Part 14 (2/2)

note his beneficent progress at home--

”In Windsor forest he did slay A boar of pa.s.sing might and strength; The like in England never was, For hugeness both in breadth and length.

Some of his bones in Warwick yet, Within the castle there do lye; One of his s.h.i.+eld bones to this day Hangs in the city of Coventry.

”On Dunsmore heath he also slew A monstrous wild and cruel beast, Call'd the dun cow of Dunsmore heath, Which many people had opprest; Some of her bones in Warwick yet Still for a monument doth lie, Which unto every looker's view, As wondrous strange they may espy.

”And the dragon in the land, He also did in flight destroy, Which did both men and beasts oppress, And all the country sore annoy:”

Or look we at him all doughty as he was, as the pilgrim of love, as subdued by the influence of the tender pa.s.sion, a suppliant to the gentle Phillis, and ready to compa.s.s the earth to fulfil her wishes, and to prove his devotion:

”Was ever knight for lady's sake So tost in love, as I, Sir Guy; For Phillis fair, that Lady bright, As ever man beheld with eye; She gave me leave myself to try The valiant knight with s.h.i.+eld and spear, Ere that her love she would grant me, Who made me venture far and near.”

Or, afterwards view him as--

”All clad in grey in Pilgrim sort, His voyage from her he did take, Unto that blessed, holy land, For Jesus Christ, his Saviour's sake.”

Lastly, recal we the time when the fierce and ruthless Danes were ravaging our land, and there was scarce a town or castle as far as Winchester, which they had not plundered or burnt, and a proposal was made, and per force acceded to by the English king to decide the struggle by single combat. But the odds were great: Colbrand the Danish champion, was a giant, and ere he came to a combat he provided himself with a cart-load of Danish axes, great clubs with k.n.o.bs of iron, squared barrs of steel lances and iron hooks wherewith to pull his adversary to him.

On the other hand the English--and sleepless and unhappy, the king Athelstan pondered the circ.u.mstance as he lay on his couch, on St.

John Baptist's night--had no champion forthcoming, even though the county of Hants had been promised as a reward to the victor. Roland, the most valiant knight of a thousand, was dead; Heraud, the pride of the nation, was abroad; and the great and valiant Guy, Earl of Warwick, was gone on a pilgrimage. The monarch was perplexed and sorrowful; but an angel appeared to him and comforted him.

In conformity with the injunctions of this gracious messenger, the king, attended by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Chichester, placed himself at the north gate of the city (Winchester) at the hour of prime. Divers poor people and pilgrims entered thereat, and among the rest appeared a man of n.o.ble visage and stalwart frame, but wan withal, pale with abstinence, and macerated by reason of journeying barefoot. His beard was venerably long and he rested on a staff; he wore a pilgrim's garb, and on his bare and venerable head was strung a chaplet of white roses. Bending low, he pa.s.sed the gate, but the king warned by the vision, hastened to him, and entreated him ”by his love for Jesus Christ, by the devotion of his pilgrimage, and for the preservation of all England, to do battle with the giant.” The Palmer thus conjured, underwent the combat, and was victorious.

After a solemn procession to the Cathedral, and thanksgiving therein, when he offered his weapon to G.o.d and the patron of the Church, before the High Altar, the pilgrim withdrew, having revealed himself to none but the king, and that under a solemn pledge of secrecy. He bent his course towards Warwick, and unknown in his disguise, took alms at the hands of his own lady--for, reader, this meek and holy pilgrim, was none other than the wholesale slayer, whose deeds we have been contemplating--and then retired to a solitary place hard by--

”Where with his hand he hew'd a house, Out of a craggy rock of stone; And lived like a palmer poor, Within that cave himself alone.”

Nor was this at all an unusual conclusion to a life of butchery; all the heroes of romance turned hermits; and as they all, at least all of Arthur's Round Table, were gifted with a very striking development of the organ of combativeness, their profound piety at the end of their career might not improbably give rise to a very common adage of these days regarding sinners and saints.

But here was a theme for Tapestry-workers! a real original, genuine English romance; for though the only pieces now extant be, or may be, translated from the French, still there are many concurring circ.u.mstances to prove that the original, often quoted by Chaucer, was an ancient metrical English one. That it is difficult to find who Sir Guy was, or in fact, to prove that there ever was a Sir Guy at all, is nothing to the purpose; leave we that to antiquarians, and their musty folios. Guy of Warwick was well known from west to east, even as far as Jerusalem, where, in Henry the Fourth's time, Lord Beauchamp was kindly received by those in high stations, because he was descended from

”A shadowy ancestor, so renowned as Guy.”

