A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (Complete Edition). Марк Твен

let me alone with them. Sir Kay for the pleasure

       of the knight suffered him for to do his will,

       and so stood aside. And then anon within six

       strokes Sir Launcelot had stricken them to the earth.

       And then they all three cried, Sir Knight, we

       yield us unto you as man of might matchless. As

       to that, said Sir Launcelot, I will not take

       your yielding unto me, but so that ye yield

       you unto Sir Kay the seneschal, on that covenant

       I will save your lives and else not. Fair knight,

       said they, that were we loath to do; for as for

       Sir Kay we chased him hither, and had overcome

       him had ye not been; therefore, to yield us unto

       him it were no reason. Well, as to that, said

       Sir Launcelot, advise you well, for ye may

       choose whether ye will die or live, for an ye be

       yielden, it shall be unto Sir Kay. Fair knight,

       then they said, in saving our lives we will do

       as thou commandest us. Then shall ye, said Sir

       Launcelot, on Whitsunday next coming go unto the

       court of King Arthur, and there shall ye yield

       you unto Queen Guenever, and put you all three

       in her grace and mercy, and say that Sir Kay

       sent you thither to be her prisoners. On the morn

       Sir Launcelot arose early, and left Sir Kay

       sleeping; and Sir Launcelot took Sir Kay's armor

       and his shield and armed him, and so he went to

       the stable and took his horse, and took his leave

       of his host, and so he departed. Then soon after

       arose Sir Kay and missed Sir Launcelot; and

       then he espied that he had his armor and his

       horse. Now by my faith I know well that he will

       grieve some of the court of King Arthur; for on

       him knights will be bold, and deem that it is I,

       and that will beguile them; and because of his

       armor and shield I am sure I shall ride in peace.

       And then soon after departed Sir Kay, and

       thanked his host.

      As I laid the book down there was a knock at the door, and my stranger came in. I gave him a pipe and a chair, and made him welcome. I also comforted him with a hot Scotch whisky; gave him another one; then still another—hoping always for his story. After a fourth persuader, he drifted into it himself, in a quite simple and natural way:

      The Stranger's History

      I am an American. I was born and reared in Hartford, in the State of Connecticut—anyway, just over the river, in the country. So I am a Yankee of the Yankees—and practical; yes, and nearly barren of sentiment, I suppose—or poetry, in other words. My father was a blacksmith, my uncle was a horse doctor, and I was both, along at first. Then I went over to the great arms factory and learned my real trade; learned all there was to it; learned to make everything: guns, revolvers, cannon, boilers, engines, all sorts of labor-saving machinery. Why, I could make anything a body wanted—anything in the world, it didn't make any difference what; and if there wasn't any quick new-fangled way to make a thing, I could invent one—and do it as easy as rolling off a log. I became head superintendent; had a couple of thousand men under me.

      Well, a man like that is a man that is full of fight—that goes without saying. With a couple of thousand rough men under one, one has plenty of that sort of amusement. I had, anyway. At last I met my match, and I got my dose. It was during a misunderstanding conducted with crowbars with a fellow we used to call Hercules. He laid me out with a crusher alongside the head that made everything crack, and seemed to spring every joint in my skull and made it overlap its neighbor. Then the world went out in darkness, and I didn't feel anything more, and didn't know anything at all—at least for a while.

      When I came to again, I was sitting under an oak tree, on the grass, with a whole beautiful and broad country landscape all to myself—nearly. Not entirely; for there was a fellow on a horse, looking down at me—a fellow fresh out of a picture-book. He was in old-time iron armor from head to heel, with a helmet on his head the shape of a nail-keg with slits in it; and he had a shield, and a sword, and a prodigious spear; and his horse had armor on, too, and a steel horn projecting from his forehead, and gorgeous red and green silk trappings that hung down all around him like a bedquilt, nearly to the ground.

      "Fair sir, will ye just?" said this fellow.

      "Will I which?"

      "Will ye try a passage of arms for land or lady or for—"

      "What are you giving me?" I said. "Get along back to your circus, or I'll report you."

      Now what does this man do but fall back a couple of hundred yards and then come rushing at me as hard as he could tear, with his nail-keg bent down nearly to his horse's neck and his long spear pointed straight ahead. I saw he meant business, so I was up the tree when he arrived.

      He allowed that I was his property, the captive of his spear. There was argument on his side—and the bulk of the advantage—so I judged it best to humor him. We fixed up an agreement whereby I was to go with him and he was not to hurt me. I came down, and we started away, I walking by the side of his horse. We marched comfortably along, through glades and over brooks which I could not remember to have seen before—which puzzled me and made me wonder—and yet we did not come to any circus or sign of a circus. So I gave up the idea of a circus, and concluded he was from an asylum. But we never came to an asylum—so I was up a stump, as you may say. I asked him how far we were from Hartford. He said he had never heard of the place; which I took to be a lie, but allowed it to go at that. At the end of an hour we saw a far-away town sleeping in a valley by a winding river; and beyond it on a hill, a vast gray fortress, with towers and turrets, the first I had ever seen out of a picture.

      "Bridgeport?" said I, pointing.

      "Camelot," said he.

      My stranger had been showing signs of sleepiness. He caught himself nodding, now, and smiled one of those pathetic, obsolete smiles of his, and said:

      "I find I can't go on; but come with me, I've got it all written out, and you can read it if you like."

      In his chamber, he said: "First, I kept a journal; then by and by, after years, I took the journal and turned it into a book. How long ago that was!"

      He handed me his manuscript, and pointed out the place where I should begin:

      "Begin here—I've already told you what goes before." He was steeped in drowsiness by this time. As I went out at his door I heard him murmur sleepily: "Give you good den, fair sir."

      I sat down by my fire and examined my treasure. The first part of it—the great bulk of it—was parchment, and yellow with age. I scanned a leaf particularly and saw that it was a palimpsest. Under the old dim writing of the Yankee historian appeared traces of a penmanship which was older and dimmer still—Latin words and sentences: fragments from old monkish legends, evidently. I turned to the place indicated by my stranger and began to read—as follows.

      The Tale of the Lost Land

      Chapter I.

       Camelot

       Table of Contents

      "Camelot—Camelot," said I to myself. "I don't seem to remember hearing