That glorious roundel echoing in our ears,
425 And chased the flashes of his golden horns
Until they vanish’d by the fairy well
That laughs at iron – as our warriors did –
Where children cast their pins and nails, and cry,
“Laugh, little well!” but touch it with a sword,
430 It buzzes fiercely round the point; and there
We lost him: such a noble song was that.
But, Vivien, when you sang me that sweet rhyme,
I felt as tho’ you knew this curséd charm,
Were proving it on me, and that I lay
435 And felt them slowly ebbing, name and fame.’
And Vivien answer’d smiling mournfully:
‘O mine have ebb’d away for evermore,
And all thro’ following you to this wild wood,
Because I saw you sad, to comfort you.
440 Lo now, what hearts have men! they never mount
As high as woman in her selfless mood.
And touching fame, howe’er ye scorn my song,
Take one verse more – the lady speaks it – this:
‘“My name, once mine, now thine, is closelier mine,
445 For fame, could fame be mine, that fame were thine,
And shame, could shame be thine, that shame were mine.
So trust me not at all or all in all.”
‘Says she not well? and there is more – this rhyme
Is like the fair pearl-necklace of the Queen,
450 That burst in dancing, and the pearls were spilt;
Some, lost, some stolen, some as relics kept.
But nevermore the same two sister pearls
Ran down the silken thread to kiss each other
On her white neck – so is it with this rhyme:
455 It lives dispersedly in many hands,
And every minstrel sings it differently;
Yet is there one true line, the pearl of pearls:
“Man dreams of Fame while woman wakes to love.”
Yea! Love, tho’ Love were of the grossest, carves
460 A portion from the solid present, eats
And uses, careless of the rest; but Fame,
The Fame that follows death is nothing to us;
And what is Fame in life but half-disfame,
And counterchanged with darkness? ye yourself
465 Know well that Envy calls you Devil’s son,
And since ye seem the Master of all Art,
They fain would make you Master of all vice.’
And Merlin lock’d his hand in hers and said,
‘I once was looking for a magic weed,
470 And found a fair young squire who sat alone,
Had carved himself a knightly shield of wood,
And then was painting on it fancied arms,
Azure, an Eagle rising or, the Sun
In dexter chief; the scroll “I follow fame.”
475 And speaking not, but leaning over him,
I took his brush and blotted out the bird,
And made a Gardener putting in a graff,
With this for motto, “Rather use than fame.”
You should have seen him blush; but afterwards
480 He made a stalwart knight. O Vivien,
For you, methinks you think you love me well;
For me, I love you somewhat; rest: and Love
Should have some rest and pleasure in himself,
Not ever be too curious for a boon,
485 Too prurient for a proof against the grain
Of him ye say ye love: but Fame with men,
Being but ampler means to serve mankind,
Should have small rest or pleasure in herself,
But work as vassal to the larger love,
490 That dwarfs the petty love of one to one.
Use gave me Fame at first, and Fame again
Increasing gave me use. Lo, there my boon!
What other? for men sought to prove me vile,
Because I fain had given them greater wits:
495 And then did Envy call me Devil’s son:
The sick weak beast seeking to help herself
By striking at her better, miss’d, and brought
Her own claw back, and wounded her own heart.
Sweet were the days when I was all unknown,
500 But when my name was lifted up, the storm
Brake on the mountain and I cared not for it.
Right well know I that Fame is half-disfame,
Yet needs must work my work. That other fame,
To one at least, who hath not children, vague,
505 The cackle of the unborn about the grave,
I cared not for it: a single misty star,
Which is the second in a line of stars
That seem a sword beneath a belt of three,
I never gazed upon it but I dreamt
510 Of some vast charm concluded in that star
To make fame nothing. Wherefore, if I fear,
Giving you power upon me thro’ this charm,
That you might play me falsely, having power,
However well ye think ye love me now
515 (As sons of kings loving in pupilage
Have turn’d to tyrants when they came to power)
I rather dread the loss of use than fame;
If you – and not so much from wickedness,
As some wild turn of anger, or a mood
520 Of overstrain’d affection, it may be,
To keep me all to your own self, – or else
A sudden spurt of woman’s jealousy, –
Should try this charm on whom ye say ye love.’
And Vivien answer’d smiling as in wrath:
525 ‘Have I not sworn? I am not trusted. Good!
Well, hide it, hide it; I shall find it out;
And being found take heed of Vivien.
A woman and not trusted, doubtless I
Might feel some sudden turn of anger born
530 Of your misfaith; and your fine epithet
Is accurate too, for this full love of mine
Without the full heart back may merit well
Your term of overstrain’d. So used as I,
My daily wonder is, I love at all.
