublimeOf spoils from Nature's fading boundaries brought,Or the dusk treasure-house of orient Time;And the unutterable calmness showsThe toil's great victory by the soul's repose.Ev'n as the Tyrian views his argosies,47Moor'd in the port (the gold of Ophir won),And heeds no more the billow and the breeze,And the clouds wandering o'er the wintry sun,So calmly Wisdom eyes (its voyage o'er)The traversed ocean from the beetling shore.A hundred years press'd o'er that awful head,48As o'er an Alp, their diadem of snow;And, as an Alp, a hundred years had fled,And left as firm the giant form below;So in the hush of some Chaonian grove,Sat the grey father of Pelasgic Jove.Before that power, sublimer than his own,49With downcast looks, the King inclined the knee;The enchanter smiled, and, bending from his throne,Drew to his breast his pupil tenderly;And press'd his lips on that young forehead fair,And with large hand smooth'd back the golden hair!And, looking in those frank and azure eyes,50"What," said the prophet, "doth my Arthur seekFrom the grey wisdom which the young despise?The young, perchance, are right!—Fair infant, speak!"Thrice sigh'd the monarch, and at length began:"Can wisdom ward the storms of fate from man?"What spell can thrust Affliction from the gate?51What tree is sacred from the lightning flame?""Son," said the seer, "the laurel!—even Fate,Which blasts Ambition, but illumines Fame.Say on."—The King smiled sternly, and obey'd—Track we the steps which track'd the warning shade."On to the wood, and to its inmost dell52Will-less I went," the monarch thus pursued,"Before me still, but darkly visible,The Phantom glided through the solitude;At length it paused,—a sunless pool was near,As ebon black, and yet as chrystal clear."'Look, King, below,' whisper'd the shadowy One:53What seem'd a hand sign'd beckoning to the wave;I look'd below, and never realms undoneShow'd war more awful than the mirror gave;There rush'd the steed, there glanced on spear the spear,And spectre-squadrons closed in fell career."I saw—I saw my dragon standard there,—54Throng'd there the Briton; there the Saxon wheel'd;I saw it vanish from that nether air—I saw it trampled on that noiseless field;On pour'd the Saxon hosts—we fled—we fled!And the Pale Horse[6]rose ghastly o'er the dead."Lo, the wan shadow of a giant hand55Pass'd o'er the pool—the demon war was gone;City on city stretch'd, and land on land;The wondrous landscape broadening, lengthening on,Till that small compass in its clasp contain'dAll this wide isle o'er which my fathers reign'd."There, by the lord of streams, a palace rose;56On bloody floors there was a throne of state;And in the land there dwelt one race—our foes;And on the single throne the Saxon sate!And Cymri's crown was on his knitted brow;And where stands Carduel, went the labourer's plough."And east and west, and north and south I turn'd,57And call'd my people as a king should call;Pale in the hollow mountains I discern'dRude scatter'd stragglers from the common thrall;Kingless and armyless, by crag and cave,—Ghosts on the margin of their country's grave."And even there, amidst the barren steeps,58I heard the tramp, I saw the Saxon steel;Aloft, red Murder like a deluge sweeps,Nor rock can save, nor cavern can conceal;Hill after hill, the waves devouring rise,Till in one mist of carnage closed my eyes!"Then spoke the hell-born shadow by my side—59'O king, who dreamest, amid sweets and bloom,Life, like one summer holiday, can glide,Blind to the storm-cloud of the coming doom;Arthur Pendragon, to the Saxon's swayThy kingdom and thy crown shall pass away.'"'And who art thou, that Heaven's august decrees60Usurp'st thus?' I cried, and lo the spaceWas void!—Amidst the horror of the trees,And by the pool, which mirror'd back the faceOf Dark in crystal darkness—there I stood,And the sole spectre was the Solitude!"I knew no more—strong as a mighty dream61The trouble seized the soul, and seal'd the sense;I knew no more, till in the blessed beam,Life sprung to loving Nature for defence;Vale, flower, and fountain laugh'd in jocund spring,And pride came back,—again I was a king!"But, ev'n the while with airy sport of tongue62(As with light wing the skylark from its nestLures the invading step) I led the throngFrom the dark brood of terror in my breast;Still frown'd the vision on my haunted eye,And blood seem'd reddening in the azure sky."O thou, the Almighty Lord of earth and heaven,63Without whose will not ev'n a sparrow falls,If to my sight the fearful truth was given,If thy dread hand hath graven on these wallsThe Chaldee's doom, and to the stranger's swayMy kingdom and my crown shall pass away,—"Grant this—a freeman's, if a monarch's, prayer!—64Life, while my life one man from chains can save;While earth one refuge, or the cave one lair,Yields to the closing struggle of the brave!—Mine the last desperate but avenging hand;If reft the sceptre, not resign'd the brand!""Close to my clasp!" the prophet cried, "Impart65To these iced veins the glow of youth once more;The healthful throb of one great human heartBaffles more fiends than all a magian's lore;Brave child——" Young arms embracing check'd the rest,And youth and age stood mingled breast to breast."Ho!" cried the mighty master, while he broke66From the embrace, and round from vault to floorMysterious echoes answered as he spoke;And flames twined snake-like round the wand he bore.And freezing winds tumultuous swept the cell,As from the wings of hosts invisible:"Ho! ye spiritual Ministers of all67The airy space below the Sapphire Throne,To the swift axle of this earthly ball—Yea, to the deep, where evermore aloneHell's king with memory of lost glory dwells.And from that memory weaves his hell of hells;—"Ho! ye who fill the crevices of air,68And speed the whirlwind round the reeling bark—Or dart destroying in the forkèd glare,Or rise—the bloodless People of the Dark,In the pale shape of Dreams—when to the bedOf Murder glide the simulated dead,—"Hither ye myriad hosts!