"Then Percivale ran home as fast as he could and said to his mother: 'Mother, I saw some knights in the forest, and one of them told me that he was not a knight always, but King Arthur made him one, and before that he was a young man like me. And now I want to go to King Arthur, too, and ask him to make me a knight, so that I can wear bright iron things like them and ride on a big horse.'
"The instant that she heard the word 'knights' the mother knew that all her care was lost. The boy was a man now. He had seen what other men were like and she knew that he would never be happy again till he was like the rest of them. Before her mind, all at once, everything came back—the court, the field of the tournament, the men all dressed in steel, with their sharp, cruel spears, the gleaming lines charging against each other, the knights falling from their horses and rolling on the ground. Her brain whirled around as she thought of all this, and her one last son in the midst of it, to be killed, perhaps, as the rest had been. But she knew that he must go—that he would go—nothing could keep him with her now.
"'My son,' she said, 'if you will leave me and be a knight, like those that you have seen, go to King Arthur. His are the best of knights and among them you will learn all that you ought to know. Before you are a knight the King will make you swear that you will be always loyal and upright, that you will be faithful, gentle, and merciful, and that you will fight for the right of the poor and the weak. Percivale, some knights forget these things, after they have sworn them, but you will not forget. Remember them the more because I tell them to you now. Be ready always to help those who need help most, the poor and the weak and the old and children and women. Keep yourself in the company of wise men and talk with them and learn of them. Percivale, the King will make you swear, too, that you will fear shame more than death. And I tell you that. I have lost your father and your brothers, but I would rather lose you, too, than not to know that you feared shame more than death.'
"Then, from the horses that his mother had, Percivale chose the one he thought the best. It was not a war horse, of course, and it was not even a good saddle horse, but it would carry him. He put some old pieces of cloth on the horse's back, for a saddle, and with more of these, and bits of cord and woven twigs he tried to make something to look like the trappings that he had seen on the horses of the knights. Then he found a long pole and sharpened the end of it, to make it look like a spear. When he had done all that he could he got on the back of the horse, bade his mother good-by, and rode away to find the court of King Arthur.
"The King and the Queen and their knights were in the great hall of the castle at Camelot, when a strange knight, dressed in red armor, came in and walked straight to where the King and the Queen sat. A page was just offering to the Queen a gold goblet of wine. The red knight seized the goblet and threw the wine in the Queen's face. Then he said: 'If there is any one here who is bold enough to avenge this insult to the Queen and to bring back this goblet, let him follow me and I will wait for him in the meadow near the castle!' Then he left the hall, took his horse, which he had left at the door, and went to the meadow.
"In the hall all the knights jumped from their places. But for an instant they only stood and stared at one another. They remembered the Green Knight, and they thought that this other knight would never dare to do what he had done, unless he had some magic to guard him against them. I am sure that in a moment some one of them would have gone after him, but just in that moment a strange-looking young man rode straight into the hall, on a poor, old, boney horse. He looked so queer, with his simple dress and the saddle and trappings that he had made himself, and his rough pole for a spear, that the knights almost forgot the insult to the Queen in looking at him, and some of them laughed as they saw him ride through the hall toward the King, with no more thought of fear than if he had been a king himself. He came to where Kay, King Arthur's seneschal, stood, and said to him: 'Tall man, is that King Arthur who sits there?'
"'What do you want with King Arthur?' said Kay.
"'My mother told me,' the young man answered, 'to come to King Arthur and be made a knight by him.'
"'You are not fit to be a knight,' said Kay; 'go back to your cows and your goats.' Kay was a rough sort of fellow and he was always saying unpleasant things without waiting to find out what he was talking about.
"Then a dwarf came close to the boy and cried out: 'Percivale, you are welcome here! I know that you will be one of the best of knights, for I knew your father and your brothers, and they were all good knights!'