The castle stands high among vast, sharp-edged waves of sand at the edge of a cliff, and looks at the sea and a long, empty shore. At its feet a little river can be seen running in a narrow valley. A few miles off it rises in the red moorland, then it falls with many a cascade down ladders of crag, broadens among willows where long leaves are all horizontal in the wind, and here by the castle it has reached an elvish, merry old age already, as it moves clear over the brown stones and out among the rocks to the sea. Opposite the castle, across the river, the other side of the valley is clothed in dense and luminous oak wood. Where the river joins the sea both the castle hill and the wooded hill break away into a broken multitude of bristling rocks, and among their alleys and hidden corridors and halls the waves leap with the motion of a herd of ridgy cattle galloping through narrow gateways. Beyond, and away for ten miles, the high dark coast sweeps in a curve which the sea whitens by showing its teeth; and round the headland at the end the ships come and go at starry intervals. Landward, the country rises in long, steep, furzy curves, interrupted by sudden rocks, to the red moor and the autumn evening sky of towering, tumultuous and yet steady grey cloud.

The castle stands among pale sand and long plumy grasses. The sand is deep within the hollow and roofless circuit of the broken walls, through which, here and there, come glimpses of sea or sky disconnected from any fragment of the land, so that I seem to stand between the sea and sky. In the summer ivy-leaved toad-flax buds and harebells, most delicate flowers, whisper from the crevices. But nothing lives here now. The trunk of an old tree that once grew through the walls is now so much worn that what it was when it lived is not to be known. Not only is all human life gone from here, but even the signs of its decay are invisible. The noble masonry can suffer no more except at the hands of men; it is too low and too strong. It is a rude crag. Neither history nor legend speaks intelligently of it. It is but known that it was raised by hands, and each man that comes to it has to build it again out of his own life and blood, or it remains not far removed from nothing. The wayfarer starts at the sight of it, tries in vain, shuddering at the cliff and the desolate sea, to conceive a life lived by beings like himself in such a place. To have lived there men must have had fairy aids or the blood of witches or of gods in their veins.

Here might easily have been builded in a night that phantom palace and its illusive pomps, where the Corinthian Lycius dwelt with the phantasmal Lamia until a philosopher’s eye unbuilt it again.

Or on these sands might have stood Myratana and blind Tiriel before the beautiful palace, and cursed their sons.

Or up in the vanished high bowman’s window the king’s daughter sat and harped and sang:—

When the sun has set, and land and sea are dissolved in cold mist, all but a circle of pale sand and the castle fragment, it seems true that here, to the foot of the tower that is gone, came the king’s daughter and wept and sighed and made a great moan: “Ah! he mourns not who does not mourn for love.” And the good king came and asked her if she desired to wed, and she answered, “Alas, sir, yes. Ah! he mourns not who does not mourn for love.”

Here, away from earth and sea and sky, apart from men and time and any care, the melody and the picture are truer than before, suiting that melancholy wood, in which the heart, seeming to go back easily through unguessed deeps of time, makes all sorrows its own, airily, not without delight.

And there are others who abode here or abide here, as for example those timeless knights of no age or clime—Pelleas, Launcelot, Pellinore, Palomides, Galahad, whose armour no man pretends to show us, whom old men’s tongues and poets’ pens have lured into immortality—to whom this castle gives a home.

When Launcelot had come to the water of Morteise, says Malory, he slept, and there in a vision he was bidden to rise and put on his armour and enter the first ship that he found. And he did so, and the ship moved without sail or oar, and in the ship was great sweetness so that “he was fulfilled with all things that he thought on or desired.” There he slept, and when he awoke there was none on board except the dead sister of Sir Percivale; and the ship went on for more than a month and Sir Launcelot fed on manna, until at last he touched land and there met Sir Galahad, his son. For half a year the two sailed together, and “often they arrived in isles far from folk, where there repaired none but wild beasts.” But one day at the edge of a forest a white knight warned Sir Galahad that he should stay with his father no more. “And therewith Galahad entered into the forest. And the wind arose, and drove Launcelot more than a month throughout the sea, where he slept but little, but prayed to God that he might see some tidings of the Sangreal. So it befell on a night, at midnight, he arrived afore a castle, on the back side, which was rich and fair, and there was a postern opened towards the sea, and was open without any keeping, save two lions kept the entry; and the moon shone clear. Anon Sir Launcelot heard a voice that said: Launcelot, go out of this ship and enter into the castle, where thou shalt see a great part of thy desire. Then he ran to his arms, and so armed him, and so went to the gate and saw the lions. Then set he hand to his sword and drew it. Then there came a dwarf suddenly, and smote him on the arm so sore that the sword fell out of his hand. Then heard he a voice say: O man of evil faith and poor belief, wherefore trowest thou more on thy harness than in thy Maker, for He might more avail thee than thine armour, in whose service thou art set. Then said Launcelot: Fair Father Jesu Christ, I thank Thee of Thy great mercy that Thou reprovest me of my misdeed; now see I well that ye hold me for your servant. Then took he again his sword and put it up in his sheath, and made a cross in his forehead, and came to the lions, and they made semblaunt to do him harm. Notwithstanding he passed by them without hurt, and entered into the castle to the chief fortress, and there were they all at rest. Then Launcelot entered in so armed, for he found no gate nor door but it was open. And at the last he found a chamber whereof the door was shut, and he set his hand thereto to have opened it, but he might not.