—O'er tower and dome,69Wait the high mission, and attend the word;Whether to pierce the mountain with the gnome,Or soar to heights where never wing'd the bird;So that the secret and the boon ye wrestFrom Time's cold grasp, or Fate's reluctant breast!"Mute stood the King—when lo, the dragon-keep70Shook to its rack'd foundations, as when allCorycia's caverns and the Delphic steepShook to the foot-tread of invading Gaul;[7]Or, as his path when flaming Ætna frees,Shakes some proud city on Sicilian seas;Reel'd heaving from his feet the dizzy floor;71Swam dreamlike on his gaze the fading cell;As falls the seaman, when the waves dash o'erThe plank that glideth from his grasp—he fell.To eyes ungifted, deadly were the leastOf those last mysteries, Nature yields her priest.Morn, the joy-bringer, from her sparkling urn72Scatters o'er herb and flower the orient dew;The larks to heaven, and souls to thought return—Life, in each source, leaps rushing forth anew,Fills every grain in Nature's boundless plan,And wakes new fates in each desire of man.In each desire, each thought, each fear, each hope,73Each scheme, each wish, each fancy, and each end,That morn calls forth, say, who can span the scope?Who track the arrow which the soul may send?One morning woke Olympia's youthful son,And long'd for fame—and half the world was won.Fair shines the sun on stately Carduel;74The falcon, hoodwink'd, basks upon the wall;The tilt-yard echoes with the clarion's swell,And lusty youth comes thronging to the call;And martial sports (the daily wont) begin,The page must practise if the knight would win.Some spur the palfrey at the distant ring;75Some, with blunt lance, in mimic tourney charge;Here skirs the pebble from the poisèd sling,Or flies the arrow rounding to the targe;While Age and Fame sigh smiling to beholdThe young leaves budding to replace the old.Nor yet forgot, amid the special sports76Of polish'd Chivalry, the primal ten[8]Athletic contests, known in elder courtsEre knighthood rose from the great Father-men.Beyond the tilt-yard spread the larger space,For the strong wrestle, and the breathless race;Here some, the huge dull weights up-heaving throw;77Some ply the staff, and some the sword and shield;And some that falchion with its thunder-blowWhichHeus[9]the Guardian, taught the Celt, to wield;Heus, who first guided o'er "the Hazy Main"Our Titan[10]sires from Defrobanni's plain.Life thus astir, and sport upon the wing,78Why yet doth Arthur dream day's prime away?Still in charm'd slumber lies the quiet King;On his own couch the merry sunbeams play,Gleam o'er the arms hung trophied from the wall;And Cymri's antique crown surmounting all.Slowly he woke; life came back with a sigh79(That herald, or that follower, to the gateOf all our knowledge)—and his startled eyeFell where beside his couch the prophet sate;And with that sight rush'd back the mystic cell,The awful summons, the arrested spell."Prince," said the prophet, "with this morn awake80From pomp, from pleasure, to high toils and brave;From yonder wall the arms of knighthood take,But leave the crown the knightly arms may save;O'er mount and vale, go, pilgrim, forth alone,And win the gifts which shall defend a throne."Thus speak the Fates—till in the heavens the sun81Rounds his revolving course, O King, returnTo man's first, noblest birthright,TOIL:—so wonIn Grecian fable, to the ambrosial urnOf joyous Hebè, and the Olympian grove,The labouring son Alemena bore to Jove."By the stout heart to peril's sight inured,82By the wise brain which toil hath stored and skill'd,Valour is school'd and glory is secured,And the large ends of fame and fate fulfill'd:But hear the gifts thy year of proof must gain,To fail in one leaves those achieved in vain."The falchion, welded from a diamond gem,83Hid in the Lake of Argent Music-Falls,Where springs a forest from a single stem,And moon-lit waters close o'er Cuthite halls—First taste the herb that grows upon a grave,Then see the bark that wafts thee down the wave."The silver Shield in which the infant sleep84Of Thor was cradled,—now the jealous careOf the fierce dwarf whose home is on the deep,Where drifting ice-rocks clash in lifeless air;And War's pale Sisters smile to see the shockStir the still curtains round the couch of Lok."And last of all—before the Iron Gate85Which opes its entrance at the faintest breath,But hath no egress; where remorseless FateSits, weaving life, within the porch of Death;Earth's childlike guide shall wait thee in the gloom,With golden locks, and looks that light the tomb."Achieve the sword, the shield, the virgin guide,86And in those gifts appease the Powers of wrath;Be danger braved, and be delight defied,From grief take wisdom, and from wisdom faith;—And though dark wings hang o'er these threaten'd halls,Though war's red surge break thundering round thy walls,"Though, in the rear of time, these prophet eyes87See to thy sons, thy Cymrians, many a woe;Yet from thy loins a race of kings shall rise,Whose throne shall shadow all the seas that flow;Whose empire, broader than the Cæsar won,Shall clasp a realm where never sets the sun:"And thou, thyself, shalt live from age to age,88A thought of beauty and a type of fame;—Not the faint memory of some mouldering page,But by the hearths of men a household name:Theme to all song, and marvel to all youth—Beloved as Fable, yet believed as Truth."But if thou fail—thrice woe!" Up sprang the King:89"Let the woe fall on feeble kings who failTheir country's need! When eagles spread the wing,They face the sun, not tremble at the gale:And, if ordain'd heaven's mission to perform,They bear the thunder where they cleave the storm."Ere yet the shadows from the castle's base90Show'd lapsing noon—in Carduel's council-hall,To the high princes of the Dragon race,The mighty Prophet, whom the awe of allAs Fate's unerring oracle adored,—Told the self exile of the parted lord;For his throne's safety and his country's weal91On high emprise to distant regions bound;The cause must wisdom for success conceal;For each sage counsel is, as fate, profound:And none may trace the travail in the seedTill the blade burst to glory in the deed.Few were the orders, as wise orders are,92For the upholding of the chiefless throne;To strengthen peace and yet prepare for war;Lest the fierce Saxon (Arthur's absence known)Loose death's pale charger from the broken rein,To its grim pastures on the bloody plain.Leave we the startled Princes in the hall;93Leave we the wondering babblers in the mart;The grief, the guess, the hope, the doubt, and allThat stir a nation to its inmost heart,When some portentous Chance, unseen till then,Strides in the circles of unthinking men.