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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Of Six Mediæval Women, by Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Of Six Mediæval Women
+       To Which Is Added A Note on Mediæval Gardens
+
+Author: Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+Release Date: March 31, 2010 [EBook #31843]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OF SIX MEDIÆVAL WOMEN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Meredith Bach, Irma Spehar and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+                         OF SIX MEDIÆVAL WOMEN
+                                 WITH
+                      A NOTE ON MEDIÆVAL GARDENS
+
+
+                      MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+                      LONDON · BOMBAY · CALCUTTA
+                               MELBOURNE
+
+                         THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
+                      NEW YORK · BOSTON · CHICAGO
+                        DALLAS · SAN FRANCISCO
+
+                   THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.
+                                TORONTO
+
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. de l’Arsenal, Paris._
+
+POET DECLAIMING TO ACCOMPANIMENT OF VIOL.
+
+_Frontispiece._]
+
+
+                         OF SIX MEDIÆVAL WOMEN
+                           TO WHICH IS ADDED
+                               A NOTE ON
+                           MEDIÆVAL GARDENS
+
+
+                                  BY
+                           ALICE KEMP-WELCH
+
+
+                  WITH INTRODUCTION AND ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                      MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+                      ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON
+                                 1913
+
+
+COPYRIGHT
+
+
+
+
+AUTHOR’S NOTE
+
+
+The Author’s acknowledgments are due to the Editor of _The Nineteenth
+Century and After_ for his kind permission to reprint such of the
+following studies as have already appeared in that Review, and also to
+“George Fleming” (Miss Constance Fletcher) for her rendering, on page
+146, of four verses of Christine de Pisan’s poem on Joan of Arc.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                                                     PAGE
+
+INTRODUCTION                                                          xi
+
+A TENTH-CENTURY DRAMATIST, ROSWITHA THE NUN                            1
+
+A TWELFTH-CENTURY ROMANCE-WRITER, MARIE DE FRANCE                     29
+
+A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY MYSTIC AND BEGUINE, MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG       57
+
+A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY ART-PATRON AND PHILANTHROPIST, MAHAUT,
+  COUNTESS OF ARTOIS                                                  83
+
+A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY FEMINISTE, CHRISTINE DE PISAN                    116
+
+AGNES SOREL                                                          147
+
+A NOTE ON MEDIÆVAL GARDENS                                           173
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+                                                               FACE PAGE
+
+Poet declaiming to accompaniment of Viol                _Frontispiece_
+
+Roswitha presenting her Poem to the Emperor Otho I.,
+  the Abbess of Gandersheim standing at her side.
+  A. Dürer, 1501                                                     1
+
+Cover of St. Emmeran Gospels. 10th century                           7
+
+Marriage of Otho II. and Theophano. Byzantine, 10th century          7
+
+Lady playing Harp. Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.                       32
+
+Add. MS. 10293, Brit. Mus.                                          34
+
+Boat with Knights and Lady. Add. MS. 10294, Brit. Mus.              49
+
+Glaukos and Polyeidos in Tomb. Greek Vase, Brit. Mus.               52
+
+Statue of Mahaut in Abbey of La Thieuloye, near Arras, now
+  destroyed. From a Drawing, now in Brussels, made in 1602          99
+
+Marriage of Charles le Bel and Marie of Luxemburg. Grandes
+  Chrons. de France. Bib. Nat.                                     100
+
+Thirteenth-Century Treatise on Surgery, in French.
+  Sloane MS. 1977                                                  103
+
+Banquet, with Minstrels playing, and Room hung with
+  Embroidery. MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century.
+  Bodleian, Oxford                                                 104
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         105
+
+Christine de Pisan                                                 119
+
+Lady in Horse-Litter, returning from Tournament.
+  Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.                                       132
+
+La Cité des Dames                                                  138
+
+Setting out for Poissy. Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.                 140
+
+Tomb of Agnes Sorel                                                158
+
+Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier                                 162
+
+Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier                                 163
+
+Book of Hours, French, 14th century. Brit. Mus.                    176
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         177
+
+Flemish Master, 15th century. Stephenson Clarke Collection         181
+
+MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century                             183
+
+Rhenish Master, C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.                      185
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         186
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+The recent researches of scholars and students have brought the study
+of mediæval times within the range of almost any one who cares to live
+in imagination in the past. No part of this study has been more
+advanced and made more informing to us than that which regards the
+individual. This is specially true of womankind, of whom we have
+learnt somewhat, in some instances from their own writings, and in
+others from allusions to their work in those of contemporary and later
+writers, and also, incidentally, from the vast storehouse of didactic
+literature, which is so suggestive in itself, reflecting through
+successive centuries, as it seems to do, the standard of conduct of
+the large majority. But on this subject--a very large one, and only
+partially explored--light can only be thrown gradually. For this there
+are various reasons. One is that, until comparatively recent times,
+the small details of everyday life which go so largely to make up a
+woman’s life, have generally been taken for granted by writers. Then
+the few mediæval historiographers and chroniclers were principally
+engaged in recounting the deeds of kings and feats of arms. Then
+again, although probably many MSS. of the time still lie undiscovered
+in libraries, those that are known to us are scattered far and wide.
+Furthermore, self-advertisement was not a mediæval fashion. It is
+perhaps difficult for us nowadays to understand a spirit of
+self-effacement. Self-esteem, which may develop for either good or
+ill, has perhaps always existed in the human breast, but certainly
+since the time of the Renaissance, when it seemed to have its own
+special revival, it has grown apace, and is to-day like unto the
+Mustard Tree of Holy Writ. But it is not proposed to contrast this our
+modern attitude with the impersonal one, if so it may be called, of
+the Middle Ages, because, whilst there were many humble, zealous
+workers then, just as there are now, it is possible there were other
+and perhaps more potent factors to account for this apparently humble
+attitude. In mediæval days, the subject of a narrative or didactic
+work was considered so important, that an author would scarcely
+venture on any independent treatment of a theme for fear of incurring
+censure for a contempt of authority, or, if he did so venture, he
+would probably deem it wiser to do so anonymously, or by ascription
+to some departed celebrity, who was obviously not in a position to
+gainsay him. The writer was of much less interest than his ideas and
+sentiments. Then again there was the intense localisation of life.
+Localities were very independent of one another. Each was complete in
+itself, and within it there was no need for self-advertisement. It was
+the same in the wider life of associated religious communities, such
+as Benedictines, Cluniacs, and Cistercians, who had so much to do with
+the building of abbeys and cathedrals. Within a fraternity, the
+specially gifted craftsman was known, and wherever work was going on
+within the Order, was made use of as needs be, not as Brother This, or
+Brother That, but simply as scribe, or as artificer in Madonnas or
+gargoyles, or whatever else was wanted. The glorification of the
+community as a whole, and not the advertisement of the individual, was
+the desired goal. This self-effacement was not so much humility,
+though of course that too existed, as the special form which communal
+feeling took at that time. Now if this suppression of the individual
+was true of men, how much more true must it have been of women, who
+seldom ventured beyond town, or castle, or convent walls. In truth,
+women hardly appear on the scene, and English women least of all. It
+is only women who were prominent through their high official
+positions, either political or religious, such as Blanche of Castile,
+or St. Catherine of Siena, or the Abbess Hildegarde, or women like the
+Blessed Angela of Foligno,[1] or Julian, anchoress of Norwich,[2] or
+some other of the devout women of mediæval Italy, who interpreted the
+mysteries of divine love to mediæval society, having in fact, as it
+were, religious salons, from whom the veil has been withdrawn, and
+even amongst such as these it has sometimes been only very slightly
+lifted. With these saintly and political women must be mentioned the
+women doctors of Salerno--Trothula, Abella, Mercurialis, and
+others--who played so important a part both as professors and
+practitioners when this school of medicine was at its zenith in the
+eleventh and twelfth centuries, and who left behind them, as evidence
+of their learning, treatises which are of interest to-day as showing
+mediæval methods in medicine.
+
+    [1] _The Book of the Divine Consolation of the Blessed Angela
+    of Foligno._ The New Mediæval Library.
+
+    [2] _Revelations of Divine Love recorded by Julian, Anchoress
+    of Norwich, 1373._
+
+Still, even so, the records are scanty. In order, therefore, to form
+some idea and estimate of women generally in the Middle Ages, we must
+perforce fall back on reasoning from the known to the unknown, and,
+by studying the few who are recorded in written history, judge of that
+great majority who, though nameless, have yet so largely helped to
+make up the world’s unwritten history. Just as many a flower blooms
+and dies unseen, so many a woman must have lived her life, serviceable
+to her special environment, but wholly unrecorded. Just as, in the
+course of ages, the seeds of some humble plant have been carried by
+wind or water from some lonely region to one less remote, and made to
+serve a purpose by adding to the sum-total of beauty and usefulness,
+so the thoughts and deeds of many an unremembered woman have doubtless
+passed into the great ocean of thought, encircling us to-day, and
+influencing us as a living force.
+
+Thus we have the women who figure in history, and whom we must take as
+types of the influential woman of the time, and the women whom history
+has not so honoured. Of the former, even when only portrayed in
+outline, we can learn something, but how are we to learn anything of
+the latter, whether living in the seclusion of religious houses or in
+the world? Of those living in religious houses, we know from records
+that, besides attending to their own spiritual and mental education
+and tending the sick, they conducted the cloister schools and taught
+in them needlework, the art of confectionery, surgery, writing, and
+drawing. They also wove, and embroidered, and added their mite to the
+sum-total of beauty by transcribing and illuminating MSS. of the
+Gospels and of the lives of the Saints. But sometimes such a limited
+sphere of activity was enlarged, and it is to an anonymous Anglo-Saxon
+nun of the eighth century, to whom the experiences were related, that
+we owe one of the earliest and most interesting accounts extant in
+Northern Europe of a journey to Palestine.
+
+To learn something of those living in the world, who were the
+inspirers, the helpmates, and the companions of men in everyday life,
+we must turn to the poems and romances. These form the key to the
+domestic life of the time. Though ordinary life may be somewhat
+idealised in them, still it is ordinary life on which they are based.
+Moreover, many of the MSS. in which they are written down contain
+miniatures--a legacy of exceeding worth to the student. But if we seek
+some knowledge of mediæval life from miniatures, it is not necessary
+to confine our researches to MSS. of romances. Transcripts of the
+classics, of the moralised Bible, and of other religious works also
+supply many pictures of everyday life, adapted quite regardless of
+incongruity, for one of the characteristics of the Middle Ages was a
+profound incapacity to picture to itself anything _but_ itself, or to
+reconstitute in any way, as we do to-day, times and scenes not its
+own. This was owing partly to its vitality and its youthfulness, which
+grasped at anything and everything without discernment, and partly to
+its lack of reliable material. The whole aspect of life, too, was
+changed and enlarged, and for the moment over-charged, for the
+flood-gates of the East, hitherto only partially opened, had been rent
+asunder by the traveller and the crusader.
+
+Before we attempt to arrive at some idea of the manner of life of the
+women of the Middle Ages, it will be well, if possible, to modify what
+seems to be a general and perhaps a distorted impression of these
+women of bygone days, as regards their want of loyalty in their
+domestic relations, and all the deceit and cunning such a want led to.
+Without attempting to justify what is fundamentally wrong, let us go
+if we can into the region of fact, and in that region there is quite
+enough romance without introducing it from outside.
+
+In the first place, so much more, as a rule, is heard of vice than of
+virtue. “La voix de la beauté parle bas: elle ne s’insinue que dans
+les âmes les plus éveillées.” Then the standard of life in those days
+was very different from what it is to-day. Manners and customs which
+were accepted facts of everyday life then, would strike us as
+strangely rude and repellent now. Take, for instance, the attitude
+towards his queen of a king we have all been taught to revere--Arthur,
+the semi-saint, and the so-called pattern of courtesy. When Guinevere
+deserts him, and some of his knights are slain, his remark--not
+whispered into the ear of a confidant, but uttered aloud in the
+presence of all around him--is, “I am sorrier for my good knights’
+loss than for the loss of my fair Queen, for queens I might have
+enow.” Such a sentiment, expressed in public, does not seem quite up
+to our modern standard of courteous, or even civilised, conduct, and
+yet here we have the sentiments of the Prince of Chivalry, as
+conceived by the poets of the thirteenth century. So it is obvious
+that before passing judgment upon the standard of life of the mediæval
+woman, we must endeavour to arrive at the truth by thinking and living
+in imagination on the same plane, as near as may be, as she did.
+
+Then again, it is largely owing to certain stories in the Middle Ages
+that the women of those times have been defamed. If we consider the
+sources and the transcribers of these stories, we shall perhaps find a
+reason for their distorted outlines, filled in with so much
+imperfectly understood detail. Many of these tales originated in the
+East, and particularly in India, where the conditions of domestic life
+led to and favoured intrigue, and many of them also were mere
+allegory, in which the Eastern sought to hide great truths. These the
+less meditative Western interpreted literally, mistaking the outward
+form for that which it concealed. So in passing to the West, Eastern
+ideas and Eastern exaggeration, misconstrued, became caricature.
+Moreover, the compilers of these stories were often monks or minstrels
+who vied with each other for popular favour, the monk introducing into
+his legends material which he hoped would rival the often shameless
+outpourings of the minstrel, whilst the minstrel, for his part, tried
+to adorn his story with some moral. Naturally neither class of such
+purveyors was in the least capable of judging woman with respect, or
+indeed of judging woman at all.
+
+On the other hand, however, it must be remembered that there are
+stories that tell a very different tale, a tale of self-sacrifice and
+devotion in face of grievous trial, as, for instance, that of Eric and
+Enide, sung by Chrétien of Troyes, and made familiar to us by
+Tennyson’s poem of “Geraint and Enid.” It is impossible that such a
+conception should have been the mere outcome of the poet’s
+imagination, since a poet, whilst he may transform, focuses and
+reflects the ideas of his time. In truth, we find mediæval
+literature, if we try to estimate it reasonably, gives a quite
+pleasing impression of womankind, whether we turn to some of the royal
+ladies who presided over brilliant Courts, where learning was
+encouraged and poets made welcome, or to the lady of lesser degree,
+who reigned supreme in her castle, at any rate when her lord was away,
+as was often the case in time of war or during attendance at Court, or
+to the abbesses who governed the religious houses they were set over,
+to their material and mental well-being, proving thus their genius for
+administration, and, in many instances, their rare intellectual
+attainments. A record in a chartulary of the Benedictine nunnery of
+Wherwell in Hampshire, now in the British Museum (Egerton MS., 2104),
+and accessible to all in translation in the second volume of the
+_Victoria History of the County of Hampshire_, may be mentioned in
+passing, since it gives such a charming picture of mediæval convent
+life. It recounts the life and work of the Abbess Euphemia, who
+presided over the house from 1226 to 1257. Amongst her many good
+deeds, it is told of her that “with maternal piety and careful
+forethought, she built, for the use of both sick and sound, a new and
+large infirmary away from the main buildings,” and that, besides
+caring thus for the bodily wants of her community, “she built there a
+place set apart for the refreshment of the soul, namely a chapel of
+the Blessed Virgin.” The writer adds that “in numberless ways she
+provided for the worship of God and the welfare of the sisters,” and
+that “she so conducted herself with regard to exterior affairs, that
+she seemed to have the spirit of a man rather than of a woman.” The
+account is altogether delightful and informing, and should be read by
+any who would go in spirit to a mediæval convent. It is therefore not
+surprising that in the late Middle Ages a regard and reverence for
+womanhood gradually arose--a regard and reverence for woman not merely
+as the weaker vessel, but as the principle of all good and of moral
+elevation. This attitude was also in large measure due to the
+inevitable fusion of the cult of the Virgin and the cult of woman,
+which in the thirteenth century developed into a faith. Then was it
+that religion and chivalry, in combination, formed the solvent that
+disintegrated the layer of selfishness--the outcome of the worship of
+brute force--that had settled over man’s nobler instincts, and by
+their appeal to his better nature decided the position that woman, not
+only as an individual, but also as a class, was thenceforth to take in
+the civilised world.
+
+Let us now turn, first to the woman of the Romances and then to the
+woman of History. Each completes and is completed by the other. For
+the woman of the Middle Ages there were practically only two
+alternatives--to enter into the bonds either of Holy Matrimony or of
+Holy Church. In both cases the vows were, as a rule, taken early,
+especially in the case of marriage, so that the woman of the Middle
+Ages knew little of the joys of girlhood, with all its romantic
+castle-building and fondly fostered illusions. From playing with
+dolls, the child of twelve or even younger often suddenly found
+herself transformed into a wife. Although the Church had decreed that
+no girl should be wedded before the age of fifteen, this mandate was
+often ignored in noble families, where, through death, large fiefs had
+been left without a male representative and protector. In such a case
+the over-lord considered it necessary to assert his authority, and
+compel the marriage of some young girl of perhaps only twelve, so as
+to secure for her vassals and retainers a qualified leader, and for
+himself the needful and pledged military service. Still these
+marriages of convenience were often really happy arrangements, for the
+girl-wife had been trained to altruism, and its principles were the
+very essence of her daily life. Love, moreover, is a subtle sprite,
+and just as surely as he can spread his wings and fly away, so he can
+come, as if at unconscious bidding, and make for himself a
+dwelling-place.
+
+To get any true insight into the life of the woman of the Middle Ages,
+we must study the small everyday affairs, and to this end go, in
+imagination, to some castle, and see how the day is passed there by
+its lady. Perhaps it is a day in late spring. The watchman on the
+tower, heralding the day, has sounded his horn, and soon all the
+castle is astir. Leaving her curtained bed, she first offers a short
+prayer at the small shrine hanging close by with its flickering light.
+Then the bath, the water scented with aromatic roots and covered with
+rose-petals, is taken. Mass and the morning broth follow, and the day
+is considered fitly begun. The poor, or any sick and sorry folk, are
+the first to be considered, or perhaps there is some wounded knight,
+who has sought shelter within the protecting walls of the castle, for
+whom soothing potions or healing salves have to be compounded. This
+latter service was generally the work of the lady of the castle, who
+as a rule possessed sufficient surgical knowledge to bind a broken
+limb. To beguile the weary hours of convalescence, she sings to the
+lute, tells stories, recounts legends, or reads aloud a romance lately
+bought from some wayfaring packman. Little is it to be wondered at
+that the convalescence is protracted, or that the knight delays his
+departure from day to day, sometimes to his own and the lady’s
+undoing.
+
+Beside such varied ministrations, the woman of the Middle Ages rode to
+the chase, went out hawking, snared birds with nets, ferreted rabbits,
+spun, wove, and embroidered. Embroidering was a really formidable
+occupation, for the great hall, and each room, had its special
+hangings, and on fête-days every inch of wall-space was covered. One
+set would picture an Arthurian legend, and others again were made
+bright with flowers, lilies, roses, and columbines. The lady and her
+maidens--often girls of noble birth, whom it was customary to send to
+some castle to complete their education--worked at the countless yards
+such decoration involved, and chatted the while, it may be, of some
+coming marriage or tourney, or perchance one among them would tell a
+story, and so time passed merrily enough. Then for the educated woman,
+of whom there were many, Latin verse offered a wide field of delight,
+and the woman of the Middle Ages read and loved her Virgil just as we
+of to-day read and love our Shakespeare. When the daylight had faded,
+there was always chess-playing, dancing the carole, and singing, and
+by the thirteenth century little pastoral ballets, in which a knight,
+and a shepherdess and her lover, took part, began to be produced for
+the diversion of castle-folk. For daily entertainment, every castle of
+any pretension had its own minstrel or minstrels, whilst in the
+smaller castles a wandering singer was warmly welcomed. Sometimes the
+lady gave audience to a poet, who read his latest idyll, a minstrel,
+to the accompaniment of his viol, singing the interspersed lyrics.
+Such a scene may be found depicted in miniatures, and suggests how
+such a story as “Aucassin and Nicolette,” and many another, partly in
+prose, partly in verse, was rendered. One such miniature shows a lady
+reclining on a couch, with a lordling seated beside her, the poet,
+with his small parchment leaflets, declaiming his story, the minstrel
+waiting to take up the theme in song. It is of interest to note that
+in this particular miniature the gown of the lady is ornamented with
+heraldic devices. By such means we are enabled not only to identify
+the person represented--since portraiture, even if there was anything
+worthy of the name, was in a very rudimentary condition--and thus
+arrive at the approximate date of the picture, but also to verify a
+custom, and a stage in social life. It was not until the end of the
+twelfth century, when some sort of heraldic system became necessary
+owing to the introduction of the closed helmet, that armorial
+bearings, hitherto mere personal badges, became attached to noble
+families. By the thirteenth century, when the bourgeoisie had become
+rich, they were worn by the sumptuously attired wife of the lord to
+distinguish her from the equally sumptuously attired wife of the
+wealthy burgher.
+
+Such, in mere outline, was the daily life of the mediæval lady.
+Descriptions of the lady herself seem to be mere replicas of an
+admired and fixed type, for there is in them such a sameness of
+delineation, that we can only imagine that poets sang of qualities
+that pleased, and did not attempt to individualise. All are good and
+gracious, beautiful, and slight of figure, with delicate hands and
+tapering fingers, small feet, fine and glossy hair, and grey eyes,
+laughing and bright. Only occasionally are these attractions varied
+and enhanced by the telling of beauty unaided by paint and hair dye.
+
+It is hardly necessary to speak, save very generally, of woman’s
+dress, for much has already been written on the subject. For everyday
+use, garments of wool or linen, according to the season, and with much
+fur in winter, were worn. At weddings or tournaments, or on any other
+kind of fête-day, the ladies vied with each other in rich cloth of
+gold and silver, in silks woven with threads of gold and patterned
+with conventional design, and in all kinds of iridescent silken
+stuffs from the East. From Mosul, on the banks of the Tigris, whence
+the material we call muslin takes its name, was brought a fine silk
+gossamer, something like our _crêpe de Chine_. This was used for the
+finely plaited underdress seen at the neck and foot of mediæval
+costume. Perhaps the best representation of this, although stone seems
+hardly the most favourable medium for the delineation of so delicate a
+fabric, can be seen in the long slim figures of the queenly ladies
+standing in the niches on either side of the west door of Chartres
+Cathedral.
+
+But when we have contemplated this gorgeous and dainty apparel, and
+all the other personal luxury that accompanied it, such as enamelled
+and jewelled gold circlets for the head, jewelled girdles with each
+jewel chosen for its own special virtue, carved ivory combs, tablets
+and hand-mirrors, and the like, we are forced to wonder how all this
+refinement and beauty could go hand in hand with so much that is
+unpleasing. If we turn to consider the manners of the men, we find the
+same contrasts--on the one hand the maximum of gallantry and courtesy,
+and on the other a corresponding churlishness and brutality.
+Metaphorically and actually, the lance and the battle-axe were still
+rivalling each other in the warfare of daily life. Although the
+battle-axe must eventually yield to the lance, still strange extremes
+have flourished side by side all down the ages. Turning to but
+comparatively recent times, the coarseness we associate with much of
+the reign of Charles II. stands out in glaring contrast with the
+delicate, graceful poetry that found expression then. And coming still
+nearer to our own days, we think of the unseemly manners in the reigns
+of George III. and IV. and the dainty miniatures such as those painted
+by Cosway, and wonder how these could exist together. Might we not
+just as well wonder why the olive tree has a gnarled, distorted stem,
+whilst its delicate, symmetrical leaves, of the tenderest green grey,
+glisten in the sunshine like silvery shells fresh from ocean’s bed?
+
+Renan, amongst the many thinkers on life’s mysteries, tells us that
+“Life is the result of a conflict between contrary forces.” But to
+philosophise is useless, and it is still more useless to question
+life’s seeming anomalies. We can only bow in silence before “what Time
+in mists confounds.”
+
+As has been already said, it is only a general idea of the women of
+the Middle Ages that can be gleaned from the Romances. For something
+to bring us into more real touch with them, and to reveal more of
+their personality, we must consider some who have made themselves
+known to us through their work, since history, until we come to the
+fourteenth century, is almost silent about them. Thus it is that as we
+study these women, it almost seems at first as if we were looking at
+some faded frescoes in a dimly lighted church. But just as the
+half-obliterated figures take form and life as our eyes grow
+accustomed to the dimness, and our minds get attuned to the days that
+knew their living representatives, so these women of whom we are
+speaking may live again for us if only we treat their works as human
+documents, and not as archæological curiosities. The following pages
+tell of six such women who lived between the tenth century and the
+first half of the fifteenth--Roswitha, a nun of Germany; Marie de
+France, a lady at the Court of Henry the Second of England; Mechthild
+of Magdeburg, mystic and beguine; Mahaut, Countess of Artois, a
+great-niece of St. Louis; Christine de Pisan, an Italian by birth,
+living at the Court of Charles the Fifth of France; and Agnes Sorel,
+the Mistress and inspirer of Charles the Seventh.
+
+In trying to evoke the women of these days of long ago, it is hardly
+possible to do more than portray them in outline. Yet even so, if the
+outline be true, we may remember, for our consolation, that it has
+been said that we shall never, except in outline, see the mysterious
+Goddess Truth.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+ROSWITHA PRESENTING HER POEM TO THE EMPEROR OTHO I., THE ABBESS OF
+GANDERSHEIM STANDING AT HER SIDE.
+
+A. Dürer, 1501.
+
+_To face page 1._]
+
+
+
+
+A TENTH-CENTURY DRAMATIST, ROSWITHA THE NUN
+
+
+In this age of personal curiosity, politely called psychological
+interest, when personalities are analysed with all the thoroughness of
+the dissecting theatre, it seems almost courting failure to try to
+call to remembrance one whose personality has long since faded away,
+and of whom, apparently, no contemporary writer has made mention. Of
+Roswitha, the woman, we know but little, and this little is gathered
+from her own writings.[3] Presumably the date of her birth was about
+A.D. 935, and that of her death about A.D. 973. There is a tradition
+that she was connected with the royal house of Germany, at that time
+represented by the enlightened Otho the Great. Be this as it may, her
+life for us begins when, probably at an early age, she entered the
+Convent of Gandersheim. Gandersheim was a Benedictine nunnery in the
+Harz Mountains, founded in the ninth century by Liudolf, Duke of
+Saxony, and important enough to entitle its Abbess to a Seat in the
+Imperial Diet, a right perhaps never exercised except by proxy. The
+story of its foundation, as told by Roswitha in the unique MS. of her
+works, is of strange beauty. Listen to her own words as she tells the
+tale:--
+
+    [3] The authenticity of these has been called in question by
+    some critics, but apparently upon insufficient data.
+
+     At that time there was, nigh unto the Monastery,[4] a little
+     wood, encircled by shady hills, those same hills by the
+     which we ourselves are surrounded. And there was, moreover,
+     in the wood a small farm where the swineherds of Liudolf
+     were wont to dwell, and within the enclosure of which the
+     men, during the hours of night, composed to rest their weary
+     bodies until the time when they must needs drive forth to
+     pasture the pigs committed to their care. Here, on a time,
+     two days before the Feast of All Saints, these same
+     herdsmen, in the darkness of the night, saw full many bright
+     lights glowing in the wood. And they were astonished at the
+     sight, and marvelled what could be the purport of this
+     strange vision of blazing light cleaving the darkness of the
+     night with its wondrous brilliance. And all trembling with
+     fear, they related unto their Master that which they had
+     seen, showing unto him the place which had been illumined by
+     the light. And he, desiring by very sight thereof to put to
+     proof that which he had heard tell, joined them without the
+     building, and began the following night, without sleeping,
+     to keep watch, closing not his eyes though they were weighed
+     down by the desire of slumber. And after a while he saw the
+     kindling lights, more in number than afore, once again burn
+     with a red glow, in the same place forsooth, but at an hour
+     somewhat earlier. And this glad sign of happy omen he made
+     known so soon as Phœbus shed his first rays from the sky,
+     and the joyous news spread everywhere. And this could not be
+     kept back from the worthy Duke Liudolf, but swifter than
+     speech did it come to his ears. And he, carefully observing
+     on the hallowed eve of the approaching festival whether
+     perchance some further like heavenly vision would clearly
+     show it to be an omen, with much company kept watch on the
+     wood all the night long. And straightway when black night
+     had covered the land with darkness, everywhere throughout
+     the wooded valley in the which the very noble temple was
+     destined to be built, many lights were perceived, the which,
+     with the shining splendour of their exceeding brightness,
+     cleft asunder the shades of the wood and the darkness of the
+     night alike. And thereupon, standing up and rendering praise
+     to God, they all with one accord declared it meet that the
+     place should be sanctified to the worship of Him who had
+     filled it with the light. And, moreover, the Duke, mindful
+     of his duty to Heaven, and with the consent of his dear
+     consort Oda, forthwith ordered the trees to be felled and
+     the brushwood cut away, and the valley to be completely
+     cleared. And this sylvan spot, aforetime the home of fauns
+     and monsters, he thus cleared and made fitting for the glory
+     of God. And then, before obtaining the money needful for the
+     work, he at once set out the lines of a noble church as
+     traced by the splendour of the red light.[5]
+
+    [4] The first foundation, afterwards removed to Gandersheim.
+
+    [5] For other instances of churches laid out on lines said to
+    have been revealed in dreams or visions, see Didron,
+    _Christian Iconography_, vol. i. (1886) pp. 381, 382, 460,
+    and Sta. Maria Maggiore, Rome.
+
+     In suchwise was the building of our second Monastery to the
+     glory of God begun. But stone suitable for the structure
+     could not be found in those parts, and thus the completion
+     of the sanctuary which had been begun, suffered delay. But
+     the Abbess Hathumoda, trusting to obtain all things from the
+     Lord by faith, oft-times, by serving God both night and day
+     with holy zeal, wore herself out with too abundant labour.
+     And with many of those placed under her care, she besought
+     the solace of speedy help from Heaven, lest the work so well
+     begun should be left unfinished. And of a sudden she became
+     aware that the divine grace which she sought was present,
+     ready to have compassion on her longings. For as she lay one
+     day prostrate nigh unto the altar, fasting and giving
+     herself up to prayer, she was bidden of a gentle voice to go
+     forth and follow a bird she would see sitting on the summit
+     of a certain great rock. And she, embracing the command with
+     ready mind, went forth, putting her trust in it with all her
+     heart. And taking with her very skilled masons, she sped
+     swiftly whither the kindly Spirit led her, until she was
+     come to the noble sanctuary which had been begun. And there
+     she saw, seated on the lofty summit of the self-same rock, a
+     white dove, the which, flying with outspread wings,
+     straightway went before her, tempering its flight in
+     unwonted way so that the virgin, walking with her
+     companions, might be able to follow in a straight course its
+     aerial track. And when the dove in its flight had come to
+     the place which we now know was not wanting in great stones,
+     it descended, and with its beak pierced through the
+     ground,[6] where, beneath the soil, many stones were
+     disclosed. And assured by this sight, the very worthy virgin
+     of Christ bade her companions clear away the heavy mass of
+     earth, and lay the spot bare. And this done, supernal and
+     devout piety presiding over the work, a great wealth of
+     mighty stones was brought to view, whence all the needful
+     material for the walls of the monastery already begun, and
+     of the church, could be obtained. Then, striving ever more
+     and more with all their heart, the builders of the temple
+     destined to be consecrated to the glory of God, laboured at
+     the work by night and by day.
+
+    [6] The intervention of a bird to aid in discovery was a
+    favourite tradition derived from antiquity. We may recall,
+    amongst many variants of the theme, the story of the
+    celebrated expedition of the Athenians to the Island of
+    Scyros to find and recover the body of Theseus. Theseus,
+    being a hero, the agent employed in the quest must likewise
+    be distinguished, and so the eagle, Zeus’s bird, is alone
+    thought worthy to peck the earth and indicate the
+    resting-place of the demi-god.
+
+Thus does Roswitha tell how the work of the new Foundation was begun,
+the Duke Liudolf and his wife having already journeyed to Rome to ask
+of the Pope his blessing, as well as to beg of him, as a token of his
+favour, some sacred relics to deposit there. The Pope, giving them his
+blessing, thus makes answer to their request:--
+
+     There were here, aforetime, two mighty rulers--the most holy
+     Anastasius who presided over this See, and his co-apostle,
+     the holy Innocent. These, through their services to the
+     Church, were the most famous next after St. Peter and St.
+     Paul. With such care have the illustrious bodies of these
+     two been heretofore preserved by all the rulers of this
+     city, that never has any one been permitted to carry away
+     the least portion of them, and thus their sacred limbs
+     remain undiminished. But forasmuch as it is meet that I
+     yield to your pious request, I will grant you, without
+     recompense, tokens from both these sacred bodies, cut before
+     your very eyes from off the sacred bodies themselves, if so
+     be that you will make solemn oath to me to venerate these
+     relics in your community, of the which you have made
+     mention, preserving them for all time within your Church,
+     sacred hymns being there sung by night and by day, and a
+     light being alway kept burning. And of our apostolic right
+     we ordain, according to your request, that your community be
+     of our See, to the end that it may be secured from all
+     secular rule.
+
+And Liudolf, with glad heart, made promise of this, and returned home
+with the coveted relics.
+
+The MS., now at Munich, which tells this fascinating story of love and
+faith, was, it is considered, written about A.D. 1000, and was
+fortunately preserved in the Benedictine convent of St. Emmeran,
+Ratisbon, where the scholar and poet, Conrad Celtes, discovered it at
+the end of the fifteenth century. It also includes metrical legends, a
+fragment of a panegyric on the Emperor Otho, and six dramas. Of such
+worth were these latter counted, that when Celtes published the MS. in
+1501, Albert Dürer received a commission for an ornamental title-page,
+and for a frontispiece to each of the plays. It is by these dramas
+that Roswitha has distinguished herself in the world of letters; for
+although the legends contain points of interest, and are treated with
+skill, they are naturally not so unique as the dramas, nor do they
+reflect her personality in the same way. She herself tells us that the
+plays were written in imitation of the manner, but not of the matter,
+of Terence, and that her only desire in writing them was “to make the
+small talent given her by Heaven to create, under the hammer of
+devotion, a faint sound to the praise of God.”
+
+But before considering her work, let us glance at her own life, and
+the life of contemporary Saxon nunneries.
+
+[Illustration: _Royal Library, Munich._
+
+COVER OF ST. EMMERAN GOSPELS.
+
+Tenth Century.
+
+_To face page 7._]
+
+Nearly one hundred and fifty years before the supposed date of
+Roswitha’s birth, the hitherto untamed and warlike Saxons had been
+finally defeated by the mercenaries of Charlemagne, and, as one of the
+signs of submission, forced to embrace Christianity. But having
+submitted, they forthwith, and with an aptitude suggestive of the
+spirit of the modern Japanese, set themselves to appropriate,
+assimilate, and remodel for their own use, the rudiments of the
+civilisation with which they found themselves brought into contact. So
+speedy and so thorough was the transformation, that scarce a century
+passed ere the once powerful Frankish kingdom of Charlemagne bowed
+down before the strenuous Saxons, to whom the supreme power was
+transferred. Their Chief was elected king of the Germans, and some
+fifty years later their king, Otho the Great, after being crowned at
+Aix-la-Chapelle, the former centre of Frankish rule, received the
+Imperial Crown from the Pope in Rome. This displacement of the
+political centre was naturally followed by a complete displacement of
+artistic centres. Both these sides of life were fostered by Otho with
+a keen personal interest--the building up of his empire and the
+encouragement of art going hand in hand. Moreover, owing to his close
+ties with Italy and the East, and the element of classic tradition
+inevitably induced by such ties, art received an added stimulus and
+grace. Oriental monks were to be found in the monasteries. Learned men
+and artists were summoned from Italy and Constantinople. The number
+and influence of these were increased when Otho’s son, afterwards Otho
+the Second, married Theophano, a Greek princess, who, bringing many
+compatriots in her train, sought to reflect in her German home
+something of the learning and splendour of the Byzantine Court. The
+ivory, shown in illustration, commemorating this marriage, is an
+example of the work of some Byzantine craftsman in her employ, whilst
+the jewelled and gold-wrought cover of the Gospels of St. Emmeran (now
+at Munich) shows to how high a level the goldsmith’s art of the time
+had been raised by the influences alluded to.
+
+[Illustration: _Musée de Cluny, Paris._
+
+MARRIAGE OF OTHO II. AND THEOPHANO.
+
+Byzantine, 10th century.
+
+_To face page 7._]
+
+Perhaps the one place which retains in the most varied and
+concentrated form the traces of this wave of artistic development then
+passing over Germany, is Hildesheim. This is of interest here because
+the bishops of Hildesheim were specially appointed to perform the
+office of consecration of nuns at Gandersheim. It seems hardly
+possible that Roswitha could have seen its gifted bishop Bernward,
+himself a painter, and a worker in mosaic and metals, though owing to
+the uncertainty of the date of her death--one chronicler making it as
+late as 1002--it is just possible that she may have done so.
+Bernward’s learning and artistic nature attracted the attention of the
+princess Theophano, who appointed him tutor to her son, the
+boy-emperor Otho the Third. Brought thus into touch with the many
+gifts presented on special occasions to the young Emperor by Greek and
+Oriental princes, as well as by “Scots” (_i.e._ Irish missionaries and
+emigrants settled in Germany), he, by taking with him to Court, from
+the School of Art established in his palace at Hildesheim, apt and
+talented youths, made use of these rare and beautiful offerings for
+the encouragement of the study of divers arts. Students also
+accompanied him when he went farther afield for study, for it is said
+of him that there was no art which he did not attempt, even if he
+failed to attain perfection.[7] Hildesheim thus became famous as a
+working-centre of fine art, especially in metals, and remained so down
+to the end of the Middle Ages. After a lapse of nearly a thousand
+years, the result of the labours of this artistic prelate and his
+pupils may still be seen in situ as it were. Besides jewelled
+service-books, there are chalices, incense burners, a gold
+candelabrum, and a jewelled crucifix, fashioned, if not in part by
+him, at least under his supervision. The entrance to the Cathedral is
+beautified with delicately wrought bronze doors, modelled, it may be,
+from those of Sta. Sabina, Rome, themselves considered to be of
+Oriental origin,[8] and in the transept rises a column adorned with
+bronze reliefs from the life of Christ, probably designed by the
+bishop either after his pilgrimage to Rome in 1001, when he had seen
+Trajan’s column, or, as a recent writer suggests, from the “Juppiter
+and giant columns” of Roman Rhineland.[9]
+
+    [7] Thangmarus, “Vita Sti. Bernwardi,” Migne, _Patrol. Lat._
+    140, col. 397. 6.
+
+    [8] Michel, _Histoire de l’Art_, 1905, Tome I. i. p. 258.
+
+    [9] _Journal of Studies_, vol. i. part i., 1911, article by
+    E. Strong, p. 24.
+
+We are tempted to recall other princesses whose marriages, and even
+more whose personalities, have influenced art and letters, but two
+must suffice us--the one, the beautiful and cultivated Anne of
+Bohemia, wife of Richard the Second, whose bridal retinue was in
+reality a small Court of literary and artistic personages; the other,
+the brilliant Valentine Visconti of Milan, sister-in-law of King
+Charles the Sixth of France, whose influence in matters of art and
+literature alone, at a time when England and France were so intimately
+associated, makes her of special interest to us.
+
+But what bearing, it may be asked, had Court life on the life of the
+nun Roswitha in the convent of Gandersheim? To answer this question we
+must recall briefly the position of the early religious houses, and
+especially those of Saxony. Many of the foundations were royal, and,
+in return for certain privileges, were obliged to entertain the king
+and his retinue whenever he journeyed. Such sojourns naturally brought
+a store of political, intellectual, and other information to the
+favoured house. Added to this, the abbess of such a house, generally a
+high-born and influential woman, was, in her position as a ruler of
+lands as well as of communities, brought into direct contact with the
+Court and with politics. To her rights of over-lordship were attached
+the same privileges and duties as in the case of any feudal baron. She
+issued summonses for attendance at her Courts, at which she was
+represented by a proctor, and, when war was declared, she had to
+provide the prescribed number of knights. In some cases her influence
+was supreme, even in imperial affairs, extending also to matters
+social and literary. Roswitha tells us how much she herself owed to
+the two successive abbesses under whose rule she lived, for
+suggestion, information, and encouragement in her literary work.
+
+The convents of Saxony, as many elsewhere in the tenth and eleventh
+centuries, were centres of culture in the nature of endowed colleges.
+In some of them women resided permanently, and besides their religious
+exercises, devoted themselves to learning and the arts, for the Church
+of the Middle Ages took thought for the intellect as well as for the
+soul. In others, no irrevocable vows were made, and if desire or
+necessity arose, the student inmate was free to return to the world.
+In others again, though residence was permanent, short leave of
+absence from time to time was granted by the abbess, and the nun was
+able to sojourn with her friends, or to visit some sister community.
+But at Gandersheim the rule was strict, and a nun, her vows once
+taken, had to remain within the convent walls. Yet even so, life there
+was perhaps far less circumscribed than in many a castle, where the
+men gave themselves up to war and the chase, and the women perforce
+spun and embroidered and gossiped, since to venture without the walls
+was fraught with difficulty and sometimes with danger. Even if there
+were some who cared to read, and who would fain go in imagination to
+other scenes and times, MSS. were difficult to come by, and costly
+withal. Wholly different was it in the religious houses. In these,
+women associated with their equals, with whom they could interchange
+ideas, and the library was well furnished with MSS. of classical and
+Christian writers. One of the first cares of St. Benedict, in the case
+of every newly founded house, was the formation of the library. So
+held in honour did this tradition become, and so assiduously was it
+pursued, that the status of a monastery or a convent, as a centre of
+learning, came to be estimated by its wealth in MSS. Besides the mass
+of transcribing which such rivalry occasioned, there was illuminating
+to be done, musical notation to be studied and prepared for the
+services of the Church, chants and choir-singing to be practised, and
+the needful time to be devoted to weaving and embroidery--a part of
+every woman’s education. Weaving had of necessity to be done in every
+convent in order to provide the requisite clothing for its inmates,
+and the large and often elaborate hangings used for covering the
+walls. Embroidery, on the other hand, was no mere occupation, or even
+a craft, but in truth a fine art. The few specimens still preserved
+give some idea of the quality of the work, whilst old inventories
+attest the quantity. Illuminated MSS. of the Gospels and the
+Apocalypse were lent from royal treasuries, and their miniatures were
+copied, with needle and silk, to adorn vestments and altar hangings.
+Then at Gandersheim, as we have already said, the occasional visits of
+princely travellers brought interest and diversion from the outside
+world. It was in an atmosphere such as this that Roswitha passed her
+days.
+
+Of her work, the metrical legends seem her earliest effort. In these,
+though they are mainly based on well-known themes, Roswitha shows much
+originality in description. Whilst they need not detain us, passing
+reference may be made to two of them--the Passion of St. Pelagius of
+Cordova, and the Fall and Conversion of Theophilus--since their
+subject matter is of value to us to-day. The one interests us because,
+in relating that the story was told her by an eye-witness of the
+martyrdom in A.D. 925 (_Acta SS._ Jun. V.), she shows that
+communication existed between that great intellectual centre, Cordova,
+and Germany, a fact that must have had considerable influence on art
+and literature; the other as being the story out of which the Faust
+legend was developed.
+
+After these legends, we turn to her panegyric on the Emperor Otho.
+This she opens by acknowledging her debt to the Abbess Gerberg, niece
+of Otho the Great, for aiding her in her literary work with her
+superior knowledge, and for giving her the necessary information
+concerning the royal doings. Then by humbly likening her mental
+perplexity and fear on entering upon so vast a subject to the feelings
+of one who has to cross a forest in winter when snow has obliterated
+the track, she in a few words pictures for us the natural wooded
+surroundings of the convent. Her poem--for such it really is--then
+sets forth the personal history of this monarch and his predecessors,
+rather than public events, and is thus of value more on account of its
+poetical than its historical quality. But one episode, picturesque in
+its quaint setting, and interesting historically because its stirring
+details are not to be found elsewhere, is worthy of record. It
+centres round Adelheid, the young and beautiful widow of Lothair, a
+Lombard king. Taken prisoner by his successor, the tyrant Berengarius,
+she is immured in a castle on the Lago di Garda, and threatened with a
+forced marriage with the son of her oppressor. This threat seems to
+endow her with superhuman power. Bidding defiance to all difficulty
+and danger, she contrives gradually to dig a secret way through the
+soft earth, and suddenly finds herself free. Dawn is just breaking.
+But how can she make use of her freedom before her guards awake and
+discover her escape? Quickly is her mind made up. But let Roswitha
+herself tell the story:--
+
+     As soon as black night yielded to the twilight, and the
+     heavens began to pale before the rays of the sun, warily
+     hiding herself in secluded caves, now she wanders in the
+     woods, now lurks in the furrows amongst the ripe ears of
+     Ceres, until returning night, clothed in its wonted gloom,
+     again veils the earth in darkness. Then once more is she
+     diligent to pursue her way begun. And her guards, not
+     finding her, all-trembling make it known to the officer
+     charged with the safe keeping of the lady. And he, struck to
+     the heart with the terror of grievous fear, set forth with
+     much company to make diligent search for her, and when he
+     failed, and moreover could not discover whither the most
+     illustrious queen had turned her steps, fearful, he made
+     report of the matter to King Berengarius. And he, at once
+     filled with exceeding wrath, forthwith sent his dependants
+     everywhere around, commanding them not to overlook any small
+     place, but cautiously to examine every hiding-place, lest
+     perchance the queen might be lying hid in any one. And he
+     himself followed with a band of stout-hearted troops as if
+     to overcome some fierce enemy in battle. And rapidly did he
+     pass on his way through the self-same corn-field in the
+     which the lady whom he sought was lurking in the bent-back
+     furrows, hidden beneath the wings of Ceres. Hither and
+     thither forsooth he traversed the very spot where she lay,
+     burdened with no little fear, and although, with great
+     effort, he essayed with outstretched spear to part the corn
+     around, yet he discovered not her whom by the grace of
+     Christ it concealed.
+
+From the sheltering corn Adelheid effects her escape, and after weary
+wandering, reaches the Castle of Canossa, the stronghold of the Counts
+of Tuscany. Any one who has visited this now ruined castle, some
+twenty miles from Parma, will remember the threadlike way between
+rocks covered with brambles, by which its eyrie height is approached.
+Up this steep track the queen, fearful of any pause, hastens, and
+finds a welcome and ready help. The Count becomes her champion, and
+appeals on her behalf to the Emperor Otho. The latter, glad of an
+excuse to further his cause in Italy, descends with his troops into
+the Lombard plain, weds the beautiful Adelheid, and receives the
+formal cession of the so-called kingdom of Italy from Berengarius and
+his son, whose power had ebbed away in their futile attempts to
+control their feudatories.
+
+Roswitha’s thrilling narrative is amplified by the graphic account
+recorded by St. Odilo, Abbot of Cluny, Queen Adelheid’s friend and
+one-time confessor. In this he tells us that during Adelheid’s
+imprisonment in a castle on the Lago di Garda, her chaplain Martin
+succeeds in making a hole in the wall, through which the queen and her
+maidservant, disguised as men, creep. He does not recount the episode
+of the hiding in the corn, but relates another equally stirring
+adventure. He tells us that, in fleeing from their persecutor to the
+safety of Canossa, the fugitives become involved in a swamp. After two
+days, they are rescued from their perilous position by a fisherman
+who, passing near by, and hearing sounds of distress, goes to their
+aid. Their deliverer, finding them faint with hunger and cold, lights
+a fire with the flint he carries in his wallet, and cooks some small
+fish, the only food he has to offer them. Once more they start on
+their way, and eventually reach Canossa. But hardly do they gain
+admittance, ere the castle is surrounded by the soldiery of the
+outwitted and wrathful Berengarius. A knight, carrying a message from
+the Emperor Otho of promised deliverance, essays to enter the castle,
+but finding this impossible owing to the hostile troops encamped
+around, he fastens the letter to an arrow, and shoots it over the
+wall. A strong force sent by Otho is near at hand, and speedily puts
+the enemy to flight. Adelheid is rescued, and is brought with
+rejoicing to Pavia, her dower city, which had already opened its gates
+to the Emperor, and she and the Emperor enter the city together in
+triumph. Much has been written of the illustrious Adelheid, but
+perhaps she would best like to be remembered by the eulogy of her
+confessor--the saintly Odilo--that she never forgot a kindness, or
+remembered an injury.
+
+It is in a spirit far different from that of her panegyric on the
+emperor Otho that Roswitha writes her dramas. Fear and mental
+perplexity no longer possess her. Though humbly begging the reader not
+to “despise these strains drawn from a fragile reed,” she has no
+misgiving, for she feels that herein lies her mission. She explains
+her reason for using the dramatic form, and for taking Terence as her
+model. There are many, she says,--and she does not entirely exonerate
+herself,--who, beguiled by the elegant diction of the Classics, prefer
+them to religious writings, whilst there are others who, though
+generally condemning heathen works, eagerly peruse the poetic
+creations of Terence because of the special beauty of his language.
+She further expresses the hope that by trying to imitate his manner,
+and by at the same time dramatising legends calculated to edify, she
+may induce readers to turn from the “godless contents of his works” to
+the contemplation of virtuous living. Emboldened by this pious hope,
+Roswitha shrinks from no difficulties or details, details which might
+well have made her hesitate, and which, betraying a knowledge of the
+world, have raised the question as to whether she made her profession
+as early as was customary. This solicitude of Roswitha for the welfare
+of frail and all too human mankind recalls St. Bernard’s condemnation,
+some hundred and fifty years later, of all carving in church or
+cloister, when he says, “one reads with more pleasure what is carven
+in stones than what is written in books, and would rather gaze all day
+upon these singular creations than meditate upon the Divine Word.”
+
+It has been maintained that the classic theatre decayed and
+disappeared as Christianity became all-powerful in Europe, and that
+the modern theatre seemingly arose in the twelfth century out of the
+services of the Church, and owed no debt to the past. But neither
+Nature nor Art works in this way except to our own unperceiving minds.
+After the fall of the Roman Empire, and the consequent disruption of
+society, classic civilisation gradually withdrew into the security of
+the religious communities, seeking, like distraught humanity, shelter
+and protection. It was in such tranquil atmosphere as this that Latin
+drama, though condemned in substance, was fostered and favoured as an
+education in style. Roswitha’s plays may, as has been said, have been
+the last ray of classical antiquity, but if so, it was a ray, like the
+pillar of fire, bright enough to guide through the dark night of
+feudalism to the coming day.
+
+Whether her dramatic efforts were an isolated phenomenon or not, must
+remain undecided, but it is reasonable to assume that any work
+surviving to the present day is but a sample of much else of the same
+sort that has disappeared in the course of time. Still all we would
+claim for them, apart from their intrinsic value and interest, is that
+they helped to keep up continuity in the tradition of drama. The
+gradual movement in the Church towards elaboration in its services
+which began in the ninth century,--a movement which led to the
+dramatising of the Mass, out of which the liturgical drama, and
+eventually the miracle-play, were evolved,--was a popular movement. To
+a people ignorant of Latin, yet fond of shows, it provided instruction
+and diversion alike. Roswitha, on the other hand, avowedly wrote for
+the literary world, and with a special end in view as regards that
+world. To attain this end, she set before her, as her master in style,
+Terence, who himself had aimed at a high ideal of artistic perfection,
+and of whom it has been said that he perpetuated the art and genius of
+Menander just as a master engraver perpetuates the designs of a great
+painter whose works have since perished. Still, in spite of the
+glamour of the style to which she aspires, and poetess though she is
+by nature, her plays reflect the handiwork of the moralist rather than
+that of the artist, for though beauty charms her by the way, her goal
+is moral truth, and to this all else must yield. If we would see the
+beauty of holiness as she saw it, we must enter in spirit within the
+shrine of her thought and feeling, just as the traveller, standing
+without the simple brick exterior of the tomb of Galla Placidia, at
+Ravenna, must penetrate within if he would know of the beauty there
+enshrined. “Il faut être saint, pour comprendre la sainteté.”
+
+The subject which dominates her horizon is that of Chastity. Treated
+by her with didactic intent, this really resolves itself into a
+conflict between Christianity and Paganism,--in other words, between
+Chastity and Passion,--in which Christianity triumphs through the
+virtue of Woman. But at the same time Roswitha neither contemns
+marriage nor generally advocates celibacy. She merely counsels, as the
+more blessed, the unmarried state. Yet even so, we feel that beneath
+her nun’s garb there beats the heart of a sympathetic woman, whose
+emotional self-expression is but tempered by the ideals of her time
+and her surroundings.
+
+Another important element to be taken into account in her plays is the
+part she assigns to the supernatural. It is impossible to develop
+character with any continuity when the supernatural, like some sword
+of Damocles, hovers continually overhead, ready to descend at any
+moment and sever cause from effect. Such a sword was the Divine
+Presence to Roswitha. When her plot requires it, she introduces a
+miracle, converting a character, at a moment’s notice, and in a way
+that no evolution could possibly effect, into one of a totally
+different kind. Still to her audience such a _dénouement_ would be
+quite satisfactory. With her, sudden changes and conversions but
+reflect the ideas which possessed the minds of her contemporaries, who
+realised God more in deviations from, than in manifestations of, law
+and order.
+
+Were her plays ever performed? To this question no certain answer can
+be given, since no record has yet been found of their performance, and
+the best critics are at variance on the subject. But judging from
+analogy, there seems to be no reason why they should not have been. We
+know that as early as the fifth and sixth centuries the monks played
+Terence, probably on some fête-day, or before their scholars as a
+means of instruction, and doubtless Roswitha’s plays were also acted
+on special occasions, such as when the Emperor sojourned at
+Gandersheim, or the Bishop made a visitation. As they were written in
+Latin, the literary language of the time, this in itself, even if
+their themes had appealed to the people, would have prevented them
+from being performed save before the educated few. So if we would
+picture to ourselves a performance of one of them by her companion
+nuns in the Chapter House, or it may be in the refectory, it must be
+before the Bishop and his clergy, and perhaps also some members of the
+Imperial family, and lords and ladies of the Court. How refreshing
+must such an entertainment have been to this distinguished company as
+it found itself carried away into an atmosphere of poetry and passion,
+of movement and colour, in place of the sobriety induced by the stiff
+liturgical dramas that probably formed the usual diversion! Such a
+drama was that of _The Wise and Foolish Virgins_, a specially
+favourite old-world dramatic exercise, dispensed as a sort of
+religious tonic to womankind, calculated to arouse slumbering souls,
+or to quicken to still further effort those that did not slumber. For
+us, its chief interest lies in the antiphonic arrangement of the
+dialogue, in which we may trace the first germs of characterisation,
+and in the music, the refrains of which contain the first suggestions,
+as far as we know, of the principle of the leitmotiv, a principle
+carried to its most complete development by Wagner. Although the
+earliest known MS. of it is of the eleventh century, so finished, yet
+so simple, are its dialogues and refrains, that it seems not
+unreasonable to infer that the form of the play was well known, either
+through some earlier MS. or through oral tradition. It is only a
+slight development of the elegy in dialogue which was performed in
+A.D. 874, at the funeral of Hathumoda, the first abbess of
+Gandersheim. This dialogue takes place between the sorrow-stricken
+nuns, who speak in chorus of their loss, and the monk Wichbert, who
+acts as consoler. Although its form is liturgical, its subject
+entitles it to be considered the earliest known mediæval dramatic work
+extant.
+
+Of Roswitha’s dramas, three seem to stand out as of special
+interest--_Abraham_, _Callimachus_, and _Paphnutius_. All of these are
+more or less patchwork adaptations from the legendary débris of
+antiquity. The first appears to have been taken by Roswitha from a
+Latin translation of a fourth-century Greek legend.[10] Whilst she
+does not display any originality in elaborating the story, but keeps
+carefully to the text--so much so that at times she merely
+transcribes--she reveals her artistic as well as her psychological
+instinct by concentrating the essentials, thereby transforming a
+rather discursive composition into a poignant picture. The subtle
+touches, the sentiment, and the dialogue so pathetic and so true to
+nature, make this drama verily her masterpiece, and one worthy of a
+place beside the delicate and dramatic miniatures of the time. In a
+few words, here is the story. A holy man, by name Abraham, has
+abandoned a life of solitude in order to take care of his young
+orphaned niece. After a few years, she is tempted to a house of ill
+fame. Some two years later, her uncle, having discovered her
+whereabouts, determines to exchange his hermit garb for that of a man
+of the world, and go to the house in the guise of a lover, so as to
+get an opportunity of speaking with his niece alone. Of course she
+does not recognise him in his change of costume, and when he asks for
+a kiss, she puts her arms round his neck, and suddenly detects a
+strange perfume. Instantly a change comes over her. The scent recalls
+to her her former unsullied life, and tears fill her eyes. At the
+fitting moment the uncle makes himself known, and showing her with
+sweet words of sympathy and encouragement that sin is natural to
+humanity, and that what is evil is to continue in it, takes her back
+with him to begin afresh the simple good life.
+
+    [10] Migne, _Patrol. Lat._ lxxiii.
+
+The second play recounts an incident taken from the apocryphal Acts of
+the Apostles, supposed to take place in the first century. A young
+heathen, Callimachus, falls in love with a young married woman, a
+Christian. She dies, and is buried the same day. That night
+Callimachus goes to the grave, and with the help of a slave disinters
+the body. Holding it in his arms, and triumphing in the embrace denied
+to him in life, he suddenly falls dead. In the morning the husband and
+St. John, coming to the cemetery to pray for her soul, see the rifled
+grave and the two dead bodies. St. John, at the command of Christ, who
+appears for but a moment, restores them both to life, and brings to
+repentance the young man, who, in further amendment of his ways,
+becomes a Christian. This mere outline of the play is given to suggest
+points of resemblance between it--the first sketch of this kind of
+drama of passion, the frenzy of the soul and senses--and the
+masterpiece of this type, _Romeo and Juliet_.
+
+Many passages in the plays of Roswitha remind us of Shakespeare, but
+it is not possible to deal adequately with them here, nor does it seem
+material to do so. There is no reason why Shakespeare should not have
+seen a printed collection of her dramas. He, like Dante, seems to have
+had the power of attracting material from every possible source, and
+it should not be forgotten what a sensation was caused by Celtes
+printing in 1501 Roswitha’s MS. But, on the other hand, the
+similarities we notice may be a mere coincidence, or, as is much more
+likely, the details in each case may have been common property handed
+down from one generation to another.
+
+In her play of _Paphnutius_, Roswitha made use of a story taken from
+the _Historia Monachorum_ of Rufinus, a contemporary of St. Jerome,
+who had journeyed through Palestine and Egypt to visit the Hermits of
+the Desert. The mention, too, at the beginning of Rufinus’s account,
+of a musician who tells of his retirement to a hermitage in order to
+change the harmony of music into that of the spirit, evidently
+suggested to her a discussion on music and harmony, probably adapted
+from Boëthius’s _De Musica_. In this discussion lies the chief
+interest of the play as giving us some idea of the sort of
+intellectual exercises probably practised by women in convents in the
+tenth century. The play opens with a truly mediæval scene,--a
+disputation between a hermit and his disciples on the question of
+harmony between soul and body, suggested by the want of it in the life
+of the courtesan Thais. Such harmony _should_ exist, says the holy
+man, for though the soul is not mortal like the body, nor the body
+spiritual like the soul, we shall, if we follow the method of the
+dialecticians, find that such differences do not necessarily render
+the two inharmonious. Harmony cannot be produced from like elements or
+like sounds, but only by the right adjustment of those which are
+dissimilar. This discussion on harmony naturally leads to one on
+music, which is divided, according to the then received writers on the
+subject, into three kinds--celestial, human, and instrumental. Music,
+in the Middle Ages, was, for dialectical purposes, treated in
+accordance with the Pythagorean theory as interpreted by Cicero in his
+_Somnium Scipionis_, who represented the eight revolving spheres of
+heaven--the Earth being fixed--as forming a complete musical octave.
+Such celestial music forms the subject of the argument in Roswitha’s
+play, the music of Earth being merely touched upon. Why, it is asked,
+do we not hear this music of the spheres if it exists? To this comes
+the answer that some think it is because of its continuity, others
+because of the density of the atmosphere, and others again because the
+volume of sound cannot penetrate the narrow passage of the human ear.
+And so with subtle argument, the music of Heaven was often drowned in
+the din of Earth. Dante, in the _Paradiso_, lifted the idea once more
+from Earth to Heaven, and clothed it in a wealth of gorgeous imagery.
+But it is Shakespeare who, with the magic of a few words, has given
+the thought immortality.
+
+    There’s not the smallest orb which thou behold’st
+    But in his motion like an angel sings,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Such harmony is in immortal souls;
+    But whilst this muddy vesture of decay
+    Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
+
+In judging of Roswitha’s dramatic work it must be remembered that, in
+true mediæval spirit fearing to profane what she venerates, she allows
+herself but little licence with the legends she dramatises.
+Nevertheless, as has been said, she from time to time shows, in
+psychological touches, a capacity for originality quite phenomenal for
+her time and for the literature of the cloister. Still her plays
+express but a very small part of the whole gamut of human emotions and
+experiences, just as her life was lived in an intellectual world
+narrow from the point of view of to-day or of the great intellectual
+age of antiquity. Many causes contributed to this. Intellectually, the
+Christian world shrank as Paganism was superseded by Christianity, a
+supersession by no means complete in Roswitha’s day. Of course this
+nascent Christianity was inconsistent with much of the intellectual
+life of the ancient world, which was either inextricably interwoven
+with Paganism, or essentially anti-religious. With its task of laying
+afresh the foundations of education, politics, and morality, it had to
+take root and become established in a relatively narrow intellectual
+field, the boundaries of which had gradually to be broken down,
+sometimes with violence.
