Multimedia Mania/abacus-multimedia-mania.iso/dp/0130/01308.txt

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$Unique_ID{bob01308}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{(A) Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Chapter 42}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Twain, Mark}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{sir
mordred
yes
king
come
launcelot
now
cave
it's
arthur}
$Date{1889}
$Log{}
Title:       (A) Connecticut Yankee In King Arthur's Court
Author:      Twain, Mark
Date:        1889

Chapter 42

War!

     I found Clarence, alone in his quarters, drowned in melancholy; and in
place of the electric light, he had reinstituted the ancient rag-lamp, and
sat there in a grisly twilight with all curtains drawn tight.  He sprang up
and rushed for me eagerly, saying:

     "Oh, it's worth a billion milrays to look upon a live person again!"

     He knew me as easily as if I hadn't been disguised at all.  Which
frightened me; one may easily believe that.

     "Quick, now, tell me the meaning of this fearful disaster," I said.
"How did it come about?"

     "Well, if there hadn't been any Queen Guenever, it wouldn't have come so
early; but it would have come, anyway.  It would have come on your own
account, by and by; by luck, it happened to come on the queen's."

     "And Sir Launcelot's?"
     "Just so."

     "Give me the details."

     "I reckon you will grant that during some years there has been only one
pair of eyes in these kingdoms that has not been looking steadily askance at
the queen and Sir Launcelot -"

     "Yes, King Arthur's."

     -"and only one heart that was without suspicion -"

     "Yes - the king's; a heart that isn't capable of thinking evil of a
friend."

     "Well, the king might have gone on, still happy and unsuspecting, to the
end of his days, but for one of your modern improvements - the stock board.
When you left, three miles of the London, Canterbury and Dover were ready for
the rails, and also ready and ripe for manipulation in the stock market.  It
was wildcat, and everybody knew it.  The stock was for sale at a giveaway.
What does Sir Launcelot do, but -"

     "Yes, I know; he quietly picked up nearly all of it, for a song; then he
bought about twice as much more, deliverable upon call; and he was about to
call when I left."

     "Very well, he did call.  The boys couldn't deliver.  Oh, he had them -
and he just settled his grip and squeezed them.  They were laughing in their
sleeves over their smartness in selling stock to him at fifteen and sixteen
and along there, that wasn't worth ten.  Well, when they had laughed long
enough on that side of their mouths, they rested up that side by shifting the
laugh to the other side.  That was when they compromised with the Invincible
at two hundred eighty-three!"

     "Good land!"

     "He skinned them alive, and they deserved it - anyway, the whole kingdom
rejoiced.  Well, among the flayed were Sir Agravaine and Sir Mordred, nephews
to the king.  End of the first act.  Act second, scene first, an apartment in
Carlisle castle, where the court had gone for a few days' hunting.  Persons
present, the whole tribe of the king's nephews.  Mordred and Agravaine
propose to call the guileless Arthur's attention to Guenever and Sir
Launcelot.  Sir Gawaine, Sir Gareth, and Sir Gaheris will have nothing to do
with it.  A dispute ensues, with loud talk; in the midst of it, enter the
king.  Mordred and Agravaine spring their devastating tale upon him.
Tableau.  A trap is laid for Launcelot, by the king's command, and Sir
Launcelot walks into it.  He made it sufficiently uncomfortable for the
ambushed witnesses - to wit, Mordred, Agravaine, and twelve knights of lesser
rank, for he killed every one of them but Mordred; but of course that
couldn't straighten matters between Launcelot and the king, and didn't."

     "Oh, dear, only one thing could result - I see that.  War, and the
knights of the realm divided into a king's party and a Sir Launcelot's party."

     "Yes - that was the way of it.  The king sent the queen to the stake,
proposing to purify her with fire.  Launcelot and his knights rescued her,
and in doing it slew certain good old friends of yours and mine - in fact,
some of the best we ever had, to wit: Sir Belias le Orgulous, Sir Segwarides,
Sir Griflet le Fils de Dieu, Sir Brandiles, Sir Aglovale"-

     "Oh, you tear out my heartstrings."

