And therewith the tears fell in his eyes. And then he said: Gawaine,
Gawaine, ye have set me in great sorrow, for I have great doubt that my
true fellowship shall never meet here more again. Ah, said Sir
Launcelot, comfort yourself; for it shall be unto us a great honour and
much more than if we died in any other places, for of death we be
siker. Ah, Launcelot, said the king, the great love that I have had
unto you all the days of my life maketh me to say such doleful words;
for never Christian king had never so many worthy men at his table as I
have had this day at the Round Table, and that is my great sorrow.
When the queen, ladies, and gentlewomen, wist these tidings, they had
such sorrow and heaviness that there might no tongue tell it, for those
knights had held them in honour and chierté. But among all other Queen
Guenever made great sorrow. I marvel, said she, my lord would suffer
them to depart from him. Thus was all the court troubled for the love
of the departition of those knights. And many of those ladies that
loved knights would have gone with their lovers; and so had they done,
had not an old knight come among them in religious clothing; and then
he spake all on high and said: Fair lords, which have sworn in the
quest of the Sangreal, thus sendeth you Nacien, the hermit, word, that
none in this quest lead lady nor gentlewoman with him, for it is not to
do in so high a service as they labour in; for I warn you plain, he
that is not clean of his sins he shall not see the mysteries of our
Lord Jesu Christ. And for this cause they left these ladies and
gentlewomen.
After this the queen came unto Galahad and asked him of whence he was,
and of what country. He told her of whence he was. And son unto
Launcelot, she said he was. As to that, he said neither yea nor nay. So
God me help, said the queen, of your father ye need not to shame you,
for he is the goodliest knight, and of the best men of the world come,
and of the strain, of all parties, of kings. Wherefore ye ought of
right to be, of your deeds, a passing good man; and certainly, she
said, ye resemble him much. Then Sir Galahad was a little ashamed and
said: Madam, sith ye know in certain, wherefore do ye ask it me? for he
that is my father shall be known openly and all betimes. And then they
went to rest them. And in the honour of the highness of Galahad he was
led into King Arthur’s chamber, and there rested in his own bed.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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