Chapter VII (7)

The Provencal religious songs, poor though they are from a literary point of view, yet possess more points of interest than can be commonly looked for in folk-songs which treat of religion. They contain frequent allusions to beliefs that have to be sought either in the earliest apocryphal writings of the Christian aera, or in the lately unearthed records of rabbinical tradition. Various of them have regard to what is still, as M. Lentheric says, "one of the great popular emotions of the South of France"--the reputed presence there of Mary Magdalene. M. Lentheric is convinced that certain Jewish Christians, flying from persecution at home, did come to Provence (between the ports of which and the East there was constant communication) a short time after the Crucifixion. He is further inclined to give credit to the impression that Mary Magdalene and her companions were among these fugitives. I will not go into the reasons that have been urged against the story by English and German scholars; it is enough for us that it is a popular credence of very ancient origin. One side issue of it is particularly worth noting. A little servant girl named Sara is supposed to have accompanied the Jewish emigrants, and her the gypsies of Provence have adopted as their patroness. Once a year they pay their respects to her tomb at Saintes Maries de la Mer. This is almost the only case in which the gypsy race has shown any disposition to identify itself with a religious cultus. The fairy legend of Tarascon is another offshoot from the main tradition. "Have you seen the Tarasque?" I was asked in the course of a saunter through that town one cold morning between the hours of seven and eight. It seemed that the original animal was kept in a stall. To stimulate my anxiety to make its acquaintance I was handed the portrait of a beast, half hedgehog, half hippopotamus, out of whose somewhat human jaw dangled the legs of a small boy. Later I heard the story from the lips of the sister of the landlord at the primitive little inn; much did it gain from the vivacious grace of the narrator, in whom there is as surely proof positive of a Greek descent as can be seen in any of the more famous daughters of Arles. "When the friends of our Lord landed in Provence, St Mary Magdalene went to Sainte Baume, St Lazarus to Marseilles, and St Martha came here to Tarascon. Now there was a terrible monster called the Tarasque, which was desolating all the country round and carrying off all the young children to eat. When St Martha was told of the straits the folks were in, she went out to meet the monster with a piece of red ribbon in her hand. Soon it came, snorting fire out of its nostrils; but the saint threw the red ribbon over its neck, and lo! it grew quite still and quiet, and followed her back into the town as if it had been a good dog. To keep the memory of this marvel, we at Tarascon have a wooden Tarasque, which we take round the town at Whitsuntide with much rejoicing. About once in twenty years there is a very grand _fete_ indeed, and people come from far, far off. I have--naturally--seen this grand celebration only once." A gleam of coquetry lit up the long eyes: our friend clearly did not wish to be supposed to have an experience ranging over too long a period. Then she went on, "You must know that at Beaucaire, just there across the Rhone, the folks have been always ready to die of jealousy of our Tarasque. Once upon a time they thought they would have one as well as we; so they made the biggest Tarasque that ever had been dreamt of. How proud they were! But, alas! when the day came to take it round the town, it was found that it would not come out of the door of the workshop! Ah! those dear Beaucairos!" This I believe to be a pure fable, like the rest; to the good people of Tarascon it appears the most pleasing part of the whole story. My informant added, with a merry laugh, "There came this way an Englishman--a very sceptical Englishman. When he heard about the difficulty of the Beaucairos he asked, 'Why did they not have recourse to St Martha?'"

As I have strayed into personal reminiscence, the record of one other item of conversation will perhaps be allowed. That same morning I went to breakfast at the house of a Provencal friend to meet the ablest exponent of political positivism, the Radical deputy for Montmartre. Over our host's strawberries (strawberries never end at Tarascon) I imparted my newly acquired knowledge. When it came to the point of saying that certain elderly persons were credibly stated to have preserved a lively faith in the authenticity of the legend, M. Clemenceau listened with a look of such unmistakable concern that I said, half amused, "You do not believe much in poetry?" The answer was characteristic. "Yes, I believe in it much; but is it necessary to poetry that the people should credit such absurdities?" Is it necessary? Possibly Marius Trussy, who inveighs so passionately against "lou progre," would say that it is. Anyhow the Tarasques of the world are doomed; whether they will be without successors is a different question. Some one has said that mankind has always lived upon illusions, and always will, the essential thing being to change the nature of these illusions from time to time, so as to bring them into harmony with the spirit of the age.

Provencal folk-songs have but few analogies with the literature which heedlessly, though beyond recall, has been named Provencal. The poetry of the Miejour was a literary orchid of the fabulous sort that has neither root nor fruit. A chance stanza, addressed to some high-born Blancoflour, finds its way occasionally into the popular verse of Provence with the marks of lettered authorship still clinging to it; but further than this the resemblance does not go. The love poets of the people make use of a flower language, which is supposed to be a legacy of the Moors. Thyme accompanies a declaration; the violet means doubt or uneasiness; rosemary signifies complaint; nettles announce a quarrel. The course of true love nowhere flows less smoothly than in old Provence. As soon as a country girl is suspected of having a liking for some youth, she is set upon by her family as if she were guilty of a monstrous crime. A microscopic distinction of rank, a divergence in politics, or a deficiency of money will be snatched as the excuse for putting the lover under the ban of absolute proscription. From the inexplicable obstacles placed in the way of lovers it follows that a large proportion of Provencal marriages are the result of an elopement. The expedient never fails; Provencal parents do not lock up their runaway daughters in convents where no one can get at them. The delinquents are married as fast as possible. What is more, no evil is thought or spoken of them. To make assurance doubly sure, a curious formality is observed. The girl calls upon two persons, secretly convened for the purpose, to bear witness that she carries off her lover, who afterwards protests that his part in the comedy was purely passive. In less than twenty years the same drama is enacted with Margarido, the daughter, in the _role_ of Mario the mother.