+
+Time, like some lens which clears our vision, makes it an easy task to
+criticise and condemn a phase of religious life which, having essayed
+to tranquillise and sweeten existence, was, under altered conditions
+of civilisation, bound to pass away. We of to-day pride ourselves on
+a wider view of life, on a higher conception of duty, expressed in
+lives dedicated to public work as a necessary complement to private
+virtue. Still, if we would judge fairly this age of contemplation and
+faith within the convent walls, and all that, even if done mistakenly
+and imperfectly, it aspired to do, we must realise, as best we can,
+the world without those walls. One of our poets has vividly reflected
+it for us when he speaks of man’s life as made up of “whole centuries
+of folly, noise, and sin.” So bitter was life then and even later,
+that by the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, when mysticism had
+claimed many votaries, eternal rest, even at the cost of personal
+annihilation, was the whispered desire of many devout souls.
+
+“A Simple Stillness.” “An Eternal Silence.” These are the words that
+float across the centuries to us, like echoes from troubled, longing
+hearts. These are the words that give us the key to the understanding
+of the choice of vocation of the mediæval woman. The spiritual need
+for harmony and peace may have been great; the practical need was
+perhaps even greater; for in its accomplishment the spiritual found
+its consummation.
+
+
+
+
+A TWELFTH-CENTURY ROMANCE-WRITER, MARIE DE FRANCE
+
+
+“Marie ai nom, si sui de France.” Thus, more than seven centuries ago,
+wrote Marie de France. What an unpretentious autobiography! Yet these
+few simple words, which seem to tell so little, but in reality suggest
+so much, are the counterpart of her work, and form its fitting crown.
+
+But who was this modest writer, and why does her work interest us
+to-day? Around Marie de France there must always remain an atmosphere
+of doubt and mystery, since she is only mentioned by an anonymous
+thirteenth-century poet, and by one of her contemporaries--an
+Anglo-Norman poet, Denys Pyramus by name--who speaks of her in the
+most flattering terms, and from whom we learn that her lays were much
+appreciated by the noblesse, especially the ladies. That these should
+take rare delight in them may well be, seeing how monotonous life must
+have been to many a woman shut up with her maidens and her needlework
+in a dismal castle, or perhaps in but one tower of it, whilst her
+lord went forth to the chase or to war, his home-coming meaning merely
+the wine-cup and war-songs, or tedious epic. Many a one must have read
+or listened to Marie’s love idylls, and longed, and perhaps even
+hoped, as in the story of “Yonec,” that a fair and gentle knight, in
+the form of some beautiful bird, might fly in at her window and bring
+her some diversion from the outside world. With nothing before us but
+her own poems and the scant recognition of Denys Pyramus, she seems
+like some old portrait in which the delicate pigments that once glowed
+in the face and made it live have, owing to their very delicacy, long
+since faded away, leaving behind only the stronger and less volatile
+colours of the dark background from which we in vain try to wrest more
+than one or two fragments of the secret it holds.
+
+Judging from internal evidence, it would seem that Marie was born in
+Normandy, about the middle of the twelfth century, but settled in
+England, where since the Conquest, and indeed since the time of Edward
+the Confessor, many Norman families had made their home. Not only does
+she make occasional use of English words, and translate from English
+into French the fables known as Æsop’s, but in the prologue to her
+_Lays_, which she dedicates to “the noble King,” generally considered
+to be Henry the Second, she expresses fear lest her work should not
+find favour in a foreign land. In this prologue she also gives her
+reason for abandoning classical translation, which, as a Latin
+scholar, she had contemplated making, not only for the use of the less
+learned, but also, as she tells us, for personal discipline, since “he
+who would keep himself from sin, should study and learn and undertake
+difficult tasks. In suchwise he may the more withdraw him and save
+himself from much sorrow.” The twelfth century was a time of
+extraordinary intellectual activity, and Marie tells us that she
+suffered from what we are apt to regard as a special evil of our own
+day--the overcrowding of the literary market. So she wisely turned
+aside from the Classics and the crowd, and set herself to give
+literary expression to the old Celtic folk-lore, hitherto perhaps
+unrecorded save in song.
+
+Of Marie’s work that has come down to us we have _The Fables_, already
+mentioned, dedicated to Count William, surnamed Longsword, and son of
+Henry the Second and Fair Rosamond;[11] _The Lays_, dedicated to the
+king, Henry the Second, and doubtless read by Fair Rosamond in her
+retreat at Woodstock; and _The Purgatory of St. Patrick_, translated
+from the Latin at the request of an anonymous benefactor. Of these
+only _The Lays_ need here concern us, as it is in them that our
+interest lies, since they are perhaps among the first stories, given
+literary form, which tell of love “for love’s sake only,”--love
+unqualified and unquestioning. They form, perhaps, the only collection
+of lays now extant, and it is to them, therefore, that we must turn to
+get some idea of the style of narration that gradually replaced the
+taste for the epic as Norman influence grew and spread in England.
+Beside the sensualism of the _Chansons de Geste_, the sentiment
+expressed in them may seem naïve; beside the gallantry of the
+Provençal poetry, it may seem primitive; but nevertheless it is, in
+its very simplicity, the profoundest note that can be struck in this
+world of men and women. Marie makes no pretence to originality, but
+even if she did not possess the supreme gift of creating beauty, she
+at least possessed the lesser gift of perceiving it where it existed
+and of making it her own, and her stories glow with colour, and
+enchant by their simple yet dramatic appeal to the imagination. She
+declares that _The Lays_ were made “for remembrance” by “Le ancien
+Bretun curteis,” and that “Folks tell them to the harp and the rote,
+and the music is sweet to hear.” Doubtless it was this sweet music
+which both soothed and thrilled even before the words were understood,
+for on sad and festive days alike, the sweet lays of Brittany were
+always to be heard.
+
+    La reine chante doucement,
+    La voiz acorde a l’estrument:
+    Les mains sont belles, li lais bons,
+    Douce la voiz et bas li tons.
+
+    [11] Marie thus refers to Count William:--
+
+         “Pur amur le cumte Willaume,
+          Le plus vaillant de cest royaume,
+           M’entremis de cest livre feire,
+           E de l’Angleiz en Roman treire.”
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+LADY PLAYING HARP.
+
+Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 32._]
+
+Whether Marie was connected with the Court of Henry the Second and his
+brilliant and artistic queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, where learned men
+and poets congregated, we do not know, but it seems a very fair
+conjecture that she was. Not only does she dedicate her principal work
+to the king and his son, Count William, but her stories are coloured
+with the courtly life and ideas of her time, notwithstanding the
+simplicity of the fundamental theme. It is doubtful whether any one
+unacquainted with the teaching of the Courts of Love, such as they
+were in the twelfth century, would have made the compulsory quest of
+love the keynote of a story, as, for instance, Marie does in the “Lay
+of Guigemar.” These Courts of Love, though not so elaborate, yet
+seemingly as imperious, as those of the fourteenth century, formed one
+of the semi-serious pastimes of the Middle Ages, and although it may
+be that they were often mere forms of entertainment, no
+self-respecting person could afford to disregard their rules or
+decisions. The cardinal doctrine was that love was necessary to a
+man’s moral, social, and æsthetic training. Hence if it did not arise
+of itself, it must be sought for, and, like its counterpart in the
+spiritual world, come at, if needs be, through much tribulation.
+
+Owing to Henry’s possessions in France through inheritance, marriage,
+and the many ties of relationship which united the royal families of
+both countries, England and France were never more closely allied
+than they were at that time. French was established by them as the
+speech of the cultured and the high-born. The Norman Conquest had made
+us more cosmopolitan in both manners and ideas. May we not look on the
+victory at Hastings as a symbol as well as a reality? Did it not mean
+for us a spiritual as well as a material conquest, since, mingled with
+the clashing of battle-axes, was to be heard the chanting of the
+_Chanson de Roland_? Moreover, through a desire to bring about
+uniformity of sentiment and service, the Church, though perhaps
+unconsciously, aided this good work of general enlargement of outlook
+by appointing outsiders to control our abbeys and religious
+foundations. Thus, in the latter half of the twelfth century, the
+romantic movement which characterised late mediæval literature stirred
+in England and France alike, and Marie was one of its truest and
+daintiest exponents. Although what she relates may be fiction
+intermingled with myth and magic, she all the same pictures on her
+somewhat small canvases the ideas of her time, and so helps to make
+history.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+ADD. MS. 10293, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 34._]
+
+Marie’s readers and hearers were naturally to be found amongst
+castle-folk. That these were many we may conclude from the fact that
+the number of castles had already come to be regarded as a menace to
+the central government, and a royal command had gone forth for the
+demolition of many of them. That her stories were read and prized
+for at least a century and more is evident from the manuscripts--five
+in number, and all of the thirteenth, or the beginning of the
+fourteenth, century--which still exist. Her renown, too, had travelled
+even beyond the seas, for in about A.D. 1245 a translation of her lays
+into Norse was made by order of the king, Haakon the Fourth. The fact
+that their popularity began to wane after a hundred years or so is in
+no wise an adverse criticism of their intrinsic worth, for in the
+fourteenth century English was, in high places, beginning to take the
+place of French, and naturally the demand created a supply. But even
+if this had not been so, Marie’s work had served its purpose, and of
+necessity passed into the crucible of human thought and expression, to
+be resolved into matter suited to other needs and conditions. As has
+been well said, “les siècles se succèdent, et chacun porte son fruit,
+qui n’est pas celui du siècle précédent: les livres sont les fruits
+des mœurs.”
+
+Of the five manuscripts still extant, two are in the British Museum.
+One of these is the most complete that has come down to us, seeing
+that, in addition to its including the largest number of lays--twelve
+in all,--it alone contains the prologue, in which for a moment the
+illusive Marie lifts, as it were, her all-enshrouding veil. It is a
+small manuscript, beautifully inscribed, and even after its seven
+hundred years of existence, as fresh as is the love enshrined in its
+parchment pages. How strange a feeling possesses us as we turn over
+its leaves, leaves across which the shadows of readers of bygone days
+still seem to flit! Could these pages speak, of what would they tell?
+Of desires that die not, of longings that are immortal, of love
+enthroned.
+
+When first read, these stories, so simply are they told, may seem
+somewhat slight and superficial. But this is the general
+characteristic of mediæval literature, which, for the most part,
+recognised things in outline only, and sought, and perhaps possessed,
+but little knowledge of the hidden springs of motive. The writers of
+those times troubled as little about moral, as the early painters did
+about physical, anatomy. Still, in spite of this indifference to what
+has become almost a craze in our own day, Marie’s lays are so full of
+charming detail, deftly handled, that they give much the same sense of
+delight as do delicate ivories or dainty embroidery. Sometimes, it is
+true, she scarcely, despite all this outward charm, seems to touch the
+world of fact. Yet in this ideal atmosphere which she so essentially
+made her own, she contrives to convey such a sense of reality, that
+for the moment we are wholly possessed by it and carried away, without
+questioning, into her fairyland. And a beautiful fairyland it is,
+where love triumphs for the most part, not in heedless ecstasy along
+flower-bestrewn ways, but through self-sacrifice and suffering
+mutually accepted and mutually endured. Listen to the words spoken to
+the knight Guigemar, wounded by a chance arrow as he rides through a
+wood. “Never shalt thou be healed of thy wound, not even by herb, or
+root, or leach, or potion, until thou art healed by her who, for love
+of thee, shall suffer such great pain and sorrow as never woman has
+suffered before: and thou shalt bear as much for her.” Equality in
+love! Such is the vital note struck amid the artificial and
+soul-enfeebling atmosphere of mediæval love-poetry! This is the note
+which Marie set ringing down the centuries whilst her manuscripts lay
+unused on library shelves. This is Marie’s gift to the world, and this
+it is that gives her stories immortality. Not only do they possess
+this immortality in themselves, but they have also been immortalised
+by poets and writers both in days long past and in those more within
+our ken. All who know her stories will recall Chaucer’s indebtedness
+to incidents and descriptions in them, and coming to our own time, we
+find Sir Walter Scott taking his ballad of “Lord Thomas and Fair
+Annie” from the lay of “The Ash Tree,” although it is possible, as has
+been suggested,[12] that his ballad may have been founded on some
+Scotch folk-song having a common origin with Marie’s lay. When her
+lays were first published in Germany in 1820, Goethe wrote thus: “The
+mist of years that mysteriously envelops Marie de France makes her
+poems more exquisite and precious to us.” Yes, it is this
+all-pervading mystery which, though so tantalising, is yet so
+attractive. It is in vain that, in studying them, we try to penetrate
+somewhat beyond our normal atmosphere, for we only find ourselves lost
+in vague possibilities and hazy distances. Brittany has kept her
+secret concerning such of these lays as were hers just as jealously as
+she has kept her secret of the long avenues of great lichened stones
+which make Carnac look like the burial-place of some giant host.
+Marie’s lays are stories of deep meaning, which each reader must
+interpret for himself.
+
+    [12] Warnke. _Die lais der Marie de France_, p. lxiii.
+
+It is impossible to do more here than just touch upon Marie’s ideal
+conception of love, for to realise it fully it is necessary to read
+the stories themselves.[13] Allusion has been made to the wounded
+knight in the “Lay of Guigemar,” who can only be healed through mutual
+love sanctified by mutual suffering. In the lay of “The Ash Tree” a
+maiden of noble birth, abandoned in infancy and brought up in a
+convent, is loved by a lord, and returns his love, and goes with him
+to his castle. After a time the knights who owe him fealty complain
+that as through his love for his mistress he has neither wife nor
+child, he does them wrong, and protest that if he does not wed some
+noble lady, they will no longer serve him or hold him for lord. The
+knight has to yield to their demands and to consent to accept in
+marriage the daughter of a neighbouring noble who had made it known
+that he desired him for son-in-law. Neither lover utters any complaint
+or reproach, and the needful sacrifice is about to be made. But
+fortune, sometimes kind, intervenes ere it is too late, and reveals
+the noble birth of the loved one. The knight weds her with great joy,
+and to complete this happy picture we read that the other lady
+returned with her parents to her own domain, and was there well
+bestowed in marriage.
+
+    [13] Marie de France, _Seven of her Lays_, trans. E. Rickert,
+    1901; Warnke, _Die lais der Marie de France_, Halle, 1885;
+    Hertz, _Spielmannsbuch_, 1905.
+
+This idea of mutual sympathy and sacrifice gives meaning also to the
+lay of “The Two Lovers,” and to that of “Yonec,” but perhaps it is
+most simply, yet forcibly, summed up in the lay of “The Honeysuckle,”
+an episode taken from the Tristan story. Tristan, hearing that Isolde
+is to ride through a certain wood on her way to Tintagel to attend the
+Pentecostal Court held by the King, hides in the wood. Here he cuts a
+branch of hazel round which honeysuckle has twined, and carving his
+name and certain letters on it, he lays it in the way by which the
+Queen must pass, knowing that she will recognise it as a sign that her
+lover is near, since they have met before in suchwise. The import of
+the writing is that he has long been waiting to see her, since without
+her he cannot live, and that they two are like the hazel branch with
+the encircling honeysuckle, the which, as long as they are
+intertwined, thrive, but as soon as they are separated, both perish.
+Says Tristan, “Sweet Love, so is it with us--nor you without me, nor I
+without you.”
+
+But besides this conception of love which Marie had simply found
+awaiting expression, when we turn to examine the stories somewhat in
+detail, we find legend and poetry, Eastern magic and Christian
+symbolism, mingled with strange ingenuity. Whence came all these
+divers threads which Marie has so dexterously interwoven? It is very
+difficult to tell whether we are wholly in a world of romance,
+accepted by her without question, or whether she had some
+understanding of the divers matters she touches upon, and shaped them
+into a new form to suit new hearers. The answer to this question seems
+to depend on whether Marie recounted the lays from hearsay, or whether
+they had been already written down, and were merely retold by her, she
+colouring them with the atmosphere of her time, which was charged with
+strange incongruities of religion and magic. To this we can give no
+certain answer, since Marie herself gives no hint, and only tells us
+that the ancient Bretons made the lays. But whatever may have been her
+contribution, Christian or otherwise, to the original matter she
+worked upon, we cannot help feeling that we have before us the remains
+of some primitive mythology overlaid and interpenetrated with Eastern
+lore, especially that of India, which, in the Middle Ages, was spread
+broadcast in the West. This Indian thought, itself borrowed in a
+measure from Egypt, had also been tempered by the Hellenism which,
+after the conquests of Alexander the Great in Asia, had filtered
+through India, and had on the way become tinged with its colour and
+its mystery. It was from the matter of these Indian stories that so
+much was learnt, for whilst, in the West, the national epic and the
+chivalrous romance had been alone considered worthy of record, in the
+Indian stories all social conditions were revealed, and poets thus
+learnt little by little to observe and portray the manners and
+sentiments of the people generally, changing social conditions also
+acting in the same direction. All such influences must be taken into
+consideration in studying mediæval literature generally, but
+particularly the occult element in Oriental thought which presents
+such difficulties to the less meditative Western mind, and has in
+consequence given rise to much misconception.
+
+In the “Lay of Guigemar,” which we take first because it is the first
+in the manuscript, we find Marie making use of a subject, in gorgeous
+setting, of Christian symbolism, but using it apparently so
+unconsciously that it is only from one or two details that we realise
+what is really lurking in disguise. Guigemar, the wounded knight
+already referred to, to whom naught but love, and sorrow endured for
+love, can bring any alleviation, sets forth for his healing. He comes
+across a ship into which he enters, and which by unseen means carries
+him to the desired haven. As we read the description of the ship, our
+thoughts at once revert to the picture of the barge in which Cleopatra
+goes to meet Antony. Marie tells us that the fittings are of ebony,
+and the unfurled sail of silk. Amid the vessel is a bed on to which
+the wounded knight sinks in anguish. This is of cypress and white
+ivory inlaid with gold, the quilt of silk and gold tissue, and the
+coverlet of sable lined with Alexandrian purple.[14] All this we might
+regard as merely a poet’s fancy were it not that we go on to read that
+there were set two candlesticks of fine gold with lighted tapers. Here
+we have the clue. Doubtless the ship, a favourite theme of Christian
+symbolism, and one which delighted poets and painters and workers in
+mosaic alike, represented the Church. It is not to be necessarily
+inferred that Marie, when giving her hero so rare a means of transit,
+had in her mind all the elaborate symbolism connected with it; but she
+had probably read or heard tell of it, and made use of it simply for
+the enhancement of her story. It is in such ways that we find
+mysteries embedded, the real significance of them being lost or
+misunderstood or unheeded, just as the Renaissance painters, without
+any knowledge of Arabic characters, and solely on account of the
+ornamental quality of the lettering, used texts from the Koran, and
+distorted into mere design the sayings of Mahomet.
+
+    [14] Compare with this the bed of “King Fisherman” described
+    in _Holy Grail_, vol. i. p. 137, trans. Sebastian Evans,
+    1898.
+
+In the lay of “The Two Lovers” we again find Christian symbolism in
+disguise. Here is the old theme of a difficult task to be accomplished
+by the lover before he can win his lady.[15] The undertaking imposed
+is the carrying of the loved one to the top of a hill, and our
+interest in it is enhanced by the fact that the trial was to be made
+near Pitres, a few miles from Rouen, where there is a green hill,
+still known as “La Côte des Deux Amans.” In Rouen there lived a king
+who had an only daughter, very fair and beautiful, whose hand was
+sought in marriage of many. Loath to part with her, he bethought him
+how he could thwart her suitors. To this end he caused it to be
+proclaimed far and wide that he would have for son-in-law only him who
+could carry his daughter to the top of the hill without pausing to
+rest. Many came, but each in turn failed, greatly to the content of
+the princess, since secretly she loved, and was loved by, a young
+knight who frequented her father’s Court. At last, constrained by
+love, the knight, though with much misgiving, determines to undertake
+the adventure. Before allowing him to do this, the maiden, in order to
+ensure his success, and herself fasting meanwhile, bids him go to
+Salerno,[16] near Naples, a school of medicine famous in the Middle
+Ages, and ask of her kinswoman there, who was well practised in
+medicine, a draught to give him the needful strength for his task.
+Returned with this potion, he makes the attempt, but so great is his
+desire to reach the goal quickly, that he will not slacken his speed
+to drink from the phial carried by his Love, but hastens forward, only
+to fall dead as he reaches the summit of the hill.
+
+    [15] Hertz, _op. cit._ p. 396.
+
+    [16] This mention of Salerno is of interest on account of the
+    reference to women practising there as medical experts. The
+    origin of the School remains in obscurity, and it is not
+    until the ninth century, when the names of certain Salerno
+    physicians appear in the archives, that we get any definite
+    information with regard to it. It seems to have been a purely
+    secular institution, but it is quite possible that its
+    development was aided by the Benedictines, who became
+    established there in the seventh century, and who made
+    medical science one of their principal studies. Before the
+    middle of the eleventh century there were many women there
+    who either practised medicine or acted as professors of the
+    science, and some of the latter even combined surgery with
+    medicine in their teaching and treatises. These women doctors
+    were much sought after by the sick, and were much esteemed by
+    their brother-professionals, who cited them as authorities.
+    That the sexes were on an equal footing we infer from the
+    fact that the title of “master” (Magister) was applied to men
+    and women alike, the term “doctor” not having come into use,
+    apparently, before the thirteenth century. Besides the
+    general practitioners and the professors, there were others
+    who fitted themselves specially for military service, as well
+    as priests who added medical knowledge to their holy calling.
+    The teaching followed that of Hippocrates and Galen, and the
+    Salerno school was world-renowned in the art of drug
+    preparation. In the thirteenth century, however, Arab medical
+    writings began to be known in Europe through Latin
+    translations, and Arab practice in medicine, though based on
+    Greek teaching, initiated a new departure. As a result of
+    this, the glory of Salerno waned. Another cause of its
+    decline in fame and popularity was the founding by the
+    Emperor Frederick the Second of a school of medicine at
+    Naples, which he richly endowed, and the rise, unencumbered
+    by old traditions--for medicine, like scholasticism, could be
+    hampered by dialectical subtlety--of the school of
+    Montpelier.
+
+In this strength-giving potion we may perhaps see the expression of a
+Christian, and the survival of a pre-Christian belief, where the
+getting of strength and life is only possible through a direct act of
+communion, either material or spiritual, with the god. Such world-old
+beliefs, in which the supernatural intervenes to help the natural, are
+also intimately connected, even if they are not identical, with the
+magic of philtres and charms.
+
+We pass from Christian symbolism to magic in the lay of “Yonec.” The
+delightful ease with which mediæval folk turned from magic to
+religion, or _vice versa_, shows how simply they accepted what they
+did not understand. At the same time it proves how intermingled the
+two were, and that what some are inclined to separate now, were once
+regarded as one and the same thing, the eccentricities and impositions
+which have developed in both being of mere external growth, and to be
+treated accordingly. In the lay of “Yonec” a young wife, passing fair,
+is shut up by her jealous old husband in a great paved chamber in a
+tower of his castle, to which no one save an ancient dame and a priest
+has admittance. After seven years of this isolation and uncongenial
+company, the lady remembers that she has heard tell that means have
+been found to rescue the unhappy, and she wishes with all her heart
+that deliverance may come to her. Suddenly a shadow comes across the
+window, and into her chamber there flies a falcon, which forthwith
+changes into a knight. As soon as the lady has recovered from her
+surprise, the knight tells her that he has long loved her, but could
+not come until she wished for him. Here we have an incident, borrowed
+direct from Oriental magic, in which a modern believer in psychical
+phenomena might find an element of telepathy. The will, as in all
+magic, is the motive power which acts sympathetically on the object of
+desire, that object being in a receptive condition. Quickly we turn
+from magic, and the story goes on to tell that the lady, before
+accepting the knight as her lover, makes it a condition that he
+believes in God, and the knight offers to prove his belief by taking
+the Sacrament. This demand is evidently in the nature of a protective
+test. It was very usual to try some means of discovering whether a
+person was in league with the powers of evil or not; for if any one
+unworthy touched holy things, retribution came at once, either by
+death or some dire visitation. But how is the priest to administer the
+Sacrament without seeing the knight? The latter tells her that he will
+make himself like her in appearance; in other words, that he will
+hypnotise the priest, and make him see what he, the knight, wishes him
+to. The ruse succeeds, and for a time all goes well; then comes
+discovery, despair, and death. The whole story is a most extraordinary
+medley of fairy-lore, religion, and magic, and most characteristic of
+the mediæval mind.
+
+The lay of “Eliduc,” the last in the manuscript, is also the longest
+and most elaborate. Marie unfolds her story with so certain yet so
+subtle a hand, that the reading of it is like the unwinding of some
+finely illuminated parchment-roll where miniature follows miniature,
+each perfect in itself, yet all needful to the whole. To the charm of
+its pictures of mediæval life, with the fine scene between the two
+women, and their final reunion in the same convent, there is added an
+incident which gives special interest and importance to the story,
+since it brings us into touch with one of the oldest and most
+widespread of traditions--the restoration to life, from apparent
+death, by means of a flower. There are few pursuits more fascinating
+than the tracing of traditions, except, it may be, that of symbols,
+with which they have so much in common. We find the same traditions,
+just as we find the same symbolic figures, common to the most widely
+separated peoples, and the real interest in the case of each lies in
+trying to discover how and why in the course of their migrations their
+form and their significance have been varied or modified. But before
+considering the tradition, let us first hear the story.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+BOAT WITH KNIGHTS AND LADY.
+
+Add. MS. 10294, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 49._]
+
+Eliduc, a knight of Brittany, whose wife, Guildeluëc, was very dear to
+him, had for over-lord one of the kings of Brittany, with whom, owing
+to faithful service, he had gained high favour. Being defamed on this
+account by envious tongues, he was banished from Court, and thereupon
+determined to quit his country for a while and seek service in the
+West of England. With many promises to his wife to be faithful to her,
+he set out for Totnes, where he found many kings ruling in the land,
+all at war with one another. One of them, a very old man, was ruler in
+the province of Exeter, and at war with a neighbouring king on account
+of his refusal to give to the latter his daughter, Guilliadun, in
+marriage. So Eliduc determined to offer his services to the old king,
+by whom they were accepted, and by his tact and prowess he soon proved
+himself worthy of the trust reposed in him. Through a skilful ambush,
+planned and conducted by him, he defeated the enemy. Guilliadun,
+hearing of his deeds, sought an interview with him, and at once fell
+in love with him, and after certain maidenly reserve and hesitation,
+made her love known to him. This Eliduc secretly returned, but,
+troubled at the remembrance of his wife and of his pledge to her, his
+courage failed him to confess that he was already wedded. In order to
+escape from his dilemma, he sought and obtained the permission of the
+old king to avail himself of the entreaty of his liege-lord to return
+to his own country to fight against the enemies who were desolating
+the kingdom. This permission was granted under his promise to come
+back if his services were again required. After pledging himself to
+Guilliadun to do this on such a day as she should name, Eliduc,
+having exchanged rings with her, and she having named the day for his
+return, departed. Having speedily reduced the enemies of his
+liege-lord to submission, he came once more to England, and
+immediately sent to Guilliadun to apprise her of this, and to beg her
+to be ready to start on the morrow. Guilliadun secretly left the
+castle the next night and joined her lover, and together they hurried
+to Totnes, whence they at once set sail. But as they were nearing
+land, a violent storm arose. Finding that prayers were of no avail,
+one of the company cried out, “We shall never make the land, for you
+have a lawful wife, and you are taking with you another woman, setting
+at naught God, the law, and uprightness. Let us cast her into the sea,
+and anon we shall get to land.” On hearing these words Guilliadun fell
+as one dead, whereupon Eliduc in anger struck the esquire on the head
+and hurled him into the sea. When the ship was brought to port
+Guilliadun showed no sign of life. So Eliduc, believing her to be
+dead, lifted her in his arms, carried her ashore, and, mounting his
+horse, sadly bore her to a small chapel in a forest adjoining his own
+lands. Here he laid her in front of the altar, and covered her with
+his cloak, and then returned to his home. Filled with sadness, he
+arose early each morning and went to the chapel to pray for her soul,
+marvelling nevertheless to find that the face of his Love suffered no
+change except to become a little paler. His wife, made anxious by his
+melancholy and silence, and wondering whither he went, had him
+watched, and soon discovered the truth. Taking a varlet with her, she
+went to the chapel, and there discovered the beautiful maiden, looking
+like a new-blown rose, and at once guessed the cause of her husband’s
+sadness and gloom. As she sat watching and weeping out of sheer pity,
+a weasel ran from behind the altar and passed over the body of
+Guilliadun, and the varlet struck it with a stick and killed it. Then
+its mate came in and walked round it several times, and finding that
+it could not rouse it, made sign of great sorrow and ran out into the
+wood, and returning with a red flower between its teeth put it into
+the mouth of its dead companion, which within an hour came to life
+again. Guildeluëc, seeing this, seized the flower and laid it in the
+mouth of the maiden, who after a short time sighed and opened her
+eyes. Then she told Guildeluëc that she was a king’s daughter, and had
+been deceived by a knight called Eliduc, whom she loved, and who
+returned her love, but who had hidden from her that he was already
+married. Guildeluëc thereupon made known to her who she was, and sent
+at once for her husband. When he came, she begged him to build a
+nunnery, and to allow her to retire from the world, as she would fain
+give herself to the service of God. When the nunnery was ready,
+Guildeluëc took the veil, with some thirty nuns, of whom she became
+the Superior. Then Eliduc wedded his love, and after some years of
+happiness they too resolved to retire from the world, Guilliadun
+joining Guildeluëc, who received her as a sister, and Eliduc going to
+a monastery which he had founded near by.[17]
+
+    [17] M. Gaston Paris (_Poésie du Moyen Age_, vol. ii.), in
+    recalling various legends of “Le Mari aux deux femmes,”
+    suggests that the present story, borrowed by Marie from
+    Celtic tradition, is probably of Occidental, and not
+    Oriental, origin, since in the polygamous East the story of
+    two wives would not have furnished a sufficient motive for a
+    special narration.
+
+In this charming romance, given here in epitome only, the two most
+interesting points, after noting the mutual suffering of the lovers
+for love’s sake, are the episode of the sacrifice to the sea, and that
+of the weasel and the life-giving flower. Both these incidents point
+to the great antiquity of the fundamental theme of the story, which
+Marie, possibly like many another before her, merely reclothed in
+garments suited to the fancy of the time. In most stories where the
+sea has to be appeased by the sacrifice of some one, it is the guilty
+person who is thrown overboard, or if the offender is not known, lots
+are cast to determine who shall be the one to make expiation to the
+god. In the present instance Eliduc is clearly the wrong-doer, but he
+is the hero, and must be treated as such, and accordingly the hostile
+voice is the one to be silenced in the depths of the sea.
+
+The other incident--the restoration to life by means of a flower or a
+herb--frequently occurs in classical stories and folk-lore.[18]
+Perhaps the most familiar example, and, owing to the recent
+excavations in Crete, the most interesting one, is that connected with
+Glaucos, son of Minos, king of Crete. In the story (Apollod. iii. 3)
+Glaucos when a boy fell into a cask of honey and was smothered. His
+father, ignorant of his fate, consulted the oracle to ascertain what
+had become of him, and the seer Polyeidos of Argos was named to
+discover him. When he had found him, Minos shut Polyeidos up in the
+tomb with the dead body of the boy until he should restore the latter
+to life. Whilst Polyeidos was watching the body, a serpent suddenly
+came towards it and touched it. Polyeidos killed the serpent, and
+immediately a second one came, which, seeing the other one lying dead,
+disappeared and soon returned with a certain herb in its mouth. This
+it laid on the mouth of the dead serpent, which immediately came to
+life again. Polyeidos seized the herb and placed it on the mouth of
+the dead boy, who was thereupon restored to life.
+
+    [18] Warnke, _op. cit._ civ.; Hertz, _op. cit._ p. 409.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+GLAUKOS AND POLYEIDOS IN TOMB.
+
+Greek Vase, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 52._]
+
+This story is most graphically depicted on a fifth-century Greek vase
+in the British Museum, and, whatever its real interpretation may be,
+it has gained in significance since the life of the distant past of
+the island has been laid bare, and large jars, which in all
+probability were used for storing wine and honey and other
+necessaries, and from their size and contents might well have
+proved a snare to a venturesome and greedy boy, have been discovered
+_in situ_. After a lapse of many centuries we find this idea of the
+life-giving plant reappearing in mediæval garb, daintily fashioned by
+Marie de France.
+
+Marie, in her story, tells us that the weasel brings a _red_ flower.
+This was possibly the verbena, well known in folk-medicine as vervain,
+and much used in the Middle Ages. According to one writer, the weasel
+uses vervain as a preservative against snake-bites, and this idea of
+its effect might easily have been extended to include death. Even so
+great an authority as Aristotle mentions that the weasel understood
+the potent effects of certain herbs. The intervention of a weasel
+instead of the usual serpent opens up the further interesting question
+as to whether this weasel incident was not imported from India, where
+Greek stories had become alloyed with Indian lore. Even to-day, in
+India, a mongoose, a species of weasel, is sometimes taken on
+expeditions by any one fearful of snakes, and kept at night in the
+tent as a protection against them.
+
+In addition to the choice of a weasel as medium, the unusual colour of
+the flower is also of interest. Giraldus Cambrensis, writing in the
+twelfth century on the subject of weasels, after remarking that they
+have more heart than body (_plus cordis habens quam corporis_), goes
+on to say that they restore their dead by means of a _yellow_ flower,
+and in the still earlier record of the Lydian hero Tylon, where a
+serpent is the intermediary--and serpents are often credited with a
+knowledge of life-giving plants,--reference is made to a _golden_
+flower.[19] This may possibly be connected with the idea of the
+life-giving power of the god, since the golden flower is dedicated to
+Zeus. Professor J. G. Frazer thinks that a red flower may perhaps have
+been chosen to suggest a flow of blood--an infusion of fresh life into
+the veins of the dead. It is also possible that red and yellow may
+have been interchangeable terms, just as they are to-day amongst the
+Italian peasantry. The choice of colour may, however, have been
+derived from the red anemone, which is said to have sprung from the
+blood of Adonis, with whom love and life are traditionally associated.
+There are some, on the other hand, who ascribe to the story a deep
+spiritual meaning. With them it is not the flower itself which brings
+about resurrection from apparent death, but the spiritual truth of
+which the flower is but the outward symbol. It may be that the red
+blossom represents the joys of earth which Eliduc’s wife voluntarily
+renounces, and which, surrendered to her rival, in time became like a
+burning thing whose fiery touch awakens to life the sleeping
+conscience. In a story such as this, which has evidently travelled far
+and wide before we find it in England in the eleventh century, it is
+possible that any or all of these surmises may be true. The whole of
+this incident of the weasel and the flower, read in the original, is
+of extraordinary interest and beauty. What a touching picture of
+animal sensibility is the account of the despair of the weasel on
+finding its dead mate, and its tender display of solicitude and
+sympathy, raising the lifeless head and trying to reanimate the small
+inert body! Only one who loved animals and knew their habits well
+could have told thus tenderly and graphically a story so simple, yet
+so suggestive, of the love of two sentient things, a love which runs
+like a thread of gold through all creation and makes it one.
+
+    [19] J. G. Frazer, _Adonis, Attis, Osiris_, p. 98.
+
+The twelfth century was an age of humanism as well as feudalism. As
+often happens in times of comparative peace, a growth of interest in
+the individual was springing up and finding expression in lyric poetry
+and stories. The day of epics was waning. Those vast and involved
+poems, like to huge and complex frescoes, found little favour at a
+time when men and women, or at least women, had more leisure and
+inclination to try to get below the surface of things. Heroes had been
+glorified till they had almost become deified, and something more
+personal, more individual, was wanted. By the side of modern romance,
+where the most sacred and secret intricacies of human nature are, as
+it were, displayed under the microscope, Marie’s narrations may seem
+somewhat artless. But in putting into words the dawning desires of her
+time she gave form and impetus to feeling and thought struggling for
+expression, and gained for her work a definite place in the
+development of human utterance. Evolution, whether of the spirit or of
+matter, is the supreme law of things. Marie struck a spark from the
+ideal which poets and writers down the ages have fanned into a flame.
+
+
+
+
+A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY MYSTIC AND BEGUINE, MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG
+
+
+The triumphant ecclesiasticism of the thirteenth century, manifested
+in the forms of political power, material wealth, splendid
+architecture, and worldly positions sufficiently commanding to satisfy
+even the most ambitious, was, perhaps naturally, accompanied by a
+gross materialism. Against this the truly pious-minded revolted,
+thereby causing a reaction towards mysticism. Whilst before the eyes
+of some there floated, as the ideal, the material ladder leading to
+fame and power, before those of others there arose, as in a vision,
+the “Ladder of Perfection,” each rung of which gained brought them
+nearer to the object of their quest--Divine Reality. These latter,
+whether of great, or lesser, or even of no renown, and amongst whom
+women played a great and very notable part, were scattered far and
+wide; but each one cultivated some little corner of the mystic garden.
+One such garden was the Cistercian convent of Helfta, near Eisleben,
+in Saxony, in the thirteenth century a centre of mystic tendencies.
+It was here that, harassed and ill, Mechthild of Magdeburg took
+refuge, and entered as a nun in 1270. But we are anticipating.
+
+Mechthild, at first a beguine, and afterwards a nun, but a visionary
+from the days of her childhood, was born, most probably of noble
+parents, in the diocese of Magdeburg, in 1212. That she is perhaps
+better known to the general reader than are other contemplatives of
+her day is probably due to the suggestion that she may be the Matilda
+immortalised by Dante in the “Earthly Paradise” (_Purg._ xxviii. 22
+_seq._), rather than to her own writings. This may be partly because
+the personality of that supreme visionary and poet tended, as does all
+superlative genius, to cast a shadow over the lesser lights of both
+earlier and later times, and partly because, although Mechthild’s
+works were early translated into Latin, she wrote in Low German.
+Though this original MS. has not yet been found, there exists one,
+translated into High German in 1345 at Basle (a centre of the “Friends
+of God”) by the Dominican, Heinrich von Nördlingen, by which
+Mechthild’s work has been made known to us, but the language even of
+this proves a very real stumbling-block to the most strenuous student.
+Still, by recording her thoughts and visions in the language of her
+country and her day, she gained a lay audience, a result which would
+have been hardly possible if she herself had been a classic. But
+though no classic--for she says Latin was difficult to her--she
+evidently, as her work shows, grew up under the influence of courtly
+life, and knew the language of minstrels. She tells us that her mind
+was turned to the spiritual life when she was but twelve years of age,
+and that from that time worldly glory and riches became distasteful to
+her. Like the visionary and Saint, Theresa of Avila, of 300 years
+later, she took into her confidence her younger brother, Baldwin, who
+later, perhaps under her influence, became a Dominican. What we know
+of her, we know from her writings, which exist in the above-mentioned
+unique MS. (No. 277) now in the monastery Library of Einsiedeln, a
+foundation south of the Lake of Zurich, and still one of the most
+famous of pilgrim resorts. In seeking to know more of the history of
+this MS. we get a most interesting and intimate glimpse of the methods
+in religious centres in bygone days, when MSS. were few. In quite
+early times--how early is not known--there dwelt in the valleys round
+about Einsiedeln certain devout women-recluses, who later lived, as a
+community, in four houses, and, ultimately, in a convent. They were
+called “Forest Sisters,” a name which may well express the poetry and
+peace of their life and surroundings. Whilst they were still living in
+the detached houses, the MS. was, through Heinrich von Rumerschein of
+Basle, sent by Margaret of the Golden Ring, a beguine of that town, to
+the one called “The Front Meadow.” Heinrich addresses the gift “To
+the Sisters in the Front Meadow.” “You shall know that the book that
+is sent by her of the Golden Ring is called _The Light of the
+Godhead_, and to this you shall give good heed. It shall also serve in
+all the houses of the wood, and shall never leave the wood, and shall
+remain a month in each house. Also it shall go from one to another as
+required, and you shall take special care of it. Pray for me who was
+your Confessor, though, alas, unworthy.”
+
+In 1235, at the age of twenty-three, Mechthild--not without many a
+heart-pang, and prompted to this determination by a troubled
+conscience, a determination doubtless brought about by the preaching
+of the Dominican friars, who were stirring all classes by their
+impassioned zeal--left her home and went to Magdeburg, where she
+entered a settlement of beguines. These settlements, semi-monastic in
+character, were provided to afford some protection, by living in
+community, for women who, whilst devoting themselves to a religious
+life, did not wish to separate themselves wholly from the world. It
+was at the time of the Crusades, when the land teemed with desolate
+women, that their numbers increased so greatly, and the first
+beguinage was founded about the beginning of the thirteenth century.
+The beguine took no vows, could return to the world and marry if she
+so desired, and did not renounce her property. If she was without
+means, she neither asked nor accepted alms, but supported herself by
+manual labour or by teaching the children of burghers, whilst those
+who were able to do so spent their time in taking care of the sick or
+in other charitable offices. Each community, with a “Grand-Mistress”
+at its head, was complete in itself, and regulated its own order of
+living, though, later, many of them adopted the rule of the Third
+Order of St. Francis.
+
+Mechthild tells us that she knew but one person in Magdeburg, and that
+even from this one she kept away for fear lest she might waver in her
+determination. In this very human way she indicated that her spiritual
+adventure was no easy matter to her, as, indeed, it could not be so
+long as her temperament and ideals were at variance. But gradually,
+she says, she got so much joy from communion with God that she could
+dispense with the world. As has been well said, “La loi des lois c’est
+que tout morceau de l’univers venu de Dieu retourne à Dieu et veut
+retourner à lui.”
+
+The book of her writings, which, under divine direction as she opens
+by saying, she calls _The Flowing Light of the Godhead_,[20] is
+composed of seven parts, of which six appear to have been written down
+during the time she was a beguine at Magdeburg, and were collected and
+arranged by a Dominican friar, Heinrich von Halle, whilst the
+seventh, consisting of sundry visions and teachings during the last
+years of her life, was put together just before her death at Helfta in
+1282, and, as she pathetically adds, “by strange eyes and hands.” In
+all of these, whilst reflecting in them her inmost feelings, she
+expresses her entire dependence on spiritual help and inspiration.
+“The writing of this book,” she says, “is seen and heard and felt in
+every limb. I see it with the eyes of my soul, and hear it with the
+ears of my eternal spirit, and feel in every part of my body the power
+of the Holy Ghost.”
+
+    [20] P. Gall. Morel, _Offenbarungen der Schwester Mechthild
+    von Magdeburg, oder das fliessende Licht der Gottheit_,
+    Regensburg, 1869.
+
+The general tenor of her writings is contemplative and prophetic.
+Whilst, as a contemplative, she reminds us of Suso, as a reformer,
+proclaiming her prophetic warnings, she recalls to us St. Hildegarde,
+though the latter was a more astute and powerful reasoner. It would
+seem as if, in general, there are two conflicting tendencies in minds
+such as Mechthild’s, a tendency to tradition--in her case, of course,
+church tradition--and a tendency to definite self-expression. With
+Mechthild it was certainly that of self-expression which predominated,
+for whilst, with her, both co-operated to make a beautiful whole, it
+was in detail and ornament, so to speak, rather than in the design
+itself, that she showed her special qualities and gifts. Further, as a
+mystic, she may be classed with those “for whom mysticism is above all
+things an intimate and personal relation, the satisfaction of a deep
+desire,” and who therefore fall back “upon imagery drawn largely from
+the language of earthly passion,” as opposed to the mystic whose
+“longing is to go out from his normal world in search of a lost home,
+a better country,” as well as to the one whose “craving is for inward
+purity and perfection.”[21]
+
+    [21] For the suggestive elaboration of this threefold
+    classification, see Evelyn Underhill, _Mysticism_, chap. vi.
+    p. 151 _seq._
+
+In order to enter into the spirit of her writings, and particularly
+the prophetic ones, it is necessary to consider how the character and
+style of her work was induced and affected, on the one hand by her
+environment and her time, and on the other by her saintly nature and
+poetic temperament, as well as by her intimate and personal attitude
+towards things touching the inner life.
+
+The world, in Mechthild’s day, was in a state of unrest and of
+looked-for change. Mankind was ever haunted by forebodings of the
+approaching happening of something momentous. Whole-hearted faith in
+the Church was waning, and although outward conformity still
+prevailed, there existed very diverse opinions, tolerated so long as
+they did not become too obtrusive. Prophetic writings, giving
+expression to the yearnings of the time--yearnings fomented and
+fostered by the prevailing misery caused, in no small degree, by the
+wars between Pope and Emperor--taught that the world was on the brink
+of a new era. One of the most influential of these writings, entitled
+_The Eternal Gospel_, and said to embody the revelations of Abbot
+Joachim of Flora (1130-1202), proclaimed that the dispensations of God
+the Father and God the Son--the first two eras of the Church--were
+past or passing, and that these would be succeeded by a third
+era--that of the Holy Ghost--when men’s eyes would be opened by the
+Spirit, and when there would be a time of perfection and freedom,
+without the necessity of disciplinary institutions. In this fair age
+it was the hermits, monks, and nuns who, whilst not superseding the
+rulers of the Church, were to lead it into new paths, for to Joachim
+the visible Church could not, where all is moving, remain unchanged,
+and his counsel was, to keep pace with the advancing world. Naturally
+such sentiments aroused ecclesiastical alarm, and, later, were
+condemned by the fourth Lateran Council (1215), though Dante, withal a
+good son of the Church, made bold to see in Paradise the “Abbott
+Joachim, endowed with prophetic Spirit” (_Par._ xii. 140).[22] When
+Mechthild wrote her predictions on the last days, Joachim’s teachings,
+owing to the stir which their unorthodoxy had created--not only in the
+Church and amongst the preaching friars, but also in the University of
+Paris, whence all manner of polemical discussions freely
+circulated--were well known in Germany, and there can be but little
+doubt that Mechthild knew of them, probably from the Dominicans, who
+found special favour in her sight, and that they greatly influenced
+her own prophetic warnings to the Church.
+
+    [22] Cf. Edmund G. Gardner, _Joachim of Flora and the
+    Everlasting Gospel_. Franciscan Essays, Bri. Soc. of Fran.
+    Studies, extra series, vol. i.
+
+From these objective conditions which, whilst influencing Mechthild’s
+own thoughts and works, might and did, however differently, influence
+the work of others as well, we turn to the consideration of her work
+as the expression of her own poetic soul, welling up from depths
+filled with love for the highest and most divine things. Before all
+else we recognise how richly endowed she was with visionary powers and
+poetic feeling. She revels in beautiful fantasies, as, for instance,
+when she says, “If I were to speak one little word of the choirs of
+heaven, it would be no more than the honey that a bee can carry away
+on its feet from a full-blown flower.” With rapture she touches upon
+the deepest questions of the soul’s life, and the highest truths and
+mysteries of belief, so that in her flights of contemplation her prose
+becomes poetry, impelled, like some torrent, by the rush of her
+emotion.
+
+    O thou God, out-pouring in thy gift!
+    O thou God, o’erflowing in thy love!
+    O thou God, all burning in thy desire!
+    O thou God, melting in union with thy body!
+    O thou God, reposing on my breast!
+        Without Thee, never could I live.
+
+But even so, she does not lose the sense of form or of the
+picturesque. Some of her writings are clothed in language recalling
+the Song of Songs, and are, perhaps, echoes of St. Bernard’s sermons
+on that wondrous allegory of the Spiritual Bridegroom and Bride, as
+when, in a transport, and attempting to express how God comes to the
+Soul, she exclaims--
+
+    I come to my Beloved
+    Like dew upon the flowers.
+
+Others suggest reflections of courtly life and poetry, and at the same
+time seem to anticipate pictures of the Celestial Garden, bright and
+blossoming, where Saints tread in measured unison, symbolic of their
+spiritual felicity and harmony. So with her didactic writings, or with
+her predictions concerning the decay and corruption in the Church, in
+which, like some prophet of old, she declaims against such evils in no
+sparing terms, all alike are fraught with a special grace. In them all
+the most intimate and the most sublime meet in one expression--the
+expression of a soul which sees God in all things, and all things in
+God.
+
+During the thirty years which Mechthild spent as a beguine at
+Magdeburg, she lived an austere life, and one beset with difficulties,
+largely created by the fearless way in which she warned and denounced
+those in high places in the Church. In such denunciations she was not
+alone, or without good example, for--to name two only of those who
+stand out pre-eminently on account of their positions and
+personalities--St. Bernard and St. Hildegarde had both sternly
+denounced the evils in the Church. “The insolence of the Clergy,” says
+St. Bernard, “troubles the earth, and molests the Church. The Bishops
+give what is holy to the dogs, and pearls to swine.” But the poor
+beguine, Mechthild, was not in the same powerful position to stay, or
+even to modify, the resentment which her attacks occasioned. “For more
+than twenty years was I bound with thee on a hideous gridiron,” she
+writes, likening her anguish to that of St. Lawrence. Nevertheless
+solace came to her troubled spirit, for, having been warned that it
+had been said of her writings that they deserved to be burnt, she
+tells how she prayed to God, as had been her wont when in trouble, and
+that He told her not to mistrust her powers, since they were from Him,
+and that no one can burn the Truth.
+
+In many passages Mechthild dwells on the clergy, and her
+reflections--some very practical, others, to those not versed in
+symbolism, very quaint--seem to suggest how grievously lacking she
+considered them to be. Writing in God’s name to a canon, she begins by
+saying that we should, in common with all men, give thanks to our
+Heavenly Father for the Divine gift which day by day, and without
+ceasing, pours forth from the Holy Trinity into sinful hearts, and
+then she quaintly adds, “For that it soars so high, the Eagle owes no
+thanks to the Owl.” Furthermore, she calls upon the priest to pray
+more, to pay his debts in full, and to live simply, and thus, with
+humble heart, to set a good example, and, with many other admonitions,
+she also counsels him to have two rods by his bedside, so that he may
+chastise himself when he awakes. Mechthild adds that she asked of God
+how such an one could keep himself without sin in this earthly state,
+and that God made answer: “He shall keep himself always in fear, like
+a mouse that sits in a trap and awaits its death. When he eats, he
+shall be frugal and meek, and when he sleeps, he shall be chaste, and
+alone with Me.”
+
+Touching upon some of the duties of a prior--and here she shows
+herself eminently practical--she writes: “Thou shalt go every day to
+the infirmary, and soothe the sick with the solace of God’s word, and
+comfort them bounteously with earthly things, for God is rich beyond
+all richness. Thou shalt keep the sick cleanly, and be merry with them
+in a godly manner. Thou shalt also go into the kitchen, and see that
+the needs of the brethren are well cared for, and that thy parsimony,
+and the cook’s laziness, rob not our Lord of the sweet song of the
+choir, for never did starving priest sing well. Moreover, a hungry man
+can do no deep study, and thus must God, through such default, lose
+the best prayers.” From advice to the priesthood, Mechthild turns to
+warning, and pours forth her reproaches and forebodings with poetic
+intensity. “Alas, O thou Crown of Holy Christendom, how greatly hast
+thou lost lustre! Thy jewels are fallen out, since thou dost outrage
+and bring dishonour on the holy Christian vows. Thy gold has become
+tarnished in the morass of unchastity, for thou art become degenerate,
+and art lacking in true love. Thy abstinence is consumed by the
+ravenous fire of gluttony, thy humility is drowned in the slough of
+the flesh, thy word no longer avails against the lies of the world,
+the flowers of all the virtues have fallen from thee. Alas, O thou
+Crown of the holy Priesthood, how diminished thou art, and verily thou
+now possessest naught but priestly power, with the which thou fightest
+against God and His elect. For this will God humble thee, ere thou
+learnest wisdom. For thus saith the Lord: ‘My shepherds of Jerusalem
+have become murderers and wolves, for that they slay before My very
+eyes the white lambs, and the sheep are all sickly for that they may
+not eat of the wholesome pasture that grows on the high mountains, the
+which is godly love and holy doctrine.’ He who knows not the way that
+leads to Hell, let him give heed to the unholy clergy, who, with wives
+and children and many heinous sins, go straightway thither.”
+
+Whilst condemning the priesthood, Mechthild eulogises nunnery life in
+an allegory entitled “The Ghostly Cloister,” in which she pictures the
+virtues as dwelling. “Charity” is the abbess, who with zeal takes care
+of the congregation in both body and soul; “Godly Humility” is the
+chaplain; “The Holy Peace of God” is the prioress; and “Loving
+Kindness” is the sub-prioress. “Hope” is the chantress, filled with
+holy, humble devotion, that the heart’s feebleness may sound beautiful
+in song before God, so that God may love the notes that sing in the
+heart; “Wisdom” is the schoolmistress, who with all good-will teaches
+the ignorant, so that the convent is held holy and honoured; “Bounty”
+is the cellaress; “Mercy” the stewardess; and “Pity” the sick-nurse.
+The provost, or priest, is “Godly Obedience,” to whom all these
+virtues are subject. “Thus does the convent abide in God, and happy
+are they who dwell therein.”
+
+From this spiritual abode of the virtues we turn to one of Mechthild’s
+earliest recorded visions--that of Hell, with its flame and flare.
+Whilst Death was perhaps man’s first mystery, the Hereafter has been
+his endless pre-occupation. Whatever his country or his time, he has
+ever sought to lift the veil which hides the future, portraying his
+vain efforts in symbol. In Mechthild’s time her world was engrossed
+with thoughts and speculations concerning the Hereafter, for Death,
+which at the end of the next century was to take dramatic and
+pictorial form in the weird and all-embracing “Dance of Death,”
+although its earliest known poetic form is of 1160, ever hovered near
+in pestilence, war, and tumult. Whilst some expressed themselves in
+carved stone, or on painted wall, others, as did Mechthild, realised
+their visions and ideas in a wealth of word-pictures. Such visions
+and ideas had accumulated adown the ages, varying but slightly one
+from another, and Mechthild, in making use of this stereotyped
+material, only took from, or added to, the general sum. Yet even so,
+she contrives to make her personality felt. She begins: “I have seen a
+place whose name is Eternal Hatred.” Lucifer, farthest removed from
+the source of Light, forms the foundation-stone, and around him are
+arranged the deadly sins. Above him are the Christians, then the Jews,
+and, farthest removed from Hell’s dire depths, the Heathen. Horror
+upon horror follows, like those pictured a hundred years before by
+Herrad von Landsperg, abbess at Hohenburg, in Alsace, and, fifty years
+later, by Dante, and when she concludes by saying that, after seeing
+the terrors of Hell, all her five senses were paralysed for three
+days, as if struck by lightning, it is significant that Dante tells
+that, overwhelmed with sorrow for the lovers, doomed for ever to be
+borne upon the winds, he “fainted with pity ... and fell, as a dead
+body falls.”
+
+It is with a sense of relief that we leave such sad scenes, to glance
+at her vision of Paradise, although it does not follow in this
+sequence in her recorded revelations, for, as seems fitting, it is one
+of the very latest. Calling it “a glimpse of Paradise,” she says that
+“of the length and breadth of Paradise there is no end.” Then she
+continues--and this is especially interesting because it is in this
+opening that some commentators have seen the connecting link with
+Dante[23]--that between this world and it, she came to a spot--the
+Earthly Paradise--where she saw trees and fresh grass and no weeds.
+Some of the trees bore apples, but most of them sweetly scented
+leaves. Swift streams flowed through it, and warm winds were wafted
+from the north. The air was sweeter than words can tell. Here, she
+adds, there were no animals or birds, for God has reserved it for
+mankind alone, so that he may dwell there undisturbed. This seems to
+strike a strange note coming from the poetess Mechthild. How different
+is her sentiment from that of her brother-mystic, St. Francis, to whom
+the birds were his “little sisters,” and who “loved above all other
+birds a certain little bird which is called the lark.” But though,
+with apparent satisfaction, Mechthild saw no birds, she did see Enoch
+and Elias, and greeted the former by questioning him as to how he came
+there. Holy Writ has supplied the only answer, “He walked with God,
+and he was not, for God took him.” Having spoken thus of the Earthly
+Paradise, Mechthild goes on to tell of the Heavenly, where she sees,
+“floating in rapture, as the air floats in the sunshine,” the souls
+which, though not deserving of Purgatory, are not yet come into God’s
+kingdom, and to whom rewards and crowns come not until they enter that
+kingdom. She then concludes by saying that “all the kingdoms of this
+world shall perish, and the earthly and the heavenly Paradise shall
+pass away, and all shall dwell together in God”--the Empyrean of
+Dante, where he “saw ingathered, bound by love in one volume, the
+scattered leaves of all the universe; substance and accidents and
+their relations, as though together fused, after such fashion that
+what I tell of is one simple flame.”
+
+    [23] The tendency of present-day Italian scholarship seems in
+    favour of identifying Mechthild of Hackeborn, rather than
+    Mechthild of Magdeburg, with Dante’s Matelda.
+
+In her very varied writings many beautiful and suggestive thoughts are
+to be found, as, for instance, when “Understanding” converses with
+“Conscience,” and accuses Conscience of being at the same time both
+proud and humble, and Conscience explains that she is proud because
+she is in touch with God, and humble because she has done so few good
+works. And again, when “Understanding” and “the Soul” hold converse.
+Understanding, desirous of knowing everything, asks the Soul why such
+brilliant light radiates from her, and the Soul replies by inquiring
+why Understanding asks this, seeing that she is so much wiser than the
+Soul. When Understanding would still penetrate the unspeakable secrecy
+between God and the Soul, the Soul refuses to answer, since, as she
+explains, to her alone is given union with God, to which Understanding
+can never attain. Or, again, when Mechthild, telling how the Soul, no
+longer led by the Senses, but leading them to the desired goal, says,
+“It is a wondrous journey along which the true soul progresses, and
+leads with it the senses, as a man with sight leads one who is blind.
+On this journey the soul is free and without sorrow, since it desires
+naught but to serve its Lord, who orders all things for the best.”
+
+Of Prayer, which to her was “naught else but yearning of soul,” she
+says, “It makes a sour heart sweet, a sad heart merry, a poor heart
+rich, a dull heart wise, a timid heart bold, a weak heart strong, a
+blind heart seeing, a cold heart burning. It draws the great God down
+into the small heart, it drives the hungry soul out to the full God,
+it brings together the two lovers, God and the soul, into a blissful
+place, where they speak much of love.”
+
+Again, in a spirit of self-examination, she writes: “What most of all
+hinders the spiritually-minded from full perfection is, that they pay
+so little heed to small sins. I tell you, of a truth, that when I
+abstain from a laugh that would hurt no one, or hide some soreness of
+heart, or feel a little impatience at my own pain, my soul becomes so
+dark, and my mind so dull, and my heart so cold, that I am constrained
+to pray heartily and long, and humbly to make confession of all my
+faults. Then grace comes again to wretched me, and I creep back like a
+beaten dog into the kitchen.”
+
+But all these and kindred thoughts pale before her discourses on love.
+Love was the keynote of her life. She was born a poetess; she became a
+saint. How sorely she strove towards this end, and spent herself in
+conflict between self-control and ecstasy, no words can tell. It was
+only when Purgation’s way was partly trod, and she had “found in Pain
+the grave but kindly teacher of immortal secrets,” that she could say,
+“Lord, I bring Thee my treasure, which is greater than the mountains,
+wider than the world, deeper than the sea, higher than the clouds,
+more beautiful than the sun, more manifold than the stars, and which
+outweighs all the earth.” Then asks the voice of God: “How is this thy
+treasure called, oh Image of my Divinity?”
+
+“Lord, it is called my heart’s desire. I have withdrawn it from the
+world, kept it to myself, and denied it to all creatures. Now no
+longer would I carry it. Lord, where shall I lay it?”
+
+“Nowhere shalt thou lay thy heart’s desire save in My own Divine
+heart. There only wilt thou find comfort.”
+
+Love and knowledge, the two aspirations of the soul after ultimate
+truth, are her frequent theme. Sometimes she contrasts Love with the
+knowledge of the understanding: “Those who would know much, and love
+little, will ever remain at but the beginning of a godly life. So we
+must have a constant care how we may please God therein. Simple love,
+with but little knowledge, can do great things”; sometimes with the
+knowledge of the heart--“To the wise soul, love without knowledge
+seems darkness, knowledge without fruition, the very pain of Hell.
+Fruition can be reached only through Death.” In one of her visions
+she, in an exquisite simile, describes how love flows from the Godhead
+to mankind, penetrating both body and soul. “It goes without effort,”
+she says, “as does a bird in the air when it does not move its wings.”
+In the same vision she sees the Holy Mother, with uncovered breasts,
+standing on God’s left hand, and Christ on the right, showing his
+still-open wounds, both pleading for sinful humanity, and she adds
+that as long as sin endures on earth, so long will Christ’s wounds
+remain open and bleeding, though painless, but that after the Day of
+Judgment they will heal, and it will be as though there was a
+rose-leaf instead of the wounds.[24]
+
+    [24] The first of these subjects--the Holy Mother and Christ
+    pleading for sinners--is to be found in a miniature in King
+    Henry VI.’s Psalter (Brit. Mus. Cotton MS. Domitian. A. xvii.
+    _circ._ 1430, fol. 205), and the two intercessions separately
+    form two of the subjects in the _Speculum Humanae
+    Salvationis_ (fourteenth century). Though the _S.H.S._ is of
+    later date than the time of Mechthild the literary source of
+    the subject appears to be a passage in the _De laudibus
+    B.M.V._ of Arnaud of Chartres, abbot of Bonneval 1138-1156
+    (J. Lutz and P. Perdrizet, _Spec. Hum. Sal._ vol. i.,
+    Mulhouse, 1907), which might quite well have been known to
+    her, especially if, as Messrs. Lutz and Perdrizet consider,
+    the _S.H.S._ was written by a Dominican, who would naturally
+    make use of Dominican teaching and tradition, and we know
+    that Mechthild, even if not, as has been suggested, a
+    tertiary of that Order, was in constant and close touch with
+    it. The second subject, the reference to rose-leaves and
+    Christ’s wounds, seems to be a purely original thought, and
+    one amongst the many fascinating ideas that have centred
+    round the rose ever since Aphrodite anointed the dead body of
+    Hector with rose-scented oil (_Iliad_, xxiii. 186).