     - "wait, I'm not done yet - Sir Tor, Sir Gauter, Sir Gillimer -"

     "The very best man in my subordinate nine.  What a handy right fielder
he was!"

     - "Sir Reynold's three brothers, Sir Damus, Sir Priamus, Sir Kay the
Stranger" -

     "My peerless shortstop!  I've seen him catch a daisy cutter in his
teeth.  Come, I can't stand this!"

     - "Sir Driant, Sir Lambegus, Sir Herminde, Sir Pertilope, Sir Perimones,
and - whom do you think?"

     "Rush!  Go on."

     "Sir Gaheris, and Sir Gareth - both!"

     "Oh, incredible!  Their love for Launcelot was indestructible."

     "Well, it was an accident.  They were simply onlookers; they were
unarmed, and were merely there to witness the queen's punishment.  Sir
Launcelot smote down whoever came in the way of his blind fury, and he killed
these without noticing who they were.  Here is an instantaneous photograph
one of our boys got of the battle; it's for sale on every newsstand.  There -
the figures nearest the queen are Sir Launcelot with his sword up, and Sir
Gareth gasping his latest breath.  You can catch the agony in the queen's
face through the curling smoke.  It's a rattling battle picture."

     "Indeed it is.  We must take good care of it; its historical value is
incalculable.  Go on."

     "Well, the rest of the tale is just war, pure and simple.  Launcelot
retreated to his town and castle of Joyous Gard, and gathered there a great
following of knights.  The king, with a great host, went there, and there was
desperate fighting during several days, and as a result, all the plain around
was paved with corpses and cast iron.  Then the Church patched up a peace
between Arthur and Launcelot and the queen and everybody - everybody but Sir
Gawaine.  He was bitter about the slaying of his brothers, Gareth and
Gaheris, and would not be appeased.  He notified Launcelot to get him thence,
and make swift preparation, and look to be soon attacked.  So Launcelot
sailed to his Duchy of Guienne, with his following, and Gawaine soon
followed, with an army, and he beguiled Arthur to go with him.  Arthur left
the kingdom in Sir Mordred's hands until you should return -"

     "Ah - a king's customary wisdom!"

     "Yes.  Sir Mordred set himself at once to work to make his kingship
permanent.  He was going to marry Guenever, as a first move; but she fled and
shut herself up in the Tower of London.  Mordred attacked; the Bishop of
Canterbury dropped down on him with the Interdict.  The king returned;
Mordred fought him at Dover, at Canterbury, and again at Barham Down.  Then
there was talk of peace and a composition.  Terms, Mordred to have Cornwall
and Kent during Arthur's life, and the whole kingdom afterward."

     "Well, upon my word!  My dream of a republic to be a dream, and so
remain."

     "Yes.  The two armies lay near Salisbury.  Gawaine - Gawaine's head is
at Dover Castle, he fell in the fight there - Gawaine appeared to Arthur in a
dream, at least his ghost did, and warned him to refrain from conflict for a
month, let the delay cost what it might.  But battle was precipitated by an
accident.  Arthur had given order that if a sword was raised during the
consultation over the proposed treaty with Mordred, sound the trumpet and
fall on!  for he had no confidence in Mordred.  Mordred had given a similar
order to his people.  Well, by and by an adder bit a knight's heel; the
knight forgot all about the order, and made a slash at the adder with his
sword.  Inside of half a minute those two prodigious hosts came together with
a crash!  They butchered away all day.  Then the king - however, we have
started something fresh since you left - our paper has."

     "No?  What is that?"

     "War correspondence!"

     "Why, that's good."

     "Yes, the paper was booming right along, for the Interdict made no
impression, got no grip, while the war lasted.  I had war correspondents with
both armies.  I will finish that battle by reading you what one of the boys
says:

