King Arthur's Knights
'It pleases me well,' said Tristram; 'it should mean that there dwell
therein brave and noble knights, and damsels like unto fairies.'
Out of the merriness of his heart he thrummed his harp with so blithe
and strange a tune that in a little while the very folk upon the shore
came listening, and some began to dance, while others looked sad. For
though the tune was very merry, there was sadness also peeping from it.
It happened that King Anguish and his court were in that castle by the
sea, and a handmaiden of the queen came to where they sat and told them
of the knight that sat in his ship and harped so strange a lay that it
made one glad and sorry at the same time.
Then King Anguish sent a knight and begged the harper to take cheer
with him, and Sir Tristram was brought in a litter, and all the damsels
were sad at his sickness, and the knights sorrowed that a knight so
noble-looking should be so wounded. King Anguish asked him who he was
and how he came by his wound. And Sir Tristram, having learned that
this was the King of Ireland, whose champion he had worsted in the
battle, and thinking that his own name would be known, replied:
'I am of the country of Lyones, and my name is Sir Tramor, and my wound
was got in battle, as I fought for a lady's right.'
'I pity thee, sir knight,' said the king, who was a right noble king
and lovable, 'and by Heaven's aid, ye shall have all the help in this
country that ye may need.'
The king told him of the battle which Sir Marhaus had had on his behalf
with a knight named Sir Tristram, and how Sir Marhaus had come home
wounded unto death, and was dead this two months. On which Sir Tristram
feigned to be sorry, but said not much thereon.
Then did the king order his daughter to come before him. She was called
La Belle Isoude, for that she was the most lovely damsel in all Ireland
and the Out-Isles, and withal gentle and kind; and her father bade her
tend and minister to this stranger knight, who had come to Ireland to
heal him of his wound.
In a few weeks, so soft was she of her hands and so learned in
leechcraft, she had cleaned Tristram's wound of all poison and he was
hale and strong again. As some reward he taught her to harp, and gave
her many good and costly presents. These she took, but valued them not
so much as his kind words and smiles. More and more she loved to hear
his voice, and when he was gone out hawking or looking at jousts she
was sad and thoughtful, sitting with her fair hands in her lap and her
eyes looking far away, and when she heard his step or his voice in the
hall, then would her sad eyes light up, and a merry tune would hum upon
her lips, and she would gaily talk with her handmaidens, who,
whispering and glancing and nodding to each other as they sat about her
at their spinning frames, knew of her love for Sir Tristram before she
was aware of it herself.
Sir Tristram cared not overmuch to be with ladies, but was more joyful
to be in hall, talking of hunting, jousting and hawking. All men
regarded him highly for his great knowledge of these things, but as
yet, for fear of hurting his wound which was but freshly healed, La
Belle Isoude forbade him gently to take violent exercise. Sir Tristram
was impatient to be in the saddle again, with lance in rest and his
great charger leaping beneath him.
Now, to the court of King Anguish there had lately come a knight named
Sir Palomides, famed for his knightly deeds, though still a pagan, and
he was well favoured both of King Anguish and his queen. Sir Palomides
came and made great court to La Belle Isoude, and proffered her many
gifts, for he loved her passing well. Indeed, for her sake he declared
he would be christened and become a Christian knight; but La Belle
Isoude had no care for him, and avoided him as well as she might.
On a certain day King Anguish made a great cry that a joust and
tournament would be held, wherein only unmarried knights should join,
and the prize would be a fair lady called the Lady of the Laundes, near
cousin to the king. The heralds further said that he who should win her
should marry her three days after, and have all her lands with her.
This cry was made in all Ireland and Wales, and in Logres and Alban,
which are now called England and Scotland.
It befell the same day that La Belle Isoude came to Sir Tristram, and
she seemed distressed of mind and as if she had wept secretly.
'Sir Tramor,' she said, 'this tournament shall exalt Sir Palomides
beyond all other knights, unless a better do come forward and overcome
him.'
'Fair lady,' said Sir Tristram, 'Sir Palomides may well win the prize
against any knight, except it be Sir Lancelot. But if ye think I am fit
to joust I will e'en essay it. Yet he is a proved knight, and I but a
young one and but lately ill; and my first battle that I fought, it
mishapped me to be sore wounded. Yet I will essay it, for I love not
this Sir Palomides.'
'Ah, but I know thou wilt do well in the battle, and thou shalt have
all my prayers for thy safety and success,' said La Belle Isoude.
On the first day of the jousts Sir Palomides came with a black shield,
and he was a knight big of his body and on a great horse. He overthrew
many knights and put them to the worst, among them being many of the
knights of the Round Table, as Sir Gawaine and his brother Sir Gaheris,
Sir Agravaine, Sir Kay, Sir Sagramore le Desirous, Sir Owen, who had
been the little page-boy who had saved King Arthur's life in his hall
at Caerleon, and three other knights. All these he struck down, and the
others were adread of him. The people had great marvel, and acclaimed
him with much worship as the victor of the first day.
The next day he came and smote down King Morgant, the pagan King of
Scotland, as also the Duke of Cambenet. Then, as he rode up and down
the lists proudly flourishing his lance, dressing his shield and
waiting for the other knights to offer themselves to him, he was aware
of a knight all in white armour, with vizor closed, riding quickly
through the gate as if he came from the seashore.
