IX

“Betweene Mersh and AverilWhen spray beginth to spring.”

The poets of the Middle Ages, all intoxicate with May-dew, did but express the hearts of their whole generation. The long dull months, shut in cold and ill-lit draughty houses, with, for nourishment, the same eternal salt meat and shipboard food, were now delightfully over-past. The voice of the stock-dove was heard in the land, and the almond-boughs began to blossom in the orchard. Spring meant a free life out of doors in the sunlight; spring meant the hunt, delicious days spent in the fresh green wood inhealthy sport that made the pulses beat. Spring meant the game-bag full; a varied table spread in bower or garden. Spring meant a hundred little intimate festivities waking to mirth the numerous young people of every fourteenth-century castle. Sometimes the whole company go out to hunt for several days in the forest, knights and ladies, pages, maidens, carrying with them tents, provisions. The girls wash their hands and faces in the dew of flowers to get a good complexion, as they still used to do in Warwickshire when I was a little child. Every hunter has a horn to sound if he gets lost in the forest. How they laugh over all the little hardships and adventures of the picnic! In one old poem—old even in the days of Valentine Visconti—the knights have forgotten their towels and have to dry their faces on the ladies’ skirts.[62]

Generally these great hunts were made with hounds, and the game was deer or bear, wild boar, hare, or otter. But the most fashionable sport was hawking. Every castle had its knight-falconer, who was a great person with onerous duties. The royal falconer was paid as much as twenty-four sols a day—three times the daily due of the physician; and even a varlet falconer was given three solsper diem—a very respectable salary.[63]But he was not paid for doing nothing; the hawk was hard to catch, and when caught difficult to train. Night and day the falconer, with the bird, hooded and fasting, on his hand, must pace up and down, up and down, like a mother with her teething child. When at last the bird was fit for use, perched lightly on his lady’s wrist, or soaring after swan, pheasant, or wild duck through the upper air, he was one of the most precious and beautiful possessions of a noble. The best esteemed was the Irish orNorwegian ger-falcon. What pet name was more endearing than that of “Gay Goshawk”? His clear eye, a pure grey, neither greenish nor bluish, is the inevitable standard to which the mediæval lover compares his lady’s glance—falcon-keen, falcon-swift, falcon-bright, and grey as the hawk’s eye. In the evening, invigorated rather than fatigued by the long day in the forest, knights and ladies would fall to dancing. The country neighbours would come for miles; even the burghers of the richest sort were now and then invited. “Il est accoustumé en esté de veiller à dances jusqu’au jour,” writes the Knight of La Tour, but he condemns the practice, being past his youth, and asserts that strange things happen when some band of practical jokers contrives to extinguish all the lights. Let us hope that such accidents did not frequently occur, and that the knight’s three daughters were not kept at home too often “pour le péril de mauvaises langues.”

It would be pleasant to spend a day or two in some fourteenth-century country-house during the early summer. Let us attach ourselves to the suite of a certain Spanish hidalgo, Don Pero Niño, a noble adventurer, who, landing at Harfleur in 1405, went to visit Renaud de Trie, Admiral of France, at his country seat of Sérifontaines. Don Pero Niño, fresh as we to France, sets forth, by means of his gifted secretary and chronicler, all the details of that memorable visit. We remember no page in Froissart at once so bright and so precise.

The Admiral de Trie was an aged knight, ill in health. In his day he had been a famous fighter, but in 1405,broken down by many battles, he lived retired on his estate in Normandy.[64]

“There dwelt he in great comfort in a castle, strong, although situate in a plain, and furnished as well as it had been in Paris. He had about him young gentlemen in pageship, and all kind of servitors, as befits so great a lord.

“In his house there was a great chapel, where Mass was said every morning to the sound of trumpets and divers instruments, played by his minstrels in a way that was a marvel. Before the house a river flowed; orchards and gracious gardens bordered it. On the other side of the castle was a pond for fish, enclosed by walls, and guarded by gates well-locked; whence, every day, the steward might furnish food for three hundred persons.... There was a pack of fifty hounds; twenty horses were kept for the service of the lord of the castle. There were plenty of falcons-gentle. There was all that heart can wish for in the way of hunting—the otter, the roe, the wild boar, small game, or waterfowl.”

The old knight had a young wife, “the fairest lady that was at that time in France.” She was a woman of great sense and order, and, as was in those days the custom, she was almost entirely responsible for the management of her husband’s estates.

“All things were arranged or decided by my lady. She alone governed everything both within and without. My lord the Admiral was a rich man, lord of many lands; but he had to take thought for none of these things, my lady being sufficient unto all.”