+
+Of Love, as she conceived it in relation to herself individually, she
+can never write enough. “I also may not suffer that any single comfort
+move me, save my love alone. I love my earthly friends in a heavenly
+fellowship, and I love my enemies with a holy longing for their
+salvation. God has enough of all good things, save of union with the
+soul.”
+
+But where Mechthild seems to strike an original note for her time is
+in her insistence on God’s craving for the soul, as well as the soul’s
+craving for God. We find the same insistence in Meister Eckhart, who
+followed her closely in time, and perhaps, in this respect, in thought
+also. “God needs man,” says Eckhart, quite simply. And again, “God can
+do as little without us as we without Him.” With Mechthild it is from
+ecstasy to ecstasy that “heart speaks to heart.” Says the soul of
+Mechthild: “Lord, Thou art ever sick of love for me, and that hast
+Thou Thyself well proved. Thou hast written me in the Book of the
+Godhead. Thou hast fashioned me after Thine own image. Thou hast bound
+me hand and foot to Thy side. O grant it to me, Beloved, to anoint
+Thee.”
+
+“Where wilt thou get thine ointment, dear one?”
+
+“Lord, I will tear my happy heart in twain, and lay Thee therein.”
+
+“It is the most precious ointment thou couldest give Me, that I should
+evermore hover in thy soul.”
+
+Further God says: “I longed for thee ere the world was. I long for
+thee, and thou longest for me. When two burning desires come together,
+then is love perfected.”
+
+Sometimes the loving soul traverses a dark way, and cries out in
+desolation and despair: “Lord, since Thou hast taken from me all that
+I had of Thee, yet of Thy grace leave me that gift which every dog has
+by nature--that in my distress I may be true to Thee, without any
+ill-will. This do I truly desire more than all Thy heavenly kingdom.”
+
+And Divine Love makes answer: “Sweet Dove, now list to me. Thy secret
+seeking must needs find me, thy heart’s distress must needs compel me,
+thy loving pursuit has so wearied me, that I long to cool myself in
+thy pure soul in the which I am imprisoned. The throbbing sighs of thy
+sore heart have driven my justice from thee. All is right between me
+and thee. I cannot be sundered from thee. However far we are parted,
+never can we be separated. I cause thee extreme pain of body. If I
+gave myself to thee as oft as thou wouldst, I should thus deprive
+myself of the sweet shelter I have in thee in this world.”
+
+Again the soul cries out--but now discomfited by the Divine Love from
+whose tireless quest there is no escape--“Thou hast pursued and
+captured and bound me, and hast wounded me so deeply that never shall
+I be healed. Thou hast given me many a hard blow. Tell me, shall I
+ever get whole from Thee? Shall I not be slain by Thee? Thus would it
+have been better for me if that I had never known Thee.”
+
+Then answers Love: “That I pursued thee gave me delight. That I made
+thee captive was my desire. That I bound thee was my joy. When I
+wounded thee, then did I become one with thee. Thus I give thee hard
+blows so that I may be possessed of thee. I drove Almighty God from
+His heavenly kingdom, and took from Him His mortal life, and have
+restored Him with honour to His Father. How canst thou, poor worm,
+save thyself from me?”
+
+Of all Mechthild’s visions, there is none that seems to reach a
+greater height of supreme beauty than that in which the loving soul
+learns the way to its Divine Lover. It is strangely reminiscent of
+courtly life and courtly poetry, translated into the ecstatic state,
+and etherealised into the very perfume of spirituality as the soul
+becomes one with God. Having passed the distress of repentance, the
+pain of confession, and the labour of penance, and having overcome the
+love of the World, the tempting of the Devil, and its own self-will,
+the soul, weary, and longing for her Divine Lover and God, cries out:
+“Beautiful Youth, I long for thee. Where shall I find thee?”
+
+Then says the youth: “I hear a voice which speaks somewhat of love.
+Many days have I wooed her, but never have I heard her voice. Now I am
+moved. I must go to meet her. She it is who bears grief and love
+together. In the morning in the dew is the most intimate rapture which
+first penetrates the soul.”
+
+Then speak her Chamberlains, which are the live senses: “Lady, thou
+must adorn thyself. We have heard a whisper that the Prince comes to
+meet thee in the dew, and the sweet song of the birds. Tarry not,
+Lady.”
+
+So she puts on a shift of gentle humility, so humble that nothing
+could be more so, and over it a white robe of pure chastity, so pure
+that she cannot endure thoughts, words, or desires which might stain
+it. Then she wraps herself in a cloak of holy desire, which she has
+wrought in gold with all the virtues. So she goes into the wood, which
+is the company of holy people. The sweetest nightingales sing there,
+day and night, of the right union with God. She tries to join in the
+festal dance, that is, to imitate the example of the elect. Then comes
+the youth and says to her: “Thou shalt dance merrily even as my
+Elect.” And she answers: “I cannot dance, Lord, if Thou dost not lead
+me. If Thou wilt that I leap joyfully, Thou must first Thyself sing.
+Then will I leap for love, from love to knowledge, from knowledge to
+fruition, from fruition to beyond all human senses. There will I
+remain, and circle evermore.”[25]
+
+    [25] It may be recalled that Dante (_Par._ xxiv.) sees the
+    Saints in Paradise as circling lights from whence issues
+    divine song, and again (_Par._ xxv.) “wheeling round in such
+    guise as their burning love befitted.”
+
+Then speaks the youth: “Thy dance of praise is well done. Thou shalt
+have thy will, for thou art heartily wearied. Come at mid-day to the
+shady fountain, to the bed of love. There shalt thou be refreshed.”
+
+Then, weary of the dance, the soul says to her Chamberlains, the
+senses: “Withdraw from me, I must go where I may cool myself.”
+
+Then say the senses: “Lady, wilt thou be refreshed with the loving
+tears of St. Mary Magdalene? They may well suffice thee.”
+
+“Be silent, sirs; you know not what I mean. Hinder me not. I would
+drink for a space of the unmingled wine.”
+
+“Lady, in the Virgin’s chastity the great love is reached.”
+
+“That may be. For me it is not the highest.”
+
+“Lady, thou mightst cool thyself in the martyrs’ blood.”
+
+“I have been martyred many a day, so that I have no need to come to
+that now.”
+
+“Lady, bright are the angels, and lovely in love’s hue. Wouldst thou
+cool thyself, be lifted up with them.”
+
+“The bliss of the angels brings me love’s woe unless I see their Lord,
+my Bridegroom.”
+
+“Lady, if thou comest there, thou wilt be blinded quite, so fiery hot
+is the Godhead, as thou thyself well knowest, for the fire and the
+glow which make heaven and all the holy ones burn and shine, all flow
+from His divine breath, and from His human mouth, through the wisdom
+of the Holy Ghost. How couldest thou endure it for an hour?”
+
+And the soul answers: “The fish cannot drown in the water, the bird
+cannot sink in the air, gold cannot perish in the fire, where it gains
+its clear and shining worth. God has granted to each creature to
+cherish its own nature. How can I withstand my nature? I must go from
+all things to God, who is my Father by Nature, my Brother through His
+Humanity, my Bridegroom through Love, and I am His for ever.”
+
+Silenced by this wondrous flight of holy passion, we bid farewell to
+Mechthild. She lived for her time, and she lives for us, as one of
+“humanity’s pioneers on the only road to rest.” “Out of the depths,”
+she cried to Heaven. We leave her in the music of the spheres.
+
+
+
+
+A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY ART-PATRON AND PHILANTHROPIST, MAHAUT, COUNTESS
+OF ARTOIS
+
+
+It has been well said that “out of things unlikely and remote may be
+won romance and beauty.” Perhaps the truth of this reflection has
+never been more signally exemplified than in the case of Mahaut,
+Countess of Artois and Burgundy, the record of whose life, in the
+absence of any contemporary biographer, has been ably deciphered from
+such commonplace material as the household accounts of her
+stewards.[26] This great lady, one of the greatest patrons of art of
+her time, lived at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the
+fourteenth century. She was a great-niece of St. Louis. No poet has
+sung of her. It is merely through the prose of daily expenditure that
+she is made known to us. She stands before us, not the ideal creation
+of the mediæval romancer, but a real woman, with her virtues and
+failings, her joys and sorrows, real by very reason of this union of
+contrasts, a woman trying to grapple with difficulties forced upon her
+by her position, and by an age when intrigue and cunning were as
+freely resorted to, and as deftly handled, as the sword and the lance.
+
+    [26] Richard (Jules Marie), _Une Petite Nièce de S. Louis:
+    Mahaut, Comtesse d’Artois_.
+
+    Dehaisnes (M. le Chanoine), _L’Histoire de l’art dans la
+    Flandre, l’Artois, et le Hainaut avant le XVme siècle_.
+
+Mahaut was the daughter of Robert the Second, Count of Artois, a
+valiant and chivalrous man, and of Amicie de Courtenay, of whom it was
+said that she was esteemed whilst she lived, and mourned of all when
+she died. Her brother, Philip, predeceased his father, leaving one
+son, Robert. In accordance with local custom, Mahaut, on the death of
+her father, inherited Artois, but her nephew, Robert, on attaining his
+majority at the age of fourteen, set up a counter-claim. This family
+feud was a constant source of trouble and vexation to her, since
+Robert again and again returned to the attack, not only appealing to
+the king to consider his cause, and fabricating spurious documents as
+a means of gaining his end, but also employing unscrupulous agents to
+spread false charges against her. He further took advantage of the
+growing discontent amongst the nobles, who were gradually realising
+that their power was waning, to attach them to his cause, and to
+induce them to join him in harassing Mahaut by making raids upon her
+lands and her castles. She, however, through her extraordinary
+personality, was able to triumph over all this opposition, which, far
+from marring, only seemed to add lustre to the work she had set
+herself to do.
+
+Mahaut was religious, artistic, and literary. All these
+characteristics, together with the circumstance of wealth, she
+inherited, and right well did she make use of her inheritance.
+
+Being religious, and living in an age when the frenzy for crusading
+had subsided and when architecture was the ruling passion, she
+expended her zeal in building religious houses and hospitals.
+
+Being artistic, she made her favourite castle at Hesdin, and the town
+around its walls, a centre of art life. Here, seemingly, she favoured
+all the arts, including to a certain extent music, then still in its
+infancy, for although she apparently had no regular minstrel or
+minstrels in her employ as was customary in the houses of the
+noblesse, she seems to have engaged them for Church festivals and
+sundry fêtes, and we know that on one occasion she hired a minstrel to
+soothe her sick child with the sweet soft music of the harp, thus
+suggesting that she herself had felt the power of music to minister to
+both body and soul.
+
+Being literary, Mahaut collected what MSS. and books she could, and
+the list of them serves to show what might be found in a library of
+the early fourteenth century. Her religious books included a Bible in
+French,[27] a Psalter, a Gradual, various Books of Hours for private
+devotion, Lives of the Saints and of the Fathers, and the Miracles of
+Our Lady. Philosophy was represented by a French translation of
+Boëthius (probably a copy of a translation made by order of King
+Philip le Bel, by Jean de Meun, the writer of the second portion of
+_The Romance of the Rose_), Law by a verse translation of the laws of
+Normandy, History by the Chronicles of the Kings of France, and Travel
+by _The Romance of the Great Kan_, known to us as _The Travels of
+Marco Polo_. But by far the largest category consisted of Romances,
+such as that of Oger le Danois from the national Epic, and another of
+Tancred, a hero of the first Crusade, the Romance of Troy, Percival le
+Gallois, Tristan, Renart, and the Violet, the story which forms the
+chief episode in the play of Cymbeline. Of course there was no great
+choice, but that Mahaut read them and loved them we may be certain,
+since we know that she took some with her on her journeyings, and to
+preserve them from the wear and tear of travel, had leather wallets
+made to protect them. Mahaut was, in truth, the first wealthy
+individual of the age to spend her substance with the express purpose
+of surrounding herself with beauty of every kind. The foremost thought
+of a man in a like case would probably have been to add to his power.
+_Her_ thought was of beauty, a quality much more far-reaching and less
+transient, and one which, even like Time itself, triumphs over the
+changes of fame and fortune.
+
+    [27] The Bible was first translated into French, and reduced
+    in size so that it could be carried in the hand, between 1200
+    and 1250.
+
+Though Mahaut did not live the allotted three score years and ten, she
+lived long enough to see seven kings on the throne of France, two of
+whom--Philip the Fifth and Charles the Fourth--were her sons-in-law.
+She was a mere child when her great-uncle, King Louis, died in 1270.
+In 1285, the year in which Philip the Fourth, surnamed le Bel,
+ascended the throne, she wedded Otho, Count Palatine of Burgundy, a
+widower of forty-five, a companion in arms of her father, and a brave
+and generous man, who died fighting for his country, but one
+absolutely incapable in administration, and, as a consequence, always
+in debt and in the clutches of the usurer. There are few documents to
+throw any light on her life until after Otho’s death in 1303. This may
+be due partly to the fact that she only came into her great
+possessions on her father’s death in 1302, and partly to the
+circumstance that the careless and luxurious expenditure of her
+husband in no small degree dissipated her resources, and naturally
+prevented, for the time, any material encouragement of art. Doubtless
+also much of her time was spent in superintending the education of her
+children--two daughters who were destined to marry kings of France,
+and a son who was born a peer of the realm, and inheritor of one of
+its richest territories. But adverse fate, by the disgrace of one of
+her daughters, and the death of her son, intervened to darken these
+brilliant prospects, and forms a grey background to her otherwise
+wonderful and glorious career.
+
+The more the life of this remarkable woman is studied, the more
+apparent it becomes that what gives it its peculiar charm and worth is
+the sense she possessed of the value of all human endeavour, whether
+in great things or in simple. To her the humblest matters of home
+life, and the affairs connected with the administration of her
+domains, had each their particular significance. The ordering of a
+small grooved tablet on which her little boy could arrange the letters
+of the alphabet claimed her attention equally with the founding and
+arranging of a hospital. In her capacity as ruler we see the same wide
+and reasonable outlook on life, for whilst strict as an administrator,
+in personal relations she was charitable and sympathetic. Sometimes a
+rebellious baron was deprived of his fief and banished, or was
+condemned to expiate his misdeed by making a pilgrimage to sundry
+shrines. But Mahaut was practical withal, and recognised human
+frailty, and as the pilgrimage was for correction, no pardon was
+granted unless the offender brought from each of the sanctuaries a
+certificate that his vow had been fulfilled. On the other hand, if any
+were sick or in trouble, she was solicitous for their relief, and even
+aided them personally where possible. She thus put into practice the
+charge of her saintly kinsman, King Louis the Ninth, who always
+counselled those about him to have compassion on all mental or
+physical suffering, since the heart may be stricken as well as the
+body.
+
+As Mahaut had no biographer, and contemporary history merely treats
+her as if she were one of many pawns on a chess-board, her stewards’
+entries furnish the only materials from which we can weave some
+outline of her life, an outline, nevertheless, which enables us to
+reason somewhat concerning her inner life, the pattern, as it were,
+that is not wrought for the world.
+
+When, in 1302, Mahaut took over the reins of government in Artois,
+Paris was the great centre of art and literature as well as of the
+science of the day, a condition largely due to the genius of Philip
+Augustus, and fostered by succeeding kings. Thither, from far and
+near, flocked scholars, poets, and artists alike. Some of these took
+up their abode permanently within its walls. Others passed to and fro,
+thus creating that constant interchange of thought which is essential
+to vitality, so that it was said that “the goddess of Wisdom, after
+having dwelt in Athens and Rome, had taken up her abode in Paris.”
+There, at least twice a year, came Mahaut to her sumptuous dwelling,
+the Hôtel d’Artois, situated near the Temple, and extending with its
+gardens and its outbuildings to the walls built by Philip Augustus.
+Here all who loved the arts and learning were made welcome, and it is
+interesting to think it possible, nay even probable, that during one
+of her many sojourns there she may have met and talked with Dante.
+
+Amongst the special treasures to be found there, mention is made of
+four figure-pictures, one of which is said to have been of Roman
+workmanship, and round in form--certainly, as far as is known, a
+rarity at that time. We also find a record of finely wrought
+embroideries and tapestries on the walls, and of windows painted
+either with armorial bearings and figures, or with simple foliage like
+the delicate ivy and hawthorn to be seen enriching the pages of Books
+of Hours of the fourteenth century. Special mention is made of a
+window, evidently over the altar in the private Chapel, in which was
+represented the Crucifixion. In the large hall were tables on
+trestles, easily removed before the dance began or minstrels or
+jugglers displayed their skill, dressers to hold the gold and silver
+plate and from which to serve the banquet, and settles with footboards
+so necessary when the rushes were only renewed at lengthy intervals.
+But if the hall was somewhat sparsely furnished, its ceiling and walls
+(the latter on occasions hung with embroideries carried from castle to
+castle as the Countess journeyed) were made bright with colour, and
+beautiful with design. How bright, and how beautiful, we can infer
+almost with certainty from examples in the Castle of Chillon of
+thirteenth and fourteenth century decoration lately rescued from under
+a coat of whitewash,[28] and from the comparison made by Brunetto
+Latini (1230-1294), in his _Tesoro_, of the Italian with the French
+feudal castle, in which he says of the one that it is only built for
+war, with ditches, palisades, and high towers and walls, and of the
+other that it lies in the midst of meadows and gardens, _with large
+painted chambers_.
+
+    [28] _Chillon_, Albert Naef, Genève, 1908.
+
+Mahaut’s cousin, the cold and impersonal Philip le Bel, was on the
+throne. For the most part war had ceased in the land, but still there
+was war in high places, for Philip, avaricious by nature, and finding
+himself a king under altering conditions--the Papacy fallen into
+disregard, the Nobility weakened, and the Nation growing, but without
+any adequate provision made to meet the needs of this growth--left no
+stone unturned to supply this want and gratify his greed. On the
+question of the subsidies of the clergy and the relation between
+things spiritual and temporal, he quarrelled with the Pope, Boniface
+the Eighth, and brought about the removal of the Holy See from Rome to
+Avignon. He robbed and ruined the Templars, and despoiled the Jews and
+Lombards, the financiers of the day. With him no trickery was too
+base, no cruelty too cold-blooded. Gold was his God. Dante, who was
+his contemporary, refers (_Purg._ vii. 109) to “his wicked and foul
+life” (_la vita sua viziata e lorda_), and (_Par._ xix. 118) to his
+“debasement of the coinage” (_falseggiando la moneta_), as well as to
+his self-seeking greed. Such, with the added glamour of art and
+learning, was the courtly atmosphere of the Time. The bourgeoisie,
+encouraged by the king who sought to aggrandise the monarchy at the
+expense of the nobles, was growing rich, and politically gaining in
+power, and Philip ere long discovered that he had helped merely to
+change the centre of power, and not to crush it.
+
+But Paris does not seem to have attracted Mahaut as did her castle at
+Hesdin. Here she was in the midst of her own domains, surrounded by
+her liegemen and retainers, and able to be in constant touch with her
+artificers and workers, whatever their art or industry. By the
+thirteenth century the dwelling of the Noble was no longer a grim
+castle, suggestive only of a place of defence, with narrow slits in
+the walls for the admission of air and light and for the discharge of
+arrows, but was more like a fortified country-house. The encompassing
+walls enclosed a wide area, within which was sheltered a village and
+everything necessary to the growth and development of a community.
+
+From Hesdin Mahaut journeyed constantly through her County of Artois,
+visiting her castles, the towns or villages around them, and the
+various religious houses and hospitals she had founded, and attending
+in general to the well-being of her subjects. For her it was not
+enough that she was born to reign. She realised that, without
+administration, reigning through the accident of birth is mere
+puppet’s work, and leads to naught. Her daily life was the visible
+expression of this belief, as she herself was an example of the woman
+who comprehends the just proportion between personal and public work.
+That her subjects responded to her sympathy, and held her in
+affectionate regard, is proved by their kindly and sympathetic concern
+if she were ill or on a journey, and by the offerings they made to her
+on special anniversaries and other festive occasions. We read of gifts
+not only of herrings, sturgeon, game, wine, dogs, peacocks, swans,
+pasties, and whipped cream, but also of the strangely assorted tribute
+of a dead bear and twelve cheeses, as well as of one which must have
+contrasted pleasantly with this sundry and singular good cheer--a
+parrakeet in a beautifully painted cage. Mahaut, as we have said, was
+a constant traveller, and though travelling was then no easy matter,
+the roads could not have been over-much beset with difficulties seeing
+that she journeyed in all weathers, either on horseback or in a
+horse-litter, or in a chariot without springs, and with no mean
+retinue. In truth, her following was like a glorified Canterbury
+pilgrimage. First came the Countess, accompanied by one or more
+knights, her ladies-in-waiting, her chaplain and confessor, her
+physician, her secretary, her treasurer and steward, and sundry petty
+officers of her household. Then followed the servants, the cook with
+his scullions, the shoemaker who could also do necessary repairs to
+the harness, the laundress riding astride as was the manner of
+serving-women, and a score of lackeys and dependants of all sorts in
+charge of the carts containing the necessaries of travel. These
+necessaries were generally packed in wooden coffers, some of which
+were simple chests, whilst others opened like a cupboard and were
+fitted with drawers. To preserve such coffers from damp and damage,
+they were put into osier cases covered with cow-hide. And with all
+this motley company and baggage, there are but few records of
+accidents. The accounts tell of a small occasional expenditure in
+consequence of the breakdown of a chariot, or the fall of a valet from
+his horse, or the upsetting into a river of a cart conveying the
+Countess’s wardrobe. But such misadventures were not taken very
+seriously by these folk, seasoned to discomfort. Valet or chariot was
+mended, or the floating garments were recovered, and on went the
+easy-going company, singing by the way, and with horns blowing as they
+neared some castle or village where a halt was to be made for the
+night. The absence of any mention of the removal of furniture from
+castle to castle during these periodical wanderings, save a small bed
+for Mahaut’s own use, leads us to infer that greater luxury then
+prevailed than in the days of her great-uncle, Louis the Ninth, when
+even Royalty itself thought it no hardship to have beds and other
+necessary pieces of furniture carried by beasts of burden from place
+to place according to the movements of the Court. This frugal and
+homely custom on one occasion very nearly ended in a tragedy. The
+devout Isabelle, Louis’s sister, was praying in the early morning, as
+was her wont, within her curtained bed, and either lost in prayer or
+overcome with fatigue by the length of her orisons, did not notice the
+arrival of the packers, who rolled up the bed without drawing the
+curtains, and the praying Princess within must have been smothered had
+not her lady-in-waiting, Agnes de Harcourt, heard her stifled cries,
+and hastened to her rescue. This quaint episode so amused Louis, that
+he ever after recounted it when telling of the piety of his sister.
+
+Let us now go in imagination to the Castle of Hesdin, and see
+something of its treasures and of the daily life of the Countess
+Mahaut.
+
+Soon after her accession to Artois, her two daughters married sons of
+King Philip le Bel, and her little son, Robert, then became her
+principal care. A little boy of noble family had been chosen as his
+companion to share in his education and to join with him in play. It
+would seem that the two were treated on an absolute equality, even to
+having their doublets cut from the same piece of cloth, and their
+tunics and cloaks trimmed with the same fur. Beyond their ordinary
+lessons, they were early taught the games of tables and chess, both of
+which were considered essential to a knight’s education. They also
+rode to the chase and attended tournaments, and at the age of fourteen
+themselves held the lance as part of their training in the art of
+war. Robert seems to have been of a most inquiring and intelligent
+nature, but when he had scarce passed his seventeenth year, Mahaut,
+with scant warning, saw this her only son stricken in death just as he
+was about to enter the ranks of knighthood. In the archives of Arras,
+the Capital of Artois, may be found a discoloured parchment containing
+the inventory of the equipment provided for the youthful Robert in
+anticipation of his initiation. What sorrow is enshrined in these
+faded pages! It is not sorrow for death, but the bitterer sorrow for
+something that has never lived, or, rather, that has lived only in the
+heart, like spring blossom blighted ere fruiting-time. In the Church
+of St. Denis, where modern restoration has but emphasised the
+transitoriness and vanity of human glory, there can still be seen the
+tomb of this youth, carved soon after his death by Pepin de Huy, and
+once painted, as was all such carved work. Even to the mere student it
+is interesting as being the only existing monument that can with
+certainty be attributed to this celebrated sculptor, and also as
+being, in Gothic art, one of the first essays in portraiture in
+recumbent figures of the dead, as contrasted with mere effigy. For the
+deeper thinker it has even greater significance. Of all the good and
+great works that Mahaut conceived and initiated--the churches,
+castles, hospitals, which she built and enriched for the glory of God
+and the safety and solace of mankind--all have passed away. This
+simple tomb alone remains. But its very simplicity is eloquent, for
+around it there seems to hover that never-dying spirit of love and
+goodness and beauty to which, throughout her life, Mahaut contributed
+in such large measure, and which was her real and lasting gift to the
+world.
+
+Life as mirrored in the Castle records gives little else than a
+pleasing picture of Mahaut’s relations with all her dependants, as
+well as with those with whom she was connected, whether by ties of
+friendship, of politics, or of the common courtesies of life. Her
+immediate household was naturally her first care. Twice a year, at
+Easter and All Saints, a distribution was made of cloth and furs. Some
+of these, fine and costly, were for those in personal attendance on
+the Countess, whilst others were in the nature of liveries. Others,
+again, of still coarser make, such as Irish serge, with sheep or
+rabbit skin for warmth in winter, were given to those of lowly service
+or who had specially rough work to perform. Her ladies-in-waiting, of
+whom there were always two or three, appear to have received for their
+services no money payment, but, over and above the cloth and fur
+already alluded to, gifts, on special occasions, of girdles and
+satchels (very often jewelled), gold chaplets, and gold and silver
+braid, jewelled, and used for twining in the hair. In addition to
+this, presents of jewels and silver cups were made to them by the
+noble ladies who came to stay with the Countess, just as she, on her
+part, presented similar gifts to those who accompanied her guests.
+How well we can picture to ourselves these maidens (for such is all
+they were), decking themselves in their girdles and jewelled braid,
+comparing their gifts, and perhaps even standing on some oaken bench
+the better to get a view of their finery, for the mirrors were small,
+and the girdles were long, and could not otherwise be seen in all
+their glory. When they married, the Countess made gifts to them
+without stint, not only of the beautiful and the needful for their
+wardrobes, but also of household goods, and sometimes, when she knew
+their parents or kinsmen to be too poor to provide the usual dowry,
+even of a sum of money. To the retainers also we find the same kind
+and helping hand held out. If any were sick they were taken care of,
+and, if needs be, sent to some place where they could the better be
+cured, as we read of one who, suffering from gout, was sent to take
+healing waters. To another retainer was given the necessary money to
+pay for his son on entering a monastery, another receiving the
+wherewithal to go to his native village to attend his mother’s burial.
+Old servants, past work, were cared for in the monasteries or
+hospitals, or given some post suitable to their years. To a poor
+knight was given money to enable him to buy a good horse and armour,
+for poverty of purse was no disgrace in the thirteenth century. At the
+beginning of winter a distribution, organised by the clergy and
+stewards of the rural communities in Artois, but superintended by
+the Countess herself, was made to the poor of blankets, garments, and
+shoes, and so arranged that the same person did not receive the like
+gift two years in succession. In truth, no details seemed too small,
+none too onerous, for Mahaut’s untiring solicitude. She had heart and
+brain for everything. It is these intimate touches which make the time
+so living and present to us, and which seem, as it were, to place this
+wonderful woman in a charmed and tranquil circle, in spite of the
+trouble and turmoil incidental to her life and her position.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+STATUE OF MAHAUT IN ABBEY OF LA THIEULOYE, NEAR ARRAS, NOW DESTROYED.
+
+From a Drawing, now in Brussels, made in 1602.
+
+_To face page 99._]
+
+Amongst Mahaut’s many good works was the keeping in repair of existing
+religious houses, hospitals, and lazar-houses, and the building and
+maintenance of new ones. Of all the religious houses which she
+founded, her special care was for the Dominican convent of La
+Thieuloye, near Arras, the equipment of which, as set out in the
+accounts, may well serve as an example of that of the others. The
+items for the furnishing and instalment of the house and chapel
+include everything needful for the community, from gold and silver
+vessels, silver-gilt images of St. Louis, the Trinity, and St. John,
+for the sanctuary, and samite and velvet for chasubles, down to the
+bowls and platters for the nuns, the woollen material for their
+garments, and all the simple necessaries of everyday life. In the
+chapel of this nunnery was preserved a kneeling statue of Mahaut,
+representing her as foundress, in the habit of the Order strewn with
+the arms of Artois. Jean Aloul, of Tournai, has been suggested as the
+sculptor, since it is known from the accounts that he was working for
+the Countess at Arras in 1323. This statue (known to us through a
+drawing, now at Brussels, made in 1602) is of interest to-day because,
+judging from the character expressed in the face, it seems probable
+that it was a portrait, and not simply imagery. This conjecture seems
+all the more likely when we compare the statue with a miniature
+painted more than a hundred years later by Jean Fouquet in _Les
+Grandes Chroniques de France_ (Bib. Nat.), portraying the marriage of
+King Charles the Fourth with his second wife, Marie de Luxembourg. In
+this picture a lady, heavily coiffed, and with features suggestive of
+those of the statue, but with anguish written upon them, turns away
+from the ceremony as if it were all too painful. If this unwilling
+guest represents Mahaut, her woeful look is intelligible when we
+recall the sad story connected with Charles’s first wife, Mahaut’s
+daughter Blanche, married when she was but fifteen, and whose beauty
+was so dazzling that Froissart records that “she was one of the most
+beautiful women in the world.” Accused of an intrigue with a gentleman
+of the Court, she was imprisoned in the Château-Gaillard, where she
+remained, with shorn head, until, shortly after Charles ascended the
+throne, the Pope declared the marriage null. Then, whilst the king
+wedded another, the sad Blanche exchanged her castle prison-house
+for a convent one, where she died a year after she had taken the vows.
+There is no reason for supposing that Mahaut was at the wedding of
+Blanche’s successor save in the imagination of the artist; but for him
+the inclusion of such a tragic figure would add a dramatic touch to
+the representation of an otherwise conventional ceremony.
+
+[Illustration: MARRIAGE OF CHARLES LE BEL AND MARIE OF LUXEMBURG.
+
+Grandes Chrons. de France, Bib. Nat.
+
+_To face page 100._]
+
+It almost takes us aback to read that in Mahaut’s domain of Artois
+there were at least eighty hospitals and thirty lazar-houses, without
+counting those attached to the monasteries. But these numbers will not
+surprise us so much when we remember that almost every small community
+had its little hospital, used not only for the sick and as a lying-in
+hospital, but also as a shelter for the poor and the pilgrim. In the
+towns they were often built and supported by the Corporations or by
+rich merchants. Evidently some were in the nature of hospitals for
+incurables, for there were special clauses in the deeds of gift
+providing that a certain specified number of beds were to be kept for
+the sick until they were either cured or released by death. Besides
+building two hospitals in the County of Burgundy in fulfilment of the
+dying wishes of her husband, Mahaut built and maintained two in her
+own County of Artois. The one at Hesdin was the more important, and we
+can get some idea of it from the documents of the time. The deed
+relating to it tells that over the large entrance gate there was
+carved in stone a figure of St. John, the patron of hospitals and of
+the needy generally, with a poor man and woman on either side of him.
+The principal ward was 160 feet long and 34 feet wide, with walls 16
+feet high ending in a gabled roof, with two windows in each gable, and
+this, coupled with the fact that the sick were sometimes laid on
+cushions by the open windows, goes to show that what we pride
+ourselves on as a special discovery in modern hygiene--the benefit of
+fresh air--was known and applied even in what we are wont to consider
+a very benighted age in such matters.
+
+Whilst touching upon such a subject as this, it may be a surprise to
+some to learn that in large towns baths were provided for those who
+could not afford to have them in their own homes, and that there were
+also professional women hair-washers.
+
+[Illustration: THIRTEENTH-CENTURY TREATISE ON SURGERY, IN FRENCH.
+
+Sloane MS. 1977.
+
+_To face page 103._]
+
+But to return to the hospital. On one side of the ward were ten
+windows, each four feet square, and on the opposite side was a large
+door leading into the cloister with its garden, where the
+convalescents and the old people, whilst sheltered, could enjoy the
+sunshine and see the flowers and the birds. In addition to this there
+was a smaller ward for women, a chapel, a kitchen, and a room for the
+matron, as well as accommodation for the resident doctor, Maître
+Robert, and the serving-women. It is some consolation to think that
+these poor suffering folk of centuries ago were even thus well
+tended, but when we look at contemporary representations of the
+surgery of the day,[29] we tremble at the mere thought of the heroic
+methods adopted. Besides the actual necessaries which she provided for
+the hospital at Hesdin, Mahaut constantly sent gifts of fish, game,
+and wine. Similar gifts she likewise made to the hospitals in Artois
+generally, as well as to those in Paris, and, on fête-days, to the
+poorer religious houses.
+
+    [29] See Roger of Parma, _Treatise on Surgery_. French
+    thirteenth century. Brit. Mus., Sloane MS., 1977.
+
+From her beneficence to the sick and sorry, the aged and the poor, we
+turn to her hospitality to her relations and friends, and to all those
+in spiritual or temporal authority in the towns or villages of Artois.
+The Castle of Hesdin, destroyed in the sixteenth century--only a few
+stones remaining to mark the site,--was situated a few miles from the
+present modern town of Hesdin. It must have been not only a scene of
+constant festivity and social intercourse, and a treasure-house
+withal, but also a veritable hive of industry, with workers and
+workshops within the Castle enclosure as well as in the town nestling
+beneath its walls. Here might be found artists and craftsmen of all
+sorts and degrees--sculptors and workers in stone, ivory-workers,
+wood-carvers, carpenters, artificers in silver and precious stones as
+well as in copper, forgers of iron, painters of wall-decoration,
+stonework, saddle-bows, and even masquerading-masks, illuminators of
+MSS., workers and painters of glass, harness-makers, armourers,
+tailors, and embroiderers--the whole forming a rare and remarkable
+centre of activity for a woman to have developed and ruled and made
+into a living force.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: BANQUET, WITH MINSTRELS PLAYING, AND ROOM HUNG WITH
+EMBROIDERY.
+
+MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century, Bodleian, Oxford.
+
+_To face page 104._]
+
+It is a fête-day within the Castle. The horns have sounded. The feast
+is ready. To the great hall repair the knights and the ladies, the
+esquires and the damsels, two and two, according to their rank,
+dipping their hands, as they pass in, into silver basins of
+rose-water. They are gorgeously apparelled in silken garments and
+cloth of gold and silver, upon which are embroidered their coats of
+arms, for by the end of the thirteenth century armorial bearings,
+which by then had become attached to families, were used as a sign of
+nobility and rank. Mahaut, as hostess, takes her seat last. Adown the
+table are specimens of silver-plate, some the work of her own
+craftsmen, others the offerings of friendship or of courtesy. They are
+fashioned variously, and used for sweetmeats of all kinds, spices,
+almonds, and dainties made of orange and pomegranate. A favourite form
+is that of a ship, such as may be seen in _Les Très Riches Heures_ of
+Jean, Duc de Berri, at Chantilly, in a representation of a feast given
+by the Duke. There are, besides, salt-cellars and sauce-boats, flagons
+and drinking-cups, and a bowl between every two guests, from which
+they eat, handing each other dainty morsels. Such, with a knife
+and a spoon for each, is their equipment for the meal, for none, save
+the carver, has both knife and fork. In a corner of the hall is a
+basket for the broken-meats destined for the poor, a leathern sack
+being also provided for foods with gravy or sauce. Neither at
+festivals nor in daily life would a meal have been considered complete
+if the poor were not remembered. Perhaps a messenger arrives during
+the feast with the news of a birth or a marriage in Mahaut’s circle of
+relations or friends, and he is rewarded with a gift of money, and
+possibly receives a silver cup to carry back to the nurse, or a
+jewelled chaplet to take to the bride. Meanwhile the music of
+trumpets, drums, viols, and flutes resounds from the minstrels’
+gallery. Later, when the feast is ended, and before the company
+disperses to walk in the garden if it is spring or summer, or to look
+at the beautiful things in the castle, or to dance or sing or play
+chess if it be winter, some one perchance chants a plaintive ditty to
+the music of the regal, or some knight tunes his harp and sings of
+valiant deeds, or, may be, of some peerless lady.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 105._]
+
+But let us look at the rooms of the Castle and their beautiful
+contents--the paintings and embroideries on the walls, the ivories,
+and the illuminated Psalters and MSS. And let us go first into the
+Countess’s own room, which doubtless was near the chapel. We can form
+some idea of its decoration and contents from the accounts, and of
+its probable arrangement from contemporary plans, illuminated MSS.,
+and pictures. Its walls were adorned with a frieze composed of heads
+of the kings of France, moulded in plaster and surmounted by crowns of
+gilded or lacquered tin, below which, on a coloured ground, were
+fastened fleurs-de-lis, likewise of tin similarly treated. At the end
+of the room was a bed, a large wooden structure surrounded by a
+footboard and laced across with cords on which were laid mattresses, a
+feather bed (sometimes, if we may judge from miniatures, used during
+the day as a seat on the floor), many cushions, linen or silk sheets,
+and a fur-lined coverlet. From rods on the ceiling hung curtains which
+completely enclosed it at night, but which were drawn back and looped
+up during the day, when the bed was used as a divan. At night a small
+oil lamp with a floating wick was hung within the curtains, and near
+the bed was a _bénitier_. At the side, separated by a narrow space,
+there were fixed seats for the accommodation of those who interviewed
+the Countess before she rose. There was a large open fireplace with a
+bench in front of it which had a movable back, so that the occupant
+could sit either facing the fire or with his back to it. Close by were
+wickerwork fire-screens, capable of being raised or lowered at will.
+Against the walls there were carved chests, enriched with colour, and
+chairs with leather seats and wickerwork backs, as well as
+three-legged and folding stools, were placed about the room. At one
+side of the room was a large oak chair of state with a cushioned seat,
+and possibly canopied, and close to it a lectern, with hinged
+candle-brackets, from which Mahaut could the more easily read her
+MSS., which were often rolled, and difficult to manipulate. In front
+of this seat was a table, at which any messengers or retainers stood
+when they sought an interview, or the Countess demanded one. Here also
+she transacted with her stewards and other agents the business
+connected with her various castles and her many philanthropic
+undertakings. Other rooms were painted in plain colour, and hung on
+special occasions with embroideries and tapestries. Others, again,
+were decorated with set designs, square or zigzag, in imitation of
+brickwork, such as may be seen in the Chapel of St. Faith, Westminster
+Abbey, or with subjects or colour after which they were named. Thus we
+find mention of the “Parrakeet” room, from the birds painted on the
+walls, the “Blue” room, from its colour, the rooms of “Roses,” of
+“Vines,” and of “Fleurs-de-lis,” the room of “Shields,” from its
+frieze of armorial bearings, and that of “Song,” from verses traced on
+the walls, taken from the favourite pastoral of “Robin and Marion,”
+and probably associated with little scenes from the same idyll. The
+ceilings, with beams and joists painted red, were coloured either
+green or blue, and strewn with tin stars coated with yellow or white
+varnish to simulate gold or silver. The lower portions of the walls
+were often painted in imitation of short curtains, sometimes of but
+one colour, sometimes gorgeously decorated, but in either case
+reminiscent of the real draperies hung on festal days. Immediately
+above there might have been, as in other examples, a border painted
+with coats of arms, or with a foliated design interspersed with
+mottoes.
+
+During Mahaut’s lifetime this decorative work seems to have been
+undertaken principally by one special family or community of artists
+from Boulogne, of which a certain “Jacques” was the leading spirit. In
+those days artist and craftsman were one and the same. It was the
+quality, and not the particular subject, of the work that mattered,
+and thus we find that the painting of a parrot’s cage, or of the
+shafts of a litter, was not considered derogatory for even the most
+skilled to undertake. From the accounts it would seem that linseed oil
+was used to mix with the colours, cherry gum or white of egg being
+added to make them dry more quickly. Payment for work was made three
+times a year--at Candlemas, Ascension-tide, and All-Saints--or by the
+day or piece, the last being the form preferred by the business-like
+Mahaut. Besides such payment, presents were occasionally given for
+specially fine work, and, if a man was married, a gift to his wife of
+a gown, or of a cloak with fur, was sometimes added. One of this
+company of Boulogne artists later on became Court-painter to the Dukes
+of Burgundy, and took with him not only his trained apprentices from
+the towns and villages of Artois, and from those bordering on
+Flanders, but also, doubtless, certain traditions. It is such early
+migrations of artists, when schools were forming, that have helped to
+create the difficult problems which confront the student of all early
+schools of art.
+
+Of embroidery there was such profusion that it is indeed no
+exaggeration to say that the needle vied with the sword. There were
+not only wall and bed hangings, embroidered with flowers to brighten
+winter days, cloaks, gowns, and tunics patterned with gold thread and
+coloured silks, and beaver hats wrought with gold lace and pearls and
+sometimes precious stones, but also girdles, satchels, purses, and
+pennons resplendent with heraldic device, and caparison and harness
+for the horses. From the East were brought velvets, silks, and stuffs
+interwoven with gold and silver thread, and used not only for personal
+adornment, but also for vestments, Church-hangings, and the coverings
+of litters. As regards tapestry as we understand it--_i.e._ woven in a
+_high_ warp loom--there is apparently no definite mention of its being
+made at Arras before 1313, so that the numerous allusions to tapestry
+must refer to stuffs woven in the _low_ warp loom. These stuffs would
+seem to have been of two kinds, the one woven with some simple
+pattern, the other with heraldic designs of animals or other
+conventional forms copied from Oriental models. Hence the term
+“Saracenic” applied to both the workers and their handiwork.
+
+In order to realise the Ivories which were probably to be seen in the
+Castle of Hesdin, we must go to the Louvre or the British Museum,
+where may be found a few rare examples of the work of the period, such
+as caskets carved with scenes from the life of Christ or the Virgin if
+they were to hold some sacred treasure, or with scenes from some
+Romance or from daily life if to contain jewels or other mundane
+objects. In addition to such caskets, often painted, Mahaut had, to
+hang from her girdle, as was customary with all ladies in the Middle
+Ages, a daintily wrought ivory writing-tablet, and a small mirror in
+an ivory case. These mirror-cases were generally carved with a scene
+from some love-story, such as two lovers playing chess, or going
+a-hawking, or some detail from the favourite romance of Tristan and
+Isolde. Possibly amongst these treasures was a saddle-bow, with a
+wondrous wealth of carving, or chess-men finely modelled, and inlaid
+with mother-of-pearl, or a triptych with scenes from the Passion,
+represented under Gothic arches of most superb and delicate
+workmanship. But it is perhaps in the Chapel that we must seek the
+finest work, for here both Mahaut and her father, Count Robert, were
+lavish with unsparing hand. One Jean le Scelleur, of Paris, a carver
+of combs and toilet articles as well as of crucifixes and Virgins, is
+named as her principal craftsman. Mention is made of a Cross carved by
+him in cedar-wood with an ivory figure of the Christ, and of two ivory
+figures of the Virgin, one under a canopy, and the other with the Holy
+Child poised upon the hip, that sublime motive belonging more
+especially to the thirteenth century. The chapel itself was beautified
+with carved work in stone. Over the Altar, and in front of it, were
+painted panels, enriched with gold, and translucent enamel over
+colour. If we could picture to ourselves the manner of the sculptor’s
+work we may recall the “Vine-Capital” in Rheims Cathedral, where the
+very stone itself seems to have been metamorphosed into tender foliage
+by the unknown artist.
+
+Of wood-carving, the accounts tell of Choir-stalls, presses for
+vestments and various vessels and ornaments, and also of Angels,
+gilded and painted and bearing the emblems of the Passion, for
+standing round the High Altar. These are described as being raised on
+slender columns, connected by a bar on which were laced fringed silk
+curtains, thus forming a recess for the Altar. We can get some idea of
+the simple beauty of this arrangement from a drawing, still preserved
+in the sacristy of Arras Cathedral, of the High Altar in the old
+Cathedral, and fortunately made before the latter, with all its
+contents, was destroyed in the sixteenth century. It accords in every
+detail with the inventory record of the Chapel of Hesdin. We may also
+compare a picture (No. 783, “The Exhumation of St. Hubert”) in the
+Flemish room in the National Gallery, where a somewhat similar scheme
+is shown.
+
+Of the MSS. and Illuminations only brief mention can be made.
+Surviving examples, and the records of the time, testify to the
+splendour and the sum of them. At the beginning of the thirteenth
+century, the French miniature was influenced in no small degree, both
+in technique and in colour, by glass painting. Towards the end of the
+century this influence yielded to the prevailing enthusiasm for
+architecture and sculpture, and in Bibles and Psalters alike there
+appear scenes with figures as in bas-relief, with architectural
+backgrounds and decorative details. The same spirit that evolved
+tender foliage out of the hard stone of cathedral and church evolved
+also the delicate hawthorn-leaf enriching the initial letter of the
+MS. It mattered little whether the material worked on was stone or
+parchment. Each was but a means for giving expression to a newly
+discovered scheme of beauty--the beauty of Nature. In the thirteenth
+and fourteenth centuries a renewed impetus had been given to the arts
+of writing and illumination. This was partly because a demand had
+arisen for a secular literature to supersede the tiresome and
+time-worn recitations of minstrels, and partly because, in the
+fourteenth century, Books of Hours, instead of the Psalter alone as
+had hitherto been customary, came into general use in private
+devotion. This created a fresh want, and at the same time supplied a
+number of new subjects in which the artist could reveal his skill.
+Arras was one of the chief centres of this new movement, a movement
+which Mahaut continued and stimulated. She employed artists to
+illuminate both sacred and secular works for her own use as well as
+for gifts--gifts counted beyond compare and beside which even precious
+stones were deemed of less worth. To Mahaut this desire for beauty was
+a very lode-star. To glance at a list of the gold- and silver-smiths’
+work--the jewelled and enamelled chaplets of gold, the jewelled
+girdles, and buckles, and braids for the hair, and the cups, some of
+silver with crystal covers or wrought with enamel and precious stones,
+and others of jasper mounted with silver work--reads like a fantasy of
+hidden treasure in some fairy tale. Even her chess-boards--and she was
+a devotee of the game--were of silver or ivory, and one, we read, was
+of jasper and chalcedony mounted with silver and gems, the chess-men
+being of jasper and crystal.
+
+For the younger folk about her there was tennis, and also games of
+hazard with forfeits of girdles and coifs to the ladies. In the Castle
+garden were certain mechanical contrivances which, by their sudden and
+unexpected action, were supposed to amuse the unwary guests. One
+sprinkled them with water, another with black or white powder, as they
+passed by, and yet another, in the form of a monkey, struck them with
+a stick, whilst in a bower might be seen a mirror wherein all who
+looked saw only the distorted semblance of themselves. These unwelcome
+pleasantries were a part of the miscellaneous borrowings from the
+East. But for the easily amused folk of the Middle Ages, time passed
+merrily enough in the midst of such pastimes, and only the shadow on
+the dial seemed to mark its flight.
+
+But Mahaut, amid the manifold claims on her time and talent, had seen
+the shadow lengthening. From time to time she had been attacked by
+illness, to which blood-letting and other remedies of the day had
+brought relief. But on the 25th November 1329, when in Paris, she was
+seized with a sudden sickness, so sudden that sinister rumours were
+noised abroad. Human aid was of no avail. Two days later there was
+general lamentation. The shadow had lengthened into the night. Mahaut
+was dead. In accordance with her wishes, she was buried at the foot of
+her father’s grave in the Abbey of Maubuisson, near Paris, her heart
+being placed in the Church of the Franciscans in Paris, beside the
+remains of her son, whose tomb there was afterwards removed to St.
+Denis. Her possession of Artois, for which she had laboured devotedly,
+became annexed to the Duchy of Burgundy through the marriage of her
+granddaughter with its Duke.
+
+Here, though only a tithe has been told, we must take leave of this
+cultivated woman of the fourteenth century, a type of the time and for
+all time. Her aim was the aim of all culture--the attainment of as
+complete a life as possible. To this she aspired, and to this in large
+measure she attained. What more can be said of even those we count the
+greatest?
+
+
+
+
+A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY FEMINISTE, CHRISTINE DE PISAN
+
+
+Christine de Pisan, Italian by birth, French by adoption, may be
+regarded not merely as a forerunner of true feminism, but also as one
+of its greatest champions, seeing that in her judgment of the sexes
+she endeavours to hold the scales evenly. Possessed of profound common
+sense and of a generous-hearted nature, she is wholly free from that
+want of fairness in urging woman’s claims which is so fatally
+prejudicial to their just consideration. Although, strictly speaking,
+Christine was not original, she was representative, and interests us
+for that very reason. She was perhaps one of the most complete
+exponents of the finer strain of thought of her time. She stands
+before us, at the dawn of the fifteenth century, Janus-headed, looking
+to the past and to the future, a woman typical of a time of
+transition, on the one hand showing, in her writings, a clinging to
+old beliefs, and on the other hand asserting, in her contact with real
+life, independence of thought in the discussion of still unsolved
+questions.
+
+Christine was born at Venice in 1363, where her father, Thomas de
+Pisan, of Bologna, distinguished for his knowledge of medicine and
+astrology, had settled on his marriage with a daughter of one of the
+Councillors of the Republic. When five years of age, she was taken by
+her mother to Paris to join her father, who had been summoned thither
+some time before by the King, Charles the Fifth, to serve as his
+astrologer. At the end of the fourteenth century astrology played a
+very real and important part in men’s lives. Before wars or journeys
+were undertaken, or additions to castle or chapel made, or even a new
+garment put on, the stars were consulted for the propitious day and
+hour. So deeply was Charles the Fifth imbued with a belief in the
+efficacy of this occult art that when he wished to confer some special
+honour, or to express his gratitude for some service rendered to him
+or to the State, he sought to enhance his bounty by sending an
+astrologer as part of his gift. By the time little Christine arrived
+in Paris her father had gained the confidence and esteem of the King,
+and was settled at Court with substantial maintenance. Here she was
+brought up as a maiden of quality, surrounded by much magnificence,
+for Charles loved beautiful things, and never stayed his hand to
+procure them, even when the gratification of his desires involved
+hardship to his people. He possessed many virtues, but economy was not
+one of them. The dismal castle of the Louvre, which had been the home
+of the French kings since the days of Philip Augustus, found no favour
+in his sight as a place of residence, and he quickly set about
+building the sumptuous Hôtel de St. Paul, in what is now known as the
+“Quartier de l’Arsenal.” The Louvre he destined for official
+functions, for an arsenal, and for his library. To form a library was
+no new thing in Paris. Some thirty years earlier Richard de Bury,
+Bishop of Durham (1333) and sometime Chancellor of England, speaks of
+his frequent ambassadorial visits to “Paris, the Paradise of the
+World, with its delightful libraries, where the days seemed ever few,
+for the greatness of our love.” And he adds, “unfastening our
+purse-strings, we scattered money with joyous heart, and purchased
+inestimable books.” But whilst it is true that Charles’s predecessors
+had collected books, none before had thought of forming a library for
+public use, and Charles’s work, as M. Delisle remarks, was really the
+first germ of the Bibliothèque Nationale.[30] To collect books was one
+of his greatest delights, and he spared no trouble or money to make
+his library as complete as possible. This taste for books he may have
+inherited from his father, King John, who, learning to read from a
+beautiful Book of Hours, early acquired a love of books from his
+mother, Jeanne of Burgundy. Charles also loved to lend or make
+presents of books, and among his many gifts, one--an offering to
+Richard the Second--may be seen in the British Museum (Royal 20, B
+VI.). The library was considerably depleted during the reign of
+Charles the Sixth, when it was used as a sort of storehouse from which
+presents were made to prince and prelate, or to any to whom it was
+desired to make a gift, or a recognition of services rendered. On the
+death of Charles the Sixth, in 1425, it was bought by the Duke of
+Bedford, Regent of France, and doubtless some of its treasures were
+transferred by him into England. Those that were left, and some that
+gradually found their way back to France, may now be seen in the
+Bibliothèque Nationale and in other libraries of France, and also in
+various libraries in other countries, but out of the 1200 books
+collected by Charles the Fifth, rather less than a hundred are now
+known to us.
+
+    [30] L. Delisle, _Recherches sur la libraire de Charles V_,
+    Paris, 1907.
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. Royale, Brussels._
+
+CHRISTINE DE PISAN.
+
+_To face page 119._]
+
+To increase the usefulness of his library, Charles employed a number
+of translators, not only of Greek and Latin authors, but also of the
+most important Arabic writings, thus bringing both the classics and
+the science of the day within the reach of the many students
+privileged to make use of it. It was in this library that Christine
+spent long days reading and meditating on the thoughts of the greatest
+minds, thus fitting herself for the part she had to play when life had
+ceased to be a gay dream. We can get from a miniature in a Book of
+Hours, now at Chantilly, and painted by the brothers Limbourg for
+Jean, Duc de Berri, a brother of the King, some idea of what this old
+residence of the Louvre was like. In this miniature we see represented
+a square grim castle, with a large tower at each corner and narrow
+slits for windows, suggestive more of a place of refuge in time of war
+and tumult than the home of a peace-loving, enlightened king. When
+Charles determined to beautify this sombre structure, statues were set
+up without and tapestries hung within. One of the towers was fitted up
+for the library, panelled with rare woods and furnished with some
+thirty small chandeliers and a large central silver lamp, kept lighted
+both night and day so that work could go on at all hours. In the
+courtyard an outside circular staircase (one of the earliest, if not
+_the_ earliest, of the kind) was added to give, as was said, a note of
+gaiety. But the idea of gaiety seems somewhat ironical when we learn
+that as it was difficult to get a sufficient number of large slabs
+quarried quickly, headstones from the cemetery of the Holy Innocents
+were taken for the purpose!
+
+Christine, as a child, showed an extraordinary capacity for learning,
+and this her father zealously fostered and developed. At the age of
+fifteen she married, and married for love, the King’s notary and
+secretary, Etienne de Castel, a gentleman of Picardy. Her happiness
+and well-being seemed assured, but Fortune, whose wheel is ever
+revolving, though sometimes so slowly as to lull us into
+forgetfulness, had decreed otherwise. For Christine it revolved all
+too quickly. Two years after her marriage the King died (1380), and
+her husband and father lost their appointments. Gradually anxiety and
+sorrow crept like some baneful atmosphere into the once happy home.
+First she lost her father, and then, two or three years later, her
+husband died, leaving her, at the age of twenty-five, with three
+children to provide for. Like many another, she turned to letters as
+both a material and a mental support. Endowed with an extraordinary
+gift of versification, she began by writing short poems, chiefly on
+the joys and sorrows of love, expressing sometimes her own sentiments,
+sometimes those of others for whom she wrote. But she tells us that
+often when she made merry she would fain have wept. How many a one
+adown the centuries has re-echoed the same sad note!
+
+“Men must work and women must weep.” So says the poet. But life shows
+us that men and women alike must needs do both. And so the sad
+Christine set to work to fit herself, by the study of the best ancient
+and modern writers, to produce more serious matter than love-ballads,
+turning, in her saddest moments, to Boëthius and Dante for inspiration
+and solace. “I betook myself,” she says, “like the child who at first
+is set to learn its A B C, to ancient histories from the beginning of
+the world--histories of the Hebrews and the Assyrians, of the Romans,
+the French, the Bretons, and diverse others--and then to the
+deductions of such sciences as I had time to give heed to, as well as
+to a study of the poets.” Her master was Aristotle, and she made his
+ethics her gospel. “Ancelle de science,” she calls herself, and
+remains a humble worshipper at the shrine of knowledge, for knowledge,
+she says, is “that which can change the mortal into the immortal.” We
+can picture her to ourselves at work in the library of the Louvre,
+amidst its 900 precious MSS., and in the library of the University of
+Paris, to which she had access through her friend Gerson, the renowned
+Chancellor. In a miniature at the beginning of one of her MSS. she is
+seen seated, in a panelled recess, on a carved wooden bench, dressed
+in a simple blue gown and a high white coif. She is working at a folio
+on a large table covered with tapestry, with a greyhound lying at her
+feet. It is quite possible that this may be either a conventional
+setting, or one due to the imagination of the artist, but as the
+miniaturists of those days were, as far as they could be, realists, it
+is more than possible that we here see her represented at work in her
+favourite nook in the Louvre library, together with the favourite dog
+who shared her lonely hours. Gradually solace came to her through
+work, and having found so precious a treasure for herself, she, like
+our own modern sage, never tired of preaching to others the gospel of
+its blessedness.
+
+Whilst Christine wrote and lived her student life--“son cuer hermit
+dans l’ermitage de Pensée”--her fame went forth, and princes sought,
+by tempting offers, to attach her to their courts, but without
+success. Of these, Henry the Fourth of England, already acquainted
+with her poems, and Gian Galleazo Visconti, Duke of Milan, were the
+most importunate, and particularly the former, who was unaccustomed to
+rebuff and failure. But Christine, with repeated gracious thanks and
+guarded refusals, remained firm. No reason for her decision is
+recorded, but it may well be believed that her patriotism would not
+allow her, even with the certainty of ease and emolument, to quit
+France at that critical time, or to serve the enemy of her adopted
+country.
+
+Although Christine’s reading was very varied and extensive, there were
+two subjects--the amelioration of her war-distraught country, then in
+the throes of the Hundred Years’ War, and the championship of the
+cause of womankind--which specially appealed to her as a patriot and a
+woman, and for which she strove with unceasing ardour. In all her
+writings she so interweaves these two causes that it is only by
+approaching them in the same way that we can understand her view of
+their psychological unity. To Christine these interests were
+essentially identical, for she recognised how paramount is woman’s
+influence in the making or marring of the world--how, in truth, in
+woman’s hand lies a key which can unlock a Heaven or a Hell.
+
+There was sore need of a patriot, and in Christine one was found. It
+has been well said of her, and by a Frenchman too, that “though born a
+woman and an Italian, she alone at the Court of France seemed to have
+manly qualities and French sentiments.” France was in a sorry plight.
+There was war in the land, there was war in the palace. The sick King
+suffered more and more from attacks of madness, and during these
+periods the Dukes of Orleans and Burgundy fought for the regency.
+Christine began her patriotic work by fervent appeals to Isabella, the
+Queen (to whom she offered a MS. now in the British Museum),[31] to
+use her influence to put an end to these dissensions which so greatly
+added to the troubles of the kingdom. She also lost no opportunity of
+proclaiming in her various writings the duties and responsibilities of
+kings and nobles to the people, and the necessity, if there was ever
+to be peace and prosperity, of winning their regard. At the command of
+Philip le Hardi, Duke of Burgundy, and uncle of the King, she wrote in
+prose, from chronicles of the time and from information obtained from
+many connected with the King’s household, _Le Livre des faits et
+bonnes mœurs du roi Charles V_, recounting his virtuous life and deeds
+and their advantage to the realm, and introducing a remarkable
+dissertation on the benefit to a country of a strong middle-class.
+She, of course, reasoned from Aristotle. The subject is a commonplace
+one now, but in the case of any one living at the beginning of the
+fifteenth century, and brought up, as Christine had been, at a
+magnificent Court, it shows rare independence and breadth of thought
+to have grasped and proclaimed with such firmness and clearness as is
+displayed in her treatise the germ of the policy of all modern
+civilised nations--that a middle-class is essential to bring into
+touch those placed at the opposite extremes, the rich and the poor.
+
+    [31] Harley, 4431.
+
+To Christine belongs an honour beyond that of having been a patriot
+and a champion of her sex--the honour of having revealed Dante to
+France.[32] Scattered up and down her writings are many allusions to
+the _Divina Commedia_, showing how real a place it must have filled in
+her soul’s life. She especially recommends it for profitable study in
+the place of the “hateful” _Romance of the Rose_, concerning which she
+gave the warning to her son:--
+
+    Se bien veulx et chastement vivre,
+    De la Rose ne lis le livre.
+
+    [32] A. Farinelli, _Dante e la Francia_, vol. i. p. 192, 1908.
+
+Like Dante, sad and lonely--“souvent seulete et pensive, regretant le
+temps passé”--like him she also realised the thirst for knowledge as
+an ever-present want of the soul, and that its ultimate perfection is
+only to be attained by following after virtue and knowledge. Although,
+as regards profundity, her conception of the world and of life cannot
+be compared with that of her great prototype, or even with that of
+such an one as St. Hildegarde, still she had read with unflagging
+diligence a vast number of profane and ecclesiastical writers, and
+seems to have been well versed in the varied knowledge of her time,
+especially history. But whilst it is possible to criticise her
+learning, tempered as this was by her character and the needs of her
+day, it is at the same time possible to acknowledge that in spite of
+flaws and an often over-elaborated setting, moral truth sparkles
+gemlike throughout her writings. One of her biographers speaks of her
+thus: “Her morale is so pure and so universally human that not only
+does it remain true to-day, but it will retain imperishable value as
+long as ever human society is based on a pure and healthy moral
+foundation.”
+
+In her poem _Le Chemin de long Estude_--a title taken from Dante’s
+appeal to Virgil at the opening of the _Inferno_--Christine begins by
+acknowledging her debt to the immortal poet, saying that much that she
+has to tell has already been told by “Dante of Florence in his book.”
