The dead Gawain appears, a ghost blown along a wandering wind, and on the eve of the battle warns King Arthur of approaching death, but intimates that somewhere is an isle of rest for him.

b. The Incidents.

  1. 1. Arthur mourns for his departed kingdom.
  2. 2. Gawain warns Arthur of his approaching death; Arthur is depressed by the warning.
  3. 3. Bedivere warns Arthur that he must rise and conquer Modred; Arthur hesitates to make war against his people.
  4. 4. He moves his host to Lyonnesse: the last weird battle is fought.
  5. 5. Arthur thinks himself king only among the dead.
  6. 6. Bedivere professes affection, and calls Arthur’s attention to the traitor, Modred.
  7. 7. The king promises one last act of kinghood.
  8. 8. Modred wounds the king; the king kills Modred.
  9. 9. Bedivere carries the wounded Arthur to the ruined chapel.
  10. 10. The dying Arthur directs Bedivere to throw Excalibur into the mere; Bedivere twice deceives Arthur and is twice reproved.
  11. 11. Bedivere throws Excalibur into the mere, and tells King Arthur what happened.
  12. 12. Bedivere bears Arthur to the margin of the mere.
  13. 13. The three black-hooded queens with crowns of gold come in the dusky barge.
  14. 14. Arthur is placed in the barge and speaks his last words to Bedivere; the barge moves swan-like from the brink.
  15. 15. Bedivere watches the speck that bears the king move down the long water opening on the deep.

c. Scenes.

  1. 1. Arthur in his tent among the slumbering host.
  2. 2. The march to the sunset bound of Lyonnesse, and the moving pageant to the battlefield.
  3. 3. The dark strait of barren land with the ocean on one side and on the other the great water; the ruined chapel with its broken chancel and broken cross, and, near at hand, the place of tombs with its bones of ancient mighty men; athwart all shines the moon, and over all the chill wind with flakes of foam sings shrilly. Zigzag paths lead around jutting points of rock down to the shining levels of the lake, where the ripple washes softly in the reeds, the wild water laps the crags, and many-knotted water-flags whistle stiff and dry. Frozen hills, barren chasms with icy caves, the bare black cliff and slippery crag wall, and the level lake gleaming in the glories of the winter moon.

d. Descriptive Passages. Besides those passages which relate especially to the scenes, there are other beautiful and powerful bits of description that will well repay examination. For instance:

  1. 1. Of King Arthur’s dream the poet says,

“And fainter onward, like wild birds that change
Their season in the night and wail their way
From cloud to cloud, down the long wind the dream
Shrill’d.”

Note the figure of speech (simile), beginning with the word like.

  1. 2. The description of the last, dim, weird battle in the west, beginning at the bottom of page 240 with the line “A death-white mist slept over land and sea,” is one of the most stirring things in the poem, and deserves particularly close reading. The pictures are crowded, the figures vivid, the phrases full of force.
  2. 3. Tennyson has used his highest art in the composition, and makes the sound of his lines imitate in no feeble way the noise of battle. For instance: