The Once and Future King (#1-4)

by T. H. White

  Arthur went forward to the space between the armies with his staff, and Mordred, with his own staff in their black accoutrements, came out to meet him. They encountered, and the old king saw his son’s face once again. It was taut and haggard. He too, poor man, had strayed beyond Sorrow and Solitude to the country of Kennaquhair; but he had gone without a guide and lost his way.

  The treaty was agreed on, to the surprise of all, more easily than had been hoped. The king was left with half his realm. For a moment joy and peace were in the balance.

  But, at that knife—edge of a moment, the old Adam reared itself in a different form. The feudal war, baronial oppression, individual might, even ideological rebellion: he had settled them all in one way or another, only to be beaten on the last lap now, by the episodic fact that man was a slayer by instinct.

  A grass—snake moved in the meadow near their feet, close to an officer of Mordred’s staff. This officer stepped back instinctively and swung his hand across his body, his armlet with the whip showing for a second’s flash. The bright sword flamed into being, to destroy the so—called viper. The waiting armies, taking it for treachery, raised their shout of rage. The lances on both sides bowed to rest. And, as King Arthur ran towards his own array, an old man, with white hair trying to stem the endless tide, holding out the knuckled hands in a gesture of pressing them back, struggling to the last against the flood of Might which had burst out all his life at a new place whenever he had dammed it, so the tumult rose, the war—yell sounded, and the meeting waters closed above his head.

  Lancelot arrived too late. He had made his best speed, but it had been in vain. All he could do was to pacify the country and give burial to the dead. Then, when a semblance of order had been restored, he hurried to Guenever. She was supposed to be in the Tower of London still, for Mordred’s siege had failed.

  But Guenever had gone.

  In those days the rules of convents were not so strict as they are now. Often they were more like hostelries for their well—born patrons. Guenever had taken the veil at Amesbury.

  She felt that they had suffered enough, and had caused enough suffering to others. She refused to see her ancient lover or to talk it over. She said, which was patently untrue, that she wished to make her peace with God.

  Guenever never cared for God. She was a good theologian, but that was all. The truth was that she was old and wise: she knew that Lancelot did care for God most passionately, that it was essential he should turn in that direction. So, for his sake, to make it easier for him, the great queen now renounced what she had fought for all her life, now set the example, and stood to her choice. She had stepped out of the picture.

  Lancelot guessed a good deal of this, and, when she refused to see him, he climbed the convent wall with Gallic, ageing gallantry. He waylaid her to expostulate, but she was adamant and brave. Something about Mordred seems to have broken her lust for life. They parted, never to meet on earth.

  Guenever became a worldly abbess. She ruled her convent efficiently, royally, with a sort of grand contempt. The little pupils of the school were brought up in the great tradition of nobility. They saw her walking in the grounds, upright, rigid, her fingers flashing with hard rings, her linen clean and fine and scented against the rules of her order. The novices worshipped her unanimously, with schoolgirl passions, and whispered about her past. She became a Grand Old Lady. When she died at last, her Lancelot came for the body, with his snow—white hair and wrinkled cheeks, to carry it to her husband’s grave. There, in the reputed grave, she was buried: a calm and regal face, nailed down and hidden in the earth.

  As for Lancelot, he became a hermit in earnest. With seven of his own knights as companions he entered a monastery near Glastonbury, and devoted his life to worship. Arthur, Guenever and Elaine were gone, but his ghostly love remained. He prayed for all of them twice a day, with all his never—beaten might, and lived in glad austerities apart from man. He even learned to distinguish bird—songs in the woods, and to have time for all the things which had been denied to him by Uncle Dap. He became an excellent gardener, and a reputed saint.

  ‘Ipse,’ says a medieval poem about another old crusader, a great lord like Lancelot in his day, and one who also retired from the world:

  Ipse post militiae cursum temporalis,

  Illustratus gratia doni spiritualis,

  Esse Christi cupiens miles specialis,

  In hac domo monachus factus est claustralis.