[11]Where the screen'd portal from the embattled town94Opes midway on the hill, the lonely King,Forth issuing, guides his barded charger downThe steep descent. Amidst the pomp of springLapses the lucid river; jocund MayWaits in the vale to strew with flowers his way.Of brightest steel (but not emboss'd with gold95As when in tourneys rode the royal knight),His arms flash sunshine back; the azure foldOf the broad mantle, like a wave of light,Floats tremulous, and leaves the sword-arm free.—Fair was that darling of all Poetry!Through the raised vizor beam'd the fearless eye,96The limpid mirror of a stately soul;Bright with young hope, but grave with purpose high;Sweet to encourage, steadfast to control;An eye from which subjected hosts might draw,As from a double fountain, love and awe.The careless curl, that from the helm escaped,97Gleam'd in the sunlight, lending gold to gold.Nor fairer face, in Parian marble shaped,Beam'd gracious down from Delian shrines of old;Albeit in bolder majesty look'd forthThe hardy soul of the chivalric NorthO'er the light limb, and o'er the shoulders broad,98The steel flow'd pliant as a silken vest;Strength was so supple that like grace it show'd,And force was only by its ease confest;Ev'n as the storms in gentlest waters sleep,And in the ripple flows the mighty deep.Now wound his path beside the woods that hang99O'er the green pleasaunce of the sunlit plain,When a young footstep from the forest sprang,And a light hand was on the charger's rein;Surprised, the adventurer halts,—but pleased surveysThe friendly face that smiles upon his gaze.Of all the flowers of knighthood in his train100Three he loved best; young Caradoc the mild,Whose soul was fill'd with song; and frank Gawaine,[12]Whom mirth for ever, like a fairy child,Lock'd from the cares of life; but neither grewClose to his heart, like Lancelot the true.Gawaine when gay, and Caradoc when grave,101Pleased: but young Lancelot, or grave or gay.As yet life's sea had roll'd not with a waveTo rend the plank from those twin hearts away;At childhood's gate instinctive love began,And warm'd with every sun that led to man.The same sports lured them, the same labours strung,102The same song thrill'd them with the same delight;Where in the aisle their maiden arms had hung,The same moon lit them through the watchful night;The same day bound their knighthood to maintainLife from reproach, and honour from a stain.And if the friendship scarce in each the same,103The soul has rivals where the heart has not;So Lancelot loved his Arthur more than fame,And Arthur more than life his Lancelot.Lost here Art's mean distinctions! knightly troth,Frank youth, high thoughts, crown'd Nature's kings in both.[13]"Whither wends Arthur?" "Whence comes Lancelot?"104"From yonder forest, sought at dawn of day.""Why from the forest?" "Prince and brother, what,When the bird startled flutters from the spray,Makes the leaves quiver? What disturbs the rillIf but a zephyr floateth from the hill?"And ask'st thou why thy brother's heart is stirr'd105By every tremor that can vex thine own?What in that forest hadst thou seen or heard?What was that shadow o'er thy sunshine thrown?Thy lips were silent,—be the secret thine;But half the trouble it conceal'd was mine."Did danger meet thee in that dismal lair?106'Twas mine to face it as thy heart had done.'Twas mine——" "O brother," cried the King, "beware,The fiend has snares it shames not man to shun;—Ah, woe to eyes on whose recoiling sightOpes the dark world beyond the veil of light!"Listen to Fate; till once more eves in May107WelcomeBal-huanback to yon sweet sky,[14]The hunter's lively horn, the hound's deep bay,May fill with joy theVale of Melody,[15]On spell-bound ears the Harper's tones may fall,Love deck the bower, and Pleasure trim the hall—"But thou, oh thou, my Lancelot shalt mourn108The void, a life withdrawn bequeaths the soul;No mirth shall greet thee in the buxom horn—Nor flash in liquid sunshine from the bowl;Sorrow shall sit where I have dwelt,—and beA second Arthur in its truth to thee."Alone I go;—submit; since thus the Fates109And the great Prophet of our race ordain;So shall we drive invasion from our gates,Guard life from shame, and Cymri from the chain;No more than this my soul to thine may tell—Forgive,—Saints shield thee!—now thy hand—farewell!""Farewell! Can danger be more strong than death—110Loose the soul's link, the grave-surviving vow?Wilt thou find fragrance ev'n in glory's wreath,If valour weave it for thy single brow?No!—not farewell! What claim more strong than brotherCanst thou allow?"—"My Country is my Mother!"—At the rebuke of those mild, solemn words,111Friendship submissive bow'd—its voice was still'd;As when some mighty bard with sudden chordsStrikes down the passion he before had thrill'd,Making grief awe;—so rush'd that sentence o'erThe soul it master'd;—Lancelot urged no more;But loosing from the hand it clasp'd, his own,112He waved farewell, and turn'd his face away;His sorrow only by his silence shown:—Thus, when from earth glides summer's golden day,Music forsakes the boughs, and winds the stream;And life, in deep'ning quiet, mourns the beam.

