Idylls of the King and a New Selection of Poems

by Alfred Tennyson

  To one who sins, and deems himself alone

  And all the world asleep, they swerved and brake

  Flying, and Arthur call’d to stay the brands

  That hack’d among the flyers, “Ho! they yield!”

  So like a painted battle the war stood

  Silenced, the living quiet as the dead,

  And in the heart of Arthur joy was lord.

  He laugh’d upon his warrior whom he loved

  And honor’d most. “Thou dost not doubt me

  King,

  So well thine arm hath wrought for me to-day.”

  “Sir and my liege,” he cried, “the fire of God

  Descends upon thee in the battle-field.

  I know thee for my King!” Whereat the two,

  For each had warded either in the fight,

  Sware on the field of death a deathless love.

  And Arthur said, “Man’s word is God in man;

  Let chance what will, I trust thee to the death.”

  Then quickly from the foughten field he sent Ulfius, and Brastias, and Bedivere,

  His new made knights, to King Leodogran,

  Saying, “If I in aught have served thee well,

  Give me thy daughter Guinevere to wife.”

  Whom when he heard, Leodogran in heart

  Debating—“How should I that am a king,

  However much he holp me at my need,

  Give my one daughter saving to a king,

  And a king’s son?”—lifted his voice, and call’d

  A hoary man, his chamberlain, to whom

  He trusted all things, and of him required

  His counsel: “Knowest thou aught of Arthur’s birth?”

  Then spake the hoary chamberlain and said:

  “Sir King, there be but two old men that know;

  And each is twice as old as I; and one

  Is Merlin, the wise man that ever served

  King Uther thro’ his magic art, and one

  Is Merlin’s master—so they call him—Bleys,

  Who taught him magic; but the scholar ran

  Before the master, and so far that Bleys

  Laid magic by, and sat him down, and wrote

  All things and whatsoever Merlin did

  In one great annal-book, where after-years

  Will learn the secret of our Arthur’s birth.”

  To whom the King Leodogran replied:

  “O friend, had I been holpen half as well

  By this King Arthur as by thee today,

  Then beast and man had had their share of me;

  But summon here before us yet once more

  Ulfius, and Brastias, and Bedivere.”

  Then, when they came before him, the King said:

  “I have seen the cuckoo chased by lesser fowl,

  And reason in the chase; but wherefore now

  Does these your lords stir up the heat of war,

  Some calling Arthur born of Gorloïs,

  Others of Anton? Tell me, ye yourselves,

  Hold ye this Arthur for King Uther’s son?”

  And Ulfius and Brastias answer’d, “Ay.”

  Then Bedivere, the first of all his knights

  Knighted by Arthur at his crowning, spake—

  For bold in heart and act and word was he,

  Whenever slander breathed against the King—

  “Sir, there be many rumors on this head;

  For there be those who hate him in their hearts,

  Call him baseborn, and since his ways are sweet,

  And theirs are bestial, hold him less than man;

  And there be those who deem him more than man,

  And dream he dropt from heaven. But my belief

  In all this matter—so ye care to learn—

  Sir, for ye know that in King Uther’s time

  The prince and warrior Gorloïs, he that held

  Tintagil castle by the Cornish sea,

  Was wedded with a winsome wife, Ygerne;

  And daughters had she borne him,—one whereof,

  Lot’s wife, the Queen of Orkney, Bellicent,

  Hath ever like a loyal sister cleaved

  To Arthur,—but a son she had not borne.

  And Uther cast upon her eyes of love;

  But she, a stainless wife of Gorloïs,

  So loathed the bright dishonor of his love

  That Gorloïs and King Uther went to war,

  And overthrown was Gorloïs and slain.

  Then Uther in his wrath and heat besieged

  Ygerne within Tintagil, where her men,

  Seeing the mighty swarm about their walls,

  Left her and fled, and Uther enter’d in,

  And there was none to call to but himself.

  So, compass’d by the power of the King,

  Enforced she was to wed him in her tears,

  And with a shameful swiftness; afterward,

  Not many moons, King Uther died himself,

  Moaning and wailing for an heir to rule

  After him, lest the realm should go to wrack.

  And that same night, the night of the new year,

  By reason of the bitterness and grief

  That vext his mother, all before his time

  Was Arthur born, and all as soon as born

  Deliver’d at a secret postern-gate

  To Merlin, to be holden far apart

  Until his hour should come, because the lords

  Of that fierce day were as the lords of this,

  Wild beasts, and surely would have torn the child

  Piecemeal among them, had they known; for each

  But sought to rule for his own self and hand,

  And many hated Uther for the sake

  Of Gorloïs. Wherefore Merlin took the child,

  And gave him to Sir Anton, an old knight

  And ancient friend of Uther; and his wife

  Nursed the young prince, and rear’d him with her

  own;

  And no man knew. And ever since the lords

  Have foughten like wild beasts among themselves,

  So that the realm has gone to wrack; but now,

  This year, when Merlin—for his hour had come—

  Brought Arthur forth, and set him in the hall,

  Proclaiming, ‘Here is Uther’s heir, your king,’

  A hundred voices cried: ‘Away with him!

