The Poetical Works of Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton, Bart. M.P Part 38

It would be extremely important towards tracing the origin of the Cymry, if authentic and indisputable records of such traditions of their migration from the East can be found in their own legends at an age before learned conjecture could avail itself of the pa.s.sages in Herodotus and Strabo, which relate to the Cimmerians, and tend to identify that people with our Cymrian ancestors. We find in the first (1. i. c. 14), that the Cimmerians, chased from their original settlements by the Nomadic Scythians, came to Lydia, where they took Sardis (except the citadel). In this account Strabo, on the authority of Callisthenes and Callinus, confirms Herodotus.

In flying from their Scythian foes, the Cimmerians took their course by the sea-coasts to Sinope, and the Cimmerian Bosphorus, and as, after this flight, the old Cimmerian league was broken up, and the tribes dispersed, this gives us the evident date for such migrations as Hu Gadarn is supposed to head; and the coincidence between Welch traditions (if genuinely ancient) and cla.s.sical authority becomes very remarkable. For the additional corroboration of the hypothesis thus suggested, which is afforded by the ident.i.ty between the Cimmerians of Asia and the Cimbri of Gaul, see Strabo (1. vii. p.

424, the Oxford edition, 1807). It is curious to note in Herodotus (1. iv. c. 11) that the same domestic feuds which destroyed the Cymrian empire in Britain destroyed the Cimmerians in their original home. While the Scythians invaded them, they quarrelled amongst themselves whether to fight or fly, and settled the dispute by fighting each other, and flying from the enemy.

10.--Page 212, stanza lxxvii.

_Our t.i.tan sires from Defrobanni's plain._

"Our t.i.tan sires,"--according to certain mythologists, the Celts, or Cimmerians, were the t.i.tans.

11.--Page 214, stanza xciii.

_Strides in the circles of unthinking men._

Imitated from Schiller.

12.--Page 215, stanza c.

_And frank Gawaine, Whom mirth for ever, like a fairy child, Lock'd from the cares of life._

Some liberty, in the course of this poem, will be taken with the legendary character, less perhaps of the Gawaine of the Fabliaux, than of the Gwalchmai (Hawk of Battle) of the Welch bards. In both, indeed, this hero is represented as sage, courteous, and eloquent; but he is a livelier character in the Fabliaux than in the tales of his native land. The characters of many of the Cymrian heroes, indeed, vary according to the caprice of the poets. Thus Kai, in the Triads, one of the Three Diademed chiefs of battle and a powerful magician, is, in the French romances, Messire Queux, the chief of the cooks; and in the Mabinogion,[A] he is at one time but an unlucky knight of more valour than discretion, and at another time attains the dignity a.s.signed to him in the Triads, and exults in supernatural attributes. And poor Gawaine himself, the mirror of chivalry, in most of the Fabliaux is, as Southey observes, "shamefully calumniated" in the MORT D'ARTHUR as the "false Gawaine."

The Caradoc of this poem is not intended to be identified with the hero Caradoc Vreichvras. The name was sufficiently common in Britain (it is the right reading for Caractacus) to allow to the use of the poet as many Caradocs as he pleases.

13.--Page 216, stanza ciii.

_Frank youth, high thoughts, crown'd Nature's kings in both._

Lancelot was, indeed, the son of a king, but a dethroned and a tributary one. The popular history of his infancy will be told in a subsequent book.

14.--Page 216, stanza cvii.

_Welcome BAL-HUAN back to yon sweet sky._

Bal-Huan, the sun. Those heaps of stone found throughout Britain (Crugiau or Carneu), were sacred to the sun in the Druid wors.h.i.+p, and served as beacons in his honour on May eve. May was his consecrated month. The rocking-stones which mark these sanctuaries were called amber-stones.

15.--Page 216, stanza cvii.

_May fill with joy the VALE OF MELODY._

Cwm-pPenllafar, the Vale of Melody--so called (as Mr. Pennant suggests) from the music of the hounds when in full cry over the neighbouring Rock of the Hunter.

[A] I cannot quote the Mabinogion without expressing a grateful sense of the obligations Lady Charlotte Guest has conferred upon all lovers of our early literature, in her invaluable edition and translation of that interesting collection of British romances.

BOOK II.

ARGUMENT.

Introductory reflections--Arthur's absence--Caradoc's suspended epic-- The deliberations of the three friends--Merlin seeks them--The trial of the enchanted forest--Merlin's soliloquy by the fountain--The return of the knights from the forest--Merlin's selection of the one permitted to join the King--The narrative returns to Arthur--The strange guide allotted to him--He crosses the sea, and arrives at the court of the Vandal--Ludovick, the Vandal King, described--His wily questions-- Arthur's answers--The Vandal seeks his friend Astutio--Arthur leaves the court--Conference between Astutio and Ludovick--Astutio's profound statesmans.h.i.+p and subtle schemes--The Amba.s.sador from Mercia--His address to Ludovick--The Saxons pursue Arthur--Meanwhile the Cymrian King arrives at the sea-sh.o.r.e--Description of the caves that intercept his progress--He turns inland--The Idol-shrine--The wolf and the priest.

