Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

What Coleridge has reported to have said of Southey may be applied to a translator. He too "is in some sort like an elegant setter of jewels; the stones are not his own: he gives them all the advantage of his art, but not their native brilliancy." I feel even more than this when I attempt translation, and reflect that, unlike the jeweller, it is my doom to reduce the lustre of the gems I handle, even if I do not substitute paste and pebbles. Yet I am frequently enticed to repeat experiments, which afterwards I regard in the light of failures. What allures me first is the pleasure of passing into that intimate familiarity with art which only a copyist or a translator enjoys. I am next impelled by the desire to fix the attention of readers on things which I admire, and which are possibly beyond their scope of view. Lastly comes that _ignis fatuus_ of the hope, for ever renewed, if also for ever disappointed, that some addition may be made in this way to the wealth of English poetry. A few exquisite pieces in Latin literature, the Catullian _Ille mi par_, for example, a few in our own, such as Jonson's _Drink to me only with thine eyes_, are translations. Possibly the miracle of such poetic transmutation may be repeated for me; possibly an English song may come to birth by my means also. With this hope in view, the translator is strongly tempted to engraft upon his versions elegances in the spirit of his native language, or to use the motives of the original for improvisations in his own manner. I must plead guilty to having here and there yielded to this temptation, as may appear upon comparison of my English with the Latin. All translation is a compromise; and while being conscious of having to sacrifice much, the translator finds himself often seeking to add something as a makeweight.

I shall divide my specimens into nine Sections. The first will include those which deal with the Order of Wandering Students in general, winding up with the _Confession_ ascribed to Golias, the father of the family. The second, third, fourth, and fifth are closely connected, since they contain spring-songs, pastorals, descriptive poems touching upon love, and erotic lyrics. The sixth Section will be devoted to a few songs of exile, doubt, and sorrow. In the seventh we shall reach anacreontics on the theme of wine, passing in the eighth to parodies and comic pieces. Four or five serious compositions will close the list in the ninth Section.

At the end of the book I mean to print a table containing detailed references to the originals of the songs I have chosen for translation, together with an index of the principal works that have been published on this subject.

XIII.

The first song which concerns the Order of Wandering Students in general has been attributed to the Archipoeta or head-bard of the guild. Whoever this poet may have been, it is to him that we owe the _Confession of Golias_, by far the most spirited composition of the whole Goliardic species. I do not think the style of the poem on the Order, though it belongs to a good period, justifies our ascribing it to so inspired and genial a lyrist.

The argument runs as follows. Just as commission was given to the Apostles to go forth and preach in the whole world, so have the Wandering Students a vocation to travel, and to test the hearts of men wherever they may sojourn. A burlesque turn is given to this function of the _Vagi_. Yet their consciousness of a satiric mission, their willingness to pose as critics of society from the independent vantage-ground of vagabondage, seems seriously hinted at.

The chief part of the song is devoted to a description of the comprehensive nature of the Order, which receives all sorts and conditions of men, and makes no distinction of nationality. The habitual poverty of its members, their favourite pastimes and vices, their love of gaming and hatred of early rising, are set forth with some humour.

ON THE ORDER OF WANDERING STUDENTS.

No. 1.

At the mandate, Go ye forth,
Through the whole world hurry!
Priests tramp out toward south and north,
Monks and hermits skurry,
Levites smooth the gospel leave,
Bent on ambulation;
Each and all to our sect cleave,
Which is life's salvation.

In this sect of ours 'tis writ:
Prove all things in season;
Weigh this life and judge of it
By your riper reason;
'Gainst all evil clerks be you
Steadfast in resistance,
Who refuse large tithe and due
Unto your subsistence.

Marquesses, Bavarians,
Austrians and Saxons,
Noblemen and chiefs of clans,
Glorious by your actions!
Listen, comrades all, I pray,
To these new decretals:
Misers they must meet decay,
Niggardly gold-beetles.

We the laws of charity
Found, nor let them crumble;
For into our order we
Take both high and humble;
Rich and poor men we receive,
In our bosom cherish;
Welcome those the shavelings leave
At their doors to perish.

We receive the tonsured monk,
Let him take his pittance;
And the parson with his punk,
If he craves admittance;
Masters with their bands of boys,
Priests with high dominion;
But the scholar who enjoys
Just one coat's our minion!

This our sect doth entertain
Just men and unjust ones;
Halt, lame, weak of limb or brain,
Strong men and robust ones;
Those who flourish in their pride,
Those whom age makes stupid;
Frigid folk and hot folk fried
In the fires of Cupid.

Tranquil souls and bellicose,
Peacemaker and foeman;
Czech and Hun, and mixed with those
German, Slav, and Roman;
Men of middling size and weight,
Dwarfs and giants mighty;
Men of modest heart and state,
Vain men, proud and flighty.

Of the Wanderers' order I
Tell the Legislature--
They whose life is free and high,
Gentle too their nature--
They who'd rather scrape a fat
Dish in gravy swimming,
Than in sooth to marvel at
Barns with barley brimming.

Now this order, as I ken,
Is called sect or section,
Since its sectaries are men
Divers in complexion;
Therefore _hic_ and _haec_ and _hoc_
Suit it in declension,
Since so multiform a flock
Here finds comprehension.

This our order hath decried
Matins with a warning;
For that certain phantoms glide
In the early morning,
Whereby pass into man's brain
Visions of vain folly;
Early risers are insane,
Racked by melancholy.

This our order doth proscribe
All the year round matins;
When they've left their beds, our tribe
In the tap sing latins;
There they call for wine for all,
Roasted fowl and chicken;
Hazard's threats no hearts appal,
Though his strokes still thicken.

