“But she, the wan sweet maiden, shore away Clean from her forehead all that wealth of hair Which made a silken mat-work for her feet; And out of this she plaited broad and long A strong sword-belt, and wove with silver thread And crimson in the belt a strange device, A crimson grail within a silver beam; And saw the bright boy-knight, and bound it on him, Saying, ‘My knight, my love, my knight of heaven, O thou, my love, whose love is one with mine, I, maiden, round thee, maiden, bind my belt. Go forth, for thou shalt see what I have seen, And break through all, till one will crown thee king Far in the spiritual city:’ and as she spake She sent the deathless passion in her eyes Through him, and made him hers, and laid her mind On him, and he believed in her belief. “Then came a year of miracle: O brother, In our great hall there stood a vacant chair, Fashioned by Merlin ere he past away, And carven with strange figures; and in and out The figures, like a serpent, ran a scroll Of letters in a tongue no man could read. And Merlin called it ‘The Siege perilous,’ Perilous for good and ill; ‘for there,’ he said, ‘No man could sit but he should lose himself:’ And once by misadvertence Merlin sat In his own chair, and so was lost; but he, Galahad, when he heard of Merlin’s doom, Cried, ‘If I lose myself, I save myself!’ “Then on a summer night it came to pass, While the great banquet lay along the hall, That Galahad would sit down in Merlin’s chair. “And all at once, as there we sat, we heard A cracking and a riving of the roofs, And rending, and a blast, and overhead Thunder, and in the thunder was a cry. And in the blast there smote along the hall A beam of light seven times more clear than day: And down the long beam stole the Holy Grail All over covered with a luminous cloud. And none might see who bare it, and it past. But every knight beheld his fellow’s face As in a glory, and all the knights arose, And staring each at other like dumb men Stood, till I found a voice and sware a vow. “I sware a vow before them all, that I, Because I had not seen the Grail, would ride A twelvemonth and a day in quest of it, Until I found and saw it, as the nun My sister saw it; and Galahad sware the vow, And good Sir Bors, our Lancelot’s cousin, sware, And Lancelot sware, and many among the knights, And Gawain sware, and louder than the rest.” Then spake the monk Ambrosius, asking him, “What said the King? Did Arthur take the vow?”