L'herbo que grio
Toujours reverdilho;
L'herbo d'amour
Reverdilho toujours.

The plant of love grows where there are young hearts; but how comes it that middle-aged hearts turn inevitably to cast iron? There is one song which has the right to be accepted as the typical love-song of Provence. Mistral adapted it to his own use, and it figures in his poem as the "Chanson de Majali." My translation follows as closely as may be after the popular version which is sung from the Comtat Venaissin to the Var:

Margaret! my first love,
Do not say me nay!
A morning music thou must have,
A waking roundelay.
--Your waking music irks me,
And irk me all who play;
If this goes on much longer
I'll drown myself one day.
--If this goes on much longer,
And thou wilt drown one day,
Why, then a swimmer I will be,
And save thee sans delay.
--If then a swimmer thou wilt be,
And save me sans delay,
Then I will be an eel, and slip
From 'twixt thy hands away.
--If thou wilt be an eel, and slip
From 'twixt my hands away,
Why, I will be the fisherman
Whom all the fish obey.
--If thou wilt be the fisherman
Whom all the fish obey,
Then I will be the tender grass
That yonder turns to hay.
--If thou wilt be the tender grass
That yonder turns to hay,
Why, then a mower I will be,
And mow thee in the may.
--If thou a mower then wilt be,
And mow me in the may,
I, as a little hare, will go
In yonder wood to stray.
--If thou a little hare wilt go
In yonder wood to stray,
Then will I come, a hunter bold,
And have thee as my prey.
--If thou wilt come a hunter bold
To have me as thy prey,
Then I will be the endive small
In yonder garden gay.
--If thou wilt be the endive small
In yonder garden gay,
Then I will be the falling dew,
And fall on thee alway.
--If thou wilt be the falling dew,
And fall on me alway,
Then I will be the white, white rose
On yonder thorny spray.
--If thou wilt be the white, white rose
On yonder thorny spray,
Then I will be the honey bee,
And kiss thee all the day.
--If thou wilt be the honey bee,
And kiss me all the day,
Then I will be in yonder heaven
The star of brightest ray.
--If thou wilt be in yonder heaven
The star of brighest ray,
Then I will be the dawn, and we
Shall meet at break of day.
--If thou wilt be the dawn, so we
May meet at break of day,
Then I will be a nun professed,
A nun of orders grey.
--If thou wilt be a nun professed,
A nun of orders grey,
Then I will be the prior, and thou
To me thy sins must say.
--If thou wilt be the prior, and I
To thee my sins must say,
Then will I sleep among the dead,
While the sisters weep and pray.
--If thou wilt sleep among the dead,
While the sisters weep and pray,
Then I will be the holy earth
That on thee they shall lay.
--If thou wilt be the holy earth
That on me they shall lay--
Well--since some gallant I must have,
I will not say thee nay.

A distinguished French scholar thought that he heard in this an echo of Anacreon's ode [Greek: k' eus koren]. The inference suggested is too hazardous for acceptance; yet that in some sort the song may date from Greek Provence would seem to be the opinion even of cautious critics. Thus we are led to look back to those associations which, without giving a personal or political splendour such as that attached to Magna Graecia, lend nevertheless to Provencal memories the exquisite charm, the "_bouquet_" (if the word does not sound absurd) of all things Greek. The legend of Greek beginnings in Provence will bear being once more told. Four hundred and ninety years before Christ a little fleet of Greek fortune-seekers left Phocaea, in Asia Minor, and put into a small creek on the Provencal coast, the port of the future Marseilles. As soon as they had disembarked, deeming it to be of importance to them to stand well with the people of the land, they sent to the king of the tribes inhabiting those shores an ambassador bearing gifts and overtures of friendly intercourse. When the ambassador reached Arles, Nann, the king, was giving a great feast to his warriors, from among whom his daughter Gyptis was that day to choose a husband. The young Greek entered the banqueting-hall and sat down at the king's board. When the feasting was over, fair-haired Gyptis, the royal maiden, rose from her seat and went straightway to the strange guest; then, lifting in her hands the cup of espousal, she offered it to his lips. He drank, and Provence became the bride of Greece.

The children of that marriage left behind them a graveyard to tell their history. Desecrated and despoiled though it is, still the great Arlesian cemetery bears unique witness as well to the civilised prosperity of the Provencal Greeks as to their decline under the influences which formed the modern Provence. Irreverence towards the dead--a comparatively new human characteristic--can nowhere be more fully observed than in the _Elysii Campi_ of Arles. The love of destruction has been doing its worst there for some centuries. To any king coming to the town the townsfolk would make a gift of a priceless treasure stolen from their dead ancestors, while the peasant who wanted a cattle trough, or the mason in need of a door lintel, went unrebuked and carried off what thing suited him. Not even the halo of Christian romance could save the Alyscamps. The legend is well known. St Trefume, man or myth, summoned the bishops of Gaul and Provence to the consecration of this burial-ground. When they were assembled and the rite was to be performed, each one shrank from taking on himself so high an office; then Christ appeared in their midst and made the sign of the cross over the sleeping-place of the pagan dead. Out of the countless stories of the meeting of the new faith and the old--stories too often of a nascent or an expiring fanaticism, there is not one which breathes a gentler spirit. It was long believed, that the devil had little power with the dead that lay in Arles. Hence the multitude of sepulchres which Dante saw _ove 'l Rodano stagna_. Princes and archbishops and an innumerable host of minor folks left instructions that they might be buried in the Alyscamps. A simple mode of transport was adopted by the population of the higher Rhone valley. The body, bound to a raft or bier, was committed to the current of the river, with a sum of money called the "drue de mourtalage" attached to it. These silent travellers always reached their destination in safety, persons appointed to the task being in readiness to receive them. The sea water washed the limits of the cemetery in the days of the Greeks, who looked across the dark, calm surface of the immense lagune and thought of dying as of embarkation upon a voyage--not the last voyage of the body down the river of life, but the first voyage of the soul over the sea of death--and they wished their dead [Greek: euploi].

