the red cross for the shield of Evelak, king of Sarras, when he was going out to war:

Then Joseph took the shield, and shaped amidst of it
A cross of ruddy cloth, and bade him thereupon,
When stress and peril be at worst, to pray to Christ.
For, verily, no man who gazes on that cross

Shall fail to meet that day with safety in distress.1

The white ground of the shield was held to denote chastity, the red cross, martyrdom. It was a continuation of the legend that Sir Galahad found the shield at Avelon or Glastonbury, and that he died at Sarras, after commissioning Sir Percival to carry his heart to Arthur to be buried at Glastonbury, by the side of Evelak and Joseph. The Crusading element is visible throughout this story; for Sarras was accounted the representative town of the Saracens, who were supposed to have received Christianity from Joseph of Arimathea, and afterwards to have become renegades to the faith.2

Merlin the Enchanter 3 was also originally by Walter de Map. In its English form it is a prose romance, with a marked religious tone running through it. It begins with several pages about the fall of man, and our Saviour's redeeming love. In it the story of the Holy Graal is recounted by Merlin to Uter Pendragon. It tells also how the void place at the Round Table, representing the vacant apostleship, should be filled again by one who was shortly to come—that is to say, by King Arthur.

Sir Launcelot, in its English form, was taken early in the sixteenth century from the French; but the French, in all probability, from the Latin of Walter de Map. That religious feeling enters largely into this poem may be shown by the mere fact that more than 800 lines of it are a sort of homily addressed by Amytans, 'the Master,' to Arthur, when the king was

1 Joseph of Arimathea, 1. 445: 'Josephe takes hys scheld, and schapes a-middes.'

2 Skeat's Preface to Joseph of Arimathea, p. xliv. 3 E.E.T.S. series, Nos. 10, 21, 36.

.

disturbed by the threats of the mighty King Galiol. I quote a few lines:

He made thee king, He made thee governour
He made thee this and set in high honour.

First, the beginning is of sapience,

To dread the Lord and His magnificence;
And what thou hast perversely Him offended,
While thou hast power, of free desire amend it.1

The virtue and the strength of victory,
It cometh not of man; it comes only
Of Him in whom all power is: if He
Be haply pleased with the ways of men,
So only have they force against their foes."

Home, therefore, to thy land thou shalt repair,
And govern thee as that I shall declare.
Firstly, thy God with lowly homage serve,
And His command with all thy might observe ;
And then let pass the ever-blessed wand

Of law with mercy jointly through thy land."

The Morte d'Arthure is another of the cycle coming indirectly through the French from Walter de Map. The English version is thought by Sir F. Madden to have been written by the Scotch poet, Huchowne. Mr. Morris thinks it was written south of the Tweed, in the Northumbrian dialect, and somewhat altered by a Midland transcriber. The copy from which Mr. Perry has edited the text was written by Robert Thornton, Archdeacon of Bedford in 1440. It is written in alliterative verse, with two accented alliterative syllables in the first part of each line, and one in the second. The story is one of bloodshed and warfare, terrible giants, and deeds of exaggerated prowess; but frequently exhibits much pathos, and a lively sense of the beauties of nature, together with many devout reflections. For example, he begins:

1 Sir Launcelot of the Lake, 1. 1341 ed. by W. W. Skeat for E.E.T.S. No. 6.

2 Id. 1. 1475: 'The vertw and the strenth of victory.'

3 Id. 1. 1597: 'Wharfor thou shalt in to thi lond home fair.

Now may the great and glorious God, through His own blessed grace,

Shield us from shame-deeds and from sinful works,

And give us grace to guide us rightly here,

In this weak wretched world, by works of grace;

That we may come to His court, the kingdom of heaven,
When souls shall part, and sunder from us fly,
To be and bide, resting in bliss with Him;
And work me wit to write some goodly words,
Not vain or void, but voice of praise to Him,
To please and profit people who will hear.1

Sir Gawaine is a very interesting romance, both in subject and treatment, and also as a valuable example of Midland English early in the fourteenth century. The writer, or translator of it from Norman-French, has been thought by some to be Huchowne; but, as Morris shows, it is almost certainly by the same West Midland author who wrote The Pearl, a poem to be spoken of in the next chapter. No knight of the Round Table, except Arthur himself, is more honoured in the old romance than Gawaine-' of alle knyghtes the kynge that undir Christe levede,' a knight in whom were embodied all graces—of courage and truth, purity and devotion, wit and joyous courtesy:

In his five wits found faultless was the knight,
And never failed he in his fingers five,
And fixed his faith in the five blessed wounds
Which Christ bore on the cross, as the Creed tells.2

It is a gay, bright story, full of prodigy and marvellous adventure, with many details borrowed from

1 Morte Arthure, 1. 9, ed. by G. G. Perry for E.E.T.S. No. 8: Now grett and glorious Godd through grace of hymselvene

Schelde us ffro schames-dede and synfulle werkes.

2 Sir Gawayne and the Green Knight, 1. 649, ed. by R. Morris for E.E.T.S. No. 4:

Fyrst he wats funden fautles in his fyue wyttes

And efte fayled neuer the freke in his fyue fyngres,

And alle his afyaunce vpon folde wats in the fyue woundes
That cryst kast on the croys, as the crede telles.

Chrestien de Troyes' Roman de Perceval; but the moral teaching is throughout pure and high, its special teaching being chastity against strong temptation, while it inculcates more incidentally faith and bravery, chivalrous bearing and truth. Gawayne bore on his shield, in pure gold, that mystical pentangle of Solomon which was held to be symbolical of truth. Like most of the romances, it concludes with a devout aspiration:

Now He that bore the crown of thorns,

He bring us to His bliss.1

I have gone as far as the limits of my subject will permit in speaking of the religious element in the early romances. In doing so, I have partly gone beyond the bounds of the century with which the chapter is chiefly concerned. But it seemed better to avoid any need of reverting to this part of the subject afterwards. It will have been made evident that the religious element in many of the romances could not properly have been altogether omitted in this work. Doubtless, they were intended primarily for amusement, and many of them were entirely confined to this purpose. But many of them took an important and notable part in teaching and fostering the noblest elements of Christian chivalry.

1 Sir Gawayne, 1. 2529:

Now that bere the crone of thorne,

He bryng ous to his blysse.

CHAPTER III

THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY

VERY early in the fourteenth century, probably about 1305, The Psalter, which had been translated into our vernacular as early as the eighth century, was rendered into rhyme and metre in a North-English version, the first predecessor of innumerable later attempts to translate the Psalms of David into English verse. I will give the first psalm as an example, and will so far depart from the plan I have throughout adopted, as to give the original English. I will put it into more generally intelligible English in a parallel column, and add a short running commentary in the notes:

2 Bern,' from 'beorn,' a chief, a man, is probably connected with 'beran,' to bear, and so with 'bairn.'

3 In the Latin 'in consilio.'

4 'A settle,' as in modern North-English.

'Setlan' to take seat or to settle.

5 The Latin is 'in cathedra pestilentiæ.' Probably pestilence was considered to arise largely from atmospheric disturbances, in which case 'storm' and 'pestilence' would be nearly allied in idea.

6 Als' when it means 'as' is shortened from 'all se,' 'all swa,' all-as. Compare the modern German 'als.' 'Als' is also a dialectic variety for 'all.'