第 四百九十五 章 · How Sir Bedivere found him on the morrow dead in an

. How Sir Bedivere found him on the morrow dead in an

hermitage, and how he abode there with the hermit.

Then was Sir Bedivere glad, and thither he went; and when he came into

the chapel, he saw where lay an hermit grovelling on all four, there

fast by a tomb was new graven. When the hermit saw Sir Bedivere he knew

him well, for he was but little to-fore Bishop of Canterbury, that Sir

Mordred flemed. Sir, said Bedivere, what man is there interred that ye

pray so fast for? Fair son, said the hermit, I wot not verily, but by

deeming. But this night, at midnight, here came a number of ladies, and

brought hither a dead corpse, and prayed me to bury him; and here they

offered an hundred tapers, and they gave me an hundred besants. Alas,

said Sir Bedivere, that was my lord King Arthur, that here lieth buried

in this chapel. Then Sir Bedivere swooned; and when he awoke he prayed

the hermit he might abide with him still there, to live with fasting

and prayers. For from hence will I never go, said Sir Bedivere, by my

will, but all the days of my life here to pray for my lord Arthur. Ye

are welcome to me, said the hermit, for I know ye better than ye ween

that I do. Ye are the bold Bedivere, and the full noble duke, Sir Lucan

the Butler, was your brother. Then Sir Bedivere told the hermit all as

ye have heard to-fore. So there bode Sir Bedivere with the hermit that

was to-fore Bishop of Canterbury, and there Sir Bedivere put upon him

poor clothes, and served the hermit full lowly in fasting and in

prayers.

Thus of Arthur I find never more written in books that be authorised,

nor more of the very certainty of his death heard I never read, but

thus was he led away in a ship wherein were three queens; that one was

King Arthur’s sister, Queen Morgan le Fay; the other was the Queen of

Northgalis; the third was the Queen of the Waste Lands. Also there was

Nimue, the chief lady of the lake, that had wedded Pelleas the good

knight; and this lady had done much for King Arthur, for she would

never suffer Sir Pelleas to be in no place where he should be in danger

of his life; and so he lived to the uttermost of his days with her in

great rest. More of the death of King Arthur could I never find, but

that ladies brought him to his burials; and such one was buried there,

that the hermit bare witness that sometime was Bishop of Canterbury,

but yet the hermit knew not in certain that he was verily the body of

King Arthur: for this tale Sir Bedivere, knight of the Table Round,

made it to be written.