Chapter II: Preface (1)

This anthology is chosen entirely from poems written in the traditional fixed forms of the _ballade_, _chant royal_, _kyrielle_, _rondel_, _rondeau_, _rondeau redoublé_, _sestina_, _triolet_, _villanelle_, and _virelai_, with the addition of the _pantoum_. That such a choice is the result of circumstances it is needless to point out, since only those that had found favour with English writers were available for the purpose. So far as I know, this collection is the first of its sort, although Mr. W. Davenport Adams' _Latter Day Lyrics_ included a section chosen on the same lines. Having, in company, no doubt, with many others, a genuine regard for the group Mr. Adams included there, I had long hoped to see a more ample compilation of later work in this school; but notwithstanding the steady increase in the number of poems written in the forms systematically arranged herein, the ground remained unoccupied, until the appearance of this book; which may fairly claim to be the first in the field, since no other volume has devoted its whole space to them, save in the rarer cases, where an author has published a collection of original poems cast in one mould, notably Mr. Swinburne's _Century of Roundels_ and Mr. Andrew Lang's _Ballades in Blue China_.

In Mr. Adams' volume another valuable feature was the _Note on some Foreign forms of Verse_ by Mr. Austin Dobson, which many years since introduced to me the laws of the various forms and created my special interest in them. It is no derogation to the charming group in the former volume to say of the present collection, that it far exceeds its predecessor in number and variety, for now there is a wide field to choose from, whereas Mr. Adams was then limited to a selection from the small number extant.

The rules which Mr. Austin Dobson was the first to formulate in English are made the basis (side by side with the treatises of M. de Gramont, M. de Banville, and other authorities) of the following chapter on the rules of the various forms. Lest a name so intimately associated with the introduction of the old French metrical shapes in English poetry should appear to be brought in to add weight to my own attempt, and the reputation of a master invoked for the work of one who at furthest can but style himself an apprentice, I must ask that this necessary tribute to Mr. Dobson's labours be taken only as an apology for so freely using his material, and that his ready help is by no means to be regarded in the faintest way as an imprimatur of any statements in this prefatory matter, save those quoted avowedly and directly from his writings.

It may be best to name at once the authorities who have been consulted in the preparation of the introductory chapter. These include the French treatises of De Banville, De Gramont, and Jullienne, Mr. Saintsbury's _Short History of French Literature_, Mr. Hueffers' _Troubadours_, an article by Mr. Gosse in the _Cornhill Magazine_, July 1877, _Les Villanelles_ by M. Joseph Boulmier, _The Rhymester_ of Mr. Brander Matthews, and many occasional papers on the various forms that have appeared in English and American periodicals. To arrange in one chapter the materials gathered from these and other sources is all that I have attempted. If at times the need to crowd enough matter for a volume into the limits of a few pages results in a want of lucidity, I must plead the necessity imposed by limited space. To those who, by their kindly permission, have allowed their poems to be quoted here, the thanks that I can offer are as hearty as the expression of my gratitude is brief. The somewhat onerous task of obtaining consent from about two hundred authors has been turned to a pleasure, by the evidence of interest taken in this, the first collection of the later growth of this branch of poetic art. Nor did the help cease with the loan of the poems; in many instances a correspondence followed that brought to light fresh material, both for the body of the book and the introductory chapter, and rendered assistance not easy to overvalue. If any writer is quoted without direct permission, it was through no want of effort to trace him, excepting in the case of a very few that reached me in the shape of newspaper cuttings, wholly devoid of any clue to the locality of the writer. To Mr. Austin Dobson my best thanks are due. From Mr. Andrew Lang and Mr. Edmund Gosse I have also appropriated material, acknowledged as often as practicable; also to my friend, Mr. A. G. Wright, for invaluable help during the rather monotonous task of hunting up and copying at the reading-room of the British Museum; and to Mr. William Sharp, whose critical advice and generous encouragement throughout have left a debt of gratitude beyond payment.

In a society paper, _The London_, a brilliant series of these poems appeared during 1877-8. After a selection was made for this volume, it was discovered that they were all by _one_ author, Mr. W. E. Henley, who most generously permitted the whole of those chosen to appear, and to be for the first time publicly attributed to him. The poems themselves need no apology, but in the face of so many from his pen, it is only right to explain the reason for the inclusion of so large a number.

From America Mr. Brander Matthews and Mr. Clinton Scollard have shown sympathy with the collection, not only by permitting their works to be cited, but also by calling my attention to poems by authors almost unknown in England; while all those writers who in the new world are using the old shapes with a peculiar freshness and vigour, gave ready assent to the demand.

To Messrs. Cassell & Co., for allowing poems that appeared in _Cassell's Family Magazine_ (those by Miss Ada Louise Martin and Mr. G. Weatherley); to Messrs. Longman, for liberty to quote freely from the many graceful examples that appeared in _Longman's Magazine_; to Messrs. Kegan Paul, Trench, & Co., for endorsing Mr. Andrew Lang's permission to include specimens from _Rhymes à la Mode_ and _Ballades in Blue China_, the utmost thanks are due for the courtesy shown; also to the proprietors of the _Century Magazine_, where so many of the American poems (many since collected by the authors in their own volumes) first appeared; and to Messrs Harper for permission to use Mr. Coleman's _Sestina_, and Mr. Graham R. Tomson's _Ballade of the Bourne_, which first appeared in their popular monthly. The poems that are cited by the courtesy of Mr. John Payne appear respectively in _Songs of Life and Death_ (W. H. Allen & Co.), _New Poems_ (ditto), and _Poems by François Villon_ (Reeves & Turner), now out of print.

