CHAPTER XVI
 
 How the Damosel of the Lake saved King Arthur from
 mantle that should have burnt him.
 
 WITH that came the Damosel of the Lake unto the king, and said,
 Sir, I must speak with you in privity.  Say on, said the king,
 what ye will.  Sir, said the damosel, put not on you this mantle
 till ye have seen more, and in no wise let it not come on you,
 nor on no knight of yours, till ye command the bringer thereof to
 put it upon her.  Well, said King Arthur, it shall be done as ye
 counsel me.  And then he said unto the damosel that came from his
 sister, Damosel, this mantle that ye have brought me, I will see
 it upon you.  Sir, she said, It will not beseem me to wear a
 king's garment.  By my head, said Arthur, ye shall wear it or it
 come on my back, or any man's that here is.  And so the king made
 it to be put upon her, and forth withal she fell down dead, and
 never more spake word after and burnt to coals.  Then was the
 king wonderly wroth, more than he was to-forehand, and said unto
 King Uriens, My sister, your wife, is alway about to betray me,
 and well I wot either ye, or my nephew, your son, is of counsel
 with her to have me destroyed; but as for you, said the king to
 King Uriens, I deem not greatly that ye be of her counsel, for
 Accolon confessed to me by his own mouth, that she would have
 destroyed you as well as me, therefore I hold you excused; but as
 for your son, Sir Uwaine, I hold him suspect, therefore I charge
 you put him out of my court.  So Sir Uwaine was discharged.  And
 when Sir Gawaine wist that, he made him ready to <127>go with
 him; and said, Whoso banisheth my cousin-germain shall banish me. 
 So they two departed, and rode into a great forest, and so they
 came to an abbey of monks, and there were well lodged.  But when
 the king wist that Sir Gawaine was departed from the court, there
 was made great sorrow among all the estates.  Now, said Gaheris,
 Gawaine's brother, we have lost two good knights for the love of
 one.  So on the morn they heard their masses in the abbey, and so
 they rode forth till that they came to a great forest.  Then was
 Sir Gawaine ware in a valley by a turret [of] twelve fair
 damosels, and two knights armed on great horses, and the damosels
 went to and fro by a tree.  And then was Sir Gawaine ware how
 there hung a white shield on that tree, and ever as the damosels
 came by it they spit upon it, and some threw mire upon the
 shield.