A mirthful man he was--the snows of age
Fell, but they did not chill him. Gaiety,
Even in life's closing, touch'd his teeming brain
With such wild visions as the setting sun
Raises in front of some hoar glacier,
Painting the bleak ice with a thousand hues.
_Old Play._
Leaving the Earl of Oxford in attendance on the stubborn Duke of
Burgundy during an expedition which the one represented as a brief
excursion, more resembling a hunting-party than a campaign, and which
the other considered in a much graver and more perilous light, we
return to Arthur de Vere, or the younger Philipson, as he continued to
be called, who was conducted by his guide with fidelity and success,
but certainly very slowly, upon his journey into Provence.
The state of Lorraine, overrun by the Duke of Burgundy's army, and
infested at the same time by different scattered bands, who took the
field, or held out the castles, as they alleged, for the interest of
Count Ferrand de Vaudemont, rendered journeying so dangerous, that it
was often necessary to leave the main road, and to take circuitous
tracks, in order to avoid such unfriendly encounters as travellers
might otherwise have met with.
Arthur, taught by sad experience to distrust strange guides, found
himself, nevertheless, in this eventful and perilous journey, disposed
to rest considerable confidence in his present conductor, Thiebault,
a Provençal by birth, intimately acquainted with the roads which they
took, and, as far as he could judge, disposed to discharge his office
with fidelity. Prudence alike, and the habits which he had acquired in
travelling, as well as the character of a merchant which he still
sustained, induced him to wave the _morgue_, or haughty superiority of
a knight and noble towards an inferior personage, especially as he
rightly conjectured that free intercourse with this man, whose
acquirements seemed of a superior cast, was likely to render him a
judge of his opinions and disposition towards him. In return for his
condescension, he obtained a good deal of information concerning the
province which he was approaching.
As they drew near the boundaries of Provence, the communications of
Thiebault became more fluent and interesting. He could not only tell
the name and history of each romantic castle which they passed, in
their devious and doubtful route, but had at his command the
chivalrous history of the noble knights and barons to whom they now
pertained, or had belonged in earlier days, and could recount their
exploits against the Saracens, by repelling their attacks upon
Christendom, or their efforts to recover the Holy Sepulchre from Pagan
hands. In the course of such narrations, Thiebault was led to speak of
the Troubadours, a race of native poets of Provençal origin, differing
widely from the minstrels of Normandy, and the adjacent provinces of
France, with whose tales of chivalry, as well as the numerous
translations of their works into Norman-French and English, Arthur,
like most of the noble youth of his country, was intimately acquainted
and deeply imbued. Thiebault boasted that his grandsire, of humble
birth indeed, but of distinguished talent, was one of this gifted
race, whose compositions produced so great an effect on the temper and
manners of their age and country. It was, however, to be regretted
that, inculcating as the prime duty of life a fantastic spirit of
gallantry, which sometimes crossed the Platonic bound prescribed to
it, the poetry of the Troubadours was too frequently used to soften
and seduce the heart, and corrupt the principles.[8]
Arthur's attention was called to this peculiarity by Thiebault
singing, which he could do with good skill, the history of a
Troubadour, named William Cabestainy, who loved, _par amours_, a noble
and beautiful lady, Margaret, the wife of a baron called Raymond de
Roussillon. The jealous husband obtained proof of his dishonour, and,
having put Cabestainy to death by assassination, he took his heart
from his bosom, and causing it to be dressed like that of an animal,
ordered it to be served up to his lady; and when she had eaten of the
horrible mess, told her of what her banquet was composed. The lady
replied, that since she had been made to partake of food so precious,
no coarser morsel should ever after cross her lips. She persisted in
her resolution, and thus starved herself to death. The Troubadour who
celebrated this tragic history had displayed in his composition a good
deal of poetic art. Glossing over the error of the lovers as the fault
of their destiny, dwelling on their tragical fate with considerable
pathos, and, finally, execrating the blind fury of the husband, with
the full fervour of poetical indignation, he recorded, with vindictive
pleasure, how every bold knight and true lover in the south of France
assembled to besiege the baron's castle, stormed it by main force,
left not one stone upon another, and put the tyrant himself to an
ignominious death. Arthur was interested in the melancholy tale, which
even beguiled him of a few tears; but as he thought further on its
purport, he dried his eyes, and said, with some sternness,--"Thiebault,
sing me no more such lays. I have heard my father say that the
readiest mode to corrupt a Christian man is to bestow upon vice the
pity and the praise which are due only to virtue. Your Baron of
Roussillon is a monster of cruelty; but your unfortunate lovers were
not the less guilty. It is by giving fair names to foul actions that
those who would start at real vice are led to practise its lessons,
under the disguise of virtue."
"I would you knew, Seignor," answered Thiebault, "that this Lay of
Cabestainy and the Lady Margaret of Roussillon is reckoned a
masterpiece of the joyous science. Fie, sir, you are too young to be
so strict a censor of morals. What will you do when your head is grey,
if you are thus severe when it is scarcely brown?"
"A head which listens to folly in youth will hardly be honourable in
old age," answered Arthur.
Thiebault had no mind to carry the dispute further.
"It is not for me to contend with your worship. I only think, with
every true son of chivalry and song, that a knight without a mistress
is like a sky without a star."
"Do I not know that?" answered Arthur; "but yet better remain in
darkness than be guided by such false lights as shower down vice and
pestilence."
"Nay, it may be your seignorie is right," answered the guide. "It is
certain that even in Provence here we have lost much of our keen
judgment on matters of love--its difficulties, its intricacies, and
its errors, since the Troubadours are no longer regarded as usual, and
since the High and Noble Parliament of Love[9] has ceased to hold its
sittings.
"But in these latter days," continued the Provençal, "kings, dukes,
and sovereigns, instead of being the foremost and most faithful
vassals of the Court of Cupid, are themselves the slaves of
selfishness and love of gain. Instead of winning hearts by breaking
lances in the lists, they are breaking the hearts of their
impoverished vassals by the most cruel exactions--instead of
attempting to deserve the smile and favours of their lady-loves, they
are meditating how to steal castles, towns, and provinces from their
neighbours. But long life to the good and venerable King René! While
he has an acre of land left, his residence will be the resort of
valiant knights, whose only aim is praise in arms, of true lovers, who
are persecuted by fortune, and of high-toned harpers, who know how to
celebrate faith and valour."
Arthur, interested in learning something more precise than common
fame had taught him on the subject of this prince, easily induced the
talkative Provençal to enlarge upon the virtues of his old sovereign's
character, as just, joyous, and debonair, a friend to the most noble
exercises of the chase and the tilt-yard, and still more so to the
joyous science of Poetry and Music; who gave away more revenue than he
received, in largesses to knights-errant and itinerant musicians, with
whom his petty court was crowded, as one of the very few in which the
ancient hospitality was still maintained.
Such was the picture which Thiebault drew of the last minstrel
monarch; and though the eulogium was exaggerated, perhaps the facts
were not overcharged.
Born of royal parentage, and with high pretensions, René had at no
period of his life been able to match his fortunes to his claims. Of
the kingdoms to which he asserted right, nothing remained in his
possession but the county of Provence itself, a fair and friendly
principality, but diminished by the many claims which France had
acquired upon portions of it by advances of money to supply the
personal expenses of its master, and by other portions, which
Burgundy, to whom René had been a prisoner, held in pledge for his
ransom. In his youth he engaged in more than one military enterprise,
in the hope of attaining some part of the territory of which he was
styled sovereign. His courage is not impeached, but fortune did not
smile on his military adventures; and he seems at last to have become
sensible that the power of admiring and celebrating warlike merit is
very different from possessing that quality. In fact, René was a
prince of very moderate parts, endowed with a love of the fine arts,
which he carried to extremity, and a degree of good-humour, which
never permitted him to repine at fortune, but rendered its possessor
happy, when a prince of keener feelings would have died of despair.
This insouciant, light-tempered, gay, and thoughtless disposition
conducted René, free from all the passions which embitter life, and
often shorten it, to a hale and mirthful old age. Even domestic
losses, which often affect those who are proof against mere reverses
of fortune, made no deep impression on the feelings of this cheerful
old monarch. Most of his children had died young; René took it not to
heart. His daughter Margaret's marriage with the powerful Henry of
England was considered a connection much above the fortunes of the
King of the Troubadours. But in the issue, instead of René deriving
any splendour from the match, he was involved in the misfortunes of
his daughter, and repeatedly obliged to impoverish himself to supply
her ransom. Perhaps in his private soul the old king did not think
these losses so mortifying as the necessity of receiving Margaret into
his court and family. On fire when reflecting on the losses she had
sustained, mourning over friends slain and kingdoms lost, the proudest
and most passionate of princesses was ill suited to dwell with the
gayest and best-humoured of sovereigns, whose pursuits she contemned,
and whose lightness of temper, for finding comfort in such trifles,
she could not forgive. The discomfort attached to her presence and
vindictive recollections embarrassed the good-humoured old monarch,
though it was unable to drive him beyond his equanimity.
Another distress pressed him more sorely.--Yolande, a daughter of his
first wife, Isabella, had succeeded to his claims upon the Duchy of
Lorraine, and transmitted them to her son, Ferrand, Count of
Vaudemont, a young man of courage and spirit, engaged at this time in
the apparently desperate undertaking of making his title good against
the Duke of Burgundy, who, with little right but great power, was
seizing upon and overrunning this rich Duchy, which he laid claim to
as a male fief. And to conclude, while the aged king on one side
beheld his dethroned daughter in hopeless despair, and on the other
his disinherited grandson in vain attempting to recover part of their
rights, he had the additional misfortune to know that his nephew,
Louis of France, and his cousin, the Duke of Burgundy, were secretly
contending which should succeed him in that portion of Provence which
he still continued to possess, and that it was only jealousy of each
other which prevented his being despoiled of this last remnant of his
territory. Yet amid all this distress René feasted and received
guests, danced, sang, composed poetry, used the pencil or brush with
no small skill, devised and conducted festivals and processions, and,
studying to promote as far as possible the immediate mirth and
good-humour of his subjects, if he could not materially enlarge their
more permanent prosperity, was never mentioned by them, excepting as
_Le bon Roi René_, a distinction conferred on him down to the present
day, and due to him certainly by the qualities of his heart, if not by
those of his head.
Whilst Arthur was receiving from his guide a full account of the
peculiarities of King René, they entered the territories of that
merry monarch. It was late in the autumn, and about the period when
the south-eastern counties of France rather show to least advantage.
The foliage of the olive-tree is then decayed and withered, and as it
predominates in the landscape, and resembles the scorched complexion
of the soil itself, an ashen and arid hue is given to the whole.
Still, however, there were scenes in the hilly and pastoral parts of
the country where the quantity of evergreens relieved the eye even in
this dead season.
The appearance of the country, in general, had much in it that was
peculiar.
The travellers perceived at every turn some marks of the King's
singular character. Provence, as the part of Gaul which first received
Roman civilisation, and as having been still longer the residence of
the Grecian colony who founded Marseilles, is more full of the
splendid relics of ancient architecture than any other country in
Europe, Italy and Greece excepted. The good taste of the King René had
dictated some attempts to clear out and to restore these memorials of
antiquity. Was there a triumphal arch or an ancient temple--huts and
hovels were cleared away from its vicinity, and means were used at
least to retard the approach of ruin. Was there a marble fountain,
which superstition had dedicated to some sequestered naiad--it was
surrounded by olives, almond and orange trees--its cistern was
repaired, and taught once more to retain its crystal treasures. The
huge amphitheatres and gigantic colonnades experienced the same
anxious care, attesting that the noblest specimens of the fine arts
found one admirer and preserver in King René, even during the course
of those which are termed the dark and barbarous ages.
A change of manners could also be observed in passing from Burgundy
and Lorraine, where society relished of German bluntness, into the
pastoral country of Provence, where the influence of a fine climate
and melodious language, joined to the pursuits of the romantic old
monarch, with the universal taste for music and poetry, had introduced
a civilisation of manners which approached to affectation. The
shepherd literally marched abroad in the morning, piping his flocks
forth to the pasture with some love-sonnet, the composition of an
amorous Troubadour; and his "fleecy care" seemed actually to be under
the influence of his music, instead of being ungraciously insensible
to its melody, as is the case in colder climates. Arthur observed,
too, that the Provençal sheep, instead of being driven before the
shepherd, regularly followed him, and did not disperse to feed until
the swain, by turning his face round to them, remaining stationary,
and, executing variations on the air which he was playing, seemed to
remind them that it was proper to do so. While in motion, his huge
dog, of a species which is trained to face the wolf, and who is
respected by the sheep as their guardian, and not feared as their
tyrant, followed his master with his ears pricked, like the chief
critic and prime judge of the performance, at some tones of which he
seldom failed to intimate disapprobation; while the flock, like the
generality of an audience, followed in unanimous though silent
applause. At the hour of noon, the shepherd had sometimes acquired an
augmentation to his audience, in some comely matron or blooming
maiden, with whom he had rendezvoused by such a fountain as we have
described, and who listened to the husband's or lover's chalumeau, or
mingled her voice with his in the duets, of which the songs of the
Troubadours have left so many examples. In the cool of the evening,
the dance on the village green, or the concert before the hamlet door;
the little repast of fruits, cheese, and bread, which the traveller
was readily invited to share, gave new charms to the illusion, and
seemed in earnest to point out Provence as the Arcadia of France.
But the greatest singularity was, in the eyes of Arthur, the total
absence of armed men and soldiers in this peaceful country. In
England, no man stirred without his long-bow, sword, and buckler. In
France, the hind wore armour even when he was betwixt the stilts of
his plough. In Germany, you could not look along a mile of highway but
the eye was encountered by clouds of dust, out of which were seen, by
fits, waving feathers and flashing armour. Even in Switzerland, the
peasant, if he had a journey to make, though but of a mile or two,
cared not to travel without his halberd and two-handed sword. But in
Provence all seemed quiet and peaceful, as if the music of the land
had lulled to sleep all its wrathful passions. Now and then a mounted
cavalier might pass them, the harp at whose saddle-bow, or carried by
one of his attendants, attested the character of a Troubadour, which
was affected by men of all ranks; and then only a short sword on his
left thigh, borne for show rather than use, was a necessary and
appropriate part of his equipment.
"Peace," said Arthur, as he looked around him, "is an inestimable
jewel; but it will be soon snatched from those who are not prepared
with heart and hand to defend it."
The sight of the ancient and interesting town of Aix, where King René
held his court, dispelled reflections of a general character, and
recalled to the young Englishman the peculiar mission on which he was
engaged.
He then required to know from the Provençal Thiebault whether his
instructions were to leave him, now that he had successfully attained
the end of his journey.
"My instructions," answered Thiebault, "are to remain in Aix while
there is any chance of your seignorie's continuing there, to be of
such use to you as you may require, either as a guide or an attendant,
and to keep these men in readiness to wait upon you when you have
occasion for messengers or guards. With your approbation, I will see
them disposed of in fitting quarters, and receive my further
instructions from your seignorie wherever you please to appoint me. I
propose this separation, because I understand it is your present
pleasure to be private."
"I must go to court," answered Arthur, "without any delay. Wait for me
in half an hour by that fountain in the street, which projects into
the air such a magnificent pillar of water, surrounded, I would almost
swear, by a vapour like steam, serving as a shroud to the jet which it
envelopes."
"The jet is so surrounded," answered the Provençal, "because it is
supplied by a hot spring rising from the bowels of the earth, and the
touch of frost on this autumn morning makes the vapour more
distinguishable than usual.--But if it is good King René whom you
seek, you will find him at this time walking in his chimney. Do not be
afraid of approaching him, for there never was a monarch so easy of
access, especially to good-looking strangers like you, seignorie."
"But his ushers," said Arthur, "will not admit me into his hall."
"His hall!" repeated Thiebault. "Whose hall?"
"Why, King René's, I apprehend. If he is walking in a chimney, it can
only be in that of his hall, and a stately one it must be to give him
room for such exercise."
"You mistake my meaning," said the guide, laughing. "What we call King
René's chimney is the narrow parapet yonder; it extends between these
two towers, has an exposure to the south, and is sheltered in every
other direction. Yonder it is his pleasure to walk and enjoy the beams
of the sun, on such cool mornings as the present. It nurses, he says,
his poetical vein. If you approach his promenade he will readily speak
to you, unless, indeed, he is in the very act of a poetical
composition."
Arthur could not forbear smiling at the thoughts of a king, eighty
years of age, broken down with misfortunes and beset with dangers, who
yet amused himself with walking in an open parapet, and composing
poetry in presence of all such of his loving subjects as chose to look
on.
"If you will walk a few steps this way," said Thiebault, "you may see
the good King, and judge whether or not you will accost him at
present. I will dispose of the people, and await your orders at the
fountain in the Corso."
Arthur saw no objection to the proposal of his guide, and was not
unwilling to have an opportunity of seeing something of the good King
René, before he was introduced to his presence.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] Note I.--The Troubadours.
[9] Note II.--Parliament of Love.