3 November 2026
(17 June 2016) We remind our readers that last time we saw the dying king threaten Sir Bedivere’s life if he did not fulfill the king’s wishes concerning Excalibur; this week, we see our knight ‘running’ to obey Arthur’s command:
Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran,
And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged
Among the bulrush-beds, and clutch’d the sword,
And strongly wheel’d and threw it. The great brand
Made lightnings in the splendour of the moon,
And flashing round and round, and whirl’d in an arch,
Shot like a streamer of the northern morn,
Seen where the moving isles of winter shock
By night, with noises of the northern sea.
So flash’d and fell the brand Excalibur:
But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful,
And caught him by the hilt, and brandish’d him
Three times, and drew him under in the mere.
And lightly went the other to the King.
Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker breath:
“Now see I by thine eyes that this is done.
Speak out: what is it thou hast heard, or seen?”
Bedivere, more wisely this time, doesn’t pause to look at the sword; instead, he runs to the lake’s edge and hurls it far out into the lake. What he sees is what Arthur knew he would see: the same hand and arm that presented the sword to the king, now reaches up to catch it, waving it around three times before disappearing beneath the waves. Now Bedivere feels better, having obeyed his king, returning to Arthur and the question (third time) of what he saw. On Thursday we will see Bedivere’s response (the correct one!) to Arthur’s question. Good reading!
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