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twg_000012925500 | I'm well content with thy heart for such as it is, Barbara, if thou 'lt but give it me." "Nay, Myles, I'm deadly sure I've none to give, and out of nothing nothing comes." "Thou ne'er canst love me, Barbara?" "No more than I love thee now, Myles." "With calm cousin-love thou meanest?" "I am ill skilled at logic, Myles. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925501 | I cannot set out my feelings in class and order, as our chirurgeon doth his herbs and flowers." "Well, Barbara, I'm grieved that thou lookest upon me so coldly, but I draw not back from my petition. I'd liefer have thy calm tenderness than another's hot love, for I can trust thee as I trust mine own honor, and I | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925502 | know full well that thou 'lt ever be better than thy word. So take me, Barbara, for thy husband, and fulfill the dear mother's last desire, and give me the hope of teaching thee in the days to come to love me even as I love thee." But for all answer Barbara only turned and laid her hands in his, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925503 | and slowly raised the wonder of her eyes until they looked straight into his; and the man whose front had never quailed in face of death or danger grew pallid beneath his bronze, and trembled like a leaf in the wind. "What!--Barbara!--Dost really love me, maid? Nay, cheat me not--speak! Dost love me, sweetheart, already?" But Barbara said never a | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925504 | word, nor did Myles ever know more of the secret of her life than in that one supreme moment he read in her steadfast eyes. . A MILITARY WEDDING. "And thou 'rt not amazed, Elsie, that our captain and his kinswoman will wed?" asked Governor Bradford of his wife in the privacy of the family bedroom. "No more than at | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925505 | the sun's rising in the East," replied Alice with a demure little smile. "Hm! Master Galileo saith the sun riseth not at all, and though the power of Rome caused him to gainsay it, he did tell me privily in Amsterdam that it was sooth, and the sun bided forever in the one place while this round world turned over | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925506 | daily." "I ever thought the good man was a little crazed," replied Mistress Bradford serenely. "Like Paul, much learning had made him mad." "Nay wife, 't was Festus charged Paul with madness, because the apostle knew more than himself. Haply 't is so with Master Galileo." "It may be, William. These be not matters for women to meddle withal," replied | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925507 | Alice meekly. "But anent our captain's wooing of his cousin, Elsie? How is 't thou 'rt not amazed like the rest of us?" "Because I saw long since that Barbara would never wed another than her cousin, and thou knowest, Will, how like draws to like, even across the waste of ocean." "Ay dame, I know it well and sweetly, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925508 | and never shall I forget to give thanks to Him whose wisdom reacheth from end to end, sweetly ordering all things. But how chanced Mistress Barbara to confess her fondness to thee, sweetheart?" "Nay now! Though men do be our masters in most things, how dull they still show themselves in others. As if a maid, or for that matter | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925509 | a widow, would ever 'confess her fondness' for any man till he had wooed her so to do, and but coyly then, if she be wise." "Too coyly for him to credit her with overmuch tenderness," suggested the bridegroom. "Facts speak louder than words, and if a woman will set herself upon far and perilous journeys, and compass sea and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925510 | land to come to him who calleth her, methinks he need not doubt her friendship for him. Nay now, nay now, we talk of Barbara and the Captain, and I'll tell thee. Since I was left alone in London,--so lonely too in my wide house in Duke's Place,--I have taken dear and sweet counsel with Barbara, whom I first knew | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925511 | in the congregation of Pastor Jacob, and she hath been my guest for weeks and months at a time, so that if any two women know each other well, their names are Barbara and Alice." "But yet she never told thee that she loved her cousin? Now that is passing strange." "'T would to my mind have been far stranger | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925512 | had she so bewrayed herself." "But still those gentle eyes of thine read the secret of her heart?" "I did mistrust it for long, but when I had thy letter, Will, and settled my mind to come to thee, I told Barbara somewhat of the old story"-- "Of how thou wast minded to spite thy comely face by cutting off | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925513 | its nose?" But Mistress Bradford had no smile for her husband's somewhat coarse jest, and went quietly on,-- "And I told her, too, that her kinsman, Myles, had lost the sweet wife of whom she had so often and so gently spoken; and at the last I told her I was minded to sell all that I had and go | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925514 | to our folk in New England, and I asked her would she go, to be ever and always my dear sister if no other home should offer, and though we said no word that day of Captain Standish, sure am I that he was in both our minds. And now, dear man, dost