condemned the last parting of Guinevere and Arthur, because the King
doth preach too much to an unhappy woman who has no reply. The
position of Arthur is not easily redeemable: it is difficult to
conceive that a noble nature could be, or should be, blind so long.
He does rehabilitate his Queen in her own self-respect, perhaps, by
assuring her that he loves her still:-


"Let no man dream but that I love thee still."


Had he said that one line and no more, we might have loved him
better. In the Idylls we have not Malory's last meeting of Lancelot
and Guinevere, one of the scenes in which the wandering composite
romance ends as nobly as the Iliad.

The Passing of Arthur, except for a new introductory passage of great
beauty and appropriateness, is the Morte d'Arthur, first published in
1842:-


"So all day long the noise of battle roll'd
Among the mountains by the winter sea."


The year has run its course, spring, summer, gloomy autumn, and dies
in the mist of Arthur's last wintry battle in the west -


"And the new sun rose, bringing the new year."