The stranger knight came with swiftness, lifting his lance in token of
challenge. Whereat Sir Palomides rode to the other end of the lists,
dressed his lance, and together they put their horses in motion. Like
two bulls the knights thundered against each other in the centre of the
lists. The white knight's lance hit the shield of Sir Palomides full in
the centre, and with the shock the pagan knight was lifted from his
saddle, carried beyond his horse, and fell with a great thud to the
ground, while his horse careered onward riderless.
Sir Gawaine and his fellows marvelled who this stranger knight might
be. Then Sir Palomides, rising from the ground, caught his horse, and
full of shame, would have slunk from the field. But the white knight
rode after him and bade him turn, 'for,' said the stranger, 'he would
better prove him with the sword.'
Then, alighting, they lashed at each other with their swords. Now Sir
Palomides was a powerful man, and his strokes were passing heavy, but
Sir Tristram, for the stranger knight was he, felt so full of strength
and joy after his long leisure, that he played with Sir Palomides, and
men wondered at the might of his blows, and his swiftness was a marvel
to see. In a while, with a great buffet on the head of the pagan
knight, Sir Tristram felled him to the earth.
'Now yield thee,' said the white knight sternly, 'and do my command, or
I will slay thee of a surety.'
Sir Palomides was sore adread, and promised.
'Swear me this,' said the stranger, 'that upon pain of thy life thou
leave my lady La Belle Isoude, and come not unto her ever again, and
for a year and a day thou shalt bear no armour. Promise me this, or
here shalt thou die!'
'I swear it,' said Sir Palomides, 'but I am for ever shamed.'
In his rage Sir Palomides cut off his armour and threw it from him and
fled away on his horse.
Then the white knight also went away, and none knew who he was. The
king sent after him, to tell him he was the winner of the lady, whom he
should wed, but the messengers could not find him. Men marvelled much
at this, that the victor knight should not come to claim the rich lady
for his wife with the wide lands that went with her.
When Sir Tristram returned to the private postern where La Belle Isoude
had led him forth secretly, he found her standing breathless, and she
was pale and red by turns, and could not speak at first.
'Thou--thou hast not failed?' she said, and clasped her hands.
'Nay,' said Sir Tristram, laughing. 'He will never trouble you again.
And, by Our Lady, I wished there had been six of him, for I never felt
more full of fight and strength than I do this day.'
'But--but have ye not claimed the prize?' said La Belle Isoude, and hid
her face that was so deathly white.
'Nay, nor will I,' said Sir Tristram, 'for I crave not to be married. I
would be free and go forth into strange lands to seek adventures.'
He went from her, with the tune of a hunting song upon his lips, and
saw not how La Belle Isoude trembled against the wall and was near to
swoon.
For La Belle Isoude herself was the Lady of the Laundes who should be
given to the victor, though this was known to none but herself and the
king and queen.
The king and queen and all the court marvelled who should be the
stranger knight, and why he had departed, and some suspected Sir
Tristram, but none knew of this except La Belle Isoude and Governale
his squire, and none dared charge him therewith. La Belle Isoude kept
her counsel, and strove to seem lighthearted.
It fell upon a day that Sir Tristram was disporting himself with other
knights at a game of ball upon the green before the castle, and had
left his sword hung upon the post beside his seat in hall. The queen,
with La Belle Isoude, passed through the hall to go to see the men at
their sport, and on her way she espied Sir Tristram's sword, and the
strange device of a serpent which was upon the handle. She said it was
a marvellous piece of work, and never had she seen the like of it.
Then, by ill hap, she drew the sword from the scabbard, and they both
admired it a long time, looking at its keenness and brightness and the
words of mystery engraved on it.
Suddenly the queen gave a little cry as of terror, and she pointed to
where, within a foot and a half of the point, there was a piece broken
out of the edge. Then, very hastily, the queen ran with the sword into
her bower, and from her treasure-chest she drew a casket, and from the
casket she drew a tiny piece of doeskin, and from that she took a
fragment of steel.
While her daughter marvelled what it all might mean, the queen took the
piece of steel and placed it in the broken part of Sir Tristram's
sword, and it fitted so that the break could hardly be seen.
'Alas!' said the queen, 'this is the piece of sword that the leech took
from the brain of my brother, Sir Marhaus, and this Sir Tramor is the
traitorous knight that slew him!'
The heart of La Belle Isoude stood still for fear of the ill that would
befall Sir Tristram, for she knew her mother's rage.
The queen caught up the sword fiercely in her hand and rushed from the
room. Midway through the hall there met her Sir Tristram himself with
his squire Governale, and the queen sped to him and would have run him
through, but for Governale, who snatched the sword from her, though she
wounded him in her wrath.
Finding her rage thus put to naught, she ran to King Anguish, and threw
herself on her knees before him, crying out:
'Oh, my lord and husband, here have ye in your house that traitor
knight that slew my brother and your champion, that noble knight, Sir
Marhaus. It is Sir Tramor, as he falsely calleth himself, but the piece