University of Virginia Library

ACT V.

Scene.—Camelot. The Great Hall of the Palace. On the left, two thrones and other raised seats, not quite so high. Dagonet, Bors, and Attendants.
First Attendant.

Careful there, careful! Have you no respect for cloth of gold? Will you handle velvet like fustian?

Dagonet
[to Bors].

No, but they will wear fustian like velvet. And you heard them in the servants' hall, you would swear they were all dukes, every man of them.

First Attendant.

That will do. There is much elsewhere to be made ready and the King is even now at the gates of the city.

[Exeunt Attendants.]
Bors.

It is the saddest tale I ever heard.

Dagonet.

I'll never attempt to undeceive a

happy man again, if he be in love with Merlin's grandmother, Lilith herself. What a plague had I to do interfering? The devil take all meddlers, say I?

Bors.

And Merlin bade you seek me with this news?

Dagonet.

Knowing you to be a staunch friend to Launcelot, for he connects this new horror with the accusation against—

Bors.

Peace, break you off! Here is the Queen herself.

[Enter Guenevere.]

Good morrow to your Majesty.

Guenevere.
Sir Bors,
You are my friend, I think; you are Launcelot's kinsman;
You know—the world knows—all but Arthur know,
Who comes with an unsuited holiday,
What hangs above our heads. That we are guiltless
Does not secure us from a guilty doom.
We have need now of friends. Our dandies here
Give me scant courtesy. I will not think
That you too hold me cheaply or mistrust
The faultless knighthood of Sir Launcelot.

Bors.
I know that Launcelot loves you—with such love
As a true knight may offer when his lady
Is wedded to another. And I would,
In frankness, lady, you had been his bride.
You had been none the less a queen; his father
Was King of Benwick and his father's brother,
My father, Bors, the King of Gaul. We both
Are of as royal blood as Arthur is
And might be kings, but that we love the King.
For him we have resigned our ancient thrones,
Content to be his liegemen, simple knights
Of that Round Table which is the great sign
Of brotherhood and true equality,
Such is the love we bear him; but if he
Should do dishonor to Sir Launcelot
Or thee, whose knight Sir Launcelot is sworn,
Let him take heed. We may resume our crowns.

Guenevere.
I thank you, sir. You are a noble friend.
Sir Ector de Maris will be with us,
Pelleas, Lionel, and Bleoberis—

Bors.
Ay, madam, all our kin.

Guenevere.
It will be much
To have so strong a party in the court.
Among the knights I brought from Cameliard
Some must be faithful. There is great devotion
Among them to my brother, and my brother
Loves me as his own soul. He will not fail—

Bors.
Alas, my lady, then you have not heard!

Guenevere.
Heard? What? Has aught—?

Bors.
Oh, steel yourself, my Queen,
For I must be the advertisement of woe.
Peredure—

Guenevere.
Speak! What ill has happened to him?

Bors.
He is dead.

Guenevere.
Dead? my brother—dead!

Bors.
Alas,
It is so—dead, and slain by his own hand.

Guenevere.
Grief loves to shoot twice at the selfsame mark,—
Ah, like a skilful archer whose first shaft
Hath pierced the centre, sends a second after,
That with unerring niceness splits the first.
Where did he this?

Bors.
There were two witnesses,
Merlin and Dagonet. Let him tell the rest.

Dagonet.

It happened on this wise, my lady. Your brother was enamoured of the Queen of Orkney, —but in honorable fashion, for he fancied her to be as spotless as a Glastonbury nun. And with this he was fallen into such a melancholy that I feared he would lose his wits. I loved your brother and in my folly I sought to deliver him. I knew what a false jade was the theme of his idolatry and, indeed, that she was this six months coddling with that fine-feathered incontinent French magpie, Sir Ladinas de la Rouse. So I lay in watch for the couple, thinking that the truth, though a vile-tasting medicine, would cure him; and yesternight, finding the two together, I brought Peredure word.

Guenevere.
You did well, Dagonet; for 'tis far better
To know and suffer than to be deceived
And dote on loathsomeness. I knew myself
Of this infatuation of my brother,
Yet in the thick and tumult of my sorrows
I took no heed of his. You have done well;
No knight of the Round Table sheathes within
His corselet a more true-steeled heart than you
Cloak with your motley.

