No More Learning

"What do I owe you, friends? " the prince asked his host, but before the
man could reply he added "take those five horses and their burdens of
arms. "

"My lord, I have scarcely spent the price of one of them on you! " cried
the landlord astonished.

"You'll have all the more riches then," the prince laughed, then turning
to Enid, "today I charge you more particularly than ever before that
whatever you may see, hear, fancy or imagine, do not speak to me, but
obey. "

"Yes, my lord," answered Enid, "I know your wish and should like to
obey, but when I go riding ahead, I hear all the violent threats you do
not hear and see the danger you cannot see, and then not to give you
warning seems hard, almost beyond me. Yet, I wish to obey you. "

"Do so, then," said he. "Do not be too wise, seeing that you are
married, not to a clown but a strong man with arms to guard his own head
and yours, too. "

The broad beaten path which they now took passed through toward the
wasted lands bordering on the castle of Earl Doorm, the Bull, as his
people called him, because of his ferocity.

It was still early morning when Enid caught the sound of quantities of
hoofs galloping up the road. Turning round she saw cloudsful of dust and
the points of lances sparkling in it. Then, not to disobey the prince,
yet to give him warning, she held up her finger and pointed toward the
dust. Geraint was pleased at her cunning, and immediately stopped his
horse. The moment after, the Earl of Limours dashed in upon him on a
charger as black and as stormy as a thunder-cloud.

Geraint closed with the earl, bore down on him with his spear, and in a
minute brought him stunned or dead to the ground. Then he turned to the
next-comer after Limours, overthrew him and blindly rushed back upon all
the men behind. But they were so startled at the flash and movement of
the prince that they scrambled away in a panic, leaving their leader
lying on the public highway. The horses also of the fallen warriors
whisked off from their wounded masters and wildly flew away to mix with
the vanishing mob.

"Horse and man, all of one mind," remarked Geraint, smiling, "not a hoof
of them left. What do you say, Enid, shall we strip the earl and pay for
a dinner or shall we fast? Fast? Then go on and let us pray heaven to
send us some Earl of Doorm's men so that we can earn ourselves something
to eat. "

Enid sadly eyed her bridle-reins and led the way, Geraint coming after,
scarcely knowing that he had been pricked by Limours in his side, and
that he was bleeding secretly beneath his armor. But at last his head
and helmet began to wag unsteadily, and at a sudden swerving of the road
he was tossed from his horse upon a bank of grass. Enid heard the
clashing of the fall, and too terrified to cry out, came back all pale.
Then she dismounted, loosed the fastenings of his armor and bound up his
wounds with her veil. Then she sat down desolately and began to cry,
wondering what ever she should do.

[Illustration: ENID SAT DOWN DESOLATELY AND BEGAN TO CRY. ]

Many men passed by but no one took any notice of her. For in that
lawless, turbulent earldom no one minded a woman weeping for a murdered
lover than they now mind a summer shower. One man scurrying as fast as
ever he could travel toward the bandit earl's castle, drove the sand
sweeping into her poor eyes, and another coming in the opposite
direction from out the earl's castle park in seeming hot haste, turned
all the long dusty road into a column of smoke behind him, and
frightened her little palfrey so that it scoured off into the coppices
and was lost. But the prince's charger stood beside them and grieved
over the mishap like a man.

At noon a huge warrior with a big face and russet beard and eyes rolling
about in search of prey, came riding hard by with a hundred spearmen at
his back all bound for some foray. It was the frightful Earl Doorm.

"What, is he dead? " cried the earl loudly to Enid, as he spied her on
the wayside.

"No, no, not dead," she quickly answered. "Would some of your kind
people take him up and bear him off somewhere out of this cruel sun? I
am very sure, quite sure that he is not dead. "

"Well, if he isn't dead, why should you cry for him so? Dead or not
dead, you just spoil your pretty face with idiotic tears. They will not
help him. But since it is a pretty face, come fellows, some of you, and
take him to our hall. If he lives he will be one of our band, and if
not, why there is earth enough to bury him in. See that you take his
charger, too, a noble one. "

And so saying, the rude earl passed on, while two brawny horsemen came
forward growling to think they might lose their chance of booty from the
morning's raid all for this dead man. They raised the prince upon a
litter, laying him in the hollow of his shield, and brought him into
the barren hall of Doorm, while Enid and the gentle charger followed
after. They tossed him and his litter down on an oaken settle in the
hall, and then shot away for the woods.

