Chapter XXXVI: Appendix: I (3)

Alas for my young days, alas for my plaint. They would force me into a
convent. Nevermore then shall I see the grass grow green and the green
clover flowers, nevermore hear the little birds sing. Woe it is, and
dead is my joy, for they would part me from my true love, and I die of
sorrow. _Alas, alas for my grief, which I must bear in secret!_
Sisters, dear sisters, must we be parted from the world? Deepest woe
it is, since I may never wear the bridal wreath and must make moan for
my sins, when I would fain be in the world and would fain wear a
bright wreath upon my hair, instead of the veil that the nuns wear.
_Alas, alas for my grief, which I must bear in secret!_ I must take
leave of the world, since the day of parting is come. I must look
sourly upon all joy, upon dancing and leaping and good courage, birds
singing and hawthorn blooming. If the little birds had my sorrow well
might they sit silent in the woods and upon the green branches. _Alas,
alas for my grief, which I must bear in silence_[1744].

A sixteenth century French song has something of the same serious tone, though it is more sophisticated and less poignant than the medieval German version:

Une jeune fillette
de noble coeur
gratieuse et honeste
de grand valeur,
contre son gre l'on a rendu nonette
point ne le voloit estre
par quoy vit en langueur.

One day after Compline she was sitting alone and lamenting her fate and she called on the Virgin to shorten her life, which she could endure no longer:

If I were married to my love, who has so desired me, whom I have so
desired, all the night long he would hold me in his arms and would
tell me all his thought and I would tell him mine. If I had believed
my love and the sweet words he said to me, alack, alack, I should be
wedded now. But since I must die in this place let me die soon. O poor
heart, that must die a death so bitter! Fare you well, abbess of this
convent, and all the nuns therein. Pray for me when I am dead, but
never tell my thought to my true love. Fare you well, father and
mother and all my kinsfolk; you made me a nun in this convent; in life
I shall never have any joy; I live unhappy, in torment and in
pain[1745].

Usually, however, the _chanson de nonne_ is more frivolous than this and all ends happily. A well defined group contains songs in the form of a round with a refrain, meant to be sung during a dance[1746]. One of the prettiest has a refrain rejecting the life of a nun for the best of reasons:

Derriere chez mon pere
Il est un bois taillis
(Serai-je nonnette, oui ou non?
Serai-je nonnette? je crois que non!)

Le rossignol y chante
Et le jour et la nuit.
Il chante pour les filles
Qui n'ont pas d'ami,
Il ne chante pas pour moi,
J'en ai un, dieu mercy[1747].

Another (first found in a version belonging to the year 1602) has the dance-refrain:

Trepignez vous, trepignez,
Trepignez vous comme moy,

and the words seem to trip of themselves:

Mon pere n'a fille que moy--
Il a jure la sienne foy
Que nonnette il fera de moy,
Et non feray, pas ne voudray.
J'amerois mieux mary avoir
Qui me baisast la nuit trois fois.
L'un au matin et l'autre au soir,
L'autre a minuit, ce sont les trois[1748].

Another song of the same date has the refrain:

Je le diray,
Je le diray, diray, ma mere,
Ma Mere, je le diray,

and tells the same tale:

Mon pere aussi ma mere
Ont jure par leur foy
Qu'ils me rendront nonnette
Tout en despit de moy.
La partie est mal faite
Elle est faite sans moy.
J'ay un amy en France
Qui n'est pas loin de moy,
Je le tiens par le doigt.
La nuit quand je me couche
Se met aupres de moy,
M'apprend ma patenostre,
Et aussi mon _ave_,
Et encore autre chose
Que je vous celeray.
De peur que ne l'oublie
Je le recorderay![1749]

The passage of years never diminished the popularity of these gay little songs; age could not wither them, and when nineteenth century scholars began to collect the folk songs sung in the provinces of France, they found many _chansons de nonnes_ still upon the lips of the people. In Poitou there is a round whose subject is still the old distaste of the girl for the convent:

Dans Paris l'on a fait faire
Deux ou trois petits couvents.
Mon pere ainsi que ma mere
Veulent me mettre dedans,
(Point de couvent, je ne veux, ma mere,
C'est un amant qu'il me faut vraiment.)

She begs her parents to wait another year; perhaps at the end of a year she will find a lover; and she will take him quickly enough:

Il vaut mieux conduire a vepres
Son mari et ses enfants,
Que d'etre dedans ces cloetres
A faire les yeux dolents;
A jeuner tout le careme,
Les quatre-temps et l'avent;
Et coucher dessus la dure
Tout le restant de son temps.
Serais-je plus heureuse
Dans les bras de mon amant?
Il me conterait ses peines,
Ses peines et ses tourments.
Je lui conterais les miennes,
Ainsi passerait le temps[1750].

Another round from the same district sings the plaint of a girl whose younger sister has married before her; "lads are as fickle as a leaf upon the wind, girls are as true as silver and gold; but my younger sister is being married. I am dying of jealousy, for they are sending me into a convent":

Car moi, qui suis l'ainee
On me met au couvent.
Si ce malheur arrive
J'mettrai feu dedans!
(Vous qui menez la ronde,
Menez-le rondement.)[1751]

Many folk-songs take the form of a dialogue between a mother and daughter, sometimes (as in two of the rounds quoted above) preserved only in the refrain. An old song taken down at Fontenay-le-Marmion contains a charmingly frivolous conversation. "Mother," says the daughter of fifteen, "I want a lover." "No, no, no, my child, none of that," says her mother, "you shall go to town to a convent and learn to read." "But tell me, mother, is it gay in a convent?":

"Dites-moi, ma mere, ah! dites-moi donc,
Dedans ce couvent, comme s'y comporte-t-on?
Porte-t-on des fontanges et des beaux habits,
Va-t-on a la danse, prend-on ses plaisis?"

"Non, non, non, ma fille, point de tout cela;
Une robe noire et elle vous servira,
Une robe noire et un voile blanc;
Te voila, ma fille, a l'etat du couvent."

"No, mother, to a convent I will not go; never will I leave the lad I love"; as she speaks her lover enters. "Fair one, will you keep your promise?" "I will keep all the promises I ever made to you, in my youth I will keep them; it is only my mother who does not wish it--but all the same, do not trouble yourself, for it shall be so. My father is very gentle when he sees me cry; I shall speak to him of love and I shall soon make him see that without any more delay I must have a lover"[1752]. In another of these dialogues the seventeen-year-old girl begs her mother to find her a husband. "You bold wicked girl," says the mother:

Effrontee, helas! que vous etes!
Si je prends le manche a balai,
Au couvent de la soeur Babet
Je te mets pour la vie entiere,
Et a grands coups de martinet
On apaisera votre caquet!

But "Mother," says the girl, "When you were my age, weren't you just the same? When love stole away your strength and your courage, didn't you love your sweetheart so well that they wanted to put you into a convent? don't you remember, mother, that you once told me that it was high time my dear father came forward, for you had more than one gallant?" The horrified mother interrupts her, "I see very well that you have a lover":

Mariez-vous, n'en parlons plus
Je vais vous compter mille ecus![1753]

Another group of songs (in narrative form and more _banal_ than the rounds and dialogues) deals with the escape from the convent. Among folk-songs collected in Velay and Forez there is one in which the girl is shut in a nunnery, whence her lover rescues her by the device of dressing himself as a gardener and getting employment in the abbess's garden[1754]; and another in which a soldier returns from the Flemish wars to find his mistress in a convent and takes her away with him in spite of the remonstrances of the abbess[1755]. In a version from Low Normandy (which probably goes back to the seventeenth century) the lover invokes the help of a chimney sweep, who goes to sweep the convent chimneys and pretends to be seized with a stomach-ache, so that the abbess hurries away for a medicine bottle and enables him to pass the young man's letter to his mistress; on a second visit the sweep carries the girl out in his sack, under the very nose of the reverend mother[1756]. An Italian version is less artificial:

In this city there is a little maid, a little maid in love. They wish
to chastise her until she loves no more. Says her father to her
mother: "In what manner shall we chastise her? Let us array her in
grey linen and put her into a nunnery." In her chamber the fair maiden
stood listening. "Ah, woe is me, for they would make me a nun!"
Weeping she wrote a letter and when she had sealed it well, she gave
it to her serving man, and bade him bear it to her lover. The gentle
gallant read the letter and began to weep and sigh: "I had but one
little love and now they would make her a nun!" He goes to the stable
where his horses are and saddles the one he prizes most. "Arise, black
steed, for thou art the strongest and fairest of all; for one short
hour thou must fly like a swallow down by the sea." The gentle gallant
mounts his horse and spurs forward at a gallop. He arrives just as his
fair one is entering the nunnery. "Hearken to me, mother abbess, I
have one little word to say." As he spake the word to the maiden, he
slipped the ring on her finger. "Is there in this city no priest or no
friar who will marry a maiden without her banns being called?"
"Goodbye to you, Father, goodbye to you, Mother, goodbye to you all my
kinsfolk. They thought to make me a nun, but with joy I am become a
bride"[1757].

Another very ribald Italian folk-song of the fourteenth or fifteenth century is specially interesting because it is founded upon Boccaccio's famous tale of the Abbess and the breeches. It is somewhat different from the usual nun-song; less plaintive and more indecent, as befits its origin in a _conte gras_; it is a _fabliau_ rather than a song, but it is worth quoting:

Kyrie, kyrie, pregne son le monache!
lo andai in un monastiero,
a non mentir ma dir el vero,
ov' eran done secrate:
diezi n' eran tute inpiate,
senza [dir de] la badesa,
che la tiritera spesa
faceva con un prete.
Kyrie, etc.

Or udirete bel sermona:
ciascuna in chiesa andone,
lasciando il dileto
che si posava in sul leto;
per rifare la danza
ciascuno aspetta l' amanza
che die retonare.
Kyrie, etc.

Quando matutin sonava
in chiesa nesuna andava,
[poi] ch' eran acopiate
qual con prete e qual con frate:
con lui stava in oracione
e ciascuno era garzone
che le serviva bene.
Kyrie, etc.

Sendo in chiesia tute andate,
e tute erano impregnate,
qual dal prete e qual dal frate,
l' una e l' altra guata;
ciascuna cred' esser velata
lo capo di benda usata;
avrino in capo brache.
Kyrie, etc.

E l' una a l' altra guatando
si vengon maravigliando;
credean che fore celato,
alor fu manifestato
questo eale convenente:
a la badessa incontenente
ch' ognun godesse or dice.
Kyrie, etc.

