Multimedia Mania/abacus-multimedia-mania.iso/dp/0126/01266.txt

Text File | 1993-07-27 | 16KB | 296 lines

$Unique_ID{bob01266}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{(A) Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Preface}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Twain, Mark}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{sir
launcelot
unto
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kay
knight
time
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book
horse
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audio
hear
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see
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see
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}
$Date{1889}
$Log{Hear Our Narrator*49280019.aud
See Mark Twain*0126601.scf
See The Curious Stranger*0126602.scf
}
Title:       (A) Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Author:      Twain, Mark
Date:        1889

Preface

     The ungentle laws and customs touched upon in this tale are historical,
and the episodes which are used to illustrate them are also historical.  It is
not pretended that these laws and customs existed in England in the sixth
century; no, it is only pretended that inasmuch as they existed in the English
and other civilizations of far later times, it is safe to consider that it is
no libel upon the sixth century to suppose them to have been in practice in
that day also.  One is quite justified in inferring that wherever one of these
laws or customs was lacking in that remote time, its place was competently
filled by a worse one.

     The question as to whether there is such a thing as divine right of kings
is not settled in this book.  It was found too difficult.  That the executive
head of a nation should be a person of lofty character and extraordinary
ability was manifest and indisputable; that none but the Deity could select
that head unerringly was also manifest and indisputable; that the Deity ought
to make that selection, then, was likewise manifest and indisputable;
consequently, that He does make it, as claimed, was an unavoidable deduction.
I mean, until the author of this book encountered the Pompadour and Lady
Castlemaine and some other executive heads of that kind; these were found so
difficult to work into the scheme that it was judged better to take the other
tack in this book (which must be issued this fall) and then go into training
and settle the question in another book.  It is of course a thing which ought
to be settled, and I am not going to have anything particular to do next
winter anyway.

Mark Twain
Hartford, July 21, 1889

[See Mark Twain: After his return from his tour around the world.]

A Word of Explanation

[Hear Our Narrator]
The stranger did all the talking.

     It was in Warwick Castle that I came across the curious stranger whom I
am going to talk about.  He attracted me by three things: his candid
simplicity, his marvelous familiarity with ancient armor, and the restfulness
of his company - for he did all the talking.  We fell together, as modest
people will, in the tail of the herd that was being shown through, and he at
once began to say things which interested me.  As he talked along, softly,
pleasantly, flowingly, he seemed to drift away imperceptibly out of this world
and time, and into some remote era and old forgotten country; and so he
gradually wove such a spell about me that I seemed to move among the specters
and shadows and dust and mold of a gray antiquity, holding speech with a relic
of it!  Exactly as I would speak of my nearest personal friends or enemies, or
my most familiar neighbors, he spoke of Sir Bedivere, Sir Bors de Ganis, Sir
Launcelot of the Lake, Sir Galahad, and all the other great names of the Table
Round - and how old, old, unspeakably old and faded and dry and musty and
ancient he came to look as he went on!  Presently he turned to me and said,
just as one might speak of the weather or any other common matter -

[See The Curious Stranger: It was in Warwick Castle that I came across the
curious stranger whom I am going to talk about.]

     "You know about transmigration of souls; do you know about transposition
of epochs - and bodies?"

     I said I had not heard of it.  He was so little interested - just as when
people speak of the weather - that he did not notice whether I made him any
answer or not.  There was half a moment of silence, immediately interrupted by
the droning voice of the salaried cicerone:

     "Ancient hauberk, date of the sixth century, time of King Arthur and the
Round Table; said to have belonged to the knight Sir Sagramorele Desirous;
observe the round hole through the chain-mail in the left breast; can't be
accounted for; supposed to have been done with a bullet since invention of
firearms - perhaps maliciously by Cromwell's soldiers."

     My acquaintance smiled - not a modern smile, but one that must have gone
out of general use many, many centuries ago - and muttered apparently to
himself:

     "Wit ye well, I saw it done." Then, after a pause, added: "I did it
myself."

     By the time I had recovered from the electric surprise of this remark,
he was gone.

     All that evening I sat by my fire at the Warwick Arms, steeped in a dream
of the olden time, while the rain beat upon the windows, and the wind roared
about the eaves and corners.  From time to time I dipped into old Sir Thomas
Malory's enchanting book and fed at its rich feast of prodigies and
adventures, breathed-in the fragrance of its obsolete names, and dreamed
again.  Midnight being come at length, I read another tale, for a nightcap -
this which here follows, to wit:

How Sir Launcelot Slew Two Giants, And Made A Castle Free

          Anon withal came there upon him two great giants, well armed, all
     save the heads, with two horrible clubs in their hands.  Sir Launcelot
     put his shield afore him, and put the stroke away of the one giant, and
     with his sword he clave his head asunder.  When his fellow saw that, he
     ran away as he were wood,^* for fear of the horrible strokes, and Sir
     Launcelot after him with all his might, and smote him on the shoulder,
     and clave him to the middle.  Then Sir Launcelot went into the hall, and
     there came afore him three score ladies and damsels, and all kneeled unto
     him, and thanked God and him of their deliverance.  For, sir, said they,
     the most part of us have been here this seven year their prisoners, and
     we have worked all manner of silk works for our meat, and we are all
     great gentlewomen born, and blessed be the time, knight, that ever thou
     wert born; for thou hast done the most worship that ever did knight in
     the world, that will we bear record, and we all pray you to tell us your
     name, that we may tell our friends who delivered us out of prison.  Fair
     damsels, he said, my name is Sir Launcelot du Lake.  And so he departed
     from them and betaught them unto God.  And then he mounted upon his
     horse, and rode into many strange and wild countries, and through many
     waters and valleys, and evil was he lodged.  And at the last by fortune
     he happened against a night to come to a fair courtelage, and therein he
     found an old gentlewoman that lodged him with a good will, and there he
     had good cheer for him and his horse.  And when time, was, his host
     brought him into a fair garret over the gate to his bed.  There Sir
     Launcelot unarmed him, and set his harness by him, and went to be, and
     anon he fell on sleep.  So, soon after there came one on horseback, and
     knocked at the gate in great haste.  And when Sir Launcelot heard this he
     arose up, and looked out at the window, and saw by the moon-light three
     knights come riding after that one man, and all three lashed on him at
     once with swords, and that one knight turned on them knightly again and
     defended him.  Truly, said Sir Launcelot, yonder one knight shall I help,
     for it were shame for me to see three knights on one, and if he be slain
     I am partner of his death.  And therewith he took his harness and went
     out at a window by a sheet down to the four knights, and then Sir
     Launcelot said on high, Turn you knights unto me, and leave your fighting
     with that knight.  And then they all three left Sir Kay, and turned unto
     Sir Launcelot, and there began great battle, for they alight all three,
     and strake many strokes at Sir Launcelot, and assailed him on every side.
     Then Sir Kay dressed him for to have holpen Sir Launcelot.  Nay, sir,
     said he, I will none of your help, therefore as ye will have my
     help let me alone with them.  Sir Kay for the pleasure of the knight
     suffered him for to do his will, and so stood aside.  And then anon
     within six strokes Sir Launcelot had stricken them to the earth.

[Footnote *: Demented.]

          And then they all three cried, Sir knight, we yield us unto you as
     man of might matchless.  As to that, said Sir Launcelot, I will not take
     your yielding unto me, but so that ye yield you unto Sir Kay the
     seneschal, on that covenant I will save your lives and else not.  Fair
     knight, said they, that were we loth to do; for as Sir Kay we chased him
     hither, and had overcome him had ye not been; therefore, to yield us unto
     him it were no reason.  Well, as to that, said Sir Launcelot, advise you
     well, for ye may choose whether ye will die or live, for an ye be
     yielden, it shall be unto Sir Kay.  Fair knight, then they said, in
     saving our lives we will do as thou commandest us.  Then shall ye, said
     Sir Launcelot, on Whitsunday next coming go unto the court of King
     Arthur, and there shall ye yield you unto Queen Guenever, and put you all
     three in her grace and mercy, and say that Sir Kay sent you thither to be
     her prisoners.  On the morn Sir Launcelot arose early, and left Sir Kay
     sleeping: and Sir Launcelot took Sir Kay's armour and his shield and
     armed him, and so he went to the stable and took his horse, and took his
     leave of his host, and so he departed.  Then soon after arose Sir Kay and
     missed Sir Launcelot: and then he espied that he had his armour and his
     horse.  Now by my faith I know well that he will grieve some of the court
     of King Arthur: for on him knights will be bold, and deem that it is I,
     and that will beguile them; and because of his armour and shield I am
     sure I shall ride in peace.  And then soon after departed Sir Kay, and
     thanked his host.

