How a feast of the Round Table was holden, and how Kondrie bare tidings of Parzival's election to the Grail Kingdom, and summoned him, his wife, and his son Lohengrin, to Monsalväsch; and how Parzival and Feirefis rode thither with Kondrie as their guide.
BOOK XV
FEIREFIS
Now many were sorely angered that I told not this tale afore
Since it wearied them naught in the hearing—Now my words I withhold no more,
But I give ye to wit full truly, as my mouth may the story tell,
The end of this wondrous venture for methinks it shall please ye well.
Ye shall know how the king, Anfortas, of his wound was made whole again— 5
Of the queen doth the venture tell us, who in far Pelrapär did reign;
How she kept a pure heart and loyal till the day of her great reward,
And earth's fairest crown was her guerdon at the hand of her faithful lord.
Ye shall hear the tale of its winning, if my skill fail me not alway;
Yet first must ye list the labour that Parzival wrought that day. 10
Now, tho' dauntless his hand had striven, but as children his foemen all,
And ne'er would I risk my hero might I rule that which shall befall.
I must sorrow sore for his peril, and fain would I speak him free,
But now must I trust that Good Fortune the shield of his heart may be.
For purity, and high courage, side by side in his heart they lay, 15
And ne'er had he cherished cowardice, nor shrunk from the knightly fray;
And I deem this shall surely give him such strength he his life may hold,
Since fierce strife draweth nigh unto him, and his foe is a hero bold.
For he meeteth a prince of battles who dauntless to strife doth ride,
And unbaptized was the foeman who rode here in his heathen pride. 20
Full soon had he come, our hero, to a mighty woodland shade,
And without, in the light of the dawning, his armour a knight displayed.
'Twere a marvel could I, a poor man, of the riches now speak to ye
That the heathen he bare as his decking, so costly their worth should be.
If more than enough I told ye, yet more would be left to tell; 25
Yet I would not his wealth were hidden—What of riches, I ween, shall dwell
In Bretagne alike and England, and be tribute to Arthur's might,
They had paid not the stones that, shining, glowed fair on his armour bright.
His blazoned coat was costly, and naught but the truth I say,
Ruby and Chalcedony, ye had held them not fair that day. 30
And bright as the sun was his vesture, on the mount of Agremontein,
In the glowing fires, Salamanders had welded that garment's shine.
There jewels rare and precious, with never a fault or flaw,
Glowed dark and light; of their nature, I ween, I can tell no more!
His desire was for love's rewarding, and the winning of high renown, 35
He had won from the hands of fair women the jewels that his pride did crown.
For the favour Frau Minne showed him with joy did his proud heart beat,
And it swelled high with manly courage, as is for a lover meet.
As reward for his deeds of knighthood on his helmet a beast he bare,
Ecidemon, all poisonous serpents they must of its power beware, 40
For of life and of strength doth it rob them, if they smell it but from afar—
Thopedissimonté, Assigarzionté, Thasmé, and Arabia,
They scarce of such silk might boast them as was covering for his steed—
He sought, that mighty heathen, in a woman's love his meed,
And therefore he bravely decked him, and fain would his courage prove, 45
And his manhood, it urged him onward to battle for sake of love.
Now the knight, so young and gallant, in a haven beside the wood,
But little known, on the water had anchored his ships so good.
And his armies were five-and-twenty, and they knew not each other's speech—
'Twas a token fair of his riches, and the lands that his power might reach, 50
As the armies, so were the kingdoms that did service unto his hand—
And Moors and Saracens were they, and unlike was each warlike band,
And the hue of their skins was diverse—Thus gathered from lands afar
Ye might see in his mighty army strange weapons of heathen war.