Two hundred years passed away in these delights, and seemed to Ogier but twenty: Charlemagne and all his lineage had failed, and even the race of Ogier was extinct, when the Paynims invaded France and Italy in vast numbers; and Morgue no longer thought herself justified in withholding Ogier from the defence of the faith. Accordingly, she one day took the Lethean crown from off his head: immediately all his old ideas rushed on his mind, and inflamed him with an ardent desire to revisit his country. The Fairy gave him a brand which was to be preserved from burning, for so long as it was unconsumed, so long should his life extend. She adds to her gift the horse Papillon and his comrade Benoist. "And when they were both mounted, all the ladies of the castle came to take leave of Ogier, by the command of king Arthur and of Morgue la Faye, and they sounded an aubade of instruments, the most melodious thing to hear that ever was listened to; then, when the aubade was finished, they sung with the voice so melodiously, that it was a thing so melodious that it seemed actually to Ogier that he was in Paradise. Again, when that was over, they sung with the instruments in such sweet concordance that it seemed rather to be a thing divine than mortal."[81] The knight then took leave of all, and a cloud, enveloping him and his companion, raised them, and set them down by a fair fountain near Montpellier. Ogier displays his ancient prowess, routs the infidels, and on the death of the king is on the point of espousing the queen, when Morgue appears and takes him back to Avalon. Since then Ogier has never reappeared in this world.
Nowhere is a Faerie of the second kind so fully and circumstantially described as in the beautiful romance of Orfeo and Heurodis. There are, indeed, copious extracts from this poem in Sir Walter Scott's Essay on the Fairies of Popular Superstition; and we have no excuse to offer for repeating what is to be found in a work so universally diffused as the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, but that it is of absolute necessity for our purpose, and that romantic poetry is rarely unwelcome.
Orfeo and Heurodis were king and queen of Winchester. The queen happening one day to sleep under an ymp[82] tree in the palace orchard, surrounded by her attendants, had a dream, which she thus relates to the king:
As I lay this undertide (afternoon)
To sleep under the orchard-side,
There came to me two faire knightes
Well arrayed allè rightes,
And bade me come without lettíng
To speakè with their lord the king;
And I answér'd with wordès bolde
That I ne durstè ne I nolde:
Fast again they can (did) drive,
Then came their kingè all so blive (quick)
With a thousand knights and mo,
And with ladies fifty also,
And riden all on snow-white steedes,
And also whitè were their weedes.
I sey (saw) never sith I was borne
So fairè knightès me by forne.
The kingè had a crown on his head,
It was not silver ne gold red;
All it was of precious stone,
As bright as sun forsooth it shone.
All so soon he to me came,
Wold I, nold I he me name (took),
And madè me with him ride
On a white palfrey by his side,
And brought me in to his palís,
Right well ydight over all ywis.
He shewed me castels and toures,
Meadows, rivers, fields and flowres,
And his forests everiche one,
And sith he brought me again home.
The fairy-king orders her, under a dreadful penalty, to await him next morning under the ymp tree. Her husband and ten hundred knights stand in arms round the tree to protect her,
And yet amiddès them full right
The queenè was away y-twight (snatched);
With Faëry forth y-nome (taken);
Men wist never where she was become.
Orfeo in despair abandons his throne, and retires to the wilderness, where he solaces himself with his harp, charming with his melody the wild beasts, the inhabitants of the spot. Often while here,
He mightè see him besides
Oft in hot undertides
The king of Faëry with his rout
Come to hunt him all about,
With dim cry and blowíng,
And houndes also with him barkíng.
Ac (yet) no beastè they no nome,
Ne never he nist whither they be come;
And other while he might them see
As a great hostè by him te.[83]
Well atourned ten hundred knightes
Each well y-armed to his rightes,
Of countenancè stout and fierce,
With many displayéd bannérs,
And each his sword y-drawè hold;
Ac never he nistè whither they wold.
And otherwhile he seigh (saw) other thing,
Knightès and levedis (ladies) come dauncíng
In quaint attirè guisëly,
Quiet pace and softëly.
Tabours and trumpès gede (went) him by,
And allè manere minstracy.
And on a day he seigh him beside
Sixty levedis on horse ride,
Gentil and jolif as brid on ris (bird on branch),
Nought o (one) man amonges hem ther nis,
And each a faucoun on hond bare,
And riden on hauken by o rivér.
Of game they found well good haunt,
Mallardes, heron, and cormeraunt.
The fowlès of the water ariseth,
Each faucoun them well deviseth,
Each faucoun his preyè slough[84] (slew).
Among the ladies he recognises his lost queen, and he determines to follow them, and attempt her rescue.
In at a roche (rock) the levedis rideth,
And he after and nought abideth.
When he was in the roche y-go
Well three milès other (or) mo,
He came into a fair countráy
As bright soonne summers day,
Smooth and plain and allè grene,
Hill ne dale nas none y-seen.
Amiddle the lond a castel he seigh,
Rich and real and wonder high.
Allè the utmostè wall
Was clear and shinè of cristal.
An hundred towers there were about,
Deguiselich and batailed stout.
The buttras come out of the ditch,
Of redè gold y-arched rich.
The bousour was anowed all
Of each manere diverse animal.
Within there werè widè wones
All of precious stones.
The worstè pillar to behold
Was all of burnished gold.
All that lond was ever light,
For when it should be therk (dark) and night,
The richè stonès lightè gonne (yield[85])
Bright as doth at nonne the sonne,
No man may tell ne think in thought
The richè work that there was wrought.