Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/337

 Rh knowledge would be free to speak. And as the story passed from one to the other, is it not probable that while the initiated might venture to add or correct a feature, the uninitiated would introduce details which appeared to him suitable, but which were really foreign to the original trend of the tale? How, except on the hypothesis of some such origin, explain the persistent adherence to the framework of the story, or the hints as to the mysterious nature of the talisman, and the penalties to be incurred if its secrets are revealed? Do not let us forget that it is precisely in this, the earliest form of the tale, and in the confused version of the same offered by the Elucidation, that the secret character of the Grail is insisted upon. On any other hypothesis, what is this secret?

And now that I have had occasion to mention the Elucidation, I would ask, does not this theory of the Grail origins provide us, at last, with a possible solution of that most perplexing text? As is known to students of the subject, the Elucidation purports to be an introduction to the Grail story, and is found in three texts, the Mons MS. of the Perceval, the Middle German translation of the continuation to that poem, and the (1530) printed edition of the work. It is extremely confused, and its connection with the other Grail texts has till recently been a complete puzzle. It starts with a warning from Master Blihis against revealing the secrets of the Grail. It then relates how at one time there were maidens dwelling in the hills, or wells, (the original word, puys, might be translated either way; I prefer the rendering of the German text, hills), who would offer food and drink to the passer by; but when King Amangons offered force to one, and took away her golden cup, they left the country; and, the writer goes on, "the court of the Fisher King could no longer be found." Nevertheless, Gawain found it; and we then