Part 11 (2/2)

O me, I fear that I am no true wife'

Half inwardly, half audibly she spoke, And the strong passion in her made her weep True tears upon his broad and naked breast, And these awoke himents of her later words, And that she fear'd she was not a true wife

And then he thought, 'In spite of all my care, For all my pains, poor man, for allfor soht in Arthur's hall'

Then tho' he loved and reverenced her too ht thro' hisThat makes a man, in the sweet face of her Whom he loves e limbs out of bed, And shook his drowsy squire awake and cried, 'My charger and her palfrey'; then to her, 'I will ride forth into the wilderness; For tho' it seems my spurs are yet to win, I have not fall'n so low as some would wish

And thou, put on thy worst and meanest dress And ride with me' And Enid ask'd, amazed, 'If Enid errs, let Enid learn her fault'

But he, 'I charge thee, ask not, but obey'

Then she bethought her of a faded silk, A fadedtoward a cedarn cabinet, Wherein she kept thes of summer laid between the folds, She took the when first he came on her Drest in that dress, and how he loved her in it, And all her foolish fears about the dress, And all his journey to her, as hi to the court”

Tennyson's

”Ar muscle sloped, As slopes a wild brook o'er a little stone, Running too veheested perhaps by Theocritus--”The muscles on his brawny arms stood out like rounded rocks that the winter torrent has rolled and worn s stream” (Idyll xxii)

The second part of the poeinal less closely Thus Limours, in the tale, is not an old suitor of Enid; Edyrn does not appear to the rescue; certain cruel gaic mist, occur in the tale, and are omitted by the poet; ”Gwyffert petit, so called by the Franks, who,” in the tale, is not a character in the Idyll, and, generally, the gross Celtic exaggerations of Geraint's feats are toned down by Tennyson

In other respects, as when Geraint eats the mowers' dinner, the tale supplies the materials But it does not dwell tenderly on the reconciliation The tale is more or less in the vein of ”patient Grizel,” and he who told it is ratio, and the sufferings of Enid The Idyll is enriched with many beautiful pictures from nature, such as this:-

”But at the flash and motion of thefish, that on a su o'er their shadows on the sand, But if a ainst the sun, There is not left the twinkle of a fin Betwixt the cressy islets white in flower; So, scared but at the motion of the man, Fled all the boon co in the public way”

In Balin and Balan Tennyson displays great constructive power, and re theto Mr Rhys, is the Belinus of Geoffrey of Monmouth, ”whose name represents the Celtic divinity described in Latin as Apollo Belenus or Belinus” {14} In Geoffrey, Belinus, euphemerised, or reduced from God to hero, has a brother, Brennius, the Celtic Bran, King of Britain from Caithness to the Humber

Belinus drives Bran into exile ”Thus it is seen that Belinus or Balyn was, , the natural enemy” (as Apollo Belinus, the radiant God) ”of the dark divinity Bran or Balan”

If this view be correct, the two brothers answer to the good and bad principles of myths like that of the Huron Iouskeha the Sun, and Anatensic the Moon, or rather Taouiscara and Iouskeha, the hostile brothers, Black and White {15} These hts of Northumberland, Balin the wild and Balan

Their adventures are mixed up with a hostile Lady of the Lake, whom Balin slays in Arthur's presence, with a shich none but Balin can draw froht Garlon, invisible at will, who Pellam Pursued from room to room by Pellam, Balin finds himself in a chamber full of relics of Joseph of Arimathea

There he seizes a spear, the very spear hich the Roman soldier pierced the side of the Crucified, and wounds Pellah that dolorous stroke” Pella, who can only be healed by the Holy Grail Apparently Celtic myths of obscure antiquity have been adapted in France, and interwoven with fables about Joseph of Ario into the co of the subject In Malory, Balin, after dealing the dolorous stroke, borrows a strange shi+eld froht, and, thus accoutred, ht, both die and are buried in one to Balin's sword ”Thus endeth the tale of Balyn and of Balan, two brethren born in Northuhts,” says Malory, siical medley under the coat armour of romance

The materials, then, seemed confused and obdurate, but Tennyson works them into the course of the fatal love of Lancelot and Guinevere, and into the spiritual texture of the Idylls Balin has been expelled froives hie He had buffeted a squire in hall He and Balan await all challengers beside a well Arthur encounters and dismounts them

Balin devotes his that Pellaion, collects relics, claims descent from Joseph of Arimathea, and owns the sacred spear that pierced the side of Christ But Garlon is with hiht invisible, who appears to come froend This Garlon has an unknightly way of killing oes to encounter Garlon Balin reaining leave to bear Guinevere's Crown Matrinisance,--which, of course, Balan does not know, -

”As golden earnest of a better life”

But Balin sees reason to think that Lancelot and Guinevere love even too well

”Then chanced, one h the hall

A walk of roses ran from door to door; A walk of lilies crost it to the bower: And down that range of roses the great Queen Ca on her face; And all in shadow from the counter door Sir Lancelot as to lanced aside, and paced The long white walk of lilies toward the bower

Follow'd the Queen; Sir Balin heard her 'Prince, Art thou so little loyal to thy Queen, As pass without good morrow to thy Queen?'

To whom Sir Lancelot with his eyes on earth, 'Fain would I still be loyal to the Queen'

'Yea so,' she said, 'but so to pass me by - So loyal scarce is loyal to thyself, Who of courtesy

Let be: ye stand, fair lord, as in a drea the flowers, 'Yea--for a dreaht I saw That maiden Saint who stands with lily in hand In yonder shrine All round her prest the dark, And all the light upon her silver face Flow'd from the spiritual lily that she held

Lo! these her eht a flush As hardly tints the blossom of the quince Would mar their charm of stainless maidenhood'