“My lady had her noble lodging apart from the mansion of her lord. They dwelt within the self-same moat, but divided the one from the other by a drawbridge. It would be long to set forth the number and the magnificence of the furniture that there was in this lodging. Here lived my lady, surrounded by ten maids of honour, very richly clad and accoutred all of them, who had nought to do save keep their lady company, for beneath them there were many waiting-women.

“Now will I tell you the rule and order of my lady’s life. Of a morning, so soon as she was dressed, forth she went with her damsels to a spring hard by, where each one told her rosary, and read her book ofHoursin silent prayer, sitting a little apart from her fellows. Next, plucking flowers and violets upon their way, they hied them home to the palace, and gathered in the chapel, where they heard a low Mass. As they came out of church their servants handed them a silver tray, furnished with larks, chickens, and other roast fowl, of which they took or left what they would, and drank a little wine. My lady ate but rarely of a morning, or trifled with some morsel to humour those about her. Their fast broken, lady and damsels mounted their noble hackneys, and then, met in company with such knights and squires as were of their party, they went riding through the lanes and open country for some while, weaving garlands of flowers as they went. Then might you hear such singing, by voices well-tuned and timed together, of virelays, lays, rondeaux, songs, complaints, ballads, and other verses, such as the French know featly how to finish, that, I declare you, could it last for ever, you would have thought yourself in Paradise.”

With this company rode the Captain Pero Niño, the occasion of all this festival. With them at dinner-time herode home to the castle, dismounted, and strode into the hall, where the portable trestle-tables had been already spread. The Admiral could no longer ride afield, but he welcomed home his guests with a marvellous good grace. My lady and Pero Niño were placed at the Admiral’s table, while the seneschal presided over the other, and saw that every damsel sat between a squire and a knight. There were meats of all manner in great number and marvellous well cooked. During the meal whosoever knew how to speak with courtesy and measure of arms and love was sure to find a hearing and an answer. Meanwhile the jongleurs made low music on divers instruments. Dinner over, grace was said, the tables removed, and then the minstrels came; my lady danced with Pero Niño, and every damsel with her squire. This dance lasted an hour; when it was over, my lady gave the kiss of peace to Pero Niño, and every lady to her cavalier. Then wine and spices were handed round, and all alike dispersed to their siesta. Pero Niño, happy knight, had his lodging in my lady’s tower.

Later in the afternoon the horses were brought round, and the pages stood ready bearing falcons: a huntsman had already tracked the heron’s course:

“Then would you have seen a noble sport and fair amusement, with swimming of hounds, beating of drums, whirring and wheeling of falcons, with knights and ladies riding along the river-bank as many as you can imagine them. That sport ended, my lady and her company would seat themselves to rest in some green meadow, while the pages unpacked cold fowl and game, and divers fruit. All eat and drank, twining garlands. Then, singing glees and songs, they returned to the castle.”

Supper came at nightfall if it were winter-time. In summer the meal was earlier, and afterwards my lady wouldset off on foot to wander up and down the countryside till dark, while some would accompany her, and some would stay to play at bowls. Then the torches flared in the great hall, the minstrels gathered in, and there was dancing until far into the night. And this is the order which was followed every day, according to the seasons and the quality of the guests, whenever there was holiday at Sérifontaines. But now, ’tis late. Hand round the wine and spices, and to bed!

During these long days, when my lady danced, sang, and rode with Pero Niño, she and he discovered that the Admiral was old. “En tout honneur,” they fell in love with one another. Like the woman of order that she was, instead of keeping Pero Niño as her lover, Madame de Trie sent him to her father to see if he would do for her second husband, while she stayed at Sérifontaines and nursed the Admiral. The father apparently consented, for we hear that they “se tinrent pour amoureux.” Meanwhile the Admiral died. My lady and Don Pero exchanged keepsakes, and he promised to return to France and marry her at the expiry of her mourning. But having met in Spain a certain Doña Beátriz, he married her instead; and perhaps in later years Madame de Trie thought more kindly of the good old Admiral.

Neither the knights nor the ladies of these old chronicles surprise us by the delicacy of their heart. With theRoman de la Rose, the still unpurified passions of those ages held that—

“Nous sommes faiz, beau filz, sans doutes,Toutes pour tous et tous pour toutes.”

