that in Uther’s days stood. 
    And I will fare to Avelon to the fairest of all maidens
    To Argente their Queen, an elf very fair,
    And she shall my wounds make all sound
    All whole me make with healing draughts,
    And afterwards I will come again to my kingdom
    And dwell with the Britons with mickle joy. 
    Even with the words that came upon the sea
    A short boat sailing, moving amid the waves
    And two women were therein wounderously clad. 
    And they took Arthur anon and bare him quickly
    And softly him adown laid and to glide forth gan they. 
    Then was it come what Merlin said whilom
    That unmeasured sorrow should be at Arthur’s forth faring. 
    Britons believe yet that he is still in life
    And dwelleth in Avelon with the fairest of all elves,
    And every Briton looketh still when Arthur shall return. 
    Was never the man born nor never the lady chosen
    Who knoweth of the sooth of Arthur to say more. 
    But erstwhile there was a wizard Merlin called. 
    He boded with words the which were sooth
    That an Arthur should yet come the English to help.”

You see by this last line that Layamon has forgotten the difference between Briton and English.  He has forgotten that in his lifetime Arthur fought against the English.  To him Arthur has become an English hero.  And perhaps he wrote these last words with the hope in his heart that some day some one would arise who would deliver his dear land from the rule of the stranger Normans.  This, we know, happened.  Not, indeed, by the might of one man, but by the might of the English spirit, the strong spirit which had never died, and which Layamon himself showed was still alive when he wrote his book in English.

Chapter VIII THE BEGINNING OF THE READING TIME

We are now going on two hundred years to speak of another book about Arthur.  This is Morte d’Arthur, by Sir Thomas Malory.

Up to this time all books had to be written by hand.  But in the fifteenth century printing was discovered.  This was one of the greatest things which ever happened for literature, for books then became much more plentiful and were not nearly so dear as they had been, and so many more people could afford to buy them.  And thus learning spread.

It is not quite known who first discovered the art of printing, but William Caxton was the first man who set up a printing-press in England.  He was an English wool merchant who had gone to live in Bruges, but he was very fond of books, and after a time he gave up his wool business, came back to England, and began to write and print books.  One of the first books he printed was Malory’s Morte d’Arthur.