But 'tis the thought of what we might have been, For ever lost; these are the darts so keen Or 'tis perchance some hasty fit of ire, But list! methinks there breathes into my soul "A new, fresh, Year!" for such this whispering voice "Redeem the past, for all who make this choice J. THE TROUBADOURS. LITERARY History is full of romantic passages and strange interesting phenomena, but perhaps among them all there is nothing so singular as the lives and writings of the Troubadours. The very name fills us with strange undefined imaginations. All that we have ever heard or read of knights or chivalry comes thronging and pressing into our minds. We seem to have reached the hotbed, the very focus of such tales and fancies, and to see before us all that is fairest and most fascinating in that wonder Q fully attractive period: the highest deeds of derring-do in camp and tourney, the brightest eyes in hall and bower, and the sweetest lays to while away long winter nights. Nor does our fancy play us very false. They were indeed a wonderful race, those poet-nobles of Provence, with their wild romantic lives and hot passions, and their literature that seems to spring up full grown, without an infancy or youth, and after filling one full, isolated, well rounded period of 200 years, to vanish for ever, without heirs, almost without influence; while their rich musical tongue, the lineal descendant of the language of old Rome, after that same little period, was to be wiped for ever from the lips of men, or only to linger in some secluded valley, or form the basis of some ignoble patois. In a literary point of view, the isolation and completeness of this period is most remarkable; we find in it a peculiar and original style of poetry, apparently proceeding nowhence, and going nowhither. The language is capable of derivation; there are fragments of edicts, sermons, and poems by which it may be clearly traced from the Rustic Latin of the provinces; the rules of its derivation are well known and arranged; its grammar is written. But the literature is untraceable. The Poem of Boethius, the Noble Lesson, and the religious poems of the Vaudois, though written in the language, are utterly alien in feeling and spirit to the lyric poetry of Provence; and though in the north of France, tales and romances had been written before the origin of the poetry of the Troubadours, it is very observable, that among the great quantity of poetry, fragmentary and other, which remains from this period, there are exceedingly few traces of narrative pieces, which, had they been at all common, could scarcely have escaped preservation. However, be the origin whence it may, the fact remains, that about the end of the eleventh century a rage for singing and poetry-writing seemed to seize on the south of France. Every-body sang and wrote, high and low, rich and poor, lady and knight, noble and squire, and even peasant; and all wrote in one style, and all wrote on one absorbing topic,-love. There remain now after seven centuries of oblivion, and after their language and their literature had been swept away by exterminating religious wars, fragments of at least three hundred writers. This, their great topic, they made the theme of many different styles of poetry; nothing can be more varied than their manner of treating the subject. They were serious, they were sentimental, they were satirical, they were religious. They had their tender "chanson" to sing their mistress' praise; their witty or merely sentimental “tenson,” or dialogue-piece, in which to talk of her perfection; their "sirvente,” in which to heap scorn on her detractors; their "complainte," in which to mourn her when dead. But though love of ladies was their chief theme, they were genuine children of the age of chivalry. That feeling, idea, system,-call it what you will,-had found a very congenial home in the hot impetuous south. Offspring of mingled barbarism and civilization, it had been caught hold of and moulded by the church, ever on the watch to turn man's passions to the advantage, if possible, of himself and his race, if not, at least to the advantage of the church; so now it touched closely all the reigning passions of mankind, indeed all the chief instincts of a fresh and unsophisticated nature. With love of ladies was mingled, in rich proportion, love of battle, and love of God. Nowhere could such a system find surer materials on which to work, than in the south; and there we find it most strongly developed; each passion in its turn was predominant; to hear a troubadour sing of his mistress, you might think him an idolator; to hear him speak of the battlefury, you might think him a wild beast; to hear him talk of heaven, you might think him a fanatical enthusiast. On this mass of smouldering passion the spark of the crusades fell, exciting, in a way far beyond the common comprehension of our more prosaic age, all the passions of that passionate people. With the rest of Europe they poured forth in a great tide to the East, and went and came as wanderers and pilgrims, and ever in their passage excited fresh ardour, added new life and energy to every feeling of their compatriots. In this turmoil of excited passion the troubadours lived; and their poems breathe out the spirit of that fiery nursery, full of all love, all battle-fury and instinct of combat, and full too of all religious asceticism. This is the full character of the southern poet, with the most opposite passions, and most antagonistic feelings linked together by bands so delicate, and separated by such fine demarcations, that often in one poem all rise in their turn to pre-eminence, and you seek in vain to fix a character on the ever changing author. More frequently, however, these characteristics existed not all together, but in separate men; and perhaps no better idea can be gained of the nature of the Provençal poets, than that derived from reading the lives of some one or two of the more prominent among them, whom we shall find just such men as we should be led to suppose from the perusal of their poems. To illustrate the softer side of their character, perhaps no pleasanter tale can be found, than the incident of the death of Jauffre Rudel. He was of noble birth and sentimental temperament, and, like most of his brother nobles, his young fancy turned lightly to thoughts of love, and his thoughts expressed themselves in poetry. Like a gallant open-hearted gentleman as he was, his house he ever kept open for the reception of the brothers of his gay science; and many went and came, and sought the refuge of his hospitable castle, and paid their entertainer nought but some new song or ballad. At that time the crusades were in their full vigour, and many a young knight took his way to the East, to win his salvation sword in hand, and carve his way to heaven through mangled limbs and cleft skulls of the Infidel: many went there, and some returned. The love of home was strong in the Provençal mind, and those whom sword or climate spared, came wandering home, one by one, shorn of their gallant equipage, as simple palmers it may be, or accompanied only by their page and cithern. All such found a ready welcome at Jauffre's castle, and much his mind was fired by the tales they told and the songs they sung of Paynim craft and cruelty, and Christian prowess, and the wild sights and wonders of that far off land; but more, far more than of these did Jauffre long to hear of the fair ladies they had met, and again and again did he press them to declare who was the fairest they had seen. Strange! once and again, the same name met his ear; ask whom he would, however disposed, of whatever rank, the answer was ever the same; the love-songs had but one theme, the romances but one heroine; none seemed to have eyes except for the peerless beauty, the fairest of the fair, the Countess of Tripoli. So Jauffre pondered, and sung, and his theme too was the Countess of Tripoli; his poet's fancy was on fire; his poet's heart |