Dagonet.
I thank you for that speech.
I did not this, forgetful of my Queen.
When first I came on Ladinas and Morgause,
Their talk was all of you,—how he had used
A key that she had begged from Peredure,
To gain an entrance to the prince's rooms,
From whence he said, he had seen—

Guenevere.
I shall not fail
To recognize this service at its worth.—
Go on! When you told this to Peredure?

Dagonet.
Then was he like a man that puts his feet
On ice whose wintry firmness has grown rotten
With the April in the air, and when he thinks
All steadfast, feels it sink from under him.
Away he starts, wild as the tameless horse
Of Tartary, and comes to where they lie.
When I, less swift of foot, came up with him,
I found him standing dumb, with bloody sword,
Over the twitching corpse of that false knight,
His senseless eyes fixed on Morgause, who cowered
Behind the curtains, silent for dismay.
Me she saw not, for ere I crossed the sill,
He threw the hot sword at her feet and fled,
Crying, “She is too fair, she is too fair!”

Guenevere.
Oh, better were it if his righteous heel
Had stamped that viper out o' the world. Go on!

Dagonet.
There is no more to tell. I followed him,
But ere I reached the gardens, he was dead.
I found him lying pallid in the moonlight
And ancient Merlin bending over him.

Guenevere.
He was too delicate to face the blasts
Of this world's winter. He was all compassion,
All gentleness, all love, all tender heart,
So sensitive of thought that he could scarce
Endure the passing of an aimless sigh,
So frail of spirit that the silent days
Were in themselves too burdensome a load.
So,—let him rest. The jarring of the world
Frets his fine ear no longer.—Gentlemen,
Pray, leave me. I would think of him alone.

Bors.
Our hearts are with you.

[Exeunt Bors and Dagonet.]
Guenevere.
Oh, that I could weep
The copious blubber of a village maid,
Uncurbed by royal pride, or consciousness
That o'ermistrusts and will not slack the bit!
Oh, could I weep—and empty woe with weeping!
There is a swelling passion in my heart
Will split all yet. I cannot like a girl
Draw 't off in driblets. Oh, my blameless brother,
Undone for a guilty world! And that which led
To the discovery that was thy doom,
A plot born of a woman's hate for me
And of my reckless fate-contending love!
Oh, what a tangled anarchy is life!
If the rash Will strive in the helter-skelter
To weave for itself a little ordered space,
Its skilless touch pulls unexpected threads
That tighten to 'ts own strangling. Peredure
Is but the first. The implacable net is drawn
About the feet of all that love us. Bors—
Poor faithful, merry Dagonet—all who hold
To Launcelot's cause—must all these spend their hearts
That we may love? Do I love Launcelot?
Oh, if I loved him, could I draw him on
So to his own undoing? Shall his name
That even in the young April of his deeds
Greatens in splendor like the northering sun,
Be made a refuse for the ragman world
To fret and fumble with a prodding stick?
O God! Shall I uncage the captive wolves
Of war, to harry the whole land and rend
The offenceless kern, to give my sorrow ease?
It must not be. What right have I to love,
What right have I to joy, that should so play
The Tambourlaine and scourge so many woes
To drag its chariot like his captive kings?
It must not be. Oh, let me take an oath
Before high heaven! Launcelot, I must save thee!
Oh, heavy fate, to love and be a queen!
Ay, Peredure, I know it now—too late!
Had I but hearkened to your pleading foresight!
Oh, Peredure, my brother!
[Enter Launcelot.]
Launcelot!

Launcelot.
Dear heart!

Guenevere.
Whence come you?

Launcelot.
Speakest thou so coldly?
I passed Sir Bors without and Dagonet;
They sent me hither, saying I should find
The Queen here. So, indeed, I do and not
The woman, not the eyes that met my eyes
With proud confession, not the lips that spoke
Quivering but dauntless, saying, “I love thee, Launcelot.”
O Guenevere, hast thou forgot so soon
That thou canst speak with this mechanic voice
And look on me so vacantly?

Guenevere.
Forgot?
I never shall forget.

Launcelot.
Then thou repentest.
Ay, now I see the longing in thy face
That thou hadst ne'er beheld me. Be it so.
I was a selfish monster when I thrust
My love into the forecourt of thy life. ...
And yet—you loved me once. And oh, those hours
When I could feel the warm breath from your lips
Creep o'er my cheek and mingle with my hair!
The sweet long hours whose lingering moments dripped
Like rhythmic water-drops into a pool
With silver parsimony of sweet sound
As if Time grudged each globule! Why, now I see
Tears in your eyes.