The Greek traces that exist in the living people of Provence are few, but distinct. There is, in the first place, the type of beauty particularly associated with the women of Arles. As a rule, the Provencal woman is not beautiful; nor is she very willing to admit that her Arlesian sisters are one whit more beautiful than she. The secret of their fame is interpreted by her in the stereotyped remark, "C'est la coiffe!" But the coif of Arles, picturesque though it is in its stern simplicity, could not change an ugly face into a pretty one, and the wearers of it are well entitled to the honour they claim as their birthright. Scarcely due attention has been paid to the good looks of the older and even of the aged women; I have not seen their equals save among a face of quite another type, the Teutonic amazons of the Val Mastalone. In countries where the sun is fire, if youth does not always mean beauty, beauty means almost always youth. M. Lentheric thinks that he detects a second clear trace of the Greeks in the horn wrestling practised all over the dried-up lagune which the fork of the Rhone below Arles forms into an island. Astride of their wild white steeds, the horsemen drive one of the superb black bulls of the Camargue towards a group of young men on foot, who, catching him by his horns, wrestle with him till he is forced to bend the knee and bite the dust. The amusement is dangerous, but it is not brutal. The horses escape unhurt, so does the bull; the risk is for the men alone, and it is a risk voluntarily and eagerly run. So popular is the sport that it is difficult to prevent children from joining in it. In Thessaly it was called [Greek: keratisis], and the bull in the act of submission is represented on a large number of Massaliote and other coins.

Marseilles, which has lost the art and the type of Greece, has kept the Greek temperament. It is no more French than Naples is Italian: both are Greek towns, though the characteristics that prove them such have been somewhat differentiated by unlike external conditions. Still they have points in common which are many and strong. Marsalia can match in _emeutes_ the proverbial _quattordici rebellioni_ of "loyal" Parthenope; and quickness of intelligence, love of display, mobility of feeling, together with an astounding vitality, belong as much to Marseillais as to Neapolitan. The people of Marseilles, the most thriftless in France, have thriven three thousand years, and are thriving now, in spite of the readiness of each small middle-class family to lay out a half-year's savings on a breakfast at Roubion's; in spite of the alacrity with which each working man sacrifices a week's wages in order to "demonstrate" in favour of, or still better against, no matter whom or what. Nowhere is there a more overweening local pride. "Paris," say the Marseillais, "would be a fine town if it had our _Cannebiere_." Nowhere, as has been made lamentably plain, are the hatreds of race and caste and politics more fierce or more ruthless. Even with her own citizens Marseilles is stern; only after protest does she grant a monument to Adolphe Thiers--himself just a Greek Massaliote thrown into the French political arena. There is reason to think that Greek was a spoken tongue at Marseilles at least as late as the sixth century A.D. The Sanjanen, the fisherman of St John's Quarter, has still a whole vocabulary of purely Greek terms incidental to his calling. The Greek character of the speech of the Marseillais sailors was noticed by the Abbe Papon, who attributed to the same source the peculiar prosody and intonation of the street cries of Marseilles. The Provencal historian remarks, with an acuteness rare in the age in which he wrote (the early part of the last century), "I draw my examples from the people, because it is with them that we must seek the precious remains of ancient manners and usages. Amongst the great, amongst people of the world, one sees only the imprint of fashion, and fashion never stands still."

The Sanjanens are credited with the authorship of this cynical little song:

Fisher, fishing in the sea,
Fish my mistress up for me.

Fish her up before she drowns,
Thou shalt have four hundred crowns.

Fish her for me dead and cold,
Thou shalt have my all in gold.

