relate what he had
seen, and to implore her to give him a horse, that he might ride after the
knights.

"'I saw four men, dear mother mine;
Not brighter is the Lord divine.
They spoke to me of chivalry;
Through Arthur's power of royalty,
In knightly honor well arrayed,
I shall receive the accolade.'"
WOLFRAM VON ESCHENBACH, _Parzival_ (Dippold's tr.).

The mother, finding herself unable to detain him any longer, reluctantly
consented to his departure, and, hoping that ridicule and lack of success
would soon drive him back to her, prepared for him the motley garb of a
fool and gave him a very sorry nag to ride.

"The boy, silly yet brave indeed,
Oft from his mother begged a steed.
That in her heart she did lament;
She thought: 'Him must I make content,
Yet must the thing an evil be.'
Thereafter further pondered she:
'The folk are prone to ridicule.
My child the garments of a fool
Shall on his shining body wear.
If he be scoffed and beaten there,
Perchance he'll come to me again.'"
WOLFRAM VON ESCHENBACH, _Parzival_ (Bayard Taylor's tr.).

[Sidenote: Parzival's journey into the world.] Thus equipped, his mind well
stored with all manner of unpractical advice given by his mother in further
hopes of making a worldly career impossible for him, the young hero set
out. As he rode away from home, his heart was filled with regret at leaving
and with an ardent desire to seek adventures abroad,--conflicting emotions
which he experienced for the first time in his life. Herzeloide accompanied
her son part way, kissed him good-by, and, as his beloved form disappeared
from view in the forest paths, her heart broke and she breathed her last!

Parzival rode onward and soon came to a meadow, in which some tents were
pitched. He saw a beautiful lady asleep in one of these tents, and,
dismounting, he wakened her with a kiss, thus obeying one of his mother's
injunctions--to kiss every fair lady he met. To his surprise, however, the
lady seemed indignant; so he tried to pacify her by telling her that he had
often thus saluted his mother. Then, slipping the bracelet from off her
arm, and carrying it away as a proof that she was not angry, he rode on.
Lord Orilus, the lady's husband, hearing from her that a youth had kissed
her, flew into a towering rage, and rode speedily away, hoping to overtake
the impudent varlet and punish