Then Sir Bedivere departed, and went to the sword, and lightly took it up, and went to the water's side; and there he bound the girdle about the hilts, and then he threw the sword into the water as far as he might; and there came an arm and an hand above the water, and met it and caught it, and so shook it thrice and brandished. And then the hand vanished away with the sword in the water. So Sir Bedivere came again to the king, and told him what he had seen. "Alas!" said the king, "help me from hence, for I dread me I have tarried over long." Then Sir Bedivere took King Arthur upon his back, and so went with him to the water's side. And when they were at the water's side, even fast by the bank hoved a little barge, with many fair ladies in it, and among them all was a queen, and all they had black hoods, and they wept and shrieked when they saw King Arthur. "Now put me into the barge," said the king; and so he did softly; and there received him three queens with great mourning, and so these three queens [whereof one was King Arthur's sister Morgan le Fay, the other was the queen of Northgalis, and the third was the queen of the waste lands] set them down, and in one of their laps King Arthur laid his head. And then that queen said, "Ah! dear brother, why have ye tarried so long from me? Alas! this wound on your head hath taken overmuch cold." And so then they rowed from the land, and Sir Bedivere beheld all those ladies go from him; then Sir Bedivere cried, "Ah! my lord Arthur, what shall become of me now ye go from me, and leave me here alone among mine enemies?" "Comfort thyself," said King Arthur, "and do as well as thou mayest, for in me is no trust for to trust in; for I will into the vale of Avalon for to heal me of my grievous wound; and if thou never hear more of me, pray for my soul." But evermore the queens and the ladies wept and shrieked that it was pity for to hear them. And as soon as Sir Bedivere had lost the sight of the barge, he wept and wailed, and so took the forest; and so he went all the night, and in the morning he was ware between two hills of a chapel and an hermitage. * * * * * Then was Sir Bedivere glad, and thither he went; and when he came into the chapel, he saw where lay an hermit grovelling upon all four there fast by a tomb newly graven. When the hermit saw Sir Bedivere, he knew him well, for he was, but a little before, [the] bishop of Canterbury that Sir Mordred banished away. "Sir," said Sir Bedivere, "what man is there that ye pray so fast for?" "Fair son," said the hermit, "I wot not verily, but by deeming, but this night, at midnight, here came a great number of ladies, and brought hither a dead corpse, and prayed me to bury him; and here they offered an hundred tapers and gave me an hundred besants." "Alas," said Sir Bedivere, "that was my lord King Arthur, that here lieth buried in this chapel!"