The romantic ballads of Provence are of an importance which demands, properly speaking, a separate study. Provence was, beyond a doubt, one of the main sources of the ballad literature of France, Spain, and Italy. That certain still existing Provencal ballads passed over into Piedmont as early as the thirteenth century is the opinion of Count Nigra, the Italian diplomatist, not the least of whose distinguished services to his country has been the support he was one of the first to give to the cause of popular research. In all these songs the plot goes for everything, the poetry for little or nothing; I shall therefore best economise my space by giving a rough outline of the stories of two or three of them. "Fluranco" is a characteristic specimen. Fluranco, "la flour d'aquest pays," was married when she was a little thing, and her husband at once went away to the wars. Monday they were wed, Tuesday he was gone. At the end of seven years the knight comes back, knocks at the door, and asks for Fluranco. His mother says that she is no longer here; they sent her to fetch water, and the Moors, the Saracen Moors, carried her off. "Where did they take her to?" "They took her a hundred leagues away." The knight makes a ship of gold and silver; he sails and sails without seeing aught but the washer-women washing fine linen. At last he asks of them: "Tell me whose tower is that, and to whom that castle belongs." "It is the castle of the Saracen Moor." "How can I get into it?" "Dress yourself as a poor pilgrim, and ask alms in Christ's name." In this way he gains admittance, and Fluranco (she it is) bids the servant set the table for the "poor pilgrim." When the knight is seated at table, Fluranco begins to laugh. "What are you laughing at, Madamo?" She confesses that she knows who he is. They collect a quantity of fine gold; then they go the stable, and she mounts the russet horse and he mounts the grey. Just as they are crossing the bridge the Moor sees them. "Seven years," he cries, "I have clothed thee in fine damask, seven years I have given thee morocco shoes, seven years I have laid thee in fine linen, seven years I have kept thee--for one of my sons!" The carelessness or cruelty of a stepmother (the head-wife of Asiatic tales) is a prolific central idea in Provencal romance. While the husband was engaged in distant adventures--tournaments, feudal wars, or crusading expeditions--the wife, who was often little more than a child, remained at the mercy of the occasionally unamiable dowager who ruled the masterless _chateau_. The case of cruelty is exemplified in the story of Guilhem de Beauvoire, who has to leave his child-wife five weeks after marriage. "I counsel you, mother," he says as he sets out, "to put her to do no kind of work: neither to fetch water, nor to spin, nor yet to knead bread. Send her to mass, and give her good dinners, and let her go out walking with other ladies." At the end of five weeks the mother put the young wife to keep swine. The swine girl went up to the mountain top and sang and sang. Guilhem de Beauvoire, who was beyond the sea, said to his page, "Does it not seem as though my wife were singing?" He travels at all speed over mountain and sea till he comes to his home, where no man knows him. On the way he meets the swine girl, and from her he hears that she has to eat only that which is rejected of the swine. At the house he is welcomed as an honoured guest; supper is laid for him, and he asks that the swine girl whom he has seen may come and sup with him. When she sits down beside him the swine girl bursts into tears. "Why do you weep, swine girl?" "For seven years I have not supped at table!" Then in the bitterness of yet another outrage to which the vile woman subjects her, she cries aloud, "Oh! Guilhem de Beauvoire, who art beyond the sea, God help thee! Verily thy cruel mother has abandoned me!" Secretly Guilhem tells her who he is, and in proof of it shows her the ring she gave him. In the morning the mother calls the swine girl to go after her pigs. "If you were not my mother," says Guilhem, "I would have you hung; as you are my mother, I will wall you up between two walls."

The antiquity of the ballads of _Fluranco_ and _Guilhem de Beauvoire_ is shown by the fact that they plainly belong to a time when such work as fetching water or making bread was regarded as amongst the likely employments of noble ladies--though, from excess of indulgence, Guilhem did not wish his wife to be set even to these light tasks. A ballad, probably of about the same date, treats the case of a man who, through the weakness which is the cause of half the crimes, becomes the agent of his mother's guilt. The tragedy is unfolded with almost the sublime laconicism of the _Divina Commedia_. Francoiso was married when she was so young that she did not know how to do the service, and the cruel mother was always saying to her son that Francoiso must die. One day, after the young wife had laid the table, and had set thereon the wine and the bread, and the fresh water, her husband said to her, "My Francoiso, is there not anyone, no friend, who shall protect thy life?" "I have my mother and my father, and you, who are my husband, very well will you protect my life." Then, as they sit at meat, he takes a knife and kills her; and he lifts her in his arms and kisses her, and lays her under the flower of the jessamine, and he goes to his mother and says, "My mother, your greatest wish is fulfilled: I have killed Francoiso."

The genuine Provencal does not shrink from violence. Old inhabitants still tell tales of the savage brigandage of the Esterel, of the horrors of the _Terreur blanche_. Mild manners and social amenities have never been characteristic of fair Provence. Even now the peasant cannot disentangle his thoughts without a volley of oaths--harmless indeed, for the most part (except those which are borrowed from the _franciots_), but in sound terrific. Yet if it be true that the character of a nation is asserted in its songs, it must be owned that the songs of Provence speak favourably for the Provencal people. They say that they are a people who have a steady and abiding sympathy with honest men and virtuous women. They say further that rough and ruthless though they may be when their blood is stirred, yet have they a pitiful heart. The Provencal singer is slow to utterly condemn; he grasps the saving inconsistencies of human nature; he makes the murderer lay his victim "souto lou flour dou jaussemin:" under the white jessamine flower, cherished beyond all flowers in Provence, which has a strange passion for white things--white horses, white dogs, white sheep, white doves, and the fair white hand of woman. Many songs deal directly with almsgivings, the ritual of pity. To no part of the Bible is there more frequent reference than to the parable of the rich man and Lazarus; no neocatholic legend has been more gladly accepted than the story in which some tattered beggar proves to be Christ--a story, by the by, that holds in it the essence of the Christian faith. If a Greek saw a beautiful unknown youth playing his pipe beside some babbling stream, he believed him to be a god; the Christian of the early ages recognised Christ in each mendicant in loathsome rags, in each leper succoured at the risk of mortal infection.

