Atlantis Online
March 28, 2024, 05:46:25 am
Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.

Login with username, password and session length
News: Hunt for Lost City of Atlantis
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3227295.stm
 
  Home Help Arcade Gallery Links Staff List Calendar Login Register  

Bulfinch's Mythology: The Age of Chivalry

Pages: 1 2 3 4 [5]   Go Down
  Print  
Author Topic: Bulfinch's Mythology: The Age of Chivalry  (Read 1060 times)
0 Members and 19 Guests are viewing this topic.
Jana Chand-Medlock
Hero Member
*****
Posts: 115



« Reply #60 on: October 27, 2009, 01:16:46 am »

But standing high aloft, low lay thine ear,
And there such ghastly noise of iron chains
And brazen cauldrons thou shalt rumbling hear,
Which thousand sprites with long enduring pains
Do toss, that it will stun thy feeble brains;
And oftentimes great groans, and grievous stounds,
When too huge toil and labor them constrains;
And oftentimes loud strokes and ringing sounds
From under that deep rock most horribly rebounds.

The cause some say is this. A little while
Before that Merlin died, he did intend
A brazen wall in compas to compile
About Caermerdin, and did it commend
Unto these sprites to bring to perfect end;
During which work the Lady of the Lake,
Whom long he loved, for him in haste did send;
Who, thereby forced his workmen to forsake,
Them bound till his return their labor not to slack.

In the meantime, through that false lady's train,
He was surprised, and buried under beare,*
Ne ever to his work returned again;
Natheless those fiends may not their work forbear,
So greatly his commandement they fear;
But there do toil and travail day and night,
Until that brazen wall they up do rear.
For Merlin had in magic more insight
Than ever him before or after living wight.

* Buried under beare. Buried under something which enclosed him like
a coffin or bier.

GUENEVER.

"Leodogran, the King of Cameliard,
Had one fair daughter, and none other child,
And she was fairest of all flesh on earth,
Guenevere, and in her his one delight."
TENNYSON.

Merlin had planned for Arthur a marriage with the daughter of King
Laodegan* of Carmalide. By his advice Arthur paid a visit to the court
of that sovereign, attended only by Merlin and by thirty-nine
knights whom the magician had selected for that service. On their
arrival they found Laodegan and his peers sitting in council,
endeavoring, but with small prospect of success, to devise means for
resisting the impending attack of Ryence, King of Ireland, who, with
fifteen tributary kings and an almost innumerable army, had nearly
surrounded the city. Merlin, who acted as leader of the band of
British knights, announced them as strangers, who came to offer the
king their services in his wars; but under the express condition
that they should be at liberty to conceal their names and quality
until they should think proper to divulge them. These terms were
thought very strange, but were thankfully accepted, and the strangers,
after taking the usual oath to the king, retired to the lodging
which Merlin had prepared for them.

* The spelling of these proper names is very often only a matter
of taste. I think, however, Leodogran and Guenevere are less common
than Laodegan and Guenever.
Report Spam   Logged
Pages: 1 2 3 4 [5]   Go Up
  Print  
 
Jump to:  

Powered by EzPortal
Bookmark this site! | Upgrade This Forum
SMF For Free - Create your own Forum
Powered by SMF | SMF © 2016, Simple Machines
Privacy Policy