          Then the king looked about him, and then was he ware
     of all his host and of all his good knights were left no more
     on live but two knights, that was Sir Lucan de Butlere, and
     his brother Sir Bedivere: and they were full sore wounded.
     Jesu mercy, said the king, where are all my noble knights
     becomen?  Alas that ever I should see this doleful day.  For
     now, said Arthur, I am come to mine end.  But would to
     God that I wist where were that traitor Sir Mordred, that
     hath caused all this mischief.  Then was King Arthur ware
     where Sir Mordred leaned upon his sword among a great
     heap of dead men.  Now give me my spear, said Arthur
     unto Sir Lucan, for yonder I have espied the traitor that all
     this woe hath wrought.  Sir, let him be, said Sir Lucan, for
     he is unhappy; and if ye pass this unhappy day, ye shall
     be right well revenged upon him.  Good lord, remember ye
     of your night's dream, and what the spirit of Sir Gawaine
     told you this night, yet God of his great goodness hath
     preserved you hitherto.  Therefore, for God's sake, my lord,
     leave off by this.  For blessed be God ye have won the field:
     for here we be three on live, and with Sir Mordred is none
     on live.  And if ye leave off now, this wicked day of destiny
     is past.  Tide me death, betide me life, saith the king, now
     I see him yonder alone, he shall never escape mine hands,
     for at a better avail shall I never have him.  God speed you
     well, said Sir Bedivere.  Then the king gat his spear in both
     his hands, and ran toward Sir Mordred, crying, Traitor,
     now is thy death day come.  And when Sir Mordred heard
     Sir Arthur, he ran until him with his sword drawn in his
     hand.  And then King Arthur smote Sir Mordred under the
     shield, with a foin of his spear throughout the body more
     than a fathom.  And when Sir Mordred felt that he had his
     death's wound, he thrust himself, with the might that he
     had, up to the butt of King Arthur's spear.  And right so he
     smote his father Arthur with his sword holden in both his
     hands, on the side of the head, that the sword pierced the
     helmet and the brain-pan, and therewithal Sir Mordred fell
     stark dead to the earth.  And noble Arthur fell in a swoon
     to the earth, and there he swooned ofttimes."

     "That is a good piece of war correspondence, Clarence; you are a
first-rate newspaper man.  Well - is the king all right?  Did he get well?"

     "Poor soul, no.  He is dead."

     I was utterly stunned; it had not seemed to me that any wound could be
mortal to him.

     "And the queen, Clarence?"

     "She is a nun, in Almesbury."

     "What changes! and in such a short while.  It is inconceivable.  What
next, I wonder?"

     "I can tell you what next."

     "Well?"

     "Stake our lives and stand by them!"

     "What do you mean by that?"

     "The Church is master, now.  The Interdict included you with Mordred; it
is not to be removed while you remain alive.  The clans are gathering.  The
Church has gathered all the knights that are left alive, and as soon as you
are discovered we shall have business on our hands."

     "Stuff!  With our deadly scientific war material; with our hosts of
trained -"

     "Save your breath - we haven't sixty faithful left!"

     "What are you saying?  Our schools, our colleges, our vast workshops,
our -"

     "When those knights come, those establishments will empty themselves and
go over to the enemy.  Did you think you had educated the superstition out of
those people?"

     "I certainly did think it."

     "Well, then, you may unthink it.  They stood every strain easily - until
the Interdict.  Since then, they merely put on a bold outside - at heart they
are quaking.  Make up your mind to it - when the armies come, the mask will
fall."

     "It's hard news.  We are lost.  They will turn our own science against
us."

     "No they won't."

     "Why?"

     "Because I and a handful of the faithful have blocked that game.  I'll
tell you what I've done, and what moved me to it.  Smart as you are, the
Church was smarter.  It was the Church that sent you cruising - through her
servants the doctors."

     "Clarence!"

     "It is the truth.  I know it.  Every officer of your ship was the
Church's picked servant, and so was every man of the crew."

     "Oh, come!"

     "It is just as I tell you.  I did not find out these things at once, but
I found them out finally.  Did you send me verbal information, by the
commander of the ship, to the effect that upon his return to you, with
supplies, you were going to leave Cadiz" -

     "Cadiz!  I haven't been at Cadiz at all!"

     - "going to leave Cadiz and cruise in distant seas indefinitely, for the
health of your family?  Did you send me that word?"

     "Of course not.  I would have written, wouldn't I?"

     "Naturally.  I was troubled and suspicious.  When the commander sailed
again I managed to ship a spy with him.  I have never heard of vessel or spy
since.  I gave myself two weeks to hear from you in.  Then I resolved to send
a ship to Cadiz.  There was a reason why I didn't."