The Provencal tongue is not a mixture (as is too often said) of Italian and French; nor is physical Provence a less fair Italy or a fairer France. A land wildly convulsed in its storms, mysteriously breathless in its calms; a garden here, a desert there; a land of translucent inlets and red porphyry hills; before all, a land of the illimitable grey of olive and limestone--this is Provence. Anyone finding himself of a sudden where the Provencal olives raise their dwarf heads with a weary look of eternity to the rainless heaven, would say that the dominant feature in the landscape was its exceeding seriousness. Sometimes on the coast the prevailing note changes from grey to blue; the blanched rocks catch the colour of the sea, and not the sky only, but dry fine air close around seems of a blueness so intense as to make the senses swim. Better suited to a Nature thus made up of crude discords and subtle harmonies is the old Provencal speech, howsoever corrupt, than the exquisite French of Parisian _salons_. But the language goes and the songs go too. Damase Arbaud relates how, when he went on a long journey to speak with a man reported to have cognisance of much traditional matter, he met, issuing from the house door, not the man, but his coffin. The fact is typical; the old order of things passes away: _nouastei diou se'n van_.

[Footnote 1: I am told that the peasants of the country round
Moscow have a natural gift for imitating birds, and that they
intersperse the singing of their own sad songs with this sweet
carolling.]

THE WHITE PATERNOSTER.

In a paper published under the head of "Chaucer's Night Spell" in the Folk-lore Record (part i. p. 145), Mr Thoms drew attention to four lines spoken by the carpenter in Chaucer's _Miller's Tale_:

Lord Jhesu Crist, and seynte Benedyht
Blesse this hous from every wikked wight,
Fro nyghtes verray, the White Paternostre
When wonestow now, seynte Petres soster.

("Verray" is commonly supposed to mean night-mare, but Mr Thoms referred it to "Werra," a Sclavonic deity.)

Mention of the White Paternoster occurs again in White's _Way to the True Church_ (1624):

White Paternoster, Saint Peter's brother,
What hast i' th t'one hand? white booke leaves,
What hast i' th t'other hand? heaven gate keyes.
Open heaven gates, and streike (shut) hell gates:
And let every crysome child creepe to its own mother.
White Paternoster, Amen.

A reading of the formula is preserved in the _Enchiridion Papae Leonis_, a book translated into French soon after its first appearance in Latin at Rome in 1502:

Au soir, m'allant coucher, je trouvis trois anges a mon lit
couches, un aux pieds, deux au chevet, la bonne Vierge Marie
du milieu, qui me dit que je me couchis, que rien ne doutis.
Le bon Dieu est mon Pere, la bonne Vierge est ma mere, les
trois vierges sont mes s[oe]urs. La chemise ou Dieu fut ne,
mon corps en est enveloppe; la croix Sainte Marguerite a ma
poitrine est ecrite; madame d'en va sur les champs a Dieu
pleurant, rencontrit Monsieur Saint Jean. Monsieur Saint Jean,
d'ou venez vous? Je viens d' _Ave Salus_. Vous n'avez pas vu
le bon Dieu; si est, il est dans l'arbre de la croix, les
pieds pendans, les mains clouans, un petit chapeau d'epine
blanche sur la tete.

Qui la dira trois fois au soir, trois fois au matin, gagnera
le Paradis a la fin.

Curious as are the above citations, they only go a little way towards filling up the blanks in the history of this waif from the fabric of early Christian popular lore. A search of some years has yielded evidence that the White Paternoster is still a part of the living traditional matter of at least five European countries. Most persons are familiar with the English version which runs thus:

Four corners to my bed,
Four angels round my head,
One to watch, one to pray,
And two to bear my soul away.

A second English variant was set on record by Aubrey, and may also be read in Ady's "Candle in the Dark" (1655):

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John,
Bless the bed that I lye on;
And blessed guardian angel keep
Me safe from danger while I sleep.

Halliwell suggests that the two last lines were imitated from the following in Bishop Ken's Evening Hymn:

Let my blest guardian, while I sleep,
His watchful station near me keep.
But if there was any imitation in the case, it was the bishop who
copied from the folk-rhymer, not the folk-rhymer from the bishop.

The thought of the coming of death in sleep, is expressed in a prayer that may be sometimes seen inscribed at the head and foot of the bed in Norwegian homesteads:

HEAD.

Here is my bed and sleeping place;
God, let me sleep in peace
And blithe open my eyes
And go to work.

FOOT.

Go into thy bed, take thee a slumber,
Reflect now on the last hour;
Reflect now,
That thou mayest take thy last slumber.

Analogous in spirit is a quatrain that has been known to me since childhood, but which I do not remember to have seen in print:

I lay me down to rest me,
And pray the Lord to bless me.
If I should sleep no more to wake
I pray the Lord my soul to take.

The _Petite Patenotre Blanche_ lingers in France in a variety of shapes. One version was written down as late as 1872 from the mouth of an old woman named Catherine Bastien, an inhabitant of the department of the Loire. It was afterwards communicated to _Melusine_.

Jesu m'endort,
Si je trepasse, mande mon corps,
Si je trepasse, mande mon ame,
Si je vis, mande mon esprit.
(Je) prends les anges pour mes amis,
Le bon Dieu pour mon pere,
La Sainte Vierge pour ma mere,
Saint Louis de Gonzague,
Aux quatre coins de ma chambre,
Aux quatre coins be mon lit;
Preservez moi de l'ennemi,
Seigneur, a l'heure de ma mort.

Quenot, in his _Statistique de la Charante_ (1818), gives the subjoined:

Dieu l'a faite, je la dit;
J'ai trouve quatre anges couches dans mon lit;
Deux a la tete, deux aux pieds,
Et le bon Dieu aux milieu.
De quoi puis-je avoir peur?
Le bon Dieu est mon pere,
La Vierge ma mere,
Les saints mes freres,
Les saints mes s[oe]urs;
Le bon Dieu m'a dit:
Leve-toi, couche-toi,
Ne crains rien; le feu, l'orage, et la tempete
Ne peuvent rien contre toi.
Saint Jean, Saint Marc, Saint Luc, et St Matthieu,
Qui mettez les ames en repos,
Mettez-y la mienne si Dieu veut.