Guenevere.
O Launcelot, my king!

Launcelot.
My own true wife!

Guenevere.
Do not call back that time
With any farewell cadence in your voice!
And oh, do not reproach yourself, my god,
For opening to me those golden doors!
We lived then.

Launcelot.
There is honey on your lips
As on the Theban child's. I am the bees
That gather it—so.

Guenevere.
Launcelot!—No, no!
I had forgot. Am I, then, like the rest?
Is there so much o' the woman in my veins
That resolution, buttressed in with vows,
Cannot endure the first assault of love?
We have had a radiant dream; we have beheld
The trellises and temples of the south
And wandered in the vineyards of the sun:—
'T is morning now; the vision fades away,
And we must face the barren norland hills.

Launcelot.
And must this be?

Guenevere.
Nay, Launcelot, it is.
How shall we stand alone against the world?

Launcelot.
More lonely in it than against it! What's
The world to us?

Guenevere.
The place in which we live.
We cannot slip it from us like a garment,
For it is like the air—if we should flee
To the remotest steppes of Tartary,
Arabia or the sources of the Nile,
Or that dim region lying in the west,
Where Brandan's holy ships found anchorage,
It still is there, nor can it be eluded
Save in the airless emptiness of death.

Launcelot.
Say rather, like the miasmatic breath
Of swamps that swarm to rankness. In the clear
And unpolluted air of mountain-tops
Freedom and solitude companion. Oh,
Let the dense earth bring forth its venomous growths!
It cannot harm us on the heights.

Guenevere.
We must not
Attempt the ascent. The perils are too great
That ward the way.

Launcelot.
What reck I of the perils
Between me and the graal of my desires?

Guenevere.
To plunge the land in war! To rend the kingdom!

Launcelot.
You are worth all the kingdoms in the world.

Guenevere.
To drag our friends down with us in our fall!

Launcelot.
We shall not fall. And what is friendship worth
That will not face adversity for us?

Guenevere.
We rend the holiest bond, the family.

Launcelot.
We but destroy the false, build up the true.

Guenevere.
—Think of your childhood's home, your father's hearth,
Helen, your mother, at her household cares,
The sacred bond from which your life began,
Within whose circle boyhood grew to youth—
Knit by the gentle hand of ageless custom
And consecrate with immemorial rites.

Launcelot.
I think of this; I, too, would have a home.

Guenevere.
You have the world; the family alone
Is woman's, it alone is her protection,
Her mission and her opportunity.
In it alone she lives, and she defends it,
Even when its knife is in her heart.

Launcelot.
And I—
I, too, defend it, when it is a family,
As I would kneel before the sacred Host
When through the still aisles sounds the sacring-bell.
But if a jester strutted through the forms
And turned the holy Mass into a mock,
Would I still kneel, or would I rise in anger
And make an end of that foul mimicry?

Guenevere.
Believest thou, then, the power of the Church?
The Church would give our love an ugly name.

Launcelot.
Faith, I believe and I do not believe.
The shocks of life oft startle us to thought,
Rouse us from acquiescence and reveal
That what we took for credence was but custom.
Though the priests be the channels of God's grace,
Yet otherwise they are but men; they err
As others, may mistake for falsehood truth,
And holiness for sin.—God help me, sweet,
I cannot reason it—I only know
I love you.

Guenevere.
You are Arthur's friend. Your love—
Stands this within the honor of your friendship?

Launcelot.
Mother of God!—Have you no pity?

Guenevere.
I would
I could be pitiful and yet do right.
Alas, how heavy—your tears move me more
Than all—(What am I saying? Dare I trust
So faint a heart? I must make turning back
Impossible.)—Best know the worst! I jested—
I—God!—I do not love you. Go! 'T was all
Mockery—wanton cruelty—what you will—lechery!—
I—
[Launcelot looks at her dumbly, then slowly turns to go. As he draws aside the curtains of the doorway,—]
Launcelot!

Launcelot.
What does the Queen desire?