+Virgil as guide is replaced by the Cumean Sibyl, who appears to
+Christine in a dream, and offers to conduct her to another and a more
+perfect world, one where there is no pain and misery. To this
+Christine consents on condition that “sad Hades, whither Æneas once
+was taken,” is not included in the journey. The Sibyl therefore
+promises to reveal to her, instead, in what manner misfortune came
+upon earth, whilst at the same time showing her on the way all that
+is worth seeing in this world, from the Pillars of Hercules, “the end
+of the world,” to distant Cathay. However exhausting this programme
+may appear to us, Christine, knowing the real passion of the late
+Middle Ages for travel--for even those who could not travel in reality
+did so in imagination,--makes use of it as a setting for the
+introduction of a discussion on the qualities most necessary to good
+government. This she does, even at the risk of incurring displeasure
+in high quarters, recalling how Dante’s patriotism led to banishment
+and death in exile, but she adds, “Qui bien ayme, tout endure.” She
+pours forth her classical examples in a chaotic stream, but when she
+leaves earth, and ascends to the celestial regions, she not only shows
+herself versed in the astronomy of the time, but also expresses some
+beauty of thought. The order of the firmament, where all obey law
+without ceasing, so that harmony ensues “like sweet melody,” reminds
+her of Pythagoras and Plato, and suggests to her what life on earth
+might be if good laws were made and observed. In furtherance of her
+idea, she appeals to Reason, who presides over the Virtues or Divine
+Powers, to interrogate the three earthly disputants, Nobility, Riches,
+and Wisdom. In the end Reason awards the prize to Wisdom, condemning
+Riches as the great enemy of mankind. Thereupon Wisdom appeals to the
+verdicts of Juvenal, Boëthius, St. Jerome, and others to establish
+that it is Virtue alone that is of worth, and ennobles a man, and then
+sets forth the qualities of a good sovereign. But as this leads to
+some difference of opinion, Christine, who was withal a courtly lady,
+descends to earth in order to ask the King, Charles the Sixth, to
+decide the matter. This dream-poem she dedicates to her royal master
+for his diversion in his saner moments, and thus once again introduces
+into high places the subject so near to her heart. She lets it be seen
+that she herself, like Dante, did not believe in the blending of the
+spiritual and the temporal powers. And as regards temporal power she
+adds--perhaps borrowing the idea from Dante’s _De Monarchia_, and
+anticipating Napoleon’s dream--that in order to ensure peace on earth,
+it is necessary that one supreme ruler should reign over the whole
+world. “La sua volontade e nostra pace,” sang a soul in Dante’s heaven
+of the Moon--the lowest in the celestial system--when questioned
+whether it was content with its lowly place. The poet therefore adds,
+“ogni dove in cielo e paradiso.” Christine, echoing these thoughts,
+would fain apply them to life on earth, giving them their deepest and
+fullest meaning.
+
+Though she laboured so unceasingly for the good of her country, she
+also did her utmost to defend her sex from the indiscriminate censure
+which had been heaped upon it, for the evil spoken seemed to her far
+to outweigh the good. A century before, Dante had also idealised
+woman--even if, as some think, he personified some abstract
+quality--and placed her in heaven beside the Deity. Chivalry had also
+idealised woman, but in an exotic, exaggerated manner, which was bound
+to reach its zenith, and bound also to have its darker side. So we
+find that to speak good or ill of womankind became a conventionalism
+in the Middle Ages. Black or white was the tone chosen by the artist
+in words. There was no blending, no shading. Women were either
+deified, or held to be evil incarnate. The material side of life men
+understood, and could depict with some exactness, but to grasp in any
+way its subtler aspects required an education which could be attained
+only by slow degrees, since it meant the gradual modification of the
+long-cherished illusion that brute force is the world’s only weapon. A
+want of capacity to discern is often responsible for a depreciatory
+opinion, and we can but ascribe this strangely narrow-minded and
+superficial attitude towards woman to some such want. Christine set
+herself the task of trying to remedy this evil, not by shouting in the
+market-place, but by studying men and women as God made them and as
+she found them. Before she began her work, a new day seemed to be
+dawning. Just as, when classicism was in full decadence, Plutarch
+wrote _De mulierum virtutibus_ (of the virtue of women), so, in the
+fourteenth century, Boccaccio gave to the world _De claris mulieribus_
+(of right-renowned women). We do not expect to find woman treated on
+a very high plane by Boccaccio, but we recognise that, in a way, this
+work forms a fresh starting-point in the eternal controversy. Perhaps
+we should not have had this curious collection of stories of women,
+virtuous and vicious, mythological and historical--stories which are
+certainly very inferior as art to those of the _Decameron_--had not a
+crisis occurred in Boccaccio’s life. One day a Carthusian monk came to
+him with a warning message from the dead, and, much troubled in mind,
+he resolved to try to begin life afresh. But he was a better
+story-teller than a moraliser. He would fain save his soul, but he
+liked and courted popularity, and knew well the deeper meaning of the
+proverb, “A terreno dolce, vanga di legno.” And so he mingles virtue
+and vice, hoping, as he says, that “some utility and profit shall come
+of the same.” To us of to-day, the chief interest of this work is that
+Boccaccio’s fame perhaps gave a definite impetus to the discussion of
+the sex, instead of wholesale assertion, and also that it probably
+suggested to Chaucer the idea for his _Legend of Good Women_. How
+refreshing to find ourselves in the atmosphere of the kindly Chaucer!
+Let us pause for a moment, and recall what he says of women, he who
+was not only a knightly Court-poet, but also a popular singer, well
+versed in the practical wisdom of life. In the prologue we read, “Let
+be the chaf, and wryt wel of the corn,” and in allusion to his
+library of sixty books, old and new, of history and love-stories, he
+says that for every bad woman, mention was duly made of a hundred good
+ones. Time and experience in no way dull this appreciation, for when,
+later, _The Canterbury Tales_ appear, his estimate has risen ten-fold,
+since in the prologue to “The Miller’s Tale” we read, “and ever a
+thousand gode ageyn one badde.” From this time onwards, literature on
+the subject increases almost _ad infinitum_. Treatises and imaginary
+debates seem to vie with each other for popularity. All these make
+intensely interesting reading, for these fanciful discussions, which
+are supposed to take place, sometimes between a man and a woman,
+sometimes between a mixed company in a garden or villa or some bath
+resort where many are gathered together, are really a record of the
+intellectual amusements of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
+“Que devez-vous préférer, du plaisir qui va vous échapper bientôt, ou
+d’une espérance toujours vive, quoique toujours trompée?” “Which sex
+loves the more easily or can do the better without love?” “It is not
+enough to know how to win love, but one must also know how to keep
+such love when it has been won.” Such-like were the subtle problems
+which on these occasions folk set themselves to solve.
+
+But whilst love problems could be treated as a pastime, they also had
+their serious side. Of this there is an example in Christine’s story
+of _The Duke of True Lovers_. Although much in its narration is
+evidently the mere invention of the poetess, it is quite possible,
+nay even probable, that it has some historical basis. Christine begins
+her story by saying that it had been confided to her by a young prince
+who did not wish his name to be divulged, and who desired only to be
+known as “The Duke of True Lovers.” It has been suggested, with much
+likelihood, that this is in truth the love-story of Jean, Duc de
+Bourbon, and of Marie, Duchesse de Berri, daughter of the famous Jean,
+Duc de Berri, and the inheritor of his MSS. When the story opens, the
+heroine of it, whoever she may have been, is already wedded. Hence all
+the difficulties of the hero, and indeed of both. Christine, with her
+womanly sympathy and psychological insight, makes all so intensely
+real that we are quite carried away in imagination to the courtly life
+of the fifteenth century. We read of the first meeting; of the Duke’s
+love at first sight; of Castle daily life; of a three days’ tournament
+given in honour of the lady; of devices for secret meetings and the
+interchange of letters; of the inevitable scandal-monger; of a letter
+from a former _gouvernante_--whose aid as go-between had been
+sought--containing a most comprehensive and remarkable treatise on
+feminine morality, the dangers of illicit love, and the satisfaction
+of simple wifely duty; of the separation which the position of the
+lady, and the gallantry of her lover, alike demanded; of meetings at
+intervals; of the mutual solace of short love-poems; and then the
+story, perhaps to evade identification, ends vaguely. But as we finish
+the story, we cannot help feeling that even if Christine’s setting is
+fiction, she yet gives us a glance of real life.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+LADY IN HORSE-LITTER, RETURNING FROM TOURNAMENT.
+
+Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 132._]
+
+When Christine turned to her serious work in the cause of womankind,
+she began by attacking two books, Ovid’s _Art of Love_, and _The
+Romance of the Rose_, both of which, in the Middle Ages, it was deemed
+wellnigh sacrilegious to decry. Her challenge, _L’Epistre au Dieu
+d’Amours_, took the form of an address to the God of Love, professing
+to come from women of all conditions, imploring Cupid’s aid against
+disloyal and deceitful lovers, whose base behaviour she largely
+attributes to the false teaching of these two books. This argument
+appeared in 1399, and she soon discovered that she had stirred up a
+hornet’s nest. But she had attacked advisedly and fearlessly, and was
+quite prepared for any counter onslaught. Her position was
+considerably strengthened by the alliance and co-operation of her
+staunch friend Gerson, the Chancellor, who himself, in the name of the
+clergy, took up arms against the flagrant scurrility to be found in
+the portion of _The Romance of the Rose_ contributed by Jean de Meun.
+Other powerful allies joined the cause, and, to help to crystallise
+their efforts, species of “Courts of Love” were instituted, not alone
+for discourse on love, as heretofore, but also in the defence of
+women. All who united in this meritorious fellowship undertook to wear
+a distinctive badge, and thus proclaim their confession of faith.
+Among these Orders one was styled “L’Escu vert à la dame blanche,”
+another, “L’Ordre de la Rose,” and so on, suggestive of their purport.
+The first-named was founded by the brave soldier Jean le Meingre,
+Maréchal de Boucicaut, whose portrait may be seen in his superb Book
+of Hours, painted between 1399 and 1407, now in the Musée
+Jacquemart-André, Paris.[33] Its membership was restricted to thirteen
+knights, who swore to defend the honour of women against all
+detractors. To distinguish them from others less gallantly disposed,
+they wore on the sleeve an ornament in the shape of a small shield,
+enamelled green on the outside, and with the representation, on the
+underside, of a woman, enamelled in white.
+
+    ... Vous portez la dame en verde targe
+    Pour démonstrer que de hardi visage
+    Vous vous voulez pour les dames tenir
+    Contre ceulz qui leur porteront dommage!
+
+    [33] “Le Musée Jacquemart-André,” _Gazette des Beaux-Arts_,
+    August 1912.
+
+Of the Order of the Rose and its foundation, Christine, in one of her
+poems, gives most picturesque and interesting particulars, interesting
+because they are evidently taken from an actual scene, though
+Christine, in her rôle as poetess, feels it necessary to add touches
+suggestive of fairyland rather than of real life. A numerous assembly,
+with goodwill at heart, has met together in the magnificent dwelling
+of Louis, Duke of Orleans, the King’s brother, Christine being one of
+the number. Suddenly there comes into their midst one personifying the
+Goddess Venus, surrounded by maidens garlanded with roses and carrying
+golden bowls filled with them. The bowls placed on the table, the
+Goddess proceeds to announce the rules of the Order, above all
+enjoining those present to avoid envy, and in no way to perjure
+themselves, since this would be a most heinous and hateful sin. The
+badge chosen is a fresh rose, but if any member of the Order should
+happen to be in a country where such is not attainable, or when the
+season is unpropitious, then a rose fashioned in gold or silver, or
+one embroidered in silk, will suffice. With pledges of loyalty,
+
+    A bonne amour je fais veu et promesse
+    Et à la fleur qui est rose clamée,
+    A la vaillant de Loyauté deesse,
+    Par qui nous est ceste chose informée,
+    Qu’à tous jours mais la bonne renommée
+    Je garderay de dame en toute chose
+    Ne par moy ja femme n’yert diffamée:
+    Et pour ce prens je L’Ordre de la Rose,[34]
+
+    [34] “Le Dit de la Rose,” 197-204, _Œuvres poétiques de
+    Christine de Pisan_, t. ii., pub. par Maurice Roy, 1891.
+
+all the company deck themselves with roses. The charter is given by
+the Goddess into the safe-keeping of Christine, who describes it as
+written on fine parchment in letters of azure, and fastened with a
+silken cord of the same colour. From this cord hangs a rare gem, on
+one side of which their patroness, the Goddess of Love, and on the
+other Cupid, with his feet on a leopard, are depicted. This moral and
+literary contest is perhaps the most brilliant of the many discussions
+that took place in the Middle Ages in honour of women. The highest and
+the wisest in the land joined in it, but all the honour must be given
+to Christine for having, by her brave and reasonable attitude, caused
+the problem, which henceforth was to evolve like truth itself, to be
+treated on a rational basis. “Toute la foy remaint en une femme,” says
+Christine. Were not her words, nearly 500 years later, echoed by Renan
+when he says, “Après Jésus, c’est Marie de Magdale qui a le plus fait
+pour la fondation du Christianisme”?
+
+_L’Epistre au Dieu d’Amours_ is an extraordinary product of worldly
+wisdom and common sense, seasoned with satire. One of the complaints
+against disloyal suitors, and one which strikes a singularly modern
+note, is that they make protests of love, and false promises, which
+must be either paid for dearly, or rejected with scorn. Then the hero,
+if he has won the day, proclaims his victory in taverns and other
+places of resort, and even in mixed company. Or if, as is more often
+the case, he has lost it, he still tries, by suggestive hints, to
+appear to his fellows a successful gallant. Surely the worldling of
+to-day does not seem to differ very essentially from his brother of
+the fifteenth century, or to have progressed any farther along the
+path of loyalty!
+
+Christine’s line of argument is that the many must not be condemned
+for the shortcomings of the few, and that even when God made the
+angels, some were bad. To the charge that books are full of the
+condemnation of women, she replies with the simple remark that books
+were not written by women. Where is the shade of the worthy Christine
+to-day? Does it walk the earth with a flag of triumph or a laurel
+wreath whilst its sisters in the flesh are writing on every subject in
+heaven and earth and sea? “De nos jours, le monde est aux femmes.”
+
+Is it marvellous, asks Christine, that a woman--“une chose simplète,
+une ignorante petite femmellette,” as she expresses it--should be
+betrayed by man, when even the great city of Troy was, and when all
+the books and romances are full of the betrayal of kings and kingdoms?
+And if a woman is not constant by nature, why should Jean de Meun, in
+_The Romance of the Rose_, devise so many tricks to deceive her,
+seeing that it is not necessary to make a great assault upon a feeble
+place? Then she deftly turns the tables on the other sex, reminding
+each that he is the son of his mother, and that
+
+    Se mauvaise est il ne peut valor rien,
+    Car nul bon fruit de mal arbre ne vient.
+
+And so on to the end, all is argument and banter. The repute of her
+letter must have travelled quickly, for whilst Christine was still
+combating with dissentients, an epitomised rendering of it appeared
+(1402) in English from the pen of Hoccleve, the pupil of Chaucer,
+entitled _The Lettre of Cupide, God of Love_.
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. Royale, Munich._
+
+LA CITÉ DES DAMES.
+
+_To face page 138._]
+
+Later, Christine, with Boccaccio’s _De claris mulieribus_ before her,
+writes _La Cité des Dames_, an account of the building of an imaginary
+city which is to shelter within its strong ramparts the women of all
+times and all countries who have distinguished themselves by good and
+heroic deeds. This has been aptly called “The Golden Book of
+Heroines.” It may certainly be considered her masterpiece on her
+favourite subject. She urges that philosophers and poets, with one
+accord, have defamed women, and she appeals to God, asking why such a
+thing should be, seeing that He Himself made them and gave them such
+inclinations as seemed good to Him, and that in no way could He err.
+She maintains that God created the soul, and made it as good in woman
+as in man, and that it is not the sex, but the perfection of virtue,
+that is material. Combating the suggestion that women are not fit to
+plead in Court because they have not sufficient intelligence to apply
+the law when they have learnt it, she refers to history to prove that
+women who have had the management of affairs have shown that, far from
+lacking intelligence and judgment, they have possessed both in large
+measure. At the same time, whilst defending their capability when
+necessity arises, she does not think it necessary for women to
+interfere in matters which seem essentially man’s business. Her
+remarks on the subject of marriage are certainly practical, and at the
+same time disclose a strange unloveliness in contemporary manners. She
+is not of St. Paul’s opinion that it is better not to marry, but all
+the same she suggests that, unless without means, that woman is
+happier who does not marry a second time, seeing that the life of a
+married woman is often worse than if she were in the hands of the
+Saracens--the terror of the Middle Ages,--and that frequently after
+her husband has been out enjoying himself, her only supper, on his
+return, is a beating. She counsels the education of women, and
+condemns those who suggest that this will conduce to unseemly ways. In
+truth, her wonderful sense of justice, and her enlightened opinions
+generally, make it a marvellous résumé of statesmanship as far as it
+goes. It is a real Utopia. Perhaps to Christine it was a glimpse of
+the Promised Land! As we read her views on the education of boys and
+girls together, in this happy city, we feel that she might be
+discussing with us the problems of to-day. She says that if boys and
+girls are taught the same subjects, girls can, as a rule, learn just
+as well, and just as intelligently, as boys, and so on. In this
+conclusion she forestalls the learned Cornelius Agrippa, a doctor and
+philosopher of the sixteenth century, and one of the most original and
+remarkable men of his time, who boldly asserts that sex is merely
+physical, and does not extend to soul or rational power. She sums up
+by strongly advocating study and learning, both for self-improvement
+and as a consolation and possession for all time.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+SETTING OUT FOR POISSY.
+
+Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 140._]
+
+Of her poetical writings on love and the sexes, perhaps the most
+enchanting is _Le Livre du Dit de Poissy_. In it she takes us, on a
+bright spring morning, with a joyous company, from Paris to the royal
+convent of Poissy, where her child is at school. She describes all the
+beauties of the country, the fields gay with flowers, the warbling of
+the birds, the shepherdesses with their flocks, the willow-shaded
+river bank along which they ride, the magic of the forest of St.
+Germain, a little world apart of greenery and shade, filled with the
+song of the nightingales. Laughing and singing by the way, they reach
+the convent gate. Then follows a description of the beautiful carved
+cloisters, the chapter-house, the nuns’ dress and their dormitory, the
+garden scented with lavender and roses, with one part, where small
+animals are allowed to run wild, left uncultivated, and the ponds well
+stocked with fish. As the day wanes, they bid farewell to the nuns,
+who offer them gifts of purses and girdles embroidered in silk and
+gold, worked by their own hands. They return to the inn where they are
+to spend the night, and after supper wander forth to listen to the
+nightingales, then dance a carole, and so to bed. The ride back to
+Paris in the morning, during which a discussion on love matters is
+introduced, is painted with the same impressionist touch, and it is
+with real regret that we take leave of these happy folk as they alight
+in Paris city from their stout nags.
+
+Another similar discourse, _Le Débat de deux amants_, has for setting
+a gala entertainment, taking place, like the founding of the “Order of
+the Rose,” under the auspices of Louis, Duke of Orleans, who ever
+extended a princely protection to Christine. Louis had married
+Valentine Visconti, daughter of Gian Galleazo Visconti, founder of the
+Certosa, near Pavia, a princess well versed in art and letters, and
+withal in pomp and splendour. It is on a day in May, the garden gay
+with gallants and fair ladies. We hear the minstrels play, and watch
+some of the company, decked with garlands, dancing under the trees. In
+the palace there is music and singing. Christine is seated in a
+tapestried hall with one or two esquires who prefer to discourse of
+love to joining in the jollity. After a time the talk turns on fickle
+men, and Christine brings forth from her vast storehouse of knowledge
+classical and mediæval examples. As she mentions Theseus, and recalls
+his baseness to Ariadne, she points to the tapestry on the wall before
+them, where the story is woven. This little touch makes the scene very
+real to us, for the record of the purchase of this tapestry, with the
+price of twelve hundred francs paid for it, may still be found amongst
+the royal inventories.
+
+There is such a volume and variety of works from Christine’s pen that
+it is no easy task to make a fair selection. One of the most
+significant, since it deals with a subject which permeated mediæval
+thought, and on which she was wont to dwell, is _La Mutation de
+fortune_, “Fortune more inconstant than the moon,” says Christine. In
+it she writes with her heart in her hand, as it were, telling first of
+the sore havoc Fortune has wrought amongst those most dear to her. Yet
+though her own heart has been torn on the Wheel of Fortune, she stands
+before her fellow sufferers like some figure of Hope pointing upward,
+where, she says, wrong is surely righted. And thus she turns to the
+world in general, not in the spirit of the pessimist, but rather in
+that of the philosopher. She well knows that Fortune is no blindfolded
+goddess turning writhing humanity on a wheel, but a something rooted
+in ourselves, and she has pity for “la povre fragilité humaine.”
+Though so independent and advanced in thought, she is still found
+clinging in her writings to mediæval forms. As a setting for her
+thoughts on Fortune’s changes, she makes use of the favourite simile
+of a castle--here the Castle of Fortune--as representing the world,
+wherein the rich and the poor, the strong and the weak, jostle one
+another. She criticises all men, from the prince to the pauper, but
+not women, since these have been sufficiently criticised and decried.
+It is like the prelude to a _Dance of Death_. Then she tells of the
+paintings on the walls of this imaginary castle, and uses this
+mediæval fancy, itself borrowed from the classics (_Met._ ii. 5. 770),
+to give what is really a history of the world as she knew it, written
+to demonstrate the instability of all earthly conditions.
+
+Once again, with her versatile gifts, she turns from philosophy to a
+treatise on military tactics and justice, _Le Livre des faits d’armes
+et de chevalerie_. However devoid of interest, except as a landmark in
+the history of military strategy and customs, this work may be to-day,
+it was thought of sufficient importance in the reign of our Henry the
+Seventh for the king to command Caxton to translate and print it
+(1489) with the title of _The Book of Faytes of Arms_, a book still
+sought after by our bibliophiles. It was further honoured by being
+quoted as an authority in the reign of Henry the Eighth. Considering
+the nature of its contents, this seems quite an extraordinary tribute
+to the judgment and ability of the writer.
+
+But the misery of France is ever increasing. Ceaseless civil war and
+foreign invasion impoverish the people, and make desolate the land.
+The dissolute Court is extravagant and filled with discord. Christine,
+fired with patriotic fervour, once more makes an effort, which proves
+to be her final one, to arouse the pleasure-loving nobility to some
+sense of its obligations to the nation. _Le Livre des trois vertues_,
+and _Le Livre de la paix_, appear one after the other. In the former,
+which she dedicates to the Dauphine, Margaret of Burgundy, she merely
+adds another to the long list of discourses for the guidance of women
+which, in Christian times, begins as early as the second century.[35]
+This theme forms the subject of so considerable a didactic literature
+that it can only be hinted at here. Whether treated from a religious
+or from a social point of view, or the two combined, the sum-total of
+the teaching is moral training with a view to self-restraint and
+subordination. Christine addresses herself to all women, from the
+highest to the lowest, but her principal theme is the influence a
+princess may and should have on Court life. She further counsels not
+princesses alone, but all well-born women, not to attach too much
+importance to the things of this world, to be charitable, and to see
+to the education of their children, and so to inform themselves that
+they may be capable of filling their husbands’ place when they are
+obliged to be absent at war or at the Court. She adds a plea for the
+country, that war should be opposed, and one for the poor, that pity
+should be shown to them. Then she addresses herself to the townswoman,
+advising her to see to her household, not to fear to go into the
+kitchen, and to avoid all luxury; then to servants, counselling them
+on no account to take bribes, adding the practical touch that as God
+is everywhere, and only asks of each a good heart, it is not
+necessary for them to go to Mass every day; then to the wife of the
+labourer, bidding her to guard well her master’s flocks and to
+encourage her husband to work; and, finally, she has a word of
+sympathy for the poor, holding out to them hope of recompense in
+heaven for misery endured here, and exhorting them to have patience
+meanwhile. From this patriotic and practical advice to women she turns
+to men, and in _Le Livre de la Paix_ sets forth the duties of princes
+and of those in power to the people, importuning them to exercise
+clemency, liberality, and justice.
+
+    [35] A. A. Hentsch, _De la littérature du moyen âge
+    s’adressant spécialement aux femmes_, Cahors, 1903.
+
+But it is too late. The sand in the hour-glass is running low.
+Disaster follows disaster, until the final blow is struck at Agincourt
+(1415), where the flower of the French nation is cut off, and princes
+of the blood are carried away into exile. Christine, with bleeding
+heart, and worn with trouble and disappointment, retires to the
+convent of Poissy, “un très doux paradis,” perchance to find peace and
+consolation within its tranquil walls, and to implore Heaven’s aid for
+her sore-stricken country. For fourteen years no sound from her
+reaches the outside world. Then, inspired by the glorious advent and
+deeds of Joan of Arc, with all her old passion she pours forth a final
+hymn of praise and thanksgiving to the woman who has at last aroused
+France to patriotism, and so dies in peace at the solemn moment of
+Charles the Seventh’s consecration at Rheims.
+
+    O Thou! ordainèd Maid of very God!
+    Joanna! born in Fortune’s golden hour,
+    On thee the Holy Spirit pours His Flood
+    And His high grace is given thee for dower.
+    Now all great gifts are thine:--O blessed be He
+    That lent thee life!--how word my grateful prayer?
+    --No prayer of thine was spoken fruitlessly,
+    O Maid of God! O Joan! O Virgin rare!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Mark me this portent! strange beyond all telling!
+    How this despoilèd Kingdom stricken lay,
+    And no man raised his hand to guard his dwelling,
+    Until a Woman came to show the way.
+    Until a Woman (since no man dare try)
+    Rallied the land and bade the traitors fly.
+    Honour to Womankind! It needs must be
+    That God loves Woman, since He fashioned Thee!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    O strange! This little maid sixteen years old
+    On whom no harness weigheth overmuch.
+    So strong the little hands! enduring hold
+    She seemeth fed by that same armour’s touch,
+    Nurtured on iron--as before her vanish
+    The enemies of her triumphal day;
+    And this by many men is witnessèd;
+    Yea, many eyes be witness of that fray!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Castles and towns, she wins them back for France,
+    And France is free again, and this her doing!
+    Never was power given as to her lance!
+    A thousand swords could do no more pursuing.
+    Of all staunch men and true she is the Chief,
+    Captain and Leader, for that she alone
+    Is braver than Achilles the brave Greek.
+    All praise be given to God who leadeth Joan!
+
+
+
+
+AGNES SOREL
+
+
+So much glamour has attached, and rightly so, to Joan of Arc, the
+soldier-saviour of Charles the Seventh of France, that another woman,
+Agnes Sorel--Charles’s good angel of a less militant order--has been
+almost entirely overlooked, and where she has been remembered, has
+been treated by the few with the honour due to her, and by the many
+merely as Charles’s mistress. But to her it was given to be a great
+inspirer of Charles, and much of the good that this weak king and
+ungrateful man did for his country may assuredly be in large measure
+attributed to her influence, just as the greatest merit that can be
+recorded of him personally was his devotion to her whilst she lived,
+though the memory of her availed naught after she had passed away.
+Agnes Sorel came as it were between the ebb and flow of the late
+Middle Ages and the Renaissance, when chivalry, not as a passing
+emotion but as an education, still lingered in men’s relation with
+women. Respect for womankind grew in the Middle Ages in France under
+the double influence of religion and chivalry, of which the cult of
+the Virgin and the cult of woman were the outcome. In honour of both,
+men strove in tournament and fought in battle. With the cry, “For our
+Lady,” or “For God and my Lady,” men hurled themselves into the thick
+of the strife as if the goddess, whether divine or human, in whose
+name they ventured, had made her champions invulnerable. And, in a
+manner as it would seem of action and re-action, the goddess became
+humanised and the woman deified. The former tendency may be traced in
+miracles attributed to the Virgin, and, later, in the “Mysteries,” and
+the latter in tales of chivalry, where love is treated as a gift from
+Heaven, and the recipients of it are idealised. Stories which seem to
+contradict this, and to refute all accepted ideas of chivalry and
+honour, are frequently original only in details, the bases being
+borrowed from Oriental tales. Buddha’s country, the land of the
+Zenana, supplied much material of an exaggerated nature which in the
+West became mere travesty.
+
+It is always difficult to determine exactly the origin of anything so
+subtle as a sentiment, especially one which gradually pervades and
+influences a people. It is, in its way, at first like a soft breeze,
+of which we can only see the effect. But as we try to discover some
+definite, if only partial, reason for this interchange of simple human
+relations between the Virgin and her votaries, we remember that St.
+Francis, the embodiment of exalted human sentiment, had lived, and
+that scholasticism, in that phase of it which treated the dialectical
+subtleties of words as paramount, was on the wane. Hence spirit,
+which had so long been restrained, and which is ever in conflict with
+form, again prevailed, and mankind discovered that a loving Mother had
+taken the place of a stately Queen in the Heavens. This attitude
+towards the Virgin is revealed in the miracles attributed to her
+agency. It is also shown in one of the greatest works of piety of the
+thirteenth century, the _Meditations on the Life of Jesus Christ_,[36]
+which, through the medium of the “Mysteries,” introduced into sacred
+pictorial art some of its most dramatic and appealing scenes. Where is
+there to be found anything more tenderly human than the incident of
+“Christ taking leave of His Mother” before His journey to Jerusalem to
+consummate His mission?
+
+    [36] These meditations, attributed in the past, and by some
+    even now, to St. Bonaventura, are considered by other
+    scholars to be of Cistercian inspiration. P. Perdrizet, _La
+    Vierge de Miséricorde_, 1908, p. 15.
+
+This note of the womanly element in its fairest form, gradually
+insinuating itself more and more, and permeating life, art, and
+literature, is the key to the right understanding of the position
+which woman had attained in the civilised world.
+
+Before turning our special attention to Agnes Sorel, let us recall the
+condition of France at the beginning of the fifteenth century.
+
+When the lunatic King Charles the Sixth died in 1422, and Charles, his
+son, at the age of nineteen, succeeded under the title of “King of
+Bourges,” Paris was held by the Burgundians, who were in league with
+the English. The Dukes of Burgundy and of Brittany were alike
+vacillating in their policy, being at one time attached to the king’s
+party, and at another allied to the English. With the exception of a
+few castles, the strongholds of lords loyal to the Crown, the English
+possessed the whole of France north of the Loire, from the Meuse to
+the Bay of Mont St. Michel. Hither the Duke of Bedford was sent as
+regent for the English king, Henry the Sixth, then ten months old,
+who, by the terms of the Treaty of Troyes (1420), was the lawful king,
+the right of succession having been conferred on his father, Henry the
+Fifth, when he married Catherine, the daughter of Charles the Sixth of
+France.
+
+Charles the Seventh divided his time between Bourges and Poitiers,
+where the government was carried on, and Loches, Chinon, and Tours,
+the places he dearly loved, and in which he sought the solitude he
+craved for. But even in these seemingly peaceful retreats his lethargy
+and indolence were disturbed by perpetual intrigues, which it must be
+admitted were largely fostered by his own caprices and fickle
+affections. Meanwhile a cry of misery was arising from the
+war-devastated land. Churches and convents, castles and cottages, were
+all fallen into ruin, and brambles grew on the untilled land where
+once golden corn had waved. Peasants hid their horses during the day
+and brought them out to graze at night. As Alain Chartier wrote at
+the time, “Les pays champestres sont tournez à l’estat de la mer, où
+chascun a tant de seigneurie comme il a de force.” Men of all
+conditions, from the proudest lord to the poorest peasant, joined in
+spasmodic and detached efforts to drive out the English, but with the
+result that they did little else than harass them. Want of cohesion
+was the characteristic of the national resistance until, from a small
+village in the east of France, there appeared a deliverer in the
+person of Joan of Arc. Instantly, as if her sword were a magic wand,
+all the fighting men, impelled and inspired by the strength of her
+personality, rallied around her, and victory was assured.
+
+The story of the siege and surrender of Orleans, of the crowning of
+Charles in Rheims Cathedral, of Joan subsequently falling into the
+hands of the Burgundians, who sold her to their allies, the English,
+of her shameful trial and cruel death, are facts so well known that
+they may well be passed over here as briefly as possible. Suffice it
+to say, that, except for a time, even the triumph of this
+maiden-patriot did little to rouse the indolent king, who speedily
+returned to his selfish life in Touraine. War, pillage, and anarchy
+again devastated France. But gradually a change came over Charles. He
+seemed to awake as from a stupor. Dissolute and self-seeking
+favourites were dismissed, and the king was surrounded by able and
+high-minded men. He bestirred himself to make a final peace with
+Burgundy and Brittany, and to take part in the war which was still
+smouldering, though there were signs of its approaching end.
+
+What was the secret of such a change? That it was due, in the first
+instance, partly to the wise influence of his mother-in-law, Yolande
+of Aragon, and partly also to that of his wife, Marie of Anjou, sister
+of the good Duke René, seems almost certain, but that it was
+intensified when Agnes Sorel came into his life, there can be no
+doubt. When we consider the king’s earlier life, and what it was
+whilst he was under the influence of Agnes, and his relapse into
+indolence and debauchery after her death, we can only attribute much
+of this change to her sympathetic and wise guidance. Joan of Arc had
+represented the popular element, Agnes Sorel represented the
+aristocratic. Joan of Arc aroused the people to united action by her
+enthusiasm and success, Agnes Sorel, in her time, helped to complete
+the consolidation of the kingdom, by inspiring and sustaining the
+king. Perhaps no one man could have accomplished such a revolution. It
+took two women to do this, and what they did was not of mere passing
+worth. Phœnix-like, France arose from the ashes of the Hundred Years’
+War, and it was Agnes Sorel, as priestess, who stirred the embers
+which hid the new life.
+
+Voltaire, generally more ready to scoff than to approve, wrote thus of
+Agnes Sorel:
+
+    Le bon roi Charles, au printemps de ses jours,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Avait trouvé, _pour le bien de la France_,
+    Une beauté, nommée Agnes Sorel.
+
+Was it for the good of France? Let us disregard prejudices, and
+examine facts. Even then, if all that is known of her were written, it
+could only bear to this rare personality the resemblance which a faint
+reflection does to reality.
+
+Agnes Sorel was probably born about 1420 or 1422, in the Castle of
+Fromenteau in Touraine.[37] Her father, Jean Soreau, or Sorel, was
+Lord of Coudon, and belonged to the lesser nobility. It was in this
+beautiful country of forest and meadow-land, of silvery rivers and
+meandering streams, that Agnes spent her early years, her education
+being principally religious, for religion naturally held the first
+place in a society which still retained faith in the supernatural. It
+was customary at that time for girls of noble birth to complete their
+education either at Court or at the castle of some princely person,
+for such places were considered excellent schools of courtesy and
+other virtues for the daughters as well as for the sons of the
+nobility.
+
+    [37] Both the date and the place of her birth seem uncertain.
+    Some writers suggest 1415, and some 1420 or 1422, as the
+    date; whilst Froidmantel, in Picardy, is conjectured by some,
+    and Fromenteau, in Touraine, by others, as the place. (Du
+    Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iv. p. 171,
+    note 4.)
+
+Though the date is uncertain, it was at the Court of Lorraine that
+Agnes became maid-of-honour to the Duchess Isabelle, wife of René,
+Duke of Anjou and Lorraine, and Count of Provence, a prince
+distinguished for chivalry and learning. This intellectual and
+chivalrous atmosphere must have been peculiarly congenial to the
+sympathetic and versatile nature of Agnes Sorel. We can picture her
+listening to the Duke René reading his latest poem to one or two of
+his brother-poets in the castle pleasaunce, or discoursing on
+philosophy or statecraft, or attending some brilliant pageant or
+sumptuous fête. Chivalry, though dead as an institution, still
+survived as a recreation, and as an appeal from the past to the
+cultured imagination, and René, mediæval knight that he was in
+sentiment, dearly loved the gorgeous spectacle of a tournament, with
+the knight jousting in honour of his chosen lady. At this Court Agnes
+also came under the influence of Yolande of Aragon, widow of Louis,
+King of Naples and Sicily, great-granddaughter of King John of France,
+mother of the Duke René, and mother-in-law of King Charles the
+Seventh, a woman renowned for her extraordinary political capacity.
+All these ties, and the remembrance of the French blood in her veins,
+emphasised Yolande’s dominant passion--the love of France,--and it may
+well be that in this patriotic atmosphere Agnes Sorel became imbued
+with a like passion, which later she was to develop in all its
+perfection, rivalled only by her devotion to the well-being and glory
+of her royal lover.
+
+Patriotism was a virtue of recent growth in France, for, in order to
+thrive, it requires unity of idea, and during the Middle Ages the only
+idea common to all was Christianity, which, from the nature of its
+teaching of humility and fraternity, does not make for patriotism. It
+may cement the structure, but it does not form the basis. It was only
+after years of suffering and unrest that men learned to sink their
+individual and local interests in those of the nation as a whole.
+Then, and only then, could patriotism arise, and only under such
+conditions could it flourish.
+
+How long Agnes lived at the Court of Lorraine (one of the most refined
+and cultured Courts of the time), and how her first meeting with the
+king came about, is uncertain. It has been considered likely that
+between 1431 and 1435 Isabelle of Lorraine went to Chinon to beseech
+the king to use his influence to obtain the release of her husband,
+imprisoned by his cousin, a rival claimant to the duchy of Lorraine.
+It is possible that Agnes, even if only born in 1422, may have
+accompanied her, but even if she did not, this visit of Isabelle’s
+may, indirectly, have led to the meeting between the king and Agnes.
+Whilst still a prisoner, René succeeded to the crown of Naples on the
+death of his brother, Louis d’Anjou, and as the country was in a
+disturbed condition it was deemed prudent for Isabelle, his wife, to
+act as his substitute, and, as _lieutenante générale_, she set forth
+to establish his claim. History is silent on the point as to whether
+Agnes accompanied her or not. It may be, as some seem to think, that
+she remained in Anjou with Isabelle’s eldest daughter, Marguerite,
+afterwards Queen of England. We should like to think that it was
+during this time that she attracted the notice of Charles, for this
+would lend additional interest to the exquisite miniature in the Musée
+du Louvre (at one time in the Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier, now
+for the most part at Chantilly), which it seems probable represents
+Agnes Sorel as a youthful shepherdess, with the Castle of Loches in
+the background and Charles the Seventh riding towards her. As we have
+already suggested elsewhere,[38] this may have been a poetical
+rendering of their first meeting. However this may be, it seems
+probable that it was soon after the year 1435[39] that she first
+attracted the notice of Charles, and that, later, she took up her
+residence in Touraine, no doubt gaining her influence over the king at
+first by her beauty, which all her contemporaries proclaim, and
+afterwards by that mysterious combination of ability and grace, of
+intelligence and physical vitality, which held him captive for many
+years. During this time she, like a true woman, and no ordinary
+place-hunter, made his devotion to her react upon himself, for the
+good of his country and to his own honour. She not only counselled him
+wisely herself, but persuaded him to surround himself with wise
+counsellors.
+
+    [38] _Athenæum_, June 25, 1904.
+
+    [39] Du Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iii.
+    p. 286.
+
+Of these counsellors, and the able and devoted men who served the king
+in divers ways, some few stand out more prominently than the rest,
+because of their position of intimacy in the royal circle, and their
+special and enduring friendship with Agnes Sorel. Such were Etienne
+Chevalier, Treasurer of France; Pierre de Brézé, of a noble Angevin
+family, and Sénéchal of Normandy after the expulsion of the English;
+and Jacques Cœur, the king’s superintendent of Finance, whose house at
+Bourges, with its angel-ceiled chapel, still delights the traveller.
+
+Etienne Chevalier was for some time secretary to the king, and after
+filling one or two smaller posts connected with finance, was made
+Treasurer of France, and member of the Grand Council. In addition to
+administrative capacity, he possessed a brilliant intellect and a
+great love of art. It is to his initiative that we owe the only
+suggestions in portraiture of Agnes Sorel. It was to him also that the
+king confided the supervision of the erection of the monuments to her
+memory at Jumièges and Loches--Jumièges where she died in 1449, and
+where her heart was buried, and Loches her favourite place of sojourn,
+and to whose church and chapter she had made large gifts. To Loches
+her body was borne in royal splendour, and there laid to rest in the
+choir of the church in a simple tomb. We can imagine the loving care
+with which Etienne Chevalier watched the sculptor, and possibly even
+gave him suggestions, as he fashioned in alabaster her recumbent
+effigy representing her with hands clasped as if in prayer, her feet
+resting against two lambs, and her head guarded by two angels with
+outstretched wings. Perhaps this stone effigy was the one true
+portrait of Agnes, but the head and face were partially destroyed
+during the Revolution, and restored in their present form in 1806, so
+that little of the original now remains.
+
+[Illustration: _Loches._
+
+TOMB OF AGNES SOREL.
+
+_To face page 158._]
+
+This tomb, which to-day may be seen in a small vestibule of the
+Château Royale (now the Sous-Préfecture), has a strange and chequered
+history. Perhaps scarce another has suffered such singular
+vicissitudes, so many removals, or more ruthless violations. Soon
+after the death of Charles the Seventh (1461), the canons of Loches,
+whom Agnes had largely endowed and of whom she asked naught save to be
+remembered in their prayers, petitioned Louis the Eleventh for its
+transfer to a side chapel, since they considered it unfitting for the
+dust of such an one to repose in the choir. Louis, using his subtlety
+to better purpose than was his wont, replied that if they removed the
+tomb, they must return her gifts. Naturally these worthy ecclesiastics
+silenced their consciences and kept the tomb where it was. However, in
+the year 1777, in the reign of Louis the Sixteenth, the priestly
+conscience again awoke to the enormity of its presence within the
+choir, and, with the king’s consent, it was removed to the nave.
+Before re-burial the coffin was opened in the presence of various
+church dignitaries and State officials. Among the latter was a doctor
+who left an authoritative account of the proceedings, from which we
+can approximately surmise the height of La Dame de Beauté, and verify
+the record of her abundant fair hair. The exterior coffin of oak was
+only 5 feet 6 inches long. Within this, and protected by another of
+lead, was a shell of cedar wood in which, after the lapse of more than
+three centuries, lay all that was mortal of Agnes Sorel. Her fair hair
+was plaited in a long tress, and two curls rested on her forehead. As
+one of those present, more curious than his fellows, stretched out his
+hand to touch, all fell to dust. Death and Time were her guardian
+angels. But even this desecration did not suffice to drain the cup of
+unmerited vengeance. In 1793 the tomb was rifled, the sculptured
+features, so lovingly wrought, defaced, and her dust cast to the
+winds. But what matter? Agnes had done her work--work which had to be
+done, and which she alone could do.
+
+Another of the little band of chosen spirits of which Agnes was the
+soul and centre, was Pierre de Brézé, Lord of Varenne and Brissac, who
+early showed himself a man of affairs, and was admitted to the King’s
+Council when he was but twenty-seven. In war, administration, and
+finance, he proved himself equally trustworthy and skilful, and to
+these qualities he added others of a brilliant intellectual nature. He
+advanced from one post of trust to another, until the king himself
+presented him with the keys of the city and castle of Rouen. Thus he
+became Sénéchal of Normandy, an honour which remained in his family.
+One of his grandsons, Louis de Brézé, a son of Charlotte, daughter of
+Agnes Sorel and Charles the Seventh, was the husband of Diane de
+Poitiers.
+
+Jacques Cœur, whose life was so intimately associated with the Court
+during Agnes’s lifetime, and so sadly marred and ended after her
+death, was the son of a simple merchant of Bourges. Following in the
+wake of many adventurous and ambitious merchants of the time, he
+journeyed to the East and amassed a large fortune, which he placed at
+the disposal of the king. This enabled Charles to carry on the war in
+spite of his impoverished exchequer, and to make a final and
+successful effort against the English. But, like many another on whom
+Fortune has smiled, evil tongues and envious hearts began, ere long,
+their vampire work, and after the death of his friend and patroness,
+Agnes Sorel, Charles made no effort on his behalf, but left him at the
+mercy of his calumniators in the same base and heartless way in which
+he had abandoned Joan of Arc. Jacques, his goods confiscated, and his
+life in danger, was obliged to fly the country, and died fighting, in
+the Pope’s service, against the Turk.
+
+Of the beauty of Agnes Sorel there can be no doubt, for all
+contemporary chroniclers and poets tell of it. Even the Pope, Pius the
+Second, allowed himself to add his tribute of praise to the general
+homage. Considering that there are so many types of physical beauty,
+appealing to as many different temperaments, there must have been
+something rare and remarkable in Agnes to have attracted and held
+bound all who came in contact with her. We can but conclude that this
+unanimous judgment could only have been the result of that mysterious
+union, so illusive, so indefinable, of spiritual with physical beauty.
+The records of the time merely tell us that she had blue eyes, and
+fair hair in abundance. The only picture, and this not done from life,
+by which we can judge her--for the miniatures by Fouquet, at
+Chantilly, from Etienne Chevalier’s Book of Hours, though exquisite in
+delicacy, are too minute for much characterisation--is, even if we
+accept it as the original from Fouquet’s hand, an overcleaned work in
+the Museum at Antwerp.[40] This, or the original painting, formed a
+wing of the so-called diptych painted to adorn the tomb of Etienne
+Chevalier and his wife in the Cathedral of Melun, the other wing--now
+in the Royal Museum, Berlin--representing Etienne Chevalier himself,
+in the attitude of prayer, his patron saint, St. Stephen, beside him.
+There seems reason, however, to suppose that this offering of
+Etienne’s was in fact a triptych, and that the missing wing pictured
+his young wife, then lately dead (1452). If this was so, Etienne and
+his wife would have appeared in adoration on either side of the Queen
+of Heaven, here personated by Agnes Sorel, thus bringing the panel
+with Etienne’s portrait into harmony with the central panel, which
+otherwise it fails to be.
+
+    [40] Du Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iv.
+    p. 171, note 2.
+
+[Illustration: _Musée de Chantilly._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.
+
+_To face page 162._]
+
+Of the miniatures at Chantilly, the whole series of which forms a most
+tender and rare tribute to wife and friend, only brief mention can
+here be made of those concerning Agnes. The most simple and beautiful
+in sentiment and design is that of the _Annunciation_, in which the
+seated Virgin, in the likeness of Agnes Sorel, with bowed head
+receives the angel’s message. The scene is laid in a Gothic chapel
+(perhaps the Sainte Chapelle with slight adaptations to suit the
+artist’s fancy),[41] with statues of the Prophets all around, and
+Moses, holding the Books of the Law, as the central figure of the
+group. This assemblage of Old Testament seers certainly typified the
+Old dispensation, whilst the Annunciation prefigures the New, and to
+us the whole may not unfitly form an allegory of the new order which
+Agnes Sorel was to help to bring about. In another miniature--the
+_Visit of the Magi_--Charles the Seventh, accompanied by his
+Scottish guard, and with the Castle of Loches in the background,
+himself kneels as one of the kings before the Virgin, here also
+represented in the likeness of Agnes. And so on, throughout the
+series, in many of the scenes of the Virgin’s life we find her bearing
+the features of Agnes until an older and sadder type becomes necessary
+in the _Crucifixion_, the _Entombment_, and the _Announcement of the
+Death_ and the _Death_ of the Virgin. When, however, death has
+transfigured age and sorrow, the likeness of Agnes reappears in the
+_Assumption_, and _Coronation_, and, the crowning glory, the
+_Enthronement_ of the Virgin.
+
+    [41] Cf. _Grandes Chroniques de France_, fol. 292, Bib. Nat.
+
+[Illustration: _Musée de Chantilly._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.
+
+_To face page 163._]
+
+In a Book of Hours, at Munich, painted about 1500 A.D. for Jacques
+Cœur’s grandson (in part perhaps by Jean Bourdichon, the artist of the
+superb Book of Hours of Anne de Bretagne now in the Bibliothèque
+Nationale, or at least by some pupil or follower of his), there are
+three miniatures that seem of special interest in connection with
+Agnes Sorel. One is a representation of the Virgin of the
+Annunciation, and another that of the Madonna with the Holy Child. In
+both these the features of the Virgin Mother appear to faintly echo
+those of Agnes as we know her, as the crowned and ermined queen in the
+picture at Antwerp. Still more interesting is the third miniature,
+giving a view--here used as a setting for the _Procession to
+Calvary_--of the front of Jacques Cœur’s stately dwelling at Bourges.
+Here doubtless many a time Agnes and the king were entertained. Hither
+Jacques returned from sundry journeys to the East, laden with
+treasures to beautify his surroundings. Hence he fled, the victim of
+success. Over the principal entrance is a canopied recess, once
+sheltering an equestrian statue destroyed during the Revolution. This
+now empty space once held a statue of King Charles the Seventh, armed
+cap-à-pie on a galloping caparisoned charger, as he may be seen
+represented on medals of the period. It is not a little significant of
+this thankless monarch that he here seems to be turning his back on
+the house of his faithful servant and supporter, and to be riding
+away. Other details worthy of mention in this Book of Hours are the
+realistic background to the picture of the _Visit of the Magi_, with
+its snow-covered village church, houses, and fields; the Italian
+drug-pot in the Magdalen’s hands in the scene of the Crucifixion,
+showing the intimate intercourse with Italy; and the Mater Dolorosa
+seated _alone_ at the foot of the Cross,--a tragic note taken from the
+_Mystery of the Passion_.
+
+There is only one unanimous opinion concerning Agnes Sorel, and that
+is as to her beauty. For the rest, it would seem as if prejudice and
+flattery held the scales. The mean is difficult to discover, and
+perhaps it is only possible to get somewhere near it by studying
+results--the remarkable change, as already noticed, in Charles’s life
+and conduct whilst under her influence.
+
+In the face of conflicting records it is no easy matter to determine
+when Agnes Sorel first became the king’s mistress. In 1435, when the
+Treaty of Arras was concluded between Charles and the Duke of
+Burgundy, Cardinal de Sainte-Croix (afterwards Pope Pius the Second)
+was Papal legate at the French Court, and aided in the negotiations.
+He tells in his memoirs that the relation between Charles and Agnes
+was known publicly at the time, and that the king could do nothing
+without her, even having her at his side at the royal councils. The
+trustworthiness of this statement has, however, been so questioned,
+that it seems safer to endeavour to arrive at the truth from other
+sources, although, if the statement can be relied on, it seems to
+follow, almost as a matter of course, that Agnes must have been born
+earlier than 1422. It is an admitted fact that between 1433 and 1438
+the manner of Charles’s life entirely changed. In the year 1433 the
+infamous and once all-powerful favourite, La Tremoille, who had been
+the king’s evil genius for six years, and was largely responsible for
+the king’s treatment of his wife, Marie of Anjou, was dismissed at the
+instance of the politic Yolande. Yet even so, the king often relapsed
+into indolence and apparent indifference to his kingly duties, and it
+was not till after 1438, when he summoned a national Council at
+Bourges, that Charles showed himself to be a new man. It is also not
+long after this that we read of favours granted by the king to
+Agnes’s relations. From that time, Charles ceased to spend his time in
+dreamland, as it were, in the sweet Touraine country, and engaged
+himself in affairs of State, listening to and accepting wise counsels,
+favouring the restoration of schools and universities--which, in the
+uncertain state of the country, had almost ceased to exist--and
+encouraging the final efforts to expel the national enemy, even at
+times personally joining in the fight. If we see in this, in a measure
+at all events, the guiding spirit of Agnes, the secret of her
+influence is not very difficult to discover. Apart from her beauty,
+which, with Charles, would be a potent factor, Agnes had a woman’s
+insight and skill in her relation with him, ever holding up to him the
+glory and obligations of kingship, at the same time herself entering,
+with all the vitality of her extraordinary nature, into his favourite
+pastimes. We know that in one or other of her many residences near
+Chinon or Loches, she and the king often spent the evening playing
+piquet or chess (the latter being his favourite game), and then, on
+the morrow, rode forth together to the chase. So the days were passed
+in work and simple outdoor pleasures, Agnes taking no recognised
+public part in the king’s life, but devoting herself heart and soul to
+the task she had in hand. But besides these relaxations of peace,
+there was also the reality of war; for the war still lingered on,
+though feebly. The English had lost their ally, the Duke of Burgundy,
+as well as Bedford, the able Regent, and there was no fit man to take
+the latter’s place. Paris opened her gates to Charles in 1436, and in
+the following year Charles, after having reigned for fourteen years,
+made his first State entry into the capital of his kingdom, mounted on
+a white charger, the sign of sovereignty. In 1444 a treaty was
+concluded at Tours with the English, and, to make the compact doubly
+sure, Margaret of Anjou, a niece of the king, was married to Henry the
+Sixth of England. For about a month the Court and its princely
+visitors gave themselves up to fêtes and pageants, and it was during
+this time of rejoicing that the position of Agnes was officially
+recognised. She was made lady-in-waiting to the queen, and took a
+prominent part throughout the festival. Charles gave her the royal
+castle of Beauté, on the Marne, near the Bois de Vincennes, “le plus
+bel chastel et joly et le mieux assis qui fust en l’Isle de France,”
+desiring, as was said, that she should be “Dame de Beauté de nom comme
+de fait.” From the time of her public recognition she appeared with
+the king at all the brilliant festivities celebrated in honour of
+treaties and marriages. She also sat in the royal council, a position
+which, as a king’s mistress, she was the first to occupy, though we
+know that Henri II. took no step without first conferring with Diane
+de Poitiers, and that Madame de Maintenon sat in Louis the
+Fourteenth’s privy council.
+
+The change which came over France after the Treaty of Tours was
+marvellous, alike in its extent and its rapidity. Commerce was again
+resumed between the two nations; men and women once again ventured
+without the city walls, to breathe, as it were, the fresh air of
+liberty; and those who had been called upon to fight, returned to
+their work in the fields or the towns. We cannot better voice the
+feeling of the people than by borrowing the song of a poet of the day:
+
+    Le temps a laissé son manteau
+    De vent, de froidure et de pluie,
+    Et s’est vêtu de broderie,
+    De soleil rayant, clair et beau;
+    Il n’y a beste ne oiseau
+    Qu’en son jargon ne chante ou crie:
+    Le temps a laissé son manteau.
+
+Now that Agnes had assumed a definite rôle at Court, she lived
+principally at Loches, where the king assigned to her “son quartier de
+maison” within the castle, and also gave her a residence without the
+walls. Here she shone like a radiant star; for although the king did
+not have much personal influence on the movement in art and letters,
+his Court was the meeting-place of many distinguished and intellectual
+men. Among them we find the name of Alain Chartier, the poet, and
+sometime secretary to the king, and one of the ambassadors who went to
+Edinburgh to ask the hand of the little Margaret of Scotland for the
+Dauphin. We remember him now chiefly in connection with the charming
+story told of this girl-wife of the Dauphin Louis. Betrothed to Louis
+when she was a child of three, and sent to France to be brought up at
+the Court, she was married at twelve to this boy of thirteen, who
+could not possibly appreciate her simple, sweet nature which endeared
+her to all others. One day as she was passing with her ladies through
+a room in the castle, she saw Alain Chartier lying on a bench asleep.
+She approached quietly, and kissed him, much to the surprise of her
+attendants that she should “kiss so ugly a man.” And she made answer:
+“I did not kiss the man, but the precious mouth whence so many
+beautiful and fair words have issued.” Poor little poetess!
+Fortunately her life was a short one. She died when she was just
+twenty-one, with these words on her lips: “Fi de la vie de ce monde,
+ne m’en parlez plus.” The scientific historian of to-day is inclined
+to dismiss this story as a pleasing though rather foolish romance. But
+even so, Alain Chartier may be remembered as a poet and philosopher,
+as well as a brave and wise patriot during some of France’s darkest
+hours--a worthy contemporary of Agnes Sorel and Joan of Arc. Fearing
+neither the nobles nor the people, he blames the former for their love
+of luxury and personal indulgence, and exhorts both to think of the
+public good, and to aid in their country’s defence, instead of
+allowing themselves to be engrossed with their private affairs. Then,
+whilst acknowledging that as he has not the strength to bear arms, it
+is only with his pen and his speech that he can serve his country, he
+reminds them that it was the historian’s pen and the orator’s
+harangue, just as much as the warrior’s lance, that made the glory of
+the Romans.
+
+Louis the Dauphin, come to man’s estate, and self-seeking and
+treacherous, was no friend to Agnes, who had incurred his hatred by
+her fearless disclosure to the king from time to time of conspiracies
+against his person, in which Louis was the prime mover. After repeated
+reconciliations, the king in despair finally banished him to his
+domain of Dauphiné. The traitor, quitting the royal presence for what
+he deemed exile, swore to be avenged on those who had driven him
+forth, and if some of the records of the time speak truly, four years
+later his opportunity came, and he kept his oath.
+
+The last scene of Agnes’s life was pathetically interesting. Her end
+came almost suddenly. The king, listening to advice, had resolved to
+continue the war in Normandy,[42] and, at the instigation of Agnes, if
+we may believe the words of a courtly writer of the time, had himself
+gone to the front. Rouen was taken, and Charles entered in triumph.
+The streets were decked with flowers and branches, and the houses hung
+with rich draperies, and everywhere the leopards and quarterings of
+England had been replaced by the fleur-de-lis. Charles, preceded by a
+gorgeous procession of archers, each company arrayed in the livery of
+its lord, and carrying his special banner, followed, under a canopy,
+on a horse caparisoned to the ground with blue cloth sprinkled with
+fleurs-de-lis of gold, surrounded by princes and the principal
+captains and officers of the Crown. With his wonted observance of
+religious duty, slowly he made his way to the cathedral through the
+shouting multitude, and to the sound of many fiddles and the fanfare
+of trumpets. There he descended, kissed the relics as he knelt beneath
+the great portal, and then entered its hushed and solemn dimness to
+return thanks. But scarce had the air ceased to ring with the plaudits
+of the people, when the report of a plot against the king, devised by
+the Dauphin, is said to have come to the ears of Agnes, and she
+hastened to the king at Jumièges, whither he had retired for a short
+rest during the unusual and inclement winter. Here, stricken by a
+mysterious sickness, by some thought to be typhoid fever, by others
+attributed to poison administered at the instigation of Louis, she
+died in February 1450, in her manor of Mesnil, near the Abbey of
+Jumièges. The king was with her to the end, and could only be induced
+to withdraw when her lifeless form sank back in his arms. So died this
+wonderful and fascinating woman who had lived and laboured for her
+country through perhaps the most critical period of its history.
+
+    [42] Lavisse, _Hist. de France_, vol. iv. part 2, p. 229, footnote.
+
+It is impossible to entirely ignore what has been written to Agnes’s
+personal discredit, though much of it may well be looked upon as
+exaggeration, and open to suspicion. That the king was not her only
+lover may be true, but in the absence of satisfactory documentary
+evidence of this, perhaps the various intrigues attributed to her may,
+for the most part at least, be regarded as the creations of scandal.
+Still, bearing in mind the condition of France at the time of her
+accession to power, the extent of the influence she admittedly
+exercised in the councils of the king, and the great change which came
+over the royal fortunes and the fortunes of the country during the
+years of her ascendancy, it is scarcely possible to refuse to her some
+right to share in the recognition so lavishly bestowed upon the other
+great woman of that time--Joan of Arc. The one may be said to have
+been the complement of the other. Both were necessary to the needs of
+the day, and the glory of successful accomplishment should be shared
+between them.
+
+
+
+
+A NOTE ON MEDIÆVAL GARDENS
+
+
+
+
+MEDIÆVAL GARDENS[43]
+
+    [43] The quotations from the _Roman de la Rose_ are taken
+    from Mr. F. S. Ellis’s translation, published by Messrs. J.
+    M. Dent & Co. in the “Temple Classics.”
+
+
+No one can study French mediæval lore, or Gothic cathedral, or Book of
+Hours, without realising how great a love of Nature prevailed in the
+late Middle Ages. The poems tell of spring, “the season of delight,”
+of gardens which suffice “for loss of Paradise,” and of birds “with
+soft melodious chant.” In the dim stillness of the cathedral, Nature
+is expressed in infinite variety. Foliage grows in the hollows of the
+mouldings, and sometimes, as at Chartres, even the shafts, as they
+tower into the gloom, end in half-opened leaves, suggestive of spring,
+of hope, and of aspiration. Many a sunny façade shows us scenes of
+rural life--sowing, reaping, vine-dressing, and so forth--fashioned as
+a calendar in stone, and many a peasant must have rejoiced as he saw
+himself and his occupation thus represented in effigy. Fortunately for
+the poor toiler, the Church not only taught that “to labour is to
+worship,” but further honoured work by thus representing it at the
+very entrance to the sanctuary, so making it, as it were, the “open
+sesame” to higher things.
+
+In Books of Hours and illuminated MSS., before the complete border of
+flowers, birds, and small grotesques was developed, we find ornamental
+flourishes, like the growth of ivy and hawthorn, splendidly free in
+design, and painted with evident joy even in the minutest bud or
+tendril. Everywhere may this love of Nature striving for expression be
+seen. But we must turn to the poems and romances if we would fully
+realise it in all its simplicity and truth, since it is in these alone
+that we get at the actual mediæval feeling unalloyed with all that we
+ourselves have, perhaps unwittingly, read into it.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS.
+
+French, 14th Century, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 176._]
+
+“All hearts are uplifted and made glad in the time of April and May,
+when once again the meadows and the pastures become green.” So says
+one of the old romancers. And this joy in returning spring seems to
+have pervaded mediæval thought and expression. Little is this to be
+wondered at when we call to mind the long dreary winters spent in cold
+and ill-lit castles, or in dark, draughty houses and hovels. Before
+glass, long regarded as a luxury, came into general use in dwellings,
+the only protection from rain and cold consisted in wooden shutters,
+or movable frames with horn slabs (necessarily small), or varnished
+parchment. In truth, the only warm, bright place was the chimney
+corner, and here, as near as might be to the blazing logs, the
+long days of winter were spent in chess-playing, broidery,
+lute-playing, and love-making, the monotony of this only occasionally
+broken by the arrival of some wandering minstrel who sang of war and
+love, or of some packman laden with sundry wares prized of womankind.
