Made sharply to the dwarf, and ask'd it of him,
Who answer'd as before; and when the Prince
Had put his horse in motion toward the knight,
Struck at him with his whip, and cut his cheek.
The Prince's blood spirted upon the scarf,
Dyeing it; and his quick, instinctive hand
Caught at the hilt, as to abolish him:
But he, from his exceeding manfulness
And pure nobility of temperament,
Wroth to be wroth at such a worm, refrain'd
From ev'n a word."


The self-restraint of Geraint, who does not slay the dwarf,


"From his exceeding manfulness
And pure nobility of temperament,"


may appear "too polite," and too much in accord with the still
undiscovered idea of "leading sweet lives." However, the uninvented
idea does occur in the Welsh original: "Then Geraint put his hand
upon the hilt of his sword, but he took counsel with himself, and
considered that it would be no vengeance for him to slay the dwarf,"
while he also reflects that he would be "attacked unarmed by the
armed knight." Perhaps Tennyson may be blamed for omitting this
obvious motive for self-restraint. Geraint therefore follows the
knight in hope of finding arms, and arrives at the town all busy with
preparations for the tournament of the sparrow-hawk. This was a