In Provence many a worthy country woman repeats each night this _preiro doou soir_:--

Au liech de Diou
Me couche iou,
Sept anges n'en trouve iou,
Tres es peds,
Quatre au capet (caput--head);
La Buoeno Mero es au mitan
Uno roso blanco a la man.

The white rose borne by the Good Mother is a pretty and characteristic interpolation peculiar to flower-loving Provence. In the conclusion of the prayer the _Boueno Mero_ tells whosoever recites it to have no fear of dog or wolf, or wandering storm or running water, or shining fire, or any evil folk. M. Damase Arbaud got together a number of other devotional fragments that may be regarded as offshoots from the parent stem. St Joseph, "Nourricier de Diou," is asked to preserve the supplicant from sudden death, "et de l'infer et de ses flammos." St Ann, "mero-grand de Jesus Christ," is prayed to teach the way to Paradise. To St Denis a very practical petition is addressed:

Grand Sant Danis de Franco,
Gardetz me moun bouen sens, ma boueno remembranco.

Another verse points distinctly to a desire for protection against witchcraft. The Provencals, by the bye, are of opinion that the _Angelus_ was instituted to scare away any ill-conditioned spirits that might be tempted out by the approach of night.

In Germany the guardian saints are dispensed with, but the angels are retained in force. I am indebted to Mr C. G. Leland for a translation of the most popular German even-song:

Fourteen angels in a band
Every night around me stand.
Two to my left hand,
Two to my right,
Who watch me ever
By day and night.
Two at my head,
Two at my feet,
To guard my slumber
Soft and sweet;
Two to wake me
At break of day,
When night and darkness
Pass away;
Two to cover me
Warm and nice,
And two to lead me
To Paradise.

Passing on to Italy we find an embarrassing abundance of folk-prayers framed after the self-same model. The repose of the Venetian is under the charge of the Perfect Angel, the Angel of God, St Bartholomew, the Blessed Mother, St Elizabeth, the Four Evangelists, and St John the Baptist. Venetian children are taught to say: "I go to bed, I know not if I shall arise. Thou, Lord, who knowest, keep good watch over me. Before my soul separates from my body, give me help and good comfort. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, so be it. Bless my heart and my soul!" The Venetians also have a "Paternoster pichenin," and a "Paternoster grande," both of which are, in their existing form, little else than nonsense. The native of the Marches goes to his rest accompanied by our Lord, the Madonna, the Four Evangelists, _l'Angelo perfetto_, four greater angels, and three others--one at the foot, one at the head, one in the middle. The Tuscan, like the German, has only angels around him: of these he has seven--one at the head, one at the foot, two at the sides, one to cover him, one to watch him, and one to bear him to Paradise. The Sicilian says: "I lay me down in this bed, with Jesus on my breast. I sleep and he watches. In this bed where I am laid, five saints I find: two at the head, two at the feet, in the middle is St Michael."

Perhaps the best expression of the belief in the divine guardians of sleep is that given to it by an ancient Sardinian poet:--

Su letto meo est de battor cantones,
Et battor anghelos si bie ponen;
Duos in pes, et duos in cabitta,
Nostra Segnora a costazu m'ista.
E a me narat: Dormi e reposa,
No hapas paura de mala cosa,
No hapas paura de mala fine.
S' Anghelu Serafine,
S' Anghelu Biancu,
S' Ispiridu Santu,
Sa Vigine Maria,
Tote siant in cumpagnia mea.
Anghelu de Deu,
Custodio meo,
Custa nott' illuminame!
Guarda e difende a me
Ca eo mi incommando a tie.

My bed has four corners and four angels standing by it. Two at
the foot and two at the head; our Lady is beside me. And to me
she says, "Sleep and repose; have no fear of evil things; have
no fear of an evil end." The angel Serafine, the angel
Blanche, the Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary--all are here to
keep me company. Angel of God, thou my guardian, illuminate me
this night. Watch and defend me, for I commend myself to thee.

A Spanish verse, so near to this that it would be needless to give it a separate translation, was sent by a friend who at that time was in the Royal College of Santa Ysabel at Madrid:

Quatro pirondelitas
Tiene mi cama;
Quatro angelitos
Me la acompana.
La madre de dios
Esta enmedio,
Dicendome:
Duerme y reposa,
Que no te sucedera
Ninguna mala cosa.

Amen.

In harmony with the leading idea of the White Paternoster, the recumbent figures of the Archbishops in Canterbury Cathedral have angels kneeling at each corner of their altar tombs. It is worth remarking, too, how certain English lettered compositions have become truly popular through the fact of their introducing the same idea. A former Dean of Canterbury once asked an old woman, who lived alone without chick or child, whether she said her prayers? "Oh! yes," was the reply, "I say every night of my life,

"Hush, my babe, lie still in slumber,
Holy angels guard thy bed!"