Or ne va, balata mia,
va a quel monastiero,
che vi si gode in fede mia
e questo facto e vero;
ciascuna non li par vero,
e quale [e] la fanziulla
ciascuna si trastulla
col cul cantano kyrie.
Kyrie, etc.[1758]

One characteristic form of the nun-theme has already been referred to in the text: the dialogue between the clerk and the nun, in which one prays the other for love and is refused. A terse version in which the nun is temptress exists in Latin and evidently enjoyed a certain popularity:

_Nonna._ Te mihi meque tibi genus, aetas et decor aequa[n]t:
Cur non ergo sumus sic in amore pares?
_Clericus._ Non hac ueste places aliis nec uestis ametur:
Quae nigra sunt, fugio, candida semper amo.
_N._ Si sim ueste nigra, niueam tamen aspice carnem:
Quae nigra sunt, fugias, candida crura petas.
_C._ Nupsisti Christo, quem non offendere fas est:
Hoc uelum sponsam te notat esse Dei.
_N._ Deponam uelum, deponam cetera quaeque:
Ibit et ad lectum nuda puella tuum.
_C._ Si uelo careas, tamen altera non potes esse:
Vestibus ablatis non mea culpa minor.
_N._ Culpa quidem, sed culpa leuis tamen ipsa fatetur
Hoc fore peccatum, sed ueniale tamen.
_C._ Uxorem uiolare uiri graue crimen habetur,
Sed grauius sponsam te uiolare Dei.
_N._ Cum non sit rectum uicini frangere lectum
Plus reor esse reum zelotypare Deum[1759].

In the Cambridge Manuscript there is a famous dialogue, half-Latin and half-German, in which a clerk prays a nun to love him in springtime, while the birds sing in the trees, but she replies: "What care I for the nightingale? I am Christ's maid and his betrothed." Almost the whole of the dialogue, in spite of the nun's irreproachable attitude, has been deleted with black ink by the monks of St Augustine's, Canterbury, who were accustomed thus to censor matter which they considered unedifying; but modern scholars have been at infinite pains to reconstruct it[1760].

It is rare to find in popular songs the idea of the convent as a refuge for maidens crossed in love; but some pretty poems have this theme. In a sixteenth century song a girl prefers a convent, if she cannot have the man she loves best, but she wishes her lover could be with her there:

Puis que l'on ne m'at donne
A celuy que j'aymois tant,
avant la fin de l'annee
quoy que facent mes parens,
je me rendray capucine
capucine en un couvent.

Si mon amis vient les feste
a la grille regardant,
je luy feray de la teste
la reverence humblement
come pauvre capucine;
je n'oserois aultrement.

S'il se pouvait par fortune
se couler secretement
dedans ma chambre sur la brune,
je lui dirois mon tourment
que la pauvre capucine
pour luy souffre en ce couvent.

Mon dieu, s'il se pouvoit faire
que nous deux ensemblement
fussions dans ung monastere
pour y passer nostre temps,
capucin et capucine
nous vindrions tous deux content.

L'on me vera attissee
d'ung beau voille de lin blanc;
mais je seray bien coiffee
dans le coeur tout aultrement,
puis que l'on m'a capucine
mise dedans ce couvent.

N'est ce pas une grand raige
quand au gre de ses parens
il faut prendre en mariaige
ceulx qu'on n'ayme nullement?
j'ameroy mieulx capucine
estre mise en ce couvent[1761].

Somewhat similar is the song (first printed in 1640) of the fifteen year-old girl married to a husband of sixty:

M'irai-je rendre nonette
Dans quelque joly couvent,
Priant le dieu d'amourette
Qu'il me donne allegement
Ou que j'aye en mariage
Celuy la que j'aime tant?[1762]

A round, with the refrain

Ah, ah, vive l'amour!
Cela ne durera pas toujours,

goes with a delightful swing:

Ce matin je me suis levee
Plus matin que ma tante;
J'ai descendu dans mon jardin
Cueillire la lavande.
Je n'avais pas cueilli trois brins
Que mon amant y rentre;
Il m'a dit trois mots en latin:
Marions nous ensemble.
--Si mes parents le veul' bien,
Pour moi je suis contente.
Si mes parents ne le veul' pas
Dans un couvent j'y rentre.
Tous mes parents le veul' bien,
Il n'y a que ma tante.
Et si ma tante ne veut pas
Dans un couvent je rentre.
Je prierai Dieu pour mes parents
Et le diable pour ma tante![1763]

In another song, with the refrain

Je ne m'y marieray jamais
Je seray religieuse,

the girl laments her own coyness which has lost her her lover[1764]. Sometimes, on the other hand, it is the lover's falseness which drives her to enter a convent. In a song, which first occurs about 1555, the maiden laments "qu'amours sont faulses":

Je m'en iray rendre bigotte
Avec les autres,
Et porteray le noir aussi le gris
(sont les couleurs de mon loyal amy)
si porteray les blanches patenostres
comme bigotte[1765].

In another very graceful little ditty the lover goes through the world in rain and wind, seeking his true love and finds her at last in a green valley:

Je luy ay dit "doucette,
ou vas tu maintenant?
(m'amour)"
"m'en vois rendre nonnette
(helas)
en un petit couvent.

Puis que d'aultre que moy
vous estes amoureux.
(m'amour)
qui faict qu'en grand esmoy
(helas)
mon coeur soit langoureux.

Helas, toute vestue
je seray de drap noir
(m'amour)
monstrant que despourveue
(helas)
je vis en desespoir"[1766].

Moreover the convent also plays its part in that numerous class of folk songs, which tells of the discomfiture of a too bold gallant by the wits of a girl. An early example occurs in 1542:

L'autrier, en revenant de tour
Sus mon cheval qui va le trou,
Par dessoubs la couldrette
L'herbe y croit folyette.

Je m'en entray en ung couvent
Pour prendre mes esbatemens.
Par ung petit guinchet d'argent
Je vis une nonnette,
Vray Dieu, tant jolyette.

Dessoubz les drabs quand je la vys
Blanche comme la fleur du lys,
Je masseitys aupres du lit
En lui disans: nonnette
Serez vous ma miette?

Chevalier, troup me detenez,
D'en faire a vostre voulente
Si m'en laissez ung peu aller,
Tant que je soye paree,
Tost seray retournee.

Sire chevalier, rassemblez
A l'esperirer vous resemblez,
Qui tient la proye enmy ses pieds
Et puis la laisse enfuire
Ainsi faictes vous, sire.

La nonnette si s'en alla
A son abbesse racompta
La en ces bois a ung musart
Qui d'amour m'a priee,
Je luy suis eschappee.

Le chevallier il demeura
Soulz la branche d'ung olivier
Attendant la nonnette--
Encore y peust il estre![1767]

Folk-songs, like flowers, spring up--or perhaps are transplanted--in the same form in different lands and under different skies; they laugh at political divisions and are a living monument to the solidarity of Europe. Thus a song taken down from the lips of a Piedmontese _contadina_ in the nineteenth century is almost exactly the same as the sixteenth century French poem just quoted, even to such details as the olive and the fowler:

Gentil galant cassa'nt el bosc,
S'e riscuntra-se'nt uena munia,
L'era tan bela, fresca e biunda.
Gentil galant a j'a ben dit:
--Sete-ve si cun mi a l'umbreta,
Mai pi viu sari munigheta.
--Gentil galant, spetei-me si,
Che vada poze la tunicheta
Poi turnro con vui a l'umbreta--
A l'a speta-la tre di, tre noit
Sut a l'umbreta de l'oliva.
E mai pi la munia veniva.
Gentil galant va al munaste,
L'a pica la porta grandeta;
J'e sorti la madre badessa.
--Coza cerchei-vo, gentil galant?
--Mi ma cerco na munigheta,
Ch'a m'a promess d'avni a l'umbreta.
--J'avie la quaja dnans ai pe,
V'la si lassa-v-la vule via.
Cozi l'a fait la munia zolia[1768].

Another version, still sung in many parts of France, is called _The Ferry Woman_. In this a girl ferrying a gentleman from court across a stream, promises him her love in return for two thousand pounds, but bids him wait till they land and can climb to the top room of a house. But when the gallant leaps ashore she pushes off her boat, taking the money with her and crying: "Galant, j't'ai passe la riviere:

Avec ton or et ton argent
Je vais entrer dans un couvent,
Dans un couvent de filles vertueuses
Pour etre un jour aussi religieuse!

"Si je passe par le couvent,
J'irai mettre le feu dedans,
Je brulerai la tour et la tourniere
Pour mieux bruler la belle bateliere"[1769].

Occasionally the references to nuns in folk-songs have even less significance. Thus one of the metamorphoses gone through by the girl, who (in a very common folk theme) assumes different shapes to elude her lover, is to become a nun:

"Si tu me suis encore
Comme un amant
Je me ferai nonne
Dans un convent,
Et jamais tu n'auras
Mon coeur content."

"Si tu te fais nonne
Dans un couvent
Je me ferai
Moine chantant
Pour confesser la nonne
Dans le couvent"[1770].

Again in _Le Canard Blanc_ occur the question and answer:

Que ferons nous de tant d'argent?
Nous mettrons nos filles au couvent
Et nos garcons au regiment.
Si nos fill's ne veul' point d'couvent
Nous les marierons richement[1771].

One very curious song deserves quotation, a Florentine carnival song of the time of Lorenzo the Magnificent, written by one Guglielmo called _Il Giuggiola_. It retails the woes of some poor "Lacresine" or "Lanclesine" who have come to Rome on a pilgrimage and been robbed of all their money on the way, and the ingenious suggestion has been made that "Lacresine" is a corruption of "Anglesine" and that the song is supposed to be sung by English nuns; certainly it is in broken Italian, such as foreigners would use:

Misericordia et caritate
Alle pofer Lacresine
Che l'argente pel chammine
Tutt'a spese et consumate.

Del paese basse Magne,
Dove assai fatiche afute
Tutte noi pofer compagne
Per ir Rome sian fenute.
Ma per tanto esser piofute,
Non pofer Lanclesine.

Nelle parte di Melane
State noi mal governate,
Che da ladri et gente strane
Nostre robe star furate;
Talche noi tutte bitate
[Non mai piu far tal chammine.]
Pero pofer Lanclesine
Buon messer da caritate.

Queste pofer Nastasie
Le fu tutte rotte stiene
Talche sue gran malattie
Per vergognia sotto tiene.
Cosi zoppe far conviene
Con fatiche suo chammine
Pero pofer Lanclesine
Buon messer da caritate.

Chi e dijote San Branchatie
Che star tant' in ciel potente,
Per afer sue sancte gratie
Voglia a noi donare argente,
Che le pofer malcontente
Pessin compier lor chammine,
Pero pofer Lanclesine
Buon messer da caritate[1772].

"Pity and charity for poor English ladies, who have spent and used up
all their money on the road. From the land of low Germany, where we
have had great difficulties, all we poor sisters are on our way to
Rome, but because it has rained so hard, we have not been able to
continue our road. _Therefore, good sirs, give alms to us poor English
ladies._ In the district of Milan ill-used were we, for thieves and
strangers stole all our goods; so buffetted were we, never again will
we go on such a journey. _Therefore, good sirs, give alms to us poor
English ladies._ Poor Anastasia was so knocked about, that in shame
she hides her ill and must needs continue her road limping.
_Therefore, good sirs, give alms to us poor English ladies._ Whoever
is a devotee of St Pancras, who is so powerful in heaven, whoever
wishes to have his grace, let him give us money, so that we poor
miserable creatures may get to our journey's end; _therefore, good
sirs, give alms to us poor English ladies_."