Having named so many who have lent aid, it is but fair to exonerate them from any blame for errors that, no doubt, in spite of the utmost care, may have crept in. In view of a later edition, I should be glad to be informed of any additional data of the use of the forms in English verse, which, if quoted, would add to the value of the collection, or to have any erroneous statements corrected.

Notwithstanding the many shortcomings of my own share in the production of this volume, I cannot doubt but that the charm of the poems themselves will endear it to readers; and as a lover of the "Gallic bonds," I venture to hope it may do some little towards their complete naturalisation in our tongue.

GLEESON WHITE.

_August 1887._

NOTES

ON THE EARLY USE OF THE

VARIOUS FORMS.

SOME NOTES ON THE EARLY USE OF THE VARIOUS FORMS, AND RULES FOR THEIR CONSTRUCTION.

In the limited space available, it is hardly possible to give more than a very crude sketch of the origin of these forms; but some reference to early Provençal literature is inevitable, since the nucleus of not a few of them can be traced among the intricate rhyming of the Troubadours. Yet it would be beyond the purpose to go minutely into the enticing history of that remarkable period, nor is it needful to raise disputed questions regarding the origin of each particular fashion. The number of books on Provençal subjects is great, the mere enumeration of the names of those in the library of the British Museum would fill several pages. The language itself has a fascination which allures many to disaster, for as Mr. Hueffer points out, it "looks at first sight so like the Latin and more familiar Romance languages that it offers special temptations" to guess at its meaning, with very doubtful success.

The term Provençal is usually applied to a dialect more correctly known as "the Langue d'Oc, which, with the Langue d'Oil, forms the two divisions of the Romance language spoken in the country we now know as France;" but Mr. Saintsbury remarks that, strictly speaking, the Langue d'Oc should not be called "French" at all, since it is hardly more akin to the Langue d'Oil than it is to Spanish and Italian, and that those who spoke it applied the term "French" to northern speech, calling their own Limousin, or Provençal, or Auvergnat. The limits where it prevailed extended far beyond Provence itself. Authorities differ with regard to the exact boundaries. It will suffice for the present purpose to take those Mr. Hueffer adopts--namely, the district within a boundary formed by a line drawn from the mouth of the Gironde to that of the Saone, in the north, while the southern limit includes parts of Spain, such as Aragon, Valencia, Catalonia, and the Balearic Islands.

Herr Karl Bartsch, the eminent historian of Provençal literature, divides it into three periods:--the first, to the end of the eleventh century; the second, which is the one that marks the most flourishing time of the poetry of the Troubadours, extending over the twelfth and thirteenth; and the third period--of its decadence--in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. To this may be added the attempt to revive it in our own day, by the school of the so-called _Félibres_, including Mistral, Aubanel, Alphonse Daudet, and others, who have worked vigorously, and with no mean success, to produce a modern literature in the old dialect, worthy of its former dignity. In this preface it is impossible to mention any part of the prose of this marvellous literature, which sprang almost suddenly into a gigantic growth, that has been a fruitful theme for wonder and admiration ever since, and left its influence widely felt. The point that is to the purpose here, concerns the invention by the Provençal poets of many set forms of verse, some few of which are still written, but most so altered and renewed by later use, that their original character is well-nigh obscured. The forms included in this book are often erroneously attributed _en masse_ to the _jongleurs_ of Provence, yet few assumptions are less true. Altered by the Trouvères, the fifteenth century poets, the Ronsardists, and later writers, it is safer to assign to the Troubadours only the germs which evolved gradually into their now matured forms. To linger over the extraordinary period is a temptation hard to dismiss; the very name still has a flavour of romance, and brings a curious medley of images to the mind when it is heard, many perhaps as far from the actual Provençal Troubadour as _Nanki-Poo_ in the "_Mikado_" is from the wandering minstrel of the court of King Thibaut. Of the Troubadours who have come down to fame, four hundred and sixty are recorded by name, besides two hundred and fifty-one pieces that have survived without evidence of their authors. King Richard I. (our own Coeur de Lion), Guillem de Cabestanh, Peire Vidal, Bertran de Born, The Monk of Montaudon, and many others, have biographical sketches of exceeding interest allotted to them in Mr. Hueffer's "The Troubadours." A halo of romance has gathered round their names, and thrown a glamour over the record of their lives; to read their history is to be transported to a region where all topics but love and song are deemed unimportant trifles, unless the old chroniclers are singularly untruthful in their statements. We know now-a-days many a young poet's crushed life appears only in his verses, and outside those he appears but an average Philistine to vulgar eyes. Perhaps the "land of the nightingale and rose" was not so idyllic as its historians paint it; but with every deduction, there yet remains evidence of an exceptional importance attached to the arts, more especially to that of song. To those who wrote, or rather sang, witty impromptus (made often, we can but fancy, with much labour beforehand), or produced dainty conceits in elaborate rhymes and rhythms, when sound came perilously near triumphing over sense, a welcome was extended, as widespread and far more personal in its application than even that accorded to our modern substitute for the troubadour--the popular novelist. The doings of the Courts of Love, set down in sober chronicles, are hardly less fantastic than Mr. Gilbert's ingenious operas. Matters of the most sentimental and amorous character were debated in public, with all the earnestness of a question of state. That their poetry was singularly limited in its character there is little doubt, but Mr. Hueffer declares that it had its serious side, often lost sight of, and that no small portion was devoted to stately and dignified subjects. Mr. Lowell, on the other hand, in an essay on Chaucer in _My Study Windows_, says--

