A fool I came back, a fool I went; a fool I
went, a fool I came back; foolishness I sought, a fool I hold myself."
[3] The wonders related of Arthur, he tells us, have been recounted so
often that they have become fables. "Not all lies, nor all true, all
foolishness, nor all sense; so much have the storytellers told, and so
much have the makers of fables fabled to embellish their stories that
they have made all seem fable." [4] He omits the prophecies of Merlin
from his narrative, because he does not understand them. "I am not
willing to translate his book, because I do not know how to interpret
it. I would say nothing that was not exactly as I said." [5] To this
scrupulous regard for the truth, absolutely foreign to the ingenious
Geoffrey, Wace adds an unusual power of visualising. He sees clearly
everything that he describes, and decorates his narrative with almost
such minute details of any scene as a seventeenth-century Dutch
painter loved to put upon his canvas. The most famous instance of
this power is his description of Arthur's embarkation for the
Roman campaign. Geoffrey, after saying simply that Arthur went to
Southampton, where the wind was fair, passes at once to the dream that
came to the king on his voyage across the Channel.
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