Sometimes the nun is found playing a part in the romantic ballad-literature of Europe. A Rhineland legend of the dance of death, interesting because it embodies the names and dates of the actors, has for its setting a convent; it is thus summarised by Countess Martinengo-Cesaresco[1773]:

In the fourteenth century Freiherr von Metternich placed his daughter
Ida in a convent on the island of Oberwoerth, in order to separate her
from her lover, one Gerbert, to whom she was secretly betrothed. A
year later the maiden lay sick in the nunnery, attended by an aged lay
sister. "Alas!" she said "I die unwed though a betrothed wife."
"Heaven forfend!" cried her companion, "then you would be doomed to
dance the death-dance." The old sister went on to explain that
betrothed maidens who die without having either married or taken
religious vows, are condemned to dance on a grassless spot in the
middle of the island, there being but one chance of escape, the coming
of a lover, no matter whether the original betrothed or another, with
whom the whole party dances round and round till he dies; then the
youngest of the ghosts makes him her own and may henceforth rest in
her grave. The old nun's gossip does not delay the hapless Ida's
departure, and Gerbert, who hears of her illness on the shores of the
Boden See, arrives at Coblenz only to have tidings of her death. He
rows over to Oberwoerth; it is midnight in midwinter. Under the
moonlight dance the unwed brides, veiled and in flowing robes; Gerbert
thinks he sees Ida among them. He joins the dance; fast and furious it
becomes, to the sound of a wild unearthly music. At last the clock
strikes and the ghosts vanish--only one, as it goes, seems to stoop
and kiss the youth, who sinks to the ground. There the gardener finds
him on the morrow, and in spite of all the care bestowed upon him by
the sisterhood, he dies before sundown.

Another German ballad, taken down from oral recitation, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, opens with a good swing:

Stund ich auf hohen bergen
Und sah ich ueber den Rhein
Ein Schifflein sah ich fahren,
Drei Ritter waren drein.

"I stood upon a high mountain and looked out over the Rhine, and I saw
three knights come sailing in a little boat. The youngest was a lord's
son, and fain would have wed me, young as he was. He drew a little
golden ring from off his finger, "Take this, my fair, my lovely one,
but do not wear it till I am dead." "What shall I do with the little
ring, if I may not wear it?" "O say you found it out in the green
grass." "O that would be a lie and evil. Far sooner would I say that
the young lord was my husband." "O maiden, were you but wealthy, came
you but of noble kin, were we but equals, gladly would I wed you."
"Though I may not be rich yet am I not without honour, and my honour I
will keep, until one who is my equal comes for me." "But if your equal
never comes, what then?" "Then I will go into a convent and become a
nun." There had not gone by a quarter of a year when the lord had an
evil dream; it seemed to him that the love of his heart was gone into
a convent. "Rise up, rise up, my trusty man, saddle horses for thee
and me. We will ride over mountains and through valleys--the maid is
worth all the world." And when they came to the convent, they knocked
at the door of the tall house, "Come forth, my fair, my lovely one,
come forth for but a minute." "Wherefore should I come forth? Short
hair have I, my locks they have cut off--for a long year has passed."
Despair filled the lord's heart; he sank upon a stone and wept
glittering tears and could never be glad again. With her snow-white
little hands she dug the lord a grave and the tears fell for him out
of her brown eyes. And to all young men this happens who seek after
great wealth. They set their love upon beautiful women; but beauty and
riches go not always hand in hand"[1774].

It is a strange thing that in all the ballad and folk-song literature of England and Scotland there should be one and only one reference to a nun. But that reference is a profoundly interesting one, for it is to be found in the fine ballad of the _Death of Robin Hood_, which tells how the great outlaw came to his end through the treachery of the Prioress of Kirklees:

When Robin Hood and Little John
_Down a-down, a-down, a-down_,
Went o'er yon bank of broom
Said Robin Hood to Little John,
"We have shot for many a pound:
_Hey down, a-down, a-down_.

"But I am not able to shoot one shot more,
My broad arrows will not flee;
But I have a cousin lives down below,
Please God, she will bleed me."

"I will never eat nor drink," he said,
"Nor meat will do me good,
Till I have been to merry Kirkleys
My veins for to let blood.

"The dame prior is my aunt's daughter,
And nigh unto my kin;
I know she wo'ld me no harm this day
For all the world to win."

"That I rede not," said Little John,
"Master, by th' assent of me,
Without half a hundred of your best bowmen
You take to go with yee."

"An thou be afear'd, thou Little John,
At home I rede thee be."
"An you be wrath, my deare master
You shall never hear more of me."

Now Robin is gone to merry Kirkleys
And knocked upon the pin;
Up then rose Dame Prioress
And let good Robin in.

Then Robin gave to Dame Prioress
Twenty pounds in gold,
And bade her spend while that did last,
She sho'ld have more when she wo'ld.

"Will you please to sit down, cousin Robin;
And drink some beer with me?"--
"No, I will neither eat nor drink
Till I am blooded by thee."

Down then came Dame Prioress
Down she came in that ilk,
With a pair of blood-irons in her hand,
Were wrapped all in silk.

"Set a chafing dish to the fire," she said,
"And strip thou up thy sleeve."
--I hold him but an unwise man
That will no warning 'leeve.

She laid the blood-irons to Robin's vein,
Alack the more pitye!
And pierc'd the vein, and let out the blood
That full red was to see.

And first it bled the thick, thick blood,
And afterwards the thin,
And well then wist good Robin Hood
Treason there was within.

And there she blooded bold Robin Hood
While one drop of blood wou'd run;
There did he bleed the livelong day,
Until the next of morn.

