I thought you said 'anybody,' and so I supposed 'anybody' included--well, anybody; that is, everybody." "It doth--anybody that is of lofty birth; and the better if he be royal." "That, it meseemeth, might well be," said the abbot, who saw his opportunity to smooth things and avert disaster, "for it were not likely that so wonderful a gift as this would be conferred for the revelation of the concerns of lesser beings than such as be born near to the summits of greatness.

Our Arthur the king--" "Would you know of him ?" broke in the enchanter.
"Most gladly, yea, and gratefully." Everybody was full of awe and interest again right away, the incorrigible idiots.

They watched the incantations absorbingly, and looked at me with a "There, now, what can you say to that ?" air, when the announcement came: "The king is weary with the chase, and lieth in his palace these two hours sleeping a dreamless sleep." "God's benison upon him!" said the abbot, and crossed himself; "may that sleep be to the refreshment of his body and his soul." "And so it might be, if he were sleeping," I said, "but the king is not sleeping, the king rides." Here was trouble again--a conflict of authority.

Nobody knew which of us to believe; I still had some reputation left.

The magician's scorn was stirred, and he said: "Lo, I have seen many wonderful soothsayers and prophets and magicians in my life days, but none before that could sit idle and see to the heart of things with never an incantation to help." "You have lived in the woods, and lost much by it.