  No king of ours! a son of Gorloïs he,

  Or else the child of Anton, and no king,

  Or else baseborn.’ Yet Merlin thro’ his craft,

  And while the people clamor’d for a king,

  Had Arthur crown’d; but after, the great lords

  Banded, and so brake out in open war.”

  Then while the King debated with himself

  If Arthur were the child of shamefulness,

  Or born the son of Gorloïs after death,

  Or Uther’s son and born before his time,

  Or whether there were truth in anything

  Said by these three, there came to Cameliard,

  With Gawain and young Modred, her two sons,

  Lot’s wife, the Queen of Orkney, Bellicent;

  Whom as he could, not as he would, the King

  Made feast for, saying, as they sat at meat:

  “A doubtful throne is ice on summer seas.

  Ye come from Arthur’s court. Victor his men

  Report him! Yea, but ye—think ye this king—

  So many those that hate him, and so strong,

  So few his knights, however brave they be—

  Hath body enow to hold his foemen down?”

  “O King,” she cried, “and I will tell thee: few,

  Few, but all brave, all of one mind with him;

  For I was near him when the savage yells

  Of Uther’s peerage died, and Arthur sat

  Crowned on the daïs, and his warriors cried,

  ‘Be thou the king, and we will work thy will

  Who love thee.’
Then the King in low deep tones,

  And simple words of great authority,

  Bound them by so strait vows to his own self

  That when they rose, knighted from kneeling, some

  Were pale as at the passing of a ghost,

  Some flush’d, and others dazed, as one who wakes

  Half-blinded at the coming of a light.

  “But when he spake, and cheer’d his Table Round

  With large, divine, and comfortable words,

  Beyond my tongue to tell thee—I beheld

  From eye to eye thro’ all their Order flash

  A momentary likeness of the King;

  And ere it left their faces, thro’ the cross

  And those around it and the Crucified,

  Down from the casement over Arthur, smote

  Flame-color, vert, and azure, in three rays,

  One falling upon each of three fair queens

  Who stood in silence near his throne, the friends

  Of Arthur, gazing on him, tall, with bright

  Sweet faces, who will help him at his need.

  “And there I saw mage Merlin, whose vast wit And hundred winters are but as the hands Of loyal vassals toiling for their liege.

  “And near him stood the Lady of the Lake.

  Who knows a subtler magic than his own—

  Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful.

  She gave the King his huge cross-hilted sword,

  Whereby to drive the heathen out. A mist

  Of incense curl’d about her, and her face

  Wellnigh was hidden in the minster gloom;

  But there was heard among the holy hymns

  A voice as of the waters, for she dwells

  Down in a deep—calm, whatsoever storms

  May shake the world—and when the surface rolls,

  Hath power to walk the waters like our Lord.

  “There likewise I beheld Excalibur

  Before him at his crowning borne, the sword

  That rose from out the bosom of the lake,

  And Arthur row’d across and took it—rich

  With jewels, elfin Urim, on the hilt,

  Bewildering heart and eye—the blade so bright

  That men are blinded by it—on one side,

  Graven in the oldest tongue of all this world,

  ‘Take me,’ but turn the blade and ye shall see,

  And written in the speech ye speak yourself,

  ‘Cast me away!’ And sad was Arthur’s face

  Taking it, but old Merlin counsell’d him,

  ‘Take thou and strike! the time to cast away

  Is yet far-off.’ So this great brand the King

  Took, and by this will beat his foemen down.”

  Thereat Leodogran rejoiced, but thought

  To sift his doubtings to the last, and ask’d,

  Fixing full eyes of question on her face,

  “The swallow and the swift are near akin,

  But thou art closer to this noble prince,

  Being his own dear sister,” and she said,

  “Daughter of Gorloïs and Ygerne am I;”

  “And therefore Arthur’s sister?” ask’d the King.

  She answer’d, “These be secret things,” and sign’d

  To those two sons to pass, and let them be.

  And Gawain went, and breaking into song

  Sprang out, and follow’d by his flying hair

  Ran like a colt, and leapt at all he saw;

  But Modred laid his ear beside the doors,

  And there half-heard—the same that afterward

  Struck for the throne, and striking found his doom.

  And then the Queen made answer: “What know

  I?

  For dark my mother was in eyes and hair,

  And dark in hair and eyes am I; and dark

  Was Gorloïs; yea, and dark was Uther too,

  Wellnigh to blackness; but this king is fair

  Beyond the race of Britons and of men.