  He, after the bustle of temporal warfare,

  Enlightened with the grace of a spiritual gift,

  Covetous to be the special soldier of Christ,

  In this house was made a cloistered monk.

  More than usually placid, gentle and benign,

  As white as a swan on account of his old age,

  Bland and affable and lovable,

  He possessed in himself the grace of the Holy Spirit.

  For he often frequented Holy Church,

  Joyfully listened to the mysteries of the Mass,

  Proclaimed such praises as he was able,

  And mentally ruminated the heavenly glory.

  His gentle and jocose conversation,

  Highly commendable and religious,

  Was thus pleasing to the whole fraternity,

  Because it was neither stuffy nor squeamish.

  Here, as often as he rambled across the cloister,

  He bowed from side to side to the monks,

  And he saluted with a bob of his head, thus,

  The ones whom he loved most intimately.

  Hic per claustrum quotiens transiens meavit,

  Hinc et hinc ad monachos caput inclinavit,

  Et sic nutu capitis eos salutavit,

  Quos affectu intimo plurimum amavit.

  When his own death—hour came, it was accompanied by visions in the monastery. The old abbot dreamed of bells sounding most beautifully, and of angels, with happy laughter, hauling Lancelot to heaven. They found him dead in his cell, in the act of accomplishing the third and last of his miracles. For he had died in what was called the Odour of Sanctity. When saints die, their bodies fill the room with lovely scent: perhaps of new hay, or of blossom in the spring, or of the clean sea—shore.

  Ector pronounced his brother’s keen, one of the most touching pieces of prose in the language. He said: ‘Ah, Lancelot, thou wert head of all Christian knights. And now I dare say, thou Sir Lancelot there thou liest, that thou were never matched of earthly knight’s hand. And thou were the courtliest knight that ever bare shield. And thou were the truest friend of thy lover that ever bestrode horse. And thou were the truest lover, of a sinful man, that ever loved woman. And thou were the kindest man that ever strake with sword. And thou were the godliest person that ever came among press of knights. And thou were the meekest man and gentlest that ever ate in hall among ladies. And thou were the sternest knight to thy mortal foe that ever put spear in rest.’

  The Round Table had been smashed at Salisbury, its few survivors thinning out as the years went by. At last there were only four of them left: Bors the misogynist, Bleoberis, Ector, and Demaris. These old men made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, for the repose of the souls of all their comrades, and there they died upon a Good Friday for God’s sake, the last of the Round Table. Now there are none of them left: only knights of the Bath and of other orders degraded by comparison.

  About King Arthur of England, that gentle heart and centre of it all, there remains a mystery to this day. Some think that he and Mordred perished on each other’s swords. Robert of Thornton mentions that he was attended by a surgeon of Salerno who found by examination of his wounds that he could never be whole again, so ‘he said In manus* boldly on the place where he lay…and spake no more.’ Those who adhere to this account claim that he was buried at Glastonbury, under a stone which said: HIC JACET ARTURUS REX QUONDAM REX QUE FUTURUS,† and that his body was exhumed by Henry II as a counter—blast to Welsh nationalism – for the Cymry were claiming even then
that the great king had never perished. They believed that he would come again to lead them, and they also mendaciously asserted, as usual, his British nationality. Adam of Domerham tells us, on the other hand, that the exhumation took place in April 1278, under Edward I, and that he himself was a witness of the proceedings; while it is known that a third search took place in vain under Edward III – who, by the way, revived the Round Table in 1344 as a serious order of knighthood like the Garter. Whatever the real date may have been, tradition has it that the bones when exhumed were of gigantic stature, and Guenever’s had golden hair.

  Then there is another tale, widely supported, that our hero was carried away to the Vale of Affalach by a collection of queens in a magic boat. These are believed to have ferried him across the Severn to their own country, there to heal him of his wounds.

