‘A, now thou haste broke my byddynge!
Why hast thou do so, thow false man?
Another bode thou muste me brynge,’” etc.
Note G, p. [130].—It would be impossible, within the limits of such a book as this, to pass in review all the English Arthurian literature of the nineteenth century. William Morris’s Defence of Guinevere, King Arthur’s Tomb, and other Arthurian poems doubtless breathe much more of the primitive romantic spirit of the legends than Tennyson’s Idylls, but they are but slight experiments in comparison with Tennyson’s elaborate design. Then there are other works like Heber’s Morte Arthur, Lytton’s King Arthur, and Hawker of Morwenstow’s Quest of the Sangreal, which claim a place in any full survey of modern Arthurian literature, but are hardly of sufficient importance to have required notice in so brief a chapter as the last had, necessarily, to be.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
[The following list comprises only a brief selection of books likely to be of most use and interest to the English reader. Welsh, French and German authorities are left entirely out of account.]
Six Old English Chronicles. Translated by J. A. Giles. Bohn’s Series. (Contains useful translations of Gildas, Nennius, and Geoffrey of Monmouth.)
Geoffrey of Monmouth. History of the Kings of Britain, translated by Dr Sebastian Evans. The Temple Classics (Dent).
The Four Ancient Books of Wales. Edited, with translations, by Dr W. F. Skene. Edinburgh, 1868.
The Mabinogion. Translated by Lady Charlotte Guest. The best popular edition is that of A. Nutt, and is especially valuable for his critical notes at the end.