see through the millstone?" "Ay, since woman's | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925515 | wit hath delved a hole, I can see through it as well as another." And the governor kissed his wife as merrily as another man, while she adjusting the demure matron's cap about her fair young face went out to see that the breakfast was fairly spread. A fortnight later when the Anne had sailed, and the Little James had | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925516 | returned and gone again upon a luckless fishing trip, and the new-comers had settled into their appointed places, and the town was once more quiet, there came a fair September day when work was laid aside, and after breakfast the armies of the colony, at least a hundred souls in all,--if we count the trumpeters, the buglers, the fifers, and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925517 | the drummers,--assembled on the Training Green just across the brook, and after some evolutions marched in orderly array back again past the spring and up the hill to the governor's house, where they were joined by him and the elder. Then up and on to the captain's house, where a guard of honor presented itself at the door, and ushered | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925518 | forth the chief, carefully dressed in his uniform of state, while at his side merrily clanked Gideon, resplendent, though none but he and his master knew it, in such a furbishing and polishing as seldom had fallen to his lot before. Saluting his comrades gravely and with somewhat more of dignity than his wont, the captain took his place, and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925519 | the procession climbed the short ascent remaining to the door of the Fort, where entered the dignitaries and as many more as could find room. Here in the great room now used as a place of worship a group of matrons and maids awaited them, with Barbara in their midst, fair and stately in her white robes, the glory of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925520 | her eyes outvying any jewels she could have worn. The meagre civil service was spoken by the governor, but at the request of both bride and bridegroom the elder made a prayer to which the captain listened more reverently than his wont, and cried Amen more heartily. Then they came forth these two Standishes made one, and the train band | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925521 | escorted them to their home, and fired a salute of honor, whose reverberating waves rolling across the waters broke at last upon the foot of Captain's Hill, sighing away into silence over the quiet plain where one day should be dug a warrior's grave, marked head and foot with a great three-cornered stone. . "PARTING IS SUCH SWEET SORROW." And | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925522 | so, tenderly, reluctantly, lingeringly we leave them, these dear ones whose memory we cherish so lovingly, and in the sober reality of whose lives lies a charm no romance can ever reach. Would you know more of them, for there are, as the Sultana promised morning by morning, stranger and better things to come than these that have been told, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925523 | go read the annals of the Pilgrims, those precious fragments left to us by Bradford and by Winslow, and a letter written by De Rasires, Secretary of the Dutch Colony at Manhattan, who, visiting Plymouth upon a diplomatic errand in , wrote to his superiors a letter preserved in the Royal Library of Holland wherein he draws this little picture | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925524 | of the town we have tried to reproduce, and mentions some of these dear friends whose lives we know so much better than he did. "New Plymouth lies on the slope of a hill, stretching east toward the sea-coast with a broad street about a cannon shot long, leading down the hill with a cross street in the middle going | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925525 | southward to the rivulet, and northward to the land. The houses are constructed of hewn planks, with gardens also enclosed behind, and at the sides, with hewn planks, so that their houses and court-yards are arranged in very good order, with a stockade against a sudden attack; and at the ends of the streets there are three wooden gates. In | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925526 | the centre on the cross street stands the Governor's house, before which is a square erection upon which four patereros are mounted so as to flank along the streets. "Upon the hill they have a large square house, with a flat roof made of thick sawn planks stayed with oak beams, upon the top of which they have six cannons | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925527 | which shoot iron balls of four or five pounds and command the surrounding country. The lower part they use for their church, where they preach on Sundays and the usual holidays. They assemble by beat of drum, each with his musket or firelock, in front of the Captain's door; they have their cloaks on, and place themselves in order three | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925528 | abreast, and are led by a sergeant without beat of drum. Behind comes the Governor in a long robe; beside him on the right hand comes the preacher with his cloak on, and on the left hand the Captain with his side-arms and cloak on, and with a small cane in his hand; and so they march in good order, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925529 | and each sets his arms down near