Yet I thy hest will all perform at full, watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word."

So saying, from the ruined shrine he stept, and in the moon athwart the place of tombs where lay the mighty bones of ancient men, old knights; and over them the sea-wind sang, shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping down by zigzag paths, and juts of pointed rock, came on the shining levels of the lake. There drew he forth the brand Excalibur, and o'er him drawing it, the winter moon, brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth and sparkled keen with frost against the hilt: for all the haft twinkled with diamond studs, myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long that both his eyes were dazzled; as he stood, this way and that dividing the swift wind, in act to throw: but at the last it seemed better to leave Excalibur concealed there in the many-knotted water-flags, that whistled stiff and dry about the marge. So strode he back slow to the wounded king.

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:-"Hast thou performed my mission which I gave? What is it thou hast seen? or what hast heard?"

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:-"I heard the ripple washing in the reeds, and the wild water lapping on the crag."

To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale:-"Thou hast betrayed thy nature and thy name, not rendering true answer, as beseemed thy fealty, nor like a noble knight: for surer sign had followed-either hand, or voice, or else a motion of the meer. This is a shameful thing for men to lie. Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again as thou art lief and dear; and do the thing I bade thee-watch, and lightly bring me word." Then went Sir Bedivere the second time, counting the dewy pebbles, fixed in thought; but when he saw the wonder of the hilt, how curiously and strangely chased, he smote his palms together, and he cried aloud:-"And if indeed I cast the brand away, surely a precious thing, one worthy note, should thus be lost for ever from the earth, which might have pleased the eyes of many men. What good should follow this, if this were done? What harm undone? Deep harm to disobey, seeing obedience is the bond of rule. Were it well to obey, then, if a king demand an act unprofitable, against himself? The king is sick, and knows not what he does. What record, or what relic of my lord should be to after-time, but empty breath and rumours of a doubt? But were this kept, stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings, some one might show it at a

joust of arms, saying, 'King Arthur's sword, Excalibur,wrought by the lonely maiden of the lake; nine years she wrought it sitting in the deeps upon the hidden bases of the hills." So might some old man speak in after-time to all the people, winning reverence. But now, much honour and much fame were lost." So spake he, clouded with his own conceit, and hid Excalibur the second time, and so strode back slow to the wounded king.

Then spoke King Arthur, breathing heavily:-"What is it thou hast seen? or what hast heard ?"

:

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere :- "I heard the water lapping on the crag, and the long ripple washing in the reeds."

To whom replied King Arthur, much in wrath :—“ Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue, unknightly, traitor-hearted! Woe is me! Authority forgets a dying king, laid widowed of the power in his eye that bowed the will. I see thee what thou art. For thou, the latest left of all my knights, in whom should meet the offices of all, thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt; either from lust of gold, or, like a girl, valuing the giddy pleasure of the eye. Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice, and the third time may prosper, get thee hence: but, if thou spare to fling Excalibur, I will arise and slay thee with my hands." Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere and ran, and, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged among the bulrush-beds, and clutched the sword, and strongly wheeled and threw it. The great brand made lightnings in the splendour of the moon; and, flashing round and round, and whirled in an arch, shot like a streamer of the northern morn,where the moving isles of winter shock by night, with noises of the northern sea. So flashed and fell the brand Excalibur; but, ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful, and caught him by the hilt, and brandished him three times, and drew him under in the meer-and lightly went the other to the king.

-seen

Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker breath :-"Now see I by thine eyes that this is done. Speak out: what is it thou hast heard or seen ?"

And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere :— "Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems should blind my purpose, for I never saw, nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die, not though I live three lives of mortal men, so great a miracle as yonder hilt. Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling him; but when I looked again, behold an arm, clothed in white

samite, mystic, wonderful, that caught him by the hilt, and brandished him three times, and drew him under in the meer." And answer made King Arthur, breathing hard:-"My end draws nigh; 'tis time that I were gone. Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight, and bear me to the margin; yet I fear my wound hath taken cold, and I shall die."

So saying, from the pavement he half rose, slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm, and looking wistfully with wide blue eyes as in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere remorsefully regarded through his tears, and would have spoken, but he found not words; then took with care, and, kneeling on one knee, o'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands, and rising bore him through the place of tombs. But as he

walked, King Arthur panted hard, like one that feels a nightmare on his bed when all the house is mute. So sighed the king, muttering and murmuring at his ear, "Quick, quick! I fear it is too late, and I shall die." But the other swiftly strode from ridge to ridge, clothed with his breath, and looking, as he walked, larger than human on the frozen hills. He heard the deep behind him, and a cry before. His own thought drove him like a goad. Dry clashed his harness in the icy caves and barren chasms, and all to left and right the bare black cliff clang'd round him, as he based his feet on juts of slippery crag, that rang sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels-and on a sudden, lo! the level lake, and the long glories of the winter moon.