Then Robin, locked in the room and too weak to escape by the casement, blew three weak blasts upon his horn, and Little John came hurrying to Kirklees and burst open two or three locks and so found his dying master. "A boon, a boon!" cried Little John:

"What is that boon," said Robin Hood
"Little John, thou begs of me?"--
"It is to burn fair Kirkleys-hall
And all their nunnerye."

"Now nay, now nay," quoth Robin Hood,
"That boon I'll not grant thee;
I never hurt woman in all my life,
Nor men in their company."

"I never hurt maid in all my time,
Nor at mine end shall it be;
But give me my bent bow in my hand,
And a broad arrow I'll let flee;
And where this arrow is taken up
There shall my grave digg'd be"[1775].

So died bold Robin Hood. The English boy nurtured on his country's ballads, has little cause to love the memory of the nun.

NOTE J.

THE THEME OF THE NUN IN LOVE IN MEDIEVAL POPULAR LITERATURE.

It may be of interest to note some further examples of the nun in love as a theme for medieval tales, and in particular: (1) other versions of the eloping nun theme, (2) the story of the abbess who was with child and was delivered by the Virgin, and (3) some other _contes gras_.

(1) Various versions of the eloping nun tale enjoyed popularity, though never as great popularity as was enjoyed by the story of Beatrice the Sacristan. An old French version in the form of a miracle play tells of a knight, who loved a nun and persuaded her to leave her convent with him; but she saluted the Virgin's image in passing and twice the image descended from its pedestal and barred her way when she tried to pass the door, until at last she ran by without saluting it and escaped with her lover. They married and had two children and lived happily together for several years. Then one day Our Lady came down from heaven to seek her faithless friend. She bade the nun return and the husband, hearing this, was moved in his heart and said "since for love of me thou didst leave thy convent, for love of thee I will leave the world and become a monk." Thus they departed together and their babies were left to cry for mother and father in vain[1776].

In another story the nun, trying to insert the key of the convent into the lock and make her escape, was prevented by some invisible object, which formed a barrier between her and the lock; she beat and pushed in vain and at last turned to go, and saw in her path, the Virgin with white hands bleeding. "Behold," said the Virgin, "it was I who withstood thee and see what thou hast done to me"[1777]. In another a nun, the sacristan of a convent, was tempted by a clerk and agreed to meet him after Compline. But when she was trying to pass through the door of the chapel, she saw Christ standing in the arch, with hands outspread, as though upon the cross. She ran to another doorway and to another and to another, but in each she found the crucifix. Then, coming to herself, she recognised her sin and flung herself before an image of the Virgin to ask pardon. The image turned away its face; then, as the trembling nun redoubled her entreaties, stretched out its arm and dealt her a buffet saying: "Foolish one, whither wouldst thou go? return to thy dorter." And so powerful was the Virgin's blow that the nun was knocked down thereby and lay unconscious upon the floor of the chapel until morning[1778]. In another version the nun falls asleep on the night upon which the elopement is fixed and has a vivid dream of the pains of hell, from which she is rescued by the Virgin, who exhorts her to chastity, so that she awakes and sends away her lover's messenger[1779]. In another the Virgin's image prevents the nun from going through one door, but she escapes by another and is seduced[1780]. A more rational version makes the nun strike her head so violently against the lintel of the door, by which she is trying to escape, that she is rendered unconscious and when she recovers her senses the temptation has gone from her and she returns to her bed[1781]. In another the nun packs her clothes into two bundles and passes them out of the window to her lover, climbing out after them herself; but thieves intercept her and her bundles and carry them off into a wood. The unhappy nun calls upon the Virgin for help and forthwith falls into a deep sleep, from which she awakes to find herself back in her dorter, with the bundles beside her[1782]. A rather different tale of the nun turned courtesan makes her return after many years to her convent, where by meditating upon the childhood of Christ she is reconverted[1783].

(2) Another theme, which is almost as widespread as that of the eloping nun, is that known as _l'abbesse grosse_. In this an abbess, who was famed for the strict discipline which she kept among her nuns, fell in love with her clerk and became his mistress, so that she soon knew herself to be with child:

Then it happened that she waxed great and drew near her time and her
sisters the nuns perceived, and were passing fain thereof, because she
was so strait unto them, that they might have a cause to accuse her
in. And her accusers gart write unto the bishop and let him wit
thereof and desired him to come unto their place and see her. So he
granted and the day of him coming drew near. And this abbess, that was
great with child, made mickle sorrow and wist never what she might do;
and she had a privy chapel within her chamber, where she was wont
daily as devoutly as she couth [knew how] to say Our Lady's matins.
And she went in there and sparred the door unto her and fell devoutly
on knees before the image of Our Lady and made her prayer unto her and
wept sore for her sin and besought Our Lady for to help her and save
her, that she were not shamed when the bishop came. So in her prayers
she happened to fall on sleep, and Our Lady, as her thought, appeared
unto her with two angels, and comforted her and said unto her in this
manner of wise: "I have heard thy prayer and I have gotten of my son
forgiveness of thy sin and deliverance of thy confusion." And anon
she was delivered of her child and Our Lady charged these two angels
to have it unto an hermit and charged him to bring it up unto it was
seven years old; and they did as she commanded them; and anon Our Lady
vanished away. And then this abbess wakened and felt herself delivered
of her child and whole and sound.

In the sequel the bishop came to the house and could find no sign that the abbess was with child and was about to punish her accusers, when she told him the whole tale. He sent messengers to the hermit and there the child was found; and (in fairy tale phrase, for what are these but religious fairy tales), they all lived happy ever afterwards[1784].

