Glossing Tennyson: The Platypus Reads Part XCIV

   Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
'The sequel of today unsolders all
The goodliest fellowship of famous knights
Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep
They sleep--the men I loved. I think that we
Shall never more, at any future time,
Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds,
Walking about the gardens and the halls
Of Camelot, as in the days that were.

Arthur tells Bedivere that his life’s work has been destroyed in the destruction of the Round Table.  Arthur has himself participated in this destruction thus siding with his duty as king over the love of his work.  Even though Arthur expresses no doubts that he has done the right thing, he still mourns the passing of his work and the individuals who participated in it.  This completes Arthur’s realization in the outset of the poem that: “For I, being simple, thought to work His will,/And have but stricken with the sword in vain;”.  Arthur knows now that he cannot build the Kingdom of God on Earth.  He is a Christ-figure, but not Christ.  The idea that Tennyson expresses here, that even a Christ-like king cannot usher in a perfect world, flies in the face of both the Victorian faith in Progress and the Post-Millennialism embraced by Christians of the era.  These two creeds would help lead Victorian civilization to its doom in what Wilson dubbed “The War to End All War.”

I perish by this people which I made,--
Though Merlin sware that I should come again
To rule once more; but, let what will be, be,
I am so deeply smitten through the helm
That without help I cannot last till morn.

Facing his death, Arthur is for a moment distracted by Merlin’s prophecy.  However, he quickly turns back, as he has throughout the work, to do his duty.  That duty is to return Excalibur, the symbol of his rule, to the Lady of the Lake.  It should be remembered that the Lady of the Lake, on one level, represents the Church, or the Christian tradition.  That she gives Arthur his mystic sword should be a reminder of the words of the apostle that civil authority comes from God and that he has given government “the sword” to punish wickedness.  Since neither his sword nor his authority comes from himself, Arthur must return them both.  This principle is written into the blade itself: “There likewise I beheld Excalibur/Before him at his crowning borne, the sword/That rose from out the bosom of the lake,/And Arthur row’d across and took it-rich/With jewels, elfin Urim, on the hilt,/Bewildering heart and eye-the blade so bright/That men are blinded by it-on one side,/Graven in the oldest tongue of all the world,/”Take me,” but turn the blade and ye shall see,/And written in the speech ye speak yourself,/”Cast me away!” And sad was Arthur’s face/Taking it, but old Merlin counsell’d him,/”Take thou and strike! the time to cast away/Is yet far-off.” So this great brand the king/Took, and by this will beat his foemen down.’”

Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur,
Which was my pride: for thou rememberest how
In those old days, one summer noon, an arm
Rose up from out the bosom of the lake,
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
Holding the sword--and how I rowed across
And took it, and have worn it, like a king;
And, wheresoever I am sung or told
In aftertime, this also shall be known:
But now delay not: take Excalibur,
And fling him far into the middle mere:
Watch what thou seest, and lightly bring me word.'

Arthur revalues Excalibur even as he instructs Bedivere to throw it away naming it “my pride.”  In relinquishing this final symbol of his kingship, Arthur overcomes his pride and thus achieves his final victory.  It should be remembered that Pride is one of the seven deadly sins, and indeed the root of the other six.  It is also the only one of the six which Arthur seems really susceptible throughout the work.  Guinevere, though spiteful, speaks true when she says in “Lancelot and Elaine”: “Ye know right well, how meek soe’er he seem,/No keener hunter after glory breathes.”  Though Arthur is able to cast off his pride, it will take Bedivere several tries before the knight can cast off his own.

   To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere:
'It is not meet, Sir King, to leave thee thus,
Aidless, alone, and smitten through the helm--
A little thing may harm a wounded man;
Yet I thy hest will all perform at full,
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word.'

Bedivere, Arthur’s first knight, still maintains a protective loyalty towards Arthur that should put us in mind of the Apostle Peter.  Like Peter, Bedivere will also be tested in his loyalty when events turn in a direction he cannot understand.

   So saying, from the ruined shrine he stept,
And in the moon athwart the place of tombs,
Where lay the mighty bones of ancient men,
Old knights, and over them the sea-wind sang
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping down
By zigzag paths, and juts of pointed rock,
Came on the shining levels of the lake.

Tennyson paints a hauntingly beautiful picture for us in true Romantic tradition.  As an artist, Tennyson rejected both of the extremes popular in the Victorian era: subordinating art to mere didacticism, as in the novels of George MacDonald, or creating art for the mere sake of technique, as in the case of Oscar Wilde.  At a symbolic level, Arthur is going to join the ancient heroes of Britain, some of whom are buried in the vaults by which Bedivere passes.

   There drew he forth the brand Excalibur,
And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon,
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth
And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt:
For all the haft twinkled with diamond sparks,
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work
Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long
That both his eyes were dazzled as he stood,
This way and that dividing the swift mind,
In act to throw: but at the last it seemed
Better to leave Excalibur concealed
There in the many-knotted waterflags,
That whistled stiff and dry about the marge.
So strode he back slow to the wounded King.

The question here placed before us is “what causes Bedivere to disobey the king?”.  In this first scene of temptation, we are not allowed into Bedivere’s thoughts.  Given what we know of bedivere’s character, it is hard to believe that he is tempted by the mere monetary value of the sword.  At an allegorical level, the sword may represent the beauty of Arthur’s reign and the past order.  In that case, this scene may be functioning as a morality play in which the folly of trying to cling to “the good old days” is revealed.  Tolkien expresses the same moral in his “Return of the King” where Denethor, steward of the ancient realm of Gondor, facing the destruction of his kingdom can only pine that he would have things as they were in the days of his “long-fathers.”  There are many things that the old ruler might have, but that is not one of them.  As Gandalf the Wizard later declares: “Whatever betide, you have come to the end of the Gondor that you have known.”  Holding on to the “old order” eventually drives Denethor mad and he misses the opportunity to participate in the salvation of his city.  His son, Faramir, while also feeling the appeal of Ancient Gondor, rejects his father’s course and so finds a place for himself in the “new order” that emerges under Aragorn.

   Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere:
'Hast thou performed my mission which I gave?
What is it thou hast seen? or what hast heard?'

   And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere:
'I heard the ripple washing in the reeds,
And the wild water lapping on the crag.'

These lines between Bedivere and the King will be repeated throughout this scene, and the repetition reinforces the sense of mythic significance as Arthur passes into legend.

   To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale:
'Thou hast betrayed thy nature and thy name,
Not rendering true answer, as beseemed
Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight:
For surer sign had followed, either hand,
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere.
This is a shameful thing for men to lie.
Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again,
As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing
I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word.'

We return to the motif of remembering or staying true to one’s name in this passage as Bedivere is forced to define himself now that the Round Table is no more.  Notice also that Arthur’s dialog is becoming increasingly ritual and archaic.  Tennyson, as one of the great doubters in an age of doubt, may be offering advice for how to maintain one’s virtue in uncertain times.  If so, this scene seems to suggest that in moments of doubt, it is ritual and principle that give men a sense of self and thus allow them to act even if all the other “certainties” have been abolished.  It may also be an affirmation that moral duty remains certain in spite of changing times.  As Aragorn tells a baffled Eomer in “The Two Towers:” “Good and ill have not changed since yesteryear; nor are they one thing among Elves and Dwarves and another among men…”