Kabanata Kabanata 2 · KING ARTHUR'S COURT

KING ARTHUR'S COURT

The moment I got a chance I slipped aside privately and touched

an ancient common looking man on the shoulder and said, in an

insinuating, confidential way:

“Friend, do me a kindness. Do you belong to the asylum, or are

you just on a visit or something like that?”

He looked me over stupidly, and said:

“Marry, fair sir, me seemeth--”

“That will do,” I said; “I reckon you are a patient.”

I moved away, cogitating, and at the same time keeping an eye

out for any chance passenger in his right mind that might come

along and give me some light. I judged I had found one, presently;

so I drew him aside and said in his ear:

“If I could see the head keeper a minute--only just a minute--”

“Prithee do not let me.”

“Let you _what_?”

“_Hinder_ me, then, if the word please thee better.” Then he went

on to say he was an under-cook and could not stop to gossip,

though he would like it another time; for it would comfort his

very liver to know where I got my clothes. As he started away he

pointed and said yonder was one who was idle enough for my purpose,

and was seeking me besides, no doubt. This was an airy slim boy

in shrimp-colored tights that made him look like a forked carrot,

the rest of his gear was blue silk and dainty laces and ruffles;

and he had long yellow curls, and wore a plumed pink satin cap

tilted complacently over his ear. By his look, he was good-natured;

by his gait, he was satisfied with himself. He was pretty enough

to frame. He arrived, looked me over with a smiling and impudent

curiosity; said he had come for me, and informed me that he was a page.

“Go ’long,” I said; “you ain't more than a paragraph.”

It was pretty severe, but I was nettled. However, it never phazed

him; he didn't appear to know he was hurt. He began to talk and

laugh, in happy, thoughtless, boyish fashion, as we walked along,

and made himself old friends with me at once; asked me all sorts

of questions about myself and about my clothes, but never waited

for an answer--always chattered straight ahead, as if he didn't

know he had asked a question and wasn't expecting any reply, until

at last he happened to mention that he was born in the beginning

of the year 513.

It made the cold chills creep over me! I stopped and said,

a little faintly:

“Maybe I didn't hear you just right. Say it again--and say it

slow. What year was it?”

“513.”

“513! You don't look it! Come, my boy, I am a stranger and

friendless; be honest and honorable with me. Are you in your

right mind?”

He said he was.

“Are these other people in their right minds?”

He said they were.

“And this isn't an asylum? I mean, it isn't a place where they

cure crazy people?”

He said it wasn't.

“Well, then,” I said, “either I am a lunatic, or something just

as awful has happened. Now tell me, honest and true, where am I?”

“IN KING ARTHUR'S COURT.”

I waited a minute, to let that idea shudder its way home,

and then said:

“And according to your notions, what year is it now?”

“528--nineteenth of June.”

I felt a mournful sinking at the heart, and muttered: “I shall

never see my friends again--never, never again. They will not

be born for more than thirteen hundred years yet.”

I seemed to believe the boy, I didn't know why. _Something_ in me

seemed to believe him--my consciousness, as you may say; but my

reason didn't. My reason straightway began to clamor; that was

natural. I didn't know how to go about satisfying it, because

I knew that the testimony of men wouldn't serve--my reason would

say they were lunatics, and throw out their evidence. But all

of a sudden I stumbled on the very thing, just by luck. I knew

that the only total eclipse of the sun in the first half of the

sixth century occurred on the 21st of June, A.D. 528, O.S., and

began at 3 minutes after 12 noon. I also knew that no total eclipse

of the sun was due in what to _me_ was the present year--i.e., 1879.

So, if I could keep my anxiety and curiosity from eating the heart

out of me for forty-eight hours, I should then find out for certain

whether this boy was telling me the truth or not.

Wherefore, being a practical Connecticut man, I now shoved this

whole problem clear out of my mind till its appointed day and hour

should come, in order that I might turn all my attention to the

circumstances of the present moment, and be alert and ready to

make the most out of them that could be made. One thing at a time,

is my motto--and just play that thing for all it is worth, even

if it's only two pair and a jack. I made up my mind to two things:

if it was still the nineteenth century and I was among lunatics

and couldn't get away, I would presently boss that asylum or know

the reason why; and if, on the other hand, it was really the sixth

century, all right, I didn't want any softer thing: I would boss

the whole country inside of three months; for I judged I would

have the start of the best-educated man in the kingdom by a matter

of thirteen hundred years and upward. I'm not a man to waste

time after my mind's made up and there's work on hand; so I said

to the page:

“Now, Clarence, my boy--if that might happen to be your name

--I'll get you to post me up a little if you don't mind. What is

the name of that apparition that brought me here?”