This our order doth forbid
Double clothes with loathing:
He whose nakedness is hid
With one vest hath clothing:
Soon one throws his cloak aside
At the dice-box calling;
Next his girdle is untied,
While the cards are falling.

What I've said of upper clothes
To the nether reaches;
They who own a shirt, let those
Think no more of breeches;
If one boasts big boots to use,
Let him leave his gaiters;
They who this firm law refuse
Shall be counted traitors.

No one, none shall wander forth
Fasting from the table;
If thou'rt poor, from south and north
Beg as thou art able!
Hath it not been often seen
That one coin brings many,
When a gamester on the green
Stakes his lucky penny?

No one on the road should walk
'Gainst the wind--'tis madness;
Nor in poverty shall stalk
With a face of sadness;
Let him bear him bravely then,
Hope sustain his spirit;
After heavy trials men
Better luck inherit!

While throughout the world you rove,
Thus uphold your banners;
Give these reasons why you prove
Hearts of men and manners:
"To reprove the reprobate,
Probity approving,
Improbate from approbate
To remove, I'm moving."

The next song is a lament for the decay of the Order and the suppression of its privileges. It was written, to all appearances, at a later date, and is inferior in style. The Goliardi had already, we learn from it, exchanged poverty for luxury. Instead of tramping on the hard hoof, they moved with a retinue of mounted servants. We seem to trace in the lament a change from habits of simple vagabondage to professional dependence, as minstrels and secretaries, upon men of rank in Church and State, which came over the Goliardic class. This poem, it may be mentioned, does not occur in the _Carmina Burana_, nor is it included among those which bear the name of Walter Mapes or Map.

ON THE DECAY OF THE ORDER.

No. 2.

Once (it was in days of yore)
This our order flourished;
Popes, whom Cardinals adore,
It with honours nourished;
Licences desirable
They gave, nought desiring;
While our prayers, the beads we tell,
Served us for our hiring.

Now this order (so time runs)
Is made tributary;
With the ruck of Adam's sons
We must draw and carry;
Ground by common serfdom down,
By our debts confounded,
Debts to market-place and town
With the Jews compounded.

Once ('twas when the simple state
Of our order lasted)
All men praised us, no man's hate
Harried us or wasted;
Rates and taxes on our crew
There was none to levy;
But the sect, douce men and true,
Served God in a bevy.

Now some envious folks, who spy
Sumptuous equipages,
Horses, litters passing by,
And a host of pages,
Say, "Unless their purses were
Quite with wealth o'erflowing,
They could never thus, I swear,
Round about be going!"

Such men do not think nor own
How with toil we bend us,
Not to feed ourselves alone,
But the folk who tend us:
On all comers, all who come,
We our substance lavish,
Therefore 'tis a trifling sum
For ourselves we ravish.

On this subject, at this time,
What we've said suffices:
Let us leave it, lead the rhyme
Back to our devices:
We the miseries of this life
Bear with cheerful spirit,
That Heaven's bounty after strife
We may duly merit.

'Tis a sign that God the Lord
Will not let us perish,
Since with scourge and rod and sword
He our souls doth cherish;
He amid this vale of woes
Makes us bear the burden,
That true joys in heaven's repose
May be ours for guerdon.

Next in order to these poems, which display the Wandering Students as a class, I will produce two that exhibit their mode of life in detail. The first is a begging petition, addressed by a scholar on the tramp to the great man of the place where he is staying. The name of the place, as I have already noticed, is only indicated by an N. The nasal whine of a suppliant for alms, begging, as Erasmus begged, not in the name of charity, but of learning, makes itself heard both in the rhyme and rhythm of the original Latin. I have tried to follow the sing-song doggerel.

A WANDERING STUDENT'S PETITION.

No. 3.

I, a wandering scholar lad,
Born for toil and sadness,
Oftentimes am driven by
Poverty to madness.

Literature and knowledge I
Fain would still be earning,
Were it not that want of pelf
Makes me cease from learning.

These torn clothes that cover me
Are too thin and rotten;
Oft I have to suffer cold,
By the warmth forgotten.

Scarce I can attend at church,
Sing God's praises duly;
Mass and vespers both I miss,
Though I love them truly.

Oh, thou pride of N----,
By thy worth I pray thee
Give the suppliant help in need,
Heaven will sure repay thee.

Take a mind unto thee now
Like unto St. Martin;
Clothe the pilgrim's nakedness,
Wish him well at parting.

So may God translate your soul
Into peace eternal,
And the bliss of saints be yours
In His realm supernal.

The second is a jovial _Song of the Open Road_, throbbing with the exhilaration of young life and madcap impudence. We must imagine that two vagabond students are drinking together before they part upon their several ways. One addresses the other as _frater catholice, vir apostolice_, vows to befriend him, and expounds the laws of loyalty which bind the brotherhood together. To the rest of the world they are a terror and a nuisance. Honest folk are jeeringly forbidden to beware of the _quadrivium_, which is apt to form a fourfold rogue instead of a scholar in four branches of knowledge.

The Latin metre is so light, careless, and airy, that I must admit an almost complete failure to do it justice in my English version. The refrain appears intended to imitate a bugle-call.

A SONG OF THE OPEN ROAD.

No. 4.

We in our wandering,
Blithesome and squandering,
Tara, tantara, teino!

Eat to satiety,
Drink with propriety;
Tara, tantara, teino!

Laugh till our sides we split,
Rags on our hides we fit;
Tara, tantara, teino!

Jesting eternally,
Quaffing infernally:
Tara, tantara, teino!

Craft's in the bone of us,
Fear 'tis unknown of us:
Tara, tantara, teino!

