After Sir Bagdemagus fails, Galahad wins a miraculous white shield marked with a red cross. The white knight who defends the shield tells Galahad its history — it comes from the days of Joseph of Aramathy and has healing powers — then the white knight vanishes. Galahad's squire, who has heard all this, asks that he may follow wherever Galahad goes. When Galahad hints that he must ride alone, the squire asks to be knighted. Galahad grants it.
Now Galahad is directed to a churchyard where a ghost howls, weakening men and driving them mad. Galahad lifts the lid of the haunted coffin, drives out a fiend, and orders the body removed from holy ground. A good man explains the allegory in the event: the body signifies the foulness of the world, corrupt with the hatred of fathers and sons — one of the reasons Christ was born of a Virgin.
Galahad and his former squire, now Sir Melias, ride together until the road forks. A magic sign says that the left fork can lead to proof of prowess, the right to proof of knightly bearing and personal virtue as well. Melias takes the left. He finds a crown on a throne in a meadow and takes it with him. A knight comes against him and nearly kills him. Galahad arrives to beat the knight and also a second knight, then takes Melias back to an abbey, where he is eventually healed. Galahad learns that in taking the left fork — the road to prowess — Melias acted with pride; in taking the crown he acted with covetousness. The two knights Galahad overcame signify Galahad's triumph over these two sins. No man with such sins in him can achieve the Grail Quest.