The White Paternoster itself, in the form of "Matthew, Mark, Luke, John," was, till lately, a not uncommon evening prayer in the agricultural parts of Kent. At present the orthodox night and morning prayers of the people in Catholic countries are the Lord's Prayer, _Credo_ and _Ave Maria_, but to these, as has been seen, the White Paternoster is often added, and at the date of the Reformation--when the "Hail Mary" had scarcely come into general use--it is probable that it was rarely omitted. Prayers that partake of the nature of charms, have always been popular, and people have ever indulged in odd, little roundabout devices to increase the efficacy of even the most sacred words. Boccaccio, for instance, speaks of "the Paternoster of San Giuliano," which seems to have been a Paternoster said for the repose of the souls of the father and mother of St Julian, in gratitude for which attention, the Saint was bound to give a good night's lodging. It remains to be asked, why the White Paternoster is called white? In the actual state of our knowledge, the reason is not apparent; but possibly the term is to be taken simply in an apologetic sense, as when applied to a stated form of dealing with the supernatural. White charms had a recognised place in popular extra-belief. It was sweet to be able to compel the invisible powers to do what you would, and yet to feel secure from uncomfortable consequences. Of course, in such a case, the thing willed must be of an innocent nature. The Breton who begs vengeance of St Yves, knows tolerably well that what he is doing is very black indeed, even though the saint were ten times a saint. Topsy-turvy as may be his moral perceptions, he would not call this procedure a "white charm." He has, however, white charms of his own, one of which was described with great spirit by Auguste Brizeux, the Breton poet who wove many of the wild superstitions of his country into picturesque verse. Brizeux' poems are not very well known either in France or out of it, but they should be dear to students of folk-lore. The following is a version of "La Poussiere Sainte:"

Sweeping an ancient chapel through the night
(A ruin now), built 'neath a rocky height,
The aged Coulm's old wife was muttering,
As if some secret strange abroad to fling.

"I brave, thee tempest, and will do alone
What by my grand-dame in her youth was done,
When at her beck (of Leon's land, the pride),
The ocean, lion-headed, curbed its tide.

"Sweep, sweep, my broom, until my charm uprears
A force more strong than sighs, more strong than tears:
Charm loved of heaven, which forces wind and wave,
Though fierce and mad, our children's lives to save.

"My angel knows, a Christian true am I;
No Pagan, nor in league with sorcery.
Hence I dispense to the four winds of God,
To quell their rage, dust from the holy sod.

"Sweep on my broom; by virtues such as these
Oft through the air I scattered swarms of bees.
And you, old Coulm, to-morrow shall be prest,
You, and my children three, against my breast."

In Enn-Tell's port meanwhile, the pier along
Pressed forward, mute, dismayed, the anxious throng.
And as the billows howl, the lightnings flash,
And skies, lead-black, to earth seem like to dash;
Neighbours clasped hand to hand, and each one prayed,
Through superstition, speechless, while afraid.
Still as the port a sail did safely reach,
All shouting hurried forward to the beach:
"Father, is't you? Speak, father is it true?"
Others, "Hast seen my son?" "My brother, you?"
"Brave man, the truth, whate'er has happened, say,
Am I a widow?" Night in such dismay
Dragged 'neath a sky without a moon or star.
Thank God! Meanwhile all boats in safety are,
And every hearth is blazing--all save one,
The Columban's. But that was void and lone.
But you, Coulm's wife, still battle with the storm,
Fixed on the rocks, your task you still perform,--
You cast, towards east, towards west, and towards the north,
And towards the south, your incantations forth.

"Go, holy dust, 'gainst all the winds that fly.
No sorceress, but a Christian true am I.
By the lamp's light, when I the fire had lit,
In God's own house, my hands collected it.

"You from the statues of the saints I swept,
And silken flags, still on the pillars kept,
And the dark tombs, of those whose sons neglect,
But you, with your white winding-sheet protect.

"Go, holy dust! To stem the winds depart!
Born beneath Christian feet, thou glorious art:
When from the porch, I to the altar sped,
I seemed upon some heavenly path to tread.

"On you the deacons and the priests have trod,
Pilgrims who live, forefathers 'neath the sod;
Wood flowers, sweet grains of incense, saintly bones;
By dawn you will restore my spouse and sons."

She ceased her charm; and from the chapel then
She saw approach four bare-foot fishermen.
The aged dame in tears fell on her knees
And cried, "I knew they would escape the seas!"
Then cleansing sand and sea-weed o'er them spread,
With happy lips she kissed each cherished head.

THE DIFFUSION OF BALLADS.

I.--LORD RONALD IN ITALY.

Several causes have combined to give the professional minstrel a more tenacious hold on life in Italy than in France or Germany or England. One of them is, that Italian culture has always been less dependent on education--or what the English poor call "book-learning"--than the culture of those countries.

To this day you may count upon finding a blind ballad-singer in every Italian city. The connection of blindness with popular songs is a noteworthy thing. It is not, perhaps, a great exaggeration to say that, had there been no blind folks in the world, there would have been few ballads. Who knows, indeed, but that Homer would not have earned his bread by bread-making instead of by enchanting the children and wise men of all after-ages, had he not been "one who followed a guide"? Every one remembers how it was the singing of a "blinde crowder, with no rougher voice than rude style," that moved the heroic heart of Sidney more than the blare of trumpets. Every one may not know that in the East of Europe and in Armenia, "blinde crowders" still wander from village to village, carrying, wheresoever they go, the songs of a former day and the news of the latest hour; acting, after a fashion, as professors of history and "special correspondents," and keeping alive the sentiment of nationality under circumstances in which, except for their agency, it must almost without a doubt have expired.

