Burnt me within, so that I rose and fled, But wailed and wept, and hated mine own self, And even the Holy Quest, and all but her; Then after I was joined with Galahad Cared not for her, nor anything upon earth.” Then said the monk, “Poor men, when yule is cold, Must be content to sit by little fires. And this am I, so that ye care for me Ever so little; yea, and blest be Heaven That brought thee here to this poor house of ours Where all the brethren are so hard, to warm My cold heart with a friend: but O the pity To find thine own first love once more—to hold, Hold her a wealthy bride within thine arms, Or all but hold, and then—cast her aside, Foregoing all her sweetness, like a weed. For we that want the warmth of double life, We that are plagued with dreams of something sweet Beyond all sweetness in a life so rich,— Ah, blessed Lord, I speak too earthlywise, Seeing I never strayed beyond the cell, But live like an old badger in his earth, With earth about him everywhere, despite All fast and penance. Saw ye none beside, None of your knights?” “Yea so,” said Percivale: “One night my pathway swerving east, I saw The pelican on the casque of our Sir Bors All in the middle of the rising moon: And toward him spurred, and hailed him, and he me, And each made joy of either; then he asked, ‘Where is he? hast thou seen him—Lancelot?—Once,’ Said good Sir Bors, ‘he dashed across me—mad, And maddening what he rode: and when I cried, “Ridest thou then so hotly on a quest So holy,” Lancelot shouted, “Stay me not! I have been the sluggard, and I ride apace, For now there is a lion in the way.” So vanished.’ “Then Sir Bors had ridden on Softly, and sorrowing for our Lancelot, Because his former madness, once the talk And scandal of our table, had returned; For Lancelot’s kith and kin so worship him That ill to him is ill to them; to Bors Beyond the rest: he well had been content Not to have seen, so Lancelot might have seen, The Holy Cup of healing; and, indeed, Being so clouded with his grief and love, Small heart was his after the Holy Quest: If God would send the vision, well: if not, The Quest and he were in the hands of Heaven.