So with that Sir Ector put up his sword again, and he and Sir Launcelot lifted the King and set him upon his horse once more. And the King wept bitter tears to see how noble and knightly was Sir Launcelot, and he said, “Ah, Launcelot, Launcelot, that this should be!”
So after that Sir Launcelot withdrew into the castle with the Queen and the gates were closed behind him. But ever King Arthur sat still weeping and saying, “Ah, Launcelot, Launcelot, that this should be!”
Then the friends of Sir Launcelot wist not what they should do in this extremity, for there were they within the castle again, and could not come out thence because of those who besieged them in that place. And ever they were growing weaker with each assault, but the armies of King Arthur were not growing weaker.
The Bishop of Rochester cometh to the King.
At this extremity there came the Bishop of Rochester to the camp of King Arthur, and the purpose of the Bishop was to make peace betwixt these parties. So the Bishop came to where King Arthur was, and he found King Arthur sunk in grief. For already three-and-twenty Knights of the Round Table had lost their lives in these wars and contentions, and King Arthur grieved for them very sorely. For there were no more knights like those first knights foregathered about the Round Table, nor have there ever been such knights as they were from that day to this.
Then the Bishop stood before the King, and the King looked at him remotely as though he were a great distance away, for his eyes were dimmed with weeping. And the Bishop said to the King, “Lord, let this quarrel cease between you and Sir Launcelot, and let there be peace in the land. For now is the entire land distracted with this quarrel. For friend fighteth against friend, neighbor against neighbor;—yea, even brother against brother. As for you, my lord, these knights are of your Round Table and of your making; what pleasure or what honor then can it be to you to destroy them?”
The King said to him, “Sir, this war was not of my forming or my seeking, but of Sir Launcelot’s. For first Sir Launcelot resisted arrest in a just cause, and then he resisted the arrest of the Queen. So he and his fellows took the Queen away from me, and they have her in this castle. Let them then deliver the Queen to me and there shall be peace betwixt the friends of Sir Launcelot and my friends.”
The Bishop intercedes for the Queen.
The Bishop said, “They will not deliver the Queen to thee, Lord, excepting thou wilt declare upon thine honor that no harm shall befall her. For it is said of all that the life of the Queen is in danger from thee. Yet she is an honorable lady and as pure to thee as the day upon which she came to thee. For she is free from sin or from guilt of any sort. Wherefore, unless thou wilt declare that no harm shall befall the life of the Queen and wilt declare that same in writing, she will not be returned, but otherwise they will lay down their lives to guard her safety.”
Then the King sat with his fist upon his forehead, and he considered for a long time what the Bishop had said, and at last he said, as in a smothered voice, “Well, then, let the Queen be delivered to me at Camelot, and I upon my part shall promise that no harm shall be done to her life, either to threaten it or to deprive her of it.” The Bishop said, “Let me have that in writing.” And the King said, “I will do so.”