THE PASSING OF ARTHUR - Legend

THE PASSING OF ARTHUR

  So all day long the noise of battle roll'd
  Among the mountains by the winter sea.
  Until King Arthur's Table, man by man,
  Had fall'n in Lyonnesse about their Lord,
  King Arthur. Then, because his wound was deep,
  The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him,
  And bore him to a chapel nigh the field,
  A broken chancel with a broken cross.
  That stood on a dark strait of barren land:
  On one side lay the Ocean, and on one
  Lay a great water, and the moon was full.

  Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
  "The sequel of today unsolders all
  The goodliest fellowship of famous knights
  Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep
  They sleep the men I loved. I think that we
  Shall never more, at any future time,
  Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds,
  Walking about the gardens and the halls
  Of Camelot, as in the days that were.
  I perish by this people which I made
  Tho' Merlin sware that I should come again
  To rule once more; but, let what will be, be,
  I am so deeply smitten thro' the helm
  That without help I cannot last till morn.

  Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur,
  Which was my pride: for thou rememberest how
  In those old days, one summer noon, an arm
  Rose up from out the bosom of the lake,
  Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
  Holding the sword and how I row'd across
  And took it, and have worn it, like a king;
  And, wheresoever I am sung or told
  In aftertime, this also shall be known:
  But now delay not: take Excalibur,
  And fling him far into the middle mere:
  Watch what thou seest and lightly bring me word."
  To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "It is not meet, Sir King, to leave thee thus,
  Aidless, alone, and smitten thro' the helm
  A little thing may harm a wounded man;
  Yet I thy hest will all perform at full,
  Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word."
  So saying, from the ruin'd shrine he stept,
  And in the moon athwart the place of tombs,
  Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men,
  Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang
  Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping down
  By zigzag paths, and juts of pointed rock,
  Came on the shining levels of the lake.
  There drew he forth the brand Excalibur,
  And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon,
  Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth
  And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt:
  For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks,
  Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth work
  Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long
  That both his eyes were dazzled, as he stood,

  This way and that dividing the swift mind,
  In act to throw: but at the last it seem'd
  Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd
  There in the many-knotted water flags,
  That whistled stiff and dry about the marge.
  So strode he back slow to the wounded King.
  Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
  "Hast thou perform'd my mission which I gave ?
  What is it thou hast seen ? or what hast heard ?"
  And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "I heard the ripple washing in the reeds,
  And the wild water lapping on the crag."
  To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale:
  "Thou hast betray'd thy nature and thy name,
  Not rendering true answer, as beseem'd
  Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight:
  For surer sign had followed either hand,
  Or voice, or else a motion of the mere.
  This is a shameful thing for men to lie.
  Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again,
  As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing
  I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word."
  Then went Sir Bedivere the second time
  Across the ridge, and paced beside the mere,
  Counting the dewy pebbles, fix'd in thought;
  But when he saw the wonder of the hilt,
  How curiously and strangely chased, he smote
  His palms together, and he cried aloud:
  "And if indeed I cast the brand away,
  Surely a precious thing, one worthy note,
  Should thus be lost forever from the earth,
  Which might have pleased the eyes of many men.
  What good should follow this, if this were done ?

  What harm, undone ? Deep harm to disobey,
  Seeing obedience is the bond of rule.
  Were it well to obey then, if a king demand
  An act unprofitable, against himself ?
  The King is sick, and knows not what he does.
  What record, or what relic of my lord
  Should be to aftertime, but empty breath
  And rumours of a doubt ? but were this kept,
  Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings,
  Some one might show it at a joust of arms,
  Saying, 'King Arthur's sword, Excalibur,
  Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake.
  Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the deeps
  Upon the hidden bases of the hills.'
  So might some old man speak in the aftertime
  To all the people, winning reverence.
  But now much honour and much fame were lost."
  So spake he, clouded with his own conceit,
  And hid Excalibur the second time,
  And so strode back slow to the wounded King.
  Then spoke King Arthur, breathing heavily:
  "What is it thou hast seen ? or what hast heard ?"
  And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "I heard the water lapping on the crag,
  And the long ripple washing in the reeds."
  To whom replied King Arthur, much in wrath:
  "Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue,
  Unknightly, traitor-hearted ! Woe is me !
  Authority forgets a dying king,
  Laid widow'd of the power in his eye
  That bow'd the will. I see thee what thou art,
  For thou, the latest-left of all my knights,
  In whom should meet the offices of all,

  Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt;
  Either from lust of gold, or like a girl
  Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes.
  Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice,
  And the third time may prosper, get thee hence:
  But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur,
  I will arise and slay thee with my hands."
  Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran,
  And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged
  Among the bulrush beds, and clutch'd the sword,
  And strongly wheel'd and threw it. The great brand
  Made lightings in the splendour of the moon,
  And flashing round and round, and whirl'd in an arch,
  Shot like a streamer of the northern morn,
  Seen where the moving isles of winter shock
  By night with noises of the Northern Sea.
  So flashed and fell the brand Excalibur:
  But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm

  Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
  And caught him by the hilt, and brandish'd him
  Three times, and drew him under in the mere.
  And lightly went the other to the King.
  Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker breath:
  "Now see I by thine eyes that this is done.
  Speak out: what is it thou hast heard, or seen ?"
  And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems
  Should blind my purpose, for I never saw,
  Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die,
  Not tho' I live three lives of mortal men,
  So great a miracle as yonder hilt.
  Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling him;
  But when I look'd again, beheld an arm,

  Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful.
  That caught him by the hilt, and brandished him
  Three times, and drew him under In the mere."
  And answer made King Arthur, breathing hard:
  "My end draws nigh;'tis time that I were gone.
  Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight,
  And bear me to the margin; yet I fear
  My wound hath taken cold, and I shall die."
  So saying, from the pavement he half rose,
  Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm,
  And looking wistfully with wide blue eyes
  As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere
  Remorsefully regarded thro' his tears,
  And would have spoken, but he found not word;
  Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee,
  O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands,
  And rising bore him thro' the place of tombs.
  But, as he walk'd, King Arthur panted hard,
  Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed
  When all the house is mute. So sigh'd the King,
  Muttering and murmuring at his ear, "Quick, quick !
  I fear it is too late, and I shall die."
  But the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge,
  Clothed with his breath, and looking, as he walk'd,
  Larger than human on the frozen hills.
  He heard the deep behind him, and a cry
  Before. His own thought drove him like a goad.
  Dry clashed his harness in the icy caves
  And barren chasms, and all to left and right
  The bare black cliff clang'd round him, as he based
  His feet on juts of slippery crag that rang
  Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels
  And on a sudden, lo ! the level lake,

  And the long glories of the winter moon.
  Then saw they how there hove a dusky barge,
  Dark as a funeral scarf from stern to stern,
  Beneath them; and descending they were ware
  That all the decks were dense with stately forms,
  Black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream by these
  Three Queens with crowns of gold: and from them rose
  A cry that shiver'd to the tingling stars,
  And, as it were one voice, an agony
  Of lamentation, like a wind that shrills
  All night in a waste land, where no one comes
  Or hath come, since the making of the world.
  Then murmur'd Arthur, "Place me in the barge."
  So to the barge they came. There those three Queens
  Put forth their hands, and took the King, and wept.
  But she, that rose the tallest of them all
  And fairest, laid his head upon her lap,
  And loosed the shatter'd casque, and chafed his hands,
  And call'd him by his name, complaining loud,
  And dropping bitter tears against a brow
  Striped with dark blood: for all his face was white
  And colourless, and like the withered moon
  Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east;
  And all his greaves and cuisses dash'd with drops
  Of onset; and the light and lustrous curls
  That made his forehead like a rising sun
  High from the dias-throne were parch'd with dust;
  Or, clotted into points and hanging loose,
  Mix'd with the knightly growth that fringed his lips.
  So like a shatter'd column lay the King;
  Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest,
  From spur to plume a star of tournament,
  Shot thro' the lists of Camelot, and charged

  Before the eyes of ladles and of kings,
  Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere:
  "Ah! my Lord Arthur, whither shall I go ?
  Where shall I hide my forehead and my eyes ?
  For now I see the true old times are dead,
  When every morning brought a noble chance,
  And every chance brought out a noble knight.
  Such times have been not since the light that led
  The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh.
  But now the whole Round Table is dissolved
  Which was an image of the mighty world,
  And, I the last, go forth companionless,
  And the days darken round me, and the years,
  Among new men, strange faces, other minds."
  And slowly answered Arthur from the barge:
  "The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
  And God fulfils himself in many ways,
  Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
  Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me?
  I have lived my life, and that which I have done
  May He within himself make pure ! but thou,
  If thou shouldst never see my face again,
  Pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer
  Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice
  Rise like a fountain for me night and day.
  For what are men better than sheep or goats
  That nourish a blind life within the brain,
  If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
  Both for themselves and those who call them friend ?
  For so the whole round earth is every way
  Bound by gold chains about the feet of God.
  But now farewell. I am going a long way
  With these thou seest-if indeed I go

  (For all my mind is clouded with a doubt)
  To the island-valley of Avilion;
  Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow,
  Nor ever wind blows loudly; but it lies
  Deep-meadow'd, happy, fair with orchard lawns
  And bowery hollows crown'd with summer sea.
  Where I will heal me of my grievous wound."
  So said he, and the barge with oar and sail
  Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted swan
  That, fluting a wild carol ere her death,
  Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood
  With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere
  Revolving many memories, till the hull
  Look'd one black dot against the verge of dawn,
  And on the mere the wailing died away.
  But when that moan had past for evermore,
  The stillness of the dead world's winter dawn
  Amazed him, and he groan'd, "The King is gone."
  And therewithal came on him the weird rhyme,
  "From the great deep to the great deep he goes"

  Whereat he slowly turn'd and slowly clomb
  The last hard footstep of that iron crag;
  Thence mark'd the black hull moving yet, and cried,
  "He passes to be King among the dead,
  And after healing of his grievous wound
  He comes again; but if he come no more
  O me, be yon dark Queens in yon black boat,
  Who shriek'd and wail'd, the three whereat we gazed
  On that high day, when, clothed with living light,
  They stood before his throne in silence, friends
  Of Arthur, who should help him at his need ?"

  Then from the dawn it seem'd there came, but faint
  As from beyond the limit of the world,
  Like the last echo born of a great cry,
  Sounds, as if some fair city were one voice
  Around a king returning from his wars.

  Thereat once more he moved about, and clomb
  Ev'n to the highest he could climb, and saw,
  Straining his eyes beneath an arch of hand,
  Or thought he saw, the speck that bare the King,
  Down that long water opening on the deep
  Somewhere far off, pass on and on, and go
  From less to less and vanish into light.
  And the new sun rose bringing the new year.