Enid sat through long hours all alone with Geraint besides the oaken
settle, propping his head and chafing his hands, but in the late
afternoon she saw the huge Earl Doorm returning with his lusty spearmen
and their plunder. Each hurled down a heap of spoils on the floor, threw
aside his lance and doffed his helmet, while a tribe of brightly gowned
gentle-women fluttered into the hall and began to talk with them. Earl
Doorm struck his knife against the table and bellowed for meat, and
wine. In a moment the place fairly steamed and smoked with whole roast
hogs and oxen, and everybody sat down in a hodge-podge and ate like
cattle feeding in their stalls, while Enid shrank far back startled,
into her nook.

But suddenly, when Earl Doorm had eaten all he would, and all he could
for the moment, he revolved his eyes about the bare hall and caught a
glimpse of the fair little lady drooping in her niche. Then he
recollected how she had crouched weeping by the roadside for her fallen
lord that morning. A wild pity filled his gruff heart.

"Eat, eat! " he shouted. "I never before saw any thing so pale. Be
yourself. Isn't your lord lucky, for were I dead who is there in all the
world who would mourn for me? Sweet lady, never have I ever seen a lily
like you. If there were a bit of color living in your cheeks there is
not one among my gentle-women here who would be fit to wear your
slippers for gloves. But listen to me and you will share my earldom with
me, girl, and we will live like two birds in a nest and I will bring you
all sorts of finery from every part of the world to make you happy. "

As the earl spoke his two cheeks bulged with the two tremendous morsels
of meat which he had tucked into his mouth.

Enid was more alarmed than ever.

"How can I be happy over anything," replied she, "until my lord is well
again? "

The earl laughed, then plucked her up out of the corner, carried her
over to the table, thrust a dish of food before her and held a horn of
wine to her lips.

"By all heaven," cried Enid, "I will not drink until my lord gets up and
drinks and eats with me. And if he will not rise again I will not drink
any wine until I die. "

At this the earl turned perfectly red and paced up and down the hall,
gnawing first his upper and then his lower lip.

"Girl," shouted he, "why wail over a man who shames your beauty so, by
dressing it in that rag? Put off those beggar-woman's weeds and robe
yourself in this which my gentle-woman has brought you. "

It was a gorgeous, wonderful dress, colored in the tints of a shallow
sea with the blue playing into the green, and gemmed with precious
stones all down the front of it as thick as dewdrops on the grass. But
Enid was harder to move than any cold tyrant on his throne, and said:

"Earl, in this poor gown my dear lord found me first and loved me while
I was living with my father; in this poor gown I rode with him to court
and was presented to the queen; in this poor gown he bade me ride as we
came out on this fatal quest of honor, and in this poor gown I am going
to stay until he gets up again, a live, strong man, and tells me to put
it away. I have griefs enough, pray be gentle with me, let me be. O God!
I beg of your gentleness, since he is as he is, to let me be. "

Then the brutal earl strode up and down the hall and cried out:

"It is of no more use to be gentle with you than to be rough. So take my
salute," and with that he slapped her lightly on her white cheek.

Enid shrieked. Instantly the fallen Geraint was up on his feet with the
sword that had laid beside him in the hollow of the shield, making a
single bound for the earl, and with one sweep of it sheared through the
swarthy neck. The rolling eyes turned glassy, the russet-bearded head
tumbled over the floor like a ball, and all the bandit knights and the
gentle-women in the hall flitted, scampering pell-mell away, yelling as
if they had seen a ghoul. Enid and Geraint were left alone.

[Illustration: THE RUSSET-BEARDED HEAD TUMBLED OVER THE FLOOR LIKE A
BALL. ]

Now Geraint had come out of his swoon before the earl had returned, and
he had lain perfectly silent and immovable because he wished to test
Enid and see what she would do when she thought he was sleeping or
fainted away, or perhaps dead. So he had listened to all that had taken
place and had heard everything that Earl Doorm had said to her and all
that Enid had replied, so now he knew that she loved him as ever and
that she stood steadfast by him. All his heart filled with pity and
remorse that he had brought her away on this hard, hard quest, and had
made her suffer so much and had been so rough and cold.

"Enid," said the prince tenderly, very tenderly. "I have used you worse
than that big dead brute of a man used you. I have done you more wrong
than he. I misunderstood you. Now, now you are three times mine. "

Geraint's kindness burst upon Enid so abruptly and was so unforeseen
that she could not speak a word only this:

"Fly, Geraint, they will kill you, they will come back. Fly. Your horse
is outside, my poor little thing is lost. "

"You shall ride behind me, then, Enid. "

So they slipped quickly outside, found the stately charger and mounted
him, first Geraint, then Enid, climbing up the prince's feet, and
throwing her arms about him to hold herself firm as they bounded off.

But as the horse dashed outside of the earl's gateway there before them
in the highroad stood a knight of Arthur's court holding his lance as if
ready to spring upon Geraint.

"Stranger! " shrieked Enid, thinking of the prince's wound and loss of
blood, "do not kill a dead man! "

"The voice of Enid! " cried the stranger knight.

Then Enid saw that he was Edryn, the son of Nudd, and feeling the more
terrified as she remembered the jousts, cried out:

"O, cousin, this is the man who spared your life! "

[Illustration: BEFORE THEM IN THE HIGHROAD STOOD A KNIGHT OF ARTHUR'S
COURT. ]

Edryn stepped forward. "My lord Geraint," he said, "I took you for some
bandit knight of Doorm's. Do not fear, Enid, that I will attack the
prince. I love him. When he overthrew me at the lists he threw me
higher. For now I have been made a Knight of the Round Table and am
altogether changed. But since I used to know Earl Doorm in the old days
when I was lawless and half a bandit myself, I have come as the
mouthpiece of our king to tell Doorm to disband all his men and become
subject to Arthur, who is now on his way hither. "

"Doorm is now before the King of Kings," Geraint replied, "And his men
are already scattered," and the prince pointed to groups in the
thickets or still running off in their panic. Then back to the people
all aghast whom they could see huddling, he related fully to Edryn how
he had slain the huge earl in his own hall.

[Illustration: TO THE ROYAL CAMP WHERE ARTHUR CAME OUT TO GREET THEM. ]

"Come with me to the king," astonished Edryn said.

So they all traveled off to the royal camp where Arthur himself came out
to greet them, lifted Enid from her saddle, kissed her and showed her a
tent where his own physician came in to attend to Geraint's wound. When
that was healed he rode away with them to Caerleon for a visit with
Queen Guinevere, who dressed Enid again in magnificent clothes. Then
fifty armed knights escorted Enid and the prince as far as the banks of
the Severn River, where they crossed over into the land of Devon. And
all their people welcomed them back.

Geraint after that never forgot his princedom or the tournament, but was
known through all the country round as the cleverest and bravest
warrior, while his princess was called Enid the Good.




MERLIN AND VIVIEN.


Vivien was a very clever, wily and wicked woman, who wanted to become a
greater magician than even the great Merlin, who was the most famous man
of all his times, who understood all the arts, who had built the king's
harbors, ships and halls, who was a fine poet and who could read the
future in the stars in the skies.

He had once told Vivien of a charm that he could work to make people
invisible. Whenever he worked it upon anyone that person would seem to
be imprisoned within the four walls of a tower and could not get out.
The person would seem dead, lost to every one, and could be seen only by
the person who worked the charm. Vivien yearned to know what the charm
was, for she wanted to cast its spell on Merlin so that no one would
know where he was and she could become a great enchantress in the realm,
as she foolishly thought. And she planned very cleverly so as to find
out the wise old man's secret.

She wanted him to think that she loved him dearly. At first she played
about him with lively, pretty talk, vivid smiles, and he watched and
laughed at her as if she were a playful kitten. Then as she saw that he
half disdained her she began to put on very grave and serious fits,
turned red and pale when he came near her, or sighed or gazed at him, so
silently and with such sweet devotion that he half believed that she
really loved him truly.

[Illustration: HE LAUGHED AT HER. ]

But after a while a great melancholy fell over Merlin, he felt so
terribly sad that he passed away out of the kings' court and went down
to the beach. There he found a little boat and stepped into it. Vivien
had followed him without his knowing it. She sat down in the boat and
while he took the sail she seized the helm of the boat. They were driven
across the sea with a strong wind and came to the shores of Brittany.
Here Merlin got out and Vivien followed him all the way into the wild
woods of Broceliande. Every step of the way Merlin was perfectly quiet.