Guenevere.
Oh, no, I am not the Queen—I am your wife!
Take me away with you! Let me not lie
To you, of all—My whole life is a lie.
To one, at least, let it be truth. I—I—
O Launcelot, do you not understand?—
I love you—oh, I cannot let you go.

Launcelot.
I pray you do not jest a second time;
I scarce could bear it.—Yet your eyes speak true.
Tell me you speak the truth.

Guenevere.
I speak the truth.
Call me your wife!

Launcelot.
My wife, my wife, my wife!

Guenevere.
Love, I will fly with thee where'er thou wilt.

Launcelot.
Speak not of flight; I have played him false—the King,
My friend. I ne'er can wipe that smirch away
At least, I will not add a second shame
And blazon out the insult to the world.

Guenevere.
What I have given thee was ne'er another's.
How has another, then, been wronged?

Launcelot.
What's done
Is done, nor right nor wrong, as help me heaven,
Would I undo it if I could. But more
I will not do. I will not be the Brutus
To stab with mine own hand my dearest friend.
It must suffice me that you love me, sweet,
And sometime, somewhere, somehow must be mine.
I know not—it may be some dim land
Beyond the shadows, where the King himself,
Still calling me his friend, shall place your hand
In my hand, saying—“She was always thine.”

Guenevere.
I will do as thou wilt, in this and all things.
But oh, the weary days!

Launcelot.
It is enough
To know thou lovest me—sometimes, perhaps—
Oh, I am but a man!—to feel as now
Thy cheek against my own.

Guenevere.
Oh, Launcelot,
Peredure is dead.

Launcelot.
Thy brother?

Guenevere.
He is dead.

Launcelot.
I do not wonder that you were distraught.

[Shouting, etc., without.]
Guenevere.
It is the silly rabble that toss up
Their caps for Arthur. He will soon be here,—
Though a king's progress is a tedious one.
[Morgause, about to enter, perceives Launcelot and Guenevere and withdraws. A

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153

slight stir of the curtain shows that she is listening.]
I must go to get me ready for the pageant.

Launcelot.
Be not afraid. The charge that's laid against us,
Cannot be certified by evidence.

Guenevere.
And if it were—why, then it were, and so
The burden of decision were removed.
Kiss me! Farewell, a little while, my love!
It is a woeful world, at best. Thank God
For love, even with its anguish!

[Exit, through a small door back of the thrones.]
Launcelot.
Why, then it were!
Ay, even disgrace would be an ease of breath
After this tension of duplicity.
God help me, I am like a man aghast
Between a dragon and a basilisk,
Which one he fronts dilating as he stares
More horrid than the other. O mystery
Of Fate, that folds us with encircling gloom!
What issue sleeps for us in thy dark womb?

[As he starts to go out, enter Morgause carelessly. They bow to each other. Exit Launcelot.]
Morgause.
So? Kissing at the very foot of the throne?
What impudence! ... Why, now I have the witness
Of mine own eyes to carry to the King.
What, billing like two sparrows on the highway,
Shameless of who may see? Oho, my birds!
You are in the springe. And Mistress Eyebrows, you
Shall lower a little those proud orbs of yours.
Arthur can hardly doubt his sister's word,
Especially when she is Queen of Orkney
And Rome is knocking at his gates for tribute.
But yet there's Peredure to reckon with.
Oh, had I but picked up his bloody sword
And plunged it in his heart before he fled!
But, like an infant, I must lose my wits,
To see him raging so, like a mad bull
That breaks its tether in the fields, and gores
The dull earth in its fury. Poor La Rouse!
He's out of it. He has taken a bath this time
Has frozen all the longing in his veins.
Why, I was fondling him and found it sweet—
And then, so cold, a coldness like damp earth
Or some slow-blooded fishy creature,—pah!
I was a-creep with loathing at the feel
Of that limp dummy, as I dragged it out
And dumped it in the fountain. So much, at least,
Is done to kill the scent. But Peredure?—
Will he be silent when he finds his sister
Is muddied by my hands? No, he will blurt
All out; and gossip virtue, like a hawk,
Leaving the fluttered Queen, will change its flight
And fall on the new quarry. The accusation
Cannot be held back now, even if I would.
'Tis known to the whole palace. I have sailed
Into a storm that bears me where it will,
And all my hope is to escape the reefs. ...
Devise, devise. If Peredure accuse me,
As he will surely do, I will be merry,
Jest of his love—I have it, I will say
He would himself have won me to his will
And, failing, slew La Rouse of jealousy,—
But not in my apartments. I must swear
La Rouse was not with me.—That will not do.
Curse him, they will not doubt his word. Fie, fie!
Cannot I weave a better lie than this?—
'Tis odd I have not seen the boy to-day.
What if he have gone mad—that would not be
So strange—or in a melancholy fit,
Such as he often sullens with for trifles,
Have wandered from the court? Why, there's some hope.
If he but make no entrance in the scene
That's on this morning—then let him come back!
But, Peredure, it will be to thy—Ah,
[Enter Publius.]
The ambassador!—Good morrow, Publius!

