Arthur, meanwhile, with his hundred spearmen had gone far, far away, until at last over the countless reeds of marshes and islands he saw a huge tower glaring in the wide-winged sunset of the West. As he drew near he saw that the tower doors stood open and heard roars of rioting and wicked songs of ruffian men and women.

"Look," cried one of his knights, for there high on a grim dead tree before the tower, a brother of the Round Table was swinging by his neck, his shield flowing with a shower of blood on a branch near by.

All the knights wanted to dash forward and blow the great horn that hung beside the gate, but Arthur waved them back and went himself. He blew so hard that the horn roared until all the grasses of the marshes flared up, and out of the castle gate sallied a knight dressed from tip to toe in blood-red arms, the Red Knight.

"Aren't you the king?" he bellowed, "the king that keeps us all with such strict vows that we can't have any pleasures, a milky-hearted king? Look to your life now!"

Arthur scorned to speak to so vile a man or to fight him with his sword. He simply let the drunkard, stretching out from his horse to strike, fall head-heavy, over from the castle causeway to the swamp below.

Then all the Round Table Knights roared and shouted, leaped down on the fallen man, trampled out his face in the mire, sank his head so that it could not be seen, and, still shouting, sprang through the open doors among the people within. They hurled their swords right and left on men and women, hurled over the tables and the wines and slew and slew until all the rafters rang with yells and all the pavements streamed with blood. Then they set the tower all afire and half the night through it flushed the long low meadows and marshlands and lazily plunging sea with its flames. That was how Arthur made the ways of the island safe from one shore to the other.

Sir Tristram, not many nights after, reached Tintagil, where Isolt, the White, lived in a crown of towers, where she now sat with the low sea-sunset glorying her hair and glossy throat, thinking of him and of Mark, her Cornish lord.

When Tristram's footsteps came grinding up the tower steps she flushed, started out to meet him and threw her white arms about him.

"Not Mark, not Mark!" she cried. "At first your footsteps fluttered me, for Mark steals into his own castle like a cat."

"No, it's I," said Sir Tristram, "and don't think about your Mark any more, for he isn't yours any longer."

"But listen," she cried, "to-day he went away for a three days' hunt, he said, and that means that he may be back in an hour for that's his way. My God, my hate for him is as strong as my love for you. Let me tell you how I sat here one evening thinking of you, one black midsummer night, all alone, dreaming of you, and sometimes speaking your name aloud, when suddenly there Mark stood behind me, for that's his way to steal behind one in the dark.

"'Tristram has married her!' he hissed out and then this tower shook with such a roar that I swooned away."

"Come," cried Sir Tristram, laughing, "never mind, I'm hungry, give me some meat and wine."

So they ate and drank, talked and laughed about Mark with his long crane-like legs, and Sir Tristram took a harp and sang a song. Then while the last light of the day glimmered away he swung the ruby necklace before Isolt.

"It's the fruit of a magical oak-tree that grew mid air," he cried, "and was won by Sir Tristram as a tourney prize to bring to you."

Flinging the rubies round her neck he had just touched her jeweled throat with his lips when behind him rose a shadow and a shriek.

"Mark's way!" cried Mark, the Cornish king, and he clove Tristram through the brain.

That very night Arthur came back from the North, and as he climbed up the tower steps to go to the queen, in the dark of the tower something pulled at him. It was little Dagonet.

"Who are you?" said the king.

"I'm little Dagonet, your fool," sobbed the little jester, "and I cry because I can never make you laugh again."

THE PASSING OF ARTHUR.

So the king took his army by night and pushed upon Modred league after league, until they reached the Western part of Lyonesse where the long mountains ended in the moaning sea. There Modred's men could flee no farther, so on the waste lands by the barren sea they began that last dim weird battle of the West.

A white chill mist slept over all the land and water so that even Arthur became confused since he could not see which were his friends and which were his foes. Friends killed friends, some saw the faces of old ghosts looking in upon the battle. Spears were splintered, shields were broken, swords clashed, helmets were shattered, men shrieked and looked up to heaven for help but saw only the white, white mists. There were cries for light and moans.

At last toward the close of the day a hush fell over the whole shore; a bitter wind from the North blew the mist aside and the pale king looked across the battlefield. But no one was there only the waves breaking in among the dead faces.

But bold Bedivere said: "My King! the man who hates you stands there, Modred, the traitor of your house!"

"Don't call this traitor a person of my house," the king replied. "The men of my house are not those who have lived under one roof with me, but those who always call me their king."

