Now sirs, said the gentlewoman, wit ye well that the drawing
of this sword is warned to all men save all only to you. Also this
ship arrived in the realm of Logris; and that time was deadly war
between King Labor, which was father unto the maimed king, and King
Hurlame, which was a Saracen. But then was he newly christened, so
that men held him afterward one of the wyttyest men of the world. And
so upon a day it befel that King Labor and King Hurlame had assembled
their folk upon the sea where this ship was arrived; and there King
Hurlame was discomfit, and his men slain; and he was afeard to be
dead, and fled to his ship, and there found this sword and drew it,
and came out and found King Labor, the man in the world of all
Christendom in whom was then the greatest faith. And when King Hurlame
saw King Labor he dressed this sword, and smote him upon the helm so
hard that he clave him and his horse to the earth with the first
stroke of his sword. And it was in the realm of Logris; and so befel
great pestilence and great harm to both realms. For sithen increased
neither corn, nor grass, nor well-nigh no fruit, nor in the water was
no fish; wherefore men call it the lands of the two marches, the waste
land, for that dolorous stroke.
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