"Their poetry is purely lyric in its most narrow sense, that is,
the expression of personal and momentary moods. To the fancy of
the critics who take their cue from tradition, Provence is a
morning sky of early summer, out of which innumerable larks rain a
faint melody (the sweeter because rather half divined than heard
too distinctly) over an earth where the dew never dries and the
flowers never fade. But when we open Raynouard it is like opening
the door of an aviary. We are deafened and confused by a hundred
minstrels singing the same song at once, and more than suspect the
flowers they welcome are made of French cambric, spangled with
dewdrops of prevaricating glass."

The forms in which the Provençal poets wrote were chiefly these:--The oldest was called _vers_, and consisted of octosyllabic lines arranged in stanzas; from this grew the _canzo_, with interlaced rhymes--later on with the distinctive feature still prominent in French, but unknown in English poetry, the rhymes _masculine_ and _feminine_. The _canzo_ was used entirely for subjects of love and gallantry, but the _sirvente_, composed of short stanzas, simply rhyming, and corresponding one to the other, was employed for political and social subjects, sometimes treated seriously, at others satirically. The _tenso_ was a curious trial of skill in impromptu versification. Two antagonists met and agreed that the one should reply on the opposite side to any argument the first might select. The opening stanza, chosen at will by the speaker, was imitated in the reply, both in observance of its rhyme and rhythm, the same rhyme-sound being often kept throughout the whole poem. It must not be forgotten that the Langue d'Oc was singularly fertile in rhymes, so that the feat was less arduous than it would be in other tongues. The _alba_, a farewell at morning, and the _serena_, or evening song, the _pastorella_, devoted, as its name implies, to pastoral subjects, appear to govern the themes of the verses rather than the form. There is record, however, of the _breu-doble_ (double short), invented by Guirant Riquier, a little form with three rhymes, two of which are repeated twice in three four-lined stanzas, and given once in a concluding couplet, while the third finished each quatrain. The _retroensa_ is noticeable for its refrain of more than one line. The sonnet has ceased to be claimed as a Provençal invention, yet it must be noted, as at one time its origin there was a favourite theory. The _ballade_, "a song serving to accompany the dance," must not be confused with the later ballade; and lastly, the greatest in most respects, the _sestina_, which, as it occurs among the poems noticed technically later on, need not be further mentioned here.

"The artificial verse-forms of Provence include some as peculiar and arbitrary as ever issued from the brain of Persian poet--verse-forms by the side of which the metrical glitter of _ballade_, _chant royal_, _rondeau_, _rondel_, _triolet_, _virelai_ and _villanelle_ must pale," says a writer in the _Westminster Review_ (October 1878), and instances the _tenso_ and the _sestina_ in proof of his assertion. Mr. Hueffer also treats the _chant royal_ as mere child's play beside the intricate feats displayed by the Troubadours. The above short list shows many examples of forms using the refrain and some other features preserved in Northern poetry; but the debt owed by the North to the Troubadours is far less, according to later writers, than that assigned to Provençal influence some few years ago. Mr. Saintsbury says that "poems called _rondeaux_ and _ballades_, of loose construction and undecided form, began to make their appearance at the end of the twelfth and beginning of the thirteenth century," but the forms as we know them owe their present shape to their reformation in Northern France, culminating in the poems of Charles d'Orléans and François Villon. In this revival, the _lai_ and _pastourelle_ kept their Provençal titles, but were made much more exact in form, and never attained the widespread celebrity of the newer shapes, which are to all intents and purposes the models for the forms in this volume, save the _sestina_, which is practically an Italian, and the _pantoum_, an Eastern form.

There is no space here to notice more than the names of a few of even the most prominent of the poets who succeeded the Provençal singers in their use of these forms. There are thousands of ballades in MSS. in the Royal French Library, by known and unknown writers. Eustache Deschamps (1328-1415), a friend of Chaucer's, "has left no less than 1175 ballades. Rondeaus, virelais, etc., also proceeded in great numbers from his pen; also an important _Art of Poetry_, a treatise rendered at once necessary and popular by the fashion of artificial rhyming."[1] Some of the earliest ballades and rondel-triolets bear the name of Jehan Froissart (1337-1410), the chronicler. Messire Guy de la Tremouille, according to Mr. Gosse, is supposed to have been the first to devise the elaborate rules of construction of the ballade, which have been in force ever since. He was guard of the Oriflamme in 1383, and died in 1398; but Deschamps is more often credited with the honour. That he cultivated the form we know, besides writing an "Art of making Chansons, Ballades, Virelais, and Rondels," which is a valuable relic of his time. Jehannot de Lescurel, "of whom absolutely nothing is known, has left sixteen ballades, fifteen rondeaus (not in regular form), and other pieces, said to be 'of singular grace, lightness, and elegance.'"

[1] See Saintsbury's _Short History of French Literature_, p. 103.