Publius.
My duty to your Majesty. All morrows
Are good when age receives the smile of beauty.

Morgause.
Or wisdom deigns to bow to witless youth.

Publius.
Your Majesty's most rancorous enemy
Would not accuse her of a lack of wit.

Morgause.
But wit and folly ever course together.
—Go to, we draw it out too thin. What think you
The King will say to Rome's demand to-day?

Publius.
He will refuse it. He is overbold.
A soldier is but a huge animal
Whose brawn the statesman turns to his own ends.

Morgause.
To underrate the foe does not augment
Our strength before, nor glory after battle.
Arthur is not a horse for you to stride,
And Merlin, though the King not always heeds him,
Is shrewder than us all.

Publius.
He will refuse,
Though fifty Merlins counsel. 'T is his pride
That thinks itself a second Julius Cæsar.
Then, with these unforeseen domestic feuds,
He must do battle with enfeebled forces.
And Britain is once more a Roman province.
Where is La Rouse to-day?

Morgause.
I have not seen him.

Publius.
Strange! He was to communicate with me
At daybreak.

Morgause.
The Empire's system of espionage
Is very perfect, is it not?

Publius.
Your Majesty,
It is my charge; I cannot praise myself.

Morgause.
I fancy, were some enemy of Rome,
Some dangerous enemy, in a foreign court,
Some man who knew too much, we'll say—you could
Remove him, I presume, with little trouble.

Publius.
Were such a man in Camelot, he were dead
Before the day were.—She has some one in mind.
No matter; Rome can spend a dram of hemlock
For such allies.

Morgause.
So soon as that, indeed!
I see 't is well to keep in Roman favor.—
Then look to it that the Prince of Cameliard
Never appears again before the King.
'T is well for Rome, I tell you. We have used him
And now he is incensed. He has not been
About the court to-day.

Publius.
If he appear
Too quickly, he shall perish by the knife;
Else, lest we wake suspicion, he must die
A natural death.

Morgause.
St! Finger on the lips!

[Enter Merlin.]
Publius.
Is the King near?

Merlin.
He even now dismounts.

Publius.
I must withdraw and seek my fellow-legates.
Madam, I humbly take my leave,— [apart rapidly]
I give
The order at once— [to Merlin]
and of you, sir, most humbly.

[Exit.]
Merlin.
I am well pleased to find the Queen of Orkney
Does not forget her brother's interests,
But even spreads her fascinating snares
About the feet of senile enemies.

Morgause.
Would all of Arthur's blood were but as true!
Merlin, I fear my sister, Fay Morgana,
Will set her husband and the King at odds,
If Rome should war upon us.

Merlin.
Fay Morgana
Would say, “My sister is not overwise;
She is so shrewd she ceases to be shrewd.”

Morgause.
I know my learned sister is your pupil;
I never thought to match with her in craft.

Merlin.
Craft is no craft, when craftier is at play;
Craft and no craft—and that is all I say.
A woman's wit is subtle but unsure.

Morgause.
Why do you juggle with a senseless rhyme?

Merlin.
So that your wits may have a tree to climb.

[Flourish without.]
Morgause.
At last, the King!

[Enter Arthur, Guenevere, Launcelot, Godmar, Galahault, Kaye, Bors, Lionel, Ector, Gawaine, Lionors, Dagonet, Knights, Ladies, Heralds and Attendants. Flourish. The King and Queen ascend their thrones.

