Le Morte d'Arthur BOOK XVI CHAPTER XI

Sacred Texts  Legends and Sagas  Index  BOOK XVI  Previous  Next 

 CHAPTER XI
 
 How Sir Bors told his dream to a priest, which he had
 dreamed, and of the counsel that the priest gave to him.
 
 
 NOW leave we him here, said the good man, and go we
 to our harbour till to-morrow; we will come here again
 to do him service.  Sir, said Bors, be ye a priest?  Yea
 forsooth, said he.  Then I pray you tell me a dream that
 befell to me the last night.  Say on, said he.  Then he
 began so much to tell him of the great bird in the forest,
 and after told him of his birds, one white, another black,
 and of the rotten tree, and of the white flowers.  Sir, I
 shall tell you a part now, and the other deal to-morrow.
 The white fowl betokeneth a gentlewoman, fair and rich,
 which loved thee paramours, and hath loved thee long;
 and if thou warn her love she shall go die anon, if thou
 have no pity on her.  That signifieth the great bird, the
 which shall make thee to warn her.  Now for no fear that
 thou hast, ne for no dread that thou hast of God, thou
 shalt not warn her, but thou wouldst not do it for to be
 holden chaste, for to conquer the loos of the vain glory of
 the world; for that shall befall thee now an thou warn
 her, that Launcelot, the good knight, thy cousin, shall die.
 And therefore men shall now say that thou art a manslayer,
 both of thy brother, Sir Lionel, and of thy cousin, Sir
 Launcelot du Lake, the which thou mightest have saved and
 rescued easily, but thou weenedst to rescue a maid which
 pertaineth nothing to thee.  Now look thou whether it
 had been greater harm of thy brother's death, or else to
 have suffered her to have lost her maidenhood.  Then
 asked he him:  Hast thou heard the tokens of thy dream
 the which I have told to you?  Yea forsooth, said Sir Bors,
 all your exposition and declaring of my dream I have well
 understood and heard.  Then said the man in this black
 clothing: Then is it in thy default if Sir Launcelot, thy
 cousin, die.  Sir, said Bors, that were me loath, for wit ye
 well there is nothing in the world but I had liefer do it
 than to see my lord, Sir Launcelot du Lake, to die in my
 default.  Choose ye now the one or the other, said the
 good man.
 
 And then he led Sir Bors into an high tower, and there
 he found knights and ladies: those ladies said he was
 welcome, and so they unarmed him.  And when he was
 in his doublet men brought him a mantle furred with
 ermine, and put it about him; and then they made him
 such cheer that he had forgotten all his sorrow and anguish,
 and only set his heart in these delights and dainties, and
 took no thought more for his brother, Sir Lionel, neither
 of Sir Launcelot du Lake, his cousin.  And anon came
 out of a chamber to him the fairest lady than ever he saw,
 and more richer beseen than ever he saw Queen Guenever
 or any other estate.  Lo, said they, Sir Bors, here is the
 lady unto whom we owe all our service, and I trow she be
 the richest lady and the fairest of all the world, and the
 which loveth you best above all other knights, for she will
 have no knight but you.  And when he understood that
 language he was abashed.  Not for then she saluted him,
 and he her; and then they sat down together and spake
 of many things, in so much that she besought him to be
 her love, for she had loved him above all earthly men, and
 she should make him richer than ever was man of his age.
 When Bors understood her words he was right evil at ease,
 which in no manner would not break chastity, so wist not
 he how to answer her.