Now is the time when, after sparkling showers,2Her starry wreaths the virgin jasmine weaves;Now murmurous bees return with sunny hours;And light wings rustic quick through glinting leaves;Music in every bough; on mead and lawnMay lifts her fragrant altars to the dawn.

Now life, with every moment, seems to start3In air, in wave, on earth—above, below;And o'er her new-born children, Nature's heartHeaves with the gladness mothers only know;On poet times the month of poets shone—May deck'd the world, and Arthur fill'd the throne.

Hard by a stream, amidst a pleasant vale4King Arthur held his careless holiday:—The stream was blithe with many a silken sail,The vale with many a proud pavilion gay;While Cymri's dragon, from the Roman's hold,[1]Spread with calm wing o'er Carduel's domes of gold.

Dark, to the right, thick forests mantled o'er5A gradual mountain sloping to the plain;Whose gloom but lent to light a charm the more,As pleasure pleases most when neighbouring pain;And all our human joys most sweet and holy,Sport in the shadows cast from Melancholy.

Below that mount, along the glossy sward6Were gentle groups, discoursing gentle things;Or listening idly where the skilful bardWoke the sweet tempest of melodious strings;Or whispering love—I ween, less idle they,For love's the honey in the flowers of May.

Some plied in lusty race the glist'ning oar;7Some, noiseless, snared the silver-scalèd prey;Some wreathed the dance along the level shore;And each was happy in his chosen way.Not by one shaft is Care, the hydra kill'd,So Mirth, determined, had his quiver fill'd.

Bright 'mid his blooming Court, like royal Morn8Girt with the Hours that lead the jocund Spring,When to its smile delight and flowers are born,And clouds are rose-hued,—shone the Cymrian King.Above that group, o'er-arch'd from tree to tree,Thick garlands hung their odorous canopy;

And in the midst of that delicious shade9Up sprang a sparkling fountain, silver-voiced,And the bee murmur'd and the breezes play'd:In their gay youth, the youth of May rejoiced—And they in hers—as though that leafy hallChimed the heart's laughter with the fountain's fall.

Propped on his easy arm, the King reclined,10And glancing gaily round the ring, quoth he—"'Man,' say our sages, 'hath a fickle mind,And pleasures pall, if long enjoyed they be.'But I, methinks, like this soft summer-day,'Mid blooms and sweets could wear the hours away;—

"Feel, in the eyes of Love, a cloudless sun,11Taste, in the breath of Love, eternal spring;Could age but keep the joys that youth has won,The human heart would fold its idle wing!If change there be in Fate and Nature's plan,Wherefore blame us?—it is in Time, not Man."

He spoke, and from the happy conclave there12Echo'd the murmur, "Time is but to blame:"Each knight glanced amorous on his chosen fair,And to the glance blush'd each assenting dame:But thought had dimm'd the smile in Arthur's eye,And the light speech was rounded by a sigh.

And while they murmur'd "Time is but to blame,"13Right in the centre of the silken ring,Sudden stood forth (none marking whence it came),The gloomy shade of some Phantasmal Thing;It stood, dim-outlined in a sable shroud,And shapeless, as in noon-day hangs a cloud.

Hush'd was each lip, and every cheek was pale;14The stoutest heart beat tremulous and high:"Arise," it mutter'd from the spectral veil,"I call thee, King!" Then burst the wrathful cry,Feet found the earth, and ready hands the sword,And angry knighthood bristled round its lord.

But Arthur rose, and, waiving back the throng,15Fronted the Image with a dauntless brow:Then shrunk the Phantom, indistinct, alongThe unbending herbage, noiseless, dark, and slow;And, where the forest night at noonday made,Glided,—as from the dial glides the shade.

Gone;—but an ice-bound horror seemed to cling16To air; the revellers stood transfix'd to stone;While from amidst them, palely pass'd the King,Dragg'd by a will more royal than his own:Onwards he went; the invisible controlCompell'd him, as a dream compels the soul.

They saw, and sought to stay him, but in vain,17They saw, and sought to speak, but voice was dumb:So Death some warrior from his armèd trainPlucks forth defenceless when his hour is come.He gains the wood; their sight the shadows bar,And darkness wraps him as the cloud a star.

Abruptly, as it came, the charm was past18That bound the circle: as from heavy sleepStarts the hush'd war-camp at the trumpet's blast,Fierce into life the voiceless revellers leap;Swift to the wood the glittering tumult springs,And through the vale the shrillBON-LEF-HERrings.[2]

From stream, from tent, from pastime near and far,19All press confusedly to the signal cry—So from theRock of Birds[3]the shout of warSends countless wings in clamour through the sky—The cause a word, the track a sign affords,And all the forest gleams with starry swords.

As on some stag the hunters single, gaze,20Gathering together, and from far, the herd,So round the margin of the woodland-mazePale beauty circles, trembling if a birdFlutter a bough, or if, without a sound,Some leaf fall breezeless, eddying to the ground.

An hour or more had towards the western seas21Speeded the golden chariot of the day,When a white plume came glancing through the trees,The serried branches groaningly gave way,And, with a bound, delivered from the wood,Safe, in the sun-light, royal Arthur stood.

Who shall express the joy that aspect woke!22Some laugh'd aloud, and clapp'd their snowy hands:Some ran, some knelt, some turn'd aside and brokeInto glad tears:—But all unheeding standsThe King; and shivers in the glowing light;And his breast heaves as panting from a fight.

Yet still in those pale features, seen more near,23Speak the stern will, the soul to valour true;It shames man not to feel man's human fear,It shames man only if the fear subdue;And masking trouble with a noble guile,Soon the proud heart restores the kingly smile.

But no account could anxious love obtain,24Nor curious wonder, of the portents seen:"Bootless his search," he lightly said, "and vainAs haply had the uncourteous summons been.Some mocking sport, perchance, of merry May."He ceased; and, shuddering, turn'd his looks away.

Now back, alas! less comely than they went,25Drop, one by one, the seekers from the chace,With mangled plumes and mantles dreadly rent;—Sore bleed the Loves in Elphin's blooming face:Madoc, whose dancing scarcely brush'd the dew,O grief! limps, crippled by a stump of yew!

In short, such pranks had brier and bramble play'd,26And stock and stone, with vest, and face, and limb,That had some wretch denied the place was madeFor sprites, a sprite had soon been made of him!And sure, nought less than some demoniac powerHad looks so sweet bewitch'd to lines so sour.

But shame and anger vanish'd when they saw27Him whose warm smile a life had well repaid,For noble hearts a noble chief can drawInto that circle where all self doth fade;Lost in the sea a hundred waters roll,And subject natures merge in one great soul.

Now once again quick question, brief reply,28"What saw, what heard the King?" Nay, gentles, whatSaw or heard ye?"—"The forest and the sky,The rustling branches,"—"And the Phantom not?No more," quoth Arthur, "of a thriftless chace.For cheer so stinted brief may be the grace.

"But see, the sun descendeth down the west,29And graver cares to Carduel now recall:Gawaine, my steed;—Sweet ladies, gentle rest,And dreams of happy morrows to ye all."Now stirs the movement on the busy plain;To horse—to boat; and homeward winds the train.

O'er hill, down stream, the pageant fades away,30More and more faint the plash of dipping oar;Voices, and music, and the steed's shrill neigh,From the grey twilight dying more and more;Till over stream and valley, wide and far,Reign the sad silence and the solemn star.

Save where, like some true poet's lonely soul,31Careless who hears, sings on the unheeded fountain;Save where the thin clouds wanly, slowly rollO'er the mute darkness of the forest mountain—Where, haply, busied with unholy rite,Still glides that Phantom, and dismays the night.

Sleep, the sole angel left of all below,32O'er the lull'd city sheds the ambrosial wreaths,Wet with the dews of Eden; Bliss and WoeAre equals, and the lowest slave that breathesUnder the shelter of those healing wings,Reigns, half his life, in realms too fair for Kings.

Too fair those realms for Arthur; long he lay33An exiled suppliant at the gate of dreams,And vex'd, and wild, and fitful as a rayQuivering upon the surge of stormy streams;Thought broke in glimmering trouble o'er his breast,And found no billow where its beam could rest.[4]

He rose, and round him drew his ermined gown,34Pass'd from his chamber, wound the turret stair,And from his castle's steep embattled crownBared his hot forehead to the fresh'ning air.How Silence, like a god's tranquillity,Fill'd with delighted peace the conscious sky!

Broad, luminous, serene, the sovereign moon35Shone o'er the roofs below, the lands afar—The vale so joyous with the mirth at noon;The pastures virgin of the lust of war;And the still river shining as it flows,Calm as a soul on which the heavens repose.

"And must these pass from me and mine away?"36Murmur'd the monarch; "Must the mountain homeOf those whose fathers, in a ruder day,With naked bosoms rush'd on shrinking Rome,Yield this last refuge from the ruthless wave,And what was Britain be the Saxon's slave?

"Why hymn our harps high music in our hall?37Doom'd is the tree whose fruit was noble deeds—Where the axe spared the thunder-bolt must fall,And the wind scatter as it list the seeds!Fate breathes, and kingdoms wither at the breath;But kings are deathless, kingly if their death!"

He ceased, and look'd, with a defying eye,38Where the dark forest clothed the mount with aweGazed, and then proudly turn'd;—when lo, hard by,From a lone turret in his keep, he sawThrough the horn casement, a clear steadfast light,Lending meek tribute to the orbs of night.

And far, and far, I ween, that little ray39Sent its pure streamlet through the world of air:The wanderer oft, benighted on his way,Saw it, and paused in superstitious prayer;For well he knew the beacon and the tower,And the great Master of the spells of power.

There He, who yet in Fable's deathless page40Reigns, compass'd with the ring of pleasing dread,Which the true wizard, whether bard or sage,Draws round him living, and commands when dead—The solemn Merlin—from the midnight wonThe hosts that bow'd to starry Solomon.

Not fear that light on Arthur's breast bestow'd,41As with a father's smile it met his gaze;It cheer'd, it soothed, it warm'd him while it glow'd;Brought back the memory of young hopeful days,When the child stood by the great prophet's knee,And drank high thoughts to strengthen years to be.

As with a tender chiding, the calm light42Seem'd to reproach him for secreted care,Seem'd to ask back the old familiar rightOf lore to counsel, or of love to share;The prompt heart answers to the voiceless call,And the step quickens o'er the winding wall.

Before that tower precipitously sink43The walls, down-shelving to the castle base;A slender drawbridge, swung from brink to brink,Alone gives fearful access to the place;Now, from that tower, the chains the drawbridge raise,And leave the gulf all pathless to the gaze.

But close where Arthur stands, a warder's horn,44Fix'd to the stone, to those who dare to winThe enchanter's cell, supplies the note to warnThe mighty weaver of dread webs within.Loud sounds the horn, the chain descending clangs,And o'er the abyss the dizzy pathway hangs;

Mutely the door slides sullen in the stone,45And closes back, the gloomy threshold cross'd;There sate the wizard on a Druid throne,Where sateDuw-Iou,[5]ere his reign was lost;His wand uplifted in his solemn hand,And the weird volume on its brazen stand.

O'er the broad breast the heavy brows of thought46Hang, as if bow'd beneath the load sublimeOf spoils from Nature's fading boundaries brought,Or the dusk treasure-house of orient Time;And the unutterable calmness showsThe toil's great victory by the soul's repose.

