Reviews. 353
feature of the whole ingenious scheme. I will let Herr Wechssler speak for himself.
"An Arturs Tafelrunde erscheint eines Tags, am Pfingstfest, ein wunderbares freischwebendes Gefäss, das Speise und Trank spendet. Alle Genossen des Tisches, Gauvain voran, geloben zu einer Suche auszuziehen. Aber nur ein fremder junger Mann gelangt ans Ziel der sich zuvor durch die Besitznahme eines bisher von niemand ungestraft eingenommenen Sitzes als der Erwählte erwiesen hat. Wer der Held dieser Erzählung war wissen wir nicht." (This is really too modest of Herr Wechssler; his imagination would surely have been equal to this small effort. Or was it exhausted by its previous labours?) "Drei wesentliche Motive, Tafelrunde, Wunsch-gefäss und der verbotene Sitz, erinnerten den Legendendichter an verwandte Züge in der Legende von Joseph und dem Gral. So kam er dazu, beides zu combiniren." (Cf. note 24, p. 119.)
But where in all the mass of Arthurian romance have we the faintest hint or trace of such an adventure, saving and excepting in the Queste? Outside the Grail as distinguished from the Arthurian story there is nothing that can be twisted by any ingenuity into such an adventure. If the suggestion were correct, we should have to conclude that when the Grail legend touched the Arthurian it was already in so complete and finished a stage that it did not merely mingle with, but completely swallowed up, a part of the latter story, doing its work so thoroughly that no trace of the origina legend has survived.
No, this theory is again pure guess-work on the part of the writer. When we have proof that such a story was ever told of Arthur's court, then, and not till then, will it be worth while examining it.
But now what part did Perceval play in this gradual evolution — how and where did he first come into the story? According to Herr Wechssler, Galahad (even when endowed with Perceval's essential characteristics and a good share of his story) was still too shadowy and unsubstantial a creation (though he was previously a popular Welsh hero) to be fully satisfactory as the central figure of a romance which was becoming widely popular. Welsh tradition, richly endowed, was, however, ready with another hero. This time it was the rough untutored son of a fairy (Wald-fee), the human side of whose nature, inherited from his
VOL. IX.
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