Four Arthurian Romances
flight the moment I met with you. Moreover, the affair is none of mine:
I come to you from one that is better than I, a woman who is more noble
and excellent. But if she be disappointed in her hopes of you, then she
has been betrayed by your fair renown, for she has no expectation of
other aid. My damsel, who is deprived of her inheritance by a sister,
expects with your help to win her suit; she will have none but you
defend her cause. No one can make her believe that any one else could
bear her aid. By securing her share of the heritage, you will have won
and acquired the love of her who is now disinherited, and you will also
increase your own renown. She herself was going in search for you to
secure the boon for which she hoped; no one else would have taken her
place, had she not been detained by an illness which compels her to keep
her bed. Now tell me, please, whether you will dare to come, or whether
you will decline." "No," he says; "no man can win praise in a life of
ease; and I will not hold back, but will follow you gladly, my sweet
friend, whithersoever it may please you. And if she for whose sake you
have sought me out stands in some great need of me, have no fear that I
shall not do all I can for her. Now may God grant me the happiness and
grace to settle in her favour her rightful claim."
(Vv. 5107-5184.) [325] Thus conversing, they two rode away until they
approached the town of Pesme Avanture. They had no desire to pass it
by, for the day was already drawing to a close. They came riding to the
castle, when all the people, seeing them approach, called out to the
knight: "Ill come, sire, ill come. This lodging-place was pointed out to
you in order that you might suffer harm and shame. An abbot might take
his oath to that." "Ah," he replied, "foolish and vulgar folk, full
of all mischief, and devoid of honour, why have you thus assailed me?"
"Why? you will find out soon enough, if you will go a little farther.
But you shall learn nothing more until you have ascended to the
fortress." At once my lord Yvain turns toward the tower, and the crowd
cries out, all shouting aloud at him: "Eh, eh, wretch, whither goest
thou? If ever in thy life thou hast encountered one who worked thee
shame and woe, such will be done thee there, whither thou art going,
as will never be told again by thee." My lord Yvain, who is listening,
says: "Base and pitiless people, miserable and impudent, why do you
assail me thus, why do you attack me so? What do you wish of me, what
do you want, that you growl this way after me?" A lady, who was somewhat
advanced in years, who was courteous and sensible, said: "Thou hast no
cause to be enraged: they mean no harm in what they say; but, if thou
understoodest them aright, they are warning thee not to spend the night
up there; they dare not tell thee the reason for this, but they are
warning and blaming thee because they wish to arouse thy fears. This
they are accustomed to do in the case of all who come, so that they may
not go inside. And the custom is such that we dare not receive in our
own houses, for any reason whatsoever, any gentleman who comes here from
a distance. The responsibility now is thine alone; no one will stand in
thy way. If thou wishest, thou mayst go up now; but my advice is to turn
back again." "Lady," he says, "doubtless it would be to my honour and
advantage to follow your advice; but I do not know where I should find
a lodging-place to-night." "Upon my word," says she, "I'll say no more,
for the concern is none of mine. Go wherever you please. Nevertheless,
I should be very glad to see you return from inside without too great
shame; but that could hardly be." "Lady," he says, "may God reward you
for the wish. However, my wayward heart leads me on inside, and I
shall do what my heart desires." Thereupon, he approaches the gate,
accompanied by his lion and his damsel. Then the porter calls to him,
and says: "Come quickly, come. You are on your way to a place where you
will be securely detained, and may your visit be accursed."
(Vv. 5185-5346.) The porter, after addressing him with this very
ungracious welcome, hurried upstairs. But my lord Yvain, without making
reply, passed straight on, and found a new and lofty hall; in front
of it there was a yard enclosed with large, round, pointed stakes,
and seated inside the stakes he saw as many as three hundred maidens,
working at different kinds of embroidery. Each one was sewing with
golden thread and silk, as best she could. But such was their poverty,
that many of them wore no girdle, and looked slovenly, because so poor;
and their garments were torn about their breasts and at the elbows, and
their shifts were soiled about their necks. Their necks were thin, and
their faces pale with hunger and privation. They see him, as he looks at
them, and they weep, and are unable for some time to do anything or to
raise their eyes from the ground, so bowed down they are with woe. When
he had contemplated them for a while, my lord Yvain turned about and
moved toward the door; but the porter barred the way, and cried: "It
is no use, fair master; you shall not get out now. You would like to be
outside: but, by my head, it is of no use. Before you escape you will
have suffered such great shame that you could not easily suffer more;
so you were not wise to enter here, for there is no question of escaping
now." "Nor do I wish to do so, fair brother," said he; "but tell me,
by thy father's soul, whence came the damsels whom I saw in the yard,
weaving cloths of silk and gold. I enjoy seeing the work they do, but I
am much distressed to see their bodies so thin, and their faces so pale
and sad. I imagine they would be fair and charming, if they had what
they desire." "I will tell you nothing," was the reply; "seek some one
else to tell you." "That will I do, since there is no better way." Then
he searches until he finds the entrance of the yard where the damsels
were at work: and coming before them, he greets them all, and sees tears
flowing from their eyes, as they weep. Then he says to them: "May it
please God to remove from your hearts, and turn to joy, this grief, the
cause of which I do not know." One of them answers: "May you be heard by
God, to whom you have addressed your prayer. It shall not be concealed
from you who we are, and from what land: I suppose that is what you wish
to know." "For no other purpose came I here," says he. [326] "Sire,
it happened a long while ago that the king of the Isle of Damsels went
seeking news through divers courts and countries, and he kept on his
travels like a dunce until he encountered this perilous place. It was an
unlucky hour when he first came here, for we wretched captives who are
here receive all the shame and misery which we have in no wise deserved.