Guillaume de Machault (1284-1377) was also a voluminous writer. One of his poems, a _chanson balladée_, is printed in Mr. Saintsbury's _Short History of French Literature_, which contains also a _Ballade_ by Alain Chartier (1390-1458), the hero of the famous story of the kiss of Queen Margaret of Scotland, and other specimens of this period, in a succinct and trustworthy account of the growth of French poetry, surpassed by no book in our own language.

Charles d'Orléans (1391-1466), noticed among the English writers, is specially honoured as the master of the rondel; while François Villon (1431-1485) stands out as the "prince of all ballade-makers." For brief, but splendid sketches of these two, Mr. R. L. Stevenson's _Familiar Studies of Men and Books_ should be consulted, while for more prosaic description there is no lack of data. Since the revival of interest in Villon, France has done tardy but unstinted honour to her most famous poet, as it is the fashion just now to style him, but there is a doubt whether the praise given is not in danger of being exaggerated. Yet, making all allowances, there is vital humanity in his wondrous writings, that now, after four hundred years, read as living and modern in their presentation of life, as though they were by a realist of our own day. In Villon, student, poet, housebreaker, we find the forerunner of the Zola of to-day--one who, in so eminently an artificial form as the ballade, cast aside all conventional restraints, and sang of what he saw and knew. It is much to be regretted that space forbids more translations of his poems to be included in this collection. For those who wish to tackle him in his old, and by no means easy, French, a good edition is published for a franc, in the _Collection Jannet-Picard (Paris)_. Mr. Payne has translated the whole of his authentic works into English in a volume, at present out of print, which contains also a very graphic and full biography of this remarkable man. Space forbids insertion of the sketch of his life prepared for this chapter. Born in 1431, student 1448, B.A. in 1452, writing his _Lesser Testament_ in 1446, his _Greater Testament_ in 1461; in those few years he contrived to win more fame, and, to speak truly, more infamy, than a whole generation of lesser poets. He was condemned to die--he wrote his marvellous _Ballade of the Gibbet_ while lying under sentence of death--but escaped. Where he died is unknown, the date of his _Greater Testament_ being the last record of Master François Villon of Paris.

In 1493 appeared _L'art et science de rhéthorique pour faire rigmes et ballades_, by Henry de Croï--an invaluable treatise on French Poetics. The works of Pierre Gringoire (1478-1544) must be named, if only for the fact of De Banville's splendid ballade in his comedy "Gringoire," founded on an incident in the poet's life. By Mr. Lang's permission a translation is quoted in the body of this volume. Mr. John Payne also englished it, in the _Dublin University Magazine_, 1879. The works of Clement Marot (1497-1544) demand special note, since his _ballades_ and _chants royaux_ are now accepted as the ideal models for imitation.

In his _Art Poëtique_, 1555, Thomas Sibilet reviews many of the former writers, and gives the rules of the poetry then in force. Immediately after this date came another change; with the famous school of Ronsard (1524-1585) and the _Pléiade_, as they are styled, one of whom, however, Du Bellay, was eager to abolish the _ballade_ and _chant royal_ in favour of the _sonnet_. The members of this group produced some notable work in strict forms. Among the Ronsardists we find Grévin the dramatist, who wrote some graceful poems which he called _Villanesques_--a modified form of the _Villanelle_--and Jean Passerat (1534-1602) who is specially noteworthy, since in his hand the _Villanelle_ crystallised into its present shape, Joseph Boulmier, in the last revival, making this form his special study, and writing all his verses after Passerat's model given elsewhere in this volume.

The rondeau was revived in great splendour in the middle of the seventeenth century. Foremost among the brilliant group is Voiture (1598-1648), the acknowledged master of this form. Only thirty of his rondeaus are left, but each one of these is a masterpiece, and may be studied for all the subtle devices and dainty inventions that the form has yet yielded. Benserade (1612-1691) and Sarrasin were also famous for rondeau-making, the former translating the whole of Ovid's _Metamorphoses_ into rondeaus, which were sumptuously printed at the King's Press at a cost of 10,000 francs. When Voiture died in 1648, it is curious to note that Sarrasin wrote a "pompous funereal poem--possibly the most funny serious elegy ever composed--in which, among other strange mourners, he makes the 'poor little triolet,' all in tears, trot by the side of the dead poet," who, according to Mr. Gosse, from whom the above paragraph is quoted, had never written one in his life. Sarrasin also left a curious specimen of the _Glose_, written on the famous Sonnet "de IOB" by Benserade. In 1649 Gérard de Saint Amant wrote a volume of sixty-four triolets. From the seventeenth to the nineteenth century no important examples occur. About thirty years ago De Banville revived these old shapes, and initiated a movement that Daudet, Glatigny, Boulmier, and a host of others have helped forward, so that now modern French literature is flooded with examples of the forms-the ballade, rondeau, and triolet being the most widely used.

Having imperfectly followed the growth of the forms in France, it will be interesting to give a few notes of the various attempts made to acclimatise some in England. Although no effort previous to 1873 warrants us in claiming an English pedigree for them, yet it is curious to see how often the attempt was made to write them in our own tongue. The sonnet gradually grew into use, until it became as little an exotic as the potato, to employ an uncouth simile; the ballade and rondeau--hardly more formal in their rules, and with susceptibilities of infinite grace and beauty--failed to be even residents amongst us, much less naturalised subjects, sharing the rights and duties of citizens. Chaucer is believed to have used these forms, as in "The Legend of Good Women" he says, speaking of himself--

"Many a himpne for your holy daies
That highten balades, roundels, virelaies."