Ev'n as the Tyrian views his argosies,47Moor'd in the port (the gold of Ophir won),And heeds no more the billow and the breeze,And the clouds wandering o'er the wintry sun,So calmly Wisdom eyes (its voyage o'er)The traversed ocean from the beetling shore.

A hundred years press'd o'er that awful head,48As o'er an Alp, their diadem of snow;And, as an Alp, a hundred years had fled,And left as firm the giant form below;So in the hush of some Chaonian grove,Sat the grey father of Pelasgic Jove.

Before that power, sublimer than his own,49With downcast looks, the King inclined the knee;The enchanter smiled, and, bending from his throne,Drew to his breast his pupil tenderly;And press'd his lips on that young forehead fair,And with large hand smooth'd back the golden hair!

And, looking in those frank and azure eyes,50"What," said the prophet, "doth my Arthur seekFrom the grey wisdom which the young despise?The young, perchance, are right!—Fair infant, speak!"Thrice sigh'd the monarch, and at length began:"Can wisdom ward the storms of fate from man?

"What spell can thrust Affliction from the gate?51What tree is sacred from the lightning flame?""Son," said the seer, "the laurel!—even Fate,Which blasts Ambition, but illumines Fame.Say on."—The King smiled sternly, and obey'd—Track we the steps which track'd the warning shade.

"On to the wood, and to its inmost dell52Will-less I went," the monarch thus pursued,"Before me still, but darkly visible,The Phantom glided through the solitude;At length it paused,—a sunless pool was near,As ebon black, and yet as chrystal clear.

"'Look, King, below,' whisper'd the shadowy One:53What seem'd a hand sign'd beckoning to the wave;I look'd below, and never realms undoneShow'd war more awful than the mirror gave;There rush'd the steed, there glanced on spear the spear,And spectre-squadrons closed in fell career.

"I saw—I saw my dragon standard there,—54Throng'd there the Briton; there the Saxon wheel'd;I saw it vanish from that nether air—I saw it trampled on that noiseless field;On pour'd the Saxon hosts—we fled—we fled!And the Pale Horse[6]rose ghastly o'er the dead.

"Lo, the wan shadow of a giant hand55Pass'd o'er the pool—the demon war was gone;City on city stretch'd, and land on land;The wondrous landscape broadening, lengthening on,Till that small compass in its clasp contain'dAll this wide isle o'er which my fathers reign'd.

"There, by the lord of streams, a palace rose;56On bloody floors there was a throne of state;And in the land there dwelt one race—our foes;And on the single throne the Saxon sate!And Cymri's crown was on his knitted brow;And where stands Carduel, went the labourer's plough.

"And east and west, and north and south I turn'd,57And call'd my people as a king should call;Pale in the hollow mountains I discern'dRude scatter'd stragglers from the common thrall;Kingless and armyless, by crag and cave,—Ghosts on the margin of their country's grave.

"And even there, amidst the barren steeps,58I heard the tramp, I saw the Saxon steel;Aloft, red Murder like a deluge sweeps,Nor rock can save, nor cavern can conceal;Hill after hill, the waves devouring rise,Till in one mist of carnage closed my eyes!

"Then spoke the hell-born shadow by my side—59'O king, who dreamest, amid sweets and bloom,Life, like one summer holiday, can glide,Blind to the storm-cloud of the coming doom;Arthur Pendragon, to the Saxon's swayThy kingdom and thy crown shall pass away.'

"'And who art thou, that Heaven's august decrees60Usurp'st thus?' I cried, and lo the spaceWas void!—Amidst the horror of the trees,And by the pool, which mirror'd back the faceOf Dark in crystal darkness—there I stood,And the sole spectre was the Solitude!

"I knew no more—strong as a mighty dream61The trouble seized the soul, and seal'd the sense;I knew no more, till in the blessed beam,Life sprung to loving Nature for defence;Vale, flower, and fountain laugh'd in jocund spring,And pride came back,—again I was a king!

"But, ev'n the while with airy sport of tongue62(As with light wing the skylark from its nestLures the invading step) I led the throngFrom the dark brood of terror in my breast;Still frown'd the vision on my haunted eye,And blood seem'd reddening in the azure sky.

"O thou, the Almighty Lord of earth and heaven,63Without whose will not ev'n a sparrow falls,If to my sight the fearful truth was given,If thy dread hand hath graven on these wallsThe Chaldee's doom, and to the stranger's swayMy kingdom and my crown shall pass away,—

"Grant this—a freeman's, if a monarch's, prayer!—64Life, while my life one man from chains can save;While earth one refuge, or the cave one lair,Yields to the closing struggle of the brave!—Mine the last desperate but avenging hand;If reft the sceptre, not resign'd the brand!"

"Close to my clasp!" the prophet cried, "Impart65To these iced veins the glow of youth once more;The healthful throb of one great human heartBaffles more fiends than all a magian's lore;Brave child——" Young arms embracing check'd the rest,And youth and age stood mingled breast to breast.

"Ho!" cried the mighty master, while he broke66From the embrace, and round from vault to floorMysterious echoes answered as he spoke;And flames twined snake-like round the wand he bore.And freezing winds tumultuous swept the cell,As from the wings of hosts invisible:

"Ho! ye spiritual Ministers of all67The airy space below the Sapphire Throne,To the swift axle of this earthly ball—Yea, to the deep, where evermore aloneHell's king with memory of lost glory dwells.And from that memory weaves his hell of hells;—

"Ho! ye who fill the crevices of air,68And speed the whirlwind round the reeling bark—Or dart destroying in the forkèd glare,Or rise—the bloodless People of the Dark,In the pale shape of Dreams—when to the bedOf Murder glide the simulated dead,—

"Hither ye myriad hosts!—O'er tower and dome,69Wait the high mission, and attend the word;Whether to pierce the mountain with the gnome,Or soar to heights where never wing'd the bird;So that the secret and the boon ye wrestFrom Time's cold grasp, or Fate's reluctant breast!"