They sat down together, she lay beside him and kissed his feet as if in
the deepest reverence and love. A twist of gold was wound round her
hair, a priceless robe of satiny samite clung about her beautiful limbs.
As she kissed his feet she cried:

"Trample me down, dear feet which I have followed all through the world
and I will worship you. Tread me down and I will kiss you for it. "

But Merlin still said not a word.

[Illustration: MERLIN FELT SO TERRIBLY SAD. ]

"Merlin do you love me? " at last cried Vivien, with her face sadly
appealing to him. And again, "O, Merlin, do you love me? " "Great Master,
do you love me? " she cried for the third time.

And then when he was as quiet as ever she writhed up toward him, slid
upon his knee, twined her feet about his ankles, curved her arms about
his neck and used one of her hands as a white comb to run through his
long ashy beard which she drew all across her neck down to her knees.

"See! I'm clothing myself with wisdom," she cried. "I'm a golden summer
butterfly that's been caught in a great old tyrant spider's web that's
going to eat me up in this big wild wood without a word to me. "

"What do you mean, Vivien, with these pretty tricks of yours? " cried
Merlin at last. "What do you want me to give you? "

"What! " said Vivien, smiling saucily, "have you found your tongue at
last? Now yesterday you didn't open your lips once except to drink. And
then I, with my own lady hands, made a pretty cup and offered you your
water kneeling before you and you drank it, but gave me not a word of
thanks. And when we stopped at the other spring when you lay with your
feet all golden with blossoms from the meadows we passed through you
know that I bathed your feet before I bathed my own. But yet no thanks
from you. And all through this wild wood, all through this morning when
I fondled you, still not a word of thanks. "

Then Merlin locked her hand in his and said, "Vivien, have you never
seen a wave as it was coming up the beach ready to break? Well, I've
been seeing a wave that was ready to break on me. It seemed to me that
some dark, tremendous wave was going to come and sweep me away from my
hold on the world, away from my fame and my usefulness and my great
name. That's why I came away from Arthur's court to make me forget it
and feel better. And when I saw you coming after me it seemed to me that
you were that wave that was going to roll all over me. But pardon me,
now, child, your pretty ways have brightened everything again, and now
tell me what you would like to have from me. For I owe you something
three times over, once for neglecting you, twice for the thanks for your
goodness to me, and lastly for those dainty gambols of yours. So tell me
now, what will you have? "

Vivien smiled mournfully as she answered:

"I've always been afraid that you were not really mine, that you didn't
love me truly, that you didn't quite trust me, and now you yourself have
owned it. Don't you see, dear love, how this strange mood of yours must
make me feel it more than ever? must make me yearn still more to prove
that you are mine, must make me wish still more to know that great charm
of waving hands and woven footsteps that you told me about, just as a
proof that you trust me? If you told that to me I should know that you
are mine, and I should have the great proof of your love, because I
think that however wise you may be you do not know me yet. "

"I never was less wise, you inquisitive Vivien," said Merlin, "than when
I told you about that charm. Why won't you ask me for another boon? "

Then Vivien, as if she were the tenderest hearted little maid that ever
lived, burst into tears and said:

"No, master, don't be angry at your little girl. Caress me, let me feel
myself forgiven, for I have not the heart to ask for another boon. I
don't suppose that you know the old rhyme, 'Trust not at all or all in
all? '"

Then Merlin looked at her and half believed what she said. Her voice was
so tender, her face was so fair, her eyes were so sweetly gleaming
behind her tears.

He locked her hand in his again and said, "If you should know this charm
you might sometimes in a wild moment of anger or a mood of overstrained
affection when you wanted me all to yourself or when you were jealous
in a sudden fit, you might work it on me. "

"Good! " cried Vivien, as if she were angry, "I am not trusted. Well,
hide it away, hide it, and I shall find it out, and when I've found it
beware, look out for Vivien! When you use me so it's a wonder that I can
love you at all, and as for jealousy, it seems to me this wonderful
charm was invented just to make me jealous. I suppose you have a lot of
pretty girls whom you have caged here and there all over the world with
it. "

Then the great master laughed merrily.