His "Balade de Vilage sauns Peynture," however, does not correspond with the accepted form. Mr. Gosse says that the Chaucer of 1651 contains a number of poems attributed to himself and Lydgate "which are merely pieces in rhyme-royal, so arranged as to imitate the French ballade: without its severity of form."

The following is a roundel attributed to Chaucer:--

I.-BURDEN.

So hath your beauty fro your hertè chased
Pitee, that mee availeth not to pleyne;
For daunger[2] halt your mercy in his cheyne.

II.

Giltles my deth thus have ye purchased,
I sey you soth, me nedeth not to fayne;
So hath, etc.

III.

Alas, that Nature hath in you compassed
So grete beaute, that no man may atteyne
To mercy, though he stewe[3] for the peyne.
So hath, etc.

[2] Dominion, power.

[3] Sterve.

This is given in Furnival's _Trial-Forewords to Chaucer's Minor Poems_, and is especially interesting in connection with the history of the forms in English use.

Of his immediate followers, Lydgate, a monk of Bury, author of _London Lyckpenny_, is said by Guest to have written a "roundle," and one by Thomas Occleve is printed in Morley's _Shorter English Poems_.

John Gower (1340-1408), author of _Confessio Amantis_, at the coronation of Henry IV. presented the king with a collection of fifty _Ballades_, written in the Provençal manner, "to entertain his noble court." The thin oblong MS., on vellum, which contains them is still extant in the Marquis of Stafford's library at Trentham, and in 1818 it was printed for the Roxburghe Club; but as the poems are unfortunately written in French, they do not assist in supporting a claim for the early use of the form in England. Professor Henry Morley has translated one for his _English Writers_; it follows the rhymes accurately, but has a somewhat trite subject. A critic has well said of it, that the poets of Gowers's day "were not burdened with solving 'the riddle of the painful earth.' It may be that a good deal of their guileless delight in things fresh and young was feigned, but then so is much of our more pretentious philosophy." From its special interest it is quoted here--

Winter departs, and comes the flowery May,
And round from cold to heat the seasons fly;
The bird that to its nest had lost the way
Rebuilds it that he may rejoice thereby.
Like change in my love's world I now descry,
With such a hope I comfort myself here,
And you, my lady, on this truth rely:
When grief departs the coming joys are near.

My lady sweet, by that which now I say
You may discover how my heart leaps high,
That serves you, and has served you many a day,
As it will serve you daily till I die.
Remember, then, my lady, knowing why,
That my desire for you will never veer
As God wills that it be, so be our tie:
When grief departs the coming joys are near.

The day that news of you came where I lay,
It seem'd there was no grief could make me sigh;
Wherefore of you, dear lady mine, I pray
By your own message--when you will, not I--
Send me what you think best as a reply
Wherewith my heart can keep itself from fear;
And, lady, search the reason of my cry--
When grief departs the coming joys are near.

_Envoy._

O noble Dame, to you this note shall hie,
And when God wills I follow to my dear.
This writing speaks, and says, till I am by,
When grief departs the coming joys are near.

John Shirley, who lived about 1440, made a collection of _Ballades_, _Roundels_, _Virelais_, and Tragedies, in MSS., which are still extant in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford. After noticing Gower, who wrote ballades in French, Charles d'Orléans, who wrote rondels in English, comes as another instance of the early use, but again as a mere exception, since the accident which led both writers to adopt exotic forms is outside the history of our native poetry, and cannot be brought forward to prove their early naturalisation. Of Charles d'Orléans much might be said worth saying, but there are so many sources of information open, that here we need note only the poems written during his captivity. He is said to have been our prisoner for about twenty-five years, and during that time to have acquired a taste for our language. The Abbé Sallier, who unearthed the manuscript of his poems in the Royal Library at Paris during the last century, says he wrote but two in English; but in the MS. at the British Museum, the Rev. H. F. Cary, the translator of Dante, found three, quoted in his _Early French Poets_ (Bohn, 1846). The editor of that volume, the Rev. Henry Cary, son of the author, mentions in a footnote a large collection among the Harleian MSS., attributed to Charles d'Orléans, but throws doubt on their being more than translations. Into this question there is no space to enter. These are the three from Cary's book:--

Go forth, my hert, with my lady;
Loke that ye spar no bysines
To serve her with such lolyness
That ye gette her oftyme prively
That she kepe truly her promes.
Go forth, etc.

I must, as a helis-body,[4]
Abyde alone in hevynes;
And ye that dwell with your mastris
In plaisaunce glad and mery,
Go forth, etc.

* * * * *

My hertly love is in your governas,
And ever shall whill that I live may.
I pray to God I may see that day
That ye be knyt with trouthful alyans.
Ye shall not fynd feyning or variaunce
As in my part; that wyl I truly say.
My hertly, etc.

* * * * *

Bewere, my trewe innocent hert,
How ye hold with her aliauns,
That somtym with word of plesuns
Resceyved you under covert.
Thynke how the stroke of love comsmert[5]
Without warnyng or deffiauns.
Bewere, my, etc.

And ye shall pryvely or appert
See her by me in loves dauns,
With her faire femenyn contenauns
Ye shall never fro her astert.
Bewere, my, etc.

[4] _Helis-body_--One deprived of health or happiness.

[5] _Comsmert_--Can smart, or comes smart.