Mute stood the King—when lo, the dragon-keep70Shook to its rack'd foundations, as when allCorycia's caverns and the Delphic steepShook to the foot-tread of invading Gaul;[7]Or, as his path when flaming Ætna frees,Shakes some proud city on Sicilian seas;

Reel'd heaving from his feet the dizzy floor;71Swam dreamlike on his gaze the fading cell;As falls the seaman, when the waves dash o'erThe plank that glideth from his grasp—he fell.To eyes ungifted, deadly were the leastOf those last mysteries, Nature yields her priest.

Morn, the joy-bringer, from her sparkling urn72Scatters o'er herb and flower the orient dew;The larks to heaven, and souls to thought return—Life, in each source, leaps rushing forth anew,Fills every grain in Nature's boundless plan,And wakes new fates in each desire of man.

In each desire, each thought, each fear, each hope,73Each scheme, each wish, each fancy, and each end,That morn calls forth, say, who can span the scope?Who track the arrow which the soul may send?One morning woke Olympia's youthful son,And long'd for fame—and half the world was won.

Fair shines the sun on stately Carduel;74The falcon, hoodwink'd, basks upon the wall;The tilt-yard echoes with the clarion's swell,And lusty youth comes thronging to the call;And martial sports (the daily wont) begin,The page must practise if the knight would win.

Some spur the palfrey at the distant ring;75Some, with blunt lance, in mimic tourney charge;Here skirs the pebble from the poisèd sling,Or flies the arrow rounding to the targe;While Age and Fame sigh smiling to beholdThe young leaves budding to replace the old.

Nor yet forgot, amid the special sports76Of polish'd Chivalry, the primal ten[8]Athletic contests, known in elder courtsEre knighthood rose from the great Father-men.Beyond the tilt-yard spread the larger space,For the strong wrestle, and the breathless race;

Here some, the huge dull weights up-heaving throw;77Some ply the staff, and some the sword and shield;And some that falchion with its thunder-blowWhichHeus[9]the Guardian, taught the Celt, to wield;Heus, who first guided o'er "the Hazy Main"Our Titan[10]sires from Defrobanni's plain.

Life thus astir, and sport upon the wing,78Why yet doth Arthur dream day's prime away?Still in charm'd slumber lies the quiet King;On his own couch the merry sunbeams play,Gleam o'er the arms hung trophied from the wall;And Cymri's antique crown surmounting all.

Slowly he woke; life came back with a sigh79(That herald, or that follower, to the gateOf all our knowledge)—and his startled eyeFell where beside his couch the prophet sate;And with that sight rush'd back the mystic cell,The awful summons, the arrested spell.

"Prince," said the prophet, "with this morn awake80From pomp, from pleasure, to high toils and brave;From yonder wall the arms of knighthood take,But leave the crown the knightly arms may save;O'er mount and vale, go, pilgrim, forth alone,And win the gifts which shall defend a throne.

"Thus speak the Fates—till in the heavens the sun81Rounds his revolving course, O King, returnTo man's first, noblest birthright,TOIL:—so wonIn Grecian fable, to the ambrosial urnOf joyous Hebè, and the Olympian grove,The labouring son Alemena bore to Jove.

"By the stout heart to peril's sight inured,82By the wise brain which toil hath stored and skill'd,Valour is school'd and glory is secured,And the large ends of fame and fate fulfill'd:But hear the gifts thy year of proof must gain,To fail in one leaves those achieved in vain.

"The falchion, welded from a diamond gem,83Hid in the Lake of Argent Music-Falls,Where springs a forest from a single stem,And moon-lit waters close o'er Cuthite halls—First taste the herb that grows upon a grave,Then see the bark that wafts thee down the wave.

"The silver Shield in which the infant sleep84Of Thor was cradled,—now the jealous careOf the fierce dwarf whose home is on the deep,Where drifting ice-rocks clash in lifeless air;And War's pale Sisters smile to see the shockStir the still curtains round the couch of Lok.

"And last of all—before the Iron Gate85Which opes its entrance at the faintest breath,But hath no egress; where remorseless FateSits, weaving life, within the porch of Death;Earth's childlike guide shall wait thee in the gloom,With golden locks, and looks that light the tomb.

"Achieve the sword, the shield, the virgin guide,86And in those gifts appease the Powers of wrath;Be danger braved, and be delight defied,From grief take wisdom, and from wisdom faith;—And though dark wings hang o'er these threaten'd halls,Though war's red surge break thundering round thy walls,

"Though, in the rear of time, these prophet eyes87See to thy sons, thy Cymrians, many a woe;Yet from thy loins a race of kings shall rise,Whose throne shall shadow all the seas that flow;Whose empire, broader than the Cæsar won,Shall clasp a realm where never sets the sun:

"And thou, thyself, shalt live from age to age,88A thought of beauty and a type of fame;—Not the faint memory of some mouldering page,But by the hearths of men a household name:Theme to all song, and marvel to all youth—Beloved as Fable, yet believed as Truth.

"But if thou fail—thrice woe!" Up sprang the King:89"Let the woe fall on feeble kings who failTheir country's need! When eagles spread the wing,They face the sun, not tremble at the gale:And, if ordain'd heaven's mission to perform,They bear the thunder where they cleave the storm."

Ere yet the shadows from the castle's base90Show'd lapsing noon—in Carduel's council-hall,To the high princes of the Dragon race,The mighty Prophet, whom the awe of allAs Fate's unerring oracle adored,—Told the self exile of the parted lord;

For his throne's safety and his country's weal91On high emprise to distant regions bound;The cause must wisdom for success conceal;For each sage counsel is, as fate, profound:And none may trace the travail in the seedTill the blade burst to glory in the deed.