"Long, long years ago," he said, "there lived a King in the farthest
East of the East. A tawny pirate who had plundered twenty islands or
more anchored his boat in the King's port, and in the boat was a woman.
For, as he had passed one of the islands the pirates had seen two cities
full of men in boats fighting for a woman on the sea; he had pushed up
his black boat in among the rest, lightly scattered every one of them
and brought her off with half his people killed with arrows. She was a
maiden so smooth, so white, so wonderful that a light seemed to come
from her as she walked. When the pirate came upon the shore of the
Eastern King's island the King asked him for the woman, but he would not
give her up. So the King imprisoned the pirate and made the woman his
queen.

"All the people adored her, the King's councilmen and all his soldiers,
the beasts themselves. The camels knelt down before her unbidden, and
the black slaves of the mountains rang her golden ankle bells just to
see her smile. So little wonder that the King grew very jealous. He had
his horns blown through all the hundred under-kingdoms which he ruled,
telling the people that he wanted a wizard who would teach him some
charm to work upon the queen and make her all his own.
To the wizard who
could do this he promised a league of mountain land full of golden
mines, a province with a hundred miles of coast, a palace and a
princess. But all the wizards who failed should be killed and their
heads would be hung on the city gates until they mouldered away.

"So there were many, many wizards all through the hundred kingdoms who
tried to work the charm, but failed; many wizard heads bleached on the
walls, and for weeks a troupe of carrion crows hung like a cloud above
the towers of the city gateways. But at last the king's men found a
little glassy headed, hairless man who lived alone in a great wilderness
and ate nothing but grass. He read only one book, and by always reading
had got grated down, filed away and lean, with monstrous eyes and his
skin clinging to his bones. But since he never tasted wine or flesh--the
wall that separates people from spirits became crystal to him. He could
see through it, perceive the spirits as they walked and hear them
talking; so he learned their secrets. Often he drew a cloud of rain
across a sunny sky, or when there was a wild storm and the pine woods
roared he made everything calm again.

"He was the man that was wanted. They dragged him to the king's court by
force, he didn't want to go. There he taught the king how to charm the
queen so that no one could see her again, and she could see no one
except the king as he passed about the palace. She lay as if quite dead
and lost to life. But when the king offered the magician his league of
golden mines, the province with a hundred miles of sea coast, the palace
and the princess, the old man turned away, went back to his wilderness
and lived on grass and vanished away. But his book came down to me. "

"You have the book! " cried Vivian smiling saucily. "The charm is written
in it. Good, take my advice and let me know the secret at once, for if
you should hide it away like a puzzle in a chest, if you should put
chest upon chest, and lock and padlock each chest thirty times and bury
them all away under some vast mound like the heaps of soldiers on the
battle-field, still I should hit upon some way of digging it out, of
picking it, of opening it and reading the charm. And _then_ if I tried
it on you who would blame me? "

"You read the book, my pretty Vivien? " cried Merlin. "Well, it's only
twenty pages long, but such pages! Every page has a square of text that
looks like a blot, the letters no longer than fleas' legs written in a
language that has long gone by, and all the borders and margins
scribbled, crossed and crammed with notes. You read that book! No one,
not even I can read the text, and no one besides me can make out the
notes on the margins. I found the charm in the margin. Oh, it is simple
enough. Any child might work it and then not be able to undo it. Don't
ask me again for it, because even although you would love me too much to
try it on me, still you might try it on some of the knights of the Round
Table. "

"O, you are crueller than any man ever told of in a story, or sung about
in song! " cried Vivien. She clapped her hands together and wailed out a
shriek. "I'm stabbed to the heart! I only wished that prove to you that
were wholly mine, that you loved me and now I'm killed with a word.
There's nothing left for me to do except crawl into some hole or cave,
and if the wolves won't tear me to pieces, just to weep my life away,
killed with unutterable unkindness! "

She paused, turned away, hung her head while the hair uncoiled itself.
Then she wept afresh.

The dark wood grew darker with a storm coming over the sky.

Merlin sat thinking quietly and half believed that she was true.

"Come out of the storm," he called over to her, "come here into the
hollow old oak tree. "

Then since she didn't answer, he tried three times to calm her but quite
in vain. At last, however, she let herself be conquered, came back to
her old perch, and nestled there, half falling from his knees. Gentle
Merlin saw the slow tears still standing in her eyes and threw his arms
kindly about her. But Vivien unlinked herself at once, rose with her
arms crossed upon her bosom and fled away.

