During the trip across the Irish Channel, Tristram entertains Princess Iseult with songs and tales, until he becomes so thirsty that he begs for a drink. By mistake the love-potion is brought, and, as Iseult graciously dips her lips in the cup before handing it to her entertainer, it comes to pass both partake of the magic draught, and thus become victims of a passion which naught can cure. Still, as their intentions remain perfectly honorable, they continue the journey to Cornwall, and, in spite of all he suffers, Tristram delivers the reluctant bride into his uncle's hands.
Some legends claim that Iseult made her maid Brengwain take her place by the king's side on their wedding night, and that, although the Irish princess dwelt in the palace at Cornwall, she never proved untrue to her lover Tristram. The romances now give us stolen interviews, temporary elopements, and hair-breadth escapes from all manner of dangers. Once, for instance, Iseult is summoned by her husband to appear before the judges and clear herself from all suspicion of infidelity by taking a public oath in their presence. By Iseult's directions, Tristram, disguised as a mendicant, carries her ashore from the boat, begging for a kiss as reward. This enables the queen to swear truthfully that she has never been embraced by any man save King Mark and the mendicant who carried her ashore!
Tristram—like Launcelot—deeply feels the baseness of his conduct toward his uncle and often tries to tear himself away, but the spell of the magic potion is too powerful to break. Once remorse and shame actually drive him mad, and he roams around the country performing all manner of crazy deeds.
He too, when restored to his senses, visits Arthur's court, is admitted to the Round Table, and joins in the Quest for the Holy Grail, which, of course, he cannot achieve. Then he does marvels in the matter of hunting and fighting, and, having received another dangerous wound, wonders who besides Iseult of Cornwall can cure it? It is then he hears for the first time of Iseult of Brittany (or of the White Hands), whose skill in such matters is proverbial, and, seeking her aid, is soon made whole. But meantime the physician has fallen in love with her patient, and fancies her love is returned because every lay he sings is in praise of Iseult!
Her brother, discovering her innocent passion, reveals it to Tristram, who, through gratitude or to drive the remembrance of his guilty passion out of his mind, finally marries her. But even marriage cannot make him forget Iseult of Cornwall. The time comes when, wounded beyond the power of his wife's skill to cure, Tristram sends for Iseult of Cornwall, who, either owing to treachery or to accident, arrives too late, and dies of grief on her lover's corpse.
Some legends vary greatly in the manner of Tristram's death, for he is sometimes slain by King Stark, who is justly angry to find him in his wife's company. Most of the versions, however, declare that the lovers were buried side by side, and that creepers growing out of their respective graves twined lovingly around each other.
Other beautiful episodes which are taken from old Welsh versions of the Arthurian legends are the stories of Geraint and Enid, of Pelleas and Ettarre, of Gareth and Lynette, which have received their latest and most beautiful setting at the hands of the poet-laureate Tennyson, and the very tragic and pathetic tale of the twin brothers Balin and Balan, who, after baleful happenings galore, failing to recognize each other, fight until one deals the "dolorous stroke" which kills his brother.
Were any one patient enough to count the characters, duels, and hair-breadth escapes in Malory's Morte d'Arthur, the sum might well appall a modern reader. Magic, too, plays a prominent part in the Arthurian cycle, where Merlin, by means of a magic ring given by the Lady of the Lake to her sister Vivien, becomes so infatuated with the latter lady, that she is able to coax from him all his secrets, and even to learn the spell whereby a mortal can be kept alive although hidden from all eyes. Having obtained the magic formula by bringing all her coquettish wiles to bear upon besotted old Merlin, Vivien is said to have decoyed the wizard either to an enchanted castle, where she enclosed him in a stone sepulchre, or into the forest of Broceliande, in Brittany, where she left him, spellbound in a flowering thorn-bush. Another legend, however, claims that, having grown old and forgetful, Merlin absent-mindedly attempted to sit down in the Siege Perilous, only to be swallowed up by the yawning chasm which opened beneath his feet.
It was at the height of Arthur's prosperity and fame that the knights of the Round Table solemnly pledged themselves to undertake the Quest of the Holy Grail, as is described in the chapter on that subject. Their absence, the adultery of the queen, and the king's consciousness of past sins cast such a gloom over the once brilliant reunions of Camelot and Caerleon, as well as over the whole land, that Arthur's foes became bolder, and troubles thickened in an ominous way. Finally, most of the knights returned from the Quest sadder and wiser men, Launcelot was banished by the king to Joyous Garde, and was therefore not at hand when the last great fight occurred. Mordred, the Judas of the Arthurian cycle—whom some poets represent as the illegitimate and incestuous son of Arthur, while others merely make him a nephew of the king—rebels against Arthur, who engages in his last battle, near the Castle of Tintagel, where he was born.
In this encounter all are slain on both sides, and Arthur, having finally killed the traitor Mordred, after receiving from him a grievous wound, finds no one near to help or sustain him save Sir Bedevere. Knowing his wonderful blade Excalibure must return to its donor ere he departs, Arthur thrice orders his henchman to cast it into the mere. Twice Sir Bedevere hides the sword instead of obeying, but the third time, having exactly carried out the royal orders, he reports having seen a hand rise out of the Lake, catch and brandish Excalibure, and vanish beneath the waters with it! Arthur is next carried by Sir Bedevere down to the water's edge, where a mysterious barge receives the almost dying king. In this barge are three black-veiled queens,—the king's step-sisters,—and, when Arthur's head has been tenderly laid in the lap of Morgana the Fay, he announces he is about to sail off to the Isle of Avalon "to be healed of his wound." Although the Isle of Avalon was evidently a poetical mediaeval version of the "bourne whence no man returns," people long watched for Arthur's home-coming, for he was a very real personage to readers of epics and romances in the Middle Ages.