It will be to thy worship, as my knight,
And mine, as head of all our Table Round,
To see that she be buried worshipfully.'

'Lancelot, my Lancelot, thou in whom
I have

Most joy and most affiance, for I know
What thou hast been in battle by my side,

So toward that shrine which then in all And many a time have watch'd thee at

the realm

Was richest, Arthur leading, slowly went
The marshall'd Order of their Table
Round,

see

And let the younger and unskill'd go by

And Lancelot sad beyond his wont, to To win his honour and to make his name, And loved thy courtesies and thee, a man Made to be loved; but now I would to God,

The maiden buried, not as one unknown,
Nor meanly, but with gorgeous obsequies,
And mass, and rolling music, like a queen.
And when the knights had laid her comely
head

Low in the dust of half-forgotten kings,
Then Arthur spake among them, 'Let

her tomb

Be costly, and her image thereupon.
And let the shield of Lancelot at her feet
Be carven, and her lily in her hand.
And let the story of her dolorous voyage
For all true hearts be blazon'd on her tomb
In letters gold and azure!' which was
wrought

Thereafter; but when now the lords and
dames

Seeing the homeless trouble in thine eyes,
Thou couldst have loved this maiden,
shaped, it seems,

By God for thee alone, and from her face,
If one may judge the living by the dead,
Delicately pure and marvellously fair,
Who might have brought thee, now a
lonely man

Wifeless and heirless, noble issue, sons
Born to the glory of thy name and fame,
My knight, the great Sir Lancelot of the
Lake.'

Then answer'd Lancelot, 'Fair she was, my King,

And people, from the high door streaming, Pure, as you ever wish your knights to be.

brake Disorderly, as homeward each, the Queen, Who mark'd Sir Lancelot where he

moved apart,

To doubt her fairness were to want an eye,
To doubt her pureness were to want a

heart

Yea, to be loved, if what is worthy love Drew near, and sigh'd in passing, Could bind him, but free love will not be

'Lancelot,

bound.'

'Free love, so bound, were freest,' said the King.

'That is love's curse; pass on, my Queen, 'Let love be free; free love is for the best :

forgiven.'

But Arthur, who beheld his cloudy brows, Approach'd him, and with full affection said,

She fail'd to bind, tho' being, as I think, Of greatest knight? I fought for it, and Unbound as yet, and gentle, as I know.'

have it :

Pleasure to have it, none; to lose it, pain;

And Lancelot answer'd nothing, but Now grown a part of me : but what use in

he went,

And at the inrunning of a little brook
Sat by the river in a cove, and watch'd
The high reed wave, and lifted up his eyes
And saw the barge that brought her
moving down,

Far-off, a blot upon the stream, and said

it ?

To make men worse by making my sin

known?

Or sin seem less, the sinner seeming great?
Alas for Arthur's greatest knight, a man
Not after Arthur's heart! I needs must
break

Low in himself, Ah simple heart and These bonds that so defame me: not

sweet,

Ye loved me, damsel, surely with a love Far tenderer than my Queen's. Pray for thy soul?

without

She wills it: would I, if she will'd it? nay, Who knows? but if I would not, then may God,

Ay, that will I. Farewell too-now at I pray him, send a sudden Angel down

lastFarewell, fair lily. "Jealousy in love?" Not rather dead love's harsh heir, jealous pride?

Queen, if I grant the jealousy as of love, May not your crescent fear for name and fame

To seize me by the hair and bear me far,
And fling me deep in that forgotten mere,
Among the tumbled fragments of the

hills.'

So groan'd Sir Lancelot in remorseful pain,

Speak, as it waxes, of a love that wanes ? Not knowing he should die a holy man.

Why did the King dwell on my name to

me ?

Who passes thro' the vision of the night-
She chanted snatches of mysterious hymns
Heard on the winding waters, eve and

morn

THE HOLY GRAIL.