(3) Ribald stories on the same theme are, naturally enough, common in medieval literature, which never spared the Church. A few of the more interesting may here be added to those quoted or referred to in the text. The _Cento Novelle Antiche_ contains a curious tale of a Countess and her maidens, who, having disgraced themselves with a porter, retired to hide their shame in a nunnery; the story continues thus:

They became nuns and built a convent that is called the Convent of
Rimini. The fame of this convent spread and it became very wealthy.
And this story is narrated as true, viz. they had a custom that when
any cavaliers passed by that had rich armour the abbess and her
attendants met them on the threshold and served them with all sorts of
good fare and accompanied them to table and to bed. In the morning
they provided them with water for washing and then gave them a needle
and thread of silk for them to thread and if they could not accomplish
this in three tries, she took from them all their armour and
accoutrement and sent them away empty, but if they succeeded she
allowed them to retain their possessions and gave them presents of
jewellery, etc.[1785]

Francesco da Barberino in his book of deportment, _Del reggimento e costumi di donne_, has a tale of a convent in Spain, which Satan receives permission to tempt; accordingly his emissary Rasis sends into the house three young men, disguised as nuns, to whom all the nuns and the Abbess in turn succumb[1786]. In one Italian version of an extremely widespread theme, found among the _Novelle_ of Masuccio Guardata da Salerno (1442-1501), a Dominican friar deceives a devout and high-born nun. The story is thus summarised by A. C. Lee:

In one of her books of devotion were some pictures of saints, amongst
others the third person of the Trinity; from the mouth of this figure
he makes proceed the words in letters of gold, "Barbara, you will
conceive of a holy man and give birth to the fifth evangelist." He
acts as the holy man and on the lady becoming _enceinte_ he deserts
her[1787].

Among medieval French stories may be mentioned those which occur in _Les Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles_, a fifteenth century collection of tales, probably written by Antoine de la Sale in imitation of the _Cento Novelle_. No. XV, concerning the relations between two neighbouring houses of monks and nuns respectively, is too gross to be summarised; No. XXI is the story of the sick abbess, who was recommended by her physician to take a lover and out of respect for her all her nuns did the same; No. XLVI is one of the many tales of a Jacobin friar, who haunted a convent and obtained the favours of a nun[1788]. These are really prose fabliaux; and verse fabliaux on this theme are not wanting, for example Watriquet Brassenal's story of _The Three Canonesses of Cologne_[1789] and the most indecent fabliau of _The Three Ladies_[1790]. There is a rather delightful and merry little German poem called _Daz Maere von dem Sperwaere_, which is a version of the popular French fabliau of _The Crane_[1791]. In this thirteenth century poem a little nun, who has never seen the world, looks over her convent wall and sees a knight with a sparrow hawk; she begs for it and he says he will sell it her for "love," a thing of which she has never heard. He teaches her what it is and gives her the sparrow hawk. But the nun, her schoolmistress, is so angry with her, that she watches on the wall again and next time the knight passes, she makes him give her back her "love" and take the sparrow hawk again[1792].

English versions of these tales are extremely rare; for the English were always less adroit than the French and the Italians in the matter of _contes gras_. The nun theme occasionally appears, however, in the sixteenth century; Boccaccio's "breeches" story is in Thomas Twyne's _The Schoolmaster_ (1576)[1793] and the behaviour of nuns and "friars" at Swineshead Abbey forms a comic interlude in _The Troublesome Raigne of King John_ (1591), which was one of the sources used by Shakespeare in his more famous play. In Scene X of the old play Philip Falconbridge comes to Swineshead, with his soldiers, and bids a friar show him where the abbot's treasure is hid. They break open a chest and a nun is discovered inside it. The friar cries:

Oh, I am undone
Fair Alice the nun
Hath took up her rest
In the Abbot's chest.
_Santa benedicite_,
Pardon my simplicity
Fie, Alice, confession
Will not salve this transgression.

Philip remarks:

What have we here? a holy nun? so keep me God in health,
A smooth-faced nun, for aught I know, is all the abbot's wealth.

The nun begs for the life of the first friar and offers in exchange to show Philip a chest containing the hoard of an ancient nun. They pick the lock and discover a friar within. The first friar cries:

Friar Laurence, my lord;
Now holy water help us:
Some witch or some devil is sent to delude us:
_Haud credo, Laurentius_,
That thou shouldst be pen'd thus
In the press of a nun:
We are all undone,
And brought to discredence,
If thou be Friar Laurence.

Philip's comment is pertinent:

How goes this gear? the friar's chest fill'd with a sausen nun.
The nun again locks friar up to keep him from the sun.
Belike the press is purgatory, or penance passing grievous:
The friar's chest a hell for nuns! How do these dolts deceive us?
Is this the labour of their lives, to feed and live at ease?
To revel so lasciviously as often as they please?
I'll mend the fault, or fault my aim, if I do miss amending;
'Tis better burn the cloisters down than leave them for offending.

Eventually, Friar Laurence buys his freedom for a hundred pounds[1794].

In conclusion may be mentioned the entertaining little English _fabliau_, which was at one time attributed to Lydgate, called _The Tale of the Lady Prioress and her three Suitors_; this is not a _conte gras_, but recounts the adroit expedient, by which a prioress succeeded in ridding herself of her three wooers, a knight, a parson and a merchant[1795].

NOTE K.

NUNS IN THE _DIALOGUS MIRACULORUM_ OF CAESARIUS OF HEISTERBACH.