“My master and thine? That is the good knight and great lord

Sir Kay the Seneschal, foster brother to our liege the king.”

“Very good; go on, tell me everything.”

He made a long story of it; but the part that had immediate interest

for me was this: He said I was Sir Kay's prisoner, and that

in the due course of custom I would be flung into a dungeon and

left there on scant commons until my friends ransomed me--unless

I chanced to rot, first. I saw that the last chance had the best

show, but I didn't waste any bother about that; time was too

precious. The page said, further, that dinner was about ended

in the great hall by this time, and that as soon as the sociability

and the heavy drinking should begin, Sir Kay would have me in and

exhibit me before King Arthur and his illustrious knights seated at

the Table Round, and would brag about his exploit in capturing

me, and would probably exaggerate the facts a little, but it

wouldn't be good form for me to correct him, and not over safe,

either; and when I was done being exhibited, then ho for the

dungeon; but he, Clarence, would find a way to come and see me every

now and then, and cheer me up, and help me get word to my friends.

Get word to my friends! I thanked him; I couldn't do less; and

about this time a lackey came to say I was wanted; so Clarence

led me in and took me off to one side and sat down by me.

Well, it was a curious kind of spectacle, and interesting. It was

an immense place, and rather naked--yes, and full of loud contrasts.

It was very, very lofty; so lofty that the banners depending from

the arched beams and girders away up there floated in a sort of

twilight; there was a stone-railed gallery at each end, high up,

with musicians in the one, and women, clothed in stunning colors,

in the other. The floor was of big stone flags laid in black and

white squares, rather battered by age and use, and needing repair.

As to ornament, there wasn't any, strictly speaking; though on

the walls hung some huge tapestries which were probably taxed

as works of art; battle-pieces, they were, with horses shaped like

those which children cut out of paper or create in gingerbread;

with men on them in scale armor whose scales are represented by

round holes--so that the man's coat looks as if it had been done

with a biscuit-punch. There was a fireplace big enough to camp in;

and its projecting sides and hood, of carved and pillared stonework,

had the look of a cathedral door. Along the walls stood men-at-arms,

in breastplate and morion, with halberds for their only weapon

--rigid as statues; and that is what they looked like.

In the middle of this groined and vaulted public square was an oaken

table which they called the Table Round. It was as large as

a circus ring; and around it sat a great company of men dressed

in such various and splendid colors that it hurt one's eyes to look

at them. They wore their plumed hats, right along, except that

whenever one addressed himself directly to the king, he lifted

his hat a trifle just as he was beginning his remark.

Mainly they were drinking--from entire ox horns; but a few were

still munching bread or gnawing beef bones. There was about

an average of two dogs to one man; and these sat in expectant

attitudes till a spent bone was flung to them, and then they went

for it by brigades and divisions, with a rush, and there ensued

a fight which filled the prospect with a tumultuous chaos of

plunging heads and bodies and flashing tails, and the storm of

howlings and barkings deafened all speech for the time; but that

was no matter, for the dog-fight was always a bigger interest

anyway; the men rose, sometimes, to observe it the better and bet

on it, and the ladies and the musicians stretched themselves out

over their balusters with the same object; and all broke into

delighted ejaculations from time to time. In the end, the winning

dog stretched himself out comfortably with his bone between his

paws, and proceeded to growl over it, and gnaw it, and grease

the floor with it, just as fifty others were already doing; and the

rest of the court resumed their previous industries and entertainments.

As a rule, the speech and behavior of these people were gracious

and courtly; and I noticed that they were good and serious listeners

when anybody was telling anything--I mean in a dog-fightless

interval. And plainly, too, they were a childlike and innocent lot;

telling lies of the stateliest pattern with a most gentle and

winning naivety, and ready and willing to listen to anybody else's

lie, and believe it, too. It was hard to associate them with

anything cruel or dreadful; and yet they dealt in tales of blood

and suffering with a guileless relish that made me almost forget

to shudder.

I was not the only prisoner present. There were twenty or more.

Poor devils, many of them were maimed, hacked, carved, in a frightful

way; and their hair, their faces, their clothing, were caked with

black and stiffened drenchings of blood. They were suffering

sharp physical pain, of course; and weariness, and hunger and

thirst, no doubt; and at least none had given them the comfort

of a wash, or even the poor charity of a lotion for their wounds;

yet you never heard them utter a moan or a groan, or saw them show

any sign of restlessness, or any disposition to complain. The

thought was forced upon me: “The rascals--_they_ have served other

people so in their day; it being their own turn, now, they were

not expecting any better treatment than this; so their philosophical

bearing is not an outcome of mental training, intellectual fortitude,

reasoning; it is mere animal training; they are white Indians.”