Roger Ascham said, are the staple of Tennyson's sources, whether in
the mediaeval French, the Welsh, or in Malory's compilation, chiefly
from French sources. Tennyson is accused of "Bowdlerising" these,
and of introducing gentleness, courtesy, and conscience into a
literature where such qualities were unknown. I must confess myself
ignorant of any early and popular, or "primitive" literature, in
which human virtues, and the human conscience, do not play their
part. Those who object to Tennyson's handling of the great Arthurian
cycle, on the ground that he is too refined and too moral, must
either never have read or must long have forgotten even Malory's
romance. Thus we read, in a recent novel, that Lancelot was an homme
aux bonnes fortunes, whereas Lancelot was the most loyal of lovers.

Among other critics, Mr Harrison has objected that the Arthurian
world of Tennyson "is not quite an ideal world. Therein lies the
difficulty. The scene, though not of course historic, has certain
historic suggestions and characters." It is not apparent who the
historic characters are, for the real Arthur is but a historic
phantasm. "But then, in the midst of so much realism, the knights,
from Arthur downwards, talk and act in ways with which we are
familiar in modern ethical and psychological novels, but which are as
impossible in real mediaeval knights as a Bengal tiger or a Polar
bear would be in a drawing-room." I confess to little acquaintance
with modern ethical novels; but real mediaeval knights, and still
more the knights of mediaeval romance, were capable of very ethical
actions. To halt an army for the protection and comfort of a
laundress was a highly ethical action. Perhaps Sir Redvers Buller
would do it: Bruce did. Mr Harrison accuses the ladies of the
Idylls of soul-bewildering casuistry, like that of women in
Middlemarch or Helbeck of Bannisdale. Now I am not reminded by