Charles returned to Hugo master of the situation. He repeated that they had drunk too much wine the night before, and went on to say that it was an outrage on Hugo's part to set a spy in the room, and that they knew a land where such an act would be accounted villainy: "but all shall be carried out; choose who shall begin." Hugo said, Oliver; and let him not fall short of his boast, or I will cut off his head, and the other twelve shall share his fate. The next morning, in pursuance of an arrangement made between Oliver and the princess, the king was informed that what had been undertaken had been precisely discharged. "The first has saved himself," says Hugo; "by magic, I believe; now I wish to know about the rest." "What next?" says Charlemagne. William of Orange was called for, threw off his furs, lifted the huge ball with one hand, hurled it at the wall, and threw down more than forty toises. "They are enchanters," said the king to his men. "Now I should like to see if the rest will do as much. If one of them fails, I will hang them all to-morrow." "Do you want any more of the gabs?" asked Charles. Hugo called upon Bernard to do what he had threatened. Bernard asked the prayers of the emperor, ran down to the water, and made the sign of the cross. All the water left its bed, spread over the fields, came into the city, filled the cellars, drenched the people, and drove King Hugo into his highest tower; Charles and the peers being the while ensconced in an old pine-tree, all praying for God's pity.
Charles in the tree heard Hugo in the tower making his moan: he would give the emperor all his treasure, would become his man and hold his kingdom of him. The emperor was moved, and prayed that the flood might stop, and at once the water began to ebb. Hugo was able to descend from his tower, and he came to Charles, under an "ympe tree," and repeated what he had uttered in the moment of extremity. "Do you want the rest of the gabs?" asked Charles. "Ne de ceste semaine," replied Hugo. "Then, since you are my man," said the emperor, "we will make a holiday and wear our crowns together." When the French saw the two monarchs walking together, and Charles overtopping Hugo by fifteen inches, they said the queen was a fool to compare anybody with him.
After this promenade there was mass, at which Turpin officiated, and then a grand dinner. Hugo once more proffered all his treasures to Charles, but Charles would not take a denier. "We must be going," he said. The French mounted their mules, and went off in high spirits. Very happy was Charles to have conquered such a king without a battle. Charles went directly to St Denis, and performed his devotions. The nail and the crown he deposited on the altar, distributed the other relics over the kingdom, and for the love of the sepulchre he gave up his anger against the queen.
The story in the English ballad, so far as it is to be collected from our eight fragments, is that Arthur, represented as King of Little Britain, while boasting to Gawain of his round table, is told by Guenever that she knows of one immeasurably finer; the very trestle is worth his halls and his gold, and the palace it stands in is worth all Little Britain besides; but not a word will she say as to where this table and this goodly building may be. Arthur makes a vow never to sleep two nights in one place till he sees that round table; and, taking for companions Gawain, Tristram, Sir Bredbeddle, and an otherwise unknown Sir Marramiles, sets out on the quest.
The pilgrimage which, to save his dignity, Charles makes a cover for his visit to the rival king forms no part of Arthur's programme.[271] The five assume a palmer's weed simply for disguise, and travel east and west, in many a strange country, only to arrive at Cornwall, so very little a way from home.