Adultery is as common in their chronicles as it has always been in fiction—and perhaps in fact. And when the lovers are tired of each other, it is difficult to veil the case less kindly than the Dame des Belles-Cousines, in her behaviour to Jehan de Saintré, or the Chastelain de Coucy when he punishes the Lady of Vermandois. Moreover, the very first beginnings of love were contaminated by a thought of utility, of “subsidy,” as one of our authors does not fear to state. Even in that pure and charming chronicle, theLivre des Faiz de Jehan Bouciquaut, we read that on account of her influence and her prestige, “it is much better to love a lady of a station superior to one’s own.” Listen to the counsels which a lady of great position, the Dame des Belles-Cousines, gives to Jehan de Saintré! The lad, a child of thirteen, has refused to tell her the name of his sweetheart:

“The tears came into the lad’s eyes, for never in his days had he given thought to such a thing as love or lady-loves. His heart fell, his face turned pale.... He sat a long while in silence, twirling the loose end of his girdle round his thumbs.... At last he cried out in his despair, for all the maids of honour fell to questioning him together and at once: ‘What can I tell her? I have no lady-love! If I had one, I would tell you soon enough!’

“‘Well, whom do you love the best of all in the world?’ asked the maidens.

“‘My mother,’ said little Saintré, ‘and after her my sister Jacqueline.’

“Then said my lady:

“‘But of them that are nothing to ye, which love ye the best?’

“‘I love none of them,’ said Saintré.

“‘What! none of them?’ quoth my lady. ‘Ha! falsegentleman! You love none of them? Then by that token I prophesy that you will come to nothing. Faint heart that ye are! whence sprang all noble enterprises, all great achievements and valorous deeds of Launcelot, of Gawain, of Tristan, of the courteous Giron, and the other knights of the Round Table? Also of Ponthus,[65]and innumerable other heroes? What else but love-service? What else but the desire to keep the favour of their much-desired dame? And I myself have known many men who, through their love affairs, have reached the highest possible honours, of whom, but for these, no more talk had been made than of so many simple soldiers.’”

Little Saintré left the lady’s presence shamefaced, and when the door was shut, “he ran down the gallery as fast as if he had fifty wolves behind him.” But one day, as he waited at table on the maids of honour, these ladies made him vow to give the promised answer that afternoon. Therefore, when the king and queen retired for their noonday siesta, my lady sought young Saintré in the gallery, and took him to her chamber with her; and there, surrounded by her ladies, she seated him at the foot of her couch and summoned him for a reply.

“At last the poor lad bethought him of one of the noble maidens sent to court, who was ten years of age.

“‘My lady,’ quoth he, ’tis Matheline de Courcy!’

“‘Ah, coward!’ cried my lady, ‘to choose a child like Matheline. Not that she be not a very fair maiden, and of an excellent house, better than thine. But what good, what profit, what honour, what comfort, what advantage,what subsidy, what aid and counsel can you find in the love of Matheline? She is but a lassie yet. Nay, youshould choose a lady of high and noble birth, wise, andwith the wherewithal to help your fortunes, and set you above necessity; and her should you love with perfect service, loyally and well, and in all honour. Be sure that in the end she will have mercy upon you, “et par ainsy deviendrez homme de bien.”’”[66]

When we think that this harangue (and especially all that follows it) was penned by an ecclesiastic for the education of a prince, we perceive that our code of morals has changed. Young Saintré received large sums of money from his mistress, with no loss of honour, and the lady herself enters on her mission as on a sacred calling. “Although so young, she had, in her virtue, formed a Roman resolution never to remarry; but often she wished that her work in the world might be to train some young knight or squire and make him a pattern of chivalry.” It is with this high intention that she becomes the mistress of young Saintré; that she bestows her wealth upon him, and keeps him in due splendour of steed and apparel; that she preaches to him, with a sublime lack of logic, “how to flee the seven mortal sins”; that she finds him books to read, and stuffs him with quotation from Thales of Miletus, Chilon of Lacedemonia, Avicenna, Valerius Maximus, and Pittacus of Mitylene. To this end she persuades herself to a cruel separation, and sends him on his travels as knight-errant. She is, in fact, his mundane Beatrice. Her love for him is in truth a liberal education, and one that seems delightful and legitimate to her contemporaries. But our eyes see in her an ugly likeness to Madame de Warens, and we should say, in downright English, that she corrupts the lad.

Virtuous or frail, the ladies of the Trecento, as of the two preceding centuries, were all alike as sisters in their loveliness. Or rather, we may say that only one type of beauty was recognized as such, all mediæval heroines were required to conform to that absolute standard.

In our eyes the dark-eyed beauties of Murillo, the warm blondes of Titian and Palma, the slender angels of Perugino, the powderedespiègleladies of Gainsborough and Reynolds; the majestic form of the Venus of Milo, and the somewhat mannered elegance of Tanagra, are all, in their kind, types of accomplished beauty. Many different ideals have enlarged and exercised our taste. But, of all the candidates on our list, the Middle Ages would have admitted only the Perugino angel and the Tanagra statuette.

This lessens, at any rate, the difficulty of description. The mediæval beauty wasalwaysgolden-haired, either naturally or by the aid of art. Her hair was very fine, rippling in long curves above a fair broad forehead. One of her distinctive charms was the large space between the brows, the “plaisant entr’euil” so often sung of early poets; very few things seemed more hideous to our forefathers than shaggy eyebrows meeting in the middle. It was also a great disadvantage for the eyebrows to be fair. They should be several shades darker than the hair, narrow, pencilled, delicately arched; Burns’—

“Eyebrows of a darker hueBewitchingly o’erarching.”

Eyes, not blue, but “grey as glass,” “plus vairs que cristal,” not over-large, somewhat deeply set, and always bright, keen, and shining as a falcon’s.

Below these brilliant eyes, a small straight nose, rather long than short, but above all “traitis”—that is to say, neat and straight—divided two oval cheeks, with dimples that appear at the bidding of a smile. A fresh, faint pink-and-white colour, like the first apple-blossom, must flourish in these little cheeks. The lips are much redder, slightly pursed over the tiny pearly teeth; “la bouche petite et grossette,” says the prosaicRoman de la Rose; but Ulrich von Lichtenstein expressed his meaning better in his “kleinvelhitzerôter munt,” his “little, very fire-red mouth;” or the author ofGuillaume le Faucon, who likens his heroine’s lips to a scarlet poppy-bud:

“Tant estoit vermeille et close.”

Sometimes the small mouth was only half shut, as if about to speak:

“Les lèvres jointes en itel guiseC’un poi i lessa ouvertureSelonc réson et par mesure,”

says the author ofNarcisse.[67]

The cleft chin and the ears must be small and round and white, above a long neck, with a full white throat. The fairness of this throat, its delicacy and transparence, was thesine quâ nonof feminine loveliness. “When she drank red wine, one saw the rosy fluid through her throat,” say the poets.

The beauty of the Middle Ages was invariably slender, slim, and round as a willow-wand. The shoulders are small, the whole figure “greslette et alignie”; long-drawn out in slenderness, with slim, round, long limbs, and slim, round, long fingers, that show no joints, and terminate in trim, shining nails, cut very close. The bust is high, with neat, round, well-divided breasts, and a slim, round waist.When Eustache Deschamps, in his 960th Ballad, sings the charms of a lady quite correctly like this portrait, he ends with saying:

“Mais sur toutes portez bien vos habizPlus que nulle dame ne damoiselleQui soit vivante en terre n’en paÿs.”[68]

Poets in every century have laid great store by that

“something i’ the gaitGars ony dress look weel.”

TheRoman de la Rose, that manual of the fourteenth century, devotes a score or so of verses to this doctrine of deportment.

“‘Marche joliettement,’ walk prettily, mincingly, showing your pretty little shoes, so well made they fit without a wrinkle.... And if your dress trail behind on the pavement, yet take thought to lift it a little towards the front, as if the wind had caught it, so that every one who passes you may notice the dainty well-shod slimness of your feet.

“And if you have a long mantle—one of those long, full cloaks that almost entirely hide your charming figure—with your two hands and your two arms manage to open it wide in front, whether the day be fair or foul, even as a peacock spreads his tail.”

Let us not think that the fourteenth-century castle was entirely peopled by men and women in the bloom of idle youth. There were charitable widows whose conversation was in heaven; there were knights strong and resolute in their absolute religion. In spite of all its mediocrity,alongside of its frivolity, its often criminal looseness of the marriage tie, the fourteenth century was an age of piety and honour. Every gentleman had two religions, for either of which he would have died; and the briefest record of life in the castle must find a place for the observances of the Church and the duties of chivalry. We cannot lay too great a stress upon the austerity, upon the charity, inherent in the ideal woman of a period whose great ladies were so often purely worldly and emotional. We should leave our readers under a false conception if we let them suppose that the women of a fourteenth-century castle were invariably after the pattern of the sprightly Dame des Belles-Cousines, or of the sweeter Lady of Fayel. “Even in a palace life can be lived well.” No saint in her cloister was purer than Madame Olive de Belleville, “la plus courtoise dame et la plus humble;” stern to herself, fasting daily, wearing the hair-shirt on her tender flesh, but to all others most pitiful and gentle, visiting the sick, helping poor women in childbirth, praying on the graves of poor or aged people who had few to mourn them. And, by a rare virtue, she was charitable not only to the unhappy; she knew no less how to welcome and honour the well-to-do, the honourable, the unpathetic; she knew how to deck with fair, white raiment the smiling daughters of ruined gentle-folk, who else would have gone to their bridegrooms without a jewel or a wedding garment. She was hospitable, and even lavish, to the careless minstrel folk, so that they made a “Ballad of Regret” when at last she left them. Above all, she would never hear ill of anybody. And when the ugly story went round in whispers, and the worldly and the sceptical smiled half-content, this good woman, who denied herself the simplest pleasures, would hasten to excuse the sinner, to doubt if the tale were true; or, were it proven,then she would say that God would amend it, and that His judgments and His mercy alike were marvellous, and would one day astound us all. So that in her neighbourhood none went undefended in the hour of slander, unsaluted in prosperity, unvisited in sickness or sorrow, unholpen in poverty, or unprayed for in the hour of death. Few sweeter eulogies could be given to any woman. “In truth,” says the Knight of La Tour, “though I was only nine years old when I knew her, I still remember many a wise thing she said and did, that I would set down here had I the time and space.”

Madame Olive de Belleville was as frequent a type as the Lady des Belles-Cousines and her kind. More frequent than either, and between the two extremes of saint and sinner, is the wise and prudent Lady of La Tour, the careful mother of growing daughters, “très gentille et preude femme,” who, beautiful still, and often subject to temptation, is skilful as Portia or Beatrice in the witty answer, the brilliant, inviolable smile, which serves to turn aside the insinuation of evil. Nor let us forget that noble wife of a nobler husband, Madame Antoinette de Turenne, “who scarce lived in her husband’s absence, with so great love did they love each other,” who had refused the hand of a Royal prince in order to marry Sir John Bouciquaut. There were then, as now, in every class, countless women of purest honour, of staunchest virtue, wise in counsel, true of heart. And, in the highest rank, if the absence of daily cares produced many frail and thoughtless beauties, the same cause added to the souls of its saints a singular aloofness, a dazzling lustre of unworldliness, and a penetrating grace of meditation. The long empty hours of the mediæval donjon, if they fostered the loves of a Tristan and an Yseult, also brought forth many a radiant spiritual flower.

In the castles of the fourteenth century, the men no less than the women were religious. The middle class, and especially the respectable bourgeois man of letters, affected a certain freedom of thought: he was already the father of Voltaire and the grandfather of the speech-making Jacobins of the French Revolution. But all that was changed among the nobility. There it was essential (even as it is among the nobles of France to-day), however light of life, to be grave of thought. The education of every knight made him instinctively religious. Even the scapegrace Louis of Orleans would pass weeks together in the Convent of the Celestines, praying, fasting with the monks before the altar. And a perfect knight was habitually not only pious, but austere.

TheLivre des Faiz de Messire Jehan Bouciquautgives us an admirable picture of a pattern of chivalry. The great Governor of Genoa (whom the documents of the Florentine archives reveal to us as an insupportable martinet, dogmatic, obstinate, and tyrannical, despite his virtues) appears in these pages in the inner splendour of a noble soul. Every morning he rose at dawn, “that the first-fruits of his day might be consecrate to God,” and we learn with some surprise that this poet of courtly ballads, this soldier, this statesman, gave every morning of his life three consecutive hours to his “œuvre d’oraison,” as infallibly renewed at night. At table, while his household were served in gold and silver, he ate and drank from pewter, glass, or wood; however rich the banquet, he partook but of one dish, the first served, with one glass of wine and water.

“He loves to read the fair books of God, the lives ofthe saints, the deeds of the Romans, and ancient history; but he talks little and will listen to no slander.... Marvellously hateth he liars and flatterers, and driveth them from him.... Marvellously hateth he also all games of chance and fortune, and never consenteth to them.... Those virtues which be contrary to lubricity are steadfast in him.... He is stern and to the point in justice, yet faileth he not in mercy and compassion.... He is very piteous to the ancient men-at-arms who can no longer help themselves, who have been good blades in their time, but have laid by nothing, and so are sore distressed in their old age.... And with all his heart loveth he those who are of good life, fearing and serving our Lord Jesus Christ.... He oweth no debts.... He never lies; and all that he promiseth, so much doth he perform.”

We are content to end our studies with the portrait of so true a knight.

THE ENDPRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.

FOOTNOTES:[1]“Flour de Brousso,” par Arsène Vermenouze. [Imprimerie Moderne. Aurillac. 1896.][2]Pages Libres, No. 103.[3]See theComptes des Frères Bonis, merchants at Montauban during the second half of the fourteenth century, published (1890) by M. Ed. Forestier. Bonis himself possessed in the vicinity of Montauban lands and houses to the value of sixty or seventy thousand pounds sterling, modern value;—which did not prevent his selling his goods with his own hands, down to the smallest detail.[4]SeeBonis, ccviii. Among Bonis’ servants the swineherd, Jean Chaussenoire, bought a vineyard; the neatherd, Salona, two houses in town; another neatherd, a house on the banks of the Aveyron. In 1366, under the English, a shepherdess comes to Bonis and entrusts him with her savings: three and thirty pounds! Bonis’s valet, a man at wages of five pounds a year, possessed enough land to take 430 litres (two septiers) of wheat at the sowing: from six to eight acres of land.[5]Léopold Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age. See pp. 8-17, an account of the position of thehospites, who, often burghers in the town, were little better than serfs in the country.[6]For example, the Marmosets of Charles V.; but this king also knighted numerous burghers of Paris.[7]For the full description of the origin and class of vavassours, we refer our reader to L. Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age.[8]Bonis.[9]Thorold Rogers, i. 16.[10]History of Prices,loc. cit., and p. 66.[11]See especially the treatise on gardening in theMenagier de Paris. There is also a valuable chapter on the kitchen-garden in M. L. Delisle’sL’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age. Most of the plants quoted were already grown in the gardens of Charlemagne.[12]Delisle, p. 221.[13]Delisle, p. 616.[14]Thorold Rogers, i. 54.[15]Delisle, p. 583.[16]Régistres du Châtelet, i. p. 3; and ii. pp. 100, 351, 370, 460, and 461.[17]Bonis, cxcvii.[18]Régistres du Châtelet: varlet thatcher, one sol and his keep (i. 393). Joubert,Vie privée en Anjou: hedgers paid per day, one sol and their food (p. 98). Thorold Rogers: for mowing an acre, 8½d.; harvesters for carting corn, one sol two deniers, and their food (i. 255).[19]Régistres du Châtelet, i. 427, 448, 558,et passim; and ii. 497.[20]Bonis, p. cxciii.[21]See the farm inventory in Joubert’sVie Privée en Anjou au XVme. siêcle.[22]Joubert.[23]Comptes des Frères Bonis, Marchands de Montauban, publié par M. Edouard M. Forestier, 1890, p. ccx.[24]Châtelet, ii. 509: “They took the bed, pulled the straw out of it, threw it in the chimney, and set fire to it.”[25]Thorold Rogers,History, i. 13.[26]See Vaissière,Gentilshommes Campagnards de l’Ancienne France; see also Thorold Rogers,History of Prices, i. 13. Seeibid., inventory of John Senekworth’s effects, for the furniture of a Cambridgeshire manor in 1314. We notice six sheets, a mattress, a coverlet, a counterpane, a “banker” or stuffed cushion for a bench, three cushions, three table-cloths and two napkins, two drinking glasses, four silver spoons, basin and ewer, two silver seals, andthree books of romance![27]Douët d’Arcq, ii. 139. 6.[28]Joubert,La Vie Privée en Anjou.[29]Léopold Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande, p. 189.[30]Régistres du Châteletfor 1392, i. 174.[31]Ibid., 427.[32]Ibid., 526.[33]Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande, 189.[34]L’Agriculture Normande.[35]Ibid., 190.[36]L’Agriculture Normande, 190.[37]Joubert,Vie Privée en Anjou, p. 94.[38]Joubert,Vie Privée en Anjou, p. 60.[39]Bonis, cxxi.[40]All these remedies are taken from theAccounts of Bonis,loc. cit.,et seq.[41]Henri de Parville, “Revue des Sciences,” in theJournal des Débats, 23rd January, 1890.[42]Thorold Rogers, i. 399.[43]Bonis.[44]Joubert, p. 60. But see especially for this subject the masterly passage of M. Léopold Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age, p. 175,et seq.[45]It will be remembered that in the Third Order of St. Francis special provision is made for laymen who can read, evidently a considerable class.[46]Registres du Châtelet, ii. 103.[47]See D. Bessin,Concilia, part i., p. 78, quoted by Delisle, p. 116.[48]Eustache Deschamps,Ballades, édition du Marquis de Queux de St. Hilaire. Ballade 835.[49]In the disastrous years immediately preceding the accession of Charles V., the price of corn doubled.[50]Eustache Deschamps, ii.[51]Voyage du Seigneur de Caumont, quoted by Viollet-le-Duc,op. cit., v. p. 83.[52]See, for instance, Douët d’Arcq,Comptes de l’Hotel des Rois de France.[53]Labarte,Mobilier de Charles V.[54]The “chamber” generally consisted of bed-curtains, a baldaquin, counterpane and covering for the couch or sofa, hangings for the wall, doors, and windows, cushions for the benches and chairs.[55]The Knight of La Tour makes a mock of certain eccentric “Gallois” who strew their floors and deck their hearths, in winter, “comme en esté,” with herbs and holly.—p. 242.[56]Labarte,Mobilier de Charles V.[57]Le Livre du Chevalier de La Tour Landry.[58]“Après mengier al miédi, et lors tout nuz il se couçoit, dormir deux heures, puis levoit” (Philippe Mouskes:Chronique).[59]Quoted by Herr Alwin Schultz,op. cit., i. 362.[60]See, for instance, theComptes de la Trémoilleand theComptes de l’Hotel des Rois.[61]“Les Lais de France,” par J. Bédier:Revue des Deux Mondes, Oct. 15, 1891.[62]Guillaume de Dole. Quoted by Herr Alwin Schultz, t. i. p. 470.[63]Douët d’Arcq,Comptes de l’Hotel du Roy Charles V.[64]Le Victorial,Chronique de Don Pedro Niño, Comte de Buelna, par Gutierre Diaz de Gomez, son Alferez, 1379-1449. Traduit de l’Espagnol d’après le manuscrit, avec une introduction et des notes, par le Comte Albert de Circourt et le Comte de Puymaigre.[65]Les Amours de Ponthus et de la belle Sidonieis the name of a once famous romance of chivalry.[66]Le Petit Jehan de Saintré, édition Guichard.[67]Quoted from Herr Alwin Schultz,op. cit., t. i. p. 215.[68]Ballades d’Eustache Deschamps, in five volumes. Edited by the Marquis de Queux de St. Hilaire.

FOOTNOTES:

[1]“Flour de Brousso,” par Arsène Vermenouze. [Imprimerie Moderne. Aurillac. 1896.]

[2]Pages Libres, No. 103.

[3]See theComptes des Frères Bonis, merchants at Montauban during the second half of the fourteenth century, published (1890) by M. Ed. Forestier. Bonis himself possessed in the vicinity of Montauban lands and houses to the value of sixty or seventy thousand pounds sterling, modern value;—which did not prevent his selling his goods with his own hands, down to the smallest detail.

[4]SeeBonis, ccviii. Among Bonis’ servants the swineherd, Jean Chaussenoire, bought a vineyard; the neatherd, Salona, two houses in town; another neatherd, a house on the banks of the Aveyron. In 1366, under the English, a shepherdess comes to Bonis and entrusts him with her savings: three and thirty pounds! Bonis’s valet, a man at wages of five pounds a year, possessed enough land to take 430 litres (two septiers) of wheat at the sowing: from six to eight acres of land.

[5]Léopold Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age. See pp. 8-17, an account of the position of thehospites, who, often burghers in the town, were little better than serfs in the country.

[6]For example, the Marmosets of Charles V.; but this king also knighted numerous burghers of Paris.

[7]For the full description of the origin and class of vavassours, we refer our reader to L. Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age.

[8]Bonis.

[9]Thorold Rogers, i. 16.

[10]History of Prices,loc. cit., and p. 66.

[11]See especially the treatise on gardening in theMenagier de Paris. There is also a valuable chapter on the kitchen-garden in M. L. Delisle’sL’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age. Most of the plants quoted were already grown in the gardens of Charlemagne.

[12]Delisle, p. 221.

[13]Delisle, p. 616.

[14]Thorold Rogers, i. 54.

[15]Delisle, p. 583.

[16]Régistres du Châtelet, i. p. 3; and ii. pp. 100, 351, 370, 460, and 461.

[17]Bonis, cxcvii.

[18]Régistres du Châtelet: varlet thatcher, one sol and his keep (i. 393). Joubert,Vie privée en Anjou: hedgers paid per day, one sol and their food (p. 98). Thorold Rogers: for mowing an acre, 8½d.; harvesters for carting corn, one sol two deniers, and their food (i. 255).

[19]Régistres du Châtelet, i. 427, 448, 558,et passim; and ii. 497.

[20]Bonis, p. cxciii.

[21]See the farm inventory in Joubert’sVie Privée en Anjou au XVme. siêcle.

[22]Joubert.

[23]Comptes des Frères Bonis, Marchands de Montauban, publié par M. Edouard M. Forestier, 1890, p. ccx.

[24]Châtelet, ii. 509: “They took the bed, pulled the straw out of it, threw it in the chimney, and set fire to it.”

[25]Thorold Rogers,History, i. 13.

[26]See Vaissière,Gentilshommes Campagnards de l’Ancienne France; see also Thorold Rogers,History of Prices, i. 13. Seeibid., inventory of John Senekworth’s effects, for the furniture of a Cambridgeshire manor in 1314. We notice six sheets, a mattress, a coverlet, a counterpane, a “banker” or stuffed cushion for a bench, three cushions, three table-cloths and two napkins, two drinking glasses, four silver spoons, basin and ewer, two silver seals, andthree books of romance!

[27]Douët d’Arcq, ii. 139. 6.

[28]Joubert,La Vie Privée en Anjou.

[29]Léopold Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande, p. 189.

[30]Régistres du Châteletfor 1392, i. 174.

[31]Ibid., 427.

[32]Ibid., 526.

[33]Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande, 189.

[34]L’Agriculture Normande.

[35]Ibid., 190.

[36]L’Agriculture Normande, 190.

[37]Joubert,Vie Privée en Anjou, p. 94.

[38]Joubert,Vie Privée en Anjou, p. 60.

[39]Bonis, cxxi.

[40]All these remedies are taken from theAccounts of Bonis,loc. cit.,et seq.

[41]Henri de Parville, “Revue des Sciences,” in theJournal des Débats, 23rd January, 1890.

[42]Thorold Rogers, i. 399.

[43]Bonis.

[44]Joubert, p. 60. But see especially for this subject the masterly passage of M. Léopold Delisle,L’Agriculture Normande au Moyen Age, p. 175,et seq.

[45]It will be remembered that in the Third Order of St. Francis special provision is made for laymen who can read, evidently a considerable class.

[46]Registres du Châtelet, ii. 103.

[47]See D. Bessin,Concilia, part i., p. 78, quoted by Delisle, p. 116.

[48]Eustache Deschamps,Ballades, édition du Marquis de Queux de St. Hilaire. Ballade 835.

[49]In the disastrous years immediately preceding the accession of Charles V., the price of corn doubled.

[50]Eustache Deschamps, ii.

[51]Voyage du Seigneur de Caumont, quoted by Viollet-le-Duc,op. cit., v. p. 83.

[52]See, for instance, Douët d’Arcq,Comptes de l’Hotel des Rois de France.

[53]Labarte,Mobilier de Charles V.

[54]The “chamber” generally consisted of bed-curtains, a baldaquin, counterpane and covering for the couch or sofa, hangings for the wall, doors, and windows, cushions for the benches and chairs.

[55]The Knight of La Tour makes a mock of certain eccentric “Gallois” who strew their floors and deck their hearths, in winter, “comme en esté,” with herbs and holly.—p. 242.

[56]Labarte,Mobilier de Charles V.

[57]Le Livre du Chevalier de La Tour Landry.

[58]“Après mengier al miédi, et lors tout nuz il se couçoit, dormir deux heures, puis levoit” (Philippe Mouskes:Chronique).

[59]Quoted by Herr Alwin Schultz,op. cit., i. 362.

[60]See, for instance, theComptes de la Trémoilleand theComptes de l’Hotel des Rois.

[61]“Les Lais de France,” par J. Bédier:Revue des Deux Mondes, Oct. 15, 1891.

[62]Guillaume de Dole. Quoted by Herr Alwin Schultz, t. i. p. 470.

[63]Douët d’Arcq,Comptes de l’Hotel du Roy Charles V.

[64]Le Victorial,Chronique de Don Pedro Niño, Comte de Buelna, par Gutierre Diaz de Gomez, son Alferez, 1379-1449. Traduit de l’Espagnol d’après le manuscrit, avec une introduction et des notes, par le Comte Albert de Circourt et le Comte de Puymaigre.

[65]Les Amours de Ponthus et de la belle Sidonieis the name of a once famous romance of chivalry.

[66]Le Petit Jehan de Saintré, édition Guichard.

[67]Quoted from Herr Alwin Schultz,op. cit., t. i. p. 215.

[68]Ballades d’Eustache Deschamps, in five volumes. Edited by the Marquis de Queux de St. Hilaire.

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