Now, when King Arthur returned to Cameliard once more (which fell upon the afternoon of a second day), he found the gardener waiting for him, exceedingly filled with wrath. And the gardener had a long birchen rod which he had fetched thither for to punish his boy withal, when that he should have returned to the garden again. So when he saw King Arthur he said: “Thou knave! wherefore didst thou quit thy work to go a-gadding?” And King Arthur laughed and said: “Touch me not.” At this, the gardener waxed so exceeding wroth, that he catched the King by the collar of his jerkin with intent to beat him, saying: “Dost thou laugh at me, knave, and make a mock at me? Now I will beat thee well for the offence thou hast committed.” Then, when King Arthur felt that man’s hand laid upon him, and when he heard the words that the gardener spake in his wrath, his royal spirit waxed very big within him and he cried out: “Ha, wretch! wouldst thou dare to lay thy hands upon my sacred person?” So saying, he seized the gardener by the wrists, and took the rod straight away from him, and struck him with it across the shoulders. And when that poor knave felt himself thus in the powerful grasp of the angry King, and when he felt the rod upon his shoulders, he straightway lifted up a great outcry, albeit the blow hurt him not a whit. “Now get thee gone!” quoth King Arthur, “and trouble me no more; else will I serve thee in a way that will not at all belike thee.” Herewith he loosed that poor man and let him go; and the gardener was so bemazed with terror, that both the earth and the sky swam before him. For King Arthur’s eyes had flashed upon him like lightning, and those two hands had held his wrists with wonderful power. Wherefore, when the King let him go he gat him away as quickly as might be, all trembling and sweating with a great fear. [Sidenote: _The gardener complaineth to the Lady Guinevere._] So he went straight to the Lady Guinevere and complained to her of the manner in which he had been treated. “Lady,” quoth he, weeping with the memory of his terror, “my boy goeth away for a day or more, I know not whither; and when I would whip him for quitting his work he taketh the rod straight away from me and beateth me with it. Wherefore, now, I prithee, deal with him as is fitting, and let several strong men drive him away from this place with rods.” Then the Lady Guinevere laughed. “Let be!” she said, “and meddle with him no more; for, indeed, he appeareth to be a very saucy fellow. As for thee! take thou no heed of his coming or his going, and haply I will deal with him in such a way as shall be fitting.”