When the Austrians occupied Trebinje in the Herzegovina, they forbade the playing of the "guzla," the little stringed instrument which accompanies the ballads; but the ballads will not be forgotten. Proscription does not kill a song. What kills it sometimes, if it have a political sense, is the fulfilment of the hopes it expresses; then it may die a natural death. I hunted all over Naples for some one who could sing a song which every Neapolitan, man and boy, hummed through the year when the Redshirts brought freedom: _Camicia rossa, camicia ardente_. It seemed that there was not one who still knew it. Just as I was on the point of giving up the search, a blind man was produced out of a tavern at Posilippo; a poor creature in threadbare clothes, holding a wretched violin. He sang the words with spirit and pathos; he is old, however, and perhaps the knowledge of them will not survive him.

Our present business is not with songs of a national or local interest, but with those which can hardly be said to belong to any country in particular. And, first of all, we have to go back to a certain _Camillo, detto il Bianchino cieco fiorentino_, who sang ballads at Verona in the year 1629, and who had printed for the greater diffusion of his fame a sort of rhymed advertisement containing the first few lines of some twenty songs that belonged to his repertory. Last but one of these samples stands the following:

"Dov' andastu jersera,
Figlioul mio ricco, savio e gentil;
Dov' andastu jersera?"

"When I come to look at it," adds Camillo, "this is too long; it ought to have been the first to be sung"--alluding, of course, to the song, not to the sample.

Later in the same century, the ballad mentioned above had the honour of being cited before a more polite audience than that which was probably in the habit of listening to the blind Florentine. On the 24th of September 1656, Canon Lorenzo Panciatichi reminded his fellow-academicians of the Crusca of what he called "a fine observation" that had been made regarding the song:

"Dov' andastu a cena figlioul mio
Ricco, savio, e gentile?"

The observation (continued the Canon) turned on the answer the son makes to the mother when she asks him what his sweetheart gave him for supper. "She gave me," says the son, "_un' anguilla arrosto cotta nel pentolin dell' olio_." The idea of a roasted eel cooked in an oil pipkin offended the academical sense of the fitness of things; it had therefore been proposed to say instead that the eel was hashed:

"Madonna Madre,
Il cuore sta male,
Per un anguilla in guazzetto."

Had we nothing to guide us beyond these fragments, there could be no question but that in this Italian ballad we might safely recognise one of the most spirited pieces in the whole range of popular literature--the song of Lord Ronald, otherwise Rowlande, or Randal, or "Billy, my son:"

"O where hae ye been, Lord Ronald, my son?
O where hae ye been, my handsome young man?"
"I hae been to the wood; mother, make my bed soon,
For I'm weary wi' hunting, and fain would lie down."

"Where gat ye your dinner, Lord Ronald, my son?
Where gat ye your dinner, my handsome young man?"
"I dined wi' my love; mother, make my bed soon,
For I'm weary wi' hunting, and fain would lie down."

"What gat ye to dinner, Lord Ronald, my son?
What gat ye to dinner, my handsome young man?"
"I gat eels boil'd in broo; mother, make my bed soon,
For I'm weary wi' hunting, and fain would lie down."

"And where are your bloodhounds, Lord Ronald, my son?
And where are your bloodhounds, my handsome young man?"
"O they swell'd and they died; mother, make my bed soon,
For I'm weary wi' hunting, and fain would lie down."

"O I fear ye are poison'd, Lord Ronald, my son!
O I fear ye are poison'd, my handsome young man!"
"O yes, I am poison'd! mother, make my bed soon,
For I'm sick at the heart, and I fain would lie down."

This version, which I quote from Mr Allingham's _Ballad Book_ (1864), ends here; so does that given by Sir Walter Scott in the _Border Minstrelsy_. There is, however, another version which goes on:

"What will ye leave to your father, Lord Ronald, my son?
What will ye leave to your father, my handsome young man?"
"Baith my houses and land; mither, mak' my bed sune
For I'm sick at the heart, and I fain wad lie doun."

"What will ye leave to your brither, Lord Ronald, my son?
What will ye leave to your brither, my handsome young man?"
"My horse and my saddle; mither, mak' my bed sune,
For I'm sick at the heart, and I fain wad lie doun."

"What will ye leave to your sister, Lord Ronald, my son?
What will ye leave to your sister, my handsome young man?"
"Baith my gold box and rings; mither, mak' my bed sune,
For I'm sick at the heart, and I fain wad lie doun."

"What will ye leave to your true love, Lord Ronald, my son?
What will ye leave to your true love, my handsome young man?"
"The tow and the halter, for to hang on yon tree,
And let her hang there for the poisoning o' me."

Lord Ronald has already been met with, though somewhat disguised, both in Germany and in Sweden, but his appearance two hundred and fifty years ago at Verona has a peculiar interest attached to it. That England shares most of her songs with the Northern nations is a fact familiar to all; but, unless I am mistaken, this is almost the first time of discovering a purely popular British ballad in an Italian dress.

It so happens that to the fragments quoted by Camillo and the Canon can be added the complete story as sung at the present date in Tuscany, Venetia, and Lombardy. Professor d'Ancona has taken pains to collate the slightly different texts, because few Italian folk-songs now extant can be traced even as far back as the seventeenth century. The learned Professor, whose great antiquarian services are well known, does not seem to be aware that the song has currency out of Italy. The best version is one set down from word of mouth in the district of Como, and of this I subjoin a literal rendering:

"Where were you yester eve?
My son, beloved, blooming, and gentle bred,
Where were you yester eve?"
"I with my love abode;
O lady mother, my heart is very sick:
I with my love abode;
Alas, alas, that I should have to die."

"What supper gave she you?
My son beloved, blooming, and gentle bred,
What supper gave she you?"
"I supped on roasted eel;
O lady mother, my heart is very sick:
I supped on roasted eel;
Alas, alas, that I should have to die."