Poets, English -- 19th century -- Biography; Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron, 1809-1892
“And while he waited in the castle court,
The voice of Enid, Yniol’s daughter, rang
Clear thro’ the open casement of the hall,
Singing; and as the sweet voice of a bird,
Heard by the lander in a lonely isle,
Moves him to think what kind of bird it is
That sings so delicately clear, and make
Conjecture of the plumage and the form;
So the sweet voice of Enid moved Geraint;
And made him like a man abroad at morn
When first the liquid note beloved of men
Comes flying over many a windy wave
To Britain, and in April suddenly
Breaks from a coppice gemm’d with green and red,
And he suspends his converse with a friend,
Or it may be the labour of his hands,
To think or say, ‘There is the nightingale’;
So fared it with Geraint, who thought and said,
‘Here, by God’s grace, is the one voice for me.’”
Yniol frankly admits in the tale that he was in the wrong in the quarrel
with his nephew. The poet, however, gives him the right, as is natural.
The combat is exactly followed in the Idyll, as is Geraint’s insistence
in carrying his bride to Court in her faded silks. Geraint, however,
leaves Court with Enid, not because of the scandal about Lancelot, but to
do his duty in his own country. He becomes indolent and uxorious, and
Enid deplores his weakness, and awakes his suspicions, thus:—
And one morning in the summer time they were upon their couch, and
Geraint lay upon the edge of it. And Enid was without sleep in the
apartment which had windows of glass. And the sun shone upon the
couch. And the clothes had slipped from off his arms and his breast,
and he was asleep. Then she gazed upon the marvellous beauty of his
appearance, and she said, “Alas, and am I the cause that these arms
and this breast have lost their glory and the warlike fame which they
once so richly enjoyed!” And as she said this, the tears dropped
from her eyes, and they fell upon his breast. And the tears she
shed, and the words she had spoken, awoke him; and another thing
contributed to awaken him, and that was the idea that it was not in
thinking of him that she spoke thus, but that it was because she
loved some other man more than him, and that she wished for other
society, and thereupon Geraint was troubled in his mind, and he
called his squire; and when he came to him, “Go quickly,” said he,
“and prepare my horse and my arms, and make them ready. And do thou
arise,” said he to Enid, “and apparel thyself; and cause thy horse to
be accoutred, and clothe thee in the worst riding-dress that thou
hast in thy possession. And evil betide me,” said he, “if thou
returnest here until thou knowest whether I have lost my strength so
completely as thou didst say. And if it be so, it will then be easy
for thee to seek the society thou didst wish for of him of whom thou
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account