Idylls of the King, Alfred Lord Tennyson [the reading strategies book TXT] 📗

>Where first as sullen as a beast new-caged,

And waiting to be treated like a wolf,

Because I knew my deeds were known, I found,

Instead of scornful pity or pure scorn,

Such fine reserve and noble reticence,

Manners so kind, yet stately, such a grace

Of tenderest courtesy, that I began

To glance behind me at my former life,

And find that it had been the wolf’s indeed:

And oft I talked with Dubric, the high saint,

Who, with mild heat of holy oratory,

Subdued me somewhat to that gentleness,

Which, when it weds with manhood, makes a man.

And you were often there about the Queen,

But saw me not, or marked not if you saw;

Nor did I care or dare to speak with you,

But kept myself aloof till I was changed;

And fear not, cousin; I am changed indeed.’

 

He spoke, and Enid easily believed,

Like simple noble natures, credulous

Of what they long for, good in friend or foe,

There most in those who most have done them ill.

And when they reached the camp the King himself

Advanced to greet them, and beholding her

Though pale, yet happy, asked her not a word,

But went apart with Edyrn, whom he held

In converse for a little, and returned,

And, gravely smiling, lifted her from horse,

And kissed her with all pureness, brother-like,

And showed an empty tent allotted her,

And glancing for a minute, till he saw her

Pass into it, turned to the Prince, and said:

 

‘Prince, when of late ye prayed me for my leave

To move to your own land, and there defend

Your marches, I was pricked with some reproof,

As one that let foul wrong stagnate and be,

By having looked too much through alien eyes,

And wrought too long with delegated hands,

Not used mine own: but now behold me come

To cleanse this common sewer of all my realm,

With Edyrn and with others: have ye looked

At Edyrn? have ye seen how nobly changed?

This work of his is great and wonderful.

His very face with change of heart is changed.

The world will not believe a man repents:

And this wise world of ours is mainly right.

Full seldom doth a man repent, or use

Both grace and will to pick the vicious quitch

Of blood and custom wholly out of him,

And make all clean, and plant himself afresh.

Edyrn has done it, weeding all his heart

As I will weed this land before I go.

I, therefore, made him of our Table Round,

Not rashly, but have proved him everyway

One of our noblest, our most valorous,

Sanest and most obedient: and indeed

This work of Edyrn wrought upon himself

After a life of violence, seems to me

A thousand-fold more great and wonderful

Than if some knight of mine, risking his life,

My subject with my subjects under him,

Should make an onslaught single on a realm

Of robbers, though he slew them one by one,

And were himself nigh wounded to the death.’

 

So spake the King; low bowed the Prince, and felt

His work was neither great nor wonderful,

And past to Enid’s tent; and thither came

The King’s own leech to look into his hurt;

And Enid tended on him there; and there

Her constant motion round him, and the breath

Of her sweet tendance hovering over him,

Filled all the genial courses of his blood

With deeper and with ever deeper love,

As the south-west that blowing Bala lake

Fills all the sacred Dee. So past the days.

 

But while Geraint lay healing of his hurt,

The blameless King went forth and cast his eyes

On each of all whom Uther left in charge

Long since, to guard the justice of the King:

He looked and found them wanting; and as now

Men weed the white horse on the Berkshire hills

To keep him bright and clean as heretofore,

He rooted out the slothful officer

Or guilty, which for bribe had winked at wrong,

And in their chairs set up a stronger race

With hearts and hands, and sent a thousand men

To till the wastes, and moving everywhere

Cleared the dark places and let in the law,

And broke the bandit holds and cleansed the land.

 

Then, when Geraint was whole again, they past

With Arthur to Caerleon upon Usk.

There the great Queen once more embraced her friend,

And clothed her in apparel like the day.

And though Geraint could never take again

That comfort from their converse which he took

Before the Queen’s fair name was breathed upon,

He rested well content that all was well.

Thence after tarrying for a space they rode,

And fifty knights rode with them to the shores

Of Severn, and they past to their own land.

And there he kept the justice of the King

So vigorously yet mildly, that all hearts

Applauded, and the spiteful whisper died:

And being ever foremost in the chase,

And victor at the tilt and tournament,

They called him the great Prince and man of men.

But Enid, whom her ladies loved to call

Enid the Fair, a grateful people named

Enid the Good; and in their halls arose

The cry of children, Enids and Geraints

Of times to be; nor did he doubt her more,

But rested in her fealty, till he crowned

A happy life with a fair death, and fell

Against the heathen of the Northern Sea

In battle, fighting for the blameless King.

 

Balin and Balan

 

Pellam the King, who held and lost with Lot

In that first war, and had his realm restored

But rendered tributary, failed of late

To send his tribute; wherefore Arthur called

His treasurer, one of many years, and spake,

‘Go thou with him and him and bring it to us,

Lest we should set one truer on his throne.

Man’s word is God in man.’

His Baron said

‘We go but harken: there be two strange knights

Who sit near Camelot at a fountain-side,

A mile beneath the forest, challenging

And overthrowing every knight who comes.

Wilt thou I undertake them as we pass,

And send them to thee?’

Arthur laughed upon him.