Oft in the sands, in idle summer days, 1 Will childlike fondness write some cherish'd name, Lull'd on the margin, while the wavelet plays, And tides still dreaming on:--Alas! the same On human hearts Affection prints a trace; The sands record it, and the tides efface.

If absence parts, Hope, ready to console, 2 Whispers, "Be soothed, the absent shall return;"

If Death divides, a moment from the goal, Love stays the step, and decks, but leaves, the urn, Vowing remembrance;--let the year be o'er, And see, remembrance smiles like joy, once more!

In street and mart still plies the busy craft. 3 Still Beauty trims for stealthy steps the bower; By lips as gay the Hirlas horn[1] is quaft; To the dark bourne still flies as fast the hour, As when in Arthur men adored the sun; And Life's large rainbow took its hues from One!

Yet ne'er by Prince more loved a crown was worn, 4 And hadst thou ventured but to hint the doubt That loyal subjects ever ceased to mourn, And that without him, earth was joy without,-- Thou soon hadst join'd in certain warm dominions The horned friends of pestilent opinions.

Thrice bless'd, O King, that on thy royal head 5 Fall the night-dews; that the broad-spreading beech Curtains thy sleep; that in the paths of dread, Lonely thou wanderest,--so thy steps may reach RENOWN,--that bridge which spans the midnight sea, And joins two worlds,--Time and Eternity!

All is forgot save Poetry; or whether 6 Haunting Time's river from the vocal reeds, Or link'd not less in human souls together With ends, which make the poetry of deeds; For either poetry alike can s.h.i.+ne-- From Hector's valour as from Homer's line.

Yet let me wrong ye not, ye faithful three, 7 Gawaine, and Caradoc, and Lancelot!

Gawaine's light lip had lost its laughing glee And gentle Caradoc had half forgot That famous epic which his muse had hit on, Of Trojan Brut--from whom the name of Briton.

Therein Sir Brut, expell'd from flaming Troy,[2] 8 Comes to this isle, and seeks to build a city, Which Devils, then the Freeholders, destroy; Till the sweet Virgin on Sir Brut takes pity, And bids that Saint who now speaks Welsh on high,[3]

Baptize the astonish'd heathen in the Wye!

This done, the fiends, at once disfranchised, fled; 9 And to the Saint the Trojan built a chapel, Where ma.s.ses daily were for Priam said:-- While thrice a week, the priests, that golden apple By which three fiends, as G.o.ddesses disguised, Bewitch'd Sir Paris, anathematized.

But now this epic, in its course suspended, 10 Slept on the shelf--(a not uncommon fate); Ah, who shall tell, if, ere resumed and ended, That kind of poem be not out of date?

For of all ladies there are none who chuse Such freaks and turns of fas.h.i.+on, as the Muse.

And then, sad Lancelot--but there I hold; 11 Some griefs there are which grief alone can guess, And so we leave whate'er he felt untold; Light steps profane the heart's deep loneliness.

I, too, had once a friend, in happier years!

He fled,--he owed,--forgot;--Forgive these tears!--

Much, their sole comfort, much conversed the three 12 Upon their absent Arthur; what the cause Of his self-exile, and its ends, could be; Much did they ponder, hesitate, and pause In high debate if loyal love might still Pursue his wanderings, though against his will.

But first the awe which kings command, restrain'd; 13 And next the ignorance of the path and goal; So, thus for weeks they communed and remain'd; Till o'er the woods a mellower verdure stole; The bell-flower clothed the river-banks; the moon Stood in the breathless firmament of June;

When--as one twilight near the forest-mount 14 They sate, and heard the vesper-bell afar Swing from the dim Cathedral, and the fount Hymn low its own sweet music to the star Lone in the west--they saw a shadow pa.s.s Where the pale beam shot silvering o'er the gra.s.s.

They turn'd, beheld their Cymri's mighty seer, 15 Majestic Merlin, and with reverence rose; "Knights," said the soothsayer, smiling, "be of cheer If yet alone (the stars themselves his foes) Wanders the King,--now, of his faithful three One, Fate permits; the choice with Fate must be.

"Enter the forest--each his several way; 16 Return as dies in air the vesper chime; The fiend the forest populace obey Hath not o'er mortals empire in the time When holy sounds the wings of Heaven invite, And prayer hangs charm-like on the wheels of Night.

"What seen, what heard, mark mindful, and relate! 17 Here will I tarry till your steps return."

Ne'er leapt the captive from the prison grate With livelier gladness to the smiles of morn, Than sprang those rivals to the forest-gloom, And its dark arms closed round them like a tomb.

Before the fount, with thought-o'ershadow'd brow, 18 The prophet stood, and bent a wistful eye Along its starlit s.h.i.+mmer;--"Ev'n as now,"

He murmur'd, "didst thou lift thyself on high, O symbol of my soul, and make thy course One upward struggle to thy mountain source--

"When first, a musing boy, I stood beside 19 Thy sparkling showers, and ask'd my restless heart What secrets Nature to the herd denied, But might to earnest hierophant impart; Then, in the boundless s.p.a.ce around and o'er, Thought whisper'd--'Rise, O seeker, and explore;