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161

Merlin takes the raised seat next the King. Kaye stands at the foot of the throne, attended by two Heralds.]
Arthur.
Fair dames and damsels, greeting!
My lords and gentlemen, most noble knights
Of the Round Table, greeting to you all!
With wassail and rejoicing we return;
For victory, like the reflected sun,
Sits flashing on our helmets. Cornwall now
Acknowledges our suzerainty and holds
His crown in feoff. This rings the curtain down
Upon the first act of our purposes.
Our Trojan race, enfeebled by dependence
So long upon the strong protecting swords
Of Rome, our cousin and erstwhile our conqueror,
And, that stout panoply and bond withdrawn,
Cleft into princedoms and conflicting states,
Lay, when I found it, helpless in its chaos
To make a head against the Saxon raids
Or to cast off the yoke of Roman tribute.
Nor needed there a foreign foe; for when
Each realm within the realm would be supreme,
What hinders that each lordship do the like,
Each barony, each village, each strong arm?
Why, such a land is like a rotting corpse;
For when that harmony and principle
Of union, which is life, is ta'en away,
And each corporeal atom works alone,
The issue is corruption. The great world
Should have one lord, as Britain has at last;
There lies the true goal of all polity.
But we, at least, are one; nor only Britain
But many parts of France accept our sway.
'T is fit, at such a joyous consummation,
Wrought with such toil of statecraft and of arms,
To deck our city like a Queen of May
With many-colored flags and summer garlands,
And make the midnight sky to mock the dawn
With the red gleam of bonfires on the hills.
[Sits. Murmurs of applause.]
What matters in our absence have arisen
That need the scrutiny of the King? Proceed.

[The heralds sound.]
Kaye.
First, dread my lord, the ambassadors from Rome.

Arthur.
Let them appear.

[Flourish. Enter Publius and nine other Ambassadors, old men, bearing each a branch of olive. They kneel before the throne.]
Publius.
First for ourselves we do
This reverence to your Majesty, entreating
Lest we lose favor in your eyes, in that
We do a graceless office. We are but cogs
In the machinery of imperial Rome
And work our master's will.

Arthur.
Rise, gentlemen,
And let the throne of Britain know your message.

Publius
[reads].
“Lucius, the high and mighty Emperor,
Sendeth to Arthur, King of Britain, greeting,
Commanding thee that thou acknowledge him
Thy lord, and that thou send the truage due
Unto the Empire, which thy father paid
And other heretofore thy predecessors,
As is of record. Thou, as a false rebel,
Not knowing him to be thy sovereign,
Withholdest and retainest this just impost,
Contrary to the statutes and decrees,
Made by the noble and worthy Julius Cæsar,
Conqueror of this realm and of the world,
First Emperor of Rome. If thou refuse,
Know thou for certain he shall make strong war
On thee, thy realms and lands, and shall chastise
Thee and thy subjects, making an ensample
Perpetual unto all kings and princes
Not to rebel against that noble empire
Which domineth the universal world.”

A Young Knight.
Gentlemen, shall this graybeard insolence
Scoff in our teeth?

[Several of the younger knights draw their swords.]
Arthur.
Put up your swords. He dies,
Who touches these old men except with reverence.
Fie, would ye strike the herald in his office
Or run upon unweaponed age?—Go, tell
Your lord, there was a king of Britain once
Who sacked great Rome itself, despite the geese
Cackled to save it. As for this demand,
I know no tribute that I owe to him,
Nor to no earthly prince, Christian nor heathen.
Say furthermore that I myself pretend
In virtue of my lineal descent
From that great Constantine who saw the Cross
Blazoned upon the sky for his device,
And conquered in that sign, who was himself
A Briton, son of Helena, our Queen,
And sprung from immemorial royalty—
From him, I say, I trace my high descent,
From him I hold the sovereignty of Britain
And from him, too, the Iron Crown of Rome.
And I proclaim that Lucius wears that crown
As an usurper and a rebel, and
Demand that he and all that are of Rome
Hasten incontinent to do me homage
As their true Emperor, on pain of all
That shall ensue. For, rest you well assured,
If I invade Italia with my chivalry,
The legioned arms of Rome shall stead you little.
This is my answer. But do not for this
Yourselves be too impetuous of return.
Abide some days in Camelot, my lords;
We shall afford you merry entertainment.

Publius.
Your declaration puts the world at war;
We may not dally in a hostile court.