When we're in neediness,
Thieve we with greediness:
Tara, tantara, teino!

Brother catholical,
Man apostolical,
Tara, tantara, teino!

Say what you will have done,
What you ask 'twill be done!
Tara, tantara, teino!

Folk, fear the toss of the
Horns of philosophy!
Tara, tantara, teino!

Here comes a quadruple
Spoiler and prodigal!
Tara, tantara, teino!

License and vanity
Pamper insanity:
Tara, tantara, teino!

As the Pope bade us do,
Brother to brother's true:
Tara, tantara, teino!

Brother, best friend, adieu!
Now, I must part from you!
Tara, tantara, teino!

When will our meeting be?
Glad shall our greeting be!
Tara, tantara, teino!

Vows valedictory
Now have the victory;
Tara, tantara, teino!

Clasped on each other's breast,
Brother to brother pressed,
Tara, tantara, teino!

In the fourth place I insert the _Confession of Golias_. This important composition lays bare the inner nature of a Wandering Student, describing his vagrant habits, his volatile and indiscriminate amours, his passion for the dice-box, his devotion to wine, and the poetic inspiration he was wont to draw from it.

In England this _Confession_ was attributed to Walter Map; and the famous drinking-song, on which the Archdeacon of Oxford's reputation principally rests in modern times, was extracted from the stanzas II _et seq._[29] But, though Wright is unwilling to refuse Map such honour as may accrue to his fame from the composition, we have little reason to regard it as his work. The song was clearly written at Pavia--a point inexplicably overlooked by Wright in the note appended to stanza 9--and the Archbishop-elect of Cologne, who is appealed to by name in stanza 24, was Reinald von Dassel, a minister of Frederick Barbarossa. This circumstance enables us to determine the date of the poem between 1162 and 1165. When the _Confession_ was manipulated for English readers, _Praesul Coventrensium, Praesul mibi cognite_, and _O pastor ecclesiae_ were in several MS. redactions substituted for _Electe Coloniae_. Instead of _Papiae_, in stanza 8, we read _in mundo_; but in stanza 9, where the rhyme required it, _Papiae_ was left standing--a sufficient indication of literary rehandling by a clumsy scribe. In the text of the _Carmina Burana_, the _Confession_ winds up with a petition that Reinald von Dassel should employ the poet as a secretary, or should bestow some mark of his bounty upon him.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 29: Wright's _Walter Mapes_, p. xlv.]

THE CONFESSION OF GOLIAS.

No. 5.

Boiling in my spirit's veins
With fierce indignation,
From my bitterness of soul
Springs self-revelation:
Framed am I of flimsy stuff,
Fit for levitation,
Like a thin leaf which the wind
Scatters from its station.

While it is the wise man's part
With deliberation
On a rock to base his heart's
Permanent foundation,
With a running river I
Find my just equation,
Which beneath the self-same sky
Hath no habitation.

Carried am I like a ship
Left without a sailor,
Like a bird that through the air
Flies where tempests hale her;
Chains and fetters hold me not,
Naught avails a jailer;
Still I find my fellows out,
Toper, gamester, railer.

To my mind all gravity
Is a grave subjection;
Sweeter far than honey are
Jokes and free affection.
All that Venus bids me do,
Do I with erection,
For she ne'er in heart of man
Dwelt with dull dejection.

Down the broad road do I run,
As the way of youth is;
Snare myself in sin, and ne'er
Think where faith and truth is;
Eager far for pleasure more
Than soul's health, the sooth is,
For this flesh of mine I care,
Seek not ruth where ruth is.

Prelate, most discreet of priests,
Grant me absolution!
Dear's the death whereof I die,
Sweet my dissolution;
For my heart is wounded by
Beauty's soft suffusion;
All the girls I come not nigh,
Mine are in illusion.

'Tis most arduous to make
Nature's self surrender;
Seeing girls, to blush and be
Purity's defender!
We young men our longings ne'er
Shall to stern law render,
Or preserve our fancies from
Bodies smooth and tender.

Who, when into fire he falls,
Keeps himself from burning?
Who within Pavia's walls
Fame of chaste is earning?
Venus with her finger calls
Youths at every turning,
Snares them with her eyes, and thralls
With her amorous yearning.

If you brought Hippolitus
To Pavia Sunday,
He'd not be Hippolitus
On the following Monday;
Venus there keeps holiday
Every day as one day;
'Mid these towers in no tower dwells
Venus Verecunda.

In the second place I own
To the vice of gaming:
Cold indeed outside I seem,
Yet my soul is flaming:
But when once the dice-box hath
Stripped me to my shaming,
Make I songs and verses fit
For the world's acclaiming.

In the third place, I will speak
Of the tavern's pleasure;
For I never found nor find
There the least displeasure;
Nor shall find it till I greet
Angels without measure,
Singing requiems for the souls
In eternal leisure.

In the public-house to die
Is my resolution;
Let wine to my lips be nigh
At life's dissolution:
That will make the angels cry,
With glad elocution,
"Grant this toper, God on high,
Grace and absolution!"

With the cup the soul lights up,
Inspirations flicker;
Nectar lifts the soul on high
With its heavenly ichor:
To my lips a sounder taste
Hath the tavern's liquor
Than the wine a village clerk
Waters for the vicar.

Nature gives to every man
Some gift serviceable;
Write I never could nor can
Hungry at the table;
Fasting, any stripling to
Vanquish me is able;
Hunger, thirst, I liken to
Death that ends the fable.

Nature gives to every man
Gifts as she is willing;
I compose my verses when
Good wine I am swilling,
Wine the best for jolly guest
Jolly hosts are filling;
From such wine rare fancies fine
Flow like dews distilling.