Spenser (1553-1599) is said (but I cannot trace the authority) to have used some of these forms. Again, Sir Philip Sidney's (1554-1586) famous ditty, "My true love hath my heart," recalls the rondel, but cannot claim to be one. Drummond of Hawthornden (1585-1649) has a fine sestina (too long for quotation), "Sith gone is my delight and only pleasure."

_The Trivial Poems, and Triolets_ of Patrick Carey deserve mention. This volume was unknown until the beginning of the present century, although dated Warnefurd, 1651. The poems were brought into notice by Sir Walter Scott, who obtained the MSS. from John Murray, and after inserting a few in the _Edinburgh Annual Register_, 1810, published the whole for the first time in 1819. The following specimen is taken from Scott's reprint, p. 43:--

Worldly designes, feares, hopes, farwell!
Farwell all earthly joyes and cares!

On nobler thoughts my soule shall dwell
Worldly designes, feares, hopes, farwell!
Att quiett, in my peacefull cell,
I'le thincke on God, free from your snares;
Worldly designes, feares, hopes, farwell!
Farwell all earthly joyes and cares.

In the _Athenæum_, May 7, 1887, is a long article on Carey, signed C. F. S. Warner, M. A. Charles Cotton, the friend of Izaak Walton, wrote a rondeau, "a very ungallant example," cited in Dr. Guests' _History of English Rhythms_. There is also one unquotable, by reason of its subject, among the correspondence of Alexander Pope (1688-1744), and in the _Rolliad_, 1784, a volume of satires in prose and verse, that enjoyed a great popularity for a time, there is a set of five rondeaus, written in pure form after the Voiture model. They satirise North, Eden, Pitt, and Dorset, and are perfect in construction, and vigorous in their ridicule. The popularity of these effusions led to many imitations in the periodical prints at the beginning of this century, few, however, of sufficient merit to be worth reviving. By the courtesy of Mr. Austin Dobson, the owner, I am able to extract a specimen from a scarce and little-known book, entitled _Rondeaulx; translated from the Black Letter French Edition of 1527, by J. R. Best, Esq._;--

#Rondeaulx en Nombre trois cens cinquante.#
#Singuliers et a tous propos. Nouvellement#
#Imprimez a Paris. Avec Privelege#
#On les vend en la grant salle du palays au#
#Premier pillier en la boutique de Galliot du#
#Pre marchaut librarie jure de L'universite.#

The dedication to Robert Studley Vidal, Esq., is dated 1838. The first poem is preceded by a quaint apology, that unfortunately is too long to quote, but the rondeau itself, if its rhythm is faulty and its language ungraceful, shows that the original had sterling advice to offer, and that the translator was not ignorant of the true rules of the form.

UNG BON RONDEAU

A good rondeau I was induced to show
To some fair ladies some short while ago;
Well knowing their ability and taste,
I asked, should ought be added or effac'd,
And prayed that every fault they'd make me know

The first did her most anxious care bestow
To impress one point from which I ne'er should go:
"Upon a good beginning must be based
A good rondeau."

Zeal bid the other's choicest language glow:
She softly said, "Recount your weal or woe,
Your every subject free from pause or haste:
Ne'er let your hero fail, nor be disgraced."
The third--"With varying emphasis should flow
A good rondeau."

In Mr. Oxenford's _Book of French Songs_, now published with Miss Costello's _Specimens of the Early Poetry of France_, in a volume of the _Chandos Classics_, there is one ballade given (with its original French, both without envoy); but although noting the peculiarity that each stanza has the same terminations, Mr. Oxenford has not kept it in his translation, nor has Miss Costello, in a numerous collection of ballades, rondels, lais, and other forms, once paraphrased them accurately, usually varying even the refrain; nor can I see, in her voluminous notes, that she draws attention to this important feature, although she gives the particulars of the eccentricities of rhyming known as _Fraternisée, Brisée_, and the like, and condemns their triviality rather strongly. In the edition before me no date is given; the authoress died in 1870. The oft-quoted Rondeau by Leigh Hunt is so beautiful in itself that all its shortcomings in the matter of form may be readily pardoned, and if--but the saving clause is great--others as beautiful could be built on the same shape, a "Leigh Hunt" variation would be a welcome addition to the forms in English; but it is no _rondeau_, and has not the faintest claim to be so styled. Probably it is familiar to all readers, but in case even one should not know it, it is quoted here:--

"Jenny kissed me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in.
Time, you thief, who love to get
Sweets upon your list, put that in!
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad;
Say that health and wealth have missed me;
Say I'm growing old, but add--
Jenny kissed me."