  Moreover, always in my mind I hear

  A cry from out the dawning of my life,

  A mother weeping, and I hear her say,

  ‘O that ye had some brother, pretty one,

  To guard thee on the rough ways of the world.’ ”

  “Ay,” said the King, “and hear ye such a cry? But when did Arthur chance upon thee first?”

  “O King!” she cried, “and I will tell thee true.

  He found me first when yet a little maid.

  Beaten I had been for a little fault

  Whereof I was not guilty; and out I ran

  And flung myself down on a bank of heath,

  And hated this fair world and all therein,

  And wept, and wish’d that I were dead; and he—

  I know not whether of himself he came,

  Or brought by Merlin, who, they say, can walk

  Unseen at pleasure—he was at my side,

  And spake sweet words, and comforted my heart,

  And dried my tears, being a child with me.

  And many a time he came, and evermore

  As I grew greater grew with me; and sad

  At times he seem’d, and sad with him was I,

  Stern too at times, and then I loved him not,

  But sweet again, and then I loved him well.

  And now of late I see him less and less,

  But those first days had golden hours for me,

  For then I surely thought he would be king.

  “But let me tell thee now another tale:

  For Bleys, our Merlin’s master, as they say,

  Died but of late, and sent his cry to me,

  To hear him speak before he left his life.

  Shrunk like a fairy changeling lay the mage;

  And when I enter’d told me that himself

  And Merlin ever served about the King,

  Uther, before he died; and on the night

  When Uther in Tintagil past away

  Moaning and wailing for an heir, the two

  Left the still king, and passing forth to breathe,

  Then from the castle gateway by the chasm

  Descending thro’ the dismal night—a night

  In which the bounds of heaven and earth were lost—

  Beheld, so high upon the dreary deeps

  It seem’d in heaven, a ship, the shape thereof

  A dragon wing’d, and all from stem to stern

  Bright with a shining people on the decks,

  And gone as soon as seen. And then the two

  Dropt to the cove, and watch’d the great sea fall,

  Wave after wave, each mightier than the last,

  Till last, a ninth one, gathering half the deep

  And full of voices, slowly rose and plunged

  Roaring, and all the wave was in a flame;

  And down the wave and in the flame was borne

  A naked babe, and rode to Merlin’s feet,

  Who stoopt and caught the babe, and cried, ‘The

  King!

  Here is an heir for Uther!’ And the fringe

  Of that great breaker, sweeping up the strand,

  Lash’d at the wizard as he spake the word,

  And all at once all round him rose in fire,

  So that the child and he were clothed in fire.

  And presently thereafter follow’d calm,

  Free sky and stars. ‘And this same child,’ he said,

  ‘Is he who reigns; nor could I part in peace

  Till this were told.’ And saying this the seer

  Went thro’ the strait and dreadful pass of death,

  Not ever to be question’d any more

  Save on the further side; but when I met

  Merlin, and ask’d him if these things were truth—

  The shining dragon and the naked child

  Descending in the glory of the seas—

  He laugh’d as is his wont, and answer’d me

  In riddling triplets of old t
ime, and said:—

  “ ‘Rain, rain, and sun! a rainbow in the sky!

  A young man will be wiser by and by;

  An old man’s wit may wander ere he die.

  “ ‘Rain, rain, and sun! a rainbow on the lea!

  And truth is this to me, and that to thee;

  And truth or clothed or naked let it be.

  “ ‘Rain, sun, and rain! and the free blossom blows; Sun, rain, and sun! and where is he who knows? From the great deep to the great deep he goes.’

  “So Merlin riddling anger’d me; but thou

  Fear not to give this King thine only child,

  Guinevere; so great bards of him will sing

  Hereafter, and dark sayings from of old

  Ranging and ringing thro’ the minds of men,

  And echo’d by old folk beside their fires

  For comfort after their wage-work is done,

  Speak of the King; and Merlin in our time

  Hath spoken also, not in jest, and sworn

  Tho’ men may wound him that he will not die,

  But pass, again to come, and then or now

  Utterly smite the heathen underfoot,

  Till these and all men hail him for their king.”

  She spake and King Leodogran rejoiced,

  But musing “Shall I answer yea or nay?”

  Doubted, and drowsed, nodded and slept, and saw,

  Dreaming, a slope of land that ever grew,

  Field after field, up to a height, the peak

  Haze-hidden, and thereon a phantom king,

  Now looming, and now lost; and on the slope

  The sword rose, the hind fell, the herd was driven,

  Fire glimpsed; and all the land from roof and rick,

  In drifts of smoke before a rolling wind,

  Stream’d to the peak, and mingled with the haze

  And made it thicker; while the phantom king

  Sent out at times a voice; and here or there

  Stood one who pointed toward the voice, the rest

  Slew on and burnt, crying, “No king of ours,

  No son of Uther, and no king of ours;”

  Till with a wink his dream was changed, the haze

  Descended, and the solid earth became

  As nothing, but the King stood out in heaven,

  Crown’d. And Leodogran awoke, and sent