Such my verse is wont to be
As the wine I swallow;
No ripe thoughts enliven me
While my stomach's hollow;
Hungry wits on hungry lips
Like a shadow follow,
But when once I'm in my cups,
I can beat Apollo.

Never to my spirit yet
Flew poetic vision
Until first my belly had
Plentiful provision;
Let but Bacchus in the brain
Take a strong position,
Then comes Phoebus flowing in
With a fine precision.

There are poets, worthy men,
Shrink from public places,
And in lurking-hole or den
Hide their pallid faces;
There they study, sweat, and woo
Pallas and the Graces,
But bring nothing forth to view
Worth the girls' embraces.

Fasting, thirsting, toil the bards,
Swift years flying o'er them;
Shun the strife of open life,
Tumults of the forum;
They, to sing some deathless thing,
Lest the world ignore them,
Die the death, expend their breath,
Drowned in dull decorum.

Lo! my frailties I've betrayed,
Shown you every token,
Told you what your servitors
Have against me spoken;
But of those men each and all
Leave their sins unspoken,
Though they play, enjoy to-day,
Scorn their pledges broken.

Now within the audience-room
Of this blessed prelate,
Sent to hunt out vice, and from
Hearts of men expel it;
Let him rise, nor spare the bard,
Cast at him a pellet;
He whose heart knows not crime's smart,
Show my sin and tell it!

I have uttered openly
All I knew that shamed me,
And have spued the poison forth
That so long defamed me;
Of my old ways I repent,
New life hath reclaimed me;
God beholds the heart--'twas man
Viewed the face and blamed me.

Goodness now hath won my love,
I am wroth with vices;
Made a new man in my mind,
Lo, my soul arises!
Like a babe new milk I drink--
Milk for me suffices,
Lest my heart should longer be
Filled with vain devices.

Thou Elect of fair Cologne,
Listen to my pleading!
Spurn not thou the penitent;
See, his heart is bleeding!
Give me penance! what is due
For my faults exceeding
I will bear with willing cheer,
All thy precepts heeding.

Lo, the lion, king of beasts,
Spares the meek and lowly;
Toward submissive creatures he
Tames his anger wholly.
Do the like, ye powers of earth,
Temporal and holy!
Bitterness is more than's right
When 'tis bitter solely.

XIV.

Having been introduced to the worshipful order of vagrants both in their collective and in their personal capacity, we will now follow them to the woods and fields in spring. It was here that they sought love-adventures and took pastime after the restraints of winter.

The spring-songs are all, in the truest sense of the word, _lieder_--lyrics for music. Their affinities of form and rhythm are less with ecclesiastical verse than with the poetry of the Minnesinger and the Troubadour. Sometimes we are reminded of the French _pastourelle_, sometimes of the rustic ditty, with its monotonous refrain.

The exhilaration of the season which they breathe has something of the freshness of a lark's song, something at times of the richness of the nightingale's lament. The defect of the species may be indicated in a single phrase. It is a tedious reiteration of commonplaces in the opening stanzas. Here, however, is a lark-song.

WELCOME TO SPRING.

No. 6.

Spring is coming! longed-for spring
Now his joy discloses;
On his fair brow in a ring
Bloom empurpled roses!
Birds are gay; how sweet their lay!
Tuneful is the measure;
The wild wood grows green again,
Songsters change our winter's pain
To a mirthful pleasure.

Now let young men gather flowers,
On their foreheads bind them,
Maidens pluck them from the bowers,
Then, when they have twined them,
Breathe perfume from bud and bloom,
Where young love reposes,
And into the meadows so
All together laughing go,
Crowned with ruddy roses.

Here again the nightingale's song, contending with the young man's heart's lament of love, makes itself heard.

THE LOVER AND THE NIGHTINGALE.

No. 7.

These hours of spring are jolly;
Maidens, be gay!
Shake off dull melancholy,
Ye lads, to-day!
Oh! all abloom am I!
It is a maiden love that makes me sigh,
A new, new love it is wherewith I die!

The nightingale is singing
So sweet a lay!
Her glad voice heavenward flinging--
No check, no stay.

Flower of girls love-laden
Is my sweetheart;
Of roses red the maiden
For whom I smart.

The promise that she gives me
Makes my heart bloom;
If she denies, she drives me
Forth to the gloom.

My maid, to me relenting,
Is fain for play;
Her pure heart, unconsenting,
Saith, "Lover, stay!"

Hush, Philomel, thy singing,
This little rest!
Let the soul's song rise ringing
Up from the breast!

In desolate Decembers
Man bides his time:
Spring stirs the slumbering embers;
Love-juices climb.

Come, mistress, come, my maiden!
Bring joy to me!
Come, come, thou beauty-laden!
I die for thee!
O all abloom am I!
It is a maiden love that makes me sigh,
A new, new love it is wherewith I die!

There is a very pretty _Invitation to Youth_, the refrain of which, though partly undecipherable, seems to indicate an Italian origin. I have thought it well to omit this refrain; but it might be rendered thus, maintaining the strange and probably corrupt reading of the last line:--

"List, my fair, list, _bela mia_,
To the thousand charms of Venus!
_Da hizevaleria_."

THE INVITATION TO YOUTH.

No. 8.

Take your pleasure, dance and play,
Each with other while ye may:
Youth is nimble, full of grace;
Age is lame, of tardy pace.

We the wars of love should wage,
Who are yet of tender age;
'Neath the tents of Venus dwell
All the joys that youth loves well.

Young men kindle heart's desire;
You may liken them to fire:
Old men frighten love away
With cold frost and dry decay.

