Page:Celtic Stories by Edward Thomas.djvu/123

 Owen's eyes. Then Owen ordered the young man with the mighty lance speckled yellow to lower his banner. He lowered it and Rhonabwy saw peace and heard great silence. The Ravens gathered in ranks about the banner, and as their human fellows walked in and out amongst them not a beak or an eyelid stirred, and they looked wiser than any man that Rhonabwy had ever seen.

Rhonabwy now saw twenty-four knights come up to Arthur from Osla to crave a truce. The Emperor rose up and assembled his counsellors, Rhun the son of Maelgwn Gwynedd, Bedwini the bishop, Mark, Caradoc, Gwalchmai, Mabon, Peredur, Trystan, Morien, Cador, Adaon the son of Taliesin, and Cadyriaith, and men of Norway and Denmark and men of Greece and many others.

'Who is the tall auburn knight?' asked Rhonabwy.

'He,' said Iddawc, 'is Rhun son of Maelgwn Gwynedd.'

'And why,' again asked Rhonabwy, 'why is such a stripling as Cadyriaith admitted to this council?'

'Because,' answered Iddawc, 'there is no man throughout Britain more skilled in counsel.'

Then the bards came and recited verses before Arthur, but no man save Cadyriaith understood more of them than that they were in praise of the Emperor.

Next arrived twenty-four wayworn men leading each an ass, bearing gold and silver as tribute to Arthur from the Islands of Greece, and Cadyriaith rose and spoke, proposing that the asses and the gold and silver should be given to the bards as a reward for their verses, and that the truce should be granted to Osla.

'Rhonabwy,' said Iddawc, 'would it not be wrong to exclude so liberal a youth as Cadyriaith from the councils of his Lord?'