NOW, after Sir Galahad had smitten down Sir Launcelot, as aforetold of, he rode for a long while in a wild forest and had many adventures of divers sorts, of which no account hath been given, though mention is made of them in the ancient histories of those things which I have read. That while he dwelt in the forest and slept in the forest, and was fed, when he was an hungered, by the people of the forest.
So it befell that one morning he rode out from the forest and found himself in an open country that sloped down very deep to a valley, as though it were a deep bowl of the earth.
Sir Galahad beholds several knights in the valley.
And Sir Galahad sat upon his horse on the edge of that bowl and gazed down into it. And he beheld a great way off a castle; and he beheld that there was a concourse of many knights gathered about that castle. For the early sunlight shone down upon the armor of those knights, so that the armor caught the light and flung it back again as it were in brilliant points of pure and blazing flame.
Then Sir Galahad said to himself, “What is that concourse of knights, and why gather they around about that castle in such a wise?” And he said to himself, “I will ride down thither into the valley, and will see for myself what is the meaning of that assembly.”
Sir Galahad bespeaketh those knights.
So therewith he drew rein and descended down into the valley as he proposed to himself to do. And so he approached ever nearer to that distant castle. So by and by he was near enough to them to bespeak them, and when he had come still a little nearer he said to them, “Messires, what is this that you do at this place?” They say to him, “Sir, at this place there was not long since held a tournament of eight knights. In that tournament a certain young knight was slain. We be his relatives and his friends who have come hither to avenge him. So we wait here outside the castle, and those seven knights hide them away from us within the walls of the castle.”
“For shame!” said Sir Galahad. “For shame, that ye who are several should thus besiege seven men who cannot stand against ye. Get you gone and let them come forth.”
They say to him, “We will not get us gone from this place until we have taken those seven men with us. Because it is for that purpose we have come hither and for that purpose shall we stay until it be achieved.”
“Well, then,” said Sir Galahad, “I will assail ye upon this side, and then they will come forth and assail ye upon the other side, and so will we raise this siege.”