Read Ebook: Stories of King Arthur's Knights Told to the Children by Macgregor Mary Malory Thomas Sir Contributor Chisholm Louey Editor Cameron Katharine Illustrator

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Ebook has 531 lines and 20665 words, and 11 pages

Again Geraint tied the armour of the three slain knights round their horses. Then he twisted the three reins together, and handed them to Enid.

'Drive these on in front,' said Geraint. And now Enid had six horses to drive, and Geraint saw that they were difficult to manage. Then he rode nearer Enid.

They had left the wood behind them now, and were riding through cornfields, where reapers were busy cutting down the waving corn.

Coming down the path towards them, they saw a fair-haired boy. He was carrying food to the reapers. Geraint thought Enid looked faint, and he was very hungry, so he stopped the lad and asked for food.

'I can give you some of this; it is the reapers' dinner,' said the boy. 'But it is coarse and plain food,' and he glanced doubtfully at the lady with the sad eyes and her stern-looking knight.

But Geraint thanked him, and took the food to Enid. And to please him she ate a little, but Geraint was so hungry that he finished all the reapers' dinner.

'I will reward you,' said Geraint, for the lad was dismayed to find nothing left for the reapers to eat. And he told him to take one of the horses, with the suit of armour bound round it.

Then the boy was full of glee, and thought himself a knight, as he led the horse away.

Geraint and Enid then went to the little village near the cornfields, and lodged there for one night.

The country they were in belonged to a cruel Earl. He had once wanted to marry Enid. When he heard that she was in his country, he made up his mind to kill Geraint, and make Enid marry him after all.

'I will go to the inn while they are still asleep,' thought the Earl, 'and kill the knight and take Enid away.'

But Geraint and Enid had got up very early that morning, and had left the five horses and the five suits of armour with the landlord, to pay him for their food and shelter.

Then the wicked Earl galloped after them, and Enid heard the sound of horse's hoofs coming nearer and nearer. As the horseman dashed down upon Geraint, Enid hid her face, and asked God to spare her dear lord's life once more.

The fight was long and fierce, but at last Geraint overthrew the Earl, and left him lying half-dead in the dust.

Still a little in front, Enid rode silently on, and Geraint followed, but he had been wounded in the fight with the Earl, though he did not tell Enid. And the wound bled inside his armour, till Geraint felt very faint, and suddenly everything seemed black in front of him. He reeled and fell from his horse on to a bank of grass.

Enid heard the crash of his armour as he fell, and in a moment she was beside him. She unbuckled the armour and took off his helmet Then she took her veil of faded silk and bound up his wound. But Geraint lay quite still.

Enid's horse wandered into a forest and was lost, but Geraint's noble war-horse kept watch with Enid, as if he understood.

About noon, the Earl, in whose country they now were, passed along with his followers. He saw the two by the wayside, and shouted to Enid, 'Is he dead?'

'No, no, not dead; he cannot be dead. Let him be carried out of the sun,' she entreated.

And Enid's great sorrow, and her great beauty, made the Earl a little less rough, and he told his men to carry Geraint to the hall. 'His charger is a noble one, bring it too,' shouted the Earl.

His men unwillingly carried Geraint to the hall, and laid him down on a stretcher there, and left him.

Enid bent over him, chafing his cold hands, and calling him to come back to her.

After a long time Geraint opened his eyes. He saw Enid tenderly watching him, and he felt Enid's tears dropping on his face. 'She weeps for me,' he thought; but he did not move, but lay there as if he were dead.

In the evening the Earl came into the great hall and called for dinner, and many knights and ladies sat down with him, but no one remembered Enid. But when the Earl had finished eating and drinking, his eye fell on her. He remembered how she had wept for her wounded lord in the morning.

'Do not weep any more, but eat and be merry. Then I will marry you, and you shall share my earldom, and I will hunt for you,' said the wild Earl.

Enid's head drooped lower, and she murmured, 'Leave me alone, I beseech you, for my lord is surely dead.'

