. "Prince" is not used in
this sense by the older Romancers, but only for distinguished knights
like Galahault, who is really a king.

[48] There is one admirable word here, _enbarnis_, which has so long
been lost to French that it is not even in Littre. But Dryden's
"_burnish_ into man" probably preserves it in English; for this is
certainly not the other "burnish" from _brunir_.

[49] "Car moult en parole diroit la parole."

[50] Puzzled by the number of new thoughts and emotions.

[51] Ywain suggests one of the commonest things in Romance.

[52] Arthur had, by a set of chances, not actually girded on Lancelot's
sword.

[53] Whose prisoner Lancelot had been, who had been ready to fall in
love with him, and to whom he had expressly refused to tell his own
love. Hence his confusion.

[54] The day when Lancelot, at her request, had turned against the side
of his friend Galahault and brought victory to Arthur's.

[55] By the way, the Vulgate Mordred is a more subtle conception than
the early stories gave, or than Malory transfers. He is no mere traitor
or felon knight, much less a coward, from the first; but at that first
shows a mixture of good and bad qualities in which the "dram of eale"
does its usual office. Here once more is a subject made to the hand of a
novelist of the first class.

[56] Some poet or pundit, whether of East or West, or of what place,
from Santiago to Samarcand, I know not, has laid it down, that men can
love many, but without ceasing to love any; that women love only one at
once, but can (to borrow, at fifty years' memory, a phrase of George
Lawrence's in _Sans Merci_) "drop their lovers down _oubliettes_" with
comparative ease.

[57] It is excusable to use two words for the single verb _savoir_ to
bring out the meaning. King Bagdemagus does not "know" as a fact that
Lancelot has slain his son, though he fears it and feels almost sure of
it.

CHAPTER III

ROMANS D'AVENTURES

[Sidenote: Variety of the present groups.]

On the whole, however, the most important influence in the development
of the novel originally--that of the _nouvelle_ or _novella_ in French,
and Italian taking the second place in order of time--must be assigned
to the very numerous and very delightful body of compositions (not very
long as a rule,[58] but also never exactly short) to which the name
_Romans d'aventures_ has been given with a limited connotation. They
exist in all languages; our own Engli