“Then he enforced him mickle to undo the door. Then he listened and heard a voice which sung so sweetly that it seemed none earthly thing; and him thought the voice said: Joy and honour be to the Father of Heaven. Then Launcelot kneeled down before the chamber, for well wist he that there was the Sangreal within that chamber. Then said he: Fair sweet Father, Jesu Christ, if ever I did thing that pleased Thee, Lord, for Thy pity ne have me not in despite for my foul sins done aforetime, and that Thou show me something of that I seek. And with that he saw the chamber door open, and there came out a great clearness, that the house was as bright as all the torches of the world had been there. So came he to the chamber door and would have entered. And anon a voice said to him: Flee, Launcelot, and enter not, for thou oughtest not to do it; and if thou enter thou shalt forthink it. Then he withdrew him aback right heavy. Then looked he up in the middle of the chamber, and saw a table of silver, and the Holy Vessel, covered with red samite and many angels about it, whereof one held a candle of wax burning, and the other held a cross and the ornaments of an altar. And before the Holy Vessel he saw a good man clothed as a priest. And it seemed that he was at the sacring of the mass. And it seemed to Launcelot that above the priest’s hands were three men, whereof the two put the youngest by likeness between the priest’s hands; and so he lift it up right high, and it seemed to show so to the people. And then Launcelot marvelled not a little, for him thought the priest was so greatly charged of the figure that him seemed that he should fall to the earth. And when he saw none about him that would help him, then came he to the door a great pace, and said: Fair Father Jesu Christ, ne take it for no sin though I help the good man which hath great need of help. Right so entered he into the chamber, and came toward the table of silver; and when he came nigh he felt a breath, that him thought it was intermeddled with fire, which smote him so sore in the visage that him thought it brent his visage; and therewith he fell to the earth and had no power to arise; so he was so araged, that had lost the power of his body, and his hearing, and his seeing. Then felt he many hands about him, which took him up and bare him out of the chamber door, without any amending of his swoon, and left him there, seeming dead to all people. So upon the morrow when it was fair day they within were arisen, and found Launcelot lying afore the chamber door. All they marvelled how that he came in, and so they looked upon him, and felt his pulse to wit whether there were any life in him; and so they found life in him, but he might not stand nor stir no member that he had. And so they took him by every part of the body, and bare him into a chamber, and laid him in a rich bed, far from all folk; and so he lay four days. Then the one said he was alive, and the other said, nay. In the name of God, said an old man, for I do you verily to wit he is not dead, but he is so full of life as the mightiest of you all; and therefore I counsel you that he be well kept till God send him life again.

“In such manner they kept Launcelot four-and-twenty days and all so many nights, that ever he lay still as a dead man; and at the twenty-fifth day befell him after midday that he opened his eyes, and when he saw folk he made great sorrow, and said: Why have ye awaked me, for I was more at ease than I am now. O Jesu Christ, who might be so blessed that might see openly thy great marvels of secretness there where no sinner may be! What have ye seen? said they about him. I have seen, said he, so great marvels that no tongue may tell, and more than any heart can think, and had not my son been here afore me I had seen much more. Then they told him how he had lain there four-and-twenty days and nights. Then him thought it was punishment for the four-and-twenty years that he had been a sinner, wherefore our Lord put him in penance four-and-twenty days and nights. Then looked Sir Launcelot afore him, and saw the hair which he had borne nigh a year, for that he forthought him right much that he had broken his promise unto the hermit, which he had avowed to do. Then they asked how it stood with him. Forsooth, said he, I am whole of body, thanked be our Lord; therefore, sirs, for God’s love tell me where I am. Then said they all that he was in the Castle of Carbonek.”

And when the moon is clear, and the tingling sea is vast and alone, this castle on the sand above the grim coast is Carbonek, meet for all adventures and all dreams.