With that, Arthur dashed after Modred. Modred struck at the king's helmet, which had grown thin with all his heathen wars. Arthur with his sword Excalibur struck Modred dead, then fell down himself almost killed with the wound through his helmet.

Sir Bedivere lifted him up and carried him to a chapel near by.

"Take my sword, Excalibur," said the King, "and fling it out into the middle of the sea, watch what happens to it and then come back at once and tell me."

"It doesn't seem right to leave you all alone here," said Sir Bedivere, "when you are wounded and ill, but since you wish me to go, I will, and will do all that you have told me."

He slipped away by zigzag paths, points and jutting rock to the shining level of the sea. There he drew out the sword Excalibur. The winter moon sparkled against its hilt and made it twinkle with its diamond sparks, with myriads of topaz lights and fine jewelry work. Bedivere gazed so long at it that both his eyes were dazzled as he stood, and he wondered whether he ought to throw away so beautiful a thing. At last he decided to hide it away among the water-flags that grew along shore.

"Did you do as I said?" asked the king, when he saw him. "What did you see?"

"I heard the ripple washing in the reeds," said Sir Bedivere, "and the wild water lapping on the rock."

"You are not giving me a true answer," said the king, faint and pale. "It's shameful for men to lie. Quickly go again and as you are true and dear, do just as I bade you. Watch and bring me word."

Then Sir Bedivere went the second time and paced up and down beside the pebbly water, counting the dewey pebbles, but when he saw the wonderful sword he clapped his hands together and cried:

"If I threw that sword away, a precious thing will be lost forever. The King is ill; he does not know what he is doing. His great sword ought to be kept, then in long years hereafter people will look at it at the tournament and they will say: 'This was the great Arthur's sword Excalibur which was made by the lonely lady of the Lake, working in the deep sea for nine years.'"

So the second time he hid Excalibur and strode very slowly back to the king.

"What did you see or what did you hear?" asked Arthur breathing very heavily.

"I heard the water lapping on the rock and the long ripples washing in the reeds."

"Unkind! miserable! untrue! unknightly!" cried Arthur, filled with anger. "I see what you are, for you are the only one left me of all the knights, yet you would betray me for my sword, either to sell it or like a girl, because you love its beauty. Go out now the third time and if you do not throw out my sword Excalibur I'll get up and kill you with my hands."

At this Sir Bedivere sprang up like a flash and ran down leaping lightly over the ridges, plunged into the beds of bulrushes, clutched the sword, wheeled it round strongly and threw it as far as he could.

Excalibur made lightning in the moonlight as it flashed round and round and whirled in an arch, shooting far out to the water. But before it quite dipped into the sea an arm robed in white samite, mystic and wonderful, rose out of the waves, caught it by the hilt, brandished it three times and drew it under.

"Now I can see by your eyes that you have done it!" cried the King. "Speak out; what have you seen or heard?"

"Sir King," cried Sir Bedivere, "I closed my eyes when I picked it up so that I would not be turned from my purpose of throwing it into the water, for I could live three lives, Sir King, and I wouldn't again see such a wonderful thing as your sword. Sir, I threw it out with both hands, wheeling it round and when I looked an arm robed in white samite reached up out of the water and caught it by the hilt, brandished it three times and drew it under."

"Carry me to the shore," said the king.

So Bedivere lifted him up and walked as swiftly as he could from the ridge, heavily, heavily down to the beach. As they reached the shore they saw a black barge beside the water filled with stately people all dressed in black. Among the people were three queens wearing crowns of gold.

"Put me into the barge," cried Arthur.

So they came to the barge and the three queens held out their hands and took the king.

The tallest and fairest of them held his head upon her lap loosed his shattered helmet and chafed his hands, and moaned tenderly over him.

"Ah, my lord Arthur," cried Sir Bedivere, "where shall I go now? For the old times are past now and the whole Round Table is broken."

"Go and pray," cried the king. "Farewell, for I am going a very long way to the lovely Island-valley of Avilion where it will never hail nor rain nor snow, and where the loud winds never blow. It lies in deep meadows, beautiful with lawns and fruit trees and flowery glens."

Then the barge set sail and oar, and moved away from the shore.

"The king is gone!" groaned Bedivere.

He walked away from the shore and climbed up to the highest peaks and ridges about him and looked far, far away. And from far away out beyond the world he thought he heard sounds from a beautiful city as if every one in it all together were welcoming a great King who had just come back from his wars.

END.