the dragon banner which he had given them and said that he would bear it
himself; "for the banner of a king," he said, "should not be hid in
battle,--but borne in the foremost front." Then Merlin rode forth and
cried with a loud voice, "Now shall be shown who is a knight." And the
knights, seeing Merlin, exclaimed that he was "a full noble man"; and
"without fail," says the legend, "he was full of marvellous powers and
strength of body and great and long stature; but brown he was and lean and
rough of hair." Then he rode in among the enemy on a great black horse;
and the golden dragon which he had made and had attached to the banner
gave out from its throat such a flaming fire that the air was black with
its smoke; and all King Arthur's men began to fight again more stoutly,
and Arthur himself held the bridle reins in his left hand, and so wielded
his sword with his right as to slay two hundred men.

There was no end to Merlin's disguises--sometimes as an old man,
sometimes as a boy or a dwarf, then as a woman, then as an ignorant clown;
--but the legends always give him some object to accomplish, some work to
do, and there was always a certain dignity about him, even when helping
King Arthur, as he sometimes did, to do wrong things. His fame extended
over all Britain, and also through Brittany, now a part of France, where
the same poetic legends extended. This, for instance, is a very old Breton
song about him:--

MERLIN THE DIVINER

Merlin! Merlin! where art thou going
So early in the day, with thy black dog?
Oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi! oi!
Oi! oi! oi! oi! oi!