Then saw they how there hove a dusky barge, dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern, beneath them; and descending they were ware that all the decks were dense with stately forms, black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream ;-by these three queens with crowns of gold-and from them rose a cry that shivered to the tingling stars, and, as it were one voice, an agony of lamentation; like a wind that shrills all night in a waste land, where no one comes, or hath come since the making of the world.

Then murmured Arthur:-"Place me in the barge." And to the barge they came. There those three queens put forth their hands and took the king, and wept; but she that rose, the tallest of them all and fairest, laid his head upon her lap, and loosed the shattered casque, and chafed his hands, and called him by his name, complaining loud, and dropping bitter tears, against his brow striped with dark blood!-for all his face was white and colourless, and like the withered moon smote by the fresh beam of the springing east; and all his

greaves and cuisses dashed with drops of onset; and the light and lustrous curls-that made his forehead like a rising sun high from the dais-throne-were parched with dust; or, clotted into points and hanging loose, mixed with the knightly growth that fringed his lips: so like a shattered column lay the king; not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest, from spur to plume a star of tournament, shot through the lists of Camelot, and charged before the eyes of ladies and of kings.

Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere:-"Ah! my lord Arthur, whither shall I go? where shall I hide my forehead and my eyes? for now I see the true old times are dead, when every morning brought a noble chance, and every chance brought out a noble knight. Such times have been not since the light that led the holy elders with the gift of myrrh. But now the whole Round Table is dissolved, which was an image of the mighty world; and I, the last, go forth companionless; and the days darken round me, and the years, among new men, strange faces, other minds."

And slowly answered Arthur from the barge: "The old order changeth, yielding place to new, and God fulfils himself in many ways, lest one good custom should corrupt the world. Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me? I have lived my life, and that which I have done, may He within himself make pure! but thou, if thou shouldst never see my face again, pray for my soul. More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice rise like a fountain for me, night and day. For what are men better than sheep or goats that nourish a blind life within the brain, if, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer, both for themselves and those who call them friend? for so the whole round earth is every way bound by gold chains about the feet of God. But now farewell!-I am going a long way with these thou seestif indeed I go (for all my mind is clouded with a doubt) to the island valley of Avilion; where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, nor ever wind blows loudly: but it lies deepmeadowed, happy, fair, with orchard-lawns and bowery hollows crowned with summer sea-where I will heal me of my grievous wound."

So said he; and the barge with oar and sail moved from the brink like some full-breasted swan, that, fluting a wild carol ere her death, ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood with swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere revolving many memories, till the hull looked one black dot against the verge of dawn, and on the meer the wailing died away.

XLII.-RETREAT OF THE FRENCH ARMY FROM MOSCOW.-Dr. Croly.

MAGNIFICENCE of ruin! What has time,
In all it ever gazed upon, of war,

Of the wild rage of storm, or deadly clime,
Seen, with that battle's vengeance to compare?
How glorious shone the invader's pomp afar!
Like pampered lions from the spoil they came;
The land before them, silence and despair,
The land behind them, massacre and flame:

Blood will have tenfold blood:-What are they now? Aname.
Homeward by hundred thousands,-column deep,
Broad square, loose squadron,-rolling like the flood
When mighty torrents from their channels leap,
Rushed through the land the haughty multitude,
Billow on endless billow: on, through wood,
O'er rugged hill, down sunless marshy vale,
The death-devoted moved; to clangour rude
Of drum, and horn, and dissonant clash of mail,
Glancing disastrous light before that sunbeam pale.
Again they reached thee, Borodino! Still
Upon the loaded soil the carnage lay;

The human harvest, now stark, stiff, and chill—
Friend, foe, stretched thick together, clay to clay!
In vain the startled legions burst away;
The land was all one naked sepulchre:

The shrinking eye still glanced on grim decay—
Still did the hoof and wheel their passage tear,

Through cloven helms, and arms, and corpses mouldering drear.

The field was as they left it: fosse and fort
Streaming with slaughter still, but desolate;
The cannon flung dismantled by its port:

Each knew the mound, the black ravine, whose strait
Was won, and lost, and thronged with dead; till Fate
Had fixed upon the victor, half undone.

There was the hill, from which their eyes elate
Had seen the burst of Moscow's golden zone;

But death was at their heels!—they shuddered and rushed on
The hour of vengeance strikes! Hark to the gale,
As it bursts hollow through the rolling clouds,
That from the north in sullen grandeur sail,
Like floating Alps! Advancing darkness broods