The Earl hardly heard what she said, but thought Enid was thanking him. 'Yes, eat and be glad,' he repeated, 'for you are mine.'

'How can I ever be glad again?' said Enid, thinking, 'Surely Geraint is dead.'

But the Earl was growing impatient. He seized her roughly, and made her sit at the table, and he put food before her, shouting, 'Eat.'

'No,' said Enid, 'I will not eat, till my lord arises and eats with me.'

'Then drink,' said the Earl, and he thrust a cup to her lips.

'No,' said Enid, 'I will not drink, till my lord arises and drinks with me; and if he does not arise, I will not drink wine till I die.'

The Earl strode up and down the hall in a great rage. 'If you will neither eat nor drink, will you take off this old faded dress?' said the Earl. And he told one of his women to bring Enid a robe, which had been woven across the sea, and which was covered with many gems.

But Enid told the Earl how Geraint had first seen and loved her in the dress she wore, and how he had asked her to wear it when he took her to the Queen. 'And when we started on this sad journey, I wore it again, to win back his love,' she said, 'and I will never take it off till he arises and bids me.'

Then the Earl was angry. He came close to Enid, and struck her on the cheek with his hand.

And Enid thought, 'He would not have dared to strike me, if he had not known that my lord was truly dead,' and she gave a bitter cry.

When Geraint heard Enid's cry, with one bound he leaped to where the huge Earl stood, and with one swing of his sword cut off the Earl's head, and it fell down and rolled along the floor.

Then all the lords and ladies were afraid, for they had thought Geraint was dead, and they fled, and Geraint and Enid were left alone.

And Geraint never again thought that Enid loved the gay lords and ladies at King Arthur's court better than she loved him.

Then they went back to their own land. And soon the people knew that Prince Geraint had come back a true knight, and the old whispers that he was a coward faded away, and the people called him 'Geraint the Brave.'

And her ladies called Enid, 'Enid the Fair,' but the people on the land called her 'Enid the Good.'

LANCELOT AND ELAINE

Her name was Elaine. But she was so fair that her father called her 'Elaine the Fair,' and she was so lovable that her brothers called her 'Elaine the Lovable,' and that was the name she liked best of all.

The country people, who lived round about the castle of Astolat, which was Elaine's home, had another and a very beautiful name for her. As she passed their windows in her white frock, they looked at the white lilies growing in their gardens, and they said, 'She is tall and graceful and pure as these,' and they called her the 'Lily Maid of Astolat.'

Elaine lived in the castle alone with her father and her two brothers, and an old dumb servant who had waited on her since she was a baby.

To her father Elaine seemed always a bright and winsome child, though she was growing up now. He would watch her serious face as she listened to Sir Torre, the grave elder brother, while he told her that wise maidens stayed at home to cook and sew. And he would laugh as he saw her, when Sir Torre turned away, run off wilfully to the woods.

Elaine spent long happy days out of doors with her younger brother Lavaine. When they grew tired of chasing the butterflies and gathering the wildflowers, they would sit under the pine-trees and speak of Arthur's knights and their noble deeds, and they longed to see the heroes of whom they talked.

'And the tournament will be held at Camelot this year,' Lavaine reminded his sister. 'If some of the knights ride past Astolat, we may see them as they pass.' And Elaine and Lavaine counted the days till the tournament would begin.

Now Arthur had offered the prize of a large diamond to the knight who fought most bravely at the tournament.

But the knights murmured to each other, 'We need not hope to win the prize, for Sir Lancelot will be on the field, and who can stand before the greatest knight of Arthur's court?'

And the Queen heard what the knights said to each other, and she told Lancelot how they lost courage and hope when he came on to the field. 'They begin to think some magic is at work when they see you, and they cannot fight their best. But I have a plan. You must go to the tournament at Camelot in disguise. And though the knights do not know with whom they fight, they will still fall before the strength of Lancelot's arm,' added the Queen, smiling up to him.

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