The proud porter of Cornwall's gate, a minion swain, befittingly clad in a suit of gold, for his master is the richest king in Christendom, or yet in heathenness, is evidently impressed with Arthur's bearing, as is quite the rule in such cases:[272] he has been porter thirty years and three, but [has never seen the like]. Cornwall would naturally ask the pilgrims some questions. From their mentioning some shrine of Our Lady he infers that they have been in Britain,—Little Britain we must suppose to be meant. Cornwall asks if they ever knew King Arthur, and boasts that he had lived seven years in Little Britain, and had had a daughter by Arthur's wife, now a lady of radiant beauty, and Arthur has none such.[273] He then sends for his steed, which he can ride three times as far in a day as Arthur can any of his, and we may suppose that he also exhibits to his guests a horn and a sword of remarkable properties, and a Bur-low-Beanie, or Billy-Blin, a seven-headed, fire-breathing fiend whom he has in his service. Arthur is then conducted to bed, and the Billy-Blin, shut up, as far as we can make out, in some sort of barrel, or other vessel,[274] is set by Arthur's bed-side to hear and report the talk of the pilgrims. Now, it would seem, the knights make each their vow or brag. Arthur's is that he will be the death of Cornwall King before he sees Little Britain. Gawain, who represents Oliver, will have Cornwall's daughter home with him. Here there is an unlucky gap. Tristram should undertake to carry off the horn, Marramiles the steed, and Sir Bredbeddle the sword. But first it would be necessary to subdue the loathly fiend. Bredbeddle goes to work without dallying, bursts open the rub-chadler with his sword, and fights the fire-breathing monster in a style that is a joy to see; but sword, knife, and axe all break, and he is left without a weapon. Yet he had something better to fall back on, and that was a little book which he had found by the seaside, no doubt in the course of those long travels which conducted the pilgrims from Little Britain to Cornwall. It was probably a book of Evangiles; our Lord had written it with his hands and sealed it with his blood. With this little book, which in a manner takes the place of the relics in the French tale, for the safety of the pilgrims and the accomplishment of their vows are secured through it, Bredbeddle conjures the Burlow-beanie, and shuts him up till wanted in a "wall of stone," which reminds us of the place in which Hugo's spy is concealed. He then reports to Arthur, who has a great desire to see the fiend in all his terrors, and, upon the king's promising to stand firm, Bredbeddle makes the fiend start out again, with his seven heads and the fire flying out of his mouth. The Billy-Blin is now entirely amenable to command: Bredbeddle has only to "conjure" him to do a thing, and it is done. First he fetches down the steed. Marramiles, who perhaps had vowed to bring off the horse, considers that he is the man to ride him, but finds he can do nothing with him, and has to call on Bredbeddle for help. The Billy-Blin is required to tell how the steed is to be ridden, and reveals that three strokes of a gold wand which stands in Cornwall's study-window will make him spring like spark from brand. And so it comes out that Cornwall is a magician. Next the horn has to be fetched, but, when brought, it cannot be sounded. For this a certain powder is required. This the fiend procures, and Tristram blows a blast which rends the horn up to the midst.[275] Finally the Billy-Blin is conjured to fetch the sword, and with this sword Arthur goes and strikes off Cornwall's head. So Arthur keeps his vow, and, so far as we can see, all the rest are in a condition to keep theirs.
The English ballad retains too little of the French story to enable us to say what form of it this little was derived from. The poem of Galien would cover all that is borrowed as well as the Journey of Charlemagne. It may be regarded as an indication of late origin that in this ballad Arthur is king of Little Britain, that Bredbeddle and Marramiles are made the fellows of Gawain and Tristram, Bredbeddle carrying off all the honors, and that Cornwall has had an intrigue with Arthur's queen. The name Bredbeddle is found elsewhere only in the late Percy version of the romance of the Green Knight, Hales and Furnivall, II, 56, which version alludes to a custom of the Knights of the Bath, an order said to have been instituted by Henry IV at his coronation, in 1399.
The Färöe ballad, 'Geipa-táttur,' exists in four versions: A, Svabo's manuscript collection, 1782, III, 1, 85 stanzas; B, Sandøbog, 1822, p. 49, 140 stanzas; C, Fugløbog, c. 1840, p. 9, 120 stanzas; D, Syderø version, obtained by Hammershaimb, 1848, 103 stanzas.