chair. "Sit thou on that stool, Maude."

The old lady took her distaff, now ready, and sat down, smiling at the
impatience of the capricious child.

"Once upon a time," she began, "the ending of the realm of England was
not that stide [place] which men now call the Land's End in Cornwall.
Far beyond, even as far as the Isles of Scilly, stretched the fair green
plains: a kingdom lay betwixt the two, and men called it La Lyonesse.
And in the good olden days, when Arthur was king, the Lyonesse had her
prince, and on her plains and hills were fair rich cities, and through
her forests pricked good knights on the quest of the Holy Grail, [see
note 2] that none, save unsinning eyes, might ever see. For of all the
four-and-twenty Knights of the Round Table, none ever saw the Holy Grail
save one, and that was Sir Galahad, that was pure of heart and clean of
life. Howbeit, one night came a mighty tempest. The sea raged and
roared on the Cornish coast, and dashed its waters far up the rocks,
washing the very walls of the Castle of Tintagel. And they that saw
upon that night told after, that there came one wild flash of lightning
that lightened sky and earth; and men looked and saw by its light,
statelily standing, the rich cities and green forests of the Lyonesse;
and then came black darkness, and a roar, and a crash, and a rending, as
though all the rocks and the mountains should be torent [violently torn
asunder]; and then another wild flash lightened sky and earth, and men
looked, and the rich cities and green forests of the Lyonesse were
gone."

Maude was listening entranced, with parted lips; Constance carelessly,
as if she knew all about it beforehand, and were chiefly amusing herself
by watching the rapt face of her fellow-listener.

"Long years thereafter," resumed Dame Agnes, "ay, and even now, men said
and say, that at times ye may yet hear the sound and see the sight of
the drowned cities of the Lyonesse. Ever sithence that tempestuous
night, the deep green sea lies heavy on the bosom of the lost land; and
no man of unpure heart, nor of evil life, ne unbaptised, ne unshriven,
may see nor hear. But if one of Christian blood, a christened man, pure
of heart and clean in life, that is newly shriven, whether man or maid,
will sail forth at midnight over the green sea, and when he cometh to
the place where lieth the Lyonesse, will bend him down from the boat,
and look and listen, then shall come up around his ears