him. Thus they are constantly on their guard night and day." But after all, glad as we are of this little loophole pierced through the mists of antiquity, the fashion of our friends' houses and court-yards, their cloaks and muskets and quaint Sunday procession are not as valuable to us as the story | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925530 | of their individual lives: the story of Priscilla and John Alden and their children; of Myles, military power of the colony, beyond his threescore years and ten; of Barbara, called his "dear wife" in the dignified Last Will, wherein he bequeaths "Ormistic, Bousconge, Wrightington, Maudesley" and the rest, to Alexander his "son and heir," sturdily proclaiming with as it were | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925531 | his last breath, that these fair domains were "surreptitiously detained" from him. And Lora Standish, fair sweet shadow upon the mirror of the past; and Mary Dingley, beloved of the grand old warrior; and Alice Bradford, of whom at the last Morton wrote,-- "Adoe my loving friend, my aunt, my mother, Of those that's left I have not such another." | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925532 | And Bradford himself, and Brewster, and Winslow, and Howland, each one of whom hath left behind him enough of achievement to fill a dozen of the degenerate lives of a butterfly of to-day; and the women they loved, and the young men and maidens who rose up around them: ah, how can we leave them, how can we say good-by! | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925533 | Shall we not the rather cherish them and study them more than we ever yet have done, feeling in our hearts that those virtues, that courage, and that nobility of life may be ours as well as theirs, may illustrate the easy life of to-day, and make it less unworthy to be the fruit of the Tree of Liberty, planted | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925534 | in the blood and watered by the tears of our Fathers. * * * * * Transcriber's Notes: Page , Comma added after "Thou liest, knave" Page , Comma added after "Good-morrow" Page , Hyphen added to "commander in-chief" Page , Period added after "his unwonted amenity" Page , Double quote added after "thou mayest set down" Page , Period | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925535 | E-text prepared by Al Haines Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See -h.htm or -h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs//////-h/-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs//////-h.zip) STORIES OF KING ARTHUR AND HIS KNIGHTS Retold from Malory's "Morte dArthur" by U. WALDO CUTLER [Frontispiece: King Arthur] _The goodliest fellowship of famous knights_ _Whereof this world holds record._ TENNYSON George | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925536 | G. Harrap & Co. Ltd. London ---- Bombay ---- Sydney First published January by GEORGE G. HARRAP & COMPANY - Parker Street, Kingsway, London, W.C., Reprinted: December ; July ; May ; January ; September ; July ; July ; October ; October ; March ; February ; August ; May ; October ; June ; October ; October ; | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925537 | June ; January ; April ; September ; October ; January ; January ; April CONTENTS INTRODUCTION . OF THE BIRTH OF KING ARTHUR II. UTHER'S SON, RIGHTWISE KING OF ALL ENGLAND III. HOW ARTHUR GAT HIS SWORD EXCALIBUR IV. BALIN AND BALAN V. THE NOBLE ORDER OF THE ROUND TABLE VI. THE LADIES' KNIGHT VII. WISE MERLIN'S FOOLISHNESS VIII. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925538 | A STAG-HUNT AND WHAT CAME OF IT IX. THE TREACHERY OF MORGAN LE FAY X. SIR LAUNCELOT OF THE LAKE XI. A NIGHT-TIME ADVENTURE OF SIR LAUNCELOT XII. HOW SIR LAUNCELOT CAME INTO THE CHAPEL PERILOUS XIII. THE KNIGHT, THE LADY, AND THE FALCON XIV. HOW A KITCHEN-PAGE CAME TO HONOUR XV. HOW SIR GARETH FOUGHT FOR THE LADY OF | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925539 | CASTLE PERILOUS XVI. HOW SIR GARETH RETURNED TO THE COURT OF KING ARTHUR XVII. HOW YOUNG TRISTRAM SAVED THE LIFE OF THE QUEEN OF LYONESSE XVIII. SIR TRISTRAM'S FIRST BATTLE XIX. SIR TRISTRAM AND THE FAIR ISOUD XX. HOW SIR TRISTRAM DEMANDED THE FAIR ISOUD FOR KING MARK, AND HOW SIR TRISTRAM AND ISOUD DRANK THE LOVE POTION XXI. HOW | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925540 | SIR TRISTRAM DEPARTED FROM TINTAGIL, AND WAS LONG IN THE FOREST XXII. HOW KING MARK WAS SORRY FOR THE GOOD RENOWN OF SIR TRISTRAM XXIII. HOW SIR PERCIVALE OF GALIS SOUGHT AND FOUND SIR LAUNCELOT XXIV. OF THE COMING OF SIR GALAHAD XXV. HOW THE QUEST OF THE HOLY GRAIL WAS BEGUN XXVI. HOW GALAHAD GAT HIM A SHIELD XXVII. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925541 | SIR GALAHAD AT THE CASTLE OF MAIDENS XXVIII. SIR LAUNCELOT'S REPENTANCE XXIX. SIR PERCIVALE'S TEMPTATION XXX. THE VICTORY OF SIR BORS OVER HIMSELF XXXI. HOW SIR LAUNCELOT FOUND THE HOLY GRAIL XXXII. THE END OF THE QUEST XXXIII. SIR LAUNCELOT AND THE FAIR MAID OF ASTOLAT XXXIV. OF THE GREAT TOURNAMENT ON CANDLEMAS DAY XXXV. QUEEN GUENEVER'S MAY-DAY RIDE AND | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925542 | WHAT CAME OF IT XXXVI. OF THE PLOT AGAINST SIR LAUNCELOT XXXVII. HOW SIR LAUNCELOT DEPARTED FROM THE KING AND FROM JOYOUS GARD XXXVIII. HOW KING ARTHUR AND SIR GAWAINE INVADED SIR LAUNCELOT'S REALM XXXIX. OF SIR MORDRED'S TREASON XL. OF ARTHUR'S LAST GREAT BATTLE IN THE WEST XLI. OF THE PASSING OF KING ARTHUR XLII. OF THE END OF | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925543 | THIS USTRATIONS KING ARTHUR . . . . . . . . . . . . (W. B. Margetson) _Frontispiece_ THE DEDICATION . . . . . . . . . . . (J. Pettie, R.A.) MERLIN AND NIMUE . . . . . . . . . . (Burne-Jones) SIR TRISTRAM AND THE FAIR ISOUD . . (D. G. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925544 | Rosetti) SIR GALAHAD . . . . . . . . . . . . (G. F. Watts) SIR LAUNCELOT AT THE CROSS . . . . . (Stella Langdale) ELAINE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . (J. M. Strudwick) THE PASSING OF ARTHUR . . . . . . . | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925545 | (Stella Langdale) "We have from the kind Creator a variety of mental powers, to which we must not neglect giving their proper culture in our earliest years, and which cannot be cultivated either by logic or metaphysics, Latin or Greek. We have an imagination, before which, since it should not seize upon the very first conceptions that chance to present | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925546 | themselves, we ought to place the fittest and most beautiful images, and thus accustom and practise the mind to recognise and love the beautiful everywhere." Quoted from Wieland by Goethe in his Autobiography Introduction Among the best liked stories of five or six hundred years ago were those which told of chivalrous deeds--of joust and tourney and knightly adventure. To | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925547 | be sure, these stories were not set forth in printed books, for there were no printed books as early as the times of the first three King Edwards, and few people could have read them if there had been any. But children and grown people alike were eager to hear these old-time tales read or recited by the minstrels, and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925548 | the interest in them has continued in some measure through all the changing years and tastes. We now, in the times of the seventh King Edward, still find them far more worth our while than many modern stories. For us they have a special interest, because of home setting and Christian basis, and they may well share in our attention | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925549 | with the legends of Greece and Rome. In these early romances of chivalry, Arthur and his knights of the Round Table are by far the most popular heroes, and the finding of the Holy Grail is the highest achievement of knightly valour. The material for the Arthur stories came from many countries and from many different periods of history. Much | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925550 | of it is wholly fanciful, but the writers connected all the incidents directly or indirectly with the old Briton king of the fifth century, who was the model of knighthood, "without fear and without reproach." Perhaps there was a real King Arthur, who led the Britons against the Saxon invaders of their land, who was killed by his traitor nephew, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925551 | and who was buried at Glastonbury,--the valley of Avilion of the legends; perhaps there was a slight historical nucleus around which all the romantic material was crystallising through the centuries, but the Arthur of romance came largely from the imagination of the early writers. And yet, though our "own ideal knight" may never have trod the soil of Britain or | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925552 | Roman or Saxon England, his chivalrous character and the knightly deeds of his followers are real to us, if we read them rightly, for "the poet's ideal was the truest truth." Though the sacred vessel--the Holy Grail--of the Christ's last supper with His disciples has not been borne about the earth in material form, to be seen only by those | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925553 | of stainless life and character, it is eternally true that the "pure in heart" are "blessed," "for they shall see God." This is what the Quest of the Holy Grail means, and there is still many a true Sir Galahad, who can say, as he did, "My strength is as the strength of ten, Because my heart is pure," and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925554 | who attains the highest glory of knighthood, as before his clear vision "down dark tides the glory glides, And starlike mingles with the stars." We call these beautiful stories of long ago Stories of Chivalry, for, in the Middle Ages, chivalry influenced all that people did and said and thought. It began in the times of Charlemagne, a hundred years | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925555 | before our own King Alfred, and only very gradually it made its way through all the social order. Charlemagne was really a very great man, and because he was so, he left Western Europe a far better place to live in than he found it. Into the social life of his time he brought something like order and justice and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925556 | peace, and so he greatly helped the Christian Church to do its work of teaching the rough and warlike Franks and Saxons and Normans the gentle ways of thrift and helpfulness. Charlemagne's "heerban," or call to arms, required that certain of his men should attend him on horseback, and this mounted service was the beginning of what is known as | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925557 | chivalry. The lesser nobles of each feudal chief served their overlords on horseback, _ cheval_, in times of war; they were called _knights_, which originally meant servants,--German _knechte_; and the system of knighthood, its rules, customs, and duties, was called