‘Old friend, too old to be so young, depart,

Delay not thou for aught, but let them sit,

Until they find a lustier than themselves.’

 

So these departed. Early, one fair dawn,

The light-winged spirit of his youth returned

On Arthur’s heart; he armed himself and went,

So coming to the fountain-side beheld

Balin and Balan sitting statuelike,

Brethren, to right and left the spring, that down,

From underneath a plume of lady-fern,

Sang, and the sand danced at the bottom of it.

And on the right of Balin Balin’s horse

Was fast beside an alder, on the left

Of Balan Balan’s near a poplartree.

‘Fair Sirs,’ said Arthur, ‘wherefore sit ye here?’

Balin and Balan answered ‘For the sake

Of glory; we be mightier men than all

In Arthur’s court; that also have we proved;

For whatsoever knight against us came

Or I or he have easily overthrown.’

‘I too,’ said Arthur, ‘am of Arthur’s hall,

But rather proven in his Paynim wars

Than famous jousts; but see, or proven or not,

Whether me likewise ye can overthrow.’

And Arthur lightly smote the brethren down,

And lightly so returned, and no man knew.

 

Then Balin rose, and Balan, and beside

The carolling water set themselves again,

And spake no word until the shadow turned;

When from the fringe of coppice round them burst

A spangled pursuivant, and crying ‘Sirs,

Rise, follow! ye be sent for by the King,’

They followed; whom when Arthur seeing asked

‘Tell me your names; why sat ye by the well?’

Balin the stillness of a minute broke

Saying ‘An unmelodious name to thee,

Balin, “the Savage”—that addition thine—

My brother and my better, this man here,

Balan. I smote upon the naked skull

A thrall of thine in open hall, my hand

Was gauntleted, half slew him; for I heard

He had spoken evil of me; thy just wrath

Sent me a three-years’ exile from thine eyes.

I have not lived my life delightsomely:

For I that did that violence to thy thrall,

Had often wrought some fury on myself,

Saving for Balan: those three kingless years

Have past—were wormwood-bitter to me. King,

Methought that if we sat beside the well,

And hurled to ground what knight soever spurred

Against us, thou would’st take me gladlier back,

And make, as tentimes worthier to be thine

Than twenty Balins, Balan knight. I have said.

Not so—not all. A man of thine today

Abashed us both, and brake my boast. Thy will?’

Said Arthur ‘Thou hast ever spoken truth;

Thy too fierce manhood would not let thee lie.

Rise, my true knight. As children learn, be thou

Wiser for falling! walk with me, and move

To music with thine Order and the King.

Thy chair, a grief to all the brethren, stands

Vacant, but thou retake it, mine again!’

 

Thereafter, when Sir Balin entered hall,

The Lost one Found was greeted as in Heaven

With joy that blazed itself in woodland wealth

Of leaf, and gayest garlandage of flowers,

Along the walls and down the board; they sat,

And cup clashed cup; they drank and some one sang,

Sweet-voiced, a song of welcome, whereupon

Their common shout in chorus, mounting, made

Those banners of twelve battles overhead

Stir, as they stirred of old, when Arthur’s host

Proclaimed him Victor, and the day was won.

 

Then Balan added to their Order lived

A wealthier life than heretofore with these

And Balin, till their embassage returned.

 

‘Sir King’ they brought report ‘we hardly found,

So bushed about it is with gloom, the hall

Of him to whom ye sent us, Pellam, once

A Christless foe of thine as ever dashed

Horse against horse; but seeing that thy realm

Hath prospered in the name of Christ, the King

Took, as in rival heat, to holy things;

And finds himself descended from the Saint

Arimathaean Joseph; him who first

Brought the great faith to Britain over seas;

He boasts his life as purer than thine own;

Eats scarce enow to keep his pulse abeat;

Hath pushed aside his faithful wife, nor lets

Or dame or damsel enter at his gates

Lest he should be polluted. This gray King

Showed us a shrine wherein were wonders—yea—

Rich arks with priceless bones of martyrdom,

Thorns of the crown and shivers of the cross,

And therewithal (for thus he told us) brought

By holy Joseph thither, that same spear

Wherewith the Roman pierced the side of Christ.

He much amazed us; after, when we sought

The tribute, answered “I have quite foregone

All matters of this world: Garlon, mine heir,

Of him demand it,” which this Garlon gave

With much ado, railing at thine and thee.

 

‘But when we left, in those deep woods we found

A knight of thine spear-stricken from behind,

Dead, whom we buried; more than one of us

Cried out on Garlon, but a woodman there

Reported of some demon in the woods

Was once a man, who driven by evil tongues

From all his fellows, lived alone, and came

To learn black magic, and to hate his kind

With such a hate, that when he died, his soul

Became a Fiend, which, as the man in life

Was wounded by blind tongues he saw not whence,

Strikes from behind. This woodman showed the cave

From which he sallies, and wherein he dwelt.

We saw the hoof-print of a horse, no more.’

 

Then Arthur, ‘Let who goes before me, see

He do not fall behind me: foully slain

And villainously! who will hunt for me

This demon of the woods?’ Said Balan, ‘I’!

So claimed the quest and rode away, but first,

Embracing