+But in winter such wayfarers were rare, and life was, perforce, one of
+boredom and discomfort. Thus there was exceeding joy when “woods and
+thickets donned their rich green mantling of resplendent sheen.”
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 177._]
+
+It is generally of springtime in a garden--a garden of green glades
+and alleys, fruit-trees and flowers, such as was very dear to the
+mediæval soul--of which we read. The _Roman de la Rose_ opens with a
+description of a garden, hemmed round with castle wall--a pleasaunce
+within a fortress--and planted with trees “from out the land of
+Saracens,” and many others, to wit, the pine, the beech (loved of
+squirrels), the graceful birch, the shimmering aspen, the hazel, the
+oak, and many flowers withal--roses and violets and periwinkle, golden
+king-cups, and pink-rimmed daisies. The poet describes with careful
+detail the design of the garden:
+
+    The garden was nigh broad as wide,
+    And every angle duly squared;
+
+how the trees were planted:
+
+    Such skilful art
+    Had planned the trees that each apart
+    Six fathoms stood, yet like a net
+    The interlacing branches met;
+
+and how “channelled brooks” flowed from clear fountains through “thymy
+herbage and gay flowers.”
+
+The debt which the mediæval world owed to the East is shown both in
+the fruits and the spices which are described as growing in the
+garden, and in the pastimes said to have been enjoyed in its cool
+shade. We read of pomegranates, nutmegs, almonds, dates, figs,
+liquorice, aniseed, cinnamon, and zedoary, an Eastern plant used as a
+stimulant. When the poet would tell of dance and song, he goes by
+
+    A shaded pathway, where my feet,
+    Bruised mint and fennel savouring sweet,
+
+to a secluded lawn. Here he sees one whose name is “Gladness”:
+
+    Gently swaying, rose and fell
+    Her supple form, the while her feet
+    Kept measured time with perfect beat:
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    While minstrels sang, the tambourine
+    Kept with the flute due time I ween.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Then saw I cunning jugglers play,
+    And girls cast tambourines away
+    Aloft in air, then gaily trip
+    Beneath them, and on finger-tip
+    Catch them again.
+
+In every garden there was a fountain or sheet of water with a small
+channelled way carrying the water to the castle and through the
+women’s apartment. Sometimes these waterways were made use of by the
+lover as a means of communication with his beloved, as we read in the
+romance of _Tristan and Isolde_, where Tristan, to apprise his
+mistress that he is at their trysting-place in the garden, drops into
+the water small pieces of bark and twigs, which are quickly carried to
+the chamber where Isolde is waiting and watching. And one eventide a
+perilous encounter befalls. Tristan has been banished the Court, for
+evil tongues have whispered in King Mark’s ear of his love for Isolde,
+and have further whispered of secret meetings in the garden, beside
+the fountain. Now near the fountain is a pine-tree, into which King
+Mark resolves to climb, and perchance to discover the meeting of the
+lovers. As daylight fades, Tristan scales the wall, and hastens to
+throw into the water the little signals for his lady. But as he stoops
+over the pool he sees, reflected in its clear surface, the image of
+the king, with bow ready bent. Can he stop the floating twigs as they
+are hurried along on their mission? No. The water carries them away
+out of sight, and Isolde must come. She comes, but Tristan does not go
+to meet her as was his wont, but remains standing by the water. She
+wonders at her lover’s seeming unconcern, but as she approaches him,
+suddenly, in the bright moonlight, she, too, sees in the water the
+reflection of the king, and the lovers are saved.
+
+A pine-tree is so often mentioned as a special feature in a mediæval
+garden that one is led to think that its use may either have been a
+survival from the days of Tree Worship, seeing that the tree was
+sacred to Adonis, Attis, and Osiris[44] (all, perhaps, varying forms
+of one and the same divinity), or have been suggested by some northern
+Saga. It makes its appearance in the _Chanson de Roland_, which has
+come down to us in a thirteenth-century form, incorporating the
+earlier Epic of _Roland_, probably composed towards the end of the
+eleventh century. In this we find mention of it when Charlemagne,
+after he is said to have taken Cordova, retires to a garden with
+Roland and Oliver and his barons, the elder ones amusing themselves
+with chess and tric-trac, and the younger ones with fencing, the king
+meanwhile looking on, seated under a pine-tree. Later in the day tents
+are set up, in which they pass the night, and in the early morning
+Charlemagne, after hearing mass, again sits under the pine-tree to
+take counsel of his barons.
+
+    [44] J. G. Frazer, _Adonis, Attis, Osiris_, 1906.
+
+In the _Roman de la Rose_, the fateful fountain of Narcissus is
+described as being beneath a pine-tree, which is represented as being
+taller and fairer than any that mortal eye had seen since the glorious
+pine of Charlemagne’s time, showing that here at least the poet is
+making use of tradition.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Brückmann._
+
+FLEMISH MASTER.
+
+Fifteenth Century. Stephenson Clarke Collection.
+
+_To face page 181._]
+
+But to make our way into a mediæval garden, and see all that grows
+therein, we must needs get within the precincts of the castle, for
+inside its fortified enclosure the castle, like a small village, was
+self-contained. And this was no easy matter, if we may judge from
+the vivid description to be found in _Huon de Bordeaux_, a poem
+concerning a Bordelais lord of the ninth century. After sundry
+adventures, Huon sets out on a journey to Babylon, and seeks an
+audience with the Emir. He tells of his arrival at what he describes
+as the castle, and how, after long parley with the porter, the
+drawbridge is let down and the great gate opened, and he finds himself
+in an arched way, with a series of portcullises showing their teeth
+overhead. After further parley, and further opening of gates, he
+enters a large courtyard, and goes thence into the garden, which is
+planted with every kind of tree, aromatic herb, and sweet-scented
+flower. In the garden is a fountain with its little channelled way,
+supplied with water from the Earthly Paradise. This description may
+seem a little fantastic, but it is only the poet’s way of telling us
+what we might ourselves experience if we would go in imagination to
+some thirteenth- or fourteenth-century castle, and seek to gain
+admittance.
+
+Sometimes the garden was within the castle fortifications. It was then
+necessarily circumscribed, and would, more or less, be laid out with
+formal pathways and stone-curbed borders, also with trees cut in
+various devices (a reminder of Rome’s once far-reaching influence),
+and a tunnel or pergola of vines or sweet-scented creepers running the
+length of the wall to form a covered walk for shelter against sunshine
+or shower. But where the garden was without the fortifications, but
+yet within the castle enclosure, as was always the arrangement if
+possible, opportunity was afforded for wooded dell and flowery slope,
+as well as for the orchard with its special patch for herb-growing.
+
+The herb-plot was one of the most important items in a mediæval
+garden; for here were grown not only herbs and roots for healing, but
+also sweet-scented mint and thyme for mingling with the rushes strewn
+on the floors. Sometimes the rushes themselves were fragrant, and
+such, lemon-scented when crushed, may even to-day be found in the
+neighbourhood of Oxford, probably growing in the very place which at
+one time supplied many a college hall with its carpet of fresh green.
+
+[Illustration: _Bodician._
+
+MS. ROMANCE OF ALEXANDER.
+
+Fourteenth Century.
+
+_To face page 183._]
+
+In the larger gardens might also be found labyrinths and aviaries,
+with bright-plumaged birds from the East. Here, too, were often
+enclosures for wild beasts, much prized by the lord of the castle, to
+whom they may have been proffered as peace-offerings, or as friendly
+gifts from some neighbouring lord. Strange beasts were royal gifts;
+for kings, we read, made such offerings to each other. Even as early
+as the ninth century, Haroun al Raschid sent an elephant to
+Charlemagne. It was brought to Aix-la-Chapelle by Isaac the Jew, and
+survived its long walk seven years, and it would be interesting to
+know by what route it journeyed thither in those days. These private
+zoological gardens may possibly account for the comparative
+accuracy with which the early miniaturists painted such beasts as
+lions, bears, and leopards, which otherwise they might have had no
+chance of studying.
+
+One of the greatest delights of the garden was the bower in which the
+warm months were passed. Here meals were taken, and merry pastimes
+enjoyed, as long as daylight lasted. Hither came tumblers and
+dancing-girls, and sometimes performing animals. A poor captive bear
+would be made to stumble over the rough roads for miles in order to go
+through its grotesque antics before some joyous company of dames and
+gallants. But spring and youth was the time to be gay, and nothing
+came amiss to these light-hearted folk.
+
+The bower was also the “privy playing place,” and all care was taken
+to make its leafy screen grow close and thick. Perhaps one of the most
+interesting references to a green arbour--interesting because of the
+romance which was the cause of its mention--is in a poem by King James
+I. of Scotland, telling of sad years in prison, which ended in love
+and liberty. James, whilst still a young man, was imprisoned in
+Windsor Castle, and writing to solace himself with something more
+tangible than the mere contemplation of his beloved one, and to while
+away time, describes the garden with “herbere green,” which he saw
+through the barred window of his prison-house. Leaning his head
+against the cold stone wall, by night he gazed at the stars, by day
+at the garden. And weary and woe-begone as he was, he says, “to look,
+it did me good.”
+
+    Now there was made fast by the tower wall
+    A garden fair, and in the corners set
+    A herbere green, with wands so long and small
+    Railed all about: and so with trees close set
+    Was all the place, and hawthorn hedges knit
+    That no one though he were near walking by
+    Might there within scarce any one espy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    So thick the branches and the leafage green.
+    Beshaded all the alleys that there were,
+    And ’midst of ev’ry herbere might be seen
+    The sharp and green sweet-scented juniper,
+    Growing so fair with branches here and there,
+    That, as it seemed to any one without,
+    The branches spread the herbere all about.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    And on the slender green-leaved branches sat
+    The little joyous nightingales, and sang
+    So loud and clear, the carols consecrat
+    To faithful love.[45]
+
+    [45] _King’s Quair_, verse 31 _seq._
+
+This “garden fair” was the scene of the romance which solaced this
+royal prisoner, and helped him to bear his irksome lot, and to be able
+to exclaim, after nearly eighteen years’ captivity--a captivity since
+boyhood:
+
+    Thanks be to the massive castle wall,
+    From which I eagerly looked forth and leant.
+
+Looking from his window he espied, notwithstanding “hawthorne hedges”
+and “beshaded alleys,” Lady Johanna Beaumont (whom he wedded on his
+release) walking in the garden. Neither poet nor historian tells how
+they found means to communicate with one another, but tradition,
+which is sometimes twin-brother to truth, has handed down the story of
+a go-between who conveyed missives and tokens.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Brückmann._
+
+RHENISH MASTER.
+
+C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.
+
+_To face page 185._]
+
+In the accompanying picture we see a corner of a mediæval garden,
+hemmed round with castle wall. In it the artist has adapted an
+everyday scene to a religious purpose, by giving my lady a crown, and
+the baby an aureole, to suggest the Holy Mother and Child, whilst one
+of the gentlemen-in-waiting is provided with wings, so as to make him
+more in harmony with such saintly company. But this is only what might
+have been seen on any bright morning in late spring or summer, in some
+castle pleasaunce. My lady reads a book, whilst her maidens amuse
+themselves, one holding a psaltery on which the child tinkles, to its
+evident delight and wonderment; another, with a perverted sporting
+instinct, seems to be trying to catch fish with a ladle (note the
+usual little channelled way, on which a bird is perched, refreshing
+itself), whilst a third is picking fruit. The three squires are
+doubtless talking of the chase, for, in my lady’s presence, love would
+hardly be their theme. And all around are beautiful flowers--roses,
+lilies, and irises. Over against the enclosing wall is the usual bank
+of earth, faced with wood to keep it the necessary height, and planted
+with many flowers. This raised portion enabled those in the garden to
+get a view over the surrounding country, and to have a point of
+outlook in case of attack. It also served as a seat; for at
+intervals, between the flowers and sweet-scented herbs, portions were
+covered with turf.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 186._]
+
+Of all the flowers in the garden the rose “red and pale” was the
+greatest favourite, and many different sorts were planted there. To so
+many purposes were they put, and so great was the demand for them,
+that large quantities of roses frequently served as the payment of
+vassals to their lord. They were used for strewing the floor at the
+wedding-feast, or at the entertaining of some great baron. The fresh
+petals were sprinkled over the surface of the water in the bath, and
+were distilled to make the rose-water with which the knights and
+ladies washed their hands and faces when they left their
+much-curtained beds. Further, they were specially prized for garlands,
+the making of which was one of the favourite occupations of the ladies
+of the Middle Ages. Dante, who sums up the spirit of the Middle Ages
+from the simplest reality to the sublimest ideal, alludes to garlands
+and garland-making as amongst the joys of the Earthly Paradise. In his
+poet’s vision of the pageant of the Church Militant he sees the last
+company wreathed with red roses, emblems to him of Charity or Love.
+Boccaccio, in a more mundane atmosphere and a less august assemblage,
+also introduces us to this mediæval love of garlands. In a preamble to
+one of his tales he gives a dainty picture of the manners and pastimes
+of the gay folk of his day. Of the merry company,  which his fancy
+makes to quit plague-stricken Florence for the country, where they
+tell stories to prevent monotony, he relates that, after dining in the
+cool shade, and before the story-telling begins, “the gentlemen walked
+with the ladies into a goodly garden, making chaplets and nosegays of
+divers flowers, and singing silently to themselves.” Both sexes wore
+them on festive occasions, and in summer young girls wore no
+head-covering save a garland. The knight at the tournament decked his
+helm with a chaplet of some chosen flower, deftly woven by the fair
+one in whose name he made venture; and many a merry company, wreathed
+with flowers or foliage, rode forth on May-day, with trumpets and
+flutes, to celebrate the festival.
+
+Another favourite flower for garlands was the cornflower, as we learn
+from the poets, who tell of ladies dancing the carole (a popular dance
+in which all moved slowly round in a circle, singing at the same
+time), their heads crowned with garlands of cornflower. Violets and
+periwinkles, and meadow flowers, white, red, and blue, were also
+gathered to indulge this pretty fancy.
+
+The gillyflower is another flower frequently mentioned. This name has
+been applied to various flowers, but originally it belonged to the
+carnation, and was used for such in Shakespeare’s time. In the _Roman
+de la Rose_ it is called the gillyflower-clove, thus definitely
+defining it. One of its virtues, according to an old writer, was “to
+comfort the spirites by the sence of smelling,” and also “to be of
+much use in ornament.” But indeed most flowers were not only used for
+chaplets, and for strewing on the floor, but were also painted on the
+chamber walls, and embroidered on the hangings, to serve in winter
+days as sweet memories and as sweeter hopes.
+
+Apparently the earliest records of gardens, after Roman times, date
+from the ninth century, and are mostly to be found amongst monastic
+archives. A garden was an important, and even essential, annex of a
+monastery, not only because of the “herbularis” or physic garden, from
+the herbs of which the monks compounded salves and potions for the
+wounded knight or the plundered wayfarer who might take shelter within
+its protecting walls, but also because of the solace which the shady
+trees and the gay flowers brought to the sick, for a monastery was
+generally a hospital as well. St. Bernard of Clairvaux, speaking of an
+abbey garden, gives a charming picture of one of these cloistered
+pleasaunces for the sick and the aged. He says:
+
+     Within the enclosure of this wall many and various trees,
+     prolific in various fruits, constitute an orchard resembling
+     a wood, which, being near the cell of the sick, lightens the
+     infirmities of the brethren with no moderate solace, while
+     it affords a spacious walking place to those who walk and a
+     sweet place for reclining to those who are overheated. Where
+     the orchard terminates the garden begins. Here also a
+     beautiful spectacle is exhibited to the infirm brethren:
+     while they sit upon the green margin of the huge basin, they
+     see the little fishes playing under the water and
+     representing a military encounter by swimming to meet each
+     other.
+
+This warlike note seems strange and almost discordant in the midst of
+the peace of the cloister; but many, before seeking shelter there, had
+been doughty knights, and St. Bernard, man of the world as he was,
+would realise that even this mimic warfare might bring diversion to
+their tranquil seclusion.
+
+What a contrast to all this joy in the Middle Ages in gardens and
+flowers are the sober reflections of Marcus Aurelius! Philosopher as
+he was, he would have us learn from plants the lesson of cause and
+effect, the continuity of life. He says:
+
+     The destruction of one thing is the making of another; and
+     that which subsists at present is, as it were, the seed of
+     succession, which springs from it. But if you take seed in
+     the common notion, and confine it to the field or the
+     garden, you have a dull fancy.
+
+It is with a sense of relief that we turn from the thoughts which a
+garden suggests to this stoic, to those not less profound, though
+perhaps more simple, of a Chinese writer of the fourth century:
+
+     Ah, how short a time it is that we are here! Why then not
+     set our hearts at rest, ceasing to trouble whether we remain
+     or go? What boots it to wear out the soul with anxious
+     thoughts? Let me stroll through the bright hours as they
+     pass in my garden among my flowers.
+
+
+_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Of Six Mediæval Women, by Alice Kemp-Welch
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diff --git a/31843-0.zip b/31843-0.zip
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Of Six Medi�val Women, by Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Of Six Medi�val Women
+       To Which Is Added A Note on Medi�val Gardens
+
+Author: Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+Release Date: March 31, 2010 [EBook #31843]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OF SIX MEDI�VAL WOMEN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Meredith Bach, Irma Spehar and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+                         OF SIX MEDI�VAL WOMEN
+                                 WITH
+                      A NOTE ON MEDI�VAL GARDENS
+
+
+                      MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+                      LONDON � BOMBAY � CALCUTTA
+                               MELBOURNE
+
+                         THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
+                      NEW YORK � BOSTON � CHICAGO
+                        DALLAS � SAN FRANCISCO
+
+                   THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.
+                                TORONTO
+
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. de l'Arsenal, Paris._
+
+POET DECLAIMING TO ACCOMPANIMENT OF VIOL.
+
+_Frontispiece._]
+
+
+                         OF SIX MEDI�VAL WOMEN
+                           TO WHICH IS ADDED
+                               A NOTE ON
+                           MEDI�VAL GARDENS
+
+
+                                  BY
+                           ALICE KEMP-WELCH
+
+
+                  WITH INTRODUCTION AND ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                      MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+                      ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON
+                                 1913
+
+
+COPYRIGHT
+
+
+
+
+AUTHOR'S NOTE
+
+
+The Author's acknowledgments are due to the Editor of _The Nineteenth
+Century and After_ for his kind permission to reprint such of the
+following studies as have already appeared in that Review, and also to
+"George Fleming" (Miss Constance Fletcher) for her rendering, on page
+146, of four verses of Christine de Pisan's poem on Joan of Arc.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                                                     PAGE
+
+INTRODUCTION                                                          xi
+
+A TENTH-CENTURY DRAMATIST, ROSWITHA THE NUN                            1
+
+A TWELFTH-CENTURY ROMANCE-WRITER, MARIE DE FRANCE                     29
+
+A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY MYSTIC AND BEGUINE, MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG       57
+
+A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY ART-PATRON AND PHILANTHROPIST, MAHAUT,
+  COUNTESS OF ARTOIS                                                  83
+
+A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY FEMINISTE, CHRISTINE DE PISAN                    116
+
+AGNES SOREL                                                          147
+
+A NOTE ON MEDI�VAL GARDENS                                           173
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+                                                               FACE PAGE
+
+Poet declaiming to accompaniment of Viol                _Frontispiece_
+
+Roswitha presenting her Poem to the Emperor Otho I.,
+  the Abbess of Gandersheim standing at her side.
+  A. D�rer, 1501                                                     1
+
+Cover of St. Emmeran Gospels. 10th century                           7
+
+Marriage of Otho II. and Theophano. Byzantine, 10th century          7
+
+Lady playing Harp. Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.                       32
+
+Add. MS. 10293, Brit. Mus.                                          34
+
+Boat with Knights and Lady. Add. MS. 10294, Brit. Mus.              49
+
+Glaukos and Polyeidos in Tomb. Greek Vase, Brit. Mus.               52
+
+Statue of Mahaut in Abbey of La Thieuloye, near Arras, now
+  destroyed. From a Drawing, now in Brussels, made in 1602          99
+
+Marriage of Charles le Bel and Marie of Luxemburg. Grandes
+  Chrons. de France. Bib. Nat.                                     100
+
+Thirteenth-Century Treatise on Surgery, in French.
+  Sloane MS. 1977                                                  103
+
+Banquet, with Minstrels playing, and Room hung with
+  Embroidery. MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century.
+  Bodleian, Oxford                                                 104
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         105
+
+Christine de Pisan                                                 119
+
+Lady in Horse-Litter, returning from Tournament.
+  Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.                                       132
+
+La Cit� des Dames                                                  138
+
+Setting out for Poissy. Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.                 140
+
+Tomb of Agnes Sorel                                                158
+
+Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier                                 162
+
+Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier                                 163
+
+Book of Hours, French, 14th century. Brit. Mus.                    176
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         177
+
+Flemish Master, 15th century. Stephenson Clarke Collection         181
+
+MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century                             183
+
+Rhenish Master, C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.                      185
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         186
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+The recent researches of scholars and students have brought the study
+of medi�val times within the range of almost any one who cares to live
+in imagination in the past. No part of this study has been more
+advanced and made more informing to us than that which regards the
+individual. This is specially true of womankind, of whom we have
+learnt somewhat, in some instances from their own writings, and in
+others from allusions to their work in those of contemporary and later
+writers, and also, incidentally, from the vast storehouse of didactic
+literature, which is so suggestive in itself, reflecting through
+successive centuries, as it seems to do, the standard of conduct of
+the large majority. But on this subject--a very large one, and only
+partially explored--light can only be thrown gradually. For this there
+are various reasons. One is that, until comparatively recent times,
+the small details of everyday life which go so largely to make up a
+woman's life, have generally been taken for granted by writers. Then
+the few medi�val historiographers and chroniclers were principally
+engaged in recounting the deeds of kings and feats of arms. Then
+again, although probably many MSS. of the time still lie undiscovered
+in libraries, those that are known to us are scattered far and wide.
+Furthermore, self-advertisement was not a medi�val fashion. It is
+perhaps difficult for us nowadays to understand a spirit of
+self-effacement. Self-esteem, which may develop for either good or
+ill, has perhaps always existed in the human breast, but certainly
+since the time of the Renaissance, when it seemed to have its own
+special revival, it has grown apace, and is to-day like unto the
+Mustard Tree of Holy Writ. But it is not proposed to contrast this our
+modern attitude with the impersonal one, if so it may be called, of
+the Middle Ages, because, whilst there were many humble, zealous
+workers then, just as there are now, it is possible there were other
+and perhaps more potent factors to account for this apparently humble
+attitude. In medi�val days, the subject of a narrative or didactic
+work was considered so important, that an author would scarcely
+venture on any independent treatment of a theme for fear of incurring
+censure for a contempt of authority, or, if he did so venture, he
+would probably deem it wiser to do so anonymously, or by ascription
+to some departed celebrity, who was obviously not in a position to
+gainsay him. The writer was of much less interest than his ideas and
+sentiments. Then again there was the intense localisation of life.
+Localities were very independent of one another. Each was complete in
+itself, and within it there was no need for self-advertisement. It was
+the same in the wider life of associated religious communities, such
+as Benedictines, Cluniacs, and Cistercians, who had so much to do with
+the building of abbeys and cathedrals. Within a fraternity, the
+specially gifted craftsman was known, and wherever work was going on
+within the Order, was made use of as needs be, not as Brother This, or
+Brother That, but simply as scribe, or as artificer in Madonnas or
+gargoyles, or whatever else was wanted. The glorification of the
+community as a whole, and not the advertisement of the individual, was
+the desired goal. This self-effacement was not so much humility,
+though of course that too existed, as the special form which communal
+feeling took at that time. Now if this suppression of the individual
+was true of men, how much more true must it have been of women, who
+seldom ventured beyond town, or castle, or convent walls. In truth,
+women hardly appear on the scene, and English women least of all. It
+is only women who were prominent through their high official
+positions, either political or religious, such as Blanche of Castile,
+or St. Catherine of Siena, or the Abbess Hildegarde, or women like the
+Blessed Angela of Foligno,[1] or Julian, anchoress of Norwich,[2] or
+some other of the devout women of medi�val Italy, who interpreted the
+mysteries of divine love to medi�val society, having in fact, as it
+were, religious salons, from whom the veil has been withdrawn, and
+even amongst such as these it has sometimes been only very slightly
+lifted. With these saintly and political women must be mentioned the
+women doctors of Salerno--Trothula, Abella, Mercurialis, and
+others--who played so important a part both as professors and
+practitioners when this school of medicine was at its zenith in the
+eleventh and twelfth centuries, and who left behind them, as evidence
+of their learning, treatises which are of interest to-day as showing
+medi�val methods in medicine.
+
+    [1] _The Book of the Divine Consolation of the Blessed Angela
+    of Foligno._ The New Medi�val Library.
+
+    [2] _Revelations of Divine Love recorded by Julian, Anchoress
+    of Norwich, 1373._
+
+Still, even so, the records are scanty. In order, therefore, to form
+some idea and estimate of women generally in the Middle Ages, we must
+perforce fall back on reasoning from the known to the unknown, and,
+by studying the few who are recorded in written history, judge of that
+great majority who, though nameless, have yet so largely helped to
+make up the world's unwritten history. Just as many a flower blooms
+and dies unseen, so many a woman must have lived her life, serviceable
+to her special environment, but wholly unrecorded. Just as, in the
+course of ages, the seeds of some humble plant have been carried by
+wind or water from some lonely region to one less remote, and made to
+serve a purpose by adding to the sum-total of beauty and usefulness,
+so the thoughts and deeds of many an unremembered woman have doubtless
+passed into the great ocean of thought, encircling us to-day, and
+influencing us as a living force.
+
+Thus we have the women who figure in history, and whom we must take as
+types of the influential woman of the time, and the women whom history
+has not so honoured. Of the former, even when only portrayed in
+outline, we can learn something, but how are we to learn anything of
+the latter, whether living in the seclusion of religious houses or in
+the world? Of those living in religious houses, we know from records
+that, besides attending to their own spiritual and mental education
+and tending the sick, they conducted the cloister schools and taught
+in them needlework, the art of confectionery, surgery, writing, and
+drawing. They also wove, and embroidered, and added their mite to the
+sum-total of beauty by transcribing and illuminating MSS. of the
+Gospels and of the lives of the Saints. But sometimes such a limited
+sphere of activity was enlarged, and it is to an anonymous Anglo-Saxon
+nun of the eighth century, to whom the experiences were related, that
+we owe one of the earliest and most interesting accounts extant in
+Northern Europe of a journey to Palestine.
+
+To learn something of those living in the world, who were the
+inspirers, the helpmates, and the companions of men in everyday life,
+we must turn to the poems and romances. These form the key to the
+domestic life of the time. Though ordinary life may be somewhat
+idealised in them, still it is ordinary life on which they are based.
+Moreover, many of the MSS. in which they are written down contain
+miniatures--a legacy of exceeding worth to the student. But if we seek
+some knowledge of medi�val life from miniatures, it is not necessary
+to confine our researches to MSS. of romances. Transcripts of the
+classics, of the moralised Bible, and of other religious works also
+supply many pictures of everyday life, adapted quite regardless of
+incongruity, for one of the characteristics of the Middle Ages was a
+profound incapacity to picture to itself anything _but_ itself, or to
+reconstitute in any way, as we do to-day, times and scenes not its
+own. This was owing partly to its vitality and its youthfulness, which
+grasped at anything and everything without discernment, and partly to
+its lack of reliable material. The whole aspect of life, too, was
+changed and enlarged, and for the moment over-charged, for the
+flood-gates of the East, hitherto only partially opened, had been rent
+asunder by the traveller and the crusader.
+
+Before we attempt to arrive at some idea of the manner of life of the
+women of the Middle Ages, it will be well, if possible, to modify what
+seems to be a general and perhaps a distorted impression of these
+women of bygone days, as regards their want of loyalty in their
+domestic relations, and all the deceit and cunning such a want led to.
+Without attempting to justify what is fundamentally wrong, let us go
+if we can into the region of fact, and in that region there is quite
+enough romance without introducing it from outside.
+
+In the first place, so much more, as a rule, is heard of vice than of
+virtue. "La voix de la beaut� parle bas: elle ne s'insinue que dans
+les �mes les plus �veill�es." Then the standard of life in those days
+was very different from what it is to-day. Manners and customs which
+were accepted facts of everyday life then, would strike us as
+strangely rude and repellent now. Take, for instance, the attitude
+towards his queen of a king we have all been taught to revere--Arthur,
+the semi-saint, and the so-called pattern of courtesy. When Guinevere
+deserts him, and some of his knights are slain, his remark--not
+whispered into the ear of a confidant, but uttered aloud in the
+presence of all around him--is, "I am sorrier for my good knights'
+loss than for the loss of my fair Queen, for queens I might have
+enow." Such a sentiment, expressed in public, does not seem quite up
+to our modern standard of courteous, or even civilised, conduct, and
+yet here we have the sentiments of the Prince of Chivalry, as
+conceived by the poets of the thirteenth century. So it is obvious
+that before passing judgment upon the standard of life of the medi�val
+woman, we must endeavour to arrive at the truth by thinking and living
+in imagination on the same plane, as near as may be, as she did.
+
+Then again, it is largely owing to certain stories in the Middle Ages
+that the women of those times have been defamed. If we consider the
+sources and the transcribers of these stories, we shall perhaps find a
+reason for their distorted outlines, filled in with so much
+imperfectly understood detail. Many of these tales originated in the
+East, and particularly in India, where the conditions of domestic life
+led to and favoured intrigue, and many of them also were mere
+allegory, in which the Eastern sought to hide great truths. These the
+less meditative Western interpreted literally, mistaking the outward
+form for that which it concealed. So in passing to the West, Eastern
+ideas and Eastern exaggeration, misconstrued, became caricature.
+Moreover, the compilers of these stories were often monks or minstrels
+who vied with each other for popular favour, the monk introducing into
+his legends material which he hoped would rival the often shameless
+outpourings of the minstrel, whilst the minstrel, for his part, tried
+to adorn his story with some moral. Naturally neither class of such
+purveyors was in the least capable of judging woman with respect, or
+indeed of judging woman at all.
+
+On the other hand, however, it must be remembered that there are
+stories that tell a very different tale, a tale of self-sacrifice and
+devotion in face of grievous trial, as, for instance, that of Eric and
+Enide, sung by Chr�tien of Troyes, and made familiar to us by
+Tennyson's poem of "Geraint and Enid." It is impossible that such a
+conception should have been the mere outcome of the poet's
+imagination, since a poet, whilst he may transform, focuses and
+reflects the ideas of his time. In truth, we find medi�val
+literature, if we try to estimate it reasonably, gives a quite
+pleasing impression of womankind, whether we turn to some of the royal
+ladies who presided over brilliant Courts, where learning was
+encouraged and poets made welcome, or to the lady of lesser degree,
+who reigned supreme in her castle, at any rate when her lord was away,
+as was often the case in time of war or during attendance at Court, or
+to the abbesses who governed the religious houses they were set over,
+to their material and mental well-being, proving thus their genius for
+administration, and, in many instances, their rare intellectual
+attainments. A record in a chartulary of the Benedictine nunnery of
+Wherwell in Hampshire, now in the British Museum (Egerton MS., 2104),
+and accessible to all in translation in the second volume of the
+_Victoria History of the County of Hampshire_, may be mentioned in
+passing, since it gives such a charming picture of medi�val convent
+life. It recounts the life and work of the Abbess Euphemia, who
+presided over the house from 1226 to 1257. Amongst her many good
+deeds, it is told of her that "with maternal piety and careful
+forethought, she built, for the use of both sick and sound, a new and
+large infirmary away from the main buildings," and that, besides
+caring thus for the bodily wants of her community, "she built there a
+place set apart for the refreshment of the soul, namely a chapel of
+the Blessed Virgin." The writer adds that "in numberless ways she
+provided for the worship of God and the welfare of the sisters," and
+that "she so conducted herself with regard to exterior affairs, that
+she seemed to have the spirit of a man rather than of a woman." The
+account is altogether delightful and informing, and should be read by
+any who would go in spirit to a medi�val convent. It is therefore not
+surprising that in the late Middle Ages a regard and reverence for
+womanhood gradually arose--a regard and reverence for woman not merely
+as the weaker vessel, but as the principle of all good and of moral
+elevation. This attitude was also in large measure due to the
+inevitable fusion of the cult of the Virgin and the cult of woman,
+which in the thirteenth century developed into a faith. Then was it
+that religion and chivalry, in combination, formed the solvent that
+disintegrated the layer of selfishness--the outcome of the worship of
+brute force--that had settled over man's nobler instincts, and by
+their appeal to his better nature decided the position that woman, not
+only as an individual, but also as a class, was thenceforth to take in
+the civilised world.
+
+Let us now turn, first to the woman of the Romances and then to the
+woman of History. Each completes and is completed by the other. For
+the woman of the Middle Ages there were practically only two
+alternatives--to enter into the bonds either of Holy Matrimony or of
+Holy Church. In both cases the vows were, as a rule, taken early,
+especially in the case of marriage, so that the woman of the Middle
+Ages knew little of the joys of girlhood, with all its romantic
+castle-building and fondly fostered illusions. From playing with
+dolls, the child of twelve or even younger often suddenly found
+herself transformed into a wife. Although the Church had decreed that
+no girl should be wedded before the age of fifteen, this mandate was
+often ignored in noble families, where, through death, large fiefs had
+been left without a male representative and protector. In such a case
+the over-lord considered it necessary to assert his authority, and
+compel the marriage of some young girl of perhaps only twelve, so as
+to secure for her vassals and retainers a qualified leader, and for
+himself the needful and pledged military service. Still these
+marriages of convenience were often really happy arrangements, for the
+girl-wife had been trained to altruism, and its principles were the
+very essence of her daily life. Love, moreover, is a subtle sprite,
+and just as surely as he can spread his wings and fly away, so he can
+come, as if at unconscious bidding, and make for himself a
+dwelling-place.
+
+To get any true insight into the life of the woman of the Middle Ages,
+we must study the small everyday affairs, and to this end go, in
+imagination, to some castle, and see how the day is passed there by
+its lady. Perhaps it is a day in late spring. The watchman on the
+tower, heralding the day, has sounded his horn, and soon all the
+castle is astir. Leaving her curtained bed, she first offers a short
+prayer at the small shrine hanging close by with its flickering light.
+Then the bath, the water scented with aromatic roots and covered with
+rose-petals, is taken. Mass and the morning broth follow, and the day
+is considered fitly begun. The poor, or any sick and sorry folk, are
+the first to be considered, or perhaps there is some wounded knight,
+who has sought shelter within the protecting walls of the castle, for
+whom soothing potions or healing salves have to be compounded. This
+latter service was generally the work of the lady of the castle, who
+as a rule possessed sufficient surgical knowledge to bind a broken
+limb. To beguile the weary hours of convalescence, she sings to the
+lute, tells stories, recounts legends, or reads aloud a romance lately
+bought from some wayfaring packman. Little is it to be wondered at
+that the convalescence is protracted, or that the knight delays his
+departure from day to day, sometimes to his own and the lady's
+undoing.
+
+Beside such varied ministrations, the woman of the Middle Ages rode to
+the chase, went out hawking, snared birds with nets, ferreted rabbits,
+spun, wove, and embroidered. Embroidering was a really formidable
+occupation, for the great hall, and each room, had its special
+hangings, and on f�te-days every inch of wall-space was covered. One
+set would picture an Arthurian legend, and others again were made
+bright with flowers, lilies, roses, and columbines. The lady and her
+maidens--often girls of noble birth, whom it was customary to send to
+some castle to complete their education--worked at the countless yards
+such decoration involved, and chatted the while, it may be, of some
+coming marriage or tourney, or perchance one among them would tell a
+story, and so time passed merrily enough. Then for the educated woman,
+of whom there were many, Latin verse offered a wide field of delight,
+and the woman of the Middle Ages read and loved her Virgil just as we
+of to-day read and love our Shakespeare. When the daylight had faded,
+there was always chess-playing, dancing the carole, and singing, and
+by the thirteenth century little pastoral ballets, in which a knight,
+and a shepherdess and her lover, took part, began to be produced for
+the diversion of castle-folk. For daily entertainment, every castle of
+any pretension had its own minstrel or minstrels, whilst in the
+smaller castles a wandering singer was warmly welcomed. Sometimes the
+lady gave audience to a poet, who read his latest idyll, a minstrel,
+to the accompaniment of his viol, singing the interspersed lyrics.
+Such a scene may be found depicted in miniatures, and suggests how
+such a story as "Aucassin and Nicolette," and many another, partly in
+prose, partly in verse, was rendered. One such miniature shows a lady
+reclining on a couch, with a lordling seated beside her, the poet,
+with his small parchment leaflets, declaiming his story, the minstrel
+waiting to take up the theme in song. It is of interest to note that
+in this particular miniature the gown of the lady is ornamented with
+heraldic devices. By such means we are enabled not only to identify
+the person represented--since portraiture, even if there was anything
+worthy of the name, was in a very rudimentary condition--and thus
+arrive at the approximate date of the picture, but also to verify a
+custom, and a stage in social life. It was not until the end of the
+twelfth century, when some sort of heraldic system became necessary
+owing to the introduction of the closed helmet, that armorial
+bearings, hitherto mere personal badges, became attached to noble
+families. By the thirteenth century, when the bourgeoisie had become
+rich, they were worn by the sumptuously attired wife of the lord to
+distinguish her from the equally sumptuously attired wife of the
+wealthy burgher.
+
+Such, in mere outline, was the daily life of the medi�val lady.
+Descriptions of the lady herself seem to be mere replicas of an
+admired and fixed type, for there is in them such a sameness of
+delineation, that we can only imagine that poets sang of qualities
+that pleased, and did not attempt to individualise. All are good and
+gracious, beautiful, and slight of figure, with delicate hands and
+tapering fingers, small feet, fine and glossy hair, and grey eyes,
+laughing and bright. Only occasionally are these attractions varied
+and enhanced by the telling of beauty unaided by paint and hair dye.
+
+It is hardly necessary to speak, save very generally, of woman's
+dress, for much has already been written on the subject. For everyday
+use, garments of wool or linen, according to the season, and with much
+fur in winter, were worn. At weddings or tournaments, or on any other
+kind of f�te-day, the ladies vied with each other in rich cloth of
+gold and silver, in silks woven with threads of gold and patterned
+with conventional design, and in all kinds of iridescent silken
+stuffs from the East. From Mosul, on the banks of the Tigris, whence
+the material we call muslin takes its name, was brought a fine silk
+gossamer, something like our _cr�pe de Chine_. This was used for the
+finely plaited underdress seen at the neck and foot of medi�val
+costume. Perhaps the best representation of this, although stone seems
+hardly the most favourable medium for the delineation of so delicate a
+fabric, can be seen in the long slim figures of the queenly ladies
+standing in the niches on either side of the west door of Chartres
+Cathedral.
+
+But when we have contemplated this gorgeous and dainty apparel, and
+all the other personal luxury that accompanied it, such as enamelled
+and jewelled gold circlets for the head, jewelled girdles with each
+jewel chosen for its own special virtue, carved ivory combs, tablets
+and hand-mirrors, and the like, we are forced to wonder how all this
+refinement and beauty could go hand in hand with so much that is
+unpleasing. If we turn to consider the manners of the men, we find the
+same contrasts--on the one hand the maximum of gallantry and courtesy,
+and on the other a corresponding churlishness and brutality.
+Metaphorically and actually, the lance and the battle-axe were still
+rivalling each other in the warfare of daily life. Although the
+battle-axe must eventually yield to the lance, still strange extremes
+have flourished side by side all down the ages. Turning to but
+comparatively recent times, the coarseness we associate with much of
+the reign of Charles II. stands out in glaring contrast with the
+delicate, graceful poetry that found expression then. And coming still
+nearer to our own days, we think of the unseemly manners in the reigns
+of George III. and IV. and the dainty miniatures such as those painted
+by Cosway, and wonder how these could exist together. Might we not
+just as well wonder why the olive tree has a gnarled, distorted stem,
+whilst its delicate, symmetrical leaves, of the tenderest green grey,
+glisten in the sunshine like silvery shells fresh from ocean's bed?
+
+Renan, amongst the many thinkers on life's mysteries, tells us that
+"Life is the result of a conflict between contrary forces." But to
+philosophise is useless, and it is still more useless to question
+life's seeming anomalies. We can only bow in silence before "what Time
+in mists confounds."
+
+As has been already said, it is only a general idea of the women of
+the Middle Ages that can be gleaned from the Romances. For something
+to bring us into more real touch with them, and to reveal more of
+their personality, we must consider some who have made themselves
+known to us through their work, since history, until we come to the
+fourteenth century, is almost silent about them. Thus it is that as we
+study these women, it almost seems at first as if we were looking at
+some faded frescoes in a dimly lighted church. But just as the
+half-obliterated figures take form and life as our eyes grow
+accustomed to the dimness, and our minds get attuned to the days that
+knew their living representatives, so these women of whom we are
+speaking may live again for us if only we treat their works as human
+documents, and not as arch�ological curiosities. The following pages
+tell of six such women who lived between the tenth century and the
+first half of the fifteenth--Roswitha, a nun of Germany; Marie de
+France, a lady at the Court of Henry the Second of England; Mechthild
+of Magdeburg, mystic and beguine; Mahaut, Countess of Artois, a
+great-niece of St. Louis; Christine de Pisan, an Italian by birth,
+living at the Court of Charles the Fifth of France; and Agnes Sorel,
+the Mistress and inspirer of Charles the Seventh.
+
+In trying to evoke the women of these days of long ago, it is hardly
+possible to do more than portray them in outline. Yet even so, if the
+outline be true, we may remember, for our consolation, that it has
+been said that we shall never, except in outline, see the mysterious
+Goddess Truth.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+ROSWITHA PRESENTING HER POEM TO THE EMPEROR OTHO I., THE ABBESS OF
+GANDERSHEIM STANDING AT HER SIDE.
+
+A. D�rer, 1501.
+
+_To face page 1._]
+
+
+
+
+A TENTH-CENTURY DRAMATIST, ROSWITHA THE NUN
+
+
+In this age of personal curiosity, politely called psychological
+interest, when personalities are analysed with all the thoroughness of
+the dissecting theatre, it seems almost courting failure to try to
+call to remembrance one whose personality has long since faded away,
+and of whom, apparently, no contemporary writer has made mention. Of
+Roswitha, the woman, we know but little, and this little is gathered
+from her own writings.[3] Presumably the date of her birth was about
+A.D. 935, and that of her death about A.D. 973. There is a tradition
+that she was connected with the royal house of Germany, at that time
+represented by the enlightened Otho the Great. Be this as it may, her
+life for us begins when, probably at an early age, she entered the
+Convent of Gandersheim. Gandersheim was a Benedictine nunnery in the
+Harz Mountains, founded in the ninth century by Liudolf, Duke of
+Saxony, and important enough to entitle its Abbess to a Seat in the
+Imperial Diet, a right perhaps never exercised except by proxy. The
+story of its foundation, as told by Roswitha in the unique MS. of her
+works, is of strange beauty. Listen to her own words as she tells the
+tale:--
+
+    [3] The authenticity of these has been called in question by
+    some critics, but apparently upon insufficient data.
+
+     At that time there was, nigh unto the Monastery,[4] a little
+     wood, encircled by shady hills, those same hills by the
+     which we ourselves are surrounded. And there was, moreover,
+     in the wood a small farm where the swineherds of Liudolf
+     were wont to dwell, and within the enclosure of which the
+     men, during the hours of night, composed to rest their weary
+     bodies until the time when they must needs drive forth to
+     pasture the pigs committed to their care. Here, on a time,
+     two days before the Feast of All Saints, these same
+     herdsmen, in the darkness of the night, saw full many bright
+     lights glowing in the wood. And they were astonished at the
+     sight, and marvelled what could be the purport of this
+     strange vision of blazing light cleaving the darkness of the
+     night with its wondrous brilliance. And all trembling with
+     fear, they related unto their Master that which they had
+     seen, showing unto him the place which had been illumined by
+     the light. And he, desiring by very sight thereof to put to
+     proof that which he had heard tell, joined them without the
+     building, and began the following night, without sleeping,
+     to keep watch, closing not his eyes though they were weighed
+     down by the desire of slumber. And after a while he saw the
+     kindling lights, more in number than afore, once again burn
+     with a red glow, in the same place forsooth, but at an hour
+     somewhat earlier. And this glad sign of happy omen he made
+     known so soon as Phoebus shed his first rays from the sky,
+     and the joyous news spread everywhere. And this could not be
+     kept back from the worthy Duke Liudolf, but swifter than
+     speech did it come to his ears. And he, carefully observing
+     on the hallowed eve of the approaching festival whether
+     perchance some further like heavenly vision would clearly
+     show it to be an omen, with much company kept watch on the
+     wood all the night long. And straightway when black night
+     had covered the land with darkness, everywhere throughout
+     the wooded valley in the which the very noble temple was
+     destined to be built, many lights were perceived, the which,
+     with the shining splendour of their exceeding brightness,
+     cleft asunder the shades of the wood and the darkness of the
+     night alike. And thereupon, standing up and rendering praise
+     to God, they all with one accord declared it meet that the
+     place should be sanctified to the worship of Him who had
+     filled it with the light. And, moreover, the Duke, mindful
+     of his duty to Heaven, and with the consent of his dear
+     consort Oda, forthwith ordered the trees to be felled and
+     the brushwood cut away, and the valley to be completely
+     cleared. And this sylvan spot, aforetime the home of fauns
+     and monsters, he thus cleared and made fitting for the glory
+     of God. And then, before obtaining the money needful for the
+     work, he at once set out the lines of a noble church as
+     traced by the splendour of the red light.[5]
+
+    [4] The first foundation, afterwards removed to Gandersheim.
+
+    [5] For other instances of churches laid out on lines said to
+    have been revealed in dreams or visions, see Didron,
+    _Christian Iconography_, vol. i. (1886) pp. 381, 382, 460,
+    and Sta. Maria Maggiore, Rome.
+
+     In suchwise was the building of our second Monastery to the
+     glory of God begun. But stone suitable for the structure
+     could not be found in those parts, and thus the completion
+     of the sanctuary which had been begun, suffered delay. But
+     the Abbess Hathumoda, trusting to obtain all things from the
+     Lord by faith, oft-times, by serving God both night and day
+     with holy zeal, wore herself out with too abundant labour.
+     And with many of those placed under her care, she besought
+     the solace of speedy help from Heaven, lest the work so well
+     begun should be left unfinished. And of a sudden she became
+     aware that the divine grace which she sought was present,
+     ready to have compassion on her longings. For as she lay one
+     day prostrate nigh unto the altar, fasting and giving
+     herself up to prayer, she was bidden of a gentle voice to go
+     forth and follow a bird she would see sitting on the summit
+     of a certain great rock. And she, embracing the command with
+     ready mind, went forth, putting her trust in it with all her
+     heart. And taking with her very skilled masons, she sped
+     swiftly whither the kindly Spirit led her, until she was
+     come to the noble sanctuary which had been begun. And there
+     she saw, seated on the lofty summit of the self-same rock, a
+     white dove, the which, flying with outspread wings,
+     straightway went before her, tempering its flight in
+     unwonted way so that the virgin, walking with her
+     companions, might be able to follow in a straight course its
+     aerial track. And when the dove in its flight had come to
+     the place which we now know was not wanting in great stones,
+     it descended, and with its beak pierced through the
+     ground,[6] where, beneath the soil, many stones were
+     disclosed. And assured by this sight, the very worthy virgin
+     of Christ bade her companions clear away the heavy mass of
+     earth, and lay the spot bare. And this done, supernal and
+     devout piety presiding over the work, a great wealth of
+     mighty stones was brought to view, whence all the needful
+     material for the walls of the monastery already begun, and
+     of the church, could be obtained. Then, striving ever more
+     and more with all their heart, the builders of the temple
+     destined to be consecrated to the glory of God, laboured at
+     the work by night and by day.
+
+    [6] The intervention of a bird to aid in discovery was a
+    favourite tradition derived from antiquity. We may recall,
+    amongst many variants of the theme, the story of the
+    celebrated expedition of the Athenians to the Island of
+    Scyros to find and recover the body of Theseus. Theseus,
+    being a hero, the agent employed in the quest must likewise
+    be distinguished, and so the eagle, Zeus's bird, is alone
+    thought worthy to peck the earth and indicate the
+    resting-place of the demi-god.
+
+Thus does Roswitha tell how the work of the new Foundation was begun,
+the Duke Liudolf and his wife having already journeyed to Rome to ask
+of the Pope his blessing, as well as to beg of him, as a token of his
+favour, some sacred relics to deposit there. The Pope, giving them his
+blessing, thus makes answer to their request:--
+
+     There were here, aforetime, two mighty rulers--the most holy
+     Anastasius who presided over this See, and his co-apostle,
+     the holy Innocent. These, through their services to the
+     Church, were the most famous next after St. Peter and St.
+     Paul. With such care have the illustrious bodies of these
+     two been heretofore preserved by all the rulers of this
+     city, that never has any one been permitted to carry away
+     the least portion of them, and thus their sacred limbs
+     remain undiminished. But forasmuch as it is meet that I
+     yield to your pious request, I will grant you, without
+     recompense, tokens from both these sacred bodies, cut before
+     your very eyes from off the sacred bodies themselves, if so
+     be that you will make solemn oath to me to venerate these
+     relics in your community, of the which you have made
+     mention, preserving them for all time within your Church,
+     sacred hymns being there sung by night and by day, and a
+     light being alway kept burning. And of our apostolic right
+     we ordain, according to your request, that your community be
+     of our See, to the end that it may be secured from all
+     secular rule.
+
+And Liudolf, with glad heart, made promise of this, and returned home
+with the coveted relics.
+
+The MS., now at Munich, which tells this fascinating story of love and
+faith, was, it is considered, written about A.D. 1000, and was
+fortunately preserved in the Benedictine convent of St. Emmeran,
+Ratisbon, where the scholar and poet, Conrad Celtes, discovered it at
+the end of the fifteenth century. It also includes metrical legends, a
+fragment of a panegyric on the Emperor Otho, and six dramas. Of such
+worth were these latter counted, that when Celtes published the MS. in
+1501, Albert D�rer received a commission for an ornamental title-page,
+and for a frontispiece to each of the plays. It is by these dramas
+that Roswitha has distinguished herself in the world of letters; for
+although the legends contain points of interest, and are treated with
+skill, they are naturally not so unique as the dramas, nor do they
+reflect her personality in the same way. She herself tells us that the
+plays were written in imitation of the manner, but not of the matter,
+of Terence, and that her only desire in writing them was "to make the
+small talent given her by Heaven to create, under the hammer of
+devotion, a faint sound to the praise of God."
+
+But before considering her work, let us glance at her own life, and
+the life of contemporary Saxon nunneries.
+
+[Illustration: _Royal Library, Munich._
+
+COVER OF ST. EMMERAN GOSPELS.
+
+Tenth Century.
+
+_To face page 7._]
+
+Nearly one hundred and fifty years before the supposed date of
+Roswitha's birth, the hitherto untamed and warlike Saxons had been
+finally defeated by the mercenaries of Charlemagne, and, as one of the
+signs of submission, forced to embrace Christianity. But having
+submitted, they forthwith, and with an aptitude suggestive of the
+spirit of the modern Japanese, set themselves to appropriate,
+assimilate, and remodel for their own use, the rudiments of the
+civilisation with which they found themselves brought into contact. So
+speedy and so thorough was the transformation, that scarce a century
+passed ere the once powerful Frankish kingdom of Charlemagne bowed
+down before the strenuous Saxons, to whom the supreme power was
+transferred. Their Chief was elected king of the Germans, and some
+fifty years later their king, Otho the Great, after being crowned at
+Aix-la-Chapelle, the former centre of Frankish rule, received the
+Imperial Crown from the Pope in Rome. This displacement of the
+political centre was naturally followed by a complete displacement of
+artistic centres. Both these sides of life were fostered by Otho with
+a keen personal interest--the building up of his empire and the
+encouragement of art going hand in hand. Moreover, owing to his close
+ties with Italy and the East, and the element of classic tradition
+inevitably induced by such ties, art received an added stimulus and
+grace. Oriental monks were to be found in the monasteries. Learned men
+and artists were summoned from Italy and Constantinople. The number
+and influence of these were increased when Otho's son, afterwards Otho
+the Second, married Theophano, a Greek princess, who, bringing many
+compatriots in her train, sought to reflect in her German home
+something of the learning and splendour of the Byzantine Court. The
+ivory, shown in illustration, commemorating this marriage, is an
+example of the work of some Byzantine craftsman in her employ, whilst
+the jewelled and gold-wrought cover of the Gospels of St. Emmeran (now
+at Munich) shows to how high a level the goldsmith's art of the time
+had been raised by the influences alluded to.
+
+[Illustration: _Mus�e de Cluny, Paris._
+
+MARRIAGE OF OTHO II. AND THEOPHANO.
+
+Byzantine, 10th century.
+
+_To face page 7._]
+
+Perhaps the one place which retains in the most varied and
+concentrated form the traces of this wave of artistic development then
+passing over Germany, is Hildesheim. This is of interest here because
+the bishops of Hildesheim were specially appointed to perform the
+office of consecration of nuns at Gandersheim. It seems hardly
+possible that Roswitha could have seen its gifted bishop Bernward,
+himself a painter, and a worker in mosaic and metals, though owing to
+the uncertainty of the date of her death--one chronicler making it as
+late as 1002--it is just possible that she may have done so.
+Bernward's learning and artistic nature attracted the attention of the
+princess Theophano, who appointed him tutor to her son, the
+boy-emperor Otho the Third. Brought thus into touch with the many
+gifts presented on special occasions to the young Emperor by Greek and
+Oriental princes, as well as by "Scots" (_i.e._ Irish missionaries and
+emigrants settled in Germany), he, by taking with him to Court, from
+the School of Art established in his palace at Hildesheim, apt and
+talented youths, made use of these rare and beautiful offerings for
+the encouragement of the study of divers arts. Students also
+accompanied him when he went farther afield for study, for it is said
+of him that there was no art which he did not attempt, even if he
+failed to attain perfection.[7] Hildesheim thus became famous as a
+working-centre of fine art, especially in metals, and remained so down
+to the end of the Middle Ages. After a lapse of nearly a thousand
+years, the result of the labours of this artistic prelate and his
+pupils may still be seen in situ as it were. Besides jewelled
+service-books, there are chalices, incense burners, a gold
+candelabrum, and a jewelled crucifix, fashioned, if not in part by
+him, at least under his supervision. The entrance to the Cathedral is
+beautified with delicately wrought bronze doors, modelled, it may be,
+from those of Sta. Sabina, Rome, themselves considered to be of
+Oriental origin,[8] and in the transept rises a column adorned with
+bronze reliefs from the life of Christ, probably designed by the
+bishop either after his pilgrimage to Rome in 1001, when he had seen
+Trajan's column, or, as a recent writer suggests, from the "Juppiter
+and giant columns" of Roman Rhineland.[9]
+
+    [7] Thangmarus, "Vita Sti. Bernwardi," Migne, _Patrol. Lat._
+    140, col. 397. 6.
+
+    [8] Michel, _Histoire de l'Art_, 1905, Tome I. i. p. 258.
+
+    [9] _Journal of Studies_, vol. i. part i., 1911, article by
+    E. Strong, p. 24.
+
+We are tempted to recall other princesses whose marriages, and even
+more whose personalities, have influenced art and letters, but two
+must suffice us--the one, the beautiful and cultivated Anne of
+Bohemia, wife of Richard the Second, whose bridal retinue was in
+reality a small Court of literary and artistic personages; the other,
+the brilliant Valentine Visconti of Milan, sister-in-law of King
+Charles the Sixth of France, whose influence in matters of art and
+literature alone, at a time when England and France were so intimately
+associated, makes her of special interest to us.
+
+But what bearing, it may be asked, had Court life on the life of the
+nun Roswitha in the convent of Gandersheim? To answer this question we
+must recall briefly the position of the early religious houses, and
+especially those of Saxony. Many of the foundations were royal, and,
+in return for certain privileges, were obliged to entertain the king
+and his retinue whenever he journeyed. Such sojourns naturally brought
+a store of political, intellectual, and other information to the
+favoured house. Added to this, the abbess of such a house, generally a
+high-born and influential woman, was, in her position as a ruler of
+lands as well as of communities, brought into direct contact with the
+Court and with politics. To her rights of over-lordship were attached
+the same privileges and duties as in the case of any feudal baron. She
+issued summonses for attendance at her Courts, at which she was
+represented by a proctor, and, when war was declared, she had to
+provide the prescribed number of knights. In some cases her influence
+was supreme, even in imperial affairs, extending also to matters
+social and literary. Roswitha tells us how much she herself owed to
+the two successive abbesses under whose rule she lived, for
+suggestion, information, and encouragement in her literary work.
+
+The convents of Saxony, as many elsewhere in the tenth and eleventh
+centuries, were centres of culture in the nature of endowed colleges.
+In some of them women resided permanently, and besides their religious
+exercises, devoted themselves to learning and the arts, for the Church
+of the Middle Ages took thought for the intellect as well as for the
+soul. In others, no irrevocable vows were made, and if desire or
+necessity arose, the student inmate was free to return to the world.
+In others again, though residence was permanent, short leave of
+absence from time to time was granted by the abbess, and the nun was
+able to sojourn with her friends, or to visit some sister community.
+But at Gandersheim the rule was strict, and a nun, her vows once
+taken, had to remain within the convent walls. Yet even so, life there
+was perhaps far less circumscribed than in many a castle, where the
+men gave themselves up to war and the chase, and the women perforce
+spun and embroidered and gossiped, since to venture without the walls
+was fraught with difficulty and sometimes with danger. Even if there
+were some who cared to read, and who would fain go in imagination to
+other scenes and times, MSS. were difficult to come by, and costly
+withal. Wholly different was it in the religious houses. In these,
+women associated with their equals, with whom they could interchange
+ideas, and the library was well furnished with MSS. of classical and
+Christian writers. One of the first cares of St. Benedict, in the case
+of every newly founded house, was the formation of the library. So
+held in honour did this tradition become, and so assiduously was it
+pursued, that the status of a monastery or a convent, as a centre of
+learning, came to be estimated by its wealth in MSS. Besides the mass
+of transcribing which such rivalry occasioned, there was illuminating
+to be done, musical notation to be studied and prepared for the
+services of the Church, chants and choir-singing to be practised, and
+the needful time to be devoted to weaving and embroidery--a part of
+every woman's education. Weaving had of necessity to be done in every
+convent in order to provide the requisite clothing for its inmates,
+and the large and often elaborate hangings used for covering the
+walls. Embroidery, on the other hand, was no mere occupation, or even
+a craft, but in truth a fine art. The few specimens still preserved
+give some idea of the quality of the work, whilst old inventories
+attest the quantity. Illuminated MSS. of the Gospels and the
+Apocalypse were lent from royal treasuries, and their miniatures were
+copied, with needle and silk, to adorn vestments and altar hangings.
+Then at Gandersheim, as we have already said, the occasional visits of
+princely travellers brought interest and diversion from the outside
+world. It was in an atmosphere such as this that Roswitha passed her
+days.
+
+Of her work, the metrical legends seem her earliest effort. In these,
+though they are mainly based on well-known themes, Roswitha shows much
+originality in description. Whilst they need not detain us, passing
+reference may be made to two of them--the Passion of St. Pelagius of
+Cordova, and the Fall and Conversion of Theophilus--since their
+subject matter is of value to us to-day. The one interests us because,
+in relating that the story was told her by an eye-witness of the
+martyrdom in A.D. 925 (_Acta SS._ Jun. V.), she shows that
+communication existed between that great intellectual centre, Cordova,
+and Germany, a fact that must have had considerable influence on art
+and literature; the other as being the story out of which the Faust
+legend was developed.
+
+After these legends, we turn to her panegyric on the Emperor Otho.
+This she opens by acknowledging her debt to the Abbess Gerberg, niece
+of Otho the Great, for aiding her in her literary work with her
+superior knowledge, and for giving her the necessary information
+concerning the royal doings. Then by humbly likening her mental
+perplexity and fear on entering upon so vast a subject to the feelings
+of one who has to cross a forest in winter when snow has obliterated
+the track, she in a few words pictures for us the natural wooded
+surroundings of the convent. Her poem--for such it really is--then
+sets forth the personal history of this monarch and his predecessors,
+rather than public events, and is thus of value more on account of its
+poetical than its historical quality. But one episode, picturesque in
+its quaint setting, and interesting historically because its stirring
+details are not to be found elsewhere, is worthy of record. It
+centres round Adelheid, the young and beautiful widow of Lothair, a
+Lombard king. Taken prisoner by his successor, the tyrant Berengarius,
+she is immured in a castle on the Lago di Garda, and threatened with a
+forced marriage with the son of her oppressor. This threat seems to
+endow her with superhuman power. Bidding defiance to all difficulty
+and danger, she contrives gradually to dig a secret way through the
+soft earth, and suddenly finds herself free. Dawn is just breaking.