If Mr. Swinburne's examples of the forms in his earlier volumes be not counted (since he then ignored many of the rules that, as his later books show, he can use with such splendid mastery), to Mr. Andrew Lang's _Lays and Lyrics of Old France_ (Longman, 1872) must be assigned the honour of leading the way in the reproduction in English of the old French metrical forms, made in conformance to their ascertained laws. How far that volume led the way to the modern employment of these forms for original poetry in our own tongue, is not so easily proved. One thing, at least, is certain, that Mr. Austin Dobson, Mr. Edmund Gosse, Mr. W. E. Henley, Mr. Payne, and one or two other writers, were each, unknown to the rest, trying the new measures. In the words of one of these, "the study of French literature was in the air;" and naturally, as we now see, the new movement began simultaneously to adapt its rules to English conditions. To Mr. Bridges belongs the honour of printing the first Triolet in modern English; but he expressly disclaims being looked upon as the apostle for the naturalisation of the exotic forms, for which he had no peculiar sympathy, and after his _Poems_, 1873, ceased to use. So little were his experiments appreciated, that their presence in his volume was considered prejudicial to its success, by competent authorities of the day, who little foresaw the rapid growth that would so soon spring up. To Mr. Austin Dobson is assigned the first _ballade_, "The Prodigals;" to Mr. Edmund Gosse the first _villanelle_ and _chant royal_; and to Mr. W. E. Henley the first _double ballade_, and a few other variations. But it is most likely that the priority of some of these was due to the mere accident of publication, and that it is more near the truth to regard the whole as a contemporaneous movement toward French rhythms, thought out and experimented upon by many writers, ignorant of the fact that they were not alone in the study, and that others were working upon the same lines. One of the first who made trial of these French rhythms has (I believe) never published any; yet examples of their use by the author of _A Child's Garden of Verse_ would have added greatly to the interest of this collection, but the author has willed that they should remain unquoted, so I can only regret their absence.

From 1873 to 1877 a fair number had appeared, but these were produced almost entirely by the writers already named. From 1877, however, the number of those who made them increased rapidly. In that year Mr. Dobson's _Proverbs in Porcelain_ was published, containing a series of these forms, which, as internal evidence of much subsequent work shows, have been accepted as typical models to be followed in their English use. The series in _The London_ noticed elsewhere, during this year and 1878, also increased their popularity, while the later English use may be traced to some extent by the examples here collected. In America about the same time the new fashion in versemaking was taken up very warmly, and to the present day the Americans have shown themselves more cordial towards the Gallic measures than even our own countrymen. In the popular periodicals of the United States there are more specimens than in our English magazines, and the appearance of so many examples in this book shows that the American poets have caught a great deal of the peculiar quality, hard to define but easy to recognise, which the forms demand. Then came Mr. W. Davenport Adams's _Latter Day Lyrics_, with a section devoted to these forms, and "A Note on Some Foreign Forms of Verse," by Mr. Dobson. Since then the poems written in these styles have been increasing in number, until the idea of collecting them in one volume, long in my mind, was favourably entertained by Mr. William Sharp, the general editor of the series in which this book appears.

The taste for these _tours de force_ in the art of versemaking is no doubt an acquired one; yet to quote the first attempt to produce a lyric with a repeated burden would take one back to the earliest civilisation. The use of the refrain and conventional arrangement of rhyme in these forms differs as widely from the burdens of the old examples, as the purely conventional design of Greek art from the savage patterns of its ancestral stock. Whether the first refrains were used for decorative effect only, or to give the singer time to recollect or to improvise the next verse, it matters little, since the once mere adjunct was made in later French use an integral and vital part of the verse. The charm of these strictly written verses is undoubtedly increased by some knowledge of their technical rules. As a subtle harmony of colours may reveal, to those who can grasp it, a miracle of skill and science, while it is no more nor less than "a pretty picture" to others--or polyphonic harmony, with all the resources of the science of music, may be employed to enrich a clear popular melody, to which the unmusical can yet nod their heads and fancy they understand it all; so a ballade or rondeau may be so deftly wrought, with an infinity of care and grace, that those who read it simply as a dainty poem never suspect the stern laws ordering the apparent spontaneity of the whole. To approach ideal perfection, nothing less than implicit obedience to all the rules is the first element of success; but the task is by no means finished there. Every quality that poetry demands, whether clearness of thought, elegance of expression, harmonious sound, or faultless rhythm, is needed as much in these shapes as in unfettered verse, and not until all those are contributed comes the final test of the poem itself; whether it utters thoughts worth uttering, or suggests ideas worth recalling. It may be said, without fear of exaggeration, that all the qualities required to form a perfect lyric in poetry are equally needful here, _plus_ a great many special ones the forms themselves demand. To the students of any art there is always a peculiar charm when the highest difficulties are surmounted with such ease, that the consummate art is hidden to all who know not the magic password to unveil it. But for those who have no special knowledge of poetry, it is pertinent to inquire what good these ingenious _tours de force_ achieve, and why the poem could not please as well if it was written in ordinary verse? This is hard to answer; but the fact remains that in every phase of art, whether music, picture, or poem, such technical achievements have invariably found admirers in any period of advanced civilisation. It has been said that these forms display no higher aim than the verses printed to resemble an hour-glass or altar, in some of our early poets; but such an accusation is hardly worthy of serious reply. If the sonnet in Italian form has gained world-wide fame, the principle of fixed form is at once shown to be acceptable to the majority of scholars, and it becomes only a question of degree whether these rondeaus and ballades gain so prominent a place. It is hardly fair to expect to find among these forms a lyric that has caught the ear of the public, and won its way to the hearts of everyone; fifteen years of use is all they may claim, and compared with the lyric poetry guileless of bonds, during the same period, they at least hold their own. It must also be remembered that they were adopted by the younger men, who won no small amount of their present fame by these pretty devices.

