the eyes of ladies and of kings."

_e. Character Study_--King Arthur. The best estimate of King Arthur's
character is made from his own words and those of Bedivere, not from
Tennyson's description.

1. He has been a devout man. He has fought for Christ and searched
for Christ and

"found Him in the shining of the stars,
Mark'd Him in the flowering of His fields."

2. He is now discouraged. He has not found Him in His ways with men,
and now it seems to him,

"As if some lesser god had made the world,
But had not force to shape it as he would."

"My God, thou hast forgotten me in my death."

3. Yet he is hopeful, and he feels that perchance the world is
wholly fair, and that his doubts come because he has not the
power to see it as it is, and may not see it to the close.

4. He desires to be just, and feels that in the coming battle in the
west he may not have the right on his side:

"Ill doom is mine
To war against my people and my knights.
The king who fights his people fights himself."

5. Yet courage and confidence are not all gone:

"Yet let us hence, and find or feel a way
Thro' this blind haze."

6. After the battle, he grows more confused:

"I know not what I am,
Nor whence I am, nor whether I be King.
Behold, I seem but King among the dead."

7. He must be noble, kingly, to have inspired such devotion as
Bedivere shows. Hear what the latter says:

"My King,
King everywhere! and so the dead have kings,
There also will I worship thee as King."

8. He is a warrior to the last. Listen to his reply to Bedivere:

"King am I, whatsoever be their cry;
And one last act of kinghood shalt thou see
Yet, ere I pass."

9. He is resigned: "Let what will be, be."

10. He is faithful to the trust imposed upon him when he acquired
Excalibur. Three times he sends Bedivere to cast the sword into
the mere. The last time he says:

"But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur,
I will arise and slay thee with my hands."

11. He loves truth and reveres it:

"This is a shameful thing for men to lie."

12. Though he appears to fear death, rather is his fear that he shall
die before he reaches the water whe