ain in
single combat for charging him with treason. He has kept his
helm on, but doffs it at the King's request._]

And when the King saw him he ran to kiss him, and began to make such joy
of him as none could overgo. But Lancelot said, "Ah, Sir! for God's
sake, make no joy or feast for me. Certainly you should make none, for
if you knew the evil I have done you, you would hate me above all men in
the world." "Oh! Lancelot," said he, "tell it me not, for I
understand[57] too well what you would say; but I will know[57] nothing
of it, because it might be such a thing" as would part them for ever.

FOOTNOTES:

[14] The subdivision of the _gestes_ does not matter: they were all
connected closely or loosely--except the Crusading section, and even
that falls under the Christian _v._ Saracen grouping if not under the
Carlovingian. The real "outside" members are few, late, and in almost
every case unimportant.

[15] There are comic _episodes_ elsewhere; but almost the whole of this
poem turns on the _gabz_ or burlesque boasts of the paladins.--It may be
wise here to anticipate an objection which may be taken to these remarks
on the _chansons_. I have been asked whether I know M. Bedier's handling
of them; and, by an odd coincidence, within a few hours of the question
I saw an American statement that this excellent scholar's researches
"have revised our conceptions" of the matter. No one can exceed me in
respect for perhaps the foremost of recent scholars in Old French. But
my "conception" of the _chansons_ was formed long before he wrote, not
from that of any of his predecessors, but from the _chansons_
themselves. It is therefore not subject to "revisal" except from my own
re-reading, and such re-reading has only confirmed it.

[16] It is not of course intended to be preferred to the far more widely
known tale in which the heroine bears the same name, and which will be
mentioned below. But if it is less beautiful such beauty as it has is
free from the slightest _morbidezza_.

[17] And to this introduction our dealings with it here may be confined.
The accounts of the siege itself are of much less interest, especially
in connection with our special subject.

[18] A sort of companion handbook to the first part of this volume will
be found in the present writer's sketch of twelfth and thirteenth
century European literature, under the title of _The Flourishing of
Romance and the Rise of Allegory_, in Messrs. Bla