No More Learning

So now we know the Holy Thing is here again, Brother fast,
too, and pray, and tell your brother-knights about it, then perhaps the
vision may be seen by you all, and the whole world will be healed. '

[Illustration: MY KNIGHT OF HEAVEN, GO FORTH. ]

"So I told all the knights and we fasted and prayed for many weeks. Then
my sister cut off all her long streaming silken hair which used to fall
to her feet and out of it braided a strong sword belt and with silver
and crimson thread she wove into it a crimson grail in a silver beam.
Then she bound it on our beautiful boy knight, Sir Galahad, and said:

"'My knight of heaven, go forth, for you shall see what I have seen and
far in the spiritual city you will be crowned king. ' Then she sent the
deathless passion of her eyes through him and he believed what she said.

"Then came a year of miracles. In our great hall there stood a chair
which Merlin had fashioned carved with strange figures like a serpent
and in and out among the strange figures ran a scroll of strange letters
in a language nobody knew like a serpent. Merlin called it the Seat
Perilous, because he said if any one sat in it he would get lost. And
Galahad said that if he got lost in it he would save himself. So one
summer night Sir Galahad sat down in the chair and all at once there was
a cracking of the roofs above us, and a blast and thunder, and in the
thunder there was a cry and in the blast there was a beam of light seven
times clearer than the daylight. Down the beam stole the Holy Grail all
covered over with a luminous cloud. Then it passed away but every knight
saw his brother knight's faces in a glory and we all rose and stared at
each other until at last I found my voice and swore a vow.

"I swore that because I had not seen the Holy Grail behind the cloud I
would ride away a year and a day in quest of it until I could see it as
my sister saw it. Galahad swore too, and good Sir Bors, and Lancelot and
many others, knights, and Gawain louder than all the rest.
"The king was not in the hall that day for he had gone out to help some
poor maiden, but as he came back over the plains beyond Camelot he saw
the roofs rolling in smoke and thought that his wonderfully dear,
beautiful hall which Merlin had built for him so wonderfully was afire.
So he rode fast and rushed into the tumult of knights and asked me what
it all meant.

"'Woe is me! ' cried the king when I told him. 'Had I been here you would
not have sworn the vows. '

"'My king,' I answered boldly, had you been here you would have sworn
the vows yourself. '

"'Yes, yes,' said he, 'are you so bold when you didn't see the Grail?
You didn't see farther than the cloud, and what can you expect to see
now if you go out into the wilderness? '

"'No, no, Lord, I didn't see the Grail, I heard the sound, I saw the
light and since I didn't see the holy thing I swore the vow that I would
follow it until I did see. '

"'Then he asked us, knight by knight, whether we had seen it and each
one said, 'No, no, Lord, that was why we swore our vows,' but suddenly
Galahad called out, 'But I saw the Holy Grail, Sir Arthur, and heard the
cry, "O Galahad, follow me. "'

"Ah, Galahad, Galahad,' said the king, 'the vision is for such as you
and for your holy nun but not for these. Are you all Galahads or all
Percivals? No, no, you are just men with the strength to right the
wrongs and violences of the land. But now since one has seen, all the
blind want to see. However, since you have made the vow, go. But oh, how
often the distressed people of the kingdom will come into the hall for
you to help them and all your chairs will be vacant while you are out
chasing a fire in the quagmire!