A roundelay, which might be styled the _Praise of May_ or the exhortation to be liberal in love by _The Example of the Rose_, shall follow.

THE EXAMPLE OF THE ROSE.

No. 9.

Winter's untruth yields at last,
Spring renews old mother earth;
Angry storms are overpast,
Sunbeams fill the air with mirth;
Pregnant, ripening unto birth,
All the world reposes.

Our delightful month of May,
Not by birth, but by degree,
Took the first place, poets say;
Since the whole year's cycle he,
Youngest, loveliest, leads with glee,
And the cycle closes.

From the honours of the rose
They decline, the rose abuse,
Who, when roses red unclose,
Seek not their own sweets to use;
'Tis with largess, liberal dues,
That the rose discloses.

Taught to wanton, taught to play,
By the young year's wanton flower,
We will take no heed to-day,
Have no thought for thrift this hour;
Thrift, whose uncongenial power
Laws on youth imposes.

Another song, blending the praises of spring with a little pagan vow to Cupid, has in the original Latin a distinction and purity of outline which might be almost called Horatian.

THE VOW TO CUPID.

No. 10.

Winter, now thy spite is spent,
Frost and ice and branches bent!
Fogs and furious storms are o'er,
Sloth and torpor, sorrow frore,
Pallid wrath, lean discontent.

Comes the graceful band of May!
Cloudless shines the limpid day,
Shine by night the Pleiades;
While a grateful summer breeze
Makes the season soft and gay.

Golden Love I shine forth to view!
Souls of stubborn men subdue!
See me bend! what is thy mind?
Make the girl thou givest kind,
And a leaping ram's thy due!

O the jocund face of earth,
Breathing with young grassy birth!
Every tree with foliage clad,
Singing birds in greenwood glad,
Flowering fields for lovers' mirth!

Nor is the next far below it in the same qualities of neatness and artistic brevity.

A-MAYING.

No. 11.

Now the fields are laughing; now the maids
Take their pastime; laugh the leafy glades:
Now the summer days are blooming,
And the flowers their chaliced lamps for love illuming.
Fruit-trees blossom; woods grow green again;
Winter's rage is past: O ye young men,
With the May-bloom shake off sadness!
Love is luring you to join the maidens' gladness.

Let us then together sport and play;
Cytherea bids the young be gay:
Laughter soft and happy voices,
Hope and love invite to mirth when May rejoices.

All the spring is in the lyric next upon my list.

THE RETURN OF SPRING:

No. 12.

Spring returns, the glad new-comer,
Bringing pleasure, banning pain:
Meadows bloom with early summer,
And the sun shines out again:
All sad thoughts and passions vanish;
Plenteous Summer comes to banish
Winter with his starveling train.

Hails and snows and frosts together
Melt and thaw like dews away;
While the spring in cloudless weather
Sucks the breast of jocund May;
Sad's the man and born for sorrow
Who can live not, dares not borrow
Gladness from a summer's day.

Full of joy and jubilation,
Drunk with honey of delight,
Are the lads whose aspiration
Is the palm of Cupid's fight!
Youths, we'll keep the laws of Venus,
And with joy and mirth between us
Live and love like Paris wight!

The next has the same accent of gladness, though it is tuned to a somewhat softer and more meditative note of feeling.

THE SWEETNESS OF THE SPRING.

No. 13.

Vernal hours are sweet as clover,
With love's honey running over;
Every heart on this earth burning
Finds new birth with spring's returning.

In the spring-time blossoms flourish,
Fields drink moisture, heaven's dews nourish;
Now the griefs of maidens, after
Dark days, turn to love and laughter.

Whoso love, are loved, together
Seek their pastime in spring weather;
And, with time and place agreeing,
Clasp, kiss, frolic, far from seeing.

Gradually the form of the one girl whom the lyrist loves emerges from this wealth of description.

THE SUIT TO PHYLLIS.

No. 14.

Hail! thou longed-for month of May,
Dear to lovers every day!
Thou that kindlest hour by hour
Life in man and bloom in bower!
O ye crowds of flowers and hues
That with joy the sense confuse,
Hail! and to our bosom bring
Bliss and every jocund thing!
Sweet the concert of the birds;
Lovers listen to their words:
For sad winter hath gone by,
And a soft wind blows on high.

Earth hath donned her purple vest,
Fields with laughing flowers are dressed,
Shade upon the wild wood spreads,
Trees lift up their leafy heads;
Nature in her joy to-day
Bids all living things be gay;
Glad her face and fair her grace
Underneath the sun's embrace!
Venus stirs the lover's brain,
With life's nectar fills his vein,
Pouring through his limbs the heat
Which makes pulse and passion beat.

O how happy was the birth
When the loveliest soul on earth
Took the form and life of thee,
Shaped in all felicity!
O how yellow is thy hair!
There is nothing wrong, I swear,
In the whole of thee; thou art
Framed to fill a loving heart!
Lo, thy forehead queenly crowned,
And the eyebrows dark and round,
Curved like Iris at the tips,
Down the dark heavens when she slips!

Red as rose and white as snow
Are thy cheeks that pale and glow;
'Mid a thousand maidens thou
Hast no paragon, I vow.
Round thy lips and red as be
Apples on the apple-tree;
Bright thy teeth as any star;
Soft and low thy speeches are;
Long thy hand, and long thy side,
And the throat thy breasts divide;
All thy form beyond compare
Was of God's own art the care.