  The Italians have got hold of an idea about a certain Arturo Magno who was translated to Mount Etna, where he can still be seen occasionally, they say. Don Quixote the Spaniard, a very learned gentleman, indeed he went mad on account of it, maintains that he became a raven – an assertion which may not seem so wholly ridiculous to those who have read our little story. Then there are the Irish, who have muddled him up with one of the FitzGeralds and declare that he rides round a rath, with sword upraised, to the Londonderry Air. The Scots, who have a legend about

  Arthur Knyght

  Wha raid on nycht

  Wi’ gilten spur

  And candel lycht,

  still swear to him in Edinburgh, where they believe that he presides from Arthur’s Seat. The Bretons claim to have heard his horn and to have seen his armour, and they also believe he will return. A book called The High History of the Holy Grail, which was translated by an irascible scholar called Dr Sebastian Evans, says, on the contrary, that he was safely buried in a house of religion ‘that standeth at the head of the Moors Adventurous.’ A Miss Jessie L. Weston mentions a manuscript which she pleases to call 1533, supported by Le Morte d’Arthur, in which it is stated that the queen who came to carry him away was none other than the aged enchantress Morgan, his half—sister, and that she took him to a magic island. Dr Sommer regards the entire account as absurd. A lot of people called Wolfram von Eschenbach, Ulrich von Zatzikhoven, Dr Wechssler, Professor Zimmer, Mr Nutt and so forth, either scout the question wholly, or remain in learned confusion. Chaucer, Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth, Tennyson and a number of other reliable witnesses agree that he is still on earth: Milton inclining to the view that he is underneath it (Arthurumque etiam sub terris bella moventem)* while Tennyson is of the opinion that he will come again to visit us ‘like a modern Gentleman of stateliest port,’ possibly like the Prince Consort. Shakespeare’s contribution is to place the beloved Falstaff, at his death, not in Abraham’s, but in Arthur’s bosom.

  The legends of the common people are beautiful, strange and positive. Gervase of Tilbury, writing in 1212, says that, in the woods of Britain, ‘the foresters tell that on alternate days, about noon, or at midnight when the moon is full and shiny, they often see an array of huntsmen who, in answer to inquirers, say they are of the household and fellowship of Arthur.’ These, however, were probably real bands of Saxon poachers, like the followers of Robin Wood, who had named their gang in honour of the ancient king. The men of Devon are accustomed to point out ‘the chair and oven’ of Arthur among the rocks of their coast. In Somersetshire there are some villages called East and West Camel (ot), mentioned by Leland, which are beset with legends of a king still sitting in a golden crown. It is to be noted that the river Ivel, whence, according to Drayton, our ‘knightly deeds and brave achievements sprong,’ is in the same country. So is South Cadbury, whose rector reports his parishioners as relating how ‘folks do say that in the night of the full moon King Arthur and his men ride round the hill, and their horses are shod with silver, and a silver shoe has been found in the track where they do ride, and when they have ridden round the hill they do stop to water their horses at the wishing well.’ Finally there is the little village of Bodmin in Cornwall, whose inhabitants are certain that the King inhabits a local tumulus. In 1113 they even assaulted, within the sanctuary, a party of monks from Brittany – an unheard—of thing to do – because they had thrown doubts upon the legend. It has to be admitted that some of these dates scarcely fit in with the thorny subject of Arthurian chronology, and Malory, that great man who is the noblest source of all this history, maintains a discreet reserve.

  As for myself, I cannot forget the hedgehog’s last farewell, coupled with Quixote’s hint about the animals and Milton’s subterranean dream. It is little more than a theory, but perhaps the inhabitants of Bodmin will look at their tumulus, and, if it is like an enormous mole—hill with a dark opening in its side, particularly if there are some badger tracks in the vicinity, we can draw our own conclusions. For I am inclined to believe that my beloved Arthur of the future is sitting at this very moment among his learned friends, in the Combination Room of the College of Life, and that they are thinking away in there for all they are worth, about the best means to help our curious species: and I for one hope that some day, when not only England but the World has need of them, and when it is ready to listen to reason, if it ever is, they will issue from their rath in joy and power: and then, perhaps, they will give us happiness in the world once more and chivalry, and the old medieval blessing of certain simple people – who tried, at any rate, in their own small way, to still the ancient brutal dream of Attila the Hun.

  Explicit liber Regis Quondam, graviter et laboriose scriptus inter annos MDCCCCXXXVI et MDCCCCXLII, nationibus in diro bello certantibus. Hic etiam incipit, si forte in futuro homo superstes pestilenciam possit evadere et opus continuare inceptum, spes Regis Futuri. Ora pro Thoma Malory Equite, discipuloqùe humili ejus, qui nunc sua sponte libros deponit ut pro specie pugnet.

  Here ends the book of the Onetime King, written with much toil and effort between the years 1936 and 1942, when the nations were striving in fearful warfare. Here also begins – if perchance a man may in future time survive the pestilence and continue the task he has begun – the hope of the Future King. Pray for Thomas Malory, Knight, and his humble disciple, who now voluntarily lays aside his books to fight for his kind.

  Afterword by Sylvia Townsend Warner

  The dream, like the one before it, lasted about half an hour. In the last three minutes of the dream some fishes, dragons and such—like ran hurriedly about. A dragon swallowed one of the pebbles, but spat it out.

  In the ultimate twinkling of an eye, far tinier in time than the last millimetre on a six—foot rule, there came a man. He split up the one pebble which remained of all that mountain with blows; then made an arrow—head of it, and slew his brother.

  The Sword in the Stone

  Chapter XVIII, original version

  ‘My father made me a wooden castle big enough to get into, and he fixed real pistol barrels beneath its battlements to fire a salute on my birthday, but made me sit in front the first night – that deep Indian night – to receive the salute, and I, believing I was to be shot, cried.’

  Throughout his life White was subject to fears: fears from without – a menacing psychopathic mother, the prefects at Cheltenham College ‘rattling their canes,’ poverty, tuberculosis, public opinion; fears from within – fear of being afraid, of being a failure, of being trapped. He was afraid of death, afraid of the dark. He was afraid of his own proclivities, which might be called vices: drink, boys, a latent sadism. Notably free from fearing God, he was basically afraid of the human race. His life was a running battle with these fears, which he fought with courage, levity, sardonic wit, and industry. He was never without a project, never tired of learning, and had a high opinion of his capacities.

  This high opinion was shared by his teachers at the University of Cambridge. When tuberculosis tripped him in his second year, a group of dons made up a sum of money sufficient to send him to Italy for a year’s convalescence. He took to Italy like a duck to
water, learned the language, made some low friends, studied pension life, and wrote his first novel, They Winter Abroad. The inaugurator of the convalescent fund recalled: ‘…he returned in great form, determined to have the examiner’s blood in Part II; and sure enough in 1929 he took a tearing First Class with Distinction.’

  In 1932, on a Cambridge recommendation, he was appointed head of the English Department at Stowe School.

  It was a position of authority under an enlightened headmaster who allowed him ample rope. His pupils still remember him, some for the stimulus of his teaching, others for the sting of his criticism, others again for extracurriculum rambles in search of grass—snakes. He learned to fly, in order to come to terms with a fear of falling from high places, and to think rather better of the human race by meeting farm labourers at the local inn. After a couple of years he tired of Stowe, and decided on no evidence that his headmaster meant to get rid of him. With poverty a fear to be reckoned with, he constructed two potboilers and compiled another. An Easter holiday fishing in rain and solitude on a Highland river showed him what he really wanted – to write in freedom, to land a book of his own as well as a salmon.

  At midsummer 1936 he gave up his post and rented a game—keeper’s cottage at Stowe Ridings on the Stowe estate. The compiled potboiler, made up of extracts from his fishing, hunting, shooting, and flying diaries and called England Have My Bones, sold so well that its publisher undertook to pay him £200 a year against a yearly book.