ON THE RULES OF THE VARIOUS FORMS.--There are several general laws governing these fixed metrical forms that must be insisted on at the outset. The rule of the limited number of rhymes holds good of nearly all. One feature prominent in the French rules is impossible in English, as the difference between the rhyme masculine on words that have not the _e_ mute for their final letter, and the rhyme feminine on words that possess the _e_ mute, is unknown to us; but side by side with the release from one binding law in French verse, a new one is imposed. In that language, words of exactly similar _sound_ and _spelling_ may be used to rhyme together, provided the meaning of the words is distinct--such license the most doggerel bard would reject in English--in spite of the precedent Milton offers, having "Ruth" and "ruth" in one of his sonnets. Purists forbid in our tongue the use of words of distinct spelling, but identical sound, as "sail" and "sale," "bear" and "bare;" nor would they allow words closely allied, as "claim," "disclaim," "reclaim," to be employed, the strict rule being, _that no syllable once used as a rhyme can be used again for that purpose throughout the poem, not even if it be spelt differently while keeping the same sound; nor if the whole word is altered by a prefix; the syllable that rhymes must always be a new one both in sense and sound_. It is this feature of the many rhymes to be found on a limited root-sound that proves the initial difficulty in these shapes.

If the above rule is thought too strict--and it must be owned very few writers acknowledge it to the extent of excluding such words as "claim, acclaim, prove, reprove," etc.--at least such words should be kept as far apart as possible, not used in the same stanza, if it can be avoided, and never to rhyme with one another. Next in order, but of equal, perhaps primary importance, is the use of the refrain. This recurrent phrase is common in many languages; but the way these ballades, rondeaus, and other shapes employ it, differs from all others. In most old ballads and folk-songs the refrain comes as a mere jingle, or, at best, an interlude, not reflecting the idea of the verse it closes, nor varying its sense in spite of retaining its sound, as it does in a perfect example of these forms. An ordinary refrain in other poetry is usually kept to one note resounding through the whole poem, much as the drone-bass in "pifferari" or "musette" music is kept going throughout. In music there is another form of bass always kept continuous--the ground-bass, on which Handel and Bach built some mighty choruses; but in this the repeated sequence of notes in the phrase, although they occur again and again unaltered, have the superstructure welded into them, one splendid harmony--not, as in the other, a melody merely floating over the accompaniment of the one note or chord of the drone bass. It may be a somewhat forced parallel, but in the instance quoted, and the fugue, canon, and other contrapuntal laws of classical music, there is much in common with these laws of strict metrical verse. The enormous use of set forms in the masterpieces of tone-art may be a happy augury to the future that yet awaits them in word-art. It may be said that at present the poems dare claim no such success as the contrapuntal devices in music can show, where the greatest works employ such devices frequently; yet the leap from the simple forms of counterpoint to the works of the mighty John Sebastian took but comparatively few years, although the distance was so great. But fanciful parallels of this sort are rarely satisfactory to any, except their maker, and need not be dwelt on here. The refrain in each case is noticed more especially among the laws of each form, but with regard to all the forms it is necessary to insist on the importance of introducing it unaltered in sound on each recurrence; it is sometimes changed by using, say, "and" for "but," or "then" for "if;" but, without condemning any who take this license, it is better to avoid it. Still, any change of meaning that be obtained by alteration of punctuation, accent, or even of spelling, provided the sound is unchanged, is not merely allowable but desirable, in lighter verse especially. Without recommending the use of the pun pure and simple, where its easy vulgarity would quickly be fatal to the dainty conceits that mark the best humorous verse in these forms, yet any pretty play upon words, or a sentence with new meaning read into it by the context, is more than permissible, being present in the best models of the Voiture rondeau and many triolets and ballades. This applies chiefly to poems of the class called _Vers de Société_, for want of an English synonym. The comic papers of our own country show no use of the form quite so fine in burlesque treatment as some of the American ones, notably the chant royal, _Mrs. Jones_, by Mr. H. C. Bunner; in the burlesque examples printed in this book it will be seen that the forms can be made to give added zest to satire or humour, beside imparting a certain scholarly finish, that itself raises them from the terribly dead level of much of our so-called comic poetry. A few shapes yet await presentation in English dress. I have not succeeded in finding specimens of the _glose_ or the _virelai_ (rhythme d'Alain Chartier), while the example of the _virelai_ (_nouveau_), Mr. Dobson's "July," is the only one brought to light. The _lai_ and the _rondelet_ are also very little used, so that anyone interested in these old measures will yet find plenty of unhackneyed forms for experimenting upon. It is curious that the sonnet, no less exacting in its technical rules, and far more imperious in the treatment it demands, finds so many eager followers, for with its wealth of literature, the chance of attaining to the second rank even, among such splendid poems, requires a high amount of talent, if not absolute genius. In the rondeau, or ballade, many writers who are ignored in the ampler crowd of sonnet-makers might find pleasing forms, not merely to display true poetic thoughts (if they have the power to do so), but verse that has in its shape some air of novelty still, and would sound less like the faint re-echoes of a stronger song, the frequent effect of many a modern sonnet.

These few prefatory lines may well close with De Banville's own words (in Mr. Lang's English)--"This cluster of forms is one of our most precious treasures, for each of them forms a rhythmic whole, complete and perfect, while at the same time they all possess the fresh and unconscious grace which marks the production of primitive times." As the translator adds, "There is some truth in this criticism, for it is a mark of man's early ingenuity in many arts to seek complexity (where you would expect simplicity), and yet to lend to that complexity an infantine naturalness. One can see this phenomenon in early decorative art, and in early law and custom, and even in the complicated structure of primitive languages. Now, just as early and even savage races are our masters in the decorative use of colour and of carving, so the nameless mastersingers of ancient France may be our teachers in decorative poetry--the poetry some call _vers de société_."