535 And as to woman’s jealousy, O why not?
O to what end, except a jealous one,
And one to make me jealous if I love,
Was this fair charm invented by yourself?
I well believe that all about this world
540 Ye cage a buxom captive here and there,
Closed in the four walls of a hollow tower
From which is no escape for evermore.’
Then the great Master merrily answer’d her:
‘Full many a love in loving youth was mine;
545 I needed then no charm to keep them mine
But youth and love; and that full heart of yours
Whereof ye prattle, may now assure you mine;
So live uncharm’d. For those who wrought it first,
The wrist is parted from the hand that waved,
550 The feet unmortised from their ankle-bones
Who paced it, ages back: but will ye hear
The legend as in guerdon for your rhyme?
‘There lived a king in the most Eastern East,
Less old than I, yet older, for my blood
555 Hath earnest in it of far springs to be.
A tawny pirate anchor’d in his port,
Whose bark had plunder’d twenty nameless isles;
And passing one, at the high peep of dawn,
He saw two cities in a thousand boats
560 All fighting for a woman on the sea.
And pushing his black craft among them all,
He lightly scatter’d theirs and brought her off,
With loss of half his people arrow-slain;
A maid so smooth, so white, so wonderful,
565 They said
a light came from her when she moved:
And since the pirate would not yield her up,
The King impaled him for his piracy;
Then made her Queen: but those isle-nurtured eyes
Waged such unwilling tho’ successful war
570 On all the youth, they sicken’d; councils thinn’d,
And armies waned, for magnet-like she drew
The rustiest iron of old fighters’ hearts;
And beasts themselves would worship; camels knelt
Unbidden, and the brutes of mountain back
575 That carry kings in castles, bow’d black knees
Of homage, ringing with their serpent hands,
To make her smile, her golden ankle-bells.
What wonder, being jealous, that he sent
His horns of proclamation out thro’ all
580 The hundred under-kingdoms that he sway’d
To find a wizard who might teach the King
Some charm, which being wrought upon the Queen
Might keep her all his own: to such a one
He promised more than ever king has given,
585 A league of mountain full of golden mines,
A province with a hundred miles of coast,
A palace and a princess, all for him:
But on all those who tried and fail’d, the King
Pronounced a dismal sentence, meaning by it
590 To keep the list low and pretenders back,
Or like a king, not to be trifled with-
Their heads should moulder on the city gates.
And many tried and fail’d, because the charm
Of nature in her overbore their own:
595 And many a wizard brow bleach’d on the walls:
And many weeks a troop of carrion crows
Hung like a cloud above the gateway towers.’
And Vivien breaking in upon him, said:
‘I sit and gather honey; yet, methinks,
600 Thy tongue has tript a little: ask thyself.
The lady never made unwilling war
With those fine eyes: she had her pleasure in it,
And made her good man jealous with good cause.
And lived there neither dame nor damsel then
605 Wroth at a lover’s loss? were all as tame,
I mean, as noble, as their Queen was fair?
Not one to flirt a venom at her eyes,
Or pinch a murderous dust into her drink,
Or make her paler with a poison’d rose?
610 Well, those were not our days: but did they find
A wizard? Tell me, was he like to thee?’
She ceased, and made her lithe arm round his neck
Tighten, and then drew back, and let her eyes
Speak for her, glowing on him, like a bride’s
615 On her new lord, her own, the first of men.
He answer’d laughing, ‘Nay, not like to me.
At last they found – his foragers for charms –
A little glassy-headed hairless man,
Who lived alone in a great wild on grass;
620 Read but one book, and ever reading grew
So grated down and filed away with thought,
So lean his eyes were monstrous; while the skin
Clung but to crate and basket, ribs and spine.
And since he kept his mind on one sole aim,
625 Nor ever touch’d fierce wine, nor tasted flesh,
Nor own’d a sensual wish, to him the wall
That sunders ghosts and shadow-casting men
Became a crystal, and he saw them thro’ it,
And heard their voices talk behind the wall,
630 And learnt their elemental secrets, powers
And forces; often o’er the sun’s bright eye
Drew the vast eyelid of an inky cloud,
And lash’d it at the base with slanting storm;
Or in the noon of mist and driving rain,
635 When the lake whiten’d and the pinewood roar’d,
And the cairn’d mountain was a shadow, sunn’d
The world to peace again: here was the man.
And so by force they dragg’d him to the King.