The _Dialogus Miraculorum_, written between 1220 and 1235 by Caesarius, Prior and Teacher of the Novices in the Cistercian Abbey of Heisterbach in the Siebengebirge, is one of the most entertaining books of the middle ages[1796]. Caesarius in a prologue describes how it came to be written and the plan upon which it is arranged, taking as his text a quotation from John vi. 12: "Gather up the fragments lest they perish":

Since I was wont to recite to the novices, as in duty bound, some of
the miracles which have taken place in our time and daily are taking
place in our order, several of them besought me most instantly to
perpetuate the same in writing. For they said that it would be an
irreparable disaster if these things should perish from forgetfulness
which might be an edification to posterity. And since I was all
unready to do so, now for lack of the Latin tongue, now by reason of
the detraction of envious men, there came at length the command of my
own abbot, to say naught of the advice of the abbot of Marienstatt,
which it is not lawful for me to disobey. Mindful also of the
aforesaid saying of the Saviour, while others break up whole loaves
for the crowd (that is to say, expound difficult questions of the
Scriptures or write the more signal deeds of modern days) I,
collecting the falling crumbs, from lack not of good will but of
scholarship, have filled with them twelve baskets. For I have divided
the whole book into as many divisions. The first division tells of
conversion, the second of contrition, the third of confession, the
fourth of temptation, the fifth of demons, the sixth of the power of
simplicity, the seventh of the blessed Virgin Mary, the eighth of
divers visions, the ninth of the sacrament of the body and blood of
Christ, the tenth of miracles, the eleventh of the dying, the twelfth
of the pains and glories of the dead. Moreover in order that I might
the more easily arrange the examples, I have introduced two persons in
the manner of a dialogue, to wit a novice asking questions and a monk
replying to them.... I have also inserted many things which took place
outside the [Cistercian] order, because they were edifying, and like
the rest had been told to me by religious men. God is my witness that
I have not invented a single chapter in this dialogue. If anything
therein perchance fell about otherwise than I have written it, the
fault should rather be imputed to those who told it to me[1797].

It will be seen from this sketch that the book is really a collection of stories grouped round certain subjects which they are intended to illustrate and connected by a slender thread of dialogue. Such collections of _exempla_ are nearly always valuable, but the work of Caesarius is particularly so, because he does not confine himself to "stock" stories, but relates many with details of time and place, drawn from his own experience and from that of his friends. The book is full of local colour and gives an exceedingly vivid picture of lay and ecclesiastical life in medieval Germany. For our purpose it is interesting because it contains many _exempla_ concerning nuns, and any reader attracted by this particular class of didactic literature may be glad to add some more stories to those quoted in the text.

Caesarius has much to say of the devil, a very visible and audible and tangible devil and one who can be smelt with the nose. His tales of devil-haunted nuns display a side of convent life about which English records are in the main silent; but that they represent with fair accuracy the sufferings of some half-hysterical, half-mystical women cannot be doubted by anyone familiar with the lives of medieval saints and mystics, such as Mary of Oignies, Christina of Stommeln and Lydwine of Schiedam. He tells in his section on "Confession" of a nun Alice or Aleidis, who had led an ill life in the world, but had repented her when her lover, a priest, hanged himself, and had taken the veil at Langwaden in the diocese of Cologne:

Once when she was standing in the dorter and looking out of the
window, she beheld a young man, nay rather a devil in the form of a
young man, standing hard by a well, which was near the wall of the
dorter; who in her sight set one foot upon the wooden frame which
surrounded the well, and as it were flying with the other, conveyed
himself to her in the window, and tried to seize her head with his
extended hand; but she fell back stricken with terror and almost in a
faint, and cried out and hearing her call, her sisters ran to her and
placed her upon her bed. And when they had gone away again and she had
recovered her breath and lay alone, the demon was once more with her,
and began to tempt her with words of love, but she denied him,
understanding him to be an evil spirit. Then he answered "Good
Aleidis, do not say so, but consent to me, and I will cause you to
have a husband, honest, worthy, noble and rich. Why do you torture
yourself with hunger in this poor place, killing yourself before your
time by vigils and many other discomforts? Return to the world and use
those delights which God created for man; you shall want for nothing
under my guidance." Then said she, "I grieve that I followed thee for
so long; begone for I will not yield to thee."

Then the foul fiend blew with his nostrils and spattered her with a foul black pitch and vanished. Neither the sign of the cross, nor sprinkling with holy water, nor censing with incense prevailed against this particular demon; he would retreat for a time and return again as soon as Aleidis ceased to employ these weapons against him. She was in despair, when one day

One of the sisters, of maturer years and wisdom than the others,
persuaded her when the demon tried to approach her to hurl the angelic
salutation[1798] in a loud voice in his face; and when she had done
so the devil, as though struck by a dart or driven by a whirlwind,
fled away and from that hour never dared to approach her.

Another time the same Aleidis went to confession, hoping thus to rid herself forever of her tormentor:

And behold as she was hastening along the road, the devil stood in her
path and said: "Aleidis, whither away so fast?" And she replied: "I go
to confound myself and thee." Then said the devil: "Nay, Aleidis, do
not so! Turn again!" And she replied: "Oft hast thou put me to
confusion, now will I confound thee. I will not turn back." And when
he could turn her back neither by blandishments nor by threats, he
followed her to the place of confession flying in the air above her in
the form of a kite; and as soon as she bent her knee before the Prior
and opened her lips in confession, he vanished, crying and howling and
was never seen or heard by her from that hour. Behold here ye have a
manifest example of what virtue lieth in a pure confession. These
things were told to me by the lord Hermann, Abbot of
Marienstatt[1799].

In his section "De Daemonibus" Caesarius has a yet more startling collection of stories about devils. The trials of sister Euphemia are described as having been related to him by the nun herself, at the instance of her abbess: