Chapter: Guinevere

  Queen Guinevere had fled the court, and sat
  There in the holy house at Almesbury
  Weeping, none with her save a little maid,
  A novice:  one low light betwixt them burned
  Blurred by the creeping mist, for all abroad,
  Beneath a moon unseen albeit at full,
  The white mist, like a face-cloth to the face,
  Clung to the dead earth, and the land was still.

     For hither had she fled, her cause of flight
  Sir Modred; he that like a subtle beast
  Lay couchant with his eyes upon the throne,
  Ready to spring, waiting a chance:  for this
  He chilled the popular praises of the King
  With silent smiles of slow disparagement;
  And tampered with the Lords of the White Horse,
  Heathen, the brood by Hengist left; and sought
  To make disruption in the Table Round
  Of Arthur, and to splinter it into feuds
  Serving his traitorous end; and all his aims
  Were sharpened by strong hate for Lancelot.

     For thus it chanced one morn when all the court,
  Green-suited, but with plumes that mocked the may,
  Had been, their wont, a-maying and returned,
  That Modred still in green, all ear and eye,
  Climbed to the high top of the garden-wall
  To spy some secret scandal if he might,
  And saw the Queen who sat betwixt her best
  Enid, and lissome Vivien, of her court
  The wiliest and the worst; and more than this
  He saw not, for Sir Lancelot passing by
  Spied where he couched, and as the gardener's hand
  Picks from the colewort a green caterpillar,
  So from the high wall and the flowering grove
  Of grasses Lancelot plucked him by the heel,
  And cast him as a worm upon the way;
  But when he knew the Prince though marred with dust,
  He, reverencing king's blood in a bad man,
  Made such excuses as he might, and these
  Full knightly without scorn; for in those days
  No knight of Arthur's noblest dealt in scorn;
  But, if a man were halt or hunched, in him
  By those whom God had made full-limbed and tall,
  Scorn was allowed as part of his defect,
  And he was answered softly by the King
  And all his Table.  So Sir Lancelot holp
  To raise the Prince, who rising twice or thrice
  Full sharply smote his knees, and smiled, and went:
  But, ever after, the small violence done
  Rankled in him and ruffled all his heart,
  As the sharp wind that ruffles all day long
  A little bitter pool about a stone
  On the bare coast.

                    But when Sir Lancelot told
  This matter to the Queen, at first she laughed
  Lightly, to think of Modred's dusty fall,
  Then shuddered, as the village wife who cries
  'I shudder, some one steps across my grave;'
  Then laughed again, but faintlier, for indeed
  She half-foresaw that he, the subtle beast,
  Would track her guilt until he found, and hers
  Would be for evermore a name of scorn.
  Henceforward rarely could she front in hall,
  Or elsewhere, Modred's narrow foxy face,
  Heart-hiding smile, and gray persistent eye:
  Henceforward too, the Powers that tend the soul,
  To help it from the death that cannot die,
  And save it even in extremes, began
  To vex and plague her.  Many a time for hours,
  Beside the placid breathings of the King,
  In the dead night, grim faces came and went
  Before her, or a vague spiritual fear--
  Like to some doubtful noise of creaking doors,
  Heard by the watcher in a haunted house,
  That keeps the rust of murder on the walls--
  Held her awake:  or if she slept, she dreamed
  An awful dream; for then she seemed to stand
  On some vast plain before a setting sun,
  And from the sun there swiftly made at her
  A ghastly something, and its shadow flew
  Before it, till it touched her, and she turned--
  When lo! her own, that broadening from her feet,
  And blackening, swallowed all the land, and in it
  Far cities burnt, and with a cry she woke.
  And all this trouble did not pass but grew;
  Till even the clear face of the guileless King,
  And trustful courtesies of household life,
  Became her bane; and at the last she said,
  'O Lancelot, get thee hence to thine own land,
  For if thou tarry we shall meet again,
  And if we meet again, some evil chance
  Will make the smouldering scandal break and blaze
  Before the people, and our lord the King.'
  And Lancelot ever promised, but remained,
  And still they met and met.  Again she said,
  'O Lancelot, if thou love me get thee hence.'
  And then they were agreed upon a night
  (When the good King should not be there) to meet
  And part for ever.  Vivien, lurking, heard.
  She told Sir Modred.  Passion-pale they met
  And greeted.  Hands in hands, and eye to eye,
  Low on the border of her couch they sat
  Stammering and staring.  It was their last hour,
  A madness of farewells.  And Modred brought
  His creatures to the basement of the tower
  For testimony; and crying with full voice
  'Traitor, come out, ye are trapt at last,' aroused
  Lancelot, who rushing outward lionlike
  Leapt on him, and hurled him headlong, and he fell
  Stunned, and his creatures took and bare him off,
  And all was still:  then she, 'The end is come,
  And I am shamed for ever;' and he said,
  'Mine be the shame; mine was the sin:  but rise,
  And fly to my strong castle overseas:
  There will I hide thee, till my life shall end,
  There hold thee with my life against the world.'
  She answered, 'Lancelot, wilt thou hold me so?
  Nay, friend, for we have taken our farewells.
  Would God that thou couldst hide me from myself!
  Mine is the shame, for I was wife, and thou
  Unwedded:  yet rise now, and let us fly,
  For I will draw me into sanctuary,
  And bide my doom.'  So Lancelot got her horse,
  Set her thereon, and mounted on his own,
  And then they rode to the divided way,
  There kissed, and parted weeping:  for he past,
  Love-loyal to the least wish of the Queen,
  Back to his land; but she to Almesbury
  Fled all night long by glimmering waste and weald,
  And heard the Spirits of the waste and weald
  Moan as she fled, or thought she heard them moan:
  And in herself she moaned 'Too late, too late!'
  Till in the cold wind that foreruns the morn,
  A blot in heaven, the Raven, flying high,
  Croaked, and she thought, 'He spies a field of death;
  For now the Heathen of the Northern Sea,
  Lured by the crimes and frailties of the court,
  Begin to slay the folk, and spoil the land.'

     And when she came to Almesbury she spake
  There to the nuns, and said, 'Mine enemies
  Pursue me, but, O peaceful Sisterhood,
  Receive, and yield me sanctuary, nor ask
  Her name to whom ye yield it, till her time
  To tell you:' and her beauty, grace and power,
  Wrought as a charm upon them, and they spared
  To ask it.

            So the stately Queen abode
  For many a week, unknown, among the nuns;
  Nor with them mixed, nor told her name, nor sought,
  Wrapt in her grief, for housel or for shrift,
  But communed only with the little maid,
  Who pleased her with a babbling heedlessness
  Which often lured her from herself; but now,
  This night, a rumour wildly blown about
  Came, that Sir Modred had usurped the realm,
  And leagued him with the heathen, while the King
  Was waging war on Lancelot:  then she thought,
  'With what a hate the people and the King
  Must hate me,' and bowed down upon her hands
  Silent, until the little maid, who brooked
  No silence, brake it, uttering, 'Late! so late!
  What hour, I wonder, now?' and when she drew
  No answer, by and by began to hum
  An air the nuns had taught her; 'Late, so late!'
  Which when she heard, the Queen looked up, and said,
  'O maiden, if indeed ye list to sing,
  Sing, and unbind my heart that I may weep.'
  Whereat full willingly sang the little maid.

     'Late, late, so late! and dark the night and chill!
  Late, late, so late! but we can enter still.
  Too late, too late! ye cannot enter now.

     'No light had we:  for that we do repent;
  And learning this, the bridegroom will relent.
  Too late, too late! ye cannot enter now.

     'No light:  so late! and dark and chill the night!
  O let us in, that we may find the light!
  Too late, too late:  ye cannot enter now.

     'Have we not heard the bridegroom is so sweet?
  O let us in, though late, to kiss his feet!
  No, no, too late! ye cannot enter now.'

     So sang the novice, while full passionately,
  Her head upon her hands, remembering
  Her thought when first she came, wept the sad Queen.
  Then said the little novice prattling to her,
     'O pray you, noble lady, weep no more;
  But let my words, the words of one so small,
  Who knowing nothing knows but to obey,
  And if I do not there is penance given--
  Comfort your sorrows; for they do not flow
  From evil done; right sure am I of that,
  Who see your tender grace and stateliness.
  But weigh your sorrows with our lord the King's,
  And weighing find them less; for gone is he
  To wage grim war against Sir Lancelot there,
  Round that strong castle where he holds the Queen;
  And Modred whom he left in charge of all,
  The traitor--Ah sweet lady, the King's grief
  For his own self, and his own Queen, and realm,
  Must needs be thrice as great as any of ours.
  For me, I thank the saints, I am not great.
  For if there ever come a grief to me
  I cry my cry in silence, and have done.
  None knows it, and my tears have brought me good:
  But even were the griefs of little ones
  As great as those of great ones, yet this grief
  Is added to the griefs the great must bear,
  That howsoever much they may desire
  Silence, they cannot weep behind a cloud:
  As even here they talk at Almesbury
  About the good King and his wicked Queen,
  And were I such a King with such a Queen,
  Well might I wish to veil her wickedness,
  But were I such a King, it could not be.'

     Then to her own sad heart muttered the Queen,
  'Will the child kill me with her innocent talk?'
  But openly she answered, 'Must not I,
  If this false traitor have displaced his lord,
  Grieve with the common grief of all the realm?'

     'Yea,' said the maid, 'this is all woman's grief,
  That she is woman, whose disloyal life
  Hath wrought confusion in the Table Round
  Which good King Arthur founded, years ago,
  With signs and miracles and wonders, there
  At Camelot, ere the coming of the Queen.'

     Then thought the Queen within herself again,
  'Will the child kill me with her foolish prate?'
  But openly she spake and said to her,
  'O little maid, shut in by nunnery walls,
  What canst thou know of Kings and Tables Round,
  Or what of signs and wonders, but the signs
  And simple miracles of thy nunnery?'

     To whom the little novice garrulously,
  'Yea, but I know:  the land was full of signs
  And wonders ere the coming of the Queen.
  So said my father, and himself was knight
  Of the great Table--at the founding of it;
  And rode thereto from Lyonnesse, and he said
  That as he rode, an hour or maybe twain
  After the sunset, down the coast, he heard
  Strange music, and he paused, and turning--there,
  All down the lonely coast of Lyonnesse,
  Each with a beacon-star upon his head,
  And with a wild sea-light about his feet,
  He saw them--headland after headland flame
  Far on into the rich heart of the west:
  And in the light the white mermaiden swam,
  And strong man-breasted things stood from the sea,
  And sent a deep sea-voice through all the land,
  To which the little elves of chasm and cleft
  Made answer, sounding like a distant horn.
  So said my father--yea, and furthermore,
  Next morning, while he past the dim-lit woods,
  Himself beheld three spirits mad with joy
  Come dashing down on a tall wayside flower,
  That shook beneath them, as the thistle shakes
  When three gray linnets wrangle for the seed:
  And still at evenings on before his horse
  The flickering fairy-circle wheeled and broke
  Flying, and linked again, and wheeled and broke
  Flying, for all the land was full of life.
  And when at last he came to Camelot,
  A wreath of airy dancers hand-in-hand
  Swung round the lighted lantern of the hall;
  And in the hall itself was such a feast
  As never man had dreamed; for every knight
  Had whatsoever meat he longed for served
  By hands unseen; and even as he said
  Down in the cellars merry bloated things
  Shouldered the spigot, straddling on the butts
  While the wine ran:  so glad were spirits and men
  Before the coming of the sinful Queen.'

     Then spake the Queen and somewhat bitterly,
  'Were they so glad? ill prophets were they all,
  Spirits and men:  could none of them foresee,
  Not even thy wise father with his signs
  And wonders, what has fallen upon the realm?'

     To whom the novice garrulously again,
  'Yea, one, a bard; of whom my father said,
  Full many a noble war-song had he sung,
  Even in the presence of an enemy's fleet,
  Between the steep cliff and the coming wave;
  And many a mystic lay of life and death
  Had chanted on the smoky mountain-tops,
  When round him bent the spirits of the hills
  With all their dewy hair blown back like flame:
  So said my father--and that night the bard
  Sang Arthur's glorious wars, and sang the King
  As wellnigh more than man, and railed at those
  Who called him the false son of Gorlois:
  For there was no man knew from whence he came;
  But after tempest, when the long wave broke
  All down the thundering shores of Bude and Bos,
  There came a day as still as heaven, and then
  They found a naked child upon the sands
  Of dark Tintagil by the Cornish sea;
  And that was Arthur; and they fostered him
  Till he by miracle was approven King:
  And that his grave should be a mystery
  From all men, like his birth; and could he find
  A woman in her womanhood as great
  As he was in his manhood, then, he sang,
  The twain together well might change the world.
  But even in the middle of his song
  He faltered, and his hand fell from the harp,
  And pale he turned, and reeled, and would have fallen,
  But that they stayed him up; nor would he tell
  His vision; but what doubt that he foresaw
  This evil work of Lancelot and the Queen?'

     Then thought the Queen, 'Lo! they have set her on,
  Our simple-seeming Abbess and her nuns,
  To play upon me,' and bowed her head nor spake.
  Whereat the novice crying, with clasped hands,
  Shame on her own garrulity garrulously,
  Said the good nuns would check her gadding tongue
  Full often, 'and, sweet lady, if I seem
  To vex an ear too sad to listen to me,
  Unmannerly, with prattling and the tales
  Which my good father told me, check me too
  Nor let me shame my father's memory, one
  Of noblest manners, though himself would say
  Sir Lancelot had the noblest; and he died,
  Killed in a tilt, come next, five summers back,
  And left me; but of others who remain,
  And of the two first-famed for courtesy--
  And pray you check me if I ask amiss--
  But pray you, which had noblest, while you moved
  Among them, Lancelot or our lord the King?'

     Then the pale Queen looked up and answered her,
  'Sir Lancelot, as became a noble knight,
  Was gracious to all ladies, and the same
  In open battle or the tilting-field
  Forbore his own advantage, and the King
  In open battle or the tilting-field
  Forbore his own advantage, and these two
  Were the most nobly-mannered men of all;
  For manners are not idle, but the fruit
  Of loyal nature, and of noble mind.'

     'Yea,' said the maid, 'be manners such fair fruit?'
  Then Lancelot's needs must be a thousand-fold
  Less noble, being, as all rumour runs,
  The most disloyal friend in all the world.'

     To which a mournful answer made the Queen:
  'O closed about by narrowing nunnery-walls,
  What knowest thou of the world, and all its lights
  And shadows, all the wealth and all the woe?
  If ever Lancelot, that most noble knight,
  Were for one hour less noble than himself,
  Pray for him that he scape the doom of fire,
  And weep for her that drew him to his doom.'

     'Yea,' said the little novice, 'I pray for both;
  But I should all as soon believe that his,
  Sir Lancelot's, were as noble as the King's,
  As I could think, sweet lady, yours would be
  Such as they are, were you the sinful Queen.'

     So she, like many another babbler, hurt
  Whom she would soothe, and harmed where she would heal;
  For here a sudden flush of wrathful heat
  Fired all the pale face of the Queen, who cried,
  'Such as thou art be never maiden more
  For ever! thou their tool, set on to plague
  And play upon, and harry me, petty spy
  And traitress.'  When that storm of anger brake
  From Guinevere, aghast the maiden rose,
  White as her veil, and stood before the Queen
  As tremulously as foam upon the beach
  Stands in a wind, ready to break and fly,
  And when the Queen had added 'Get thee hence,'
  Fled frighted.  Then that other left alone
  Sighed, and began to gather heart again,
  Saying in herself, 'The simple, fearful child
  Meant nothing, but my own too-fearful guilt,
  Simpler than any child, betrays itself.
  But help me, heaven, for surely I repent.
  For what is true repentance but in thought--
  Not even in inmost thought to think again
  The sins that made the past so pleasant to us:
  And I have sworn never to see him more,
  To see him more.'

                   And even in saying this,
  Her memory from old habit of the mind
  Went slipping back upon the golden days
  In which she saw him first, when Lancelot came,
  Reputed the best knight and goodliest man,
  Ambassador, to lead her to his lord
  Arthur, and led her forth, and far ahead
  Of his and her retinue moving, they,
  Rapt in sweet talk or lively, all on love
  And sport and tilts and pleasure, (for the time
  Was maytime, and as yet no sin was dreamed,)
  Rode under groves that looked a paradise
  Of blossom, over sheets of hyacinth
  That seemed the heavens upbreaking through the earth,
  And on from hill to hill, and every day
  Beheld at noon in some delicious dale
  The silk pavilions of King Arthur raised
  For brief repast or afternoon repose
  By couriers gone before; and on again,
  Till yet once more ere set of sun they saw
  The Dragon of the great Pendragonship,
  That crowned the state pavilion of the King,
  Blaze by the rushing brook or silent well.

     But when the Queen immersed in such a trance,
  And moving through the past unconsciously,
  Came to that point where first she saw the King
  Ride toward her from the city, sighed to find
  Her journey done, glanced at him, thought him cold,
  High, self-contained, and passionless, not like him,
  'Not like my Lancelot'--while she brooded thus
  And grew half-guilty in her thoughts again,
  There rode an armed warrior to the doors.
  A murmuring whisper through the nunnery ran,
  Then on a sudden a cry, 'The King.'  She sat
  Stiff-stricken, listening; but when armed feet
  Through the long gallery from the outer doors
  Rang coming, prone from off her seat she fell,
  And grovelled with her face against the floor:
  There with her milkwhite arms and shadowy hair
  She made her face a darkness from the King:
  And in the darkness heard his armed feet
  Pause by her; then came silence, then a voice,
  Monotonous and hollow like a Ghost's
  Denouncing judgment, but though changed, the King's:

     'Liest thou here so low, the child of one
  I honoured, happy, dead before thy shame?
  Well is it that no child is born of thee.
  The children born of thee are sword and fire,
  Red ruin, and the breaking up of laws,
  The craft of kindred and the Godless hosts
  Of heathen swarming o'er the Northern Sea;
  Whom I, while yet Sir Lancelot, my right arm,
  The mightiest of my knights, abode with me,
  Have everywhere about this land of Christ
  In twelve great battles ruining overthrown.
  And knowest thou now from whence I come--from him
  From waging bitter war with him:  and he,
  That did not shun to smite me in worse way,
  Had yet that grace of courtesy in him left,
  He spared to lift his hand against the King
  Who made him knight:  but many a knight was slain;
  And many more, and all his kith and kin
  Clave to him, and abode in his own land.
  And many more when Modred raised revolt,
  Forgetful of their troth and fealty, clave
  To Modred, and a remnant stays with me.
  And of this remnant will I leave a part,
  True men who love me still, for whom I live,
  To guard thee in the wild hour coming on,
  Lest but a hair of this low head be harmed.
  Fear not:  thou shalt be guarded till my death.
  Howbeit I know, if ancient prophecies
  Have erred not, that I march to meet my doom.
  Thou hast not made my life so sweet to me,
  That I the King should greatly care to live;
  For thou hast spoilt the purpose of my life.
  Bear with me for the last time while I show,
  Even for thy sake, the sin which thou hast sinned.
  For when the Roman left us, and their law
  Relaxed its hold upon us, and the ways
  Were filled with rapine, here and there a deed
  Of prowess done redressed a random wrong.
  But I was first of all the kings who drew
  The knighthood-errant of this realm and all
  The realms together under me, their Head,
  In that fair Order of my Table Round,
  A glorious company, the flower of men,
  To serve as model for the mighty world,
  And be the fair beginning of a time.
  I made them lay their hands in mine and swear
  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 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; for indeed I knew
  Of no more subtle master under heaven
  Than is the maiden passion for a maid,
  Not only to keep down the base in man,
  But teach high thought, and amiable words
  And courtliness, and the desire of fame,
  And love of truth, and all that makes a man.
  And all this throve before I wedded thee,
  Believing, "lo mine helpmate, one to feel
  My purpose and rejoicing in my joy."
  Then came thy shameful sin with Lancelot;
  Then came the sin of Tristram and Isolt;
  Then others, following these my mightiest knights,
  And drawing foul ensample from fair names,
  Sinned also, till the loathsome opposite
  Of all my heart had destined did obtain,
  And all through thee! so that this life of mine
  I guard as God's high gift from scathe and wrong,
  Not greatly care to lose; but rather think
  How sad it were for Arthur, should he live,
  To sit once more within his lonely hall,
  And miss the wonted number of my knights,
  And miss to hear high talk of noble deeds
  As in the golden days before thy sin.
  For which of us, who might be left, could speak
  Of the pure heart, nor seem to glance at thee?
  And in thy bowers of Camelot or of Usk
  Thy shadow still would glide from room to room,
  And I should evermore be vext with thee
  In hanging robe or vacant ornament,
  Or ghostly footfall echoing on the stair.
  For think not, though thou wouldst not love thy lord,
  Thy lord hast wholly lost his love for thee.
  I am not made of so slight elements.
  Yet must I leave thee, woman, to thy shame.
  I hold that man the worst of public foes
  Who either for his own or children's sake,
  To save his blood from scandal, lets the wife
  Whom he knows false, abide and rule the house:
  For being through his cowardice allowed
  Her station, taken everywhere for pure,
  She like a new disease, unknown to men,
  Creeps, no precaution used, among the crowd,
  Makes wicked lightnings of her eyes, and saps
  The fealty of our friends, and stirs the pulse
  With devil's leaps, and poisons half the young.
  Worst of the worst were that man he that reigns!
  Better the King's waste hearth and aching heart
  Than thou reseated in thy place of light,
  The mockery of my people, and their bane.'

     He paused, and in the pause she crept an inch
  Nearer, and laid her hands about his feet.
  Far off a solitary trumpet blew.
  Then waiting by the doors the warhorse neighed
  At a friend's voice, and he spake again:

     'Yet think not that I come to urge thy crimes,
  I did not come to curse thee, Guinevere,
  I, whose vast pity almost makes me die
  To see thee, laying there thy golden head,
  My pride in happier summers, at my feet.
  The wrath which forced my thoughts on that fierce law,
  The doom of treason and the flaming death,
  (When first I learnt thee hidden here) is past.
  The pang--which while I weighed thy heart with one
  Too wholly true to dream untruth in thee,
  Made my tears burn--is also past--in part.
  And all is past, the sin is sinned, and I,
  Lo! I forgive thee, as Eternal God
  Forgives:  do thou for thine own soul the rest.
  But how to take last leave of all I loved?
  O golden hair, with which I used to play
  Not knowing! O imperial-moulded form,
  And beauty such as never woman wore,
  Until it became a kingdom's curse with thee--
  I cannot touch thy lips, they are not mine,
  But Lancelot's:  nay, they never were the King's.
  I cannot take thy hand:  that too is flesh,
  And in the flesh thou hast sinned; and mine own flesh,
  Here looking down on thine polluted, cries
  "I loathe thee:" yet not less, O Guinevere,
  For I was ever virgin save for thee,
  My love through flesh hath wrought into my life
  So far, that my doom is, I love thee still.
  Let no man dream but that I love thee still.
  Perchance, and so thou purify thy soul,
  And so thou lean on our fair father Christ,
  Hereafter in that world where all are pure
  We two may meet before high God, and thou
  Wilt spring to me, and claim me thine, and know
  I am thine husband--not a smaller soul,
  Nor Lancelot, nor another.  Leave me that,
  I charge thee, my last hope.  Now must I hence.
  Through the thick night I hear the trumpet blow:
  They summon me their King to lead mine hosts
  Far down to that great battle in the west,
  Where I must strike against the man they call
  My sister's son--no kin of mine, who leagues
  With Lords of the White Horse, heathen, and knights,
  Traitors--and strike him dead, and meet myself
  Death, or I know not what mysterious doom.
  And thou remaining here wilt learn the event;
  But hither shall I never come again,
  Never lie by thy side; see thee no more--
  Farewell!'

            And while she grovelled at his feet,
  She felt the King's breath wander o'er her neck,
  And in the darkness o'er her fallen head,
  Perceived the waving of his hands that blest.

     Then, listening till those armed steps were gone,
  Rose the pale Queen, and in her anguish found
  The casement:  'peradventure,' so she thought,
  'If I might see his face, and not be seen.'
  And lo, he sat on horseback at the door!
  And near him the sad nuns with each a light
  Stood, and he gave them charge about the Queen,
  To guard and foster her for evermore.
  And while he spake to these his helm was lowered,
  To which for crest the golden dragon clung
  Of Britain; so she did not see the face,
  Which then was as an angel's, but she saw,
  Wet with the mists and smitten by the lights,
  The Dragon of the great Pendragonship
  Blaze, making all the night a steam of fire.
  And even then he turned; and more and more
  The moony vapour rolling round the King,
  Who seemed the phantom of a Giant in it,
  Enwound him fold by fold, and made him gray
  And grayer, till himself became as mist
  Before her, moving ghostlike to his doom.

     Then she stretched out her arms and cried aloud
  'Oh Arthur!' there her voice brake suddenly,
  Then--as a stream that spouting from a cliff
  Fails in mid air, but gathering at the base
  Re-makes itself, and flashes down the vale--
  Went on in passionate utterance:

                                  'Gone--my lord!
  Gone through my sin to slay and to be slain!
  And he forgave me, and I could not speak.
  Farewell?  I should have answered his farewell.
  His mercy choked me.  Gone, my lord the King,
  My own true lord! how dare I call him mine?
  The shadow of another cleaves to me,
  And makes me one pollution:  he, the King,
  Called me polluted:  shall I kill myself?
  What help in that?  I cannot kill my sin,
  If soul be soul; nor can I kill my shame;
  No, nor by living can I live it down.
  The days will grow to weeks, the weeks to months
  The months will add themselves and make the years,
  The years will roll into the centuries,
  And mine will ever be a name of scorn.
  I must not dwell on that defeat of fame.
  Let the world be; that is but of the world.
  What else? what hope? I think there was a hope,
  Except he mocked me when he spake of hope;
  His hope he called it; but he never mocks,
  For mockery is the fume of little hearts.
  And blessed be the King, who hath forgiven
  My wickedness to him, and left me hope
  That in mine own heart I can live down sin
  And be his mate hereafter in the heavens
  Before high God.  Ah great and gentle lord,
  Who wast, as is the conscience of a saint
  Among his warring senses, to thy knights--
  To whom my false voluptuous pride, that took
  Full easily all impressions from below,
  Would not look up, or half-despised the height
  To which I would not or I could not climb--
  I thought I could not breathe in that fine air
  That pure severity of perfect light--
  I yearned for warmth and colour which I found
  In Lancelot--now I see thee what thou art,
  Thou art the highest and most human too,
  Not Lancelot, nor another.  Is there none
  Will tell the King I love him though so late?
  Now--ere he goes to the great Battle? none:
  Myself must tell him in that purer life,
  But now it were too daring.  Ah my God,
  What might I not have made of thy fair world,
  Had I but loved thy highest creature here?
  It was my duty to have loved the highest:
  It surely was my profit had I known:
  It would have been my pleasure had I seen.
  We needs must love the highest when we see it,
  Not Lancelot, nor another.'