Sparks of passion sent from thee
Set on fire the heart of me;
Thee beyond all whom I know
I must love for ever so.
Lo, my heart to dust will burn
Unless thou this flame return;
Still the fire will last, and I,
Living now, at length shall die!
Therefore, Phyllis, hear me pray,
Let us twain together play,
Joining lip to lip and breast
Unto, breast in perfect rest!

The lover is occasionally bashful, sighing at a distance.

MODEST LOVE.

No. 15.

Summer sweet is coming in;
Now the pleasant days begin;
Phoebus rules the earth at last;
For sad winter's reign is past.

Wounded with the love alone
Of one girl, I make my moan:
Grief pursues me till she bend
Unto me and condescend.

Take thou pity on my plight!
With my heart thy heart unite!
In my love thy own love blending,
Finding thus of life the ending!

Occasionally his passion assumes a romantic tone, as is the case with the following _Serenade_ to a girl called Flos-de-spina in the Latin. Whether that was her real name, or was only used for poetical purposes, does not admit of debate now. Anyhow, Flos-de-spina, Fior-di-spina, Fleur-d'epine, and English Flower-o'-the-thorn are all of them pretty names for a girl.

THE SERENADE TO FLOWER-O'-THE-THORN.

No. 16.

The blithe young year is upward steering.
Wild winter dwindles, disappearing;
The short, short days are growing longer,
Rough weather yields and warmth is stronger.
Since January dawned, my mind
Waves hither, thither, love-inclined
For one whose will can loose or bind.

Prudent and very fair the maiden,
Than rose or lily more love-laden;
Stately of stature, lithe and slender,
There's naught so exquisite and tender.
The Queen of France is not so dear;
Death to my life comes very near
If Flower-o'-the-thorn be not my cheer.

The Queen of Love my heart is killing
With her gold arrow pain-distilling;
The God of Love with torches burning
Lights pyre on pyre of ardent yearning.
She is the girl for whom I'd die;
I want none dearer, far or nigh,
Though grief on grief upon me lie.

I with her love am thralled and taken,
Whose flower doth flower, bud, bloom, and waken;
Sweet were the labour, light the burden,
Could mouth kiss mouth for wage and guerdon.
No touch of lips my wound can still,
Unless two hearts grow one, one will,
One longing! Flower of flowers, farewell!

Once at least we find him writing in absence to his mistress, and imploring her fidelity. This ranks among the most delicate in sentiment of the whole series.

THE LOVE-LETTER IN SPRING.

No. 17.

Now the sun is streaming,
Clear and pure his ray;
April's glad face beaming
On our earth to-day.
Unto love returneth
Every gentle mind;
And the boy-god burneth
Jocund hearts to bind.

All this budding beauty,
Festival array,
Lays on us the duty
To be blithe and gay.
Trodden ways are known, love!
And in this thy youth,
To retain thy own love
Were but faith and truth.

In faith love me solely,
Mark the faith of me,
From thy whole heart wholly,
From the soul of thee.
At this time of bliss, dear,
I am far away;
Those who love like this, dear,
Suffer every day!

At one time he seems upon the point of clasping his felicity.

A SPRING DITTY.

No. 18.

In the spring, ah happy day!
Underneath a leafy spray
With her sister stands my may.
O sweet love!
He who now is reft of thee
Poor is he!

Ah, the trees, how fair they flower
Birds are singing in the bower;
Maidens feel of love the power.
O sweet love!

See the lilies, how they blow!
And the maidens row by row
Praise the best of gods below.
O sweet love!

If I held my sweetheart now,
In the wood beneath the bough,
I would kiss her, lip and brow.
O sweet love!
He who now is reft of thee,
Poor is he!

At another time he has clasped it, but he trembles lest it should escape him.

LOVE-DOUBTS.

No. 19.

With so sweet a promise given
All my bosom burneth;
Hope uplifts my heart to heaven,
Yet the doubt returneth,
Lest perchance that hope should be
Crushed and shattered suddenly.

On one girl my fancy so,
On one star, reposes;
Her sweet lips with honey flow
And the scent of roses:
In her smile I laugh, and fire
Fills me with her love's desire.

Love in measure over-much
Strikes man's soul with anguish;
Anxious love's too eager touch
Makes man fret and languish:
Thus in doubt and grief I pine;
Pain more sure was none than mine.

Burning in love's fiery flood,
Lo, my life is wasted!
Such the fever of my blood
That I scarce have tasted
Mortal bread and wine, but sup
Like a god love's nectar-cup.

The village dance forms an important element in the pleasures of the season. Here is a pretty picture in two stanzas of a linden sheltering some Suabian meadow.

THE VILLAGE DANCE.

No. 20.

Wide the lime-tree to the air
Spreads her boughs and foliage fair;
Thyme beneath is growing
On the verdant meadow-where
Dancers' feet are going.

Through the grass a little spring
Runs with jocund murmuring;
All the place rejoices;
Cooling zephyrs breathe and sing
With their summer voices.

I have freely translated a second, which presents a more elaborate picture of a similar scene.

LOVE AMONG THE MAIDENS.

No. 21.

Yonder choir of virgins see
Through the spring advancing,
Where the sun's warmth, fair and free,
From the green leaves glancing,
Weaves a lattice of light gloom
And soft sunbeams o'er us,
'Neath the linden-trees in bloom,
For the Cyprian chorus.

In this vale where blossoms blow,
Blooming, summer-scented,
'Mid the lilies row by row,
Spreads a field flower-painted.
Here the blackbirds through the dale
Each to each are singing,
And the jocund nightingale
Her fresh voice is flinging.

See the maidens crowned with rose
Sauntering through the grasses!
Who could tell the mirth of those
Laughing, singing lasses?
Or with what a winning grace
They their charms discover,
Charms of form and blushing face,
To the gazing lover?

