Stories of King Arthur and His Knights/Chapter 26

Now Sir Galahad was yet without shield, and so he rode four days without any adventure. After even-song of the fourth day he came to a white abbey, and there he was received with great reverence, and led to a chamber wherein he was ware of two knights of the Round Table, the one King Bagdemagus and the other Sir Uwaine. They went unto him and made of him great solace; and they told him that within this place was a shield that no man might bear about his neck without great harm to himself, unless he were the worthiest knight of the world.



"Ah, sir," said King Bagdemagus to Galahad, "I shall to-morrow assay this strange adventure, and if I may not achieve it ye shall take it upon you, for I am sure ye shall not fail."

"Sir," said Galahad, "I agree right well thereto, for I have no shield."

So on the morn they arose and heard mass. Then King Bagdemagus asked where the adventurous shield was. Anon a monk led him behind an altar, where the shield hung as white as any snow, but in the midst was a red cross. The monk counselled him to be well advised before taking it, and King Bagdemagus answered:

"Well, I wot well that I am not the best knight of the world, but yet shall I assay to bear it."

And so, bidding Sir Galahad to abide there still, till it was known how he sped, King Bagdemagus bore the red cross shield out of the monastery, took with him a squire, the which should bring tidings unto Sir Galahad how he sped, and rode away.

Two miles off they came into a fair valley afore a hermitage, and there they saw a goodly knight in white armour, horse and all. He came as fast as his horse might run, with his spear in the rest, and King Bagdemagus dressed his spear against him, and brake it upon the White Knight. The other struck him so hard that he brake the mails, and thrust him through the right shoulder, for the shield covered him not at that time, and so he bare him from his horse.

Therewith the White Knight alighted and took the white shield from King Bagdemagus, saying, "Knight, thou hast done thyself great folly, for this shield ought not to be borne but by him that shall have no peer that liveth." Then he came to the squire, and said, "Bear this shield unto the good knight Sir Galahad, that thou left in the abbey, and greet him well from me."

The squire first went unto Bagdemagus, and asked him whether he were sore wounded or not. "Yea, forsooth," said he, "I shall escape hard from death." Then the squire fetched his horse, and brought him with great pain unto an abbey. Then was he taken down safely, and unarmed, and laid in a bed. There his wounds were looked to, and, as the book telleth, he lay there long, and escaped hard with life.

"Sir," said the squire, when he came to Galahad, "that knight that wounded Bagdemagus sendeth you greeting, and bade that ye should bear this shield, wherethrough great adventures should befall."

"Now blessed be God," said Sir Galahad. Then he asked his arms, mounted upon his horse, and, commending himself unto God, hung the white shield about his neck. So he departed, and within a while came by the hermitage, where the White Knight awaited him. Every each saluted other courteously, and the knight told Sir Galahad the marvels of the shield.

"Sir," said he, "at that same hour that Joseph of Arimathea came to Sarras, there was a king in that city called Evelake, that had great war against the Saracens, and there Joseph made this shield for him in the name of Him that died upon the cross. Then through his good belief he had the better of his enemies; for when King Evelake was in the battle, there was a cloth set afore the shield, and when he was in the greatest peril he let put away the cloth, and then his enemies saw a figure of a man on the cross, wherethrough they all were discomfited.

"Soon afterwards Joseph departed from Sarras, and King Evelake would go with him whether he would or nould, and they came unto this land of Britain. Not long after this, when Joseph lay on his death-bed, King Evelake begged of him some token that would lead him to think on the old knight for love of whom he had left his own country. So Joseph took this shield, and thereupon he made a cross with his own blood; that should be Evelake's token. Then he said that no man should bear this shield until the time that Galahad come, the last of Joseph's lineage, that should do many marvellous deeds while bearing it about his neck. To-day is the time they then set when ye shall have King Evelake's shield."

So spake the White Knight, and then vanished away; and Sir Galahad rode with the squire back to the abbey.