FROM noiseful arms, and acts of prowess

done

In tournament or tilt, Sir Percivale,
Whom Arthur and his knighthood call'd

The Pure,

Had pass'd into the silent life of prayer, Praise, fast, and alms; and leaving for the cowl

She kiss'd me saying, "Thou art fair, The helmet in an abbey far away

my child,

As a king's son," and often in her arms
She bare me, pacing on the dusky mere.
Would she had drown'd me in it, where'er
it be !

For what am I? what profits me my name

From Camelot, there, and not long after, died.

And one, a fellow-monk among the rest, Ambrosius, loved him much beyond the rest,

A way by love that waken'd love within, We are green in Heaven's eyes; but here

My brother? was it earthly passion crost?' Could touch or see it, he was heal'd at

'Nay,' said the knight; for no such By faith, of all his ills. But then the times

Who wins, who falls; and waste the And there the heathen Prince, Arviragus,

And there he built with wattles from the But sin broke out. Ah, Christ, that it

Mute of this miracle, far as I have read. To me by prayer and fasting?" "Nay," But who first saw the holy thing to-day?'

nun,

said he,

know not, for thy heart is pure as

snow."

And so she pray'd and fasted, till the sun And one no further off in blood from me Shone, and the wind blew, thro' her, and

Than sister; and if ever holy maid
With knees of adoration wore the stone,
A holy maid; tho' never maiden glow'd,
But that was in her earlier maidenhood,
With such a fervent flame of human love,
Which being rudely blunted, glanced and
shot

Only to holy things; to prayer and praise
She gave herself, to fast and alms. And
yet,

Nun as she was, the scandal of the Court,
Sin against Arthur and the Table Round,
And the strange sound of an adulterous

race,

I thought

Beyond my knowing of them, beautiful,
Beyond all knowing of them, wonderful,
Beautiful in the light of holiness.
And "O my brother Percivale," she
said,

"Sweet brother, I have seen the Holy
Grail :

Across the iron grating of her cell
Beat, and she pray'd and fasted all the For, waked at dead of night, I heard a

more

sound

As of a silver horn from o'er the hills

use

'And he to whom she told her sins, or Blown, and I thought, 'It is not Arthur's what Her all but utter whiteness held for sin, To hunt by moonlight ;' and the slender

sound

As from a distance beyond distance grew Coming upon me-O never harp nor horn,

A man wellnigh a hundred winters old,
Spake often with her of the Holy Grail,
A legend handed down thro' five or six,
And each of these a hundred winters old,
From our Lord's time. And when King Nor aught we blow with breath, or touch
Arthur made

with hand,

His Table Round, and all men's hearts Was like that music as it came; and then Stream'd thro' my cell a cold and silver beam,

became

Clean for a season, surely he had thought

That now the Holy Grail would come And down the long beam stole the Holy

Rose-red with beatings in it, as if alive,

Till all the white walls of my cell were
dyed

With rosy colours leaping on the wall;
And then the music faded, and the Grail
Past, and the beam decay'd, and from the
walls

The rosy quiverings died into the night.
So now the Holy Thing is here again
Among us, brother, fast thou too and
pray,

And tell thy brother knights to fast and
pray,

That so perchance the vision may be seen By thee and those, and all the world be heal'd."

Clean from her forehead all that wealth of hair

Which made a silken mat-work for her feet;

'Then leaving the pale nun, I spake And out of this she plaited broad and long A strong sword-belt, and wove with silver

of this

"God make thec good as thou art beau- I, maiden, round thee, maiden, bind my

Said Arthur, when he dubb'd him knight; Go forth, for thou shalt see what I have

In so young youth, was ever made a And break thro' all, till one will crown knight thee king

Till Galahad; and this Galahad, when Far in the spiritual city:" and as she

he heard

My sister's vision, fill'd me with amaze; His eyes became so like her own, they seem'd

spake

She sent the deathless passion in her eyes
Thro' him, and made him hers, and laid

her mind

Hers, and himself her brother more than I. On him, and he believed in her belief.

'Sister or brother none had he; but

some

'Then came a year of miracle: O

brother,