+But how can she make use of her freedom before her guards awake and
+discover her escape? Quickly is her mind made up. But let Roswitha
+herself tell the story:--
+
+     As soon as black night yielded to the twilight, and the
+     heavens began to pale before the rays of the sun, warily
+     hiding herself in secluded caves, now she wanders in the
+     woods, now lurks in the furrows amongst the ripe ears of
+     Ceres, until returning night, clothed in its wonted gloom,
+     again veils the earth in darkness. Then once more is she
+     diligent to pursue her way begun. And her guards, not
+     finding her, all-trembling make it known to the officer
+     charged with the safe keeping of the lady. And he, struck to
+     the heart with the terror of grievous fear, set forth with
+     much company to make diligent search for her, and when he
+     failed, and moreover could not discover whither the most
+     illustrious queen had turned her steps, fearful, he made
+     report of the matter to King Berengarius. And he, at once
+     filled with exceeding wrath, forthwith sent his dependants
+     everywhere around, commanding them not to overlook any small
+     place, but cautiously to examine every hiding-place, lest
+     perchance the queen might be lying hid in any one. And he
+     himself followed with a band of stout-hearted troops as if
+     to overcome some fierce enemy in battle. And rapidly did he
+     pass on his way through the self-same corn-field in the
+     which the lady whom he sought was lurking in the bent-back
+     furrows, hidden beneath the wings of Ceres. Hither and
+     thither forsooth he traversed the very spot where she lay,
+     burdened with no little fear, and although, with great
+     effort, he essayed with outstretched spear to part the corn
+     around, yet he discovered not her whom by the grace of
+     Christ it concealed.
+
+From the sheltering corn Adelheid effects her escape, and after weary
+wandering, reaches the Castle of Canossa, the stronghold of the Counts
+of Tuscany. Any one who has visited this now ruined castle, some
+twenty miles from Parma, will remember the threadlike way between
+rocks covered with brambles, by which its eyrie height is approached.
+Up this steep track the queen, fearful of any pause, hastens, and
+finds a welcome and ready help. The Count becomes her champion, and
+appeals on her behalf to the Emperor Otho. The latter, glad of an
+excuse to further his cause in Italy, descends with his troops into
+the Lombard plain, weds the beautiful Adelheid, and receives the
+formal cession of the so-called kingdom of Italy from Berengarius and
+his son, whose power had ebbed away in their futile attempts to
+control their feudatories.
+
+Roswitha's thrilling narrative is amplified by the graphic account
+recorded by St. Odilo, Abbot of Cluny, Queen Adelheid's friend and
+one-time confessor. In this he tells us that during Adelheid's
+imprisonment in a castle on the Lago di Garda, her chaplain Martin
+succeeds in making a hole in the wall, through which the queen and her
+maidservant, disguised as men, creep. He does not recount the episode
+of the hiding in the corn, but relates another equally stirring
+adventure. He tells us that, in fleeing from their persecutor to the
+safety of Canossa, the fugitives become involved in a swamp. After two
+days, they are rescued from their perilous position by a fisherman
+who, passing near by, and hearing sounds of distress, goes to their
+aid. Their deliverer, finding them faint with hunger and cold, lights
+a fire with the flint he carries in his wallet, and cooks some small
+fish, the only food he has to offer them. Once more they start on
+their way, and eventually reach Canossa. But hardly do they gain
+admittance, ere the castle is surrounded by the soldiery of the
+outwitted and wrathful Berengarius. A knight, carrying a message from
+the Emperor Otho of promised deliverance, essays to enter the castle,
+but finding this impossible owing to the hostile troops encamped
+around, he fastens the letter to an arrow, and shoots it over the
+wall. A strong force sent by Otho is near at hand, and speedily puts
+the enemy to flight. Adelheid is rescued, and is brought with
+rejoicing to Pavia, her dower city, which had already opened its gates
+to the Emperor, and she and the Emperor enter the city together in
+triumph. Much has been written of the illustrious Adelheid, but
+perhaps she would best like to be remembered by the eulogy of her
+confessor--the saintly Odilo--that she never forgot a kindness, or
+remembered an injury.
+
+It is in a spirit far different from that of her panegyric on the
+emperor Otho that Roswitha writes her dramas. Fear and mental
+perplexity no longer possess her. Though humbly begging the reader not
+to "despise these strains drawn from a fragile reed," she has no
+misgiving, for she feels that herein lies her mission. She explains
+her reason for using the dramatic form, and for taking Terence as her
+model. There are many, she says,--and she does not entirely exonerate
+herself,--who, beguiled by the elegant diction of the Classics, prefer
+them to religious writings, whilst there are others who, though
+generally condemning heathen works, eagerly peruse the poetic
+creations of Terence because of the special beauty of his language.
+She further expresses the hope that by trying to imitate his manner,
+and by at the same time dramatising legends calculated to edify, she
+may induce readers to turn from the "godless contents of his works" to
+the contemplation of virtuous living. Emboldened by this pious hope,
+Roswitha shrinks from no difficulties or details, details which might
+well have made her hesitate, and which, betraying a knowledge of the
+world, have raised the question as to whether she made her profession
+as early as was customary. This solicitude of Roswitha for the welfare
+of frail and all too human mankind recalls St. Bernard's condemnation,
+some hundred and fifty years later, of all carving in church or
+cloister, when he says, "one reads with more pleasure what is carven
+in stones than what is written in books, and would rather gaze all day
+upon these singular creations than meditate upon the Divine Word."
+
+It has been maintained that the classic theatre decayed and
+disappeared as Christianity became all-powerful in Europe, and that
+the modern theatre seemingly arose in the twelfth century out of the
+services of the Church, and owed no debt to the past. But neither
+Nature nor Art works in this way except to our own unperceiving minds.
+After the fall of the Roman Empire, and the consequent disruption of
+society, classic civilisation gradually withdrew into the security of
+the religious communities, seeking, like distraught humanity, shelter
+and protection. It was in such tranquil atmosphere as this that Latin
+drama, though condemned in substance, was fostered and favoured as an
+education in style. Roswitha's plays may, as has been said, have been
+the last ray of classical antiquity, but if so, it was a ray, like the
+pillar of fire, bright enough to guide through the dark night of
+feudalism to the coming day.
+
+Whether her dramatic efforts were an isolated phenomenon or not, must
+remain undecided, but it is reasonable to assume that any work
+surviving to the present day is but a sample of much else of the same
+sort that has disappeared in the course of time. Still all we would
+claim for them, apart from their intrinsic value and interest, is that
+they helped to keep up continuity in the tradition of drama. The
+gradual movement in the Church towards elaboration in its services
+which began in the ninth century,--a movement which led to the
+dramatising of the Mass, out of which the liturgical drama, and
+eventually the miracle-play, were evolved,--was a popular movement. To
+a people ignorant of Latin, yet fond of shows, it provided instruction
+and diversion alike. Roswitha, on the other hand, avowedly wrote for
+the literary world, and with a special end in view as regards that
+world. To attain this end, she set before her, as her master in style,
+Terence, who himself had aimed at a high ideal of artistic perfection,
+and of whom it has been said that he perpetuated the art and genius of
+Menander just as a master engraver perpetuates the designs of a great
+painter whose works have since perished. Still, in spite of the
+glamour of the style to which she aspires, and poetess though she is
+by nature, her plays reflect the handiwork of the moralist rather than
+that of the artist, for though beauty charms her by the way, her goal
+is moral truth, and to this all else must yield. If we would see the
+beauty of holiness as she saw it, we must enter in spirit within the
+shrine of her thought and feeling, just as the traveller, standing
+without the simple brick exterior of the tomb of Galla Placidia, at
+Ravenna, must penetrate within if he would know of the beauty there
+enshrined. "Il faut �tre saint, pour comprendre la saintet�."
+
+The subject which dominates her horizon is that of Chastity. Treated
+by her with didactic intent, this really resolves itself into a
+conflict between Christianity and Paganism,--in other words, between
+Chastity and Passion,--in which Christianity triumphs through the
+virtue of Woman. But at the same time Roswitha neither contemns
+marriage nor generally advocates celibacy. She merely counsels, as the
+more blessed, the unmarried state. Yet even so, we feel that beneath
+her nun's garb there beats the heart of a sympathetic woman, whose
+emotional self-expression is but tempered by the ideals of her time
+and her surroundings.
+
+Another important element to be taken into account in her plays is the
+part she assigns to the supernatural. It is impossible to develop
+character with any continuity when the supernatural, like some sword
+of Damocles, hovers continually overhead, ready to descend at any
+moment and sever cause from effect. Such a sword was the Divine
+Presence to Roswitha. When her plot requires it, she introduces a
+miracle, converting a character, at a moment's notice, and in a way
+that no evolution could possibly effect, into one of a totally
+different kind. Still to her audience such a _d�nouement_ would be
+quite satisfactory. With her, sudden changes and conversions but
+reflect the ideas which possessed the minds of her contemporaries, who
+realised God more in deviations from, than in manifestations of, law
+and order.
+
+Were her plays ever performed? To this question no certain answer can
+be given, since no record has yet been found of their performance, and
+the best critics are at variance on the subject. But judging from
+analogy, there seems to be no reason why they should not have been. We
+know that as early as the fifth and sixth centuries the monks played
+Terence, probably on some f�te-day, or before their scholars as a
+means of instruction, and doubtless Roswitha's plays were also acted
+on special occasions, such as when the Emperor sojourned at
+Gandersheim, or the Bishop made a visitation. As they were written in
+Latin, the literary language of the time, this in itself, even if
+their themes had appealed to the people, would have prevented them
+from being performed save before the educated few. So if we would
+picture to ourselves a performance of one of them by her companion
+nuns in the Chapter House, or it may be in the refectory, it must be
+before the Bishop and his clergy, and perhaps also some members of the
+Imperial family, and lords and ladies of the Court. How refreshing
+must such an entertainment have been to this distinguished company as
+it found itself carried away into an atmosphere of poetry and passion,
+of movement and colour, in place of the sobriety induced by the stiff
+liturgical dramas that probably formed the usual diversion! Such a
+drama was that of _The Wise and Foolish Virgins_, a specially
+favourite old-world dramatic exercise, dispensed as a sort of
+religious tonic to womankind, calculated to arouse slumbering souls,
+or to quicken to still further effort those that did not slumber. For
+us, its chief interest lies in the antiphonic arrangement of the
+dialogue, in which we may trace the first germs of characterisation,
+and in the music, the refrains of which contain the first suggestions,
+as far as we know, of the principle of the leitmotiv, a principle
+carried to its most complete development by Wagner. Although the
+earliest known MS. of it is of the eleventh century, so finished, yet
+so simple, are its dialogues and refrains, that it seems not
+unreasonable to infer that the form of the play was well known, either
+through some earlier MS. or through oral tradition. It is only a
+slight development of the elegy in dialogue which was performed in
+A.D. 874, at the funeral of Hathumoda, the first abbess of
+Gandersheim. This dialogue takes place between the sorrow-stricken
+nuns, who speak in chorus of their loss, and the monk Wichbert, who
+acts as consoler. Although its form is liturgical, its subject
+entitles it to be considered the earliest known medi�val dramatic work
+extant.
+
+Of Roswitha's dramas, three seem to stand out as of special
+interest--_Abraham_, _Callimachus_, and _Paphnutius_. All of these are
+more or less patchwork adaptations from the legendary d�bris of
+antiquity. The first appears to have been taken by Roswitha from a
+Latin translation of a fourth-century Greek legend.[10] Whilst she
+does not display any originality in elaborating the story, but keeps
+carefully to the text--so much so that at times she merely
+transcribes--she reveals her artistic as well as her psychological
+instinct by concentrating the essentials, thereby transforming a
+rather discursive composition into a poignant picture. The subtle
+touches, the sentiment, and the dialogue so pathetic and so true to
+nature, make this drama verily her masterpiece, and one worthy of a
+place beside the delicate and dramatic miniatures of the time. In a
+few words, here is the story. A holy man, by name Abraham, has
+abandoned a life of solitude in order to take care of his young
+orphaned niece. After a few years, she is tempted to a house of ill
+fame. Some two years later, her uncle, having discovered her
+whereabouts, determines to exchange his hermit garb for that of a man
+of the world, and go to the house in the guise of a lover, so as to
+get an opportunity of speaking with his niece alone. Of course she
+does not recognise him in his change of costume, and when he asks for
+a kiss, she puts her arms round his neck, and suddenly detects a
+strange perfume. Instantly a change comes over her. The scent recalls
+to her her former unsullied life, and tears fill her eyes. At the
+fitting moment the uncle makes himself known, and showing her with
+sweet words of sympathy and encouragement that sin is natural to
+humanity, and that what is evil is to continue in it, takes her back
+with him to begin afresh the simple good life.
+
+    [10] Migne, _Patrol. Lat._ lxxiii.
+
+The second play recounts an incident taken from the apocryphal Acts of
+the Apostles, supposed to take place in the first century. A young
+heathen, Callimachus, falls in love with a young married woman, a
+Christian. She dies, and is buried the same day. That night
+Callimachus goes to the grave, and with the help of a slave disinters
+the body. Holding it in his arms, and triumphing in the embrace denied
+to him in life, he suddenly falls dead. In the morning the husband and
+St. John, coming to the cemetery to pray for her soul, see the rifled
+grave and the two dead bodies. St. John, at the command of Christ, who
+appears for but a moment, restores them both to life, and brings to
+repentance the young man, who, in further amendment of his ways,
+becomes a Christian. This mere outline of the play is given to suggest
+points of resemblance between it--the first sketch of this kind of
+drama of passion, the frenzy of the soul and senses--and the
+masterpiece of this type, _Romeo and Juliet_.
+
+Many passages in the plays of Roswitha remind us of Shakespeare, but
+it is not possible to deal adequately with them here, nor does it seem
+material to do so. There is no reason why Shakespeare should not have
+seen a printed collection of her dramas. He, like Dante, seems to have
+had the power of attracting material from every possible source, and
+it should not be forgotten what a sensation was caused by Celtes
+printing in 1501 Roswitha's MS. But, on the other hand, the
+similarities we notice may be a mere coincidence, or, as is much more
+likely, the details in each case may have been common property handed
+down from one generation to another.
+
+In her play of _Paphnutius_, Roswitha made use of a story taken from
+the _Historia Monachorum_ of Rufinus, a contemporary of St. Jerome,
+who had journeyed through Palestine and Egypt to visit the Hermits of
+the Desert. The mention, too, at the beginning of Rufinus's account,
+of a musician who tells of his retirement to a hermitage in order to
+change the harmony of music into that of the spirit, evidently
+suggested to her a discussion on music and harmony, probably adapted
+from Bo�thius's _De Musica_. In this discussion lies the chief
+interest of the play as giving us some idea of the sort of
+intellectual exercises probably practised by women in convents in the
+tenth century. The play opens with a truly medi�val scene,--a
+disputation between a hermit and his disciples on the question of
+harmony between soul and body, suggested by the want of it in the life
+of the courtesan Thais. Such harmony _should_ exist, says the holy
+man, for though the soul is not mortal like the body, nor the body
+spiritual like the soul, we shall, if we follow the method of the
+dialecticians, find that such differences do not necessarily render
+the two inharmonious. Harmony cannot be produced from like elements or
+like sounds, but only by the right adjustment of those which are
+dissimilar. This discussion on harmony naturally leads to one on
+music, which is divided, according to the then received writers on the
+subject, into three kinds--celestial, human, and instrumental. Music,
+in the Middle Ages, was, for dialectical purposes, treated in
+accordance with the Pythagorean theory as interpreted by Cicero in his
+_Somnium Scipionis_, who represented the eight revolving spheres of
+heaven--the Earth being fixed--as forming a complete musical octave.
+Such celestial music forms the subject of the argument in Roswitha's
+play, the music of Earth being merely touched upon. Why, it is asked,
+do we not hear this music of the spheres if it exists? To this comes
+the answer that some think it is because of its continuity, others
+because of the density of the atmosphere, and others again because the
+volume of sound cannot penetrate the narrow passage of the human ear.
+And so with subtle argument, the music of Heaven was often drowned in
+the din of Earth. Dante, in the _Paradiso_, lifted the idea once more
+from Earth to Heaven, and clothed it in a wealth of gorgeous imagery.
+But it is Shakespeare who, with the magic of a few words, has given
+the thought immortality.
+
+    There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st
+    But in his motion like an angel sings,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Such harmony is in immortal souls;
+    But whilst this muddy vesture of decay
+    Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
+
+In judging of Roswitha's dramatic work it must be remembered that, in
+true medi�val spirit fearing to profane what she venerates, she allows
+herself but little licence with the legends she dramatises.
+Nevertheless, as has been said, she from time to time shows, in
+psychological touches, a capacity for originality quite phenomenal for
+her time and for the literature of the cloister. Still her plays
+express but a very small part of the whole gamut of human emotions and
+experiences, just as her life was lived in an intellectual world
+narrow from the point of view of to-day or of the great intellectual
+age of antiquity. Many causes contributed to this. Intellectually, the
+Christian world shrank as Paganism was superseded by Christianity, a
+supersession by no means complete in Roswitha's day. Of course this
+nascent Christianity was inconsistent with much of the intellectual
+life of the ancient world, which was either inextricably interwoven
+with Paganism, or essentially anti-religious. With its task of laying
+afresh the foundations of education, politics, and morality, it had to
+take root and become established in a relatively narrow intellectual
+field, the boundaries of which had gradually to be broken down,
+sometimes with violence.
+
+Time, like some lens which clears our vision, makes it an easy task to
+criticise and condemn a phase of religious life which, having essayed
+to tranquillise and sweeten existence, was, under altered conditions
+of civilisation, bound to pass away. We of to-day pride ourselves on
+a wider view of life, on a higher conception of duty, expressed in
+lives dedicated to public work as a necessary complement to private
+virtue. Still, if we would judge fairly this age of contemplation and
+faith within the convent walls, and all that, even if done mistakenly
+and imperfectly, it aspired to do, we must realise, as best we can,
+the world without those walls. One of our poets has vividly reflected
+it for us when he speaks of man's life as made up of "whole centuries
+of folly, noise, and sin." So bitter was life then and even later,
+that by the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, when mysticism had
+claimed many votaries, eternal rest, even at the cost of personal
+annihilation, was the whispered desire of many devout souls.
+
+"A Simple Stillness." "An Eternal Silence." These are the words that
+float across the centuries to us, like echoes from troubled, longing
+hearts. These are the words that give us the key to the understanding
+of the choice of vocation of the medi�val woman. The spiritual need
+for harmony and peace may have been great; the practical need was
+perhaps even greater; for in its accomplishment the spiritual found
+its consummation.
+
+
+
+
+A TWELFTH-CENTURY ROMANCE-WRITER, MARIE DE FRANCE
+
+
+"Marie ai nom, si sui de France." Thus, more than seven centuries ago,
+wrote Marie de France. What an unpretentious autobiography! Yet these
+few simple words, which seem to tell so little, but in reality suggest
+so much, are the counterpart of her work, and form its fitting crown.
+
+But who was this modest writer, and why does her work interest us
+to-day? Around Marie de France there must always remain an atmosphere
+of doubt and mystery, since she is only mentioned by an anonymous
+thirteenth-century poet, and by one of her contemporaries--an
+Anglo-Norman poet, Denys Pyramus by name--who speaks of her in the
+most flattering terms, and from whom we learn that her lays were much
+appreciated by the noblesse, especially the ladies. That these should
+take rare delight in them may well be, seeing how monotonous life must
+have been to many a woman shut up with her maidens and her needlework
+in a dismal castle, or perhaps in but one tower of it, whilst her
+lord went forth to the chase or to war, his home-coming meaning merely
+the wine-cup and war-songs, or tedious epic. Many a one must have read
+or listened to Marie's love idylls, and longed, and perhaps even
+hoped, as in the story of "Yonec," that a fair and gentle knight, in
+the form of some beautiful bird, might fly in at her window and bring
+her some diversion from the outside world. With nothing before us but
+her own poems and the scant recognition of Denys Pyramus, she seems
+like some old portrait in which the delicate pigments that once glowed
+in the face and made it live have, owing to their very delicacy, long
+since faded away, leaving behind only the stronger and less volatile
+colours of the dark background from which we in vain try to wrest more
+than one or two fragments of the secret it holds.
+
+Judging from internal evidence, it would seem that Marie was born in
+Normandy, about the middle of the twelfth century, but settled in
+England, where since the Conquest, and indeed since the time of Edward
+the Confessor, many Norman families had made their home. Not only does
+she make occasional use of English words, and translate from English
+into French the fables known as �sop's, but in the prologue to her
+_Lays_, which she dedicates to "the noble King," generally considered
+to be Henry the Second, she expresses fear lest her work should not
+find favour in a foreign land. In this prologue she also gives her
+reason for abandoning classical translation, which, as a Latin
+scholar, she had contemplated making, not only for the use of the less
+learned, but also, as she tells us, for personal discipline, since "he
+who would keep himself from sin, should study and learn and undertake
+difficult tasks. In suchwise he may the more withdraw him and save
+himself from much sorrow." The twelfth century was a time of
+extraordinary intellectual activity, and Marie tells us that she
+suffered from what we are apt to regard as a special evil of our own
+day--the overcrowding of the literary market. So she wisely turned
+aside from the Classics and the crowd, and set herself to give
+literary expression to the old Celtic folk-lore, hitherto perhaps
+unrecorded save in song.
+
+Of Marie's work that has come down to us we have _The Fables_, already
+mentioned, dedicated to Count William, surnamed Longsword, and son of
+Henry the Second and Fair Rosamond;[11] _The Lays_, dedicated to the
+king, Henry the Second, and doubtless read by Fair Rosamond in her
+retreat at Woodstock; and _The Purgatory of St. Patrick_, translated
+from the Latin at the request of an anonymous benefactor. Of these
+only _The Lays_ need here concern us, as it is in them that our
+interest lies, since they are perhaps among the first stories, given
+literary form, which tell of love "for love's sake only,"--love
+unqualified and unquestioning. They form, perhaps, the only collection
+of lays now extant, and it is to them, therefore, that we must turn to
+get some idea of the style of narration that gradually replaced the
+taste for the epic as Norman influence grew and spread in England.
+Beside the sensualism of the _Chansons de Geste_, the sentiment
+expressed in them may seem na�ve; beside the gallantry of the
+Proven�al poetry, it may seem primitive; but nevertheless it is, in
+its very simplicity, the profoundest note that can be struck in this
+world of men and women. Marie makes no pretence to originality, but
+even if she did not possess the supreme gift of creating beauty, she
+at least possessed the lesser gift of perceiving it where it existed
+and of making it her own, and her stories glow with colour, and
+enchant by their simple yet dramatic appeal to the imagination. She
+declares that _The Lays_ were made "for remembrance" by "Le ancien
+Bretun curteis," and that "Folks tell them to the harp and the rote,
+and the music is sweet to hear." Doubtless it was this sweet music
+which both soothed and thrilled even before the words were understood,
+for on sad and festive days alike, the sweet lays of Brittany were
+always to be heard.
+
+    La reine chante doucement,
+    La voiz acorde a l'estrument:
+    Les mains sont belles, li lais bons,
+    Douce la voiz et bas li tons.
+
+    [11] Marie thus refers to Count William:--
+
+         "Pur amur le cumte Willaume,
+          Le plus vaillant de cest royaume,
+           M'entremis de cest livre feire,
+           E de l'Angleiz en Roman treire."
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+LADY PLAYING HARP.
+
+Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 32._]
+
+Whether Marie was connected with the Court of Henry the Second and his
+brilliant and artistic queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, where learned men
+and poets congregated, we do not know, but it seems a very fair
+conjecture that she was. Not only does she dedicate her principal work
+to the king and his son, Count William, but her stories are coloured
+with the courtly life and ideas of her time, notwithstanding the
+simplicity of the fundamental theme. It is doubtful whether any one
+unacquainted with the teaching of the Courts of Love, such as they
+were in the twelfth century, would have made the compulsory quest of
+love the keynote of a story, as, for instance, Marie does in the "Lay
+of Guigemar." These Courts of Love, though not so elaborate, yet
+seemingly as imperious, as those of the fourteenth century, formed one
+of the semi-serious pastimes of the Middle Ages, and although it may
+be that they were often mere forms of entertainment, no
+self-respecting person could afford to disregard their rules or
+decisions. The cardinal doctrine was that love was necessary to a
+man's moral, social, and �sthetic training. Hence if it did not arise
+of itself, it must be sought for, and, like its counterpart in the
+spiritual world, come at, if needs be, through much tribulation.
+
+Owing to Henry's possessions in France through inheritance, marriage,
+and the many ties of relationship which united the royal families of
+both countries, England and France were never more closely allied
+than they were at that time. French was established by them as the
+speech of the cultured and the high-born. The Norman Conquest had made
+us more cosmopolitan in both manners and ideas. May we not look on the
+victory at Hastings as a symbol as well as a reality? Did it not mean
+for us a spiritual as well as a material conquest, since, mingled with
+the clashing of battle-axes, was to be heard the chanting of the
+_Chanson de Roland_? Moreover, through a desire to bring about
+uniformity of sentiment and service, the Church, though perhaps
+unconsciously, aided this good work of general enlargement of outlook
+by appointing outsiders to control our abbeys and religious
+foundations. Thus, in the latter half of the twelfth century, the
+romantic movement which characterised late medi�val literature stirred
+in England and France alike, and Marie was one of its truest and
+daintiest exponents. Although what she relates may be fiction
+intermingled with myth and magic, she all the same pictures on her
+somewhat small canvases the ideas of her time, and so helps to make
+history.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+ADD. MS. 10293, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 34._]
+
+Marie's readers and hearers were naturally to be found amongst
+castle-folk. That these were many we may conclude from the fact that
+the number of castles had already come to be regarded as a menace to
+the central government, and a royal command had gone forth for the
+demolition of many of them. That her stories were read and prized
+for at least a century and more is evident from the manuscripts--five
+in number, and all of the thirteenth, or the beginning of the
+fourteenth, century--which still exist. Her renown, too, had travelled
+even beyond the seas, for in about A.D. 1245 a translation of her lays
+into Norse was made by order of the king, Haakon the Fourth. The fact
+that their popularity began to wane after a hundred years or so is in
+no wise an adverse criticism of their intrinsic worth, for in the
+fourteenth century English was, in high places, beginning to take the
+place of French, and naturally the demand created a supply. But even
+if this had not been so, Marie's work had served its purpose, and of
+necessity passed into the crucible of human thought and expression, to
+be resolved into matter suited to other needs and conditions. As has
+been well said, "les si�cles se succ�dent, et chacun porte son fruit,
+qui n'est pas celui du si�cle pr�c�dent: les livres sont les fruits
+des moeurs."
+
+Of the five manuscripts still extant, two are in the British Museum.
+One of these is the most complete that has come down to us, seeing
+that, in addition to its including the largest number of lays--twelve
+in all,--it alone contains the prologue, in which for a moment the
+illusive Marie lifts, as it were, her all-enshrouding veil. It is a
+small manuscript, beautifully inscribed, and even after its seven
+hundred years of existence, as fresh as is the love enshrined in its
+parchment pages. How strange a feeling possesses us as we turn over
+its leaves, leaves across which the shadows of readers of bygone days
+still seem to flit! Could these pages speak, of what would they tell?
+Of desires that die not, of longings that are immortal, of love
+enthroned.
+
+When first read, these stories, so simply are they told, may seem
+somewhat slight and superficial. But this is the general
+characteristic of medi�val literature, which, for the most part,
+recognised things in outline only, and sought, and perhaps possessed,
+but little knowledge of the hidden springs of motive. The writers of
+those times troubled as little about moral, as the early painters did
+about physical, anatomy. Still, in spite of this indifference to what
+has become almost a craze in our own day, Marie's lays are so full of
+charming detail, deftly handled, that they give much the same sense of
+delight as do delicate ivories or dainty embroidery. Sometimes, it is
+true, she scarcely, despite all this outward charm, seems to touch the
+world of fact. Yet in this ideal atmosphere which she so essentially
+made her own, she contrives to convey such a sense of reality, that
+for the moment we are wholly possessed by it and carried away, without
+questioning, into her fairyland. And a beautiful fairyland it is,
+where love triumphs for the most part, not in heedless ecstasy along
+flower-bestrewn ways, but through self-sacrifice and suffering
+mutually accepted and mutually endured. Listen to the words spoken to
+the knight Guigemar, wounded by a chance arrow as he rides through a
+wood. "Never shalt thou be healed of thy wound, not even by herb, or
+root, or leach, or potion, until thou art healed by her who, for love
+of thee, shall suffer such great pain and sorrow as never woman has
+suffered before: and thou shalt bear as much for her." Equality in
+love! Such is the vital note struck amid the artificial and
+soul-enfeebling atmosphere of medi�val love-poetry! This is the note
+which Marie set ringing down the centuries whilst her manuscripts lay
+unused on library shelves. This is Marie's gift to the world, and this
+it is that gives her stories immortality. Not only do they possess
+this immortality in themselves, but they have also been immortalised
+by poets and writers both in days long past and in those more within
+our ken. All who know her stories will recall Chaucer's indebtedness
+to incidents and descriptions in them, and coming to our own time, we
+find Sir Walter Scott taking his ballad of "Lord Thomas and Fair
+Annie" from the lay of "The Ash Tree," although it is possible, as has
+been suggested,[12] that his ballad may have been founded on some
+Scotch folk-song having a common origin with Marie's lay. When her
+lays were first published in Germany in 1820, Goethe wrote thus: "The
+mist of years that mysteriously envelops Marie de France makes her
+poems more exquisite and precious to us." Yes, it is this
+all-pervading mystery which, though so tantalising, is yet so
+attractive. It is in vain that, in studying them, we try to penetrate
+somewhat beyond our normal atmosphere, for we only find ourselves lost
+in vague possibilities and hazy distances. Brittany has kept her
+secret concerning such of these lays as were hers just as jealously as
+she has kept her secret of the long avenues of great lichened stones
+which make Carnac look like the burial-place of some giant host.
+Marie's lays are stories of deep meaning, which each reader must
+interpret for himself.
+
+    [12] Warnke. _Die lais der Marie de France_, p. lxiii.
+
+It is impossible to do more here than just touch upon Marie's ideal
+conception of love, for to realise it fully it is necessary to read
+the stories themselves.[13] Allusion has been made to the wounded
+knight in the "Lay of Guigemar," who can only be healed through mutual
+love sanctified by mutual suffering. In the lay of "The Ash Tree" a
+maiden of noble birth, abandoned in infancy and brought up in a
+convent, is loved by a lord, and returns his love, and goes with him
+to his castle. After a time the knights who owe him fealty complain
+that as through his love for his mistress he has neither wife nor
+child, he does them wrong, and protest that if he does not wed some
+noble lady, they will no longer serve him or hold him for lord. The
+knight has to yield to their demands and to consent to accept in
+marriage the daughter of a neighbouring noble who had made it known
+that he desired him for son-in-law. Neither lover utters any complaint
+or reproach, and the needful sacrifice is about to be made. But
+fortune, sometimes kind, intervenes ere it is too late, and reveals
+the noble birth of the loved one. The knight weds her with great joy,
+and to complete this happy picture we read that the other lady
+returned with her parents to her own domain, and was there well
+bestowed in marriage.
+
+    [13] Marie de France, _Seven of her Lays_, trans. E. Rickert,
+    1901; Warnke, _Die lais der Marie de France_, Halle, 1885;
+    Hertz, _Spielmannsbuch_, 1905.
+
+This idea of mutual sympathy and sacrifice gives meaning also to the
+lay of "The Two Lovers," and to that of "Yonec," but perhaps it is
+most simply, yet forcibly, summed up in the lay of "The Honeysuckle,"
+an episode taken from the Tristan story. Tristan, hearing that Isolde
+is to ride through a certain wood on her way to Tintagel to attend the
+Pentecostal Court held by the King, hides in the wood. Here he cuts a
+branch of hazel round which honeysuckle has twined, and carving his
+name and certain letters on it, he lays it in the way by which the
+Queen must pass, knowing that she will recognise it as a sign that her
+lover is near, since they have met before in suchwise. The import of
+the writing is that he has long been waiting to see her, since without
+her he cannot live, and that they two are like the hazel branch with
+the encircling honeysuckle, the which, as long as they are
+intertwined, thrive, but as soon as they are separated, both perish.
+Says Tristan, "Sweet Love, so is it with us--nor you without me, nor I
+without you."
+
+But besides this conception of love which Marie had simply found
+awaiting expression, when we turn to examine the stories somewhat in
+detail, we find legend and poetry, Eastern magic and Christian
+symbolism, mingled with strange ingenuity. Whence came all these
+divers threads which Marie has so dexterously interwoven? It is very
+difficult to tell whether we are wholly in a world of romance,
+accepted by her without question, or whether she had some
+understanding of the divers matters she touches upon, and shaped them
+into a new form to suit new hearers. The answer to this question seems
+to depend on whether Marie recounted the lays from hearsay, or whether
+they had been already written down, and were merely retold by her, she
+colouring them with the atmosphere of her time, which was charged with
+strange incongruities of religion and magic. To this we can give no
+certain answer, since Marie herself gives no hint, and only tells us
+that the ancient Bretons made the lays. But whatever may have been her
+contribution, Christian or otherwise, to the original matter she
+worked upon, we cannot help feeling that we have before us the remains
+of some primitive mythology overlaid and interpenetrated with Eastern
+lore, especially that of India, which, in the Middle Ages, was spread
+broadcast in the West. This Indian thought, itself borrowed in a
+measure from Egypt, had also been tempered by the Hellenism which,
+after the conquests of Alexander the Great in Asia, had filtered
+through India, and had on the way become tinged with its colour and
+its mystery. It was from the matter of these Indian stories that so
+much was learnt, for whilst, in the West, the national epic and the
+chivalrous romance had been alone considered worthy of record, in the
+Indian stories all social conditions were revealed, and poets thus
+learnt little by little to observe and portray the manners and
+sentiments of the people generally, changing social conditions also
+acting in the same direction. All such influences must be taken into
+consideration in studying medi�val literature generally, but
+particularly the occult element in Oriental thought which presents
+such difficulties to the less meditative Western mind, and has in
+consequence given rise to much misconception.
+
+In the "Lay of Guigemar," which we take first because it is the first
+in the manuscript, we find Marie making use of a subject, in gorgeous
+setting, of Christian symbolism, but using it apparently so
+unconsciously that it is only from one or two details that we realise
+what is really lurking in disguise. Guigemar, the wounded knight
+already referred to, to whom naught but love, and sorrow endured for
+love, can bring any alleviation, sets forth for his healing. He comes
+across a ship into which he enters, and which by unseen means carries
+him to the desired haven. As we read the description of the ship, our
+thoughts at once revert to the picture of the barge in which Cleopatra
+goes to meet Antony. Marie tells us that the fittings are of ebony,
+and the unfurled sail of silk. Amid the vessel is a bed on to which
+the wounded knight sinks in anguish. This is of cypress and white
+ivory inlaid with gold, the quilt of silk and gold tissue, and the
+coverlet of sable lined with Alexandrian purple.[14] All this we might
+regard as merely a poet's fancy were it not that we go on to read that
+there were set two candlesticks of fine gold with lighted tapers. Here
+we have the clue. Doubtless the ship, a favourite theme of Christian
+symbolism, and one which delighted poets and painters and workers in
+mosaic alike, represented the Church. It is not to be necessarily
+inferred that Marie, when giving her hero so rare a means of transit,
+had in her mind all the elaborate symbolism connected with it; but she
+had probably read or heard tell of it, and made use of it simply for
+the enhancement of her story. It is in such ways that we find
+mysteries embedded, the real significance of them being lost or
+misunderstood or unheeded, just as the Renaissance painters, without
+any knowledge of Arabic characters, and solely on account of the
+ornamental quality of the lettering, used texts from the Koran, and
+distorted into mere design the sayings of Mahomet.
+
+    [14] Compare with this the bed of "King Fisherman" described
+    in _Holy Grail_, vol. i. p. 137, trans. Sebastian Evans,
+    1898.
+
+In the lay of "The Two Lovers" we again find Christian symbolism in
+disguise. Here is the old theme of a difficult task to be accomplished
+by the lover before he can win his lady.[15] The undertaking imposed
+is the carrying of the loved one to the top of a hill, and our
+interest in it is enhanced by the fact that the trial was to be made
+near Pitres, a few miles from Rouen, where there is a green hill,
+still known as "La C�te des Deux Amans." In Rouen there lived a king
+who had an only daughter, very fair and beautiful, whose hand was
+sought in marriage of many. Loath to part with her, he bethought him
+how he could thwart her suitors. To this end he caused it to be
+proclaimed far and wide that he would have for son-in-law only him who
+could carry his daughter to the top of the hill without pausing to
+rest. Many came, but each in turn failed, greatly to the content of
+the princess, since secretly she loved, and was loved by, a young
+knight who frequented her father's Court. At last, constrained by
+love, the knight, though with much misgiving, determines to undertake
+the adventure. Before allowing him to do this, the maiden, in order to
+ensure his success, and herself fasting meanwhile, bids him go to
+Salerno,[16] near Naples, a school of medicine famous in the Middle
+Ages, and ask of her kinswoman there, who was well practised in
+medicine, a draught to give him the needful strength for his task.
+Returned with this potion, he makes the attempt, but so great is his
+desire to reach the goal quickly, that he will not slacken his speed
+to drink from the phial carried by his Love, but hastens forward, only
+to fall dead as he reaches the summit of the hill.
+
+    [15] Hertz, _op. cit._ p. 396.
+
+    [16] This mention of Salerno is of interest on account of the
+    reference to women practising there as medical experts. The
+    origin of the School remains in obscurity, and it is not
+    until the ninth century, when the names of certain Salerno
+    physicians appear in the archives, that we get any definite
+    information with regard to it. It seems to have been a purely
+    secular institution, but it is quite possible that its
+    development was aided by the Benedictines, who became
+    established there in the seventh century, and who made
+    medical science one of their principal studies. Before the
+    middle of the eleventh century there were many women there
+    who either practised medicine or acted as professors of the
+    science, and some of the latter even combined surgery with
+    medicine in their teaching and treatises. These women doctors
+    were much sought after by the sick, and were much esteemed by
+    their brother-professionals, who cited them as authorities.
+    That the sexes were on an equal footing we infer from the
+    fact that the title of "master" (Magister) was applied to men
+    and women alike, the term "doctor" not having come into use,
+    apparently, before the thirteenth century. Besides the
+    general practitioners and the professors, there were others
+    who fitted themselves specially for military service, as well
+    as priests who added medical knowledge to their holy calling.
+    The teaching followed that of Hippocrates and Galen, and the
+    Salerno school was world-renowned in the art of drug
+    preparation. In the thirteenth century, however, Arab medical
+    writings began to be known in Europe through Latin
+    translations, and Arab practice in medicine, though based on
+    Greek teaching, initiated a new departure. As a result of
+    this, the glory of Salerno waned. Another cause of its
+    decline in fame and popularity was the founding by the
+    Emperor Frederick the Second of a school of medicine at
+    Naples, which he richly endowed, and the rise, unencumbered
+    by old traditions--for medicine, like scholasticism, could be
+    hampered by dialectical subtlety--of the school of
+    Montpelier.
+
+In this strength-giving potion we may perhaps see the expression of a
+Christian, and the survival of a pre-Christian belief, where the
+getting of strength and life is only possible through a direct act of
+communion, either material or spiritual, with the god. Such world-old
+beliefs, in which the supernatural intervenes to help the natural, are
+also intimately connected, even if they are not identical, with the
+magic of philtres and charms.
+
+We pass from Christian symbolism to magic in the lay of "Yonec." The
+delightful ease with which medi�val folk turned from magic to
+religion, or _vice versa_, shows how simply they accepted what they
+did not understand. At the same time it proves how intermingled the
+two were, and that what some are inclined to separate now, were once
+regarded as one and the same thing, the eccentricities and impositions
+which have developed in both being of mere external growth, and to be
+treated accordingly. In the lay of "Yonec" a young wife, passing fair,
+is shut up by her jealous old husband in a great paved chamber in a
+tower of his castle, to which no one save an ancient dame and a priest
+has admittance. After seven years of this isolation and uncongenial
+company, the lady remembers that she has heard tell that means have
+been found to rescue the unhappy, and she wishes with all her heart
+that deliverance may come to her. Suddenly a shadow comes across the
+window, and into her chamber there flies a falcon, which forthwith
+changes into a knight. As soon as the lady has recovered from her
+surprise, the knight tells her that he has long loved her, but could
+not come until she wished for him. Here we have an incident, borrowed
+direct from Oriental magic, in which a modern believer in psychical
+phenomena might find an element of telepathy. The will, as in all
+magic, is the motive power which acts sympathetically on the object of
+desire, that object being in a receptive condition. Quickly we turn
+from magic, and the story goes on to tell that the lady, before
+accepting the knight as her lover, makes it a condition that he
+believes in God, and the knight offers to prove his belief by taking
+the Sacrament. This demand is evidently in the nature of a protective
+test. It was very usual to try some means of discovering whether a
+person was in league with the powers of evil or not; for if any one
+unworthy touched holy things, retribution came at once, either by
+death or some dire visitation. But how is the priest to administer the
+Sacrament without seeing the knight? The latter tells her that he will
+make himself like her in appearance; in other words, that he will
+hypnotise the priest, and make him see what he, the knight, wishes him
+to. The ruse succeeds, and for a time all goes well; then comes
+discovery, despair, and death. The whole story is a most extraordinary
+medley of fairy-lore, religion, and magic, and most characteristic of
+the medi�val mind.
+
+The lay of "Eliduc," the last in the manuscript, is also the longest
+and most elaborate. Marie unfolds her story with so certain yet so
+subtle a hand, that the reading of it is like the unwinding of some
+finely illuminated parchment-roll where miniature follows miniature,
+each perfect in itself, yet all needful to the whole. To the charm of
+its pictures of medi�val life, with the fine scene between the two
+women, and their final reunion in the same convent, there is added an
+incident which gives special interest and importance to the story,
+since it brings us into touch with one of the oldest and most
+widespread of traditions--the restoration to life, from apparent
+death, by means of a flower. There are few pursuits more fascinating
+than the tracing of traditions, except, it may be, that of symbols,
+with which they have so much in common. We find the same traditions,
+just as we find the same symbolic figures, common to the most widely
+separated peoples, and the real interest in the case of each lies in
+trying to discover how and why in the course of their migrations their
+form and their significance have been varied or modified. But before
+considering the tradition, let us first hear the story.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+BOAT WITH KNIGHTS AND LADY.
+
+Add. MS. 10294, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 49._]
+
+Eliduc, a knight of Brittany, whose wife, Guildelu�c, was very dear to
+him, had for over-lord one of the kings of Brittany, with whom, owing
+to faithful service, he had gained high favour. Being defamed on this
+account by envious tongues, he was banished from Court, and thereupon
+determined to quit his country for a while and seek service in the
+West of England. With many promises to his wife to be faithful to her,
+he set out for Totnes, where he found many kings ruling in the land,
+all at war with one another. One of them, a very old man, was ruler in
+the province of Exeter, and at war with a neighbouring king on account
+of his refusal to give to the latter his daughter, Guilliadun, in
+marriage. So Eliduc determined to offer his services to the old king,
+by whom they were accepted, and by his tact and prowess he soon proved
+himself worthy of the trust reposed in him. Through a skilful ambush,
+planned and conducted by him, he defeated the enemy. Guilliadun,
+hearing of his deeds, sought an interview with him, and at once fell
+in love with him, and after certain maidenly reserve and hesitation,
+made her love known to him. This Eliduc secretly returned, but,
+troubled at the remembrance of his wife and of his pledge to her, his
+courage failed him to confess that he was already wedded. In order to
+escape from his dilemma, he sought and obtained the permission of the
+old king to avail himself of the entreaty of his liege-lord to return
+to his own country to fight against the enemies who were desolating
+the kingdom. This permission was granted under his promise to come
+back if his services were again required. After pledging himself to
+Guilliadun to do this on such a day as she should name, Eliduc,
+having exchanged rings with her, and she having named the day for his
+return, departed. Having speedily reduced the enemies of his
+liege-lord to submission, he came once more to England, and
+immediately sent to Guilliadun to apprise her of this, and to beg her
+to be ready to start on the morrow. Guilliadun secretly left the
+castle the next night and joined her lover, and together they hurried
+to Totnes, whence they at once set sail. But as they were nearing
+land, a violent storm arose. Finding that prayers were of no avail,
+one of the company cried out, "We shall never make the land, for you
+have a lawful wife, and you are taking with you another woman, setting
+at naught God, the law, and uprightness. Let us cast her into the sea,
+and anon we shall get to land." On hearing these words Guilliadun fell
+as one dead, whereupon Eliduc in anger struck the esquire on the head
+and hurled him into the sea. When the ship was brought to port
+Guilliadun showed no sign of life. So Eliduc, believing her to be
+dead, lifted her in his arms, carried her ashore, and, mounting his
+horse, sadly bore her to a small chapel in a forest adjoining his own
+lands. Here he laid her in front of the altar, and covered her with
+his cloak, and then returned to his home. Filled with sadness, he
+arose early each morning and went to the chapel to pray for her soul,
+marvelling nevertheless to find that the face of his Love suffered no
+change except to become a little paler. His wife, made anxious by his
+melancholy and silence, and wondering whither he went, had him
+watched, and soon discovered the truth. Taking a varlet with her, she
+went to the chapel, and there discovered the beautiful maiden, looking
+like a new-blown rose, and at once guessed the cause of her husband's
+sadness and gloom. As she sat watching and weeping out of sheer pity,
+a weasel ran from behind the altar and passed over the body of
+Guilliadun, and the varlet struck it with a stick and killed it. Then
+its mate came in and walked round it several times, and finding that
+it could not rouse it, made sign of great sorrow and ran out into the
+wood, and returning with a red flower between its teeth put it into
+the mouth of its dead companion, which within an hour came to life
+again. Guildelu�c, seeing this, seized the flower and laid it in the
+mouth of the maiden, who after a short time sighed and opened her
+eyes. Then she told Guildelu�c that she was a king's daughter, and had
+been deceived by a knight called Eliduc, whom she loved, and who
+returned her love, but who had hidden from her that he was already
+married. Guildelu�c thereupon made known to her who she was, and sent
+at once for her husband. When he came, she begged him to build a
+nunnery, and to allow her to retire from the world, as she would fain
+give herself to the service of God. When the nunnery was ready,
+Guildelu�c took the veil, with some thirty nuns, of whom she became
+the Superior. Then Eliduc wedded his love, and after some years of
+happiness they too resolved to retire from the world, Guilliadun
+joining Guildelu�c, who received her as a sister, and Eliduc going to
+a monastery which he had founded near by.[17]
+
+    [17] M. Gaston Paris (_Po�sie du Moyen Age_, vol. ii.), in
+    recalling various legends of "Le Mari aux deux femmes,"
+    suggests that the present story, borrowed by Marie from
+    Celtic tradition, is probably of Occidental, and not
+    Oriental, origin, since in the polygamous East the story of
+    two wives would not have furnished a sufficient motive for a
+    special narration.
+
+In this charming romance, given here in epitome only, the two most
+interesting points, after noting the mutual suffering of the lovers
+for love's sake, are the episode of the sacrifice to the sea, and that
+of the weasel and the life-giving flower. Both these incidents point
+to the great antiquity of the fundamental theme of the story, which
+Marie, possibly like many another before her, merely reclothed in
+garments suited to the fancy of the time. In most stories where the
+sea has to be appeased by the sacrifice of some one, it is the guilty
+person who is thrown overboard, or if the offender is not known, lots
+are cast to determine who shall be the one to make expiation to the
+god. In the present instance Eliduc is clearly the wrong-doer, but he
+is the hero, and must be treated as such, and accordingly the hostile
+voice is the one to be silenced in the depths of the sea.
+
+The other incident--the restoration to life by means of a flower or a
+herb--frequently occurs in classical stories and folk-lore.[18]
+Perhaps the most familiar example, and, owing to the recent
+excavations in Crete, the most interesting one, is that connected with
+Glaucos, son of Minos, king of Crete. In the story (Apollod. iii. 3)
+Glaucos when a boy fell into a cask of honey and was smothered. His
+father, ignorant of his fate, consulted the oracle to ascertain what
+had become of him, and the seer Polyeidos of Argos was named to
+discover him. When he had found him, Minos shut Polyeidos up in the
+tomb with the dead body of the boy until he should restore the latter
+to life. Whilst Polyeidos was watching the body, a serpent suddenly
+came towards it and touched it. Polyeidos killed the serpent, and
+immediately a second one came, which, seeing the other one lying dead,
+disappeared and soon returned with a certain herb in its mouth. This
+it laid on the mouth of the dead serpent, which immediately came to
+life again. Polyeidos seized the herb and placed it on the mouth of
+the dead boy, who was thereupon restored to life.
+
+    [18] Warnke, _op. cit._ civ.; Hertz, _op. cit._ p. 409.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+GLAUKOS AND POLYEIDOS IN TOMB.
+
+Greek Vase, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 52._]
+
+This story is most graphically depicted on a fifth-century Greek vase
+in the British Museum, and, whatever its real interpretation may be,
+it has gained in significance since the life of the distant past of
+the island has been laid bare, and large jars, which in all
+probability were used for storing wine and honey and other
+necessaries, and from their size and contents might well have
+proved a snare to a venturesome and greedy boy, have been discovered
+_in situ_. After a lapse of many centuries we find this idea of the
+life-giving plant reappearing in medi�val garb, daintily fashioned by
+Marie de France.
+
+Marie, in her story, tells us that the weasel brings a _red_ flower.
+This was possibly the verbena, well known in folk-medicine as vervain,
+and much used in the Middle Ages. According to one writer, the weasel
+uses vervain as a preservative against snake-bites, and this idea of
+its effect might easily have been extended to include death. Even so
+great an authority as Aristotle mentions that the weasel understood
+the potent effects of certain herbs. The intervention of a weasel
+instead of the usual serpent opens up the further interesting question
+as to whether this weasel incident was not imported from India, where
+Greek stories had become alloyed with Indian lore. Even to-day, in
+India, a mongoose, a species of weasel, is sometimes taken on
+expeditions by any one fearful of snakes, and kept at night in the
+tent as a protection against them.
+
+In addition to the choice of a weasel as medium, the unusual colour of
+the flower is also of interest. Giraldus Cambrensis, writing in the
+twelfth century on the subject of weasels, after remarking that they
+have more heart than body (_plus cordis habens quam corporis_), goes
+on to say that they restore their dead by means of a _yellow_ flower,
+and in the still earlier record of the Lydian hero Tylon, where a
+serpent is the intermediary--and serpents are often credited with a
+knowledge of life-giving plants,--reference is made to a _golden_
+flower.[19] This may possibly be connected with the idea of the
+life-giving power of the god, since the golden flower is dedicated to
+Zeus. Professor J. G. Frazer thinks that a red flower may perhaps have
+been chosen to suggest a flow of blood--an infusion of fresh life into
+the veins of the dead. It is also possible that red and yellow may
+have been interchangeable terms, just as they are to-day amongst the
+Italian peasantry. The choice of colour may, however, have been
+derived from the red anemone, which is said to have sprung from the
+blood of Adonis, with whom love and life are traditionally associated.
+There are some, on the other hand, who ascribe to the story a deep
+spiritual meaning. With them it is not the flower itself which brings
+about resurrection from apparent death, but the spiritual truth of
+which the flower is but the outward symbol. It may be that the red
+blossom represents the joys of earth which Eliduc's wife voluntarily
+renounces, and which, surrendered to her rival, in time became like a
+burning thing whose fiery touch awakens to life the sleeping
+conscience. In a story such as this, which has evidently travelled far
+and wide before we find it in England in the eleventh century, it is
+possible that any or all of these surmises may be true. The whole of
+this incident of the weasel and the flower, read in the original, is
+of extraordinary interest and beauty. What a touching picture of
+animal sensibility is the account of the despair of the weasel on
+finding its dead mate, and its tender display of solicitude and
+sympathy, raising the lifeless head and trying to reanimate the small
+inert body! Only one who loved animals and knew their habits well
+could have told thus tenderly and graphically a story so simple, yet
+so suggestive, of the love of two sentient things, a love which runs
+like a thread of gold through all creation and makes it one.
+
+    [19] J. G. Frazer, _Adonis, Attis, Osiris_, p. 98.
+
+The twelfth century was an age of humanism as well as feudalism. As
+often happens in times of comparative peace, a growth of interest in
+the individual was springing up and finding expression in lyric poetry
+and stories. The day of epics was waning. Those vast and involved
+poems, like to huge and complex frescoes, found little favour at a
+time when men and women, or at least women, had more leisure and
+inclination to try to get below the surface of things. Heroes had been
+glorified till they had almost become deified, and something more
+personal, more individual, was wanted. By the side of modern romance,
+where the most sacred and secret intricacies of human nature are, as
+it were, displayed under the microscope, Marie's narrations may seem
+somewhat artless. But in putting into words the dawning desires of her
+time she gave form and impetus to feeling and thought struggling for
+expression, and gained for her work a definite place in the
+development of human utterance. Evolution, whether of the spirit or of
+matter, is the supreme law of things. Marie struck a spark from the
+ideal which poets and writers down the ages have fanned into a flame.
+
+
+
+
+A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY MYSTIC AND BEGUINE, MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG
+
+
+The triumphant ecclesiasticism of the thirteenth century, manifested
+in the forms of political power, material wealth, splendid
+architecture, and worldly positions sufficiently commanding to satisfy
+even the most ambitious, was, perhaps naturally, accompanied by a
+gross materialism. Against this the truly pious-minded revolted,
+thereby causing a reaction towards mysticism. Whilst before the eyes
+of some there floated, as the ideal, the material ladder leading to
+fame and power, before those of others there arose, as in a vision,
+the "Ladder of Perfection," each rung of which gained brought them
+nearer to the object of their quest--Divine Reality. These latter,
+whether of great, or lesser, or even of no renown, and amongst whom
+women played a great and very notable part, were scattered far and
+wide; but each one cultivated some little corner of the mystic garden.
+One such garden was the Cistercian convent of Helfta, near Eisleben,
+in Saxony, in the thirteenth century a centre of mystic tendencies.
+It was here that, harassed and ill, Mechthild of Magdeburg took
+refuge, and entered as a nun in 1270. But we are anticipating.
+
+Mechthild, at first a beguine, and afterwards a nun, but a visionary
+from the days of her childhood, was born, most probably of noble
+parents, in the diocese of Magdeburg, in 1212. That she is perhaps
+better known to the general reader than are other contemplatives of
+her day is probably due to the suggestion that she may be the Matilda
+immortalised by Dante in the "Earthly Paradise" (_Purg._ xxviii. 22
+_seq._), rather than to her own writings. This may be partly because
+the personality of that supreme visionary and poet tended, as does all
+superlative genius, to cast a shadow over the lesser lights of both
+earlier and later times, and partly because, although Mechthild's
+works were early translated into Latin, she wrote in Low German.
+Though this original MS. has not yet been found, there exists one,
+translated into High German in 1345 at Basle (a centre of the "Friends
+of God") by the Dominican, Heinrich von N�rdlingen, by which
+Mechthild's work has been made known to us, but the language even of
+this proves a very real stumbling-block to the most strenuous student.
+Still, by recording her thoughts and visions in the language of her
+country and her day, she gained a lay audience, a result which would
+have been hardly possible if she herself had been a classic. But
+though no classic--for she says Latin was difficult to her--she
+evidently, as her work shows, grew up under the influence of courtly
+life, and knew the language of minstrels. She tells us that her mind
+was turned to the spiritual life when she was but twelve years of age,
+and that from that time worldly glory and riches became distasteful to
+her. Like the visionary and Saint, Theresa of Avila, of 300 years
+later, she took into her confidence her younger brother, Baldwin, who
+later, perhaps under her influence, became a Dominican. What we know
+of her, we know from her writings, which exist in the above-mentioned
+unique MS. (No. 277) now in the monastery Library of Einsiedeln, a
+foundation south of the Lake of Zurich, and still one of the most
+famous of pilgrim resorts. In seeking to know more of the history of
+this MS. we get a most interesting and intimate glimpse of the methods
+in religious centres in bygone days, when MSS. were few. In quite
+early times--how early is not known--there dwelt in the valleys round
+about Einsiedeln certain devout women-recluses, who later lived, as a
+community, in four houses, and, ultimately, in a convent. They were
+called "Forest Sisters," a name which may well express the poetry and
+peace of their life and surroundings. Whilst they were still living in
+the detached houses, the MS. was, through Heinrich von Rumerschein of
+Basle, sent by Margaret of the Golden Ring, a beguine of that town, to
+the one called "The Front Meadow." Heinrich addresses the gift "To
+the Sisters in the Front Meadow." "You shall know that the book that
+is sent by her of the Golden Ring is called _The Light of the
+Godhead_, and to this you shall give good heed. It shall also serve in
+all the houses of the wood, and shall never leave the wood, and shall
+remain a month in each house. Also it shall go from one to another as
+required, and you shall take special care of it. Pray for me who was
+your Confessor, though, alas, unworthy."
+
+In 1235, at the age of twenty-three, Mechthild--not without many a
+heart-pang, and prompted to this determination by a troubled
+conscience, a determination doubtless brought about by the preaching
+of the Dominican friars, who were stirring all classes by their
+impassioned zeal--left her home and went to Magdeburg, where she
+entered a settlement of beguines. These settlements, semi-monastic in
+character, were provided to afford some protection, by living in
+community, for women who, whilst devoting themselves to a religious
+life, did not wish to separate themselves wholly from the world. It
+was at the time of the Crusades, when the land teemed with desolate
+women, that their numbers increased so greatly, and the first
+beguinage was founded about the beginning of the thirteenth century.
+The beguine took no vows, could return to the world and marry if she
+so desired, and did not renounce her property. If she was without
+means, she neither asked nor accepted alms, but supported herself by
+manual labour or by teaching the children of burghers, whilst those
+who were able to do so spent their time in taking care of the sick or
+in other charitable offices. Each community, with a "Grand-Mistress"
+at its head, was complete in itself, and regulated its own order of
+living, though, later, many of them adopted the rule of the Third
+Order of St. Francis.
+
+Mechthild tells us that she knew but one person in Magdeburg, and that
+even from this one she kept away for fear lest she might waver in her
+determination. In this very human way she indicated that her spiritual
+adventure was no easy matter to her, as, indeed, it could not be so
+long as her temperament and ideals were at variance. But gradually,
+she says, she got so much joy from communion with God that she could
+dispense with the world. As has been well said, "La loi des lois c'est
+que tout morceau de l'univers venu de Dieu retourne � Dieu et veut
+retourner � lui."
+
+The book of her writings, which, under divine direction as she opens
+by saying, she calls _The Flowing Light of the Godhead_,[20] is
+composed of seven parts, of which six appear to have been written down
+during the time she was a beguine at Magdeburg, and were collected and
+arranged by a Dominican friar, Heinrich von Halle, whilst the
+seventh, consisting of sundry visions and teachings during the last
+years of her life, was put together just before her death at Helfta in
+1282, and, as she pathetically adds, "by strange eyes and hands." In
+all of these, whilst reflecting in them her inmost feelings, she
+expresses her entire dependence on spiritual help and inspiration.
+"The writing of this book," she says, "is seen and heard and felt in
+every limb. I see it with the eyes of my soul, and hear it with the
+ears of my eternal spirit, and feel in every part of my body the power
+of the Holy Ghost."
+
+    [20] P. Gall. Morel, _Offenbarungen der Schwester Mechthild
+    von Magdeburg, oder das fliessende Licht der Gottheit_,
+    Regensburg, 1869.
+
+The general tenor of her writings is contemplative and prophetic.
+Whilst, as a contemplative, she reminds us of Suso, as a reformer,
+proclaiming her prophetic warnings, she recalls to us St. Hildegarde,
+though the latter was a more astute and powerful reasoner. It would
+seem as if, in general, there are two conflicting tendencies in minds
+such as Mechthild's, a tendency to tradition--in her case, of course,
+church tradition--and a tendency to definite self-expression. With
+Mechthild it was certainly that of self-expression which predominated,
+for whilst, with her, both co-operated to make a beautiful whole, it
+was in detail and ornament, so to speak, rather than in the design
+itself, that she showed her special qualities and gifts. Further, as a
+mystic, she may be classed with those "for whom mysticism is above all
+things an intimate and personal relation, the satisfaction of a deep
+desire," and who therefore fall back "upon imagery drawn largely from
+the language of earthly passion," as opposed to the mystic whose
+"longing is to go out from his normal world in search of a lost home,
+a better country," as well as to the one whose "craving is for inward
+purity and perfection."[21]
+
+    [21] For the suggestive elaboration of this threefold
+    classification, see Evelyn Underhill, _Mysticism_, chap. vi.
+    p. 151 _seq._
+
+In order to enter into the spirit of her writings, and particularly
+the prophetic ones, it is necessary to consider how the character and
+style of her work was induced and affected, on the one hand by her
+environment and her time, and on the other by her saintly nature and
+poetic temperament, as well as by her intimate and personal attitude
+towards things touching the inner life.
+
+The world, in Mechthild's day, was in a state of unrest and of
+looked-for change. Mankind was ever haunted by forebodings of the
+approaching happening of something momentous. Whole-hearted faith in
+the Church was waning, and although outward conformity still
+prevailed, there existed very diverse opinions, tolerated so long as
+they did not become too obtrusive. Prophetic writings, giving
+expression to the yearnings of the time--yearnings fomented and
+fostered by the prevailing misery caused, in no small degree, by the
+wars between Pope and Emperor--taught that the world was on the brink
+of a new era. One of the most influential of these writings, entitled
+_The Eternal Gospel_, and said to embody the revelations of Abbot
+Joachim of Flora (1130-1202), proclaimed that the dispensations of God
+the Father and God the Son--the first two eras of the Church--were
+past or passing, and that these would be succeeded by a third
+era--that of the Holy Ghost--when men's eyes would be opened by the
+Spirit, and when there would be a time of perfection and freedom,
+without the necessity of disciplinary institutions. In this fair age
+it was the hermits, monks, and nuns who, whilst not superseding the
+rulers of the Church, were to lead it into new paths, for to Joachim
+the visible Church could not, where all is moving, remain unchanged,
+and his counsel was, to keep pace with the advancing world. Naturally
+such sentiments aroused ecclesiastical alarm, and, later, were
+condemned by the fourth Lateran Council (1215), though Dante, withal a
+good son of the Church, made bold to see in Paradise the "Abbott
+Joachim, endowed with prophetic Spirit" (_Par._ xii. 140).[22] When
+Mechthild wrote her predictions on the last days, Joachim's teachings,
+owing to the stir which their unorthodoxy had created--not only in the
+Church and amongst the preaching friars, but also in the University of
+Paris, whence all manner of polemical discussions freely
+circulated--were well known in Germany, and there can be but little
+doubt that Mechthild knew of them, probably from the Dominicans, who
+found special favour in her sight, and that they greatly influenced
+her own prophetic warnings to the Church.
