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 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 murmur'd 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 shatter'd casque, and chafed his hands, And call'd him by his name, complaining loud, And dropping bitter tears against his brow Striped with dark blood: for all his face was white Smote by the fresh beam of the springing east ; And all his greaves and cuisses dash'd with drops Of onset; and the light and lustrous curls That made his forehead like a rising sun High from the däis-throne-were parch'd with dust, Or, clotted into points and hanging loose, Mix'd with the knightly growth that fringed his lips. So like a shatter'd column lay the King; Not like that Arthur who, with lance in rest, From spur to plume a star of tournament, Shot thro' the lists at Camelot, and charged Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere, But now the whole ROUND TABLE is dissolved And the days darken round me, and the years, And slowly answer'd 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. I have lived my life, and that which I have done 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. To the island-valley of Avilion ; Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, 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 Look'd one black dot against the verge of dawn, Here ended Hall, and our last light, that long Had wink'd and threaten'd darkness, flared and fell : At which the Parson, sent to sleep with sound, And waked with silence, grunted "Good!" but we Sat rapt it was the tone with which he readPerhaps some modern touches here and there Redeem'd it from the charge of nothingness Or else we loved the man, and prized his work; The cock crew loud; as at that time of year The lusty bird takes every hour for dawn : Then Francis, muttering, like a man ill used, To me, methought, who waited with a crowd, Of stateliest port; and all the people cried, Then those that stood upon the hills behind |