chivalry,--French _chevalerie_. Chivalry belongs chiefly to the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries,--to about the time between King Richard of the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925558 | Lion Heart and Prince Hal. There is no trace of ideas peculiar to it in the writings of the old Anglo-Saxons or in the _Nibelungen Lied_ of Germany. Geoffrey of Monmouth, who died, it is said, in the year , is about the earliest writer who mentions customs that belong especially to chivalry. The Crusades, of Geoffrey's century and of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925559 | the one following, gave much opportunity for its growth and practice; but in the fifteenth century chivalrous fashions and fancies began to seem absurd, and later, perhaps partly through the ridicule of that old-time book "Don Quixote," chivalry was finally laughed quite out of existence. The order of knighthood was given only after years of training and discipline. From his | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925560 | seventh year to his fourteenth the nobleman's son was a _page_ at the court or in the castle of his patron, learning the principles of religion, obedience, and gallantry. At fourteen, as a _squire_, the boy began a severer course of training, in order to become skilled in horsemanship, and to gain strength and courage, as well as the refinements | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925561 | and graces necessary in the company of knights and ladies. Finally, at twenty-one, his training was complete, and with elaborate and solemn formality the _squire_ was made a _knight_. Then, after a strict oath to be loyal, courteous, and brave, the armour was buckled on, and the proud young chevalier rode out into the world, strong for good or ill | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925562 | in limb, strong in impenetrable armour, strong in a social custom that lifted him above the common people about him. When rightly exercised chivalry was a great blessing to the people of its time. It offered high ideals of pure-minded, warm-hearted, courtly, courageous Christian manhood. It did much to arouse thought, to quicken sympathy, to purify morals, to make men | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925563 | truly brave and loyal. Of course this ideal of character was not in the days of chivalry--ideals are not often now--very fully realised. The Mediaeval, like the Modern, abused his power of muscle, of sword, of rank. His liberty as a knight-errant sometimes descended into the licence of a highwayman; his pride in the opportunity for helpfulness grew to be | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925564 | the braggadocio of a bully; his freedom of personal choice became the insolence of lawlessness; his pretended purity and justice proved wanton selfishness. Because of these abuses that crept into the system, it is well for the world that gunpowder at last came, to break through the knight's coat of mail, to teach the nobility respect for common men, roughly | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925565 | to end this age of so much superficial politeness and savage bravery, and to bring in a more democratic social order. The books of any age are for us a record of how the people of that age thought, how they lived, and what kind of men and women they tried to be. The old romances of chivalry give us | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925566 | clear pictures of the knights and ladies of the Middle Ages, and we shall lose the delight and the profit they may give us, if we think only of the defects of chivalry, and close our eyes to the really worthy motives of those far-off times, and so miss seeing what chivalry was able to do, while it lasted, to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925567 | make men and women better and happier. Before reading the Arthur stories themselves it is well to know something about the way they have been built up, as one writer after another has taken the material left by predecessors, and has worked into it fresh conceptions of things brave and true. First there was the old Latin chronicle of Nennius, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925568 | the earliest trace of Arthurian fact or fancy, with a single paragraph given to Arthur and his twelve great battles. This chronicle itself may have been based on yet earlier Welsh stories, which had been passed on, perhaps for centuries, by oral tradition from father to son, and gradually woven together into some legendary history of Oldest England in the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925569 | local language of Brittany, across the English Channel. This original s referred to by later writers, but was long ago lost. Geoffrey of Monmouth says it was the source of his material for his "Historia Britonum." Geoffrey's history, in Latin prose, written some time about the middle of the twelfth century, remains as the earliest definite record of the legends | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925570 | connected with King Arthur. Only a little later Geoffrey's Latin history was translated by Wace and others into Norman French, and here the Arthur material first appeared in verse form. Then, still later in the twelfth century, Walter Map worked the same stories over into French prose, and at the same time put so much of his own knowledge and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925571 | imagination with them, that we may almost say that he was the maker of the Arthur romances. Soon after the