     "What was that?"

     "Our navy had suddenly and mysteriously disappeared!  Also as suddenly
and as mysteriously, the railway and telegraph and telephone service ceased,
the men all deserted, poles were cut down, the Church laid a ban upon the
electric light!  I had to be up and doing - and straight off.  Your life was
safe - nobody in these kingdoms but Merlin would venture to touch such a
magician as you without ten thousand men at his back - I had nothing to think
of but how to put preparations in the best trim against your coming.  I felt
safe myself - nobody would be anxious to touch a pet of yours.  So this is
what I did.  From our various works I selected all the men - boys I mean -
whose faithfulness under whatsoever pressure I could swear to, and I called
them together secretly and gave them their instructions.  There are fifty-two
of them; none younger than fourteen, and none above seventeen years old."

     "Why did you select boys?"

     "Because all the others were born in an atmosphere of superstition and
reared in it.  It is in their blood and bones.  We imagined we had educated
it out of them; they thought so, too; the Interdict woke them up like a
thunderclap!  It revealed them to themselves, and it revealed them to me,
too.  With boys it was different.  Such as have been under our training from
seven to ten years have had no acquaintance with the Church's terrors, and it
was among these that I found my fifty-two.  As a next move, I paid a private
visit to that old cave of Merlin's - not the small one - the big one -"

     "Yes, the one where we secretly established our first great electric
plant when I was projecting a miracle."

     "Just so.  And as that miracle hadn't become necessary then, I thought
it might be a good idea to utilize the plant now.  I've provisioned the cave
for a siege -"

     "A good idea, a first rate idea."

     "I think so.  I placed four of my boys there, as a guard - inside, and
out of sight.  Nobody was to be hurt - while outside; but any attempt to
enter - well, we said just let anybody try it!  Then I went out into the
hills and uncovered and cut the secret wires which connected your bedroom
with the wires that go to the dynamite deposits under all our vast factories,
mills, workshops, magazines, etc., and about midnight I and my boys turned
out and connected that wire with the cave, and nobody but you and I suspects
where the other end of it goes to.  We laid it under ground, of course, and
it was all finished in a couple of hours or so.  We shan't have to leave our
fortress, now, when we want to blow up our civilization."

     "It was the right move - and the natural one; a military necessity, in
the changed condition of things.  Well, what changes have come!  We expected
to be besieged in the palace some time or other, but - however go on."

     "Next, we built a wire fence."

     "Wire fence?"

     "Yes.  You dropped the hint of it yourself, two or three years ago."

     "Oh, I remember - the time the Church tried her strength against us the
first time, and presently thought it wise to wait for a hopefuler season.
Well, how have you arranged the fence?"

     "I start twelve immensely strong wires - naked, not insulated - from a
big dynamo in the cave - dynamo with no brushes except a positive and a
negative one -"

     "Yes, that's right."

     "The wires go out from the cave and fence-in a circle of level ground a
hundred yards in diameter; they make twelve independent fences, ten feet
apart - that is to say, twelve circles within circles - and their ends come
into the cave again."

     "Right; go on."

     "The fences are fastened to heavy oaken posts only three feet apart, and
these posts are sunk five feet in the ground."

     "That is good and strong."

     "Yes.  The wires have no ground connection outside of the cave.  They go
out from the positive brush of the dynamo; there is a ground connection
through the negative brush; the other ends of the wire return to the cave,
and each is grounded independently."

     "No-no, that won't do!"

     "Why?"

     "It's too expensive - uses up force for nothing.  You don't want any
ground connection except the one through the negative brush.  The other end
of every wire must be brought back into the cave and fastened independently,
and without any ground connection.  Now, then, observe the economy of it.  A
cavalry charge hurls itself against the fence; you are using no power, you
are spending no money, for there is only one ground connection till those
horses come against the wire; the moment they touch it they form a connection
with the negative brush through the ground, and drop dead.  Don't you see -
you are using no energy until it is needed; your lightning is there, and
ready, like the load in a gun; but it isn't costing you a cent till you touch
it off.  Oh, yes, the single ground connection -"

     "Of course!  I don't know how I overlooked that.  It's not only cheaper,
but it's more effectual than the other way, for if wires break or get
tangled, no harm is done."