[Exit, with Ambassadors.]
Kaye
[apart].
My lord, I would have warned you of the next;
But I could get no audience in the press.
[Aloud, reading.]
“Sir Ladinas de la Rouse, a lord of France,
And Knight of the Round Table, doth impeach
Guenevere, Queen of Britain, Sovran Lady
Of the most Knightly and Christian Fellowship
Of the Round Table, et cetera, of treason
To the most gracious person of the King
And to the safety of the realm, in living
In shameless license with Sir Launcelot.
Also he doth impeach for the same cause
Sir Launcelot du Lac, the son of Ban,
Lord of the land of Benwick and the castle
Of Joyous Gard. This charge he undertakes
To prove by evidence irrefragable,
Or else to meet Sir Launcelot in the lists
And whatsoever Knight beside appear
To champion the quarrel of the Queen.
In pledge whereof he offers to the King
The disposition of his life and lands.”

[Profound silence.]
Launcelot.
This is a grievous charge to make. But why
Comes not the knight according to his bond,
That I may prove his lie upon his head?

Morgause.
Because he has been treacherously murdered—
Therefore he comes not, thou dishonored knight!

Kaye.
Murdered?

Morgause.
Ay, murdered—by Prince Peredure,
The brother of the Queen! A strange concurrence!

Merlin.
How comes it, lady, that you know so much?
Did Dagonet tell you or Sir Bors? They only,
Except myself, have known of this. Be careful;
With too much knowledge you undo yourself.

Arthur.
Enough! 'T is well, perhaps, that he is dead;
Else this preposterous charge might not be passed
Unquestioned and unpunished.—Is aught else—?

Morgause.
Oh, not so fast, my royal brother! La Rouse
Cannot break through his coffin to sustain
His righteous accusation; but I take
That burden on myself. I shall demand
Bors de Ganys, the Lady Lionors
—You should believe her, she was never false
To you—Prince Galahault, who knows full well
What he is loth to answer, Lynette, Laurel,
Dagonet, some others after, to bear witness.
It is the common rumor of the palace.
You cannot honorably, with that respect
You owe the knights and ladies of your court,
Allow yourself so shamelessly to be
Misused and made a jest of. I myself
Have seen Sir Launcelot and the Queen together
When they conceited they were unperceived.
It was but now I—

Arthur.
Silence! One word more
And, royal and our sister though you be,
Your womanhood shall be your shield no longer.
Too much already have we suffered you
To play the spy and weave your deft intrigues
About our footing. Now our slackness ends.
We banish you the court. Go, get you ready!
Sir Kaye will see that, ere the sun is set,
You are far hence in some sequestered castle,
Where you shall have all honor, ceremony,
And revenues appropriate to your state,—
But nevermore be seen at Camelot!

Morgause.
Why, be a fool, then, and a wittol, do!
And while you play the rogue in others' couches,
—As you are celebrated for that sport,—
Your dearest friend shall get the realm its heir.
God punishes your wantonness right fitly,
You prince of lechers and of perjurers!
You, flower of chivalry! Ay, for chivalry
Means truth to men, if they are stout enough,
And flattering falsehood to a woman's ear.
Murder and lust are the two spurs of knighthood,
Which stains a Lionors and stabs La Rouse!
—Proud harlot, I shall see your downfall yet.

[Exit, followed by Kaye.]
Arthur.
My Launcelot, sit thou by my Queen. My lords,
This is my friend—through good or ill report
My friend. Who injures him by word or deed,
Were it but the thin film of an idle breath
Clouding the clear glass of his stainless soul,
He injures me; and but that I am King
And may not, being the State more than myself,
Joust like a simple knight, and but that he,
Our stoutest arm as our most knightly heart,
Needs not my lance to right him, I would slay
With mine own hands the knave that did him wrong.
[Turns to Guenevere, who rises.]
And thou, my noble Queen!—If that I ever
By so much as the sullying of a thought
Dimmed the bright clarity of thine imaged whiteness
Within my soul, may Christ remember it
Against me at the Judgment!
[Advances and kisses her, then turns to the others.]
Good my lords,
Erase this most unnecessary scene
From your remembrance.

Launcelot
[half aside, partly to Guenevere and partly to himself].
Be less kingly, Arthur,
Or you will split my heart!—not with remorse—
No, not remorse, only eternal pain!—
Why, so the damned are!

Guenevere
[half apart].
To the souls in hell
It is at least permitted to cry out.

Curtain.