And rest assured that you yourself may expect great shame, unless a
ransom for you be accepted. But, at any rate, so it came about that my
lord came to this town, where there are two sons of the devil (do not
take it as a jest) who were born of a woman and an imp. These two were
about to fight with the king, whose terror was great, for he was not yet
eighteen years old, and they would have been able to cleave him through
like a tender lamb. So the king, in his terror, escaped his fate as best
he could, by swearing that he would send hither each year, as required,
thirty of his damsels, and with this rent he freed himself. And when
he swore, it was agreed that this arrangement should remain in force
as long as the two devils lived. But upon the day when they should
be conquered and defeated in battle, he would be relieved from this
tribute, and we should be delivered who are now shamefully given over to
distress and misery. Never again shall we know what pleasure is. But I
spoke folly just now in referring to our deliverance, for we shall never
more leave this place. We shall spend our days weaving cloths of silk,
without ever being better clad. We shall always be poor and naked, and
shall always suffer from hunger and thirst, for we shall never be able
to earn enough to procure for ourselves any better food. Our bread
supply is very scarce--a little in the morning and less at night, for
none of us can gain by her handiwork more than fourpence a day for her
daily bread. And with this we cannot provide ourselves with sufficient
food and clothes. For though there is not one of us who does not earn as
much as twenty sous [327] a week, yet we cannot live without hardship.
Now you must know that there is not a single one of us who does not do
twenty sous worth of work or more, and with such a sum even a duke would
be considered rich. So while we are reduced to such poverty, he, for
whom we work, is rich with the product of our toil. We sit up many
nights, as well as every day, to earn the more, for they threaten to do
us injury, when we seek some rest, so we do not dare to rest ourselves.
But why should I tell you more? We are so shamefully treated and
insulted that I cannot tell you the fifth part of it all. But what makes
us almost wild with rage is that we very often see rich and excellent
knights, who fight with the two devils, lose their lives on our account.
They pay dearly for the lodging they receive, as you will do to-morrow.
For, whether you wish to do so or not, you will have to fight
singlehanded and lose your fair renown with these two devils." "May God,
the true and spiritual, protect me," said my lord Yvain, "and give you
back your honour and happiness, if it be His will. I must go now and see
the people inside there, and find out what sort of entertainment they
will offer me." "Go now, sire, and may He protect you who gives and
distributes all good things."
(Vv. 5347-5456.) Then he went until he came to the hall where he found
no one, good or bad, to address him. Then he and his companion passed
through the house until they came to a garden. They never spoke of, or
mentioned, stabling their horses. But what matters it? For those who
considered them already as their own had stabled them carefully. I do
not know whether their expectation was wise, for the horses' owners are
still perfectly hale. The horses, however, have oats and hay, and stand
in litter up to their belly. My lord Yvain and his company enter the
garden. There he sees, reclining upon his elbow upon a silken rug, a
gentleman, to whom a maiden was reading from a romance about I know
not whom. There had come to recline there with them and listen to the
romance a lady, who was the mother of the damsel, as the gentleman was
her father; they had good reason to enjoy seeing and hearing her, for
they had no other children. She was not yet sixteen years old, and
was so fair and full of grace that the god of Love would have devoted
himself entirely to her service, if he had seen her, and would never
have made her fall in love with anybody except himself. For her sake he
would have become a man, and would lay aside his deity, and would smite
his own body with that dart whose wound never heals unless some base
physician attends to it. It is not fitting that any one should recover
until he meets with faithlessness. Any one who is cured by other means
is not honestly in love. I could tell you so much about this wound, if
you were pleased to listen to it, that I would not get through my tale
to-day. But there would be some one who would promptly say that I was
telling you but an idle tale; for people don't fall in love nowadays,
nor do they love as they used to do, so they do not care to hear of it.
[328] But hear now in what fashion and with what manner of hospitality
my lord Yvain was received. All those who were in the garden leaped to
their feet when they saw him come, and cried out: "This way, fair sire.