     "No, especially if we have a telltale in the cave and disconnect the
broken wire.  Well, go on.  The gatlings?"

     "Yes - that's arranged.  In the center of the inner circle, on a
spacious platform six feet high, I've grouped a battery of thirteen gatling
guns, and provided plenty of ammunition."

     "That's it.  They command every approach, and when the Church's knights
arrive, there's going to be music.  The brow of the precipice over the cave -"

     "I've got a wire fence there, and a gatling.  They won't drop any rocks
down on us."

     "Well, and the glass-cylinder dynamite torpedoes?"

     "That's attended to.  It's the prettiest garden that was ever planted.
It's a belt forty feet wide, and goes around the outer fence - distance
between it and the fence one hundred yards - kind of neutral ground, that
space is.  There isn't a single square yard of that whole belt but is
equipped with a torpedo.  We laid them on the surface of the ground, and
sprinkled a layer of sand over them.  It's an innocent looking garden, but
you let a man start in to hoe it once, and you'll see."

     "You tested the torpedoes?"

     "Well, I was going to, but -"

     "But what?  Why, it's an immense oversight not to apply a -"

     "Test?  Yes, I know; but they're all right; I laid a few in the public
road beyond our lines and they've been tested."

     "Oh, that alters the case.  Who did it?"

     "A Church committee."

     "How kind!"

     "Yes.  They came to command us to make submission.  You see they didn't
really come to test the torpedoes; that was merely an incident."

     "Did the committee make a report?"

     "Yes, they made one.  You could have heard it a mile."

     "Unanimous?"

     "That was the nature of it.  After that I put up some signs, for the
protection of future committees, and we have had no intruders since."

     "Clarence, you've done a world of work, and done it perfectly."

     "We had plenty of time for it; there wasn't any occasion for hurry."

     We sat silent awhile, thinking.  Then my mind was made up, and I said:

     "Yes, everything is ready; everything is shipshape, no detail is
wanting.  I know what to do, now."

     "So do I: sit down and wait."

     "No, sir! rise up and strike!"

     "Do you mean it?"

     "Yes, indeed!  The defensive isn't in my line, and the offensive is.
That is, when I hold a fair hand - two-thirds as good a hand as the enemy.
Oh, yes, we'll rise up and strike; that's our game."

     "A hundred to one, you are right.  When does the performance begin?"

     "Now!  We'll proclaim the Republic."

     "Well, that will precipitate things, sure enough!"

     "It will make them buzz, I tell you!  England will be a hornet's nest
before noon tomorrow, if the Church's hand hasn't lost its cunning - and we
know it hasn't.  Now you write and I'll dictate - thus:

"Proclamation

          "Be It Known Unto All.  Whereas the king having
     died and left no heir, it becomes my duty to continue
     the executive authority vested in me, until a government
     shall have been created and set in motion.  The monarchy
     has lapsed, it no longer exists.  By consequence, all
     political power has reverted to its original source, the
     people of the nation.  With the monarchy, its several
     adjuncts died also; wherefore there is no longer a nobility,
     no longer a privileged class, no longer an Established
     Church: all men are become exactly equal, they are upon one
     common level, and religion is free.  A Republic is hereby
     proclaimed, as being the natural estate of a nation when
     other authority has ceased.  It is the duty of the British
     people to meet together immediately, and by their votes
     elect representatives and deliver into their hands the
     government."

     I signed it "The Boss," and dated it from Merlin's Cave.  Clarence said:

     "Why, that tells where we are, and invites them to call right away."

     "That is the idea.  We strike - by the Proclamation - then it's their
innings.  Now have the thing set up and printed and posted, right off; that
is, give the order; then, if you've got a couple of bicycles handy at the
foot of the hill, ho for Merlin's Cave!"

     "I shall be ready in ten minutes.  What a cyclone there is going to be
tomorrow when this piece of paper gets to work!...  It's a pleasant old
palace, this is; I wonder if we shall ever again - but never mind about that."