One tapestry on this attractive subject which was in Warwick Castle, before the year 1398, was so distinguished and valued a piece of furniture, that a special grant was made of it by King Richard II.

conveying ”that suit of arras hangings in Warwick Castle, which contained the story of Guy Earl of Warwick,” together with the Castle of Warwick and other possessions, to Thomas Holland, Earl of Kent. And in the restoration of forfeited property to this lord after his imprisonment, these hangings are particularly specified in the patent of King Henry IV., dated 1399.

And the Castle wherein the tapestry was hung was worthy of the heroes it had sheltered. The first building on the site was supposed to be coeval with our Saviour, and was called Caer-leon; almost overthrown by the Picts and Scots, it lay in ruins till Caractacus built himself a manor-house, and founded a church to the honour of St. John the Baptist. Here was afterwards a Roman fort, and here again was a Pictish devastation. A cousin of King Arthur rebuilt it, and then lived in it--Arthgal, first Earl of Warwick, a Knight of the Round Table; this British t.i.tle was equivalent to _Ursus_ in Latin, whence Arthgal took the Bear for his ensign: and a successor of his, a worthy progenitor of our valiant Sir Guy, slew a mighty giant in a duel; and because this giant's delicate weapon was a tree pulled up by the roots, the boughs being snagged from it, the Earls of Warwick, successors of the victor, bore a ragged staff of silver in a sable s.h.i.+eld for their cognisance.

We are told that,--

”When Arthur first in court began, And was approved king, By force of arms great victoryes wanne, And conquest home did bring.

Then into England straight he came With fifty good and able Knights, that resorted unto him, And were of his round table.”

Of these the most renowned were Syr Perceval, Syr Tristan, Syr Launcelot du Lac, Syr Ywain, Syr Gawain, Syr Galaas, Syr Meliadus of Leonnoys, Sir Ysaie, Syr Gyron, &c. &c., and their various and wondrous achievements were woven into a series of tales which are known as the ”Romances of the Round Table.” Of course the main subject of each tale is interrupted by ten thousand varied episodes, in which very often the original object seems entirely lost sight of. Then the construction of many of these Romances, or rather their want of construction, is marvellous; their genealogies are interminable, and their geography miraculous.

One of the most marvellous and scarce of these Romances, and one, the princ.i.p.al pa.s.sages of which were frequently wrought into Tapestry, was the ”Roman du Saint Greal,” which is founded upon an incident, to say the least very peculiar, but which was perhaps once considered true as Holy Writ. St. Joseph of Arimathoea, a very important personage in many romances, having obtained the hanap, or cup from which our Saviour administered the wine to his disciples, caught in the same cup the blood which flowed from his wounds when on the Cross. After he had first achieved various adventures, and undergone an imprisonment of forty-two years, St. Joseph arrives in England with the sacred cup, by means of which numerous miracles are performed; he prepares the Round Table, and Arthur and his Knights all go in quest of the hanap, which by some, to us unaccountable, circ.u.mstance, had fallen into the hands of a sinner. All make the most solemn vow to devote their lives to its recovery; and this they must indeed have done, and not short lives either, if all recorded of them be true. None, however, but two, ever _see_ the sacred symbol; though oftentimes a soft ray of light would stream across the lonesome wild, or the dark pathless forest, or unearthly strains would float on the air, or odours as of Paradise would entrance the senses, while the wandering and woeworn knight would feel all fatigue, all sense of personal inconvenience, of pain, of sickness, or of sorrow, vanish on the instant; and then would he renew his vows, and betake himself to prayer; for though all unworthy to see the Holy Grayle, he would feel that it had been borne on viewless pinions through the air for his individual consolation and hope. And Syr Galahad and Syr Perceval, the two chaste and favoured knights who, ”after the dedely flesshe had beheld the spiritual things,” the holy St. Grael--never returned to converse with the world. The first departed to G.o.d, and ”flights of angels sang him to his rest;” the other took religious clothing and retired to a hermitage, where, after living ”a full holy life for a yere and two moneths, he pa.s.sed out of this world.”

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