     As I laid the book down there was a knock at the door, and my stranger
came in.  I gave him a pipe and a chair and made him welcome.  I also
comforted him with a hot Scotch whiskey; gave him another one; then still
another - hoping always for his story.  After a fourth persuader, he drifted
into it himself, in a quite simple and natural way:

The Stranger's History

          I am an American.  I was born and reared in Hartford in the State of
     Connecticut - anyway, just over the river, in the country.  So I am a
     Yankee of the Yankees - and practical; yes, and nearly barren of
     sentiment, I suppose - or poetry, in other words.  My father was a
     blacksmith, my uncle was a horse doctor, and I was both, along at first.
     Then I went over to the great arms factory and learned my real trade;
     learned all there was to it; learned to make everything; guns, revolvers,
     cannon, boilers, engines, all sorts of labor-saving machinery.  Why, I
     could make anything a body wanted - anything in the world, it didn't make
     any difference what; and if there wasn't any quick new-fangled way to
     make a thing, I could invent one - and do it as easy as rolling off a
     log.  I became head superintendent; had a couple of thousand men under
     me.

     Well, a man like that is a man that is full of fight - that goes without
saying.  With a couple of thousand rough men under one, one has plenty of
that sort of amusement.  I had, anyway.  At last I met my match, and I got my
dose.  It was during a misunderstanding conducted with crowbars with a fellow
we used to call Hercules.  He laid me out with a crusher alongside the head
that made everything crack, and seemed to spring every joint in my skull and
make it overlap its neighbor.  Then the world went out in darkness, and I
didn't feel anything more, and didn't know anything at all - at least for a
while.

     When I came to again, I was sitting under an oak tree, on the grass,
with a whole beautiful and broad country landscape all to myself - nearly.
Not entirely; for there was a fellow on a horse, looking down at me - a
fellow fresh out of a picture book.  He was in old-time iron armor from head
to heel, with a helmet on his head the shape of a nail keg with slits in it;
and he had a shield, and a sword, and a prodigious spear; and his horse had
armor on, too, and a steel horn projecting from his forehead, and gorgeous
red and green silk trappings that hung down all around him like a bed quilt,
nearly to the ground.

     "Fair sir, will ye just?" said this fellow.

     "Will I which?"

     "Will ye try a passage of arms for land or lady or for -"

     "What are you giving me?" I said.  "Get along back to your circus, or
I'll report you."

     Now what does this man do but fall back a couple of hundred yards and
then come rushing at me as hard as he could tear, with his nail keg bent down
nearly to his horse's neck and his long spear pointed straight ahead.  I saw
he meant business, so I was up the tree when he arrived.

     He allowed that I was his property, the captive of his spear.  There was
argument on his side - and the bulk of the advantage - so I judged it best to
humor him.  We fixed up an agreement whereby I was to go with him and he was
not to hurt me.  I came down, and we started away, I walking by the side of
his horse.  We marched comfortably along, through glades and over brooks which
I could not remember to have seen before - which puzzled me and made me
wonder - and yet we did not come to any circus or sign of a circus.  So I
gave up the idea of a circus, and concluded he was from an asylum.  But we
never came to any asylum - so I was up a stump, as you may say.  I asked him
how far we were from Hartford.  He said he had never heard of the place;
which I took to be a lie, but allowed it to go at that.  At the end of an
hour we saw a faraway town sleeping in a valley by a winding river; and
beyond it on a hill, a vast gray fortress, with towers and turrets, the first
I had ever seen out of a picture.

     "Bridgeport?" said I, pointing.

     "Camelot," said he.

     My stranger had been showing signs of sleepiness.  He caught himself
nodding, now, and smiled one of those pathetic, obsolete smiles of his, and
said:

     "I find I can't go on; but come with me, I've got it all written out,
and you can read it if you like."

     In his chamber, he said: "First, I kept a journal; then by and by, after
years, I took the journal and turned it into a book.  How long ago that was!"

     He handed me his manuscript, and pointed out the place where I should
begin:

     "Begin here - I've already told you what goes before."  He was steeped
in drowsiness by this time.  As I went out at his door I heard him murmur
sleepily: "Give you good den, fair sir."

     I sat down by my fire and examined my treasure.  The first part of it -
the great bulk of it - was parchment, and yellow with age.  I scanned a leaf
particularly and saw that it was a palimpsest.  Under the old dim writing of
the Yankee historian appeared traces of a penmanship which was older and
dimmer still - Latin words and sentences: fragments from old monkish legends,
evidently.  I turned to the place indicated by my stranger and began to read
- as follows.