Few were the orders, as wise orders are,92For the upholding of the chiefless throne;To strengthen peace and yet prepare for war;Lest the fierce Saxon (Arthur's absence known)Loose death's pale charger from the broken rein,To its grim pastures on the bloody plain.

Leave we the startled Princes in the hall;93Leave we the wondering babblers in the mart;The grief, the guess, the hope, the doubt, and allThat stir a nation to its inmost heart,When some portentous Chance, unseen till then,Strides in the circles of unthinking men.[11]

Where the screen'd portal from the embattled town94Opes midway on the hill, the lonely King,Forth issuing, guides his barded charger downThe steep descent. Amidst the pomp of springLapses the lucid river; jocund MayWaits in the vale to strew with flowers his way.

Of brightest steel (but not emboss'd with gold95As when in tourneys rode the royal knight),His arms flash sunshine back; the azure foldOf the broad mantle, like a wave of light,Floats tremulous, and leaves the sword-arm free.—Fair was that darling of all Poetry!

Through the raised vizor beam'd the fearless eye,96The limpid mirror of a stately soul;Bright with young hope, but grave with purpose high;Sweet to encourage, steadfast to control;An eye from which subjected hosts might draw,As from a double fountain, love and awe.

The careless curl, that from the helm escaped,97Gleam'd in the sunlight, lending gold to gold.Nor fairer face, in Parian marble shaped,Beam'd gracious down from Delian shrines of old;Albeit in bolder majesty look'd forthThe hardy soul of the chivalric North

O'er the light limb, and o'er the shoulders broad,98The steel flow'd pliant as a silken vest;Strength was so supple that like grace it show'd,And force was only by its ease confest;Ev'n as the storms in gentlest waters sleep,And in the ripple flows the mighty deep.

Now wound his path beside the woods that hang99O'er the green pleasaunce of the sunlit plain,When a young footstep from the forest sprang,And a light hand was on the charger's rein;Surprised, the adventurer halts,—but pleased surveysThe friendly face that smiles upon his gaze.

Of all the flowers of knighthood in his train100Three he loved best; young Caradoc the mild,Whose soul was fill'd with song; and frank Gawaine,[12]Whom mirth for ever, like a fairy child,Lock'd from the cares of life; but neither grewClose to his heart, like Lancelot the true.

Gawaine when gay, and Caradoc when grave,101Pleased: but young Lancelot, or grave or gay.As yet life's sea had roll'd not with a waveTo rend the plank from those twin hearts away;At childhood's gate instinctive love began,And warm'd with every sun that led to man.

The same sports lured them, the same labours strung,102The same song thrill'd them with the same delight;Where in the aisle their maiden arms had hung,The same moon lit them through the watchful night;The same day bound their knighthood to maintainLife from reproach, and honour from a stain.

And if the friendship scarce in each the same,103The soul has rivals where the heart has not;So Lancelot loved his Arthur more than fame,And Arthur more than life his Lancelot.Lost here Art's mean distinctions! knightly troth,Frank youth, high thoughts, crown'd Nature's kings in both.[13]

"Whither wends Arthur?" "Whence comes Lancelot?"104"From yonder forest, sought at dawn of day.""Why from the forest?" "Prince and brother, what,When the bird startled flutters from the spray,Makes the leaves quiver? What disturbs the rillIf but a zephyr floateth from the hill?

"And ask'st thou why thy brother's heart is stirr'd105By every tremor that can vex thine own?What in that forest hadst thou seen or heard?What was that shadow o'er thy sunshine thrown?Thy lips were silent,—be the secret thine;But half the trouble it conceal'd was mine.

"Did danger meet thee in that dismal lair?106'Twas mine to face it as thy heart had done.'Twas mine——" "O brother," cried the King, "beware,The fiend has snares it shames not man to shun;—Ah, woe to eyes on whose recoiling sightOpes the dark world beyond the veil of light!

"Listen to Fate; till once more eves in May107WelcomeBal-huanback to yon sweet sky,[14]The hunter's lively horn, the hound's deep bay,May fill with joy theVale of Melody,[15]On spell-bound ears the Harper's tones may fall,Love deck the bower, and Pleasure trim the hall—

"But thou, oh thou, my Lancelot shalt mourn108The void, a life withdrawn bequeaths the soul;No mirth shall greet thee in the buxom horn—Nor flash in liquid sunshine from the bowl;Sorrow shall sit where I have dwelt,—and beA second Arthur in its truth to thee.

"Alone I go;—submit; since thus the Fates109And the great Prophet of our race ordain;So shall we drive invasion from our gates,Guard life from shame, and Cymri from the chain;No more than this my soul to thine may tell—Forgive,—Saints shield thee!—now thy hand—farewell!"

"Farewell! Can danger be more strong than death—110Loose the soul's link, the grave-surviving vow?Wilt thou find fragrance ev'n in glory's wreath,If valour weave it for thy single brow?No!—not farewell! What claim more strong than brotherCanst thou allow?"—"My Country is my Mother!"—

At the rebuke of those mild, solemn words,111Friendship submissive bow'd—its voice was still'd;As when some mighty bard with sudden chordsStrikes down the passion he before had thrill'd,Making grief awe;—so rush'd that sentence o'erThe soul it master'd;—Lancelot urged no more;

But loosing from the hand it clasp'd, his own,112He waved farewell, and turn'd his face away;His sorrow only by his silence shown:—Thus, when from earth glides summer's golden day,Music forsakes the boughs, and winds the stream;And life, in deep'ning quiet, mourns the beam.

Back to Index Next