                             Here her hand
  Grasped, made her vail her eyes:  she looked and saw
  The novice, weeping, suppliant, and said to her,
  'Yea, little maid, for am I not forgiven?'
  Then glancing up beheld the holy nuns
  All round her, weeping; and her heart was loosed
  Within her, and she wept with these and said,

     'Ye know me then, that wicked one, who broke
  The vast design and purpose of the King.
  O shut me round with narrowing nunnery-walls,
  Meek maidens, from the voices crying "shame."
  I must not scorn myself:  he loves me still.
  Let no one dream but that he loves me still.
  So let me, if you do not shudder at me,
  Nor shun to call me sister, dwell with you;
  Wear black and white, and be a nun like you,
  Fast with your fasts, not feasting with your feasts;
  Grieve with your griefs, not grieving at your joys,
  But not rejoicing; mingle with your rites;
  Pray and be prayed for; lie before your shrines;
  Do each low office of your holy house;
  Walk your dim cloister, and distribute dole
  To poor sick people, richer in His eyes
  Who ransomed us, and haler too than I;
  And treat their loathsome hurts and heal mine own;
  And so wear out in almsdeed and in prayer
  The sombre close of that voluptuous day,
  Which wrought the ruin of my lord the King.'

     She said:  they took her to themselves; and she
  Still hoping, fearing 'is it yet too late?'
  Dwelt with them, till in time their Abbess died.
  Then she, for her good deeds and her pure life,
  And for the power of ministration in her,
  And likewise for the high rank she had borne,
  Was chosen Abbess, there, an Abbess, lived
  For three brief years, and there, an Abbess, past
  To where beyond these voices there is peace.

 Arthur's nephew, the villainous Modred, has been planning for a long time to usurp the throne. He is assisted in his evil designs by Vivien. Together, they take advantage of every opportunity to arouse discord and treason at the court. One night, while the king is away, Modred is able to trap Lancelot and the queen in her chamber. In the confusion that follows, several of Modred's followers are slain, Lancelot flees to his feudal domain in France, and Guinevere takes refuge in the abbey at Almesbury. Here she is given sanctuary by the nuns even though they are not aware of her real identity. For the next few weeks, Guinevere lives at the abbey, suffers from a serious depression, and speaks with no one except the young novice who serves as her maid. One night they receive startling news: Arthur, who believed Lancelot a traitor, has been waging war on him in France. Meanwhile, he left Modred as regent in his place. After having formed an alliance with the northern heathen and various unfaithful lords, Arthur's wicked nephew has made himself king. Arthur is now returning to England with his army. When Guinevere learns this development and realizes that the awful state of the kingdom is in large part due to her own behavior, she moans: "With what a hate the people and King must hate me." The young novice attempts to cheer the weeping lady but has little success. In order to distract her, the nun repeats all the old stories and prophecies about Arthur, the great achievements of his reign, and the eventual decay of his Round Table. She attributes the moral downfall to the sin first committed by the queen and Lancelot. Upon hearing this, Guinevere's grief becomes more intense. She orders the nun to leave her chamber. Alone, Guinevere muses about herself and remembers some happy episodes of her life with Arthur. Her thoughts ramble on and she indulges in self-pity. Suddenly an armed knight rides into the courtyard, and a whisper runs through the abbey: "The king! The king!" A few seconds more and Arthur confronts Guinevere in her room. The king's demeanor is saddened, for he has at last learned the truth about Guinevere's infidelity, and now he foresees his own impending defeat and death. He is, however, a majestic figure as he stands before her. Arthur speaks to his wife at great length, saying in part: ". . . I did not come to curse thee, Guinevere. . . .Lo, I forgive thee . . . do thou for thine own soul the rest. . . .Let no man dream but that I love thee still. . . .Hereafter in that world where all are pureWe two may meet before high God, and thouWilt spring to me, and claim me thine, and knowI am thine husband. . . . Leave me that,I charge thee, my last hope. Now must I hence.. . . to lead mine hostsFar down to that great battle in the west,Where I must strike against the man they callMy sister's son . . . who leaguesWith . . . heathen, and knights,Traitors -- and strike him dead, and meet myselfDeath, or I know not what mysterious doom.And thou remaining here wilt learn the event;But hither shall I never come again,Never lie by thy side, see thee no more -- Farewell!" After Arthur leaves, Guinevere becomes hysterical for she has realized that she still loves him and understands at last the full significance and consequence of her immorality. In the years that follow, she remains at the abbey and devotes her life to penance and good works. After a while, in virtue of her good deeds and pure life, she is made abbess. She dies there, beloved by the nuns and all the inhabitants of the surrounding country.

