onstantine. Sir Ector
himself could not leave the stage with more grace than with his great
discourse on his dead comrade and kinsman. Lancelot's only son has
gone with the Graal. The end is not violent or factitious, it is
necessary and inevitable. It were even less unwise to seek the grave
of Arthur than to attempt to take up the story of the Arthurians after
king and queen and Lancelot are gone each to his and her own place,
after the Graal is attained, after the Round Table is dissolved.

It is creditable to the intelligence and taste of the average mediaeval
romance-writer that even he did not yield to his besetting sin in this
particular instance. With the exception of _Ysaie le Triste_, which
deals with the fortunes of a supposed son of Tristan and Yseult, and
thus connects itself with the most outlying part of the legend--a part
which, as has been shown, is only hinged on to it--I cannot remember a
single romance which purports to deal with affairs subsequent to the
battle in Lyonesse. The two latest that can be in any way regarded as
Arthurian, _Arthur of Little Britain_ and _Cleriodus_, avowedly take
up the story long subsequently, and only claim for their heroes the
glory of distant descent from Arthur and his heroes. _Meliadus de
Lyonnois_ ascends from Tristram, and endeavours to connect the matter
of Britain with that of France. _Giron le Courtois_ deals with
Palamedes and the earlier Arthurian story; while _Perceforest_, though
based on the _Brut_, selects periods anterior to Arthur.[60]

[Footnote 60: I have a much less direct acquaintance with the romances
mentioned in this paragraph than with most of the works referred to in
this book. I am obliged to speak of them at second-hand (chiefly from
Dunlop and Mr Ward's invaluable _Catalogue of Romances_, vol. i. 1883;
vol. ii. 1893). It is one of the results of the unlucky fancy of
scholars for re-editing already accessible texts instead of devoting
themselves to _anecdota_, that work of the first interest, like
_Perceforest_, for instance, is left to black-letter, which, not to
mention its costliness, is impossible to weak eyes; even where it is
not left to manuscript, which is more impossible still.]

[Sidenote: _Latin episodes._]

There was, however, no such artistic constraint as regards episodes of
the main story, or _romans d'aventures_ celebrating the exploits of
single knights, and connected with that story by a sort of stock
overture and _denoum