"T. H. White - The Once and Future King" - читать интересную книгу автора (White T.H)

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late for law-giving. Arthur was off to read the pleas for the morrow, a practice which he followed like a
conscientious man. Nowadays the Law was his chief interest, his final effort against Might.
In Uther Pendragon's time there had been no law to speak of, except a childish and one-sided kind of
etiquette which was reserved for the upper classes. Even now, since the King had begun to encourage
Justice so as to bind the power of Fort Mayne once for all, there were three kinds of law to be wrestled
with. He was trying to boil them down, from Customary, Canon and Roman law, into a single code
which he hoped to call the Civil one. This occupation, as well as reading the morrow's pleas, was what
used to call him off to labour every evening, to solitude and silence in the Justice Room.
The Justice Room was at the other end of the palace. It was not as empty as it should have been.
Although there were five people in it, waiting for the King, perhaps the first thing which a modern
visitor would have noticed would have been the room itself. The startling thing about it was that the
hangings made it square. It was night, so that the windows were covered, and the doors were never
uncovered. The result was that you felt you were in a box: you had the strange feeling of symmetrical
enclosure which must be known by butterflies in killing-bottles. You wondered how the five people had
been introduced into the place, as if it were a Chinese puzzle. All round the walls, from floor to ceiling
in a double row, the stories of David and Bathsheba and of Susannah and the Elders were told in flexible
pictures whose gay colours were in full tone. The faded things which we see today bear no relationship
to the bright tapestry which made the justice Room a painted box.
The five men glittered in the candle-light. There was little furniture to distract the eye from themтАФonly
a long table with the parchments laid out for the King's inspection, the King's high chair, and, in the
corner, a raised reading-desk and seat combined. The colour of the place was in the walls and men. Each
of them wore a silk Jupon blazoned with the chevron and the three thistles, distinguished in the case of
the younger brothers with various labels of cadency, so that they looked like a hand of playing cards
spread out. They were the Gawaine family, and, as usual, they were quarrelling.
Gawaine said: "For the last time, Agravaine, will ye hold yer gab? I winna have airt nor pairt in it."
"Nor will I," said Gareth.
Gaheris said: "Nor I."
"If ye press on with it, ye will but split the clan. I have told ye plain that none of us will help ye. Ye will
be left to yer ain stour."
Mordred had been waiting with sneering patience.
"I am on Agravaine's side," he said. "Lancelot and my aunt are a disgrace to all of us. Agravaine and I

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will take the responsibility, if no one else will."
Gareth turned on him fiercely.
"Ye were aye fit for work of shame."
"Thank you."
Gawaine made an effort to be conciliatory. He was not a conciliatory man, so the effort looked actually
physical, like an earthquake.
"Mordred," he said, "for dear sakes, hearken reason. Ye'll be a brave hind and let it bide? I am the elder
of ye, and can see what ill will come."
"Whatever comes of it, I am going to the King."
"But, Agravaine, if you do, it will mean war. Don't you see that Arthur and Lancelot will have to go for