And then he taught the King to charm the Queen
640 In such-wise, that no man could see her more,
Nor saw she save the King, who wrought the charm,
Coming and going, and she lay as dead,
And lost all use of life: but when the King
Made proffer of the league of golden mines,
645 The province with a hundred miles of coast,
The palace and the princess, that old man
Went back to his old wild, and lived on grass,
And vanish’d, and his book came down to me.’
And Vivien answer’d smiling saucily:
650 ‘Ye have the book: the charm is written in it:
Good: take my counsel: let me know it at once:
For keep it like a puzzle chest in chest,
With each chest lock’d and padlock’d thirty-fold,
And whelm all this beneath as vast a mound
655 As after furious battle turfs the slain
On some wild down above the windy deep,
I yet should strike upon a sudden means
To dig, pick, open, find and read the charm:
Then, if I tried it, who should blame me then?’
660 And smiling as a master smiles at one
That is not of his school, nor any school
But that where blind and naked Ignorance
Delivers brawling judgments, unashamed,
On all things all day long, he answer’d her:
665 ‘Thou read the book, my pretty Vivien!
O ay, it is but twenty pages long,
But every page having an ample marge,
And every marge enclosing in the midst
A square of text that looks a little blot,
670 The text no larger than the limbs of fleas;
And every square of text an awful charm,
Writ in a language that has long gone by.
So long, that mountains have arisen since
675 And every margin scribbled, crost, and cramm’d
With comment, densest condensation, hard
To mind and eye; but the long sleepless nights
Of my long life have made it easy to me.
And none can read the text, not even I;
680 And none can read the comment but myself;
And in the comment did I find the charm.
O, the results are simple; a mere child
Might use it to the harm of anyone,
And never could undo it: ask no more:
685 For tho’ you should not prove it upon me,
But keep that oath ye sware, ye might, perchance,
Assay it on some one of the Table Round,
And all because ye dream they babble of you.’
And Vivien, frowning in true anger, said:
690 ‘What dare the full-fed liars say of me?
They ride abroad redressing human wrongs!
They sit with knife in meat and wine in horn!
They bound to holy vows of chastity!
Were I not woman, I could tell a tale.
695 But you are man, you well can understand
The shame that cannot be explain’d for shame.
Not one of all the drove should touch me: swine!’
Then answer’d Merlin careless of her words:
‘You breathe but accusation vast and vague,
700 Spleen-born, I think, and proofless. If ye know,
Set up the charge ye know, to stand or fall!’
And Vivien answer’d frowning wrathfully:
‘O ay, what say ye to Sir Valence, him
Whose kinsman left him watcher o’er his wife
705 And two fair babes, and went to distant lands;
Was
one year gone, and on returning found
Not two but three? there lay the reckling, one
But one hour old! What said the happy sire?
A seven-month’s babe had been a truer gift.
710 Those twelve sweet moons confused his fatherhood.’
Then answer’d Merlin, ‘Nay, I know the tale.
Sir Valence wedded with an outland dame:
Some cause had kept him sunder’d from his wife:
One child they had: it lived with her: she died:
715 His kinsman travelling on his own affair
Was charged by Valence to bring home the child.
He brought, not found it therefore: take the truth.’
‘O ay,’ said Vivien, ‘overtrue a tale.
What say ye then to sweet Sir Sagramore,
720 That ardent man? “to pluck the flower in season,”
So says the song, “I trow it is no treason.”
O Master, shall we call him overquick
To crop his own sweet rose before the hour?’
And Merlin answer’d, ‘Overquick art thou
725 To catch a loathly plume fall’n from the wing
Of that foul bird of rapine whose whole prey
Is man’s good name: he never wrong’d his bride.
I know the tale. An angry gust of wind
PufF’d out his torch among the myriad-room’d
730 And many-corridor’d complexities
Of Arthur’s palace: then he found a door,
And darkling felt the sculptured ornament
That wreathen round it made it seem his own;
And wearied out made for the couch and slept,
735 A stainless man beside a stainless maid;
And either slept, nor knew of other there;
Till the high dawn piercing the royal rose
In Arthur’s casement glimmer’d chastely down,
Blushing upon them blushing, and at once
740 He rose without a word and parted from her:
But when the thing was blazed about the court,
The brute world howling forced them into bonds,
And as it chanced they are happy, being pure.’
‘O ay,’ said Vivien, ‘that were likely too.
745 What say ye then to fair Sir Percivale
And of the horrid foulness that he wrought,
The saintly youth, the spotless lamb of Christ,
Or some black wether of St Satan’s fold.
What, in the precincts of the chapel-yard,
750 Among the knightly brasses of the graves,
And by the cold Hic Jacets of the dead!’
And Merlin answer’d careless of her charge,
‘A sober man is Percivale and pure;
But once in life was fluster’d with new wine,