+
+    [22] Cf. Edmund G. Gardner, _Joachim of Flora and the
+    Everlasting Gospel_. Franciscan Essays, Bri. Soc. of Fran.
+    Studies, extra series, vol. i.
+
+From these objective conditions which, whilst influencing Mechthild's
+own thoughts and works, might and did, however differently, influence
+the work of others as well, we turn to the consideration of her work
+as the expression of her own poetic soul, welling up from depths
+filled with love for the highest and most divine things. Before all
+else we recognise how richly endowed she was with visionary powers and
+poetic feeling. She revels in beautiful fantasies, as, for instance,
+when she says, "If I were to speak one little word of the choirs of
+heaven, it would be no more than the honey that a bee can carry away
+on its feet from a full-blown flower." With rapture she touches upon
+the deepest questions of the soul's life, and the highest truths and
+mysteries of belief, so that in her flights of contemplation her prose
+becomes poetry, impelled, like some torrent, by the rush of her
+emotion.
+
+    O thou God, out-pouring in thy gift!
+    O thou God, o'erflowing in thy love!
+    O thou God, all burning in thy desire!
+    O thou God, melting in union with thy body!
+    O thou God, reposing on my breast!
+        Without Thee, never could I live.
+
+But even so, she does not lose the sense of form or of the
+picturesque. Some of her writings are clothed in language recalling
+the Song of Songs, and are, perhaps, echoes of St. Bernard's sermons
+on that wondrous allegory of the Spiritual Bridegroom and Bride, as
+when, in a transport, and attempting to express how God comes to the
+Soul, she exclaims--
+
+    I come to my Beloved
+    Like dew upon the flowers.
+
+Others suggest reflections of courtly life and poetry, and at the same
+time seem to anticipate pictures of the Celestial Garden, bright and
+blossoming, where Saints tread in measured unison, symbolic of their
+spiritual felicity and harmony. So with her didactic writings, or with
+her predictions concerning the decay and corruption in the Church, in
+which, like some prophet of old, she declaims against such evils in no
+sparing terms, all alike are fraught with a special grace. In them all
+the most intimate and the most sublime meet in one expression--the
+expression of a soul which sees God in all things, and all things in
+God.
+
+During the thirty years which Mechthild spent as a beguine at
+Magdeburg, she lived an austere life, and one beset with difficulties,
+largely created by the fearless way in which she warned and denounced
+those in high places in the Church. In such denunciations she was not
+alone, or without good example, for--to name two only of those who
+stand out pre-eminently on account of their positions and
+personalities--St. Bernard and St. Hildegarde had both sternly
+denounced the evils in the Church. "The insolence of the Clergy," says
+St. Bernard, "troubles the earth, and molests the Church. The Bishops
+give what is holy to the dogs, and pearls to swine." But the poor
+beguine, Mechthild, was not in the same powerful position to stay, or
+even to modify, the resentment which her attacks occasioned. "For more
+than twenty years was I bound with thee on a hideous gridiron," she
+writes, likening her anguish to that of St. Lawrence. Nevertheless
+solace came to her troubled spirit, for, having been warned that it
+had been said of her writings that they deserved to be burnt, she
+tells how she prayed to God, as had been her wont when in trouble, and
+that He told her not to mistrust her powers, since they were from Him,
+and that no one can burn the Truth.
+
+In many passages Mechthild dwells on the clergy, and her
+reflections--some very practical, others, to those not versed in
+symbolism, very quaint--seem to suggest how grievously lacking she
+considered them to be. Writing in God's name to a canon, she begins by
+saying that we should, in common with all men, give thanks to our
+Heavenly Father for the Divine gift which day by day, and without
+ceasing, pours forth from the Holy Trinity into sinful hearts, and
+then she quaintly adds, "For that it soars so high, the Eagle owes no
+thanks to the Owl." Furthermore, she calls upon the priest to pray
+more, to pay his debts in full, and to live simply, and thus, with
+humble heart, to set a good example, and, with many other admonitions,
+she also counsels him to have two rods by his bedside, so that he may
+chastise himself when he awakes. Mechthild adds that she asked of God
+how such an one could keep himself without sin in this earthly state,
+and that God made answer: "He shall keep himself always in fear, like
+a mouse that sits in a trap and awaits its death. When he eats, he
+shall be frugal and meek, and when he sleeps, he shall be chaste, and
+alone with Me."
+
+Touching upon some of the duties of a prior--and here she shows
+herself eminently practical--she writes: "Thou shalt go every day to
+the infirmary, and soothe the sick with the solace of God's word, and
+comfort them bounteously with earthly things, for God is rich beyond
+all richness. Thou shalt keep the sick cleanly, and be merry with them
+in a godly manner. Thou shalt also go into the kitchen, and see that
+the needs of the brethren are well cared for, and that thy parsimony,
+and the cook's laziness, rob not our Lord of the sweet song of the
+choir, for never did starving priest sing well. Moreover, a hungry man
+can do no deep study, and thus must God, through such default, lose
+the best prayers." From advice to the priesthood, Mechthild turns to
+warning, and pours forth her reproaches and forebodings with poetic
+intensity. "Alas, O thou Crown of Holy Christendom, how greatly hast
+thou lost lustre! Thy jewels are fallen out, since thou dost outrage
+and bring dishonour on the holy Christian vows. Thy gold has become
+tarnished in the morass of unchastity, for thou art become degenerate,
+and art lacking in true love. Thy abstinence is consumed by the
+ravenous fire of gluttony, thy humility is drowned in the slough of
+the flesh, thy word no longer avails against the lies of the world,
+the flowers of all the virtues have fallen from thee. Alas, O thou
+Crown of the holy Priesthood, how diminished thou art, and verily thou
+now possessest naught but priestly power, with the which thou fightest
+against God and His elect. For this will God humble thee, ere thou
+learnest wisdom. For thus saith the Lord: 'My shepherds of Jerusalem
+have become murderers and wolves, for that they slay before My very
+eyes the white lambs, and the sheep are all sickly for that they may
+not eat of the wholesome pasture that grows on the high mountains, the
+which is godly love and holy doctrine.' He who knows not the way that
+leads to Hell, let him give heed to the unholy clergy, who, with wives
+and children and many heinous sins, go straightway thither."
+
+Whilst condemning the priesthood, Mechthild eulogises nunnery life in
+an allegory entitled "The Ghostly Cloister," in which she pictures the
+virtues as dwelling. "Charity" is the abbess, who with zeal takes care
+of the congregation in both body and soul; "Godly Humility" is the
+chaplain; "The Holy Peace of God" is the prioress; and "Loving
+Kindness" is the sub-prioress. "Hope" is the chantress, filled with
+holy, humble devotion, that the heart's feebleness may sound beautiful
+in song before God, so that God may love the notes that sing in the
+heart; "Wisdom" is the schoolmistress, who with all good-will teaches
+the ignorant, so that the convent is held holy and honoured; "Bounty"
+is the cellaress; "Mercy" the stewardess; and "Pity" the sick-nurse.
+The provost, or priest, is "Godly Obedience," to whom all these
+virtues are subject. "Thus does the convent abide in God, and happy
+are they who dwell therein."
+
+From this spiritual abode of the virtues we turn to one of Mechthild's
+earliest recorded visions--that of Hell, with its flame and flare.
+Whilst Death was perhaps man's first mystery, the Hereafter has been
+his endless pre-occupation. Whatever his country or his time, he has
+ever sought to lift the veil which hides the future, portraying his
+vain efforts in symbol. In Mechthild's time her world was engrossed
+with thoughts and speculations concerning the Hereafter, for Death,
+which at the end of the next century was to take dramatic and
+pictorial form in the weird and all-embracing "Dance of Death,"
+although its earliest known poetic form is of 1160, ever hovered near
+in pestilence, war, and tumult. Whilst some expressed themselves in
+carved stone, or on painted wall, others, as did Mechthild, realised
+their visions and ideas in a wealth of word-pictures. Such visions
+and ideas had accumulated adown the ages, varying but slightly one
+from another, and Mechthild, in making use of this stereotyped
+material, only took from, or added to, the general sum. Yet even so,
+she contrives to make her personality felt. She begins: "I have seen a
+place whose name is Eternal Hatred." Lucifer, farthest removed from
+the source of Light, forms the foundation-stone, and around him are
+arranged the deadly sins. Above him are the Christians, then the Jews,
+and, farthest removed from Hell's dire depths, the Heathen. Horror
+upon horror follows, like those pictured a hundred years before by
+Herrad von Landsperg, abbess at Hohenburg, in Alsace, and, fifty years
+later, by Dante, and when she concludes by saying that, after seeing
+the terrors of Hell, all her five senses were paralysed for three
+days, as if struck by lightning, it is significant that Dante tells
+that, overwhelmed with sorrow for the lovers, doomed for ever to be
+borne upon the winds, he "fainted with pity ... and fell, as a dead
+body falls."
+
+It is with a sense of relief that we leave such sad scenes, to glance
+at her vision of Paradise, although it does not follow in this
+sequence in her recorded revelations, for, as seems fitting, it is one
+of the very latest. Calling it "a glimpse of Paradise," she says that
+"of the length and breadth of Paradise there is no end." Then she
+continues--and this is especially interesting because it is in this
+opening that some commentators have seen the connecting link with
+Dante[23]--that between this world and it, she came to a spot--the
+Earthly Paradise--where she saw trees and fresh grass and no weeds.
+Some of the trees bore apples, but most of them sweetly scented
+leaves. Swift streams flowed through it, and warm winds were wafted
+from the north. The air was sweeter than words can tell. Here, she
+adds, there were no animals or birds, for God has reserved it for
+mankind alone, so that he may dwell there undisturbed. This seems to
+strike a strange note coming from the poetess Mechthild. How different
+is her sentiment from that of her brother-mystic, St. Francis, to whom
+the birds were his "little sisters," and who "loved above all other
+birds a certain little bird which is called the lark." But though,
+with apparent satisfaction, Mechthild saw no birds, she did see Enoch
+and Elias, and greeted the former by questioning him as to how he came
+there. Holy Writ has supplied the only answer, "He walked with God,
+and he was not, for God took him." Having spoken thus of the Earthly
+Paradise, Mechthild goes on to tell of the Heavenly, where she sees,
+"floating in rapture, as the air floats in the sunshine," the souls
+which, though not deserving of Purgatory, are not yet come into God's
+kingdom, and to whom rewards and crowns come not until they enter that
+kingdom. She then concludes by saying that "all the kingdoms of this
+world shall perish, and the earthly and the heavenly Paradise shall
+pass away, and all shall dwell together in God"--the Empyrean of
+Dante, where he "saw ingathered, bound by love in one volume, the
+scattered leaves of all the universe; substance and accidents and
+their relations, as though together fused, after such fashion that
+what I tell of is one simple flame."
+
+    [23] The tendency of present-day Italian scholarship seems in
+    favour of identifying Mechthild of Hackeborn, rather than
+    Mechthild of Magdeburg, with Dante's Matelda.
+
+In her very varied writings many beautiful and suggestive thoughts are
+to be found, as, for instance, when "Understanding" converses with
+"Conscience," and accuses Conscience of being at the same time both
+proud and humble, and Conscience explains that she is proud because
+she is in touch with God, and humble because she has done so few good
+works. And again, when "Understanding" and "the Soul" hold converse.
+Understanding, desirous of knowing everything, asks the Soul why such
+brilliant light radiates from her, and the Soul replies by inquiring
+why Understanding asks this, seeing that she is so much wiser than the
+Soul. When Understanding would still penetrate the unspeakable secrecy
+between God and the Soul, the Soul refuses to answer, since, as she
+explains, to her alone is given union with God, to which Understanding
+can never attain. Or, again, when Mechthild, telling how the Soul, no
+longer led by the Senses, but leading them to the desired goal, says,
+"It is a wondrous journey along which the true soul progresses, and
+leads with it the senses, as a man with sight leads one who is blind.
+On this journey the soul is free and without sorrow, since it desires
+naught but to serve its Lord, who orders all things for the best."
+
+Of Prayer, which to her was "naught else but yearning of soul," she
+says, "It makes a sour heart sweet, a sad heart merry, a poor heart
+rich, a dull heart wise, a timid heart bold, a weak heart strong, a
+blind heart seeing, a cold heart burning. It draws the great God down
+into the small heart, it drives the hungry soul out to the full God,
+it brings together the two lovers, God and the soul, into a blissful
+place, where they speak much of love."
+
+Again, in a spirit of self-examination, she writes: "What most of all
+hinders the spiritually-minded from full perfection is, that they pay
+so little heed to small sins. I tell you, of a truth, that when I
+abstain from a laugh that would hurt no one, or hide some soreness of
+heart, or feel a little impatience at my own pain, my soul becomes so
+dark, and my mind so dull, and my heart so cold, that I am constrained
+to pray heartily and long, and humbly to make confession of all my
+faults. Then grace comes again to wretched me, and I creep back like a
+beaten dog into the kitchen."
+
+But all these and kindred thoughts pale before her discourses on love.
+Love was the keynote of her life. She was born a poetess; she became a
+saint. How sorely she strove towards this end, and spent herself in
+conflict between self-control and ecstasy, no words can tell. It was
+only when Purgation's way was partly trod, and she had "found in Pain
+the grave but kindly teacher of immortal secrets," that she could say,
+"Lord, I bring Thee my treasure, which is greater than the mountains,
+wider than the world, deeper than the sea, higher than the clouds,
+more beautiful than the sun, more manifold than the stars, and which
+outweighs all the earth." Then asks the voice of God: "How is this thy
+treasure called, oh Image of my Divinity?"
+
+"Lord, it is called my heart's desire. I have withdrawn it from the
+world, kept it to myself, and denied it to all creatures. Now no
+longer would I carry it. Lord, where shall I lay it?"
+
+"Nowhere shalt thou lay thy heart's desire save in My own Divine
+heart. There only wilt thou find comfort."
+
+Love and knowledge, the two aspirations of the soul after ultimate
+truth, are her frequent theme. Sometimes she contrasts Love with the
+knowledge of the understanding: "Those who would know much, and love
+little, will ever remain at but the beginning of a godly life. So we
+must have a constant care how we may please God therein. Simple love,
+with but little knowledge, can do great things"; sometimes with the
+knowledge of the heart--"To the wise soul, love without knowledge
+seems darkness, knowledge without fruition, the very pain of Hell.
+Fruition can be reached only through Death." In one of her visions
+she, in an exquisite simile, describes how love flows from the Godhead
+to mankind, penetrating both body and soul. "It goes without effort,"
+she says, "as does a bird in the air when it does not move its wings."
+In the same vision she sees the Holy Mother, with uncovered breasts,
+standing on God's left hand, and Christ on the right, showing his
+still-open wounds, both pleading for sinful humanity, and she adds
+that as long as sin endures on earth, so long will Christ's wounds
+remain open and bleeding, though painless, but that after the Day of
+Judgment they will heal, and it will be as though there was a
+rose-leaf instead of the wounds.[24]
+
+    [24] The first of these subjects--the Holy Mother and Christ
+    pleading for sinners--is to be found in a miniature in King
+    Henry VI.'s Psalter (Brit. Mus. Cotton MS. Domitian. A. xvii.
+    _circ._ 1430, fol. 205), and the two intercessions separately
+    form two of the subjects in the _Speculum Humanae
+    Salvationis_ (fourteenth century). Though the _S.H.S._ is of
+    later date than the time of Mechthild the literary source of
+    the subject appears to be a passage in the _De laudibus
+    B.M.V._ of Arnaud of Chartres, abbot of Bonneval 1138-1156
+    (J. Lutz and P. Perdrizet, _Spec. Hum. Sal._ vol. i.,
+    Mulhouse, 1907), which might quite well have been known to
+    her, especially if, as Messrs. Lutz and Perdrizet consider,
+    the _S.H.S._ was written by a Dominican, who would naturally
+    make use of Dominican teaching and tradition, and we know
+    that Mechthild, even if not, as has been suggested, a
+    tertiary of that Order, was in constant and close touch with
+    it. The second subject, the reference to rose-leaves and
+    Christ's wounds, seems to be a purely original thought, and
+    one amongst the many fascinating ideas that have centred
+    round the rose ever since Aphrodite anointed the dead body of
+    Hector with rose-scented oil (_Iliad_, xxiii. 186).
+
+Of Love, as she conceived it in relation to herself individually, she
+can never write enough. "I also may not suffer that any single comfort
+move me, save my love alone. I love my earthly friends in a heavenly
+fellowship, and I love my enemies with a holy longing for their
+salvation. God has enough of all good things, save of union with the
+soul."
+
+But where Mechthild seems to strike an original note for her time is
+in her insistence on God's craving for the soul, as well as the soul's
+craving for God. We find the same insistence in Meister Eckhart, who
+followed her closely in time, and perhaps, in this respect, in thought
+also. "God needs man," says Eckhart, quite simply. And again, "God can
+do as little without us as we without Him." With Mechthild it is from
+ecstasy to ecstasy that "heart speaks to heart." Says the soul of
+Mechthild: "Lord, Thou art ever sick of love for me, and that hast
+Thou Thyself well proved. Thou hast written me in the Book of the
+Godhead. Thou hast fashioned me after Thine own image. Thou hast bound
+me hand and foot to Thy side. O grant it to me, Beloved, to anoint
+Thee."
+
+"Where wilt thou get thine ointment, dear one?"
+
+"Lord, I will tear my happy heart in twain, and lay Thee therein."
+
+"It is the most precious ointment thou couldest give Me, that I should
+evermore hover in thy soul."
+
+Further God says: "I longed for thee ere the world was. I long for
+thee, and thou longest for me. When two burning desires come together,
+then is love perfected."
+
+Sometimes the loving soul traverses a dark way, and cries out in
+desolation and despair: "Lord, since Thou hast taken from me all that
+I had of Thee, yet of Thy grace leave me that gift which every dog has
+by nature--that in my distress I may be true to Thee, without any
+ill-will. This do I truly desire more than all Thy heavenly kingdom."
+
+And Divine Love makes answer: "Sweet Dove, now list to me. Thy secret
+seeking must needs find me, thy heart's distress must needs compel me,
+thy loving pursuit has so wearied me, that I long to cool myself in
+thy pure soul in the which I am imprisoned. The throbbing sighs of thy
+sore heart have driven my justice from thee. All is right between me
+and thee. I cannot be sundered from thee. However far we are parted,
+never can we be separated. I cause thee extreme pain of body. If I
+gave myself to thee as oft as thou wouldst, I should thus deprive
+myself of the sweet shelter I have in thee in this world."
+
+Again the soul cries out--but now discomfited by the Divine Love from
+whose tireless quest there is no escape--"Thou hast pursued and
+captured and bound me, and hast wounded me so deeply that never shall
+I be healed. Thou hast given me many a hard blow. Tell me, shall I
+ever get whole from Thee? Shall I not be slain by Thee? Thus would it
+have been better for me if that I had never known Thee."
+
+Then answers Love: "That I pursued thee gave me delight. That I made
+thee captive was my desire. That I bound thee was my joy. When I
+wounded thee, then did I become one with thee. Thus I give thee hard
+blows so that I may be possessed of thee. I drove Almighty God from
+His heavenly kingdom, and took from Him His mortal life, and have
+restored Him with honour to His Father. How canst thou, poor worm,
+save thyself from me?"
+
+Of all Mechthild's visions, there is none that seems to reach a
+greater height of supreme beauty than that in which the loving soul
+learns the way to its Divine Lover. It is strangely reminiscent of
+courtly life and courtly poetry, translated into the ecstatic state,
+and etherealised into the very perfume of spirituality as the soul
+becomes one with God. Having passed the distress of repentance, the
+pain of confession, and the labour of penance, and having overcome the
+love of the World, the tempting of the Devil, and its own self-will,
+the soul, weary, and longing for her Divine Lover and God, cries out:
+"Beautiful Youth, I long for thee. Where shall I find thee?"
+
+Then says the youth: "I hear a voice which speaks somewhat of love.
+Many days have I wooed her, but never have I heard her voice. Now I am
+moved. I must go to meet her. She it is who bears grief and love
+together. In the morning in the dew is the most intimate rapture which
+first penetrates the soul."
+
+Then speak her Chamberlains, which are the live senses: "Lady, thou
+must adorn thyself. We have heard a whisper that the Prince comes to
+meet thee in the dew, and the sweet song of the birds. Tarry not,
+Lady."
+
+So she puts on a shift of gentle humility, so humble that nothing
+could be more so, and over it a white robe of pure chastity, so pure
+that she cannot endure thoughts, words, or desires which might stain
+it. Then she wraps herself in a cloak of holy desire, which she has
+wrought in gold with all the virtues. So she goes into the wood, which
+is the company of holy people. The sweetest nightingales sing there,
+day and night, of the right union with God. She tries to join in the
+festal dance, that is, to imitate the example of the elect. Then comes
+the youth and says to her: "Thou shalt dance merrily even as my
+Elect." And she answers: "I cannot dance, Lord, if Thou dost not lead
+me. If Thou wilt that I leap joyfully, Thou must first Thyself sing.
+Then will I leap for love, from love to knowledge, from knowledge to
+fruition, from fruition to beyond all human senses. There will I
+remain, and circle evermore."[25]
+
+    [25] It may be recalled that Dante (_Par._ xxiv.) sees the
+    Saints in Paradise as circling lights from whence issues
+    divine song, and again (_Par._ xxv.) "wheeling round in such
+    guise as their burning love befitted."
+
+Then speaks the youth: "Thy dance of praise is well done. Thou shalt
+have thy will, for thou art heartily wearied. Come at mid-day to the
+shady fountain, to the bed of love. There shalt thou be refreshed."
+
+Then, weary of the dance, the soul says to her Chamberlains, the
+senses: "Withdraw from me, I must go where I may cool myself."
+
+Then say the senses: "Lady, wilt thou be refreshed with the loving
+tears of St. Mary Magdalene? They may well suffice thee."
+
+"Be silent, sirs; you know not what I mean. Hinder me not. I would
+drink for a space of the unmingled wine."
+
+"Lady, in the Virgin's chastity the great love is reached."
+
+"That may be. For me it is not the highest."
+
+"Lady, thou mightst cool thyself in the martyrs' blood."
+
+"I have been martyred many a day, so that I have no need to come to
+that now."
+
+"Lady, bright are the angels, and lovely in love's hue. Wouldst thou
+cool thyself, be lifted up with them."
+
+"The bliss of the angels brings me love's woe unless I see their Lord,
+my Bridegroom."
+
+"Lady, if thou comest there, thou wilt be blinded quite, so fiery hot
+is the Godhead, as thou thyself well knowest, for the fire and the
+glow which make heaven and all the holy ones burn and shine, all flow
+from His divine breath, and from His human mouth, through the wisdom
+of the Holy Ghost. How couldest thou endure it for an hour?"
+
+And the soul answers: "The fish cannot drown in the water, the bird
+cannot sink in the air, gold cannot perish in the fire, where it gains
+its clear and shining worth. God has granted to each creature to
+cherish its own nature. How can I withstand my nature? I must go from
+all things to God, who is my Father by Nature, my Brother through His
+Humanity, my Bridegroom through Love, and I am His for ever."
+
+Silenced by this wondrous flight of holy passion, we bid farewell to
+Mechthild. She lived for her time, and she lives for us, as one of
+"humanity's pioneers on the only road to rest." "Out of the depths,"
+she cried to Heaven. We leave her in the music of the spheres.
+
+
+
+
+A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY ART-PATRON AND PHILANTHROPIST, MAHAUT, COUNTESS
+OF ARTOIS
+
+
+It has been well said that "out of things unlikely and remote may be
+won romance and beauty." Perhaps the truth of this reflection has
+never been more signally exemplified than in the case of Mahaut,
+Countess of Artois and Burgundy, the record of whose life, in the
+absence of any contemporary biographer, has been ably deciphered from
+such commonplace material as the household accounts of her
+stewards.[26] This great lady, one of the greatest patrons of art of
+her time, lived at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the
+fourteenth century. She was a great-niece of St. Louis. No poet has
+sung of her. It is merely through the prose of daily expenditure that
+she is made known to us. She stands before us, not the ideal creation
+of the medi�val romancer, but a real woman, with her virtues and
+failings, her joys and sorrows, real by very reason of this union of
+contrasts, a woman trying to grapple with difficulties forced upon her
+by her position, and by an age when intrigue and cunning were as
+freely resorted to, and as deftly handled, as the sword and the lance.
+
+    [26] Richard (Jules Marie), _Une Petite Ni�ce de S. Louis:
+    Mahaut, Comtesse d'Artois_.
+
+    Dehaisnes (M. le Chanoine), _L'Histoire de l'art dans la
+    Flandre, l'Artois, et le Hainaut avant le XVme si�cle_.
+
+Mahaut was the daughter of Robert the Second, Count of Artois, a
+valiant and chivalrous man, and of Amicie de Courtenay, of whom it was
+said that she was esteemed whilst she lived, and mourned of all when
+she died. Her brother, Philip, predeceased his father, leaving one
+son, Robert. In accordance with local custom, Mahaut, on the death of
+her father, inherited Artois, but her nephew, Robert, on attaining his
+majority at the age of fourteen, set up a counter-claim. This family
+feud was a constant source of trouble and vexation to her, since
+Robert again and again returned to the attack, not only appealing to
+the king to consider his cause, and fabricating spurious documents as
+a means of gaining his end, but also employing unscrupulous agents to
+spread false charges against her. He further took advantage of the
+growing discontent amongst the nobles, who were gradually realising
+that their power was waning, to attach them to his cause, and to
+induce them to join him in harassing Mahaut by making raids upon her
+lands and her castles. She, however, through her extraordinary
+personality, was able to triumph over all this opposition, which, far
+from marring, only seemed to add lustre to the work she had set
+herself to do.
+
+Mahaut was religious, artistic, and literary. All these
+characteristics, together with the circumstance of wealth, she
+inherited, and right well did she make use of her inheritance.
+
+Being religious, and living in an age when the frenzy for crusading
+had subsided and when architecture was the ruling passion, she
+expended her zeal in building religious houses and hospitals.
+
+Being artistic, she made her favourite castle at Hesdin, and the town
+around its walls, a centre of art life. Here, seemingly, she favoured
+all the arts, including to a certain extent music, then still in its
+infancy, for although she apparently had no regular minstrel or
+minstrels in her employ as was customary in the houses of the
+noblesse, she seems to have engaged them for Church festivals and
+sundry f�tes, and we know that on one occasion she hired a minstrel to
+soothe her sick child with the sweet soft music of the harp, thus
+suggesting that she herself had felt the power of music to minister to
+both body and soul.
+
+Being literary, Mahaut collected what MSS. and books she could, and
+the list of them serves to show what might be found in a library of
+the early fourteenth century. Her religious books included a Bible in
+French,[27] a Psalter, a Gradual, various Books of Hours for private
+devotion, Lives of the Saints and of the Fathers, and the Miracles of
+Our Lady. Philosophy was represented by a French translation of
+Bo�thius (probably a copy of a translation made by order of King
+Philip le Bel, by Jean de Meun, the writer of the second portion of
+_The Romance of the Rose_), Law by a verse translation of the laws of
+Normandy, History by the Chronicles of the Kings of France, and Travel
+by _The Romance of the Great Kan_, known to us as _The Travels of
+Marco Polo_. But by far the largest category consisted of Romances,
+such as that of Oger le Danois from the national Epic, and another of
+Tancred, a hero of the first Crusade, the Romance of Troy, Percival le
+Gallois, Tristan, Renart, and the Violet, the story which forms the
+chief episode in the play of Cymbeline. Of course there was no great
+choice, but that Mahaut read them and loved them we may be certain,
+since we know that she took some with her on her journeyings, and to
+preserve them from the wear and tear of travel, had leather wallets
+made to protect them. Mahaut was, in truth, the first wealthy
+individual of the age to spend her substance with the express purpose
+of surrounding herself with beauty of every kind. The foremost thought
+of a man in a like case would probably have been to add to his power.
+_Her_ thought was of beauty, a quality much more far-reaching and less
+transient, and one which, even like Time itself, triumphs over the
+changes of fame and fortune.
+
+    [27] The Bible was first translated into French, and reduced
+    in size so that it could be carried in the hand, between 1200
+    and 1250.
+
+Though Mahaut did not live the allotted three score years and ten, she
+lived long enough to see seven kings on the throne of France, two of
+whom--Philip the Fifth and Charles the Fourth--were her sons-in-law.
+She was a mere child when her great-uncle, King Louis, died in 1270.
+In 1285, the year in which Philip the Fourth, surnamed le Bel,
+ascended the throne, she wedded Otho, Count Palatine of Burgundy, a
+widower of forty-five, a companion in arms of her father, and a brave
+and generous man, who died fighting for his country, but one
+absolutely incapable in administration, and, as a consequence, always
+in debt and in the clutches of the usurer. There are few documents to
+throw any light on her life until after Otho's death in 1303. This may
+be due partly to the fact that she only came into her great
+possessions on her father's death in 1302, and partly to the
+circumstance that the careless and luxurious expenditure of her
+husband in no small degree dissipated her resources, and naturally
+prevented, for the time, any material encouragement of art. Doubtless
+also much of her time was spent in superintending the education of her
+children--two daughters who were destined to marry kings of France,
+and a son who was born a peer of the realm, and inheritor of one of
+its richest territories. But adverse fate, by the disgrace of one of
+her daughters, and the death of her son, intervened to darken these
+brilliant prospects, and forms a grey background to her otherwise
+wonderful and glorious career.
+
+The more the life of this remarkable woman is studied, the more
+apparent it becomes that what gives it its peculiar charm and worth is
+the sense she possessed of the value of all human endeavour, whether
+in great things or in simple. To her the humblest matters of home
+life, and the affairs connected with the administration of her
+domains, had each their particular significance. The ordering of a
+small grooved tablet on which her little boy could arrange the letters
+of the alphabet claimed her attention equally with the founding and
+arranging of a hospital. In her capacity as ruler we see the same wide
+and reasonable outlook on life, for whilst strict as an administrator,
+in personal relations she was charitable and sympathetic. Sometimes a
+rebellious baron was deprived of his fief and banished, or was
+condemned to expiate his misdeed by making a pilgrimage to sundry
+shrines. But Mahaut was practical withal, and recognised human
+frailty, and as the pilgrimage was for correction, no pardon was
+granted unless the offender brought from each of the sanctuaries a
+certificate that his vow had been fulfilled. On the other hand, if any
+were sick or in trouble, she was solicitous for their relief, and even
+aided them personally where possible. She thus put into practice the
+charge of her saintly kinsman, King Louis the Ninth, who always
+counselled those about him to have compassion on all mental or
+physical suffering, since the heart may be stricken as well as the
+body.
+
+As Mahaut had no biographer, and contemporary history merely treats
+her as if she were one of many pawns on a chess-board, her stewards'
+entries furnish the only materials from which we can weave some
+outline of her life, an outline, nevertheless, which enables us to
+reason somewhat concerning her inner life, the pattern, as it were,
+that is not wrought for the world.
+
+When, in 1302, Mahaut took over the reins of government in Artois,
+Paris was the great centre of art and literature as well as of the
+science of the day, a condition largely due to the genius of Philip
+Augustus, and fostered by succeeding kings. Thither, from far and
+near, flocked scholars, poets, and artists alike. Some of these took
+up their abode permanently within its walls. Others passed to and fro,
+thus creating that constant interchange of thought which is essential
+to vitality, so that it was said that "the goddess of Wisdom, after
+having dwelt in Athens and Rome, had taken up her abode in Paris."
+There, at least twice a year, came Mahaut to her sumptuous dwelling,
+the H�tel d'Artois, situated near the Temple, and extending with its
+gardens and its outbuildings to the walls built by Philip Augustus.
+Here all who loved the arts and learning were made welcome, and it is
+interesting to think it possible, nay even probable, that during one
+of her many sojourns there she may have met and talked with Dante.
+
+Amongst the special treasures to be found there, mention is made of
+four figure-pictures, one of which is said to have been of Roman
+workmanship, and round in form--certainly, as far as is known, a
+rarity at that time. We also find a record of finely wrought
+embroideries and tapestries on the walls, and of windows painted
+either with armorial bearings and figures, or with simple foliage like
+the delicate ivy and hawthorn to be seen enriching the pages of Books
+of Hours of the fourteenth century. Special mention is made of a
+window, evidently over the altar in the private Chapel, in which was
+represented the Crucifixion. In the large hall were tables on
+trestles, easily removed before the dance began or minstrels or
+jugglers displayed their skill, dressers to hold the gold and silver
+plate and from which to serve the banquet, and settles with footboards
+so necessary when the rushes were only renewed at lengthy intervals.
+But if the hall was somewhat sparsely furnished, its ceiling and walls
+(the latter on occasions hung with embroideries carried from castle to
+castle as the Countess journeyed) were made bright with colour, and
+beautiful with design. How bright, and how beautiful, we can infer
+almost with certainty from examples in the Castle of Chillon of
+thirteenth and fourteenth century decoration lately rescued from under
+a coat of whitewash,[28] and from the comparison made by Brunetto
+Latini (1230-1294), in his _Tesoro_, of the Italian with the French
+feudal castle, in which he says of the one that it is only built for
+war, with ditches, palisades, and high towers and walls, and of the
+other that it lies in the midst of meadows and gardens, _with large
+painted chambers_.
+
+    [28] _Chillon_, Albert Naef, Gen�ve, 1908.
+
+Mahaut's cousin, the cold and impersonal Philip le Bel, was on the
+throne. For the most part war had ceased in the land, but still there
+was war in high places, for Philip, avaricious by nature, and finding
+himself a king under altering conditions--the Papacy fallen into
+disregard, the Nobility weakened, and the Nation growing, but without
+any adequate provision made to meet the needs of this growth--left no
+stone unturned to supply this want and gratify his greed. On the
+question of the subsidies of the clergy and the relation between
+things spiritual and temporal, he quarrelled with the Pope, Boniface
+the Eighth, and brought about the removal of the Holy See from Rome to
+Avignon. He robbed and ruined the Templars, and despoiled the Jews and
+Lombards, the financiers of the day. With him no trickery was too
+base, no cruelty too cold-blooded. Gold was his God. Dante, who was
+his contemporary, refers (_Purg._ vii. 109) to "his wicked and foul
+life" (_la vita sua viziata e lorda_), and (_Par._ xix. 118) to his
+"debasement of the coinage" (_falseggiando la moneta_), as well as to
+his self-seeking greed. Such, with the added glamour of art and
+learning, was the courtly atmosphere of the Time. The bourgeoisie,
+encouraged by the king who sought to aggrandise the monarchy at the
+expense of the nobles, was growing rich, and politically gaining in
+power, and Philip ere long discovered that he had helped merely to
+change the centre of power, and not to crush it.
+
+But Paris does not seem to have attracted Mahaut as did her castle at
+Hesdin. Here she was in the midst of her own domains, surrounded by
+her liegemen and retainers, and able to be in constant touch with her
+artificers and workers, whatever their art or industry. By the
+thirteenth century the dwelling of the Noble was no longer a grim
+castle, suggestive only of a place of defence, with narrow slits in
+the walls for the admission of air and light and for the discharge of
+arrows, but was more like a fortified country-house. The encompassing
+walls enclosed a wide area, within which was sheltered a village and
+everything necessary to the growth and development of a community.
+
+From Hesdin Mahaut journeyed constantly through her County of Artois,
+visiting her castles, the towns or villages around them, and the
+various religious houses and hospitals she had founded, and attending
+in general to the well-being of her subjects. For her it was not
+enough that she was born to reign. She realised that, without
+administration, reigning through the accident of birth is mere
+puppet's work, and leads to naught. Her daily life was the visible
+expression of this belief, as she herself was an example of the woman
+who comprehends the just proportion between personal and public work.
+That her subjects responded to her sympathy, and held her in
+affectionate regard, is proved by their kindly and sympathetic concern
+if she were ill or on a journey, and by the offerings they made to her
+on special anniversaries and other festive occasions. We read of gifts
+not only of herrings, sturgeon, game, wine, dogs, peacocks, swans,
+pasties, and whipped cream, but also of the strangely assorted tribute
+of a dead bear and twelve cheeses, as well as of one which must have
+contrasted pleasantly with this sundry and singular good cheer--a
+parrakeet in a beautifully painted cage. Mahaut, as we have said, was
+a constant traveller, and though travelling was then no easy matter,
+the roads could not have been over-much beset with difficulties seeing
+that she journeyed in all weathers, either on horseback or in a
+horse-litter, or in a chariot without springs, and with no mean
+retinue. In truth, her following was like a glorified Canterbury
+pilgrimage. First came the Countess, accompanied by one or more
+knights, her ladies-in-waiting, her chaplain and confessor, her
+physician, her secretary, her treasurer and steward, and sundry petty
+officers of her household. Then followed the servants, the cook with
+his scullions, the shoemaker who could also do necessary repairs to
+the harness, the laundress riding astride as was the manner of
+serving-women, and a score of lackeys and dependants of all sorts in
+charge of the carts containing the necessaries of travel. These
+necessaries were generally packed in wooden coffers, some of which
+were simple chests, whilst others opened like a cupboard and were
+fitted with drawers. To preserve such coffers from damp and damage,
+they were put into osier cases covered with cow-hide. And with all
+this motley company and baggage, there are but few records of
+accidents. The accounts tell of a small occasional expenditure in
+consequence of the breakdown of a chariot, or the fall of a valet from
+his horse, or the upsetting into a river of a cart conveying the
+Countess's wardrobe. But such misadventures were not taken very
+seriously by these folk, seasoned to discomfort. Valet or chariot was
+mended, or the floating garments were recovered, and on went the
+easy-going company, singing by the way, and with horns blowing as they
+neared some castle or village where a halt was to be made for the
+night. The absence of any mention of the removal of furniture from
+castle to castle during these periodical wanderings, save a small bed
+for Mahaut's own use, leads us to infer that greater luxury then
+prevailed than in the days of her great-uncle, Louis the Ninth, when
+even Royalty itself thought it no hardship to have beds and other
+necessary pieces of furniture carried by beasts of burden from place
+to place according to the movements of the Court. This frugal and
+homely custom on one occasion very nearly ended in a tragedy. The
+devout Isabelle, Louis's sister, was praying in the early morning, as
+was her wont, within her curtained bed, and either lost in prayer or
+overcome with fatigue by the length of her orisons, did not notice the
+arrival of the packers, who rolled up the bed without drawing the
+curtains, and the praying Princess within must have been smothered had
+not her lady-in-waiting, Agnes de Harcourt, heard her stifled cries,
+and hastened to her rescue. This quaint episode so amused Louis, that
+he ever after recounted it when telling of the piety of his sister.
+
+Let us now go in imagination to the Castle of Hesdin, and see
+something of its treasures and of the daily life of the Countess
+Mahaut.
+
+Soon after her accession to Artois, her two daughters married sons of
+King Philip le Bel, and her little son, Robert, then became her
+principal care. A little boy of noble family had been chosen as his
+companion to share in his education and to join with him in play. It
+would seem that the two were treated on an absolute equality, even to
+having their doublets cut from the same piece of cloth, and their
+tunics and cloaks trimmed with the same fur. Beyond their ordinary
+lessons, they were early taught the games of tables and chess, both of
+which were considered essential to a knight's education. They also
+rode to the chase and attended tournaments, and at the age of fourteen
+themselves held the lance as part of their training in the art of
+war. Robert seems to have been of a most inquiring and intelligent
+nature, but when he had scarce passed his seventeenth year, Mahaut,
+with scant warning, saw this her only son stricken in death just as he
+was about to enter the ranks of knighthood. In the archives of Arras,
+the Capital of Artois, may be found a discoloured parchment containing
+the inventory of the equipment provided for the youthful Robert in
+anticipation of his initiation. What sorrow is enshrined in these
+faded pages! It is not sorrow for death, but the bitterer sorrow for
+something that has never lived, or, rather, that has lived only in the
+heart, like spring blossom blighted ere fruiting-time. In the Church
+of St. Denis, where modern restoration has but emphasised the
+transitoriness and vanity of human glory, there can still be seen the
+tomb of this youth, carved soon after his death by Pepin de Huy, and
+once painted, as was all such carved work. Even to the mere student it
+is interesting as being the only existing monument that can with
+certainty be attributed to this celebrated sculptor, and also as
+being, in Gothic art, one of the first essays in portraiture in
+recumbent figures of the dead, as contrasted with mere effigy. For the
+deeper thinker it has even greater significance. Of all the good and
+great works that Mahaut conceived and initiated--the churches,
+castles, hospitals, which she built and enriched for the glory of God
+and the safety and solace of mankind--all have passed away. This
+simple tomb alone remains. But its very simplicity is eloquent, for
+around it there seems to hover that never-dying spirit of love and
+goodness and beauty to which, throughout her life, Mahaut contributed
+in such large measure, and which was her real and lasting gift to the
+world.
+
+Life as mirrored in the Castle records gives little else than a
+pleasing picture of Mahaut's relations with all her dependants, as
+well as with those with whom she was connected, whether by ties of
+friendship, of politics, or of the common courtesies of life. Her
+immediate household was naturally her first care. Twice a year, at
+Easter and All Saints, a distribution was made of cloth and furs. Some
+of these, fine and costly, were for those in personal attendance on
+the Countess, whilst others were in the nature of liveries. Others,
+again, of still coarser make, such as Irish serge, with sheep or
+rabbit skin for warmth in winter, were given to those of lowly service
+or who had specially rough work to perform. Her ladies-in-waiting, of
+whom there were always two or three, appear to have received for their
+services no money payment, but, over and above the cloth and fur
+already alluded to, gifts, on special occasions, of girdles and
+satchels (very often jewelled), gold chaplets, and gold and silver
+braid, jewelled, and used for twining in the hair. In addition to
+this, presents of jewels and silver cups were made to them by the
+noble ladies who came to stay with the Countess, just as she, on her
+part, presented similar gifts to those who accompanied her guests.
+How well we can picture to ourselves these maidens (for such is all
+they were), decking themselves in their girdles and jewelled braid,
+comparing their gifts, and perhaps even standing on some oaken bench
+the better to get a view of their finery, for the mirrors were small,
+and the girdles were long, and could not otherwise be seen in all
+their glory. When they married, the Countess made gifts to them
+without stint, not only of the beautiful and the needful for their
+wardrobes, but also of household goods, and sometimes, when she knew
+their parents or kinsmen to be too poor to provide the usual dowry,
+even of a sum of money. To the retainers also we find the same kind
+and helping hand held out. If any were sick they were taken care of,
+and, if needs be, sent to some place where they could the better be
+cured, as we read of one who, suffering from gout, was sent to take
+healing waters. To another retainer was given the necessary money to
+pay for his son on entering a monastery, another receiving the
+wherewithal to go to his native village to attend his mother's burial.
+Old servants, past work, were cared for in the monasteries or
+hospitals, or given some post suitable to their years. To a poor
+knight was given money to enable him to buy a good horse and armour,
+for poverty of purse was no disgrace in the thirteenth century. At the
+beginning of winter a distribution, organised by the clergy and
+stewards of the rural communities in Artois, but superintended by
+the Countess herself, was made to the poor of blankets, garments, and
+shoes, and so arranged that the same person did not receive the like
+gift two years in succession. In truth, no details seemed too small,
+none too onerous, for Mahaut's untiring solicitude. She had heart and
+brain for everything. It is these intimate touches which make the time
+so living and present to us, and which seem, as it were, to place this
+wonderful woman in a charmed and tranquil circle, in spite of the
+trouble and turmoil incidental to her life and her position.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+STATUE OF MAHAUT IN ABBEY OF LA THIEULOYE, NEAR ARRAS, NOW DESTROYED.
+
+From a Drawing, now in Brussels, made in 1602.
+
+_To face page 99._]
+
+Amongst Mahaut's many good works was the keeping in repair of existing
+religious houses, hospitals, and lazar-houses, and the building and
+maintenance of new ones. Of all the religious houses which she
+founded, her special care was for the Dominican convent of La
+Thieuloye, near Arras, the equipment of which, as set out in the
+accounts, may well serve as an example of that of the others. The
+items for the furnishing and instalment of the house and chapel
+include everything needful for the community, from gold and silver
+vessels, silver-gilt images of St. Louis, the Trinity, and St. John,
+for the sanctuary, and samite and velvet for chasubles, down to the
+bowls and platters for the nuns, the woollen material for their
+garments, and all the simple necessaries of everyday life. In the
+chapel of this nunnery was preserved a kneeling statue of Mahaut,
+representing her as foundress, in the habit of the Order strewn with
+the arms of Artois. Jean Aloul, of Tournai, has been suggested as the
+sculptor, since it is known from the accounts that he was working for
+the Countess at Arras in 1323. This statue (known to us through a
+drawing, now at Brussels, made in 1602) is of interest to-day because,
+judging from the character expressed in the face, it seems probable
+that it was a portrait, and not simply imagery. This conjecture seems
+all the more likely when we compare the statue with a miniature
+painted more than a hundred years later by Jean Fouquet in _Les
+Grandes Chroniques de France_ (Bib. Nat.), portraying the marriage of
+King Charles the Fourth with his second wife, Marie de Luxembourg. In
+this picture a lady, heavily coiffed, and with features suggestive of
+those of the statue, but with anguish written upon them, turns away
+from the ceremony as if it were all too painful. If this unwilling
+guest represents Mahaut, her woeful look is intelligible when we
+recall the sad story connected with Charles's first wife, Mahaut's
+daughter Blanche, married when she was but fifteen, and whose beauty
+was so dazzling that Froissart records that "she was one of the most
+beautiful women in the world." Accused of an intrigue with a gentleman
+of the Court, she was imprisoned in the Ch�teau-Gaillard, where she
+remained, with shorn head, until, shortly after Charles ascended the
+throne, the Pope declared the marriage null. Then, whilst the king
+wedded another, the sad Blanche exchanged her castle prison-house
+for a convent one, where she died a year after she had taken the vows.
+There is no reason for supposing that Mahaut was at the wedding of
+Blanche's successor save in the imagination of the artist; but for him
+the inclusion of such a tragic figure would add a dramatic touch to
+the representation of an otherwise conventional ceremony.
+
+[Illustration: MARRIAGE OF CHARLES LE BEL AND MARIE OF LUXEMBURG.
+
+Grandes Chrons. de France, Bib. Nat.
+
+_To face page 100._]
+
+It almost takes us aback to read that in Mahaut's domain of Artois
+there were at least eighty hospitals and thirty lazar-houses, without
+counting those attached to the monasteries. But these numbers will not
+surprise us so much when we remember that almost every small community
+had its little hospital, used not only for the sick and as a lying-in
+hospital, but also as a shelter for the poor and the pilgrim. In the
+towns they were often built and supported by the Corporations or by
+rich merchants. Evidently some were in the nature of hospitals for
+incurables, for there were special clauses in the deeds of gift
+providing that a certain specified number of beds were to be kept for
+the sick until they were either cured or released by death. Besides
+building two hospitals in the County of Burgundy in fulfilment of the
+dying wishes of her husband, Mahaut built and maintained two in her
+own County of Artois. The one at Hesdin was the more important, and we
+can get some idea of it from the documents of the time. The deed
+relating to it tells that over the large entrance gate there was
+carved in stone a figure of St. John, the patron of hospitals and of
+the needy generally, with a poor man and woman on either side of him.
+The principal ward was 160 feet long and 34 feet wide, with walls 16
+feet high ending in a gabled roof, with two windows in each gable, and
+this, coupled with the fact that the sick were sometimes laid on
+cushions by the open windows, goes to show that what we pride
+ourselves on as a special discovery in modern hygiene--the benefit of
+fresh air--was known and applied even in what we are wont to consider
+a very benighted age in such matters.
+
+Whilst touching upon such a subject as this, it may be a surprise to
+some to learn that in large towns baths were provided for those who
+could not afford to have them in their own homes, and that there were
+also professional women hair-washers.
+
+[Illustration: THIRTEENTH-CENTURY TREATISE ON SURGERY, IN FRENCH.
+
+Sloane MS. 1977.
+
+_To face page 103._]
+
+But to return to the hospital. On one side of the ward were ten
+windows, each four feet square, and on the opposite side was a large
+door leading into the cloister with its garden, where the
+convalescents and the old people, whilst sheltered, could enjoy the
+sunshine and see the flowers and the birds. In addition to this there
+was a smaller ward for women, a chapel, a kitchen, and a room for the
+matron, as well as accommodation for the resident doctor, Ma�tre
+Robert, and the serving-women. It is some consolation to think that
+these poor suffering folk of centuries ago were even thus well
+tended, but when we look at contemporary representations of the
+surgery of the day,[29] we tremble at the mere thought of the heroic
+methods adopted. Besides the actual necessaries which she provided for
+the hospital at Hesdin, Mahaut constantly sent gifts of fish, game,
+and wine. Similar gifts she likewise made to the hospitals in Artois
+generally, as well as to those in Paris, and, on f�te-days, to the
+poorer religious houses.
+
+    [29] See Roger of Parma, _Treatise on Surgery_. French
+    thirteenth century. Brit. Mus., Sloane MS., 1977.
+
+From her beneficence to the sick and sorry, the aged and the poor, we
+turn to her hospitality to her relations and friends, and to all those
+in spiritual or temporal authority in the towns or villages of Artois.
+The Castle of Hesdin, destroyed in the sixteenth century--only a few
+stones remaining to mark the site,--was situated a few miles from the
+present modern town of Hesdin. It must have been not only a scene of
+constant festivity and social intercourse, and a treasure-house
+withal, but also a veritable hive of industry, with workers and
+workshops within the Castle enclosure as well as in the town nestling
+beneath its walls. Here might be found artists and craftsmen of all
+sorts and degrees--sculptors and workers in stone, ivory-workers,
+wood-carvers, carpenters, artificers in silver and precious stones as
+well as in copper, forgers of iron, painters of wall-decoration,
+stonework, saddle-bows, and even masquerading-masks, illuminators of
+MSS., workers and painters of glass, harness-makers, armourers,
+tailors, and embroiderers--the whole forming a rare and remarkable
+centre of activity for a woman to have developed and ruled and made
+into a living force.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: BANQUET, WITH MINSTRELS PLAYING, AND ROOM HUNG WITH
+EMBROIDERY.
+
+MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century, Bodleian, Oxford.
+
+_To face page 104._]
+
+It is a f�te-day within the Castle. The horns have sounded. The feast
+is ready. To the great hall repair the knights and the ladies, the
+esquires and the damsels, two and two, according to their rank,
+dipping their hands, as they pass in, into silver basins of
+rose-water. They are gorgeously apparelled in silken garments and
+cloth of gold and silver, upon which are embroidered their coats of
+arms, for by the end of the thirteenth century armorial bearings,
+which by then had become attached to families, were used as a sign of
+nobility and rank. Mahaut, as hostess, takes her seat last. Adown the
+table are specimens of silver-plate, some the work of her own
+craftsmen, others the offerings of friendship or of courtesy. They are
+fashioned variously, and used for sweetmeats of all kinds, spices,
+almonds, and dainties made of orange and pomegranate. A favourite form
+is that of a ship, such as may be seen in _Les Tr�s Riches Heures_ of
+Jean, Duc de Berri, at Chantilly, in a representation of a feast given
+by the Duke. There are, besides, salt-cellars and sauce-boats, flagons
+and drinking-cups, and a bowl between every two guests, from which
+they eat, handing each other dainty morsels. Such, with a knife
+and a spoon for each, is their equipment for the meal, for none, save
+the carver, has both knife and fork. In a corner of the hall is a
+basket for the broken-meats destined for the poor, a leathern sack
+being also provided for foods with gravy or sauce. Neither at
+festivals nor in daily life would a meal have been considered complete
+if the poor were not remembered. Perhaps a messenger arrives during
+the feast with the news of a birth or a marriage in Mahaut's circle of
+relations or friends, and he is rewarded with a gift of money, and
+possibly receives a silver cup to carry back to the nurse, or a
+jewelled chaplet to take to the bride. Meanwhile the music of
+trumpets, drums, viols, and flutes resounds from the minstrels'
+gallery. Later, when the feast is ended, and before the company
+disperses to walk in the garden if it is spring or summer, or to look
+at the beautiful things in the castle, or to dance or sing or play
+chess if it be winter, some one perchance chants a plaintive ditty to
+the music of the regal, or some knight tunes his harp and sings of
+valiant deeds, or, may be, of some peerless lady.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 105._]
+
+But let us look at the rooms of the Castle and their beautiful
+contents--the paintings and embroideries on the walls, the ivories,
+and the illuminated Psalters and MSS. And let us go first into the
+Countess's own room, which doubtless was near the chapel. We can form
+some idea of its decoration and contents from the accounts, and of
+its probable arrangement from contemporary plans, illuminated MSS.,
+and pictures. Its walls were adorned with a frieze composed of heads
+of the kings of France, moulded in plaster and surmounted by crowns of
+gilded or lacquered tin, below which, on a coloured ground, were
+fastened fleurs-de-lis, likewise of tin similarly treated. At the end
+of the room was a bed, a large wooden structure surrounded by a
+footboard and laced across with cords on which were laid mattresses, a
+feather bed (sometimes, if we may judge from miniatures, used during
+the day as a seat on the floor), many cushions, linen or silk sheets,
+and a fur-lined coverlet. From rods on the ceiling hung curtains which
+completely enclosed it at night, but which were drawn back and looped
+up during the day, when the bed was used as a divan. At night a small
+oil lamp with a floating wick was hung within the curtains, and near
+the bed was a _b�nitier_. At the side, separated by a narrow space,
+there were fixed seats for the accommodation of those who interviewed
+the Countess before she rose. There was a large open fireplace with a
+bench in front of it which had a movable back, so that the occupant
+could sit either facing the fire or with his back to it. Close by were
+wickerwork fire-screens, capable of being raised or lowered at will.
+Against the walls there were carved chests, enriched with colour, and
+chairs with leather seats and wickerwork backs, as well as
+three-legged and folding stools, were placed about the room. At one
+side of the room was a large oak chair of state with a cushioned seat,
+and possibly canopied, and close to it a lectern, with hinged
+candle-brackets, from which Mahaut could the more easily read her
+MSS., which were often rolled, and difficult to manipulate. In front
+of this seat was a table, at which any messengers or retainers stood
+when they sought an interview, or the Countess demanded one. Here also
+she transacted with her stewards and other agents the business
+connected with her various castles and her many philanthropic
+undertakings. Other rooms were painted in plain colour, and hung on
+special occasions with embroideries and tapestries. Others, again,
+were decorated with set designs, square or zigzag, in imitation of
+brickwork, such as may be seen in the Chapel of St. Faith, Westminster
+Abbey, or with subjects or colour after which they were named. Thus we
+find mention of the "Parrakeet" room, from the birds painted on the
+walls, the "Blue" room, from its colour, the rooms of "Roses," of
+"Vines," and of "Fleurs-de-lis," the room of "Shields," from its
+frieze of armorial bearings, and that of "Song," from verses traced on
+the walls, taken from the favourite pastoral of "Robin and Marion,"
+and probably associated with little scenes from the same idyll. The
+ceilings, with beams and joists painted red, were coloured either
+green or blue, and strewn with tin stars coated with yellow or white
+varnish to simulate gold or silver. The lower portions of the walls
+were often painted in imitation of short curtains, sometimes of but
+one colour, sometimes gorgeously decorated, but in either case
+reminiscent of the real draperies hung on festal days. Immediately
+above there might have been, as in other examples, a border painted
+with coats of arms, or with a foliated design interspersed with
+mottoes.
+
+During Mahaut's lifetime this decorative work seems to have been
+undertaken principally by one special family or community of artists
+from Boulogne, of which a certain "Jacques" was the leading spirit. In
+those days artist and craftsman were one and the same. It was the
+quality, and not the particular subject, of the work that mattered,
+and thus we find that the painting of a parrot's cage, or of the
+shafts of a litter, was not considered derogatory for even the most
+skilled to undertake. From the accounts it would seem that linseed oil
+was used to mix with the colours, cherry gum or white of egg being
+added to make them dry more quickly. Payment for work was made three
+times a year--at Candlemas, Ascension-tide, and All-Saints--or by the
+day or piece, the last being the form preferred by the business-like
+Mahaut. Besides such payment, presents were occasionally given for
+specially fine work, and, if a man was married, a gift to his wife of
+a gown, or of a cloak with fur, was sometimes added. One of this
+company of Boulogne artists later on became Court-painter to the Dukes
+of Burgundy, and took with him not only his trained apprentices from
+the towns and villages of Artois, and from those bordering on
+Flanders, but also, doubtless, certain traditions. It is such early
+migrations of artists, when schools were forming, that have helped to
+create the difficult problems which confront the student of all early
+schools of art.
+
+Of embroidery there was such profusion that it is indeed no
+exaggeration to say that the needle vied with the sword. There were
+not only wall and bed hangings, embroidered with flowers to brighten
+winter days, cloaks, gowns, and tunics patterned with gold thread and
+coloured silks, and beaver hats wrought with gold lace and pearls and
+sometimes precious stones, but also girdles, satchels, purses, and
+pennons resplendent with heraldic device, and caparison and harness
+for the horses. From the East were brought velvets, silks, and stuffs
+interwoven with gold and silver thread, and used not only for personal
+adornment, but also for vestments, Church-hangings, and the coverings
+of litters. As regards tapestry as we understand it--_i.e._ woven in a
+_high_ warp loom--there is apparently no definite mention of its being
+made at Arras before 1313, so that the numerous allusions to tapestry
+must refer to stuffs woven in the _low_ warp loom. These stuffs would
+seem to have been of two kinds, the one woven with some simple
+pattern, the other with heraldic designs of animals or other
+conventional forms copied from Oriental models. Hence the term
+"Saracenic" applied to both the workers and their handiwork.
+
+In order to realise the Ivories which were probably to be seen in the
+Castle of Hesdin, we must go to the Louvre or the British Museum,
+where may be found a few rare examples of the work of the period, such
+as caskets carved with scenes from the life of Christ or the Virgin if
+they were to hold some sacred treasure, or with scenes from some
+Romance or from daily life if to contain jewels or other mundane
+objects. In addition to such caskets, often painted, Mahaut had, to
+hang from her girdle, as was customary with all ladies in the Middle
+Ages, a daintily wrought ivory writing-tablet, and a small mirror in
+an ivory case. These mirror-cases were generally carved with a scene
+from some love-story, such as two lovers playing chess, or going
+a-hawking, or some detail from the favourite romance of Tristan and
+Isolde. Possibly amongst these treasures was a saddle-bow, with a
+wondrous wealth of carving, or chess-men finely modelled, and inlaid
+with mother-of-pearl, or a triptych with scenes from the Passion,
+represented under Gothic arches of most superb and delicate
+workmanship. But it is perhaps in the Chapel that we must seek the
+finest work, for here both Mahaut and her father, Count Robert, were
+lavish with unsparing hand. One Jean le Scelleur, of Paris, a carver
+of combs and toilet articles as well as of crucifixes and Virgins, is
+named as her principal craftsman. Mention is made of a Cross carved by
+him in cedar-wood with an ivory figure of the Christ, and of two ivory
+figures of the Virgin, one under a canopy, and the other with the Holy
+Child poised upon the hip, that sublime motive belonging more
+especially to the thirteenth century. The chapel itself was beautified
+with carved work in stone. Over the Altar, and in front of it, were
+painted panels, enriched with gold, and translucent enamel over
+colour. If we could picture to ourselves the manner of the sculptor's
+work we may recall the "Vine-Capital" in Rheims Cathedral, where the
+very stone itself seems to have been metamorphosed into tender foliage
+by the unknown artist.
+
+Of wood-carving, the accounts tell of Choir-stalls, presses for
+vestments and various vessels and ornaments, and also of Angels,
+gilded and painted and bearing the emblems of the Passion, for
+standing round the High Altar. These are described as being raised on
+slender columns, connected by a bar on which were laced fringed silk
+curtains, thus forming a recess for the Altar. We can get some idea of
+the simple beauty of this arrangement from a drawing, still preserved
+in the sacristy of Arras Cathedral, of the High Altar in the old
+Cathedral, and fortunately made before the latter, with all its
+contents, was destroyed in the sixteenth century. It accords in every
+detail with the inventory record of the Chapel of Hesdin. We may also
+compare a picture (No. 783, "The Exhumation of St. Hubert") in the
+Flemish room in the National Gallery, where a somewhat similar scheme
+is shown.
+
+Of the MSS. and Illuminations only brief mention can be made.
+Surviving examples, and the records of the time, testify to the
+splendour and the sum of them. At the beginning of the thirteenth
+century, the French miniature was influenced in no small degree, both
+in technique and in colour, by glass painting. Towards the end of the
+century this influence yielded to the prevailing enthusiasm for
+architecture and sculpture, and in Bibles and Psalters alike there
+appear scenes with figures as in bas-relief, with architectural
+backgrounds and decorative details. The same spirit that evolved
+tender foliage out of the hard stone of cathedral and church evolved
+also the delicate hawthorn-leaf enriching the initial letter of the
+MS. It mattered little whether the material worked on was stone or
+parchment. Each was but a means for giving expression to a newly
+discovered scheme of beauty--the beauty of Nature. In the thirteenth
+and fourteenth centuries a renewed impetus had been given to the arts
+of writing and illumination. This was partly because a demand had
+arisen for a secular literature to supersede the tiresome and
+time-worn recitations of minstrels, and partly because, in the
+fourteenth century, Books of Hours, instead of the Psalter alone as
+had hitherto been customary, came into general use in private
+devotion. This created a fresh want, and at the same time supplied a
+number of new subjects in which the artist could reveal his skill.