year twelve hundred,--a half century after Geoffrey of Monmouth first set our English ancestors to thinking about the legendary old hero of the times of the Anglo-Saxon conquest--Layamon, parish priest of Ernly, in Worcestershire, gave to the English language (as | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925572 | distinct from the earlier Anglo-Saxon) his poem "Brut." This was a translation and enlargement of Wace's old French poem having Arthur as hero. So these stories of King Arthur, of Welsh or Celtic origin, came through the Latin, and then through French verse and prose, into our own speech, and so began their career down the centuries of our more | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925573 | modern history. After giving ideas to generation after generation of romance writers of many countries and in many languages, these same romantic stories were, in the fifteenth century, skilfully brought together into one connected prose narrative,--one of the choicest of the older English classics, "Le Morte Darthur," by Sir Thomas Malory. Those were troublous times when Sir Thomas, perhaps after | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925574 | having himself fought and suffered in the Wars of the Roses then in progress, found some quiet spot in Warwickshire in which to put together in lasting form the fine old stories that already in his day were classics. Malory finished his n , and its permanence for all time was assured fifteen years later, when Caxton, after the "symple | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925575 | connynge" that God had sent him (to use the quaint forms of expression then common), "under the favour and correctyon of al noble lordes and gentylmen emprysed to emprynte a book of the noble hystoryes of the sayd Kynge Arthur and of certeyn of his knyghtes after a copye unto him delyuerd whyche copye Syr Thomas Malorye dyd take oute | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925576 | of certeyn bookes of Frensche and reduced it in to Englysche." This hard-headed business man,--this fifteenth-century publisher,--was rather doubtful about the Briton king of a thousand years before his day, and to those urging upon him the venture of printing Malory's book he answered: "Dyuers men holde oppynyon that there was no suche Arthur and that alle suche bookes as | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925577 | been maad of hym ben fayned and fables by cause that somme cronycles make of him no mencyon ne remember him noo thynge ne of his knyghtes." But the arguments of those in favour of the undertaking prevailed, greatly to the advantage of the four centuries that have followed, during which "Le Morte Darthur" has been a constant source of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925578 | poetic inspiration. Generation after generation of readers and of writers have drawn life from its chapters, and the new delight in Tennyson's "Idylls of the King," almost of our own time, shows that the fountain has not yet been drained dry. Malory's "Morte Darthur" is a long book, and its really great interest is partly hidden from us by forms | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925579 | of expression that belong only to the time when it was first written. Besides this, the ideas of what was right and proper in conduct and speech--moral standards--were far lower in Malory's day than they are now. The purpose of this new little volume is to bring the old tales freshly to the attention of young people of the present | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925580 | time. It keeps, as far as may be, the exact language and the spirit of the original, chooses such stories as best represent the whole, and modifies these only in order to remove what could possibly hide the thought, or be so crude in taste and morals as to seem unworthy of the really high-minded author of five hundred years | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925581 | ago. It aims also so to condense the book that, in this age of hurry, readers may not be repelled from the tales merely because of their length. Chivalry of just King Arthur's kind was given up long ago, but that for which it stood--human fellowship in noble purpose--is far older than the institution of knighthood or than even the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925582 | traditions of the energetic, brave, true, helpful King Arthur himself. It links us with all the past and all the future. The knights of the twentieth century do not set out in chain-armour to right the wrongs of the oppressed by force of arms, but the best influences of chivalry have been preserved for the quickening of a broader and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925583 | a nobler world than was ever in the dreams of knight-errant of old. Modern heroes of the genuine type owe more than they know to those of Arthur's court who swore: "To reverence the King, as if he were Their conscience, and their conscience as their King, To break the heathen and uphold the Christ, To ride abroad redressing human | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925584 | wrongs, To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it, To honour his own word as if his God's, To lead sweet lives in purest chastity, To love one maiden only, cleave to her, And worship her by years of noble deeds, Until they won her." "Antiquity produced heroes, but not gentlemen," someone has said. In the days of Charlemagne | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925585 | and Alfred began the training