all contestants by two yards.

"How like you my boy of the kitchen?" Kay would say, on seeing these
feats. "Fat broth is good for the muscles."

And so the year passed on till the festival of Whitsuntide came again.
The court was now at Carlion, where royal feasts were held. But the
king, as was his custom, refused to eat until he should hear of some
strange adventure.

While he thus waited a damsel came into the hall and saluted the king,
and begged aid and succor of him.

"For whom?" asked Arthur. "Of what do you complain?"

"Sire," she replied, "I serve a lady of great worth and merit, who is
besieged in her castle by a tyrant, and dares not leave her gates for
fear of him. I pray you send with me some knight to succor her."

"Who is your lady, and where does she dwell? And what is the name of the
man who besieges her?"

"Her name I must not now tell. I shall only say that she has wide lands
and is a noble lady. As for the tyrant that distresses her, he is called
the Red Knight of the Red Lawns."

"I know him not," said the king.

"I know him well," said Gawaine. "Men say he has seven men's strength. I
escaped him once barely with life."

"Fair damsel," said the king, "there are knights here who would do their
utmost to rescue your lady. But if you will not tell me her name nor
where she lives, none of them shall go with my consent."

"Then I must seek further," said the damsel, "for that I am forbidden to
tell."

At this moment Beaumains came to the king, and said,--

"Royal sir, I have been twelve months in your kitchen, and have had all
you promised me; now I desire to ask for my other two gifts."

"Ask, if you will. I shall keep to my word."

"This, then, is what I request. First, that you send me with the damsel,
for this adventure belongs to me."

"You shall have it," said the king.

"My third request is that you shall bid Lancelot du Lake make me a
knight, for he is the only man in your court from whom I will take that
honor. When I am gone let him ride after me, and dub me knight when I
require it of him."

"I grant your wish," said the king. "All shall be done as you desire."

"Fie on you all!" cried the damsel. "I came here for a knight, and you
offer me a kitchen scullion. Is this King Arthur's way of rescuing a
lady in distress? If so, I want none of it, and will seek my knight
elsewhere."

She left the court, red with anger, mounted her horse, and rode away.

She had hardly go