Page:Studies on the legend of the Holy Grail.djvu/266

240 story is supplied by Lancelot, who takes over many of the adventures of Perceval or Gawain in the Conte du Graal. In him we note contrition for past sin, strivings after a higher life with which we can sympathise. In fine, such moral teaching as the Queste affords is given us rather by sinful Lancelot than by sinless Galahad.

But the aversion to this world takes a stronger form in the Queste, and one which is the vital conception of the work, in the insistence upon the need for physical chastity. To rightly understand the author's position we must glance at the state of manners revealed by the romances, and in especial at the sex-relations as they were conceived of by the most refined and civilised men and women of the day. The French romances are, as a rule, too entirely narrative to enable a clear realisation of what these were. Wolfram, with his keener and more sympathetic eye for individual character—Wolfram, who loves to analyse the sentiments and to depict the outward manifestations of feeling of his personages—is our best guide here. The manners and customs of the day can be found in the French romances; the feelings which underlie them must be sought for in the German poet.

The marked feature of the sex-relations in the days of chivalry was the institution of minnedienst (love-service). The knight bound himself to serve a particular lady, matron or maid. To approve himself brave, hardy, daring, patient, and discreet was his part of the bargain, and when fulfilled the lady must fulfil hers and pay her servant. The relation must not for one moment be looked upon as platonic; the last favours were in every case exacted, or rather were freely granted, as the lady, whether maid or wedded wife, thought it no wrong thus to reward her knight. It would have been "bad form" to deny payment when the service had been rendered, and the offender guilty of such conduct would have been scouted by her fellow-women as well as by all men. Nothing is more instructive in this connection than the delightfully told episode of Gawain and Orgueilleuse. The latter is unwedded, a great and noble lady, but she has already had several favoured lovers, as indeed she frankly tells Gawain. He proffers his service, which she hardly accepts, but heaps upon him