which, continued in the days of Chaucer and Sir Thomas Malory and many, many more, has given to this our age that highest type of manhood, the Christian gentleman. U. W. C. Stories of King Arthur OF THE BIRTH OF KING ARTHUR It befell in the days of Uther Pendragon, when he was king of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925586 | all England, that there was a mighty duke in Cornwall that held war against him a long time. And the duke was named the Duke of Tintagil. Ten miles away from his castle, called Terrabil, there was, in the castle Tintagil, Igraine of Cornwall, that King Uther liked and loved well, for she was a good and fair lady, and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925587 | passing wise. He made her great cheer out of measure, and desired to have her love in return; but she would not assent unto him, and for pure anger and for great love of fair Igraine King Uther fell sick. At that time there lived a powerful magician named Merlin, who could appear in any place he chose, could change | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925588 | his looks as he liked, and at will could do wonderful things to help or to harm knights and ladies. So to King Uther came Sir Ulfius, a noble knight, and said, "I will seek Merlin, and he shall do you remedy so that your heart shall be pleased." So Ulfius departed, and by adventure met Merlin in beggar's array, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925589 | and made him promise to be not long behind in riding to Uther's pavilion. Soon Merlin stood by the king's side and said: "I know all your heart, and promise ye shall have your desire, if ye will be sworn to fulfil my wish." This the king solemnly agreed to do, and then Merlin said: "After ye shall win Igraine | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925590 | as wife, a child shall be born to you that is to be given unto me to be brought up as I will; this shall be for your honour and the child's avail." That night King Uther met in battle the Duke of Tintagil, who had protected Igraine in her castle, and overcame him. Then Igraine welcomed Uther as her | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925591 | true lover, for Merlin had given him the appearance of one dear to her, and, the barons being all well accorded, the two were married on a morning with great mirth and joy. When the time came that Igraine should bear a son, Merlin came again unto the King to claim his promise, and he said: "I know a lord | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925592 | of yours in this land, a passing true man and a faithful, named Sir Ector, and he shall have the nourishing of your child. Let the young Prince be delivered to me at yonder privy postern, when I come for him." So the babe, Arthur Pendragon, bound in a cloth of gold, was taken by two knights and two ladies | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925593 | to the postern gate of the castle and delivered unto Merlin, disguised as a poor man, and by him was carried forth to Sir Ector, whose wife nourished him as her own child. Then within two years King Uther fell sick of a great malady. Wherefore all the barons made great sorrow, and asked Merlin what counsel were best, for | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925594 | few of them had ever seen or heard of the young child, Arthur. On the morn all by Merlin's counsel came before the King, and Merlin said: "Sir, shall your son Arthur be king, after your days, of this realm with all the appurtenance?" Then Uther Pendragon turned him and said in hearing of them all, "I give him God's | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925595 | blessing and mine, and bid him righteously and honourably to claim the crown upon forfeiture of my blessing." Therewith he died, and he was buried as befitted a king, and the Queen, fair Igraine, and all the barons made great sorrow. UTHER'S SON, RIGHTWISE KING OF ALL ENGLAND Then stood the kingdom in great jeopardy a long while, for every | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925596 | lord strengthened himself, and many a one thought to be king rather than be ruled by a child that they had never known. All this confusion Merlin had foreseen, and he had taken the young prince away, to keep him safe from the jealous barons until he should be old enough to rule wisely for himself. Even Sir Ector did | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925597 | not know that the boy growing up with his own son Kay was the King's child, and heir to the realm. When now young Arthur had grown into a tall youth, well trained in all the exercises of honourable knighthood, Merlin went to the Archbishop of Canterbury and counselled him to send to all the lords of the realm and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925598 | all the gentlemen of arms, that they should come to London at Christmas time, since God of His great mercy would at that time show by miracle who should be rightwise king of the realm. The Archbishop did as Merlin advised, and all the great knights made them clean of their life so that their prayer might be the more | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000012925599 | acceptable unto God, and when Christmas came they went unto London, each one thinking that perchance his wish to be made king should be granted. So in the greatest church of the city (whether it was St Paul's or not the old chronicle maketh no mention) all were at their prayers long ere day. When matins were done and they | 60 | gutenberg |
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