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SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT Us marsh-lights to forget the sun? There is one man of mortal men Worthy to win this benison, Sir Palamede the Saracen.” Then went the applauding murmur round : Sir Lancelot girt him there and then To ride to that enchanted ground Where amid timeless snows the den Of Palamedes might be found. 21
92 SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT How weak Sir Palamedes grows! We hear no more of bouts and blows! His weapons are his ten good toes! He that was Arthur's peer, good knight Proven in many a foughten fight, Flees like a felon in the night! Ay! this thy quest is past the ken Of thee and of all mortal men, Sir Palamede the Saracen !
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT “We burn,” quoth he, “no futile fires, Nor play upon an idle reed, Nor penance vain, nor fatuous prayers— The Gods are ours, and we are theirs.” Sir Palamedes plucks the pipe The satyr tends, and blows a trill So soft and warm, so red and ripe, That echo answers from the hill In eager and voluptuous strain, While grows upon the sounding plain A gallop, and a questing turned To one profound melodious bay. Sir Palamede with pleasure burned, And bowed him to the idol grey That on the altar sneered and leered With …
THE HIGH HISTORY OF GOOD SIR PALAMEDES THE SARACEN KNIGHT; AND OF HIS FOLLOWING OF THE QUESTING BEAST
XXXVI Ort, as Sir Palamedes went Upon the quest, he was aware Of some vast shadow subtly blent With his own shadow in the air. It had no shape, no voice had it Wherewith to daunt the eye or ear; Yet all the horror of the pit Clad it with all the arms of fear. Moreover, though he sought to scan Some feature, though he listened long, No shape of God or fiend or man, No whisper, groan, shriek, scream, or song Gave him to know it. Now it chanced One day Sir Palamedes rode Through a great wood whose leafage danced In the thin sunlight as it flowed F…
SPECIAL SUPPLEMENT THE HIGH HISTORY OF GOOD SIR PALAMEDES THE SARACEN KNIGHT AND OF HIS FOLLOWING OF THE QUESTING BEAST BY ALEISTER CROWLEY RIGHTLY SET FORTH IN RIME
26 SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT The seamen to his stinging whip. Accurs’d of God, despising men, Thy reckless oars in ocean dip, Sir Palamede the Saracen!
48 SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT “ Bear me to some remotest den To heal me of my ills immense ; For now hath neither might nor sense Sir Palamede the Saracen.”
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT O thou most desperate dupe that Hell’s Malice can make of mortal men! Meddle no more with magick spells, Sir Palamede the Saracen! 75
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT By simple faith, not heathen might, Catch him, and thus achieve the quest!” Then quoth that melancholy wight: “T will believe!” The hermit blessed His convert : on the horizon Appears the Beast. ‘To thee the rest!” He cries, to urge the good knight on. But no! Sir Palamedes grips The hermit by the woebegone Beard of him; then away he rips, Wood as a maniac, to the West, Where down the sun in splendour slips, And where the quarry of the quest Canters. They run lik e hippogriffs! Like men pursued, or swine posses…
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT Straight he dissolved, a voiceless shade. “Or scotched or slain,” the knight said then, “What odds? Keep bright and sharp thy blade, Sir Palamede the Saracen!” 95
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT Then as he rushes forth the note Roars from that Beast’s malignant throat With laughter, laughter, laughter, laughter! The wits of Palamedes float In ecstasy of shame and rage. “O Thou!” exclaims the baffled sage; “ How should I match Thee? Yet, I will so, Though Doomisday devour the Age. Weeping, and beating on his breast, Gnashing his teeth, he still confessed The might of the dread oath that bound him: He would not yet give up the quest. “Nay! while I am,” quoth he, “ though Hell Engulph me, though God mock …
34 SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT He was so sick and ill at ease And hot against his fellow men, He thought to end his purpose then— Nay! let him seek new lands and seas, Sir Palamede the Saracen !
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT The sores and scabs, the warts and wens, The nameless vermin he had gathered In those insufferable dens, The foul diseases he had fathered. So now the quest slips from his brain: “ First (Christ !) let me be clean again!” 83
64 SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT He turns—the friendly folk are gone, Gone with his sumpter-mules and train Beyond the infinite horizon Of all he hopes to see again! His brain befooled, his pocket picked— How the Beast cachinnated then, Far from that doleful derelict Sir Palamede the Saracen |
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT God’s angel, standing sinister, Unfurls this scroll—a sable stain : “Who wins the spur shall ply the spur Upon his proper heart and brain.” He gave the sign of malison On traitor knights and perjured men ; And ever by the sea rode on Sir Palamede the Saracen.
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT Who is the naked man that spurs A charger into Camelot, His face like Christ's? What glory stirs The air around him, do ye wot ? Sir Arthur arms him, makes array Of seven times ten thousand men, And bids them follow and obey Sir Palamede the Saracen. 17
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT Yet, those white lips were snapped, like steel Upon the ankles of a slave! That body broken on the wheel Of Time suppressed the groan it gave! “Not there, not here, my quest!” he cried. “Not thus! Not now! Do how and when Matter? Iam, and I abide, Sir Palamede the Saracen!”
SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT While such a questing there resounds As God had loosed the very Pit, Or as a thirty couple hounds Are in its belly as it bounds! Full sick at heart, I ween, was then The loyal knight, the weak of wit, The butt of lewd and puny men, Sir Palamede the Saracen. 37
24 SIR PALAMEDES, THE SARACEN KNIGHT His nails, and made his penance end, Clothing himself in steel and gold, Arming himself, his life to spend In vigil cold and wandering bold, Disdaining song and dalliance soft, Seeking one purpose to behold, And holding ever that aloft, Nor fearing God, nor heeding men. So thus his hermit habit doffed Sir Palamede the Saracen.