Down the flowery greenwood glade
As I chanced to wander,
From bright eyes a serving-maid
Shot Love's arrows yonder;
I for her, 'mid all the crew
Of the girls of Venus,
Wait and yearn until I view
Love spring up between us.

Another lyric of complicated rhyming structure introduces a not dissimilar motive, with touches that seem, in like manner, to indicate its German origin. It may be remarked that the lover's emotion has here unusual depth, a strain of _sehnsucht_; and the picture of the mother followed by her daughter in the country-dance suggests the domesticity of Northern races.

AT THE VILLAGE DANCE.

No. 22.

Meadows bloom, in Winter's room
Reign the Loves and Graces,
With their gift of buds that lift
Bright and laughing faces;
'Neath the ray of genial May,
Shining, glowing, blushing, growing,
They the joys of spring are showing
In their manifold array.

Song-birds sweet the season greet,
Tune their merry voices;
Sound the ways with hymns of praise,
Every lane rejoices.
On the bough in greenwood now
Flowers are springing, perfumes flinging,
While young men and maids are clinging
To the loves they scarce avow.

O'er the grass together pass
Bands of lads love-laden:
Row by row in bevies go
Bride and blushing maiden.
See with glee 'neath linden-tree,
Where the dancing girls are glancing,
How the matron is advancing!
At her side her daughter see!

She's my own, for whom alone,
If fate wills, I'll tarry;
Young May-moon, or late or soon,
'Tis with her I'd marry!
Now with sighs I watch her rise,
She the purely loved, the surely
Chosen, who my heart securely
Turns from grief to Paradise.

In her sight with heaven's own light
Like the gods I blossom;
Care for nought till she be brought
Yielding to my bosom.
Thirst divine my soul doth pine
To behold her and enfold her,
With clasped arms alone to hold her
In Love's holy hidden shrine.

But the theme of the dance is worked up with even greater elaboration and a more studied ingenuity of rhyme and rhythm in the following characteristic song. This has the true accent of what may be called the _Musa Vagabundula_, and is one of the best lyrics of the series:--

INVITATION TO THE DANCE.

No. 23.

Cast aside dull books and thought;
Sweet is folly, sweet is play:
Take the pleasure Spring hath brought
In youth's opening holiday!
Right it is old age should ponder
On grave matters fraught with care;
Tender youth is free to wander,
Free to frolic light as air.
Like a dream our prime is flown,
Prisoned in a study:
Sport and folly are youth's own,
Tender youth and ruddy.

Lo, the Spring of life slips by,
Frozen Winter comes apace;
Strength is 'minished silently,
Care writes wrinkles on our face:
Blood dries up and courage fails us,
Pleasures dwindle, joys decrease,
Till old age at length assails us
With his troop of illnesses.
Like a dream our prime is flown,
Prisoned in a study;
Sport and folly are youth's own,
Tender youth and ruddy.

Live we like the gods above;
This is wisdom, this is truth:
Chase the joys of tender love
In the leisure of our youth!
Keep the vows we swore together,
Lads, obey that ordinance;
Seek the fields in sunny weather,
Where the laughing maidens dance.
Like a dream our prime is flown,
Prisoned in a study;
Sport and folly are youth's own,
Tender youth and ruddy.

There the lad who lists may see
Which among the maids is kind:
There young limbs deliciously
Flashing through the dances wind:
While the girls their arms are raising,
Moving, winding o'er the lea,
Still I stand and gaze, and gazing
They have stolen the soul of me!
Like a dream our prime is flown,
Prisoned in a study;
Sport and folly are youth's own,
Tender youth and ruddy.

XV.

A separate Section can be devoted to songs in the manner of the early French pastoral. These were fashionable at a remote period in all parts of Europe; and I have already had occasion, in another piece of literary history, to call attention to the Italian madrigals of the fourteenth century composed in this species.[30] Their point is mainly this: A man of birth and education, generally a dweller in the town, goes abroad into the fields, lured by fair spring weather, and makes love among trees to a country wench.

The _Vagi_ turn the pastoral to their own purpose, and always represent the greenwood lover as a _clericus_. One of these rural nieces has a pretty opening stanza:--

"When the sweet Spring was ascending,
Not yet May, at April's ending,
While the sun was heavenward wending,
Stood a girl of grace transcending
Underneath the green bough, sending
Songs aloft with pipings."

Another gives a slightly comic turn to the chief incident.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 30: See _Renaissance in Italy_, vol. iv. p. 156.]

A PASTORAL.

No. 24.

There went out in the dawning light
A little rustic maiden;
Her flock so white, her crook so slight,
With fleecy new wool laden.

Small is the flock, and there you'll see
The she-ass and the wether;
This goat's a he, and that's a she,
The bull-calf and the heifer.

She looked upon the green sward, where
A student lay at leisure:
"What do you there, young sir, so fair?"
"Come, play with me, my treasure!"

A third seems to have been written in the South, perhaps upon the shores of one of the Italian lakes--Como or Garda.

THE MULBERRY-GATHERER.

No. 25.

In the summer's burning heat,
When the flowers were blooming sweet,
I had chosen, as 'twas meet,
'Neath an olive bough my seat;
Languid with the glowing day,
Lazy, careless, apt for play.

Stood the tree in fields where grew
Painted flowers of every hue,
Grass that flourished with the dew,
Fresh with shade where breezes blew;
Plato, with his style so rare,
Could not paint a spot more fair.

Runs a babbling brook hard by,
Chants the nightingale on high;
Water-nymphs with song reply.
"Sure, 'tis Paradise," I cry;
For I know not any place
Of a sweeter, fresher grace.

While I take my solace here,
And in solace find good cheer,
Shade from summer, coolness dear,
Comes a shepherd maiden near--
Fairer, sure, there breathes not now--
Plucking mulberries from the bough.

Seeing her, I loved her there:
Venus did the trick, I'll swear!
"Come, I am no thief, to scare,
Rob, or murder unaware;
I and all I have are thine,
Thou than Flora more divine!"

But the girl made answer then:
"Never played I yet with men;
Cruel to me are my kin:
My old mother scolds me when
In some little thing I stray:--
Hold, I prithee, sir, to-day!"

A fourth, consisting of a short conventional introduction in praise of Spring, followed by a dialogue between a young man and a girl, in which the metre changes for the last two stanzas, may be classed among the pastorals, although it is a somewhat irregular example of the species.

THE WOOING.

No. 26.

All the woods are now in flower,
Song-birds sing in field and bower,
Orchards their white blossoms shower:
Lads, make merry in Love's hour!

Sordid grief hath flown away,
Fervid Love is here to-day;
He will tame without delay
Those who love not while they may.

_He._
"Fairest maiden, list to me;
Do not thus disdainful be;
Scorn and anger disagree
With thy youth, and injure thee.

"I am weaker than thou art;
Mighty Love hath pierced my heart;
Scarce can I endure his dart:
Lest I die, heal, heal my smart!"

_She._
"Why d'you coax me, suitor blind?
What you seek you will not find;
I'm too young for love to bind;
Such vain trifles vex my mind.

"Is't your will with me to toy?
I'll not mate with man or boy:
Like the Phoenix, to enjoy
Single life shall be my joy."

_He._
"Yet Love is tyrannous,
Harsh, fierce, imperious!
He who man's heart can thus
Shatter, may make to bow
Maidens as stern as thou!"

_She._
"Now by your words I'm 'ware
What you wish, what you are;
You know love well, I swear!
So I'll be loved by you;
Now I'm on fire too!"

XVI.

Some semi-descriptive pieces, which connect the songs of Spring with lyrics of a more purely personal emotion, can boast of rare beauty in the original.

The most striking of these, upon the theme of Sleep and Love, I have tried to render in trochaic verse, feeling it impossible, without knowledge of the medieval melody, to reproduce its complicated and now only half-intelligible rhythms.

A DESCANT UPON SLEEP AND LOVE.

No. 27.

When the lamp of Cynthia late
Rises in her silver state,
Through her brother's roseate light,
Blushing on the brows of night;
Then the pure ethereal air
Breathes with zephyr blowing fair;
Clouds and vapours disappear.
As with chords of lute or lyre,
Soothed the spirits now respire,
And the heart revives again
Which once more for love is fain.
But the orient evening star
Sheds with influence kindlier far
Dews of sweet sleep on the eye
Of o'er-tired mortality.

Oh, how blessed to take and keep
Is the antidote of sleep!
Sleep that lulls the storms of care
And of sorrow unaware,
Creeping through the closed doors
Of the eyes, and through the pores
Breathing bliss so pure and rare
That with love it may compare.

Then the god of dreams doth bring
To the mind some restful thing,
Breezes soft that rippling blow
O'er ripe cornfields row by row,
Murmuring rivers round whose brim
Silvery sands the swallows skim,
Or the drowsy circling sound
Of old mill-wheels going round,
Which with music steal the mind
And the eyes in slumber bind.

When the deeds of love are done
Which bland Venus had begun,
Languor steals with pleasant strain
Through the chambers of the brain,
Eyes 'neath eyelids gently tired
Swim and seek the rest desired.
How deliriously at last
Into slumber love hath passed!
But how sweeter yet the way
Which leads love again to play!

From the soothed limbs upward spread
Glides a mist divinely shed,
Which invades the heart and head:
Drowsily it veils the eyes,
Bending toward sleep's paradise,
And with curling vapour round
Fills the lids, the senses swound,
Till the visual ray is bound
By those ministers which make
Life renewed in man awake.

Underneath the leafy shade
Of a tree in quiet laid,
While the nightingale complains
Singing of her ancient pains,
Sweet it is still hours to pass,
But far sweeter on the grass
With a buxom maid to play
All a summer's holiday.
When the scent of herb and flower
Breathes upon the silent hour,
When the rose with leaf and bloom
Spreads a couch of pure perfume,
Then the grateful boon of sleep
Falls with satisfaction deep,
Showering dews our eyes above,
Tired with honeyed strife of love.

In how many moods the mind
Of poor lovers, weak and blind,
Wavers like the wavering wind!
As a ship in darkness lost,
Without anchor tempest-tossed,
So with hope and fear imbued
It roams in great incertitude
Love's tempestuous ocean-flood.

A portion of this descant finds an echo in another lyric of the _Carmina Burana_:--

"With young leaves the wood is new;
Now the nightingale is singing;
And field-flowers of every hue
On the sward their bloom are flinging.
Sweet it is to brush the dew
From wild lawns and woody places!
Sweeter yet to wreathe the rose
With the lily's virgin graces;
But the sweetest sweet man knows,
Is to woo a girl's embraces."

The most highly wrought of descriptive poems in this species is the _Dispute of Flora and Phyllis_, which occurs both in the _Carmina Burana_ and in the English MSS. edited by Wright. The motive of the composition is as follows:--Two girls wake in the early morning, and go out to walk together through the fields. Each of them is in love; but Phyllis loves a soldier, Flora loves a scholar. They interchange confidences, the one contending with the other for the superiority of her own sweetheart.

Having said so much, I will present the first part of the poem in the English version I have made.

FLORA AND PHYLLIS.