"No more love between us two," she cried, "for you do not trust me. Oh,
it would have been better if I had died three times over than to have
asked you once! Farewell, think gently of me and I will go. But before I
leave you let me swear once more that if I've been planning against you
in all this, may the dark heavens send one great flash from out the sky
to burn me to a cinder! "

Just as she ended a bolt of lightning darted across the sky, and sliced
the giant oak tree into a thousand splinters and spikes.

"Oh, Merlin, save me! save me! " cried Vivien, terrified lest the heavens
had heard her oath and were going to kill her. And she flew back to his
arms. She called him her dear protector, her lord and liege, her seer,
her bard, her silver star of evening, her God, her Merlin, the one
passionate love of her life, and hugged him close.

All the time overhead the tempest bellowed, the branches snapped above
them in the rushing rain. Her glittering eyes and neck seemed to come
and go before Merlin's eyes with the lightning. At last the storm had
spent its passion, the woodland was all in peace again, and Merlin,
overtalked and overworn had told all of the charm and had fallen asleep.

[Illustration: IN THE HOLLOW OF THE OLD OAK TREE LEFT HIM LYING DEAD. ]

Then in a moment Vivien worked the charm with woven footsteps and waving
arms, and in the hollow of the old oak tree left him lying dead to all
life, use and fame and name.

"I have made his glory mine! O fool! " she shrieked, and she sprang down
through the great forest, the thicket closed about her behind her and
all the woods echoed, "Fool! "




BALIN AND BALAN.


King Pellam owed Arthur some tribute money so Arthur told three of his
knights to go see about it and collect it for him.

"Very well," said one of the knights, "but listen, on the way to King
Pellam's country, near Camelot, there are two strange knights sitting
beside a fountain. They challenge and overthrow every knight that
passes. Shall I stop to fight them as we go by and send them back to
you? "

Arthur laughed, "No, don't stop for anything; let them wait until they
can find some one stronger themselves. "

With that the three men left. But after they had gone Arthur, who loved
a good fight himself, started away early one morning for the fountain
side of Camelot. On its right hand he saw the knight Balin sitting under
an alder tree, with his horse beside him, and on the left hand under a
poplar tree with his horse at his side sat the knight Balan.

"Fair sirs," cried Arthur, "why are you sitting here? "

"For the sake of glory," they answered. "We're stronger than all
Arthur's court. We've proved that because we easily overthrow every
knight that comes by here. "

"Well, I'm of Arthur's court, too," replied the king, "although I've
never done so much in jousts as in real wars. But see whether you can
overthrow me so easily too. "

So the two brothers came out boldly and fought with Arthur, but he
struck them both lightly down, then softly came away and nobody knew
anything about it.

But that evening while Balin and Balan sat very meekly by the bubbling
water a spangled messenger came riding by and cried out to them: "Sirs,
you are sent for by the King. "

So they followed the man back to the court. "Tell me your names,"
demanded Arthur, "and why do you sit there by the fountain? "

[Illustration: TWO STRANGE KNIGHTS. ]

"My name is Balin," answered one of the men, "and my brother's name is
Balan. Three years ago I struck down one of your slaves whom I heard had
spoken ill of me, and you sent me away for a three years' exile. Then I
thought that if we would sit by the well and would overcome every knight
who passed by you would be a more willing to take me back. But today
some man of yours came along and conquered us both. What do you wish
with me? "

"Be wiser for falling," Arthur said. "Your chair is in the hall vacant.
Take it again and be my knight once more. "

So Balin went back into the old hall of the Knights of the Round Table,
and they all clashed their cups together drinking his welcome, and sang
until all of Arthur's banners of war hanging overhead began to stir as
they always did on the battlefield.

Meanwhile the men who had gone to collect the taxes from King Pellam
returned.