[276] It repeats the story of the Norse saga, with a moderate number of traditional accretions and changes. The emperor, from his throne, asks his champions where is his superior [equal]. They all drop their heads; no one ventures to answer but the queen, who better had been silent. "The emperor of Constantinople" (Hákin, D), she says, "is thy superior." "If he is not," answers Karl, "thou shalt burn on bale." In B, when they have already started for Constantinople, Turpin persuades them to go rather to Jerusalem: in the other versions it must be assumed that the holy city was on the route. As Karl enters the church the bells ring and the candles light of themselves, C, D. There are thirteen seats in the choir: Karl takes the one that Jesus had occupied, and the peers those of the apostles. A heathen tells the patriarch[277] that the Lord is come down from heaven, C, D. The patriarch proceeds to the church, with no attendance but his altar-book [singing from his altar-book]; he asks Karl what he has come for, and Karl replies, to see the halidoms, A, C, D. In B the patriarch presents himself to the emperor at his lodging, and inquires his purpose; and, learning that he is on his way to Constantinople, for glory, advises him first to go to the church, where the ways and means of success are to be found. The patriarch gives Karl some of the relics: the napkin on which Jesus had wiped his hands, cups from which he had drunk, etc. Karl, in A, C, now announces that he is on his way to Constantinople; the patriarch begs him not to go, for he will have much to suffer. At the exterior gate of the palace will be twelve white bears, ready to go at him; the sight of his sword [of the holy napkin, B] will cause them to fall stone-dead, or at least harmless, B. At the gate next within there will be twelve wolf-dogs[278] [and further on twelve toads, B], which must be disposed of in like wise: etc. The castle stands on a hundred pillars, A, and is full of ingenious contrivances: the floor goes up to the sky, and the roof comes down to the ground, B. Karl now sets out, with the patriarch's blessing and escort. Before they reach the palace they come upon three hundred knights and ladies dancing, which also had been foretold, and at the portals of the palace they find and vanquish the formidable beasts. The palace is to the full as splendid and as artfully constructed as they had been informed: the floor goes up and the roof comes down, B; there are monstrous figures (?), with horns at their mouths, and upon a wind rising the horns all sound, the building begins to revolve, and the Frenchmen jump up, each clinging to the other, B, C, D. Karl remembers what his wife had said, A, D.
Of the reception by the monarch of Constantinople nothing further is said. We are immediately taken to the bedroom, in which there are twelve beds, with a thirteenth in the middle, and also a stone arch, or vault, inside of which is a man with a candle. Karl proposes that they shall choose feats, make boasts, rouses [skemtar, jests, C]. These would inevitably be more or less deranged and corrupted in the course of tradition. A and C have lost many. Karl's boast, dropped in B, C, is that he will smite King Hákin, so that the sword's point shall stick in the ground, D; hit the emperor on the neck and knock him off his horse, A. Roland, in all, will blow the emperor's hair off his head with the blast of his horn. Oliver's remains as in the French poem. William of Orange's ball is changed to a bolt. The exploit with the horses and apples is assigned to Bernard in D, the only version which preserves it, as in the Norse saga; and, as in the saga again, it is Turpin, and not Bernard, who brings in the river upon the town, and forces the king to take refuge in the tower.
Early in the morning the spy reports in writing, and King Hákin, D, says that Karl and his twelve peers shall burn on the bale, A, C, D, if they cannot make good their boasts, B. Karl's queen appears to him in his sleep, A, and bids him think of last night's words. It is the queen of Constantinople in B, C, D who rouses Karl to a sense of his plight; in B she tells him that the brags have been reported, and that burning will be the penalty unless they be achieved. Karl then sees that his wife knew what she was saying, and vows to give her Hildarheim and a scarlet cloak if he gets home alive. He hastens to church; a dove descends from heaven and sits on his arm [in B a voice comes from heaven]; he is assured that the boasts shall all be performed, but never let such a thing be done again. In A three of the feats are executed, in D four, in C seven, Oliver's in each case strictly, and Turpin's, naturally, last. The king in C does the feat which is proposed by Eimer in the saga. A and C end abruptly with Turpin's exploit. In D Karl falls on his knees and prays, and the water retires; Karl rides out of Constantinople, followed three days on the road by Koronatus, as Hákin is now called, stanza 103: it is Karlamagnús that wears his crown higher. B takes a turn of its own. Roland, Olger and Oliver are called upon to do their brags. Roland blows so that nobody in Constantinople can keep his legs, and the emperor falls into the mud, but he blows not a hair off the emperor's head; Olger slings the gold-bolt over the wall, but breaks off none; Oliver gives a hundred kisses, as in the saga. The emperor remarks each time, I hold him no champion that performs his rouse that way. But Turpin's brag is thoroughly done; the emperor is driven to the tower, and begs Karl to turn off the water; no more feats shall be exacted. Now the two kaisers walk in the hall, conferring about tribute, which Karl takes and rides away. When he reaches home his queen welcomes him, and asks what happened at Constantinople: "Hvat gekk af?" "This," says Karl; "I know the truth now; you shall be queen as before, and shall have a voice in the rule."