Page:The Mythology of the Aryan Nations.djvu/166

134 BOOK is born, Arthur is wrapped in a cloth of gold, the same glittering raiment which in the Homeric hymn the nymphs wrap round the new-born Phoibos, and like the infant Cyrus, who is arrayed in the same splendid garb, is placed in the hands of a poor man whom the persons charged with him, like Harpagos, meet at the postern-gate of the castle. In his house the child grows like Cyrus and Romulus and others, a model of human beauty, and like them he cannot long abide in his lowly station. Some one must be chosen king, and the trial is to be that which Odin appointed for the recovery of the sword Gram, which he had thrust up to the hilt in the great roof-tree of Volsung's hall. " There was seen in the churchyard, at the east end by the high altar, a great stone formed square, and in the midst thereof was like an anvil of steel a foot high, and therein stuck a fair sword naked by the point, and letters of gold were written about the sword that said thus, " Whoso pulleth out this sword out of this stone and anvil is rightwise born king of England.'" The incident by which Arthur's title is made known answers to the similar attempts made in Teutonic folk-lore to cheat Boots, the younger son, of his lawful inheritance. Sir Kay, leaving his sword at home, sends Arthur for it, and Arthur not being able to find it, draws the weapon imbedded in the stone as easily as Theseus performed the same exploit. Sir Kay, receiving it, forthwith claims the kingdom. Sir Ector, much doubting his tale, drives him to confess that it was Arthur who gave him the sword, and then bids Arthur replace it in the solid block. None now can draw it forth but Arthur, to whose touch it yields without force or pressure. Sir Ector then kneels to Arthur, who, supposing him to be his father, shrinks from the honour ; but Ector, like the shepherds in the myths of Oidipous, Romulus, or Cyrus, replies, " I was never your father nor of your blood, but I wote well ye are of an higher blood than I weened ye were." But although like the playmates of Cyrus, the knights scorn to be governed by a boy whom they hold to be baseborn, yet they are compelled to yield to the ordeal of the stone, and Arthur, being made king, forgives them alL The sword thus gained is in Arthur's first war so bright in his enemies' eyes that it gives liglit like thirty torches, as the glorious radiance flashes up to heaven when Achilleus dons his armour. But this weapon is not to be the blade with which Arthur is to perform his greatest exploits. Like the sword of Odin in the Volsung story,

from the story of Ulhcr as told by gods of the heaven and the h'ght, and Jeffrey of Monmouth or in the more as such is exercised by I'hoibos the lish detailed romance. This power of trans- god, and Dionysos the lion and bear, formation is a special attribute of the