"Sir King," they cried to Arthur, "We scarcely could see Pellam for the
gloom in his hall. That man who used to be one of your roughest and most
riotous enemies is now living like a monk in his castle and has all
sorts of holy things about him, and says he has given up all matters of
the world. He wouldn't even talk about the tribute money and told us
that his heir Sir Garlon, attended to his business for him, so we went
to Garlon and after a struggle we got it. Then we came away, but as we
passed through the deep woods we found one of your knights lying dead,
killed by a spear. After we had buried him, we talked with an old
woodman who told us that there's a demon of the woods who had probably
slain the knight. This demon, he said, was once a man who lived all
alone and learned black magic. He hated people so much that when he died
he became a fiend. The woodman showed us the cave where he has seen the
demon go in and out and where he lives. We saw the print of a horse's
hoof, but no more. "

"Foully and villainously slain! " cried Arthur thinking of his poor
killed knight in the woods. "Who will go hunt this demon of the woods
for me? "

"I! " exclaimed Balan, ready to dart instantly away, but first he
embraced Balin, saying, "Good brother, hear; don't let your angry
passions conquer you, fight them away. Remember how these knights of the
Round Table welcomed you back. Be a loving brother with them and don't
imagine that there is hatred among them here any more than there is in
heaven itself. "

When bad Balan left, Balin set himself to learn how to curb his wildness
and become a courteous and manly knight. He always hovered about
Lancelot, the pattern knight of all the court, to see how he did, and
when he noticed Lancelot's sweet smiles and his little pleasant words
that gladdened every knight or churl or child that he passed, Balin
sighed like some lame boy who longed to scale a mountain top and could
scarcely limp up one hundred feet from the base.

"It's Lancelot's worship of the queen that helps to make him gentle,"
said he to himself. "If I want to be gentle I must serve and worship
lovely Queen Guinevere too. Suppose I ask the King to let me have some
token of hers on my shield instead of these pictures of wild beasts with
big teeth and grins. Then whenever I see it I'll forget my wild heats
and violences. "

"What would you like to bear on your shield? " asked the king when Balin
spoke to him about his wish.

"The queen's own crown-royal," replied Balin.

Then the queen smiled and turned to Arthur. "The crown is only the
shadow of the king," she said, "and this crown is the shadow of that
shadow. But let him have it if it will help him out of his violences. "

"It's no shadow to me, my queen," cried Balan, "no shadow to me, king.
It's a light for me. "

So Balin was given the crown to bear on his shield and whenever he
looked at it, it seemed to make him feel gentle and patient.

But one morning as he heard Lancelot and the queen talking together on
the white walk of lilies that led to Queen Guinevere's bower, all his
old passions seemed to come back and filled him and he darted madly away
on his horse, not stopping until he had passed the fount where he had
sat with his brother Balan and had dived into the skyless woods beyond.
There the gray-headed woodman was hewing away wearily at a branch of a
tree.

[Illustration: BALIN WAS GIVEN THE CROWN TO WEAR ON HIS SHIELD. ]

"Give me your axe, Churl," cried Balin, and with one sharp cut he struck
it down.

"Lord! " cried the woodman, "you could kill the devil of this woods if
any one can. Just yesterday I saw a flash of him. Some people say that
our Sir Garlon has learned black magic too and can ride armed unseen.
Just look into the demon's cave. "

But Balin said the woodman was foolish, and rode off through the glades
with a drooping head. He did not notice that on his right a great cavern
chasm yawned out of the darkness. Once he heard the mosses beneath him
thud and tremble and then the shadow of a spear shot from behind him and
ran along the ground. The light of somebody's armor flashed by him and
vanished into the woods.

Balin dashed after this but he was so blinded by his rage that he
stumbled against a tree, breaking his lance and falling from his horse.
He sprang to his feet and darted off again not knowing where he was
going until the massy battlements of King Pellam's castle appeared.

"Why do you wear the crown royal on your shield? " Pellam's men asked him
as soon as they saw him.

"The fairest and best of ladies living gave it to me," Balin replied, as
he stalled his horse and strode across the court to the banquet hall.

"Why do you wear the royal crown? " Sir Garlon asked him as they sat at
table.

"The queen whom Lancelot and we all worship as the fairest, best and
purest gave it to me to wear," said Balin.

But Sir Garlon only hissed at him and made fun of what he said, and
Balin reached for a wonderful goblet embossed with a sacred picture to
hurl it at Garlon, but the thought of the gentle queen about whom he
was talking soothed his temper. The next morning, however, in the court
Sir Garlon mocked him again and Balin's face grew black with anger. He
tore out his sword from its shield and crying out fiercely, "Ha! I'll
make a ghost of you! " struck Garlon hard on the helmet.

The blade flew and splintered into six parts which clinked upon the
stones below while Garlon reeled slowly backward and fell. Balin dragged
him by the banneret of his helmet and struck again, but in a minute
twenty warriors with pointed lances were making for him from the castle.
Balin dashed his fist against the foremost face then dipped through a
low doorway out along a glimmering gallery until he saw the open portals
of King Pellam's chapel. He slipped inside this and crept behind the
door while the others howled past outside.

Before the golden altar he noticed lying the brightest lance he had ever
seen with its point painted red with blood. Seizing it he pushed it out
through an open casement, leaned on it and leaped in a half-circle to
the ground outside. Running along a path he found his horse, mounted him
and scudded away. An arrow whizzed to his right, another to his left and
a third over his head while he heard Pellam crying out feebly, "Catch
him, catch him! he mustn't pollute holy things! "

But Balin quickly dove beneath the tree boughs and raced through miles
of thick groves and open meadowland until his good horse, at last
wearied and uncertain in his footsteps, stumbled over a fallen oak and
threw Balin headlong.

As Balin rose to his feet he looked at the Queen's crown on his shield
and then drew the shield from off his neck. "I have shamed you," he
cried. "I won't carry you any more," and he hung it up on a branch and
threw himself on the ground in a passionate sleep.

While he slept there the beautiful wicked Vivien came riding by through
the woodland alleys with her squire, warbling a song.

"What is this? " she cried as she noticed the shield on the tree, "a
shield with a crown upon it. And there's a horse. Where's the rider? Oh!
there he is sleeping. Hail royal knight, I'm flying away from a bad king
and the knight I was riding with was hurt, and my poor squire isn't of
much use in helping me. But you, Sir Prince, will surely guide me to the
Warrior King Arthur, the Blameless, to get me some shelter. "

"Oh, no, I'll never go to Arthur's court again," cried Balin. "I'm not a
prince any more, or a knight. I have brought the Queen's crown to
shame. "

Then Vivien laughed shrilly, and told Balin a wicked story about the
Queen which she just imagined in her wicked mind. But she told it so
cunningly and smiled so sunnily as she talked that Balin believed her
and he flew into the more passionate rage because he thought he had been
deceived in the Queen whom he had worshipped.

He ground his teeth together, sprang up with a yell, tore the shield
from the branch and cast it on the ground, drove his heel _into the
royal crown_, stamped and trampled upon it until it was all spoiled,
then hurled the shield from him out among the forest weeds and cursed
the story, the queen and Vivien.

His weird yell had thrilled through the woods where Balan was lurking
for his foe. "There! that's the scream of the wood-devil I'm looking
for," he thought. "He has killed some knight and trampled on his shield
to show his loathing of our order and the queen. Devil or man,
whichever you are, take care of your head! "

[Illustration: HE DROVE HIS HEEL INTO THE ROYAL CROWN. ]

With that he made swiftly for his poor brother whom he did not
recognize. Sir Balin spoke not a word but snatched the buckler from
Vivien's squire, vaulted on his horse and in a moment had clashed with
his brother's armor. King Pellam's holy spear reddened with blood as it
pricked through Balan's shield to his flesh. Then Balin's horse, wearied
to death, rolled back over his rider and crushed him inward and both men
fell and swooned away.

"The fools! " cried Vivien to her young squire. "Come, you Sir Chick,
loosen their casques and see who they are. They must be rivals for the
same woman to fight so hard. "

"They are happy," her gentle squire answered, "if they died for love.
And Vivien, though you beat me like your dog I would die for you. "

"Don't die, Sir Boy," cried Vivien, "I'd rather have a live dog than a
dead lion. Come away, I don't like to look at them," and she made her
palfrey leap off over the fallen oak tree.

Balin was the first to wake from his swoon. As soon as he saw his
brother's face he crawled over to his side moaning. Then Balan faintly
opened his eyes and seeing who was with him kissed Balin's forehead.

"O Balin," he cried, "why didn't you carry your own shield which I knew,
and why did you trample all over this one which bears the queen's own
crown which I know? "

So Balin slowly gasped out the whole story of his shield. Then they each
said good-night to the other and closed their eyes, locked in each
other's arms.