When Sir Bors de Ganis went to Corbin, and saw Galahad, the son of Sir Launcelot, he prayed that the boy might prove as good a knight as his father, and instantly the white dove came with the golden censer, and the damsel bearing the Sancgraal, and told Sir Bors that Galahad would prove a better knight than his father, and would “achieve the Sancgreall;” then both dove and damsel vanished.—Pt. iii. 4.
Sir Percival, the son of Sir Pellinore, king of Wales, after his combat with Sir Ector de Maris (brother of Sir Launcelot), caught a sight of the Holy Graal, and both were cured of their wounds thereby. Like Sir Bors, he was with Sir Galahad when the quest was achieved (pt. iii. 14). Sir Launcelot was also miraculously cured in the same way (pt. iii. 18).
King Arthur, the queen, and all the 150 knights saw the Holy Graal as they sat at supper when Galahad was received into the fellowship of the Round Table:
First they heard a crackling and crying of thunder ... and in the midst of the blast entered a sun-beam more clear by seven times than ever they saw day, and all were lighted of the grace of the Holy Ghost ... then there entered the hall the Holy Greal [consecrated bread] covered with white samite; but none might see it, nor who bare it ... and when the Holy Greal had been borne thro’ the hall, the vessel suddenly departed.—Sir T. Malory, History of Prince Arthur, iii. 35 (1470).
⁂ The chief romances of the St. Graal are: Parceval le Gallois, by Chrétien de Troyes, in verse, and Roman des Diverses Quêtes de St. Graal, by Walter Mapes, in prose, both written in the latter part of the twelfth century; Titurel, or the Guardian of the Holy Graal, by Wolfram von Eschenbach; the Romance of Parzival, by the same—partly founded upon the poem of Chrétien—and the Life of Joseph of Arimathēa, by Robert de Borron, all belonging to the early part of the thirteenth century; The Holy Grail, by Tennyson.
Gracchi (The). Caius and Tiberius Gracchus, sons of the Roman matron, Cornelia, and leaders of the populace in several revolutions.
Grace (Lady), a sister of Lady Townly, and the engaged wife of Mr. Manly. The very opposite of a lady of fashion. She says:
“In summer I could pass my leisure hours in reading, walking, ... or sitting under a green tree: in dressing, dining, chatting with an agreeable friend; perhaps hearing a little music, taking a dish of tea, or a game at cards; managing my family, looking into its accounts, playing with my children ... or in a thousand other innocent amusements.”—Vanbrugh and Cibber, The Provoked Husband, iii. (1728).
“No person,” says George Colman, “has ever more successfully performed the elegant levities of ‘Lady Townly’ upon the stage, or more happily practiced the amiable virtues of ‘Lady Grace’ in the circles of society, than Miss Farren (the countess of Dirby, 1759-1829).”
Grace-be-here Humgudgeon, a corporal in Cromwell’s troop.—Sir W. Scott, Woodstock (time, Commonwealth).