FOOTNOTES:

Commençons à l'abécé.Escusez moy.Entendez moy, oyez moy, prononcer les lettres. Remarquez bien comment je prononce les voyelles, et principalementu, car il est bien malaisé a prononcer à vous autres mm. les Anglois, comme aussieentre les consonnes. Prononcez apres moy.Voilà qui va bien.Prononce-je bien?Fort bien. Essayez encore une fois.Ce mechantume donne bien de la peine.Il ne sauroit tant vous en donner que votrethouchnous en donne.Il est malaisé d'avoir la proprieté de votre langue.L'exercice et la lecture des bons autheurs vous apprendront avec le temps, etc.

Commençons à l'abécé.

Escusez moy.

Entendez moy, oyez moy, prononcer les lettres. Remarquez bien comment je prononce les voyelles, et principalementu, car il est bien malaisé a prononcer à vous autres mm. les Anglois, comme aussieentre les consonnes. Prononcez apres moy.

Voilà qui va bien.

Prononce-je bien?

Fort bien. Essayez encore une fois.

Ce mechantume donne bien de la peine.

Il ne sauroit tant vous en donner que votrethouchnous en donne.

Il est malaisé d'avoir la proprieté de votre langue.

L'exercice et la lecture des bons autheurs vous apprendront avec le temps, etc.

He agreed with most of the French teachers of the day in attaching much importance to conversational practice and reading. He also recommended a certain amount of memorising and the study of grammar; general rules and rules of syntax he considered indispensable; but for pronunciation he thought practice of more avail than rules. It is possible, he admits, to learn French by rote, without any grammar rules. But it is not the best way in his opinion. Without grammar rules the student cannot distinguish good French from bad, nor can he translate, write letters, or read; and reading, thought Du Grès, was an essential condition if the cultivation of French in England was to bemaintained.FRENCH AT CAMBRIDGEThose who learn by ear are at a loss as soon as they no longer hear French spoken daily. As for those who promise to teach French in a short time, they are nothing but mountebanks. Du Grès held that a man of moderate intellect could, with hard work, learn to understand an ordinary French author in three or four months. He had had, he declares, some pupils at Cambridge who learnt to read and speak fairly well in four months and others who learnt practically nothing in a whole year.

At the end of the seventeenth century the status of French at the universities had undergone no marked change. At the time of the Restoration, a certain Philemon Fabri petitioned Williamson for an appointment as Professor of French eloquence at Oxford, "he having held a similar situation at Strasburg"; he supported his request by an address to the king in French verses, entitledLe Pater Noster des Anglais au Roi. Apparently Fabri did not receive the desired position.[547]At Cambridge we find still less encouragement given to the study of French than at Oxford. During the Commonwealth, Guy Le Moyne, formerly French tutor to Charles I., lived at Cambridge, and no doubt continued to teach French there, as he had done in London and at Court.[548]At the Restoration he petitioned Charles II. to let him have the Fellowship at Pembroke Hall reserved for Frenchmen.[549]Le Moyne was then seventy-two years old, and wished, he said, to end his days at Cambridge.[550]At Cambridge, as at Oxford, there were also French tutors in charge of particular pupils. Many of these were French Protestants. Thus the famous Pierre Du Moulin, arriving in England as a destitute refugee in 1588, was received into the service of the Countess of Rutland, who sent him to Cambridge as tutor to her son. There he remained until 1592, continuing his own studies as well as attending to those of his young charge. He thoroughly disliked his position, and seized the first opportunity of leaving it.[551]We also hear of Herbert Palmer, President of Queen's College (1644-47), whohad learnt French almost as soon as he could speak, and could preach in French as well as in English.[552]He won considerable distinction as a college tutor, but whether he placed his knowledge of French at the service of students, as Sanford and Leighton did at Oxford, is not specified.

Yet, even at Oxford, the efforts of this band of French teachers were not on a large enough scale to have any very noticeable effect. Some gentlemen who, like Sanford's pupil, William Grey, had gone to the University to make themselves "fit for honourable imployments hereafter," took advantage of such opportunities as there were of studying French. Thus Henry Smith, while acting as tutor to Mr. Clifford, learnt French himself, and wrote to Williamson in that language.[553]And no doubt the French tutors found enough pupils among those who were drawn more towards the fashionable than the scholastic world. But the inability of the young Oxford student to speak French when in polite London circles was a subject of comment in the seventeenth century as the language became more and more widely cultivated. To speak French was even considered incompatible with a university education, to judge from this passage in one of Farquhar's comedies:[554]

Sir H. Wildair.Canst thou danse, child?Bantu.Oui, monsieur.Lady Lurewell.Heyday! French too! Why, sure, sir, you could never be bred at Oxford!

Sir H. Wildair.Canst thou danse, child?

Bantu.Oui, monsieur.

Lady Lurewell.Heyday! French too! Why, sure, sir, you could never be bred at Oxford!

To the same intent Pepys relates[555]how an Oxford scholar, "in a Doctor of Lawe's gowne," whom he met at dinner at the Spanish ambassador's, sat like a fool for want of French, "though a gentle sort of scholar"; nor could he speak the ambassador's language, but only Latin, which he spoke like an Englishman. Pepys, on the other hand, was very pleased at the display he was able to make of his own French on this occasion. The famous diarist was a competent judge, and spoke and wrote the language with ease. Unfortunately we know nothing of how he acquired this knowledge, beyond the fact that he had not been to France.[556]ONE-SIDEDNESS OF UNIVERSITY EDUCATIONHe often criticizes the French of those he meets, and a certain Dr. Pepys, according to him, "spoke the worst French he had ever heard from one who had been beyond sea." Pepys's brother spoke French, "very plain and good," and Mrs. Pepys, the daughter of a refugee Huguenot, was as familiar with that language as with English.[557]

Thus the universities, like the schools, failed to keep in touch with practical life by their neglect of the broader education necessary to persons of quality and fashion. At the Inns of Court, where gentlemen usually spent some time on leaving the university,[558]or where they sometimes went instead of to the university,[559]the state of things was somewhat better. Some knowledge of French was indispensable to those studying the law, and the position of the Inns, almost all of them within the boundaries of the ward of Farringdon Without, the favourite abode of the French teachers, was such as to offer exceptional facilities for the study of the language. When Robert Ashley was at the Inner Temple he studied Spanish, Italian, and Dutch, as well as French. We are told[560]that in earlier times "knights, barons, and the greatest nobility of the kingdom often placed their children in those Inns of Court, not so much to make the laws their study, much less to live by the profession ... but to form their manners and to preserve them from contagion of vice." There, could be found "a sort of gymnasium or academy fit for persons of their station, where they learn singing and all kinds of music, dancing, and other such accomplishments and Diversions ... as are suitable to their quality and such as are usually practiced at Court." French was, without doubt, one of these accomplishments. Towards the end of the seventeenth century the Inns of Court were still much in favour, and gentlemen's sons could enjoy there good company and the innocent recreations of the town, as well as improve themselves in the "exercises." Clarendon calls the Inns of Court the suburbs of the Court itself.

None the less, the gentleman with a university education, even when it was followed by residence at one of the Inns of Court, was felt to be inadequately equipped. Almost invariably he sought on the Continent the polite accomplishments and knowledge of languages, which were necessary qualifications for high employment at Court, in the army, and elsewhere. Travel came to be regarded as "an especial part"[561]of the education of a gentleman, and as such occupies an important place in the educational treatises of the time. The usual course advised for the sons of gentlemen was an early study of Greek and Latin, followed by residence at one of the Universities and at the Inns of Court, and, finally, "travel beyond seas for language and experience" and the study of such arts as could not be easily acquired in England.

In some cases gentlemen were educated quite independently of the English schools and universities[562]—at home with private tutors, and in France. Lady Brilliana Harley, for instance, feared that her son would not find much good company at Oxford. "I believe," she wrote, "that theare are but feawe nobellmens sonne in Oxford, for now, for the most part, they send theaire sonnes into France when they are very yonge, theaire to be breed."[563]

FOOTNOTES:[515]J. Heywood,Cambridge Statutes(sixteenth century), London, 1840, p. 267.[516]Cooper,Annals of Cambridge, 1852, iii. p. 429; Mullinger,History of the University of Cambridge, iii. p. 368.[517]Printed in Peacock'sObservations on the Statutes of the University of Cambridge, 1841 (Appendix).[518]Cp. C. Wordsworth,Scholae Academicae, 1877, pp. 209sqq.[519]Letter Book of Gabriel Harvey(1573-1580), Camden Soc., 1884, pp. 78-9. The tutor of John Hall, author of theHorae Vacivae(1646), testified to his pupil's attainments in French, Spanish, and Italian literature. Mullinger,History of the University of Cambridge, ii. p. 351.[520]One, Jean Verneuil, became underlibrarian of the Bodleian in 1625. Cp. Schickler,Les Églises du Refuge, i. p. 424; Foster Watson,Religious Refugees and English Education, Hug. Soc. Proceedings, 1911; Agnew,Protestant Exiles, i. ch. v. and pp. 137, 147, 148, 156, 163; ii. pp. 260, 274, 388; Smiles,The Huguenots, ch. xiv.[521]There were also numerous French Protestant students at the University of Edinburgh; cp. Schickler,op. cit.i. p. 366.[522]Schickler,op. cit.i. p. 244.[523]Wood,Fasti Oxonienses(Bliss), ii. 195.[524]Wood,Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 380.[525]Oxford Historical Society:Collectanea, i., 1885, pp. 73sqq.[526]8vo, pp. 92.[527]E. Stengel,Chronologisches Verzeichnis französischer Grammatiken, Oppeln, 1890.[528]F. Madan,Oxford Books, 1468-1640, 1895-1912, i. p. 22; ii. p. 24. Another Spanish Grammar, by d'Oyly, had appeared at Oxford in 1590.[529]4to, 21 leaves.[530]Printed by Joseph Barnes, 4to, 8 leaves.[531]He visited Spain, and wroteAn Entrance to the Spanish Tongue(1611). While at Oxford he had composedAn Introduction to the Italian Tongue(1605). Cp. Wood,Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 471; C. Plummer,Elizabethan Oxford, Ox. Hist. Soc., 1887, p. xxviii;Dict. Nat. Biog., ad nom.[532]Wood,Athen. Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 676; Foster,Alumni Oxon., ad nom.[533]Wood,Fasti Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 29, 30;Dict. Nat. Biog., ad nom.[534]12º, pp. 31.[535]In the copy in the Cambridge Univ. Library these are accompanied by a MS. translation into Latin. Some additional rules in Latin are written on the last blank leaf.[536]Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 277.[537]Printed by William Turner, 8º, pp. 72.[538]Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 624.[539]Valence, French tutor to the Earl of Lincoln, had studied at Cambridge early in the sixteenth century.[540]"Eandem linguam in celeberrima Cantabrigiensi Academia docens."[541]Sm. 8vo, pp. 96.[542]Cp. R. Bowes,Catalogue of Books printed at Cambridge, 1521-1893.[543]The statement of Wood (Athenae Oxon.iii. 184), that Du Grès had studied at Oxford before going to Cambridge, is probably incorrect.[544]8vo, pp. 195, printed by Leonard Lichfield.[545]Jean Arman Du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu and Peere of France his Life, etc., followed by a translation, "out of the French copie," ofThe Will and Legacies of the Cardinall Richelieu ... together with certaine Instructions which he left the French King. Also some remarkable passages that hath happened in France since the death of the said Cardinall.[546]He charged 10s. a month for an hour's lesson daily.[547]Cal. State Papers, Dom., 1661-62, p. 439.[548]Le Moyne also translatedThe Articles of Agreement between the King of France, the Parlaiment and Parisians. Faithfully translated out of the French original copy.London, 1649.[549]In the Middle Ages, Pembroke College gave preference to Frenchmen in the election of Fellows; cp.supra, p. 6.[550]Cal. State Papers, Dom., 1660-61, p. 162.[551]"Autobiographie de Pierre du Moulin,"Bulletin de la Société de l'histoire du Protestantisme Français, vii. pp. 343sqq.[552]Mullinger,History of the University of Cambridge, 1911, iii. p. 300.[553]Cal. State Papers, Dom., 1670, p. 275. Evelyn (Diary, ed. Wheatly, 1906, ii. p. 306) describes verses written in Latin, English, and French by Oxford students and added toNewes from the dead, an account of the restoration to life of one Anne Green, executed at Oxford, 1650.[554]Sir Harry Wildair, Act III. Sc. 2; cp. Mockmode in the same dramatist'sLove and a Bottle.[555]Diary, 5th May 1669.[556]He long looked forward to a journey there—a hope which was not fulfilled until his failing eyesight had compelled him to stop writing his diary.[557]She spent some time in France, until her father ordered her back to England on account of her leaning towards Roman Catholicism. Many times she expressed a wish to go and live in France.[558]Cp. Shakespeare,2 Henry IV.Act III. Sc. 2:"He's at Oxford still, is he not?A' must then to the Inns a' Court shortly."[559]Higford (Institution of a Gentleman, 1660, p. 58) blames those of his countrymen who neglect the Inns of Court.[560]J. Fortescue,De Laudibus Legum Angliae ... Translated into English ... with notes by Selden, new ed., 1771, p. 172.[561]Higford,The Institution of a Gentleman, 1660, p. 88.[562]Perlin says of the English in the middle of the sixteenth century, referring no doubt to the nobility: "Ceux du pays ne courent gaire ou bien peu aux deux universités, et ne se donnent point beaucoup aux lettres, sinon qu'à toute marchandise et à toute vanité" (Description des royaulmes d'Angleterre et d'Escosse, p. 11).[563]Letters(1638), Camden Soc., 1854, p. 8. Nearly half a century later, Chancellor Clarendon wrote: "I doubt our Universities are defective in providing for those exercises and recreations, which are necessary even to nourish and cherish their studies, at least towards that accomplished education which persons of quality are designed to; and it may be want of those Ornaments that may prevail with many to send their sons abroad, who since they cannot attain the lighter with the more serious Breeding, chuse the former which makes a present shew, leaving the latter to be wrought out at leisure" (Miscellaneous Works, 1751, p. 326).

[515]J. Heywood,Cambridge Statutes(sixteenth century), London, 1840, p. 267.

[516]Cooper,Annals of Cambridge, 1852, iii. p. 429; Mullinger,History of the University of Cambridge, iii. p. 368.

[517]Printed in Peacock'sObservations on the Statutes of the University of Cambridge, 1841 (Appendix).

[518]Cp. C. Wordsworth,Scholae Academicae, 1877, pp. 209sqq.

[519]Letter Book of Gabriel Harvey(1573-1580), Camden Soc., 1884, pp. 78-9. The tutor of John Hall, author of theHorae Vacivae(1646), testified to his pupil's attainments in French, Spanish, and Italian literature. Mullinger,History of the University of Cambridge, ii. p. 351.

[520]One, Jean Verneuil, became underlibrarian of the Bodleian in 1625. Cp. Schickler,Les Églises du Refuge, i. p. 424; Foster Watson,Religious Refugees and English Education, Hug. Soc. Proceedings, 1911; Agnew,Protestant Exiles, i. ch. v. and pp. 137, 147, 148, 156, 163; ii. pp. 260, 274, 388; Smiles,The Huguenots, ch. xiv.

[521]There were also numerous French Protestant students at the University of Edinburgh; cp. Schickler,op. cit.i. p. 366.

[522]Schickler,op. cit.i. p. 244.

[523]Wood,Fasti Oxonienses(Bliss), ii. 195.

[524]Wood,Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 380.

[525]Oxford Historical Society:Collectanea, i., 1885, pp. 73sqq.

[526]8vo, pp. 92.

[527]E. Stengel,Chronologisches Verzeichnis französischer Grammatiken, Oppeln, 1890.

[528]F. Madan,Oxford Books, 1468-1640, 1895-1912, i. p. 22; ii. p. 24. Another Spanish Grammar, by d'Oyly, had appeared at Oxford in 1590.

[529]4to, 21 leaves.

[530]Printed by Joseph Barnes, 4to, 8 leaves.

[531]He visited Spain, and wroteAn Entrance to the Spanish Tongue(1611). While at Oxford he had composedAn Introduction to the Italian Tongue(1605). Cp. Wood,Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 471; C. Plummer,Elizabethan Oxford, Ox. Hist. Soc., 1887, p. xxviii;Dict. Nat. Biog., ad nom.

[532]Wood,Athen. Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 676; Foster,Alumni Oxon., ad nom.

[533]Wood,Fasti Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 29, 30;Dict. Nat. Biog., ad nom.

[534]12º, pp. 31.

[535]In the copy in the Cambridge Univ. Library these are accompanied by a MS. translation into Latin. Some additional rules in Latin are written on the last blank leaf.

[536]Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 277.

[537]Printed by William Turner, 8º, pp. 72.

[538]Athenae Oxon.(Bliss), ii. 624.

[539]Valence, French tutor to the Earl of Lincoln, had studied at Cambridge early in the sixteenth century.

[540]"Eandem linguam in celeberrima Cantabrigiensi Academia docens."

[541]Sm. 8vo, pp. 96.

[542]Cp. R. Bowes,Catalogue of Books printed at Cambridge, 1521-1893.

[543]The statement of Wood (Athenae Oxon.iii. 184), that Du Grès had studied at Oxford before going to Cambridge, is probably incorrect.

[544]8vo, pp. 195, printed by Leonard Lichfield.

[545]Jean Arman Du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu and Peere of France his Life, etc., followed by a translation, "out of the French copie," ofThe Will and Legacies of the Cardinall Richelieu ... together with certaine Instructions which he left the French King. Also some remarkable passages that hath happened in France since the death of the said Cardinall.

[546]He charged 10s. a month for an hour's lesson daily.

[547]Cal. State Papers, Dom., 1661-62, p. 439.

[548]Le Moyne also translatedThe Articles of Agreement between the King of France, the Parlaiment and Parisians. Faithfully translated out of the French original copy.London, 1649.

[549]In the Middle Ages, Pembroke College gave preference to Frenchmen in the election of Fellows; cp.supra, p. 6.

[550]Cal. State Papers, Dom., 1660-61, p. 162.

[551]"Autobiographie de Pierre du Moulin,"Bulletin de la Société de l'histoire du Protestantisme Français, vii. pp. 343sqq.

[552]Mullinger,History of the University of Cambridge, 1911, iii. p. 300.

[553]Cal. State Papers, Dom., 1670, p. 275. Evelyn (Diary, ed. Wheatly, 1906, ii. p. 306) describes verses written in Latin, English, and French by Oxford students and added toNewes from the dead, an account of the restoration to life of one Anne Green, executed at Oxford, 1650.

[554]Sir Harry Wildair, Act III. Sc. 2; cp. Mockmode in the same dramatist'sLove and a Bottle.

[555]Diary, 5th May 1669.

[556]He long looked forward to a journey there—a hope which was not fulfilled until his failing eyesight had compelled him to stop writing his diary.

[557]She spent some time in France, until her father ordered her back to England on account of her leaning towards Roman Catholicism. Many times she expressed a wish to go and live in France.

[558]Cp. Shakespeare,2 Henry IV.Act III. Sc. 2:"He's at Oxford still, is he not?A' must then to the Inns a' Court shortly."

[558]Cp. Shakespeare,2 Henry IV.Act III. Sc. 2:

"He's at Oxford still, is he not?A' must then to the Inns a' Court shortly."

[559]Higford (Institution of a Gentleman, 1660, p. 58) blames those of his countrymen who neglect the Inns of Court.

[560]J. Fortescue,De Laudibus Legum Angliae ... Translated into English ... with notes by Selden, new ed., 1771, p. 172.

[561]Higford,The Institution of a Gentleman, 1660, p. 88.

[562]Perlin says of the English in the middle of the sixteenth century, referring no doubt to the nobility: "Ceux du pays ne courent gaire ou bien peu aux deux universités, et ne se donnent point beaucoup aux lettres, sinon qu'à toute marchandise et à toute vanité" (Description des royaulmes d'Angleterre et d'Escosse, p. 11).

[563]Letters(1638), Camden Soc., 1854, p. 8. Nearly half a century later, Chancellor Clarendon wrote: "I doubt our Universities are defective in providing for those exercises and recreations, which are necessary even to nourish and cherish their studies, at least towards that accomplished education which persons of quality are designed to; and it may be want of those Ornaments that may prevail with many to send their sons abroad, who since they cannot attain the lighter with the more serious Breeding, chuse the former which makes a present shew, leaving the latter to be wrought out at leisure" (Miscellaneous Works, 1751, p. 326).

Oneof the favourite methods of learning French was a sojourn in France. To speak the language well a visit there was considered imperative, and to speak it "as one who had never been out of England"[564]was synonymous with speaking it badly. Consequently a journey to France was common among the young gentry and nobility of the time. Moreover, those who pursued their travels further, and undertook the Grand Tour as many gentlemen did on leaving the university, invariably visited France first, and spent the greater part of their time there. Eighteen months in France, nine or ten in Italy, five in Germany and the Low Countries, was considered a suitable division of a three years' tour. Most young Englishmen of family and fortune spent some time on the Continent. Sir Francis Walsingham, said by one of his contemporaries to have been the most accomplished linguist of his day,[565]had acquired his proficiency abroad, as had also Lord Burghley, who wrote to Walsingham from France in 1583 to report on his progress in the language.[566]Both ministers in their turn were patrons to numerous young travellers in France. A certain Charles Danvers wrote to Walsingham from Paris, in French, to show his progress and thank him for his favours.[567]And Burghley gave one Andrew Bussy a monthly allowance of £5 to enable him to study French at Orleans, where, according to his own account, he took great pains to make good progress so as to serve his patron the better on his return.[568]It was generally held thattravel was "useful to useful men,"[569]and that "peregrination" well used was "a very profitable school, a running Academy."[570]

Many young English gentlemen went to the French Court in the train of an ambassador,[571]or with a private tutor;[572]Henry VIII. sent his natural son, the Duke of Richmond, Palsgrave's pupil, to the French Court, in the care of Lord Surrey the poet. Richard Carew, the friend of Camden, was sent to France with Sir Henry Nevill, ambassador to Henri IV., and Bacon visited Paris in his early youth in the suite of the diplomat Lord Poulet. The last-mentioned ambassador had several young Englishmen in his charge. Of few, however, could he make so favourable a report as he did of the son of Sir George Speake: "I am not unacquainted with your son's doings in Parris," he wrote to Sir George, "and cannot comend him inoughe unto you aswell for his dilligence in study as for his honest and quiett behaviour." One of these young travellers, a Mr. Throckmorton, he was particularly glad to be rid of; the young man "got the French tongue in good perfection," we are informed, but he was of flippant humour, and before he left for England, Poulet told him his mind freely, and forbade him to travel to Italy, as he intended to do later, without the company of "an honest and wyse man." The ambassador had kept him and his man in food during the whole of his stay in Paris, and, besides, provided him with a horse, which he had also "kept att his chardges."[573]

Children too were often sent abroad for education. Thomas Morrice, in hisApology for Schoolmasters(1619), commends "the ancient and laudable custom of sending children abroad when they can understand Latin perfectly"; for then they learn the romance languages all the more easily, "because the Italian, French and Spanish borrow very many words of the said Latin, albeit they do chip, chop and changedivers letters and syllables therein."ENGLISH GENTRY AT THE FRENCH COURTAnd Thomas Peacham[574]tells us in the early seventeenth century that as soon as a child shows any wildness or unruliness, he is sent either to the Court to act as a page or to France, and sometimes to Italy. The number of English children in France was, we may assume, considerable; and when the news of the terrible massacre of St. Bartholomew reached England, one of its most noticeable effects was to fill with concern and apprehension all parents who had children in France. "How fearfull and carefull the mothers and parents that be here be of such yong gentlemen as be there, you may easely ges," wrote Elizabeth's secretary of state to Sir Francis Walsingham, the English ambassador at Paris.[575]Among these "yong gentlemen" was Sir Philip Sidney, then newly arrived at the French Court, whom Walsingham himself sheltered in the ambassador's quarters during that awful night.

James Basset, the son of Lord Lisle, deputy at Calais for Henry VIII., was sent to Paris in the autumn of 1536 to complete his education, after having been for some time in the charge of a tutor in England. There he went to school with a French priest, whom he soon left for the College of Navarre. He appears to have attended the college daily, and boarded with one Guillaume le Gras, who, in June 1537, wrote to Lady Lisle that her son would soon be able to speak French better than English. "I think when he goes to see you," writes the Frenchman to her ladyship who did not understand French, "he will need an interpreter to speak to you." James himself wrote to tell his mother how he was progressing "at the large and beautiful college of Navarre, with Pierre du Val his Master and Preceptor."[576]The following letter[577]giving details on the course pursued by a young English gentleman studying French in Paris may no doubt be taken as fairly typical. "In the forenoone ... two hours he spends in French, one in reading, the other in rendryng to his teacher some part of a Latin author by word of mouth.... In the afternoon ... he retires himself into his chamber, and there employs two other hours in reading over some Latin author; which done, he translates some little part ofit into French, leaving his faults to be corrected the morrow following by his teacher. After supper we take a brief survey of all.... M. Ballendine [apparently the teacher] hath commended unto us Paulus Aemilius in French, who writeth the history of the country. His counsell we mean to follow."

Girls also were occasionally sent to France for purposes of education. Two of James Basset's young sisters, Anne and Mary, spent some time in that country. To prevent their hindering each other's progress, Anne was committed to the care of a M. and Mme. de Ryon, at Pont de Remy, while Mary was sent to Abbeville to a M. and Mme. de Bours. Both girls wrote letters in French to their mother, Lady Lisle, and it appears that they had almost forgotten their mother tongue. When Anne returned to England, where she became maid of honour to Jane Seymour, she had to apologize to her mother for not being able to write in English, "for surely where your Ladyship doth think that I can write English, in very deed I cannot, but that little that I can write is French,"[578]and Mary wrote to her sister Philippa in French expressing her wish to spend an hour with her every day in order to teach her to speak French. In France the two sisters acquired, besides French, the usual accomplishments befitting their sex—needlework, and playing on the lute and virginals.[579]

The traveller Fynes Moryson did not unreservedly approve of the custom of sending children "of unripe yeeres" to France; "howsoever they are more to be excused who send them with discreet Tutors to guide them with whose eyes and judgments they may see and observe.... Children like Parrots soone learne forraigne languages and sooner forget the same, yea, and their mother tongue also." He relates how a familiar friend of his "lately sent his sonne to Paris, who, after two yeeres returning home, refused to aske his father's blessing after the manner of England, sayingce n'est pas la mode de France."[580]Milton in the same vein deplores the fact that his compatriots have "need of the monsieurs of Paris to take their hopeful youth into their slight and prodigal custodies and send them over back again transformed into mimics, apes and kickshows."[581]ENGLISH CHILDREN IN FRANCE"My countrymen in England," wrote Sir Amias Poulet from Paris in 1577, "would doe God and theire countreye good service if either they woulde provide scolemasters for theire children at home, or else they woulde take better order of their educacion here, where they are infected with all sortes [of] pollucions bothe ghostly and bodylie and find manie willinge scolemasters to teache theme to be badd subiects."[582]

Nor were such sentiments confined to individual cases. Queen Elizabeth was constantly making inquiries concerning her subjects beyond the seas generally, often for political reasons or on account of her Protestant fears of popery. She found "noe small inconvenience to growe into the realm" by the number of children living abroad "under colour of learning the languages." In 1595 she ordered a list of such "children" to be sent to her with the names of their parents or guardians and tutors,[583]and there were frequent examinations of subjects suspected of desiring to go abroad; in 1595 the Mayor of Chester writes to Burghley to know what he is to do with two boys, aged fifteen and seventeen, who have been brought before him on suspicion of intending to travel into France to learn the language, and thence into Spain.

The objections raised against the journey to France were few, however, in comparison with those alleged as regards Italy. Italy held a place second only to France in the Grand Tour on the Continent, and in the early sixteenth century the first enthusiasm awakened by the Renaissance attracted many Englishmen there. Scholars, such as Linacre and Colet, set the example. Then others, including most literary men of the time, made their way as pilgrims to the centre of the revived learning, passing through France on their way.[584]Soon the journey became largely a matter of fashion. This rapid development of the custom of continental travel was looked upon as a danger in matters political and religious; popish plots were suspected and foreign intrigues of all kinds feared. In Elizabeth's time leave "to resort beyond seas for his better increase in learning, and his knowledge of foreign languages"[585]was not freely grantedto any who might apply. Lord Burghley would often summon before him applicants for licences to travel, and look carefully into their knowledge of their own country,[586]and if this proved insufficient, would advise them to improve it before attempting to study other countries.[587]

Voluble were the protests against foreign travel which were made in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. France and above all Italy were made responsible for all the vices of the English. It was urged that trade and state negotiations were the only adequate reasons for travel abroad. "We are moted in an Island, because Providence intended us to be shut off from other regions," Bishop Joseph Hall affirms, in hisQuo Vadis: a juste censure of travel as it is commonly undertaken by gentlemen of our own nation(1617). So strong were the prejudices of some of these critics that the grandfather of the royalist Sir Arthur Capell wrote—in 1622—a pamphlet containingReasons against the travellinge of my grandchylde Arthur Capell into the parts beyond the sea, in which he draws an alarming picture of the dangers of infection from popery, and seeks to prove that the time could be much better spent at home.[588]The chronicler Harrison went so far as to assert that the custom would prove the ruin of England.[589]And even the courtly Lyly could write: "Let not your mindes be carried away with vaine delights, as travailing into farre and straunge countries, wher you shall see more wickednesse then learn virtue and wit."[590]

But it was Italy much more than France that excited the fears of these alarmists. There was a common saying at the time that an Englishman Italianate was a devil incarnate. "I was once in Italy myself," wrote Roger Ascham,[591]"but I thank God my abode there was but nine dayes"—in which he saw more wickedness than he had beheld during nine years in London. "Suffer not thy sons to pass the Alpes, for theyshall learn nothing there but Pride, Blasphemy and Atheism;PROTESTS AGAINST FOREIGN TRAVELand if by travelling they get a few broken Languages, that will profit them no more than to have the same meat served in divers dishes," was the advice of Lord Burghley.[592]Many were the precautions taken to prevent English subjects from travelling to Rome of all places. Travellers who were suspected of such intentions or who had travelled abroad without permission were rigorously examined. One such traveller confessed that he went to Brittany and France to see the countries and learn the language, but swore he had never been to Rome or spoken to the papist Cardinal Allen.[593]Many passports issued for the Grand Tour stipulated specifically that the traveller should not repair to Rome.[594]

George Carleton gave expression to the general feeling when he wrote to his brother Dudley, afterwards Lord Dorchester: "I like your going to France much better than if you had gone to Italy."[595]"France is above all most needful for us to mark," was the advice Sir Philip Sidney sent to his brother Robert on his travels.[596]Sir John Eliot gave similar injunctions to his sons.[597]France was, he said, a country full of noble instincts and versatile energy; and what his own experience had been, he recommended his sons to profit by. Some friend had warned them of possible dangers in France. Heed them not, says Eliot; any hazard or adventure in France they will find repaid by such advantages of knowledge and experience as observation of the existing troubles there is sure to convey. But he will not allow them even to enter Spain; and the Italian territories of the Church they must avoid as dangerous: "stagnant and deadly are the waters in the region of Rome, not clear and flowing for the health-seeking energies of man." He thought, however, that some parts of Italy might be visited with profit. To attempt to learn the Italian language before some knowledge of French had been acquired, was not discreet. "Besides it being less pleasant and more difficult to talk Italian first," he writes, "it was leaving the morenecessary acquirement to be gained when there was, perchance, less leisure for it. Whereas by attaining some perfection in French, and then moving onward, what might be lost in Italy of the first acquirement, would be regained in France as their steps turned homeward."

Not only were fears of Roman Catholicism and corrupt manners directed more specifically toward Italy than France, but the French language was considered a much more necessary acquirement than Italian. It was generally agreed that the country most requisite for the English to know was France, "in regard of neighbourhood, of conformity in Government in divers things and necessary intelligence of State."[598]. "French is the most useful of languages—the richest lading of the traveller next to experience—Italian and Spanish not being so fruitful in learning," remarks Francis Osborne in hisAdvice to a Son.[599]

Thus the main object of study of the traveller in France was usually the language itself, and next to that the polite accomplishments. Those who continued their travels into Italy were attracted chiefly by the country and its antiquities. When Addison was in France, after a short stay in Paris in 1699[600]he settled for nearly a year at Blois to learn the language, living in great seclusion, studying, and seeing no one but his teachers, who would sup with him regularly. In 1700 he returned to Paris, qualified to converse with Boileau and Malebranche. But he spent his time in Italy very differently, living in fancy with the old Latin poets, taking Horace as his guide from Naples to Rome, and Virgil on the return journey: there was no question of settling down in a quiet town to study Italian. The experience of Lord Herbert of Cherbury at the end of the sixteenth century and of Evelyn in the middle of the seventeenth was of a similar nature. Though travellers continued to include Italy in their tour, the feeling in favour of France became stronger and stronger. It reached its climax in the latter half of the seventeenth century, when Clarendon wrote: "What parts soever we propose to visit, to which our curiosity usually invites us, we can hardly avoid the setting our feet first in France." And he invites travellers, on returning there after visitingItaly,THE TRAVELLING TUTORto stay in Paris a year to "unlearn the dark and affected reservation of Italy." As for Germany, he thinks they have need to remain two years in France that they may entirely forget that they were ever in Germany![601]

The sons of gentlemen setting out on the Grand Tour were usually accompanied by a governor or tutor,[602]and the need for such a guide was generally recognized by writers on travel; all urge the necessity of his being acquainted with the languages and customs of the countries to be visited. "That young men should Travaile under some Tutor or grave Servant, I allow well: so that he be such a one that hath the language and hath been in the Countrey before," wrote Bacon. And if any one was not able or did not wish to "be at the charges of keeping a Governor abroad" with his son, he was advised[603]to "join with one or two more to help to bear the charges: or else to send with him one well qualified to carry him over and settle him in one place or other of France, or of other Countries, to be there with him 2 or 3 months, leave him there after he hath set him in a good way, and then come home." We also gather from Gailhard'sThe Compleat Gentlemanthat it was "a custom with many in England to order Travelling to their sons, as Emetick Wine is by the Physician prescribed to the Patient, that is when they know not what else to do, and when schools, Universities, Inns of Court, and every other way hath been tried to no purpose: then that nature which could not be tamed in none of these places, is given to be minded by a Gouvernor, with many a woe to him."[604]

The suitable age for the Grand Tour, as distinct from the shorter journey in France, was the subject of much discussion. It was usually undertaken between the ages of sixteen and twenty, and occupied from three to five years. Some, and among them Locke,[605]agreed with Gailhard in thinking that travel should not come at the end.They argued that languages were more easily learnt at an earlier age, and that children were then less difficult to manage. Others, regarding travel as a necessary evil,[606]held that, at a later age, travellers are less receptive of evil influences and the snares of popery. This was the current opinion.

In many cases, especially in later times, the travelling tutor was a Frenchman. Many Englishmen, however, found in this capacity an opportunity for travel which they might not otherwise have had. For example, Ben Jonson visited Paris in 1613 as tutor to the son of Sir Walter Raleigh, and became better known there as a reveller than as a poet.[607]In the same way Ben Jonson's friend, the poet Aurilian Townsend, accompanied Lord Herbert of Cherbury on his foreign tour in 1608, and was of much help to him on account of his fluent knowledge of French, Italian, and Spanish.[608]The time-serving politician Sir John Reresby travelled with a Mr. Leech, a divine and Fellow of Cambridge.[609]And the philosopher Thomas Hobbes spent as travelling tutor in the Cavendish family many years which he calls the happiest time of his life. He visited France, Germany, and Italy. For a time he left the Cavendishes to act as tutor to the son of Sir Gervase Clifton, with whom he remained eighteen months in Paris. It was while travelling with his pupils that Hobbes became known in the philosophic circles of Paris.[610]Addison was offered a salary of £100 to be tutor to the Duke of Somerset, who desired him "to be more of a companion than a Governor," but did not accept the offer.[611]In some cases the travelling tutor had several pupils. Thus Mr. Cordell, the friend of Sir Ralph Verney, was tutor to a party of Englishmen.[612]

On the other hand, Sir Philip Sidney travelled without a governor. At Frankfort, in the house of the ProtestantBOOKS ON TRAVELprinter Andreas Wechel, he began his life-long friendship with the Huguenot scholar Hubert Languet, who, to some degree, supplied his needs. Languet, however, expresses his regret that Sidney had no governor, and when the young Englishman continued his journey into Italy they kept up a correspondence, in the course of which Languet sent Sidney much good advice. At his instigation Sidney practised his French and Latin by translating some of Cicero's letters into French, then from French into English, and finally back into Latin again, "by a sort of perpetual motion."[613]John Evelyn the diarist also travelled without a governor, while the eldest son of Lord Halifax first made the Grand Tour in the usual fashion, and afterwards returned to his uncle, Henry Savile, English ambassador at Paris, without the "encumbrance" of a governor. Savile superintended his nephew's reading, providing him with books on such subjects as political treaties and negotiations, and warning him against "nouvelles" and other "vainentretiens."[614]

The practice of travelling abroad called forth many books on the subject, often written by travellers desiring to place their experience at the service of others. Such books usually include indications of the routes to be followed and the places to be visited, and sometimes advice as to the best way of studying abroad. Some, such as those of Coryat, Fynes Moryson, and Purchas,[615]are descriptions of long journeys. Others deal more especially with the method of travel.[616]A few were written for the particular use of some traveller of high rank; for instance, when the Earl of Rutland set out on his travels in 1596, his cousin Essex sent him letters of advice, which circulated at Court, and were published asProfitable Instructions forTravellersin 1633.[617]Further information was supplied in the treatises on polite education.[618]

The subject of travel was thus continually under consideration, and the different books of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries which deal with this topic are of great interest. Robert Dallington, the author of an early guide to France,[619]thought it necessary, seeing the few teachers there were in France, to "set downe a course of learninge." "I will presume to advise him," he says of the traveller to France, "that the most compendious way of attaining the tongue is by booke. I mean for the knowledge, for as for the speaking he shall never attaine it but by continuall practize and conversation: he shall therefore first learne his nownes and verbs by heart, and specially the articles, and their uses, with the two wordssumandhabeo: for in these consist the greatest observation of that part of speech." He also urges the future traveller to engage a Frenchman to assist him, chiefly, no doubt, with reading and pronunciation. This "reader," as Dallington calls him, "shall not reade any booke of Poetrie at first, but some other kinde of stile, and I thinke meetest some moderne comedie. Let his lecture consist more in questions and answers, either of the one or the other, then in the reader's continued speech, for this is for the most part idle and fruitlesse: by the other many errors and mistakings either in pronunciation or sense are reformed. After three months he shall quit his lectures, and use his Maister only to walk with and discourse, first the one and then the other: for thus shal he observe the right use of the phrase in his Reader, heare his owne faults reproved and grow readie and prompt in his owne deliverie, which, with the right straine of the accent, are the two hardest things in language." He should also read much in private, and "to this reading he must adde a continuall talking and exercising of his speech with all sorts of people, with boldnesse and much assurance in himselfe,A "METHOD OF TRAVEL"for I have often observed in others that nothing hath more prejudiced their profiting then their owne diffidence and distrust. To this I would have him adde an often writing, either of matter of translation or of his owne invention, where againe is requisite the Reader's eye, to censure and correct: for who so cannot write the language he speaks, I count he hath but halfe the language. There, then, are the two onely meanes of obtaining a language, speaking and writing, but the first is the chiefest, and therefore I must advertise the traveller of one thing which in other countries is a great hinderer thereof, namely, the often haunting and frequenting of our own Countrimen, whereof he must have a speciall care,[620]neither to distaste them by a too much retirednesse[621]nor to hinder himselfe by too much familiaritie."

A few years later Fynes Moryson[622]offered equally sound advice to the traveller "for language." "Goe directly to the best citie for the puritie of language," he tells him, and first "labour to know the grammar rules, that thy selfe mayst know whether thou speaketh right or no. I meane not the curious search of those rules, but at least so much as may make thee able to distinguish Numbers, Cases, and Moodes." Moryson thought that by learning by ear alone students probably pronounced better, but, on the other hand, with the help of rules, "they both speake and write pure language, and never so forget it, as they may not with small labour and practice recover it again." The student, he adds, should make a collection of choice phrases, that "hee may speake and write more eloquently, and let him use himselfe not to the translated formes of speech, but to the proper phrases of the tongue." For this purpose he should read many good books, "in which kind, as also for the Instruction of his soule, I would commend unto him the Holy Scriptures, but that among the Papists they are not to be had in the vulgar tongue, neither is the reading of them permitted to laymen. Therefore to this purpose he shall seeke out the best familiar epistles for his writing, and I thinke no booke better for his Discourse then Amadis of Gaule.... In the third place I advise him to professe Pythagoricallsilence, and to the end he may learne true pronunciation, not to be attained but by long observation and practice, that he for a time listen to others, before he adventure to speake." He should also avoid his fellow-countrymen, and, having observed these rules, "then let him hier some skilfull man to teach him and to reprove his errors, not passing by any his least omission. And let him not take it ill that any man should laugh at him, for that will more stirre him up to endevour to learne the tongue more perfectly, to which end he must converse with Weomen, children and the most talkative people; and he must cast off all clownish bashfulnesse, for no man is borne a Master in any art. I say not that he himselfe should rashly speake, for in the beginning he shall easily take ill formes of speaking, and hardly forget them once taken."

The learning of French in England before going abroad did not, as a rule, enter into the plan of writers on the subject of travelling. Moryson, however, realized that "at the first step the ignorance of language doth much oppresse (the traveller) and hinder the fruite he should reape by his iourney." And Bacon went a step further when he wrote that "he that travaileth into a Country, before he hath some entrance into the language, goeth to schoole, and not to travaile.... If you will have a Young Man to put his Travaile into a little Roome, and in a short time to gather much, this you must doe. First, as was said, he must have some Entrance into the Language before he goeth. Then he must have such a Servant, or Tutor, as knoweth the country."[623]Later writers usually agree that it would be of benefit to have "something of the French"[624]before leaving England, "though it were only to understand something of it and be able to ask for necessary things," or to have "some grammatical instruction in the language, as a preparation to speaking it."[625]And indeed many travellers had some previous knowledge of French. Sir Philip Sidney, for instance, could manage a letter in French when he was at school at Shrewsbury; Lord Herbert of Cherbury had studied the language with the help of a dictionary; Sir John Reresby, at a later date, had learnt French at a private school, though, like many students nowadays, he could not speak the language on his arrival in France.STUDIES PREVIOUS TO TRAVELSeveral went abroad to "improve" themselves in French, and no doubt the phrase "to learn the French tongue"[626]often meant to learn to speak it.

In the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, however, many of those who studied French seriously in England did not go to France. Among these were the ladies, to whose skill Mulcaster[627]draws the attention of travellers, as a proof that languages can be learnt as well at home as abroad; and not a few of the younger sons of noblemen,[628]as well as the prosperous middle class—the frequenters of the French schools in St. Paul's Churchyard, and the pupils of Du Ploich and Holyband, neither of whom makes any reference to the tour in France.

The "common practice" in the sixteenth century among young travellers was to proceed to France knowing no French. They fully expected to learn the language there, with no further exertion than living in the country. They are constantly warned of the futility of such expectations. Dallington, Fynes Moryson, and others lay much emphasis on the necessity of some serious preliminary study of grammar and reading of good literature. French teachers in England compared the poor results obtained in France by these leisurely methods with those achieved by their own efforts in England. No doubt they found the practice of learning French by residence in France a serious rival to their own methods. De la Mothe,[629]for instance, declares he knows English ladies and gentlemen who have never left England and yet speak French incomparably better than others who have been in France three or four years trying to pick up the language by ear, as most travellers do. Another French teacher[630]writes: "I haveknowne three Gentlemen's sonnes, although I say it that should not say it, who can testify yet, that in their return from France (after they had remained foure yeares at Paris, spending a great deal of money) perused my rules but six moneths and did confesse they reaped more good language in that short space I taught them then in all the time they spent in France. And sundry others I have helped who never saw France, and yet could talke, read and write better language in one yeare than those who have bene at Paris two yeares, learning but the common phrase of the countrie, shacking off a litle paines to learne the rules."

While holding that French could be better learnt in England with rules than in France without any such assistance, the French teachers of London admitted that the language could perhaps be best learnt in France, but only with the help of a good teacher and serious study, as in England. However, there were hardly any language teachers in France, according to them, while in England it was easy to find many good ones. Dallington more specifically bewails the fact that the traveller finds a "great scarcitie" of such tutors, and directs him to a certain M. Denison, a Canon of St. Croix in Orleans, after whom he may inquire, "except his good acquaintance or good fortune bring him to better."

There was indeed little provision for the serious study of French in France before the end of the sixteenth century. Most travellers, we are told, "observed only for their owne use." Few Frenchmen took up the teaching of their own language to foreigners as a profession, and those who taught from time to time or merely upon occasion rarely proved successful. Yet the earliest grammars produced in France were intended largely for the use of foreigners. Special attention is paid to points which usually offered difficulty to foreigners, such as the pronunciation and its divergencies from the orthography.[631]Sylvius or Du Bois, writing in Latin,[632]remarks that his principles may serve the English, the Italians and Spaniards, in short, all foreigners; no doubt those he had chiefly in mind were the numbers of English and other foreign students at the University of Paris. When the earliest grammar written in French appeared, its author, Louis Meigret,[633]sought to justify his useLANGUAGE TEACHERS IN FRANCEof the vernacular by suggesting that foreign students should first learn to understand French by speaking and reading good French literature, instead of depending on Latin for the first stages. He had noticed the peculiarities of the English pronunciation of French, especially the habit of misplacing the accent; "they raise the voice on the syllableaninAngleterre, while we raise it on the syllableter: so that French as spoken by the English is not easily understood in France." From other grammarians foreigners always received some attention. Pillot[634]and Garnier[635]both wrote in Latin with a special view to foreigners; and Peletier,[636]who used French, retains all the etymological consonants, that strangers may find Latin helpful in understanding French.

Not before the end of the sixteenth century, however, do we hear of the first important language teacher in France—Charles Maupas of Blois, a surgeon by profession, who spent most of his life, more than thirty years, teaching French to "many lords and gentlemen of divers nations" who visited his native town. He was "well known to be a famous teacher of the French tongue to many of the English and Dutch nobility and gentry." For his English pupils Maupas showed particular affection.[637]And from them he received in turn numerous proofs of friendship. Among the Englishmen who learnt French under his care was George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, who, at about the age of eighteen, travelled into France, where "he improved himself[638]well in the language for one that had so little grammatical foundation, but more in the exercises of that Nobility for the space of three years and yet came home in his naturall plight, without affected formes (the ordinary disease of Travellers)."[639]Maupas bears stronger testimony to his pupil's attainments in the French language, and some years later he gratefully dedicated to the Duke his French grammar, first issued publicly in 1618.

Maupas'sGrammaire françoise contenant reigles tres certaines et adresse tres asseurée a la naïve connoissance et pur usage de nostre langue. En faveur des estrangers qui en seront desireux, was first privately printed in 1607.[640]He had not originallyintended it for publication. The work grew out of the notes and observations he compiled in order to overcome his pupils' difficulties. As these rules increased in number and importance, many students began to make extracts from them; others made copies of the whole, a "great and wearisome labour." Finally, Maupas, touched by this keenness, resolved to have a large number of copies printed. He distributed these among his pupils and their friends, till, contrary to his expectation, he found he had none left. It was then that the first public edition was issued at Lyons in 1618, and was followed by six others, which were not always authorized. A Latin edition also appeared in 1623.

Maupas insists on the necessity of employing a tutor. "Let them come to me," he says, addressing foreigners desirous of learning French, "if it is convenient."[641]To learn the language by ear and use alone is impossible. The small outlay required to engage a teacher saves much time and labour. As to the grammar, it should be read again and again, and in time all difficulties will disappear; it will be of great use even to those already advanced in French. He undertook to teach and interpret the grammar in French itself, without having recourse to the international language Latin, the usual medium of teaching French to travellers; he tells us that many of his pupils were ignorant of Latin, and that the practice of interpreting the grammar in French had been adopted by many of his fellow-teachers in other towns. The great advantage of this method was, he thought, that reading and pronunciation are learnt conjointly with grammar, the phrases and style of the language together with its rules and precepts. Besides, the student must read some book; and a grammar was, in his opinion, preferable to the little comedies and dialogues usually resorted to for this purpose. He did not, however, forget that some light reading was a greater incentive to the learner, and in practice used both.

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