+Arras was one of the chief centres of this new movement, a movement
+which Mahaut continued and stimulated. She employed artists to
+illuminate both sacred and secular works for her own use as well as
+for gifts--gifts counted beyond compare and beside which even precious
+stones were deemed of less worth. To Mahaut this desire for beauty was
+a very lode-star. To glance at a list of the gold- and silver-smiths'
+work--the jewelled and enamelled chaplets of gold, the jewelled
+girdles, and buckles, and braids for the hair, and the cups, some of
+silver with crystal covers or wrought with enamel and precious stones,
+and others of jasper mounted with silver work--reads like a fantasy of
+hidden treasure in some fairy tale. Even her chess-boards--and she was
+a devotee of the game--were of silver or ivory, and one, we read, was
+of jasper and chalcedony mounted with silver and gems, the chess-men
+being of jasper and crystal.
+
+For the younger folk about her there was tennis, and also games of
+hazard with forfeits of girdles and coifs to the ladies. In the Castle
+garden were certain mechanical contrivances which, by their sudden and
+unexpected action, were supposed to amuse the unwary guests. One
+sprinkled them with water, another with black or white powder, as they
+passed by, and yet another, in the form of a monkey, struck them with
+a stick, whilst in a bower might be seen a mirror wherein all who
+looked saw only the distorted semblance of themselves. These unwelcome
+pleasantries were a part of the miscellaneous borrowings from the
+East. But for the easily amused folk of the Middle Ages, time passed
+merrily enough in the midst of such pastimes, and only the shadow on
+the dial seemed to mark its flight.
+
+But Mahaut, amid the manifold claims on her time and talent, had seen
+the shadow lengthening. From time to time she had been attacked by
+illness, to which blood-letting and other remedies of the day had
+brought relief. But on the 25th November 1329, when in Paris, she was
+seized with a sudden sickness, so sudden that sinister rumours were
+noised abroad. Human aid was of no avail. Two days later there was
+general lamentation. The shadow had lengthened into the night. Mahaut
+was dead. In accordance with her wishes, she was buried at the foot of
+her father's grave in the Abbey of Maubuisson, near Paris, her heart
+being placed in the Church of the Franciscans in Paris, beside the
+remains of her son, whose tomb there was afterwards removed to St.
+Denis. Her possession of Artois, for which she had laboured devotedly,
+became annexed to the Duchy of Burgundy through the marriage of her
+granddaughter with its Duke.
+
+Here, though only a tithe has been told, we must take leave of this
+cultivated woman of the fourteenth century, a type of the time and for
+all time. Her aim was the aim of all culture--the attainment of as
+complete a life as possible. To this she aspired, and to this in large
+measure she attained. What more can be said of even those we count the
+greatest?
+
+
+
+
+A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY FEMINISTE, CHRISTINE DE PISAN
+
+
+Christine de Pisan, Italian by birth, French by adoption, may be
+regarded not merely as a forerunner of true feminism, but also as one
+of its greatest champions, seeing that in her judgment of the sexes
+she endeavours to hold the scales evenly. Possessed of profound common
+sense and of a generous-hearted nature, she is wholly free from that
+want of fairness in urging woman's claims which is so fatally
+prejudicial to their just consideration. Although, strictly speaking,
+Christine was not original, she was representative, and interests us
+for that very reason. She was perhaps one of the most complete
+exponents of the finer strain of thought of her time. She stands
+before us, at the dawn of the fifteenth century, Janus-headed, looking
+to the past and to the future, a woman typical of a time of
+transition, on the one hand showing, in her writings, a clinging to
+old beliefs, and on the other hand asserting, in her contact with real
+life, independence of thought in the discussion of still unsolved
+questions.
+
+Christine was born at Venice in 1363, where her father, Thomas de
+Pisan, of Bologna, distinguished for his knowledge of medicine and
+astrology, had settled on his marriage with a daughter of one of the
+Councillors of the Republic. When five years of age, she was taken by
+her mother to Paris to join her father, who had been summoned thither
+some time before by the King, Charles the Fifth, to serve as his
+astrologer. At the end of the fourteenth century astrology played a
+very real and important part in men's lives. Before wars or journeys
+were undertaken, or additions to castle or chapel made, or even a new
+garment put on, the stars were consulted for the propitious day and
+hour. So deeply was Charles the Fifth imbued with a belief in the
+efficacy of this occult art that when he wished to confer some special
+honour, or to express his gratitude for some service rendered to him
+or to the State, he sought to enhance his bounty by sending an
+astrologer as part of his gift. By the time little Christine arrived
+in Paris her father had gained the confidence and esteem of the King,
+and was settled at Court with substantial maintenance. Here she was
+brought up as a maiden of quality, surrounded by much magnificence,
+for Charles loved beautiful things, and never stayed his hand to
+procure them, even when the gratification of his desires involved
+hardship to his people. He possessed many virtues, but economy was not
+one of them. The dismal castle of the Louvre, which had been the home
+of the French kings since the days of Philip Augustus, found no favour
+in his sight as a place of residence, and he quickly set about
+building the sumptuous H�tel de St. Paul, in what is now known as the
+"Quartier de l'Arsenal." The Louvre he destined for official
+functions, for an arsenal, and for his library. To form a library was
+no new thing in Paris. Some thirty years earlier Richard de Bury,
+Bishop of Durham (1333) and sometime Chancellor of England, speaks of
+his frequent ambassadorial visits to "Paris, the Paradise of the
+World, with its delightful libraries, where the days seemed ever few,
+for the greatness of our love." And he adds, "unfastening our
+purse-strings, we scattered money with joyous heart, and purchased
+inestimable books." But whilst it is true that Charles's predecessors
+had collected books, none before had thought of forming a library for
+public use, and Charles's work, as M. Delisle remarks, was really the
+first germ of the Biblioth�que Nationale.[30] To collect books was one
+of his greatest delights, and he spared no trouble or money to make
+his library as complete as possible. This taste for books he may have
+inherited from his father, King John, who, learning to read from a
+beautiful Book of Hours, early acquired a love of books from his
+mother, Jeanne of Burgundy. Charles also loved to lend or make
+presents of books, and among his many gifts, one--an offering to
+Richard the Second--may be seen in the British Museum (Royal 20, B
+VI.). The library was considerably depleted during the reign of
+Charles the Sixth, when it was used as a sort of storehouse from which
+presents were made to prince and prelate, or to any to whom it was
+desired to make a gift, or a recognition of services rendered. On the
+death of Charles the Sixth, in 1425, it was bought by the Duke of
+Bedford, Regent of France, and doubtless some of its treasures were
+transferred by him into England. Those that were left, and some that
+gradually found their way back to France, may now be seen in the
+Biblioth�que Nationale and in other libraries of France, and also in
+various libraries in other countries, but out of the 1200 books
+collected by Charles the Fifth, rather less than a hundred are now
+known to us.
+
+    [30] L. Delisle, _Recherches sur la libraire de Charles V_,
+    Paris, 1907.
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. Royale, Brussels._
+
+CHRISTINE DE PISAN.
+
+_To face page 119._]
+
+To increase the usefulness of his library, Charles employed a number
+of translators, not only of Greek and Latin authors, but also of the
+most important Arabic writings, thus bringing both the classics and
+the science of the day within the reach of the many students
+privileged to make use of it. It was in this library that Christine
+spent long days reading and meditating on the thoughts of the greatest
+minds, thus fitting herself for the part she had to play when life had
+ceased to be a gay dream. We can get from a miniature in a Book of
+Hours, now at Chantilly, and painted by the brothers Limbourg for
+Jean, Duc de Berri, a brother of the King, some idea of what this old
+residence of the Louvre was like. In this miniature we see represented
+a square grim castle, with a large tower at each corner and narrow
+slits for windows, suggestive more of a place of refuge in time of war
+and tumult than the home of a peace-loving, enlightened king. When
+Charles determined to beautify this sombre structure, statues were set
+up without and tapestries hung within. One of the towers was fitted up
+for the library, panelled with rare woods and furnished with some
+thirty small chandeliers and a large central silver lamp, kept lighted
+both night and day so that work could go on at all hours. In the
+courtyard an outside circular staircase (one of the earliest, if not
+_the_ earliest, of the kind) was added to give, as was said, a note of
+gaiety. But the idea of gaiety seems somewhat ironical when we learn
+that as it was difficult to get a sufficient number of large slabs
+quarried quickly, headstones from the cemetery of the Holy Innocents
+were taken for the purpose!
+
+Christine, as a child, showed an extraordinary capacity for learning,
+and this her father zealously fostered and developed. At the age of
+fifteen she married, and married for love, the King's notary and
+secretary, Etienne de Castel, a gentleman of Picardy. Her happiness
+and well-being seemed assured, but Fortune, whose wheel is ever
+revolving, though sometimes so slowly as to lull us into
+forgetfulness, had decreed otherwise. For Christine it revolved all
+too quickly. Two years after her marriage the King died (1380), and
+her husband and father lost their appointments. Gradually anxiety and
+sorrow crept like some baneful atmosphere into the once happy home.
+First she lost her father, and then, two or three years later, her
+husband died, leaving her, at the age of twenty-five, with three
+children to provide for. Like many another, she turned to letters as
+both a material and a mental support. Endowed with an extraordinary
+gift of versification, she began by writing short poems, chiefly on
+the joys and sorrows of love, expressing sometimes her own sentiments,
+sometimes those of others for whom she wrote. But she tells us that
+often when she made merry she would fain have wept. How many a one
+adown the centuries has re-echoed the same sad note!
+
+"Men must work and women must weep." So says the poet. But life shows
+us that men and women alike must needs do both. And so the sad
+Christine set to work to fit herself, by the study of the best ancient
+and modern writers, to produce more serious matter than love-ballads,
+turning, in her saddest moments, to Bo�thius and Dante for inspiration
+and solace. "I betook myself," she says, "like the child who at first
+is set to learn its A B C, to ancient histories from the beginning of
+the world--histories of the Hebrews and the Assyrians, of the Romans,
+the French, the Bretons, and diverse others--and then to the
+deductions of such sciences as I had time to give heed to, as well as
+to a study of the poets." Her master was Aristotle, and she made his
+ethics her gospel. "Ancelle de science," she calls herself, and
+remains a humble worshipper at the shrine of knowledge, for knowledge,
+she says, is "that which can change the mortal into the immortal." We
+can picture her to ourselves at work in the library of the Louvre,
+amidst its 900 precious MSS., and in the library of the University of
+Paris, to which she had access through her friend Gerson, the renowned
+Chancellor. In a miniature at the beginning of one of her MSS. she is
+seen seated, in a panelled recess, on a carved wooden bench, dressed
+in a simple blue gown and a high white coif. She is working at a folio
+on a large table covered with tapestry, with a greyhound lying at her
+feet. It is quite possible that this may be either a conventional
+setting, or one due to the imagination of the artist, but as the
+miniaturists of those days were, as far as they could be, realists, it
+is more than possible that we here see her represented at work in her
+favourite nook in the Louvre library, together with the favourite dog
+who shared her lonely hours. Gradually solace came to her through
+work, and having found so precious a treasure for herself, she, like
+our own modern sage, never tired of preaching to others the gospel of
+its blessedness.
+
+Whilst Christine wrote and lived her student life--"son cuer hermit
+dans l'ermitage de Pens�e"--her fame went forth, and princes sought,
+by tempting offers, to attach her to their courts, but without
+success. Of these, Henry the Fourth of England, already acquainted
+with her poems, and Gian Galleazo Visconti, Duke of Milan, were the
+most importunate, and particularly the former, who was unaccustomed to
+rebuff and failure. But Christine, with repeated gracious thanks and
+guarded refusals, remained firm. No reason for her decision is
+recorded, but it may well be believed that her patriotism would not
+allow her, even with the certainty of ease and emolument, to quit
+France at that critical time, or to serve the enemy of her adopted
+country.
+
+Although Christine's reading was very varied and extensive, there were
+two subjects--the amelioration of her war-distraught country, then in
+the throes of the Hundred Years' War, and the championship of the
+cause of womankind--which specially appealed to her as a patriot and a
+woman, and for which she strove with unceasing ardour. In all her
+writings she so interweaves these two causes that it is only by
+approaching them in the same way that we can understand her view of
+their psychological unity. To Christine these interests were
+essentially identical, for she recognised how paramount is woman's
+influence in the making or marring of the world--how, in truth, in
+woman's hand lies a key which can unlock a Heaven or a Hell.
+
+There was sore need of a patriot, and in Christine one was found. It
+has been well said of her, and by a Frenchman too, that "though born a
+woman and an Italian, she alone at the Court of France seemed to have
+manly qualities and French sentiments." France was in a sorry plight.
+There was war in the land, there was war in the palace. The sick King
+suffered more and more from attacks of madness, and during these
+periods the Dukes of Orleans and Burgundy fought for the regency.
+Christine began her patriotic work by fervent appeals to Isabella, the
+Queen (to whom she offered a MS. now in the British Museum),[31] to
+use her influence to put an end to these dissensions which so greatly
+added to the troubles of the kingdom. She also lost no opportunity of
+proclaiming in her various writings the duties and responsibilities of
+kings and nobles to the people, and the necessity, if there was ever
+to be peace and prosperity, of winning their regard. At the command of
+Philip le Hardi, Duke of Burgundy, and uncle of the King, she wrote in
+prose, from chronicles of the time and from information obtained from
+many connected with the King's household, _Le Livre des faits et
+bonnes moeurs du roi Charles V_, recounting his virtuous life and deeds
+and their advantage to the realm, and introducing a remarkable
+dissertation on the benefit to a country of a strong middle-class.
+She, of course, reasoned from Aristotle. The subject is a commonplace
+one now, but in the case of any one living at the beginning of the
+fifteenth century, and brought up, as Christine had been, at a
+magnificent Court, it shows rare independence and breadth of thought
+to have grasped and proclaimed with such firmness and clearness as is
+displayed in her treatise the germ of the policy of all modern
+civilised nations--that a middle-class is essential to bring into
+touch those placed at the opposite extremes, the rich and the poor.
+
+    [31] Harley, 4431.
+
+To Christine belongs an honour beyond that of having been a patriot
+and a champion of her sex--the honour of having revealed Dante to
+France.[32] Scattered up and down her writings are many allusions to
+the _Divina Commedia_, showing how real a place it must have filled in
+her soul's life. She especially recommends it for profitable study in
+the place of the "hateful" _Romance of the Rose_, concerning which she
+gave the warning to her son:--
+
+    Se bien veulx et chastement vivre,
+    De la Rose ne lis le livre.
+
+    [32] A. Farinelli, _Dante e la Francia_, vol. i. p. 192, 1908.
+
+Like Dante, sad and lonely--"souvent seulete et pensive, regretant le
+temps pass�"--like him she also realised the thirst for knowledge as
+an ever-present want of the soul, and that its ultimate perfection is
+only to be attained by following after virtue and knowledge. Although,
+as regards profundity, her conception of the world and of life cannot
+be compared with that of her great prototype, or even with that of
+such an one as St. Hildegarde, still she had read with unflagging
+diligence a vast number of profane and ecclesiastical writers, and
+seems to have been well versed in the varied knowledge of her time,
+especially history. But whilst it is possible to criticise her
+learning, tempered as this was by her character and the needs of her
+day, it is at the same time possible to acknowledge that in spite of
+flaws and an often over-elaborated setting, moral truth sparkles
+gemlike throughout her writings. One of her biographers speaks of her
+thus: "Her morale is so pure and so universally human that not only
+does it remain true to-day, but it will retain imperishable value as
+long as ever human society is based on a pure and healthy moral
+foundation."
+
+In her poem _Le Chemin de long Estude_--a title taken from Dante's
+appeal to Virgil at the opening of the _Inferno_--Christine begins by
+acknowledging her debt to the immortal poet, saying that much that she
+has to tell has already been told by "Dante of Florence in his book."
+Virgil as guide is replaced by the Cumean Sibyl, who appears to
+Christine in a dream, and offers to conduct her to another and a more
+perfect world, one where there is no pain and misery. To this
+Christine consents on condition that "sad Hades, whither �neas once
+was taken," is not included in the journey. The Sibyl therefore
+promises to reveal to her, instead, in what manner misfortune came
+upon earth, whilst at the same time showing her on the way all that
+is worth seeing in this world, from the Pillars of Hercules, "the end
+of the world," to distant Cathay. However exhausting this programme
+may appear to us, Christine, knowing the real passion of the late
+Middle Ages for travel--for even those who could not travel in reality
+did so in imagination,--makes use of it as a setting for the
+introduction of a discussion on the qualities most necessary to good
+government. This she does, even at the risk of incurring displeasure
+in high quarters, recalling how Dante's patriotism led to banishment
+and death in exile, but she adds, "Qui bien ayme, tout endure." She
+pours forth her classical examples in a chaotic stream, but when she
+leaves earth, and ascends to the celestial regions, she not only shows
+herself versed in the astronomy of the time, but also expresses some
+beauty of thought. The order of the firmament, where all obey law
+without ceasing, so that harmony ensues "like sweet melody," reminds
+her of Pythagoras and Plato, and suggests to her what life on earth
+might be if good laws were made and observed. In furtherance of her
+idea, she appeals to Reason, who presides over the Virtues or Divine
+Powers, to interrogate the three earthly disputants, Nobility, Riches,
+and Wisdom. In the end Reason awards the prize to Wisdom, condemning
+Riches as the great enemy of mankind. Thereupon Wisdom appeals to the
+verdicts of Juvenal, Bo�thius, St. Jerome, and others to establish
+that it is Virtue alone that is of worth, and ennobles a man, and then
+sets forth the qualities of a good sovereign. But as this leads to
+some difference of opinion, Christine, who was withal a courtly lady,
+descends to earth in order to ask the King, Charles the Sixth, to
+decide the matter. This dream-poem she dedicates to her royal master
+for his diversion in his saner moments, and thus once again introduces
+into high places the subject so near to her heart. She lets it be seen
+that she herself, like Dante, did not believe in the blending of the
+spiritual and the temporal powers. And as regards temporal power she
+adds--perhaps borrowing the idea from Dante's _De Monarchia_, and
+anticipating Napoleon's dream--that in order to ensure peace on earth,
+it is necessary that one supreme ruler should reign over the whole
+world. "La sua volontade e nostra pace," sang a soul in Dante's heaven
+of the Moon--the lowest in the celestial system--when questioned
+whether it was content with its lowly place. The poet therefore adds,
+"ogni dove in cielo e paradiso." Christine, echoing these thoughts,
+would fain apply them to life on earth, giving them their deepest and
+fullest meaning.
+
+Though she laboured so unceasingly for the good of her country, she
+also did her utmost to defend her sex from the indiscriminate censure
+which had been heaped upon it, for the evil spoken seemed to her far
+to outweigh the good. A century before, Dante had also idealised
+woman--even if, as some think, he personified some abstract
+quality--and placed her in heaven beside the Deity. Chivalry had also
+idealised woman, but in an exotic, exaggerated manner, which was bound
+to reach its zenith, and bound also to have its darker side. So we
+find that to speak good or ill of womankind became a conventionalism
+in the Middle Ages. Black or white was the tone chosen by the artist
+in words. There was no blending, no shading. Women were either
+deified, or held to be evil incarnate. The material side of life men
+understood, and could depict with some exactness, but to grasp in any
+way its subtler aspects required an education which could be attained
+only by slow degrees, since it meant the gradual modification of the
+long-cherished illusion that brute force is the world's only weapon. A
+want of capacity to discern is often responsible for a depreciatory
+opinion, and we can but ascribe this strangely narrow-minded and
+superficial attitude towards woman to some such want. Christine set
+herself the task of trying to remedy this evil, not by shouting in the
+market-place, but by studying men and women as God made them and as
+she found them. Before she began her work, a new day seemed to be
+dawning. Just as, when classicism was in full decadence, Plutarch
+wrote _De mulierum virtutibus_ (of the virtue of women), so, in the
+fourteenth century, Boccaccio gave to the world _De claris mulieribus_
+(of right-renowned women). We do not expect to find woman treated on
+a very high plane by Boccaccio, but we recognise that, in a way, this
+work forms a fresh starting-point in the eternal controversy. Perhaps
+we should not have had this curious collection of stories of women,
+virtuous and vicious, mythological and historical--stories which are
+certainly very inferior as art to those of the _Decameron_--had not a
+crisis occurred in Boccaccio's life. One day a Carthusian monk came to
+him with a warning message from the dead, and, much troubled in mind,
+he resolved to try to begin life afresh. But he was a better
+story-teller than a moraliser. He would fain save his soul, but he
+liked and courted popularity, and knew well the deeper meaning of the
+proverb, "A terreno dolce, vanga di legno." And so he mingles virtue
+and vice, hoping, as he says, that "some utility and profit shall come
+of the same." To us of to-day, the chief interest of this work is that
+Boccaccio's fame perhaps gave a definite impetus to the discussion of
+the sex, instead of wholesale assertion, and also that it probably
+suggested to Chaucer the idea for his _Legend of Good Women_. How
+refreshing to find ourselves in the atmosphere of the kindly Chaucer!
+Let us pause for a moment, and recall what he says of women, he who
+was not only a knightly Court-poet, but also a popular singer, well
+versed in the practical wisdom of life. In the prologue we read, "Let
+be the chaf, and wryt wel of the corn," and in allusion to his
+library of sixty books, old and new, of history and love-stories, he
+says that for every bad woman, mention was duly made of a hundred good
+ones. Time and experience in no way dull this appreciation, for when,
+later, _The Canterbury Tales_ appear, his estimate has risen ten-fold,
+since in the prologue to "The Miller's Tale" we read, "and ever a
+thousand gode ageyn one badde." From this time onwards, literature on
+the subject increases almost _ad infinitum_. Treatises and imaginary
+debates seem to vie with each other for popularity. All these make
+intensely interesting reading, for these fanciful discussions, which
+are supposed to take place, sometimes between a man and a woman,
+sometimes between a mixed company in a garden or villa or some bath
+resort where many are gathered together, are really a record of the
+intellectual amusements of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
+"Que devez-vous pr�f�rer, du plaisir qui va vous �chapper bient�t, ou
+d'une esp�rance toujours vive, quoique toujours tromp�e?" "Which sex
+loves the more easily or can do the better without love?" "It is not
+enough to know how to win love, but one must also know how to keep
+such love when it has been won." Such-like were the subtle problems
+which on these occasions folk set themselves to solve.
+
+But whilst love problems could be treated as a pastime, they also had
+their serious side. Of this there is an example in Christine's story
+of _The Duke of True Lovers_. Although much in its narration is
+evidently the mere invention of the poetess, it is quite possible,
+nay even probable, that it has some historical basis. Christine begins
+her story by saying that it had been confided to her by a young prince
+who did not wish his name to be divulged, and who desired only to be
+known as "The Duke of True Lovers." It has been suggested, with much
+likelihood, that this is in truth the love-story of Jean, Duc de
+Bourbon, and of Marie, Duchesse de Berri, daughter of the famous Jean,
+Duc de Berri, and the inheritor of his MSS. When the story opens, the
+heroine of it, whoever she may have been, is already wedded. Hence all
+the difficulties of the hero, and indeed of both. Christine, with her
+womanly sympathy and psychological insight, makes all so intensely
+real that we are quite carried away in imagination to the courtly life
+of the fifteenth century. We read of the first meeting; of the Duke's
+love at first sight; of Castle daily life; of a three days' tournament
+given in honour of the lady; of devices for secret meetings and the
+interchange of letters; of the inevitable scandal-monger; of a letter
+from a former _gouvernante_--whose aid as go-between had been
+sought--containing a most comprehensive and remarkable treatise on
+feminine morality, the dangers of illicit love, and the satisfaction
+of simple wifely duty; of the separation which the position of the
+lady, and the gallantry of her lover, alike demanded; of meetings at
+intervals; of the mutual solace of short love-poems; and then the
+story, perhaps to evade identification, ends vaguely. But as we finish
+the story, we cannot help feeling that even if Christine's setting is
+fiction, she yet gives us a glance of real life.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+LADY IN HORSE-LITTER, RETURNING FROM TOURNAMENT.
+
+Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 132._]
+
+When Christine turned to her serious work in the cause of womankind,
+she began by attacking two books, Ovid's _Art of Love_, and _The
+Romance of the Rose_, both of which, in the Middle Ages, it was deemed
+wellnigh sacrilegious to decry. Her challenge, _L'Epistre au Dieu
+d'Amours_, took the form of an address to the God of Love, professing
+to come from women of all conditions, imploring Cupid's aid against
+disloyal and deceitful lovers, whose base behaviour she largely
+attributes to the false teaching of these two books. This argument
+appeared in 1399, and she soon discovered that she had stirred up a
+hornet's nest. But she had attacked advisedly and fearlessly, and was
+quite prepared for any counter onslaught. Her position was
+considerably strengthened by the alliance and co-operation of her
+staunch friend Gerson, the Chancellor, who himself, in the name of the
+clergy, took up arms against the flagrant scurrility to be found in
+the portion of _The Romance of the Rose_ contributed by Jean de Meun.
+Other powerful allies joined the cause, and, to help to crystallise
+their efforts, species of "Courts of Love" were instituted, not alone
+for discourse on love, as heretofore, but also in the defence of
+women. All who united in this meritorious fellowship undertook to wear
+a distinctive badge, and thus proclaim their confession of faith.
+Among these Orders one was styled "L'Escu vert � la dame blanche,"
+another, "L'Ordre de la Rose," and so on, suggestive of their purport.
+The first-named was founded by the brave soldier Jean le Meingre,
+Mar�chal de Boucicaut, whose portrait may be seen in his superb Book
+of Hours, painted between 1399 and 1407, now in the Mus�e
+Jacquemart-Andr�, Paris.[33] Its membership was restricted to thirteen
+knights, who swore to defend the honour of women against all
+detractors. To distinguish them from others less gallantly disposed,
+they wore on the sleeve an ornament in the shape of a small shield,
+enamelled green on the outside, and with the representation, on the
+underside, of a woman, enamelled in white.
+
+    ... Vous portez la dame en verde targe
+    Pour d�monstrer que de hardi visage
+    Vous vous voulez pour les dames tenir
+    Contre ceulz qui leur porteront dommage!
+
+    [33] "Le Mus�e Jacquemart-Andr�," _Gazette des Beaux-Arts_,
+    August 1912.
+
+Of the Order of the Rose and its foundation, Christine, in one of her
+poems, gives most picturesque and interesting particulars, interesting
+because they are evidently taken from an actual scene, though
+Christine, in her r�le as poetess, feels it necessary to add touches
+suggestive of fairyland rather than of real life. A numerous assembly,
+with goodwill at heart, has met together in the magnificent dwelling
+of Louis, Duke of Orleans, the King's brother, Christine being one of
+the number. Suddenly there comes into their midst one personifying the
+Goddess Venus, surrounded by maidens garlanded with roses and carrying
+golden bowls filled with them. The bowls placed on the table, the
+Goddess proceeds to announce the rules of the Order, above all
+enjoining those present to avoid envy, and in no way to perjure
+themselves, since this would be a most heinous and hateful sin. The
+badge chosen is a fresh rose, but if any member of the Order should
+happen to be in a country where such is not attainable, or when the
+season is unpropitious, then a rose fashioned in gold or silver, or
+one embroidered in silk, will suffice. With pledges of loyalty,
+
+    A bonne amour je fais veu et promesse
+    Et � la fleur qui est rose clam�e,
+    A la vaillant de Loyaut� deesse,
+    Par qui nous est ceste chose inform�e,
+    Qu'� tous jours mais la bonne renomm�e
+    Je garderay de dame en toute chose
+    Ne par moy ja femme n'yert diffam�e:
+    Et pour ce prens je L'Ordre de la Rose,[34]
+
+    [34] "Le Dit de la Rose," 197-204, _OEuvres po�tiques de
+    Christine de Pisan_, t. ii., pub. par Maurice Roy, 1891.
+
+all the company deck themselves with roses. The charter is given by
+the Goddess into the safe-keeping of Christine, who describes it as
+written on fine parchment in letters of azure, and fastened with a
+silken cord of the same colour. From this cord hangs a rare gem, on
+one side of which their patroness, the Goddess of Love, and on the
+other Cupid, with his feet on a leopard, are depicted. This moral and
+literary contest is perhaps the most brilliant of the many discussions
+that took place in the Middle Ages in honour of women. The highest and
+the wisest in the land joined in it, but all the honour must be given
+to Christine for having, by her brave and reasonable attitude, caused
+the problem, which henceforth was to evolve like truth itself, to be
+treated on a rational basis. "Toute la foy remaint en une femme," says
+Christine. Were not her words, nearly 500 years later, echoed by Renan
+when he says, "Apr�s J�sus, c'est Marie de Magdale qui a le plus fait
+pour la fondation du Christianisme"?
+
+_L'Epistre au Dieu d'Amours_ is an extraordinary product of worldly
+wisdom and common sense, seasoned with satire. One of the complaints
+against disloyal suitors, and one which strikes a singularly modern
+note, is that they make protests of love, and false promises, which
+must be either paid for dearly, or rejected with scorn. Then the hero,
+if he has won the day, proclaims his victory in taverns and other
+places of resort, and even in mixed company. Or if, as is more often
+the case, he has lost it, he still tries, by suggestive hints, to
+appear to his fellows a successful gallant. Surely the worldling of
+to-day does not seem to differ very essentially from his brother of
+the fifteenth century, or to have progressed any farther along the
+path of loyalty!
+
+Christine's line of argument is that the many must not be condemned
+for the shortcomings of the few, and that even when God made the
+angels, some were bad. To the charge that books are full of the
+condemnation of women, she replies with the simple remark that books
+were not written by women. Where is the shade of the worthy Christine
+to-day? Does it walk the earth with a flag of triumph or a laurel
+wreath whilst its sisters in the flesh are writing on every subject in
+heaven and earth and sea? "De nos jours, le monde est aux femmes."
+
+Is it marvellous, asks Christine, that a woman--"une chose simpl�te,
+une ignorante petite femmellette," as she expresses it--should be
+betrayed by man, when even the great city of Troy was, and when all
+the books and romances are full of the betrayal of kings and kingdoms?
+And if a woman is not constant by nature, why should Jean de Meun, in
+_The Romance of the Rose_, devise so many tricks to deceive her,
+seeing that it is not necessary to make a great assault upon a feeble
+place? Then she deftly turns the tables on the other sex, reminding
+each that he is the son of his mother, and that
+
+    Se mauvaise est il ne peut valor rien,
+    Car nul bon fruit de mal arbre ne vient.
+
+And so on to the end, all is argument and banter. The repute of her
+letter must have travelled quickly, for whilst Christine was still
+combating with dissentients, an epitomised rendering of it appeared
+(1402) in English from the pen of Hoccleve, the pupil of Chaucer,
+entitled _The Lettre of Cupide, God of Love_.
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. Royale, Munich._
+
+LA CIT� DES DAMES.
+
+_To face page 138._]
+
+Later, Christine, with Boccaccio's _De claris mulieribus_ before her,
+writes _La Cit� des Dames_, an account of the building of an imaginary
+city which is to shelter within its strong ramparts the women of all
+times and all countries who have distinguished themselves by good and
+heroic deeds. This has been aptly called "The Golden Book of
+Heroines." It may certainly be considered her masterpiece on her
+favourite subject. She urges that philosophers and poets, with one
+accord, have defamed women, and she appeals to God, asking why such a
+thing should be, seeing that He Himself made them and gave them such
+inclinations as seemed good to Him, and that in no way could He err.
+She maintains that God created the soul, and made it as good in woman
+as in man, and that it is not the sex, but the perfection of virtue,
+that is material. Combating the suggestion that women are not fit to
+plead in Court because they have not sufficient intelligence to apply
+the law when they have learnt it, she refers to history to prove that
+women who have had the management of affairs have shown that, far from
+lacking intelligence and judgment, they have possessed both in large
+measure. At the same time, whilst defending their capability when
+necessity arises, she does not think it necessary for women to
+interfere in matters which seem essentially man's business. Her
+remarks on the subject of marriage are certainly practical, and at the
+same time disclose a strange unloveliness in contemporary manners. She
+is not of St. Paul's opinion that it is better not to marry, but all
+the same she suggests that, unless without means, that woman is
+happier who does not marry a second time, seeing that the life of a
+married woman is often worse than if she were in the hands of the
+Saracens--the terror of the Middle Ages,--and that frequently after
+her husband has been out enjoying himself, her only supper, on his
+return, is a beating. She counsels the education of women, and
+condemns those who suggest that this will conduce to unseemly ways. In
+truth, her wonderful sense of justice, and her enlightened opinions
+generally, make it a marvellous r�sum� of statesmanship as far as it
+goes. It is a real Utopia. Perhaps to Christine it was a glimpse of
+the Promised Land! As we read her views on the education of boys and
+girls together, in this happy city, we feel that she might be
+discussing with us the problems of to-day. She says that if boys and
+girls are taught the same subjects, girls can, as a rule, learn just
+as well, and just as intelligently, as boys, and so on. In this
+conclusion she forestalls the learned Cornelius Agrippa, a doctor and
+philosopher of the sixteenth century, and one of the most original and
+remarkable men of his time, who boldly asserts that sex is merely
+physical, and does not extend to soul or rational power. She sums up
+by strongly advocating study and learning, both for self-improvement
+and as a consolation and possession for all time.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+SETTING OUT FOR POISSY.
+
+Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 140._]
+
+Of her poetical writings on love and the sexes, perhaps the most
+enchanting is _Le Livre du Dit de Poissy_. In it she takes us, on a
+bright spring morning, with a joyous company, from Paris to the royal
+convent of Poissy, where her child is at school. She describes all the
+beauties of the country, the fields gay with flowers, the warbling of
+the birds, the shepherdesses with their flocks, the willow-shaded
+river bank along which they ride, the magic of the forest of St.
+Germain, a little world apart of greenery and shade, filled with the
+song of the nightingales. Laughing and singing by the way, they reach
+the convent gate. Then follows a description of the beautiful carved
+cloisters, the chapter-house, the nuns' dress and their dormitory, the
+garden scented with lavender and roses, with one part, where small
+animals are allowed to run wild, left uncultivated, and the ponds well
+stocked with fish. As the day wanes, they bid farewell to the nuns,
+who offer them gifts of purses and girdles embroidered in silk and
+gold, worked by their own hands. They return to the inn where they are
+to spend the night, and after supper wander forth to listen to the
+nightingales, then dance a carole, and so to bed. The ride back to
+Paris in the morning, during which a discussion on love matters is
+introduced, is painted with the same impressionist touch, and it is
+with real regret that we take leave of these happy folk as they alight
+in Paris city from their stout nags.
+
+Another similar discourse, _Le D�bat de deux amants_, has for setting
+a gala entertainment, taking place, like the founding of the "Order of
+the Rose," under the auspices of Louis, Duke of Orleans, who ever
+extended a princely protection to Christine. Louis had married
+Valentine Visconti, daughter of Gian Galleazo Visconti, founder of the
+Certosa, near Pavia, a princess well versed in art and letters, and
+withal in pomp and splendour. It is on a day in May, the garden gay
+with gallants and fair ladies. We hear the minstrels play, and watch
+some of the company, decked with garlands, dancing under the trees. In
+the palace there is music and singing. Christine is seated in a
+tapestried hall with one or two esquires who prefer to discourse of
+love to joining in the jollity. After a time the talk turns on fickle
+men, and Christine brings forth from her vast storehouse of knowledge
+classical and medi�val examples. As she mentions Theseus, and recalls
+his baseness to Ariadne, she points to the tapestry on the wall before
+them, where the story is woven. This little touch makes the scene very
+real to us, for the record of the purchase of this tapestry, with the
+price of twelve hundred francs paid for it, may still be found amongst
+the royal inventories.
+
+There is such a volume and variety of works from Christine's pen that
+it is no easy task to make a fair selection. One of the most
+significant, since it deals with a subject which permeated medi�val
+thought, and on which she was wont to dwell, is _La Mutation de
+fortune_, "Fortune more inconstant than the moon," says Christine. In
+it she writes with her heart in her hand, as it were, telling first of
+the sore havoc Fortune has wrought amongst those most dear to her. Yet
+though her own heart has been torn on the Wheel of Fortune, she stands
+before her fellow sufferers like some figure of Hope pointing upward,
+where, she says, wrong is surely righted. And thus she turns to the
+world in general, not in the spirit of the pessimist, but rather in
+that of the philosopher. She well knows that Fortune is no blindfolded
+goddess turning writhing humanity on a wheel, but a something rooted
+in ourselves, and she has pity for "la povre fragilit� humaine."
+Though so independent and advanced in thought, she is still found
+clinging in her writings to medi�val forms. As a setting for her
+thoughts on Fortune's changes, she makes use of the favourite simile
+of a castle--here the Castle of Fortune--as representing the world,
+wherein the rich and the poor, the strong and the weak, jostle one
+another. She criticises all men, from the prince to the pauper, but
+not women, since these have been sufficiently criticised and decried.
+It is like the prelude to a _Dance of Death_. Then she tells of the
+paintings on the walls of this imaginary castle, and uses this
+medi�val fancy, itself borrowed from the classics (_Met._ ii. 5. 770),
+to give what is really a history of the world as she knew it, written
+to demonstrate the instability of all earthly conditions.
+
+Once again, with her versatile gifts, she turns from philosophy to a
+treatise on military tactics and justice, _Le Livre des faits d'armes
+et de chevalerie_. However devoid of interest, except as a landmark in
+the history of military strategy and customs, this work may be to-day,
+it was thought of sufficient importance in the reign of our Henry the
+Seventh for the king to command Caxton to translate and print it
+(1489) with the title of _The Book of Faytes of Arms_, a book still
+sought after by our bibliophiles. It was further honoured by being
+quoted as an authority in the reign of Henry the Eighth. Considering
+the nature of its contents, this seems quite an extraordinary tribute
+to the judgment and ability of the writer.
+
+But the misery of France is ever increasing. Ceaseless civil war and
+foreign invasion impoverish the people, and make desolate the land.
+The dissolute Court is extravagant and filled with discord. Christine,
+fired with patriotic fervour, once more makes an effort, which proves
+to be her final one, to arouse the pleasure-loving nobility to some
+sense of its obligations to the nation. _Le Livre des trois vertues_,
+and _Le Livre de la paix_, appear one after the other. In the former,
+which she dedicates to the Dauphine, Margaret of Burgundy, she merely
+adds another to the long list of discourses for the guidance of women
+which, in Christian times, begins as early as the second century.[35]
+This theme forms the subject of so considerable a didactic literature
+that it can only be hinted at here. Whether treated from a religious
+or from a social point of view, or the two combined, the sum-total of
+the teaching is moral training with a view to self-restraint and
+subordination. Christine addresses herself to all women, from the
+highest to the lowest, but her principal theme is the influence a
+princess may and should have on Court life. She further counsels not
+princesses alone, but all well-born women, not to attach too much
+importance to the things of this world, to be charitable, and to see
+to the education of their children, and so to inform themselves that
+they may be capable of filling their husbands' place when they are
+obliged to be absent at war or at the Court. She adds a plea for the
+country, that war should be opposed, and one for the poor, that pity
+should be shown to them. Then she addresses herself to the townswoman,
+advising her to see to her household, not to fear to go into the
+kitchen, and to avoid all luxury; then to servants, counselling them
+on no account to take bribes, adding the practical touch that as God
+is everywhere, and only asks of each a good heart, it is not
+necessary for them to go to Mass every day; then to the wife of the
+labourer, bidding her to guard well her master's flocks and to
+encourage her husband to work; and, finally, she has a word of
+sympathy for the poor, holding out to them hope of recompense in
+heaven for misery endured here, and exhorting them to have patience
+meanwhile. From this patriotic and practical advice to women she turns
+to men, and in _Le Livre de la Paix_ sets forth the duties of princes
+and of those in power to the people, importuning them to exercise
+clemency, liberality, and justice.
+
+    [35] A. A. Hentsch, _De la litt�rature du moyen �ge
+    s'adressant sp�cialement aux femmes_, Cahors, 1903.
+
+But it is too late. The sand in the hour-glass is running low.
+Disaster follows disaster, until the final blow is struck at Agincourt
+(1415), where the flower of the French nation is cut off, and princes
+of the blood are carried away into exile. Christine, with bleeding
+heart, and worn with trouble and disappointment, retires to the
+convent of Poissy, "un tr�s doux paradis," perchance to find peace and
+consolation within its tranquil walls, and to implore Heaven's aid for
+her sore-stricken country. For fourteen years no sound from her
+reaches the outside world. Then, inspired by the glorious advent and
+deeds of Joan of Arc, with all her old passion she pours forth a final
+hymn of praise and thanksgiving to the woman who has at last aroused
+France to patriotism, and so dies in peace at the solemn moment of
+Charles the Seventh's consecration at Rheims.
+
+    O Thou! ordain�d Maid of very God!
+    Joanna! born in Fortune's golden hour,
+    On thee the Holy Spirit pours His Flood
+    And His high grace is given thee for dower.
+    Now all great gifts are thine:--O blessed be He
+    That lent thee life!--how word my grateful prayer?
+    --No prayer of thine was spoken fruitlessly,
+    O Maid of God! O Joan! O Virgin rare!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Mark me this portent! strange beyond all telling!
+    How this despoil�d Kingdom stricken lay,
+    And no man raised his hand to guard his dwelling,
+    Until a Woman came to show the way.
+    Until a Woman (since no man dare try)
+    Rallied the land and bade the traitors fly.
+    Honour to Womankind! It needs must be
+    That God loves Woman, since He fashioned Thee!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    O strange! This little maid sixteen years old
+    On whom no harness weigheth overmuch.
+    So strong the little hands! enduring hold
+    She seemeth fed by that same armour's touch,
+    Nurtured on iron--as before her vanish
+    The enemies of her triumphal day;
+    And this by many men is witness�d;
+    Yea, many eyes be witness of that fray!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Castles and towns, she wins them back for France,
+    And France is free again, and this her doing!
+    Never was power given as to her lance!
+    A thousand swords could do no more pursuing.
+    Of all staunch men and true she is the Chief,
+    Captain and Leader, for that she alone
+    Is braver than Achilles the brave Greek.
+    All praise be given to God who leadeth Joan!
+
+
+
+
+AGNES SOREL
+
+
+So much glamour has attached, and rightly so, to Joan of Arc, the
+soldier-saviour of Charles the Seventh of France, that another woman,
+Agnes Sorel--Charles's good angel of a less militant order--has been
+almost entirely overlooked, and where she has been remembered, has
+been treated by the few with the honour due to her, and by the many
+merely as Charles's mistress. But to her it was given to be a great
+inspirer of Charles, and much of the good that this weak king and
+ungrateful man did for his country may assuredly be in large measure
+attributed to her influence, just as the greatest merit that can be
+recorded of him personally was his devotion to her whilst she lived,
+though the memory of her availed naught after she had passed away.
+Agnes Sorel came as it were between the ebb and flow of the late
+Middle Ages and the Renaissance, when chivalry, not as a passing
+emotion but as an education, still lingered in men's relation with
+women. Respect for womankind grew in the Middle Ages in France under
+the double influence of religion and chivalry, of which the cult of
+the Virgin and the cult of woman were the outcome. In honour of both,
+men strove in tournament and fought in battle. With the cry, "For our
+Lady," or "For God and my Lady," men hurled themselves into the thick
+of the strife as if the goddess, whether divine or human, in whose
+name they ventured, had made her champions invulnerable. And, in a
+manner as it would seem of action and re-action, the goddess became
+humanised and the woman deified. The former tendency may be traced in
+miracles attributed to the Virgin, and, later, in the "Mysteries," and
+the latter in tales of chivalry, where love is treated as a gift from
+Heaven, and the recipients of it are idealised. Stories which seem to
+contradict this, and to refute all accepted ideas of chivalry and
+honour, are frequently original only in details, the bases being
+borrowed from Oriental tales. Buddha's country, the land of the
+Zenana, supplied much material of an exaggerated nature which in the
+West became mere travesty.
+
+It is always difficult to determine exactly the origin of anything so
+subtle as a sentiment, especially one which gradually pervades and
+influences a people. It is, in its way, at first like a soft breeze,
+of which we can only see the effect. But as we try to discover some
+definite, if only partial, reason for this interchange of simple human
+relations between the Virgin and her votaries, we remember that St.
+Francis, the embodiment of exalted human sentiment, had lived, and
+that scholasticism, in that phase of it which treated the dialectical
+subtleties of words as paramount, was on the wane. Hence spirit,
+which had so long been restrained, and which is ever in conflict with
+form, again prevailed, and mankind discovered that a loving Mother had
+taken the place of a stately Queen in the Heavens. This attitude
+towards the Virgin is revealed in the miracles attributed to her
+agency. It is also shown in one of the greatest works of piety of the
+thirteenth century, the _Meditations on the Life of Jesus Christ_,[36]
+which, through the medium of the "Mysteries," introduced into sacred
+pictorial art some of its most dramatic and appealing scenes. Where is
+there to be found anything more tenderly human than the incident of
+"Christ taking leave of His Mother" before His journey to Jerusalem to
+consummate His mission?
+
+    [36] These meditations, attributed in the past, and by some
+    even now, to St. Bonaventura, are considered by other
+    scholars to be of Cistercian inspiration. P. Perdrizet, _La
+    Vierge de Mis�ricorde_, 1908, p. 15.
+
+This note of the womanly element in its fairest form, gradually
+insinuating itself more and more, and permeating life, art, and
+literature, is the key to the right understanding of the position
+which woman had attained in the civilised world.
+
+Before turning our special attention to Agnes Sorel, let us recall the
+condition of France at the beginning of the fifteenth century.
+
+When the lunatic King Charles the Sixth died in 1422, and Charles, his
+son, at the age of nineteen, succeeded under the title of "King of
+Bourges," Paris was held by the Burgundians, who were in league with
+the English. The Dukes of Burgundy and of Brittany were alike
+vacillating in their policy, being at one time attached to the king's
+party, and at another allied to the English. With the exception of a
+few castles, the strongholds of lords loyal to the Crown, the English
+possessed the whole of France north of the Loire, from the Meuse to
+the Bay of Mont St. Michel. Hither the Duke of Bedford was sent as
+regent for the English king, Henry the Sixth, then ten months old,
+who, by the terms of the Treaty of Troyes (1420), was the lawful king,
+the right of succession having been conferred on his father, Henry the
+Fifth, when he married Catherine, the daughter of Charles the Sixth of
+France.
+
+Charles the Seventh divided his time between Bourges and Poitiers,
+where the government was carried on, and Loches, Chinon, and Tours,
+the places he dearly loved, and in which he sought the solitude he
+craved for. But even in these seemingly peaceful retreats his lethargy
+and indolence were disturbed by perpetual intrigues, which it must be
+admitted were largely fostered by his own caprices and fickle
+affections. Meanwhile a cry of misery was arising from the
+war-devastated land. Churches and convents, castles and cottages, were
+all fallen into ruin, and brambles grew on the untilled land where
+once golden corn had waved. Peasants hid their horses during the day
+and brought them out to graze at night. As Alain Chartier wrote at
+the time, "Les pays champestres sont tournez � l'estat de la mer, o�
+chascun a tant de seigneurie comme il a de force." Men of all
+conditions, from the proudest lord to the poorest peasant, joined in
+spasmodic and detached efforts to drive out the English, but with the
+result that they did little else than harass them. Want of cohesion
+was the characteristic of the national resistance until, from a small
+village in the east of France, there appeared a deliverer in the
+person of Joan of Arc. Instantly, as if her sword were a magic wand,
+all the fighting men, impelled and inspired by the strength of her
+personality, rallied around her, and victory was assured.
+
+The story of the siege and surrender of Orleans, of the crowning of
+Charles in Rheims Cathedral, of Joan subsequently falling into the
+hands of the Burgundians, who sold her to their allies, the English,
+of her shameful trial and cruel death, are facts so well known that
+they may well be passed over here as briefly as possible. Suffice it
+to say, that, except for a time, even the triumph of this
+maiden-patriot did little to rouse the indolent king, who speedily
+returned to his selfish life in Touraine. War, pillage, and anarchy
+again devastated France. But gradually a change came over Charles. He
+seemed to awake as from a stupor. Dissolute and self-seeking
+favourites were dismissed, and the king was surrounded by able and
+high-minded men. He bestirred himself to make a final peace with
+Burgundy and Brittany, and to take part in the war which was still
+smouldering, though there were signs of its approaching end.
+
+What was the secret of such a change? That it was due, in the first
+instance, partly to the wise influence of his mother-in-law, Yolande
+of Aragon, and partly also to that of his wife, Marie of Anjou, sister
+of the good Duke Ren�, seems almost certain, but that it was
+intensified when Agnes Sorel came into his life, there can be no
+doubt. When we consider the king's earlier life, and what it was
+whilst he was under the influence of Agnes, and his relapse into
+indolence and debauchery after her death, we can only attribute much
+of this change to her sympathetic and wise guidance. Joan of Arc had
+represented the popular element, Agnes Sorel represented the
+aristocratic. Joan of Arc aroused the people to united action by her
+enthusiasm and success, Agnes Sorel, in her time, helped to complete
+the consolidation of the kingdom, by inspiring and sustaining the
+king. Perhaps no one man could have accomplished such a revolution. It
+took two women to do this, and what they did was not of mere passing
+worth. Phoenix-like, France arose from the ashes of the Hundred Years'
+War, and it was Agnes Sorel, as priestess, who stirred the embers
+which hid the new life.
+
+Voltaire, generally more ready to scoff than to approve, wrote thus of
+Agnes Sorel:
+
+    Le bon roi Charles, au printemps de ses jours,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Avait trouv�, _pour le bien de la France_,
+    Une beaut�, nomm�e Agnes Sorel.
+
+Was it for the good of France? Let us disregard prejudices, and
+examine facts. Even then, if all that is known of her were written, it
+could only bear to this rare personality the resemblance which a faint
+reflection does to reality.
+
+Agnes Sorel was probably born about 1420 or 1422, in the Castle of
+Fromenteau in Touraine.[37] Her father, Jean Soreau, or Sorel, was
+Lord of Coudon, and belonged to the lesser nobility. It was in this
+beautiful country of forest and meadow-land, of silvery rivers and
+meandering streams, that Agnes spent her early years, her education
+being principally religious, for religion naturally held the first
+place in a society which still retained faith in the supernatural. It
+was customary at that time for girls of noble birth to complete their
+education either at Court or at the castle of some princely person,
+for such places were considered excellent schools of courtesy and
+other virtues for the daughters as well as for the sons of the
+nobility.
+
+    [37] Both the date and the place of her birth seem uncertain.
+    Some writers suggest 1415, and some 1420 or 1422, as the
+    date; whilst Froidmantel, in Picardy, is conjectured by some,
+    and Fromenteau, in Touraine, by others, as the place. (Du
+    Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iv. p. 171,
+    note 4.)
+
+Though the date is uncertain, it was at the Court of Lorraine that
+Agnes became maid-of-honour to the Duchess Isabelle, wife of Ren�,
+Duke of Anjou and Lorraine, and Count of Provence, a prince
+distinguished for chivalry and learning. This intellectual and
+chivalrous atmosphere must have been peculiarly congenial to the
+sympathetic and versatile nature of Agnes Sorel. We can picture her
+listening to the Duke Ren� reading his latest poem to one or two of
+his brother-poets in the castle pleasaunce, or discoursing on
+philosophy or statecraft, or attending some brilliant pageant or
+sumptuous f�te. Chivalry, though dead as an institution, still
+survived as a recreation, and as an appeal from the past to the
+cultured imagination, and Ren�, medi�val knight that he was in
+sentiment, dearly loved the gorgeous spectacle of a tournament, with
+the knight jousting in honour of his chosen lady. At this Court Agnes
+also came under the influence of Yolande of Aragon, widow of Louis,
+King of Naples and Sicily, great-granddaughter of King John of France,
+mother of the Duke Ren�, and mother-in-law of King Charles the
+Seventh, a woman renowned for her extraordinary political capacity.
+All these ties, and the remembrance of the French blood in her veins,
+emphasised Yolande's dominant passion--the love of France,--and it may
+well be that in this patriotic atmosphere Agnes Sorel became imbued
+with a like passion, which later she was to develop in all its
+perfection, rivalled only by her devotion to the well-being and glory
+of her royal lover.
+
+Patriotism was a virtue of recent growth in France, for, in order to
+thrive, it requires unity of idea, and during the Middle Ages the only
+idea common to all was Christianity, which, from the nature of its
+teaching of humility and fraternity, does not make for patriotism. It
+may cement the structure, but it does not form the basis. It was only
+after years of suffering and unrest that men learned to sink their
+individual and local interests in those of the nation as a whole.
+Then, and only then, could patriotism arise, and only under such
+conditions could it flourish.
+
+How long Agnes lived at the Court of Lorraine (one of the most refined
+and cultured Courts of the time), and how her first meeting with the
+king came about, is uncertain. It has been considered likely that
+between 1431 and 1435 Isabelle of Lorraine went to Chinon to beseech
+the king to use his influence to obtain the release of her husband,
+imprisoned by his cousin, a rival claimant to the duchy of Lorraine.
+It is possible that Agnes, even if only born in 1422, may have
+accompanied her, but even if she did not, this visit of Isabelle's
+may, indirectly, have led to the meeting between the king and Agnes.
+Whilst still a prisoner, Ren� succeeded to the crown of Naples on the
+death of his brother, Louis d'Anjou, and as the country was in a
+disturbed condition it was deemed prudent for Isabelle, his wife, to
+act as his substitute, and, as _lieutenante g�n�rale_, she set forth
+to establish his claim. History is silent on the point as to whether
+Agnes accompanied her or not. It may be, as some seem to think, that
+she remained in Anjou with Isabelle's eldest daughter, Marguerite,
+afterwards Queen of England. We should like to think that it was
+during this time that she attracted the notice of Charles, for this
+would lend additional interest to the exquisite miniature in the Mus�e
+du Louvre (at one time in the Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier, now
+for the most part at Chantilly), which it seems probable represents
+Agnes Sorel as a youthful shepherdess, with the Castle of Loches in
+the background and Charles the Seventh riding towards her. As we have
+already suggested elsewhere,[38] this may have been a poetical
+rendering of their first meeting. However this may be, it seems
+probable that it was soon after the year 1435[39] that she first
+attracted the notice of Charles, and that, later, she took up her
+residence in Touraine, no doubt gaining her influence over the king at
+first by her beauty, which all her contemporaries proclaim, and
+afterwards by that mysterious combination of ability and grace, of
+intelligence and physical vitality, which held him captive for many
+years. During this time she, like a true woman, and no ordinary
+place-hunter, made his devotion to her react upon himself, for the
+good of his country and to his own honour. She not only counselled him
+wisely herself, but persuaded him to surround himself with wise
+counsellors.
+
+    [38] _Athen�um_, June 25, 1904.
+
+    [39] Du Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iii.
+    p. 286.
+
+Of these counsellors, and the able and devoted men who served the king
+in divers ways, some few stand out more prominently than the rest,
+because of their position of intimacy in the royal circle, and their
+special and enduring friendship with Agnes Sorel. Such were Etienne
+Chevalier, Treasurer of France; Pierre de Br�z�, of a noble Angevin
+family, and S�n�chal of Normandy after the expulsion of the English;
+and Jacques Coeur, the king's superintendent of Finance, whose house at
+Bourges, with its angel-ceiled chapel, still delights the traveller.
+
+Etienne Chevalier was for some time secretary to the king, and after
+filling one or two smaller posts connected with finance, was made
+Treasurer of France, and member of the Grand Council. In addition to
+administrative capacity, he possessed a brilliant intellect and a
+great love of art. It is to his initiative that we owe the only
+suggestions in portraiture of Agnes Sorel. It was to him also that the
+king confided the supervision of the erection of the monuments to her
+memory at Jumi�ges and Loches--Jumi�ges where she died in 1449, and
+where her heart was buried, and Loches her favourite place of sojourn,
+and to whose church and chapter she had made large gifts. To Loches
+her body was borne in royal splendour, and there laid to rest in the
+choir of the church in a simple tomb. We can imagine the loving care
+with which Etienne Chevalier watched the sculptor, and possibly even
+gave him suggestions, as he fashioned in alabaster her recumbent
+effigy representing her with hands clasped as if in prayer, her feet
+resting against two lambs, and her head guarded by two angels with
+outstretched wings. Perhaps this stone effigy was the one true
+portrait of Agnes, but the head and face were partially destroyed
+during the Revolution, and restored in their present form in 1806, so
+that little of the original now remains.
+
+[Illustration: _Loches._
+
+TOMB OF AGNES SOREL.
+
+_To face page 158._]
+
+This tomb, which to-day may be seen in a small vestibule of the
+Ch�teau Royale (now the Sous-Pr�fecture), has a strange and chequered
+history. Perhaps scarce another has suffered such singular
+vicissitudes, so many removals, or more ruthless violations. Soon
+after the death of Charles the Seventh (1461), the canons of Loches,
+whom Agnes had largely endowed and of whom she asked naught save to be
+remembered in their prayers, petitioned Louis the Eleventh for its
+transfer to a side chapel, since they considered it unfitting for the
+dust of such an one to repose in the choir. Louis, using his subtlety
+to better purpose than was his wont, replied that if they removed the
+tomb, they must return her gifts. Naturally these worthy ecclesiastics
+silenced their consciences and kept the tomb where it was. However, in
+the year 1777, in the reign of Louis the Sixteenth, the priestly
+conscience again awoke to the enormity of its presence within the
+choir, and, with the king's consent, it was removed to the nave.
+Before re-burial the coffin was opened in the presence of various
+church dignitaries and State officials. Among the latter was a doctor
+who left an authoritative account of the proceedings, from which we
+can approximately surmise the height of La Dame de Beaut�, and verify
+the record of her abundant fair hair. The exterior coffin of oak was
+only 5 feet 6 inches long. Within this, and protected by another of
+lead, was a shell of cedar wood in which, after the lapse of more than
+three centuries, lay all that was mortal of Agnes Sorel. Her fair hair
+was plaited in a long tress, and two curls rested on her forehead. As
+one of those present, more curious than his fellows, stretched out his
+hand to touch, all fell to dust. Death and Time were her guardian
+angels. But even this desecration did not suffice to drain the cup of
+unmerited vengeance. In 1793 the tomb was rifled, the sculptured
+features, so lovingly wrought, defaced, and her dust cast to the
+winds. But what matter? Agnes had done her work--work which had to be
+done, and which she alone could do.
+
+Another of the little band of chosen spirits of which Agnes was the
+soul and centre, was Pierre de Br�z�, Lord of Varenne and Brissac, who
+early showed himself a man of affairs, and was admitted to the King's
+Council when he was but twenty-seven. In war, administration, and
+finance, he proved himself equally trustworthy and skilful, and to
+these qualities he added others of a brilliant intellectual nature. He
+advanced from one post of trust to another, until the king himself
+presented him with the keys of the city and castle of Rouen. Thus he
+became S�n�chal of Normandy, an honour which remained in his family.
+One of his grandsons, Louis de Br�z�, a son of Charlotte, daughter of
+Agnes Sorel and Charles the Seventh, was the husband of Diane de
+Poitiers.
+
+Jacques Coeur, whose life was so intimately associated with the Court
+during Agnes's lifetime, and so sadly marred and ended after her
+death, was the son of a simple merchant of Bourges. Following in the
+wake of many adventurous and ambitious merchants of the time, he
+journeyed to the East and amassed a large fortune, which he placed at
+the disposal of the king. This enabled Charles to carry on the war in
+spite of his impoverished exchequer, and to make a final and
+successful effort against the English. But, like many another on whom
+Fortune has smiled, evil tongues and envious hearts began, ere long,
+their vampire work, and after the death of his friend and patroness,
+Agnes Sorel, Charles made no effort on his behalf, but left him at the
+mercy of his calumniators in the same base and heartless way in which
+he had abandoned Joan of Arc. Jacques, his goods confiscated, and his
+life in danger, was obliged to fly the country, and died fighting, in
+the Pope's service, against the Turk.
+
+Of the beauty of Agnes Sorel there can be no doubt, for all
+contemporary chroniclers and poets tell of it. Even the Pope, Pius the
+Second, allowed himself to add his tribute of praise to the general
+homage. Considering that there are so many types of physical beauty,
+appealing to as many different temperaments, there must have been
+something rare and remarkable in Agnes to have attracted and held
+bound all who came in contact with her. We can but conclude that this
+unanimous judgment could only have been the result of that mysterious
+union, so illusive, so indefinable, of spiritual with physical beauty.
+The records of the time merely tell us that she had blue eyes, and
+fair hair in abundance. The only picture, and this not done from life,
+by which we can judge her--for the miniatures by Fouquet, at
+Chantilly, from Etienne Chevalier's Book of Hours, though exquisite in
+delicacy, are too minute for much characterisation--is, even if we
+accept it as the original from Fouquet's hand, an overcleaned work in
+the Museum at Antwerp.[40] This, or the original painting, formed a
+wing of the so-called diptych painted to adorn the tomb of Etienne
+Chevalier and his wife in the Cathedral of Melun, the other wing--now
+in the Royal Museum, Berlin--representing Etienne Chevalier himself,
+in the attitude of prayer, his patron saint, St. Stephen, beside him.
+There seems reason, however, to suppose that this offering of
+Etienne's was in fact a triptych, and that the missing wing pictured
+his young wife, then lately dead (1452). If this was so, Etienne and
+his wife would have appeared in adoration on either side of the Queen
+of Heaven, here personated by Agnes Sorel, thus bringing the panel
+with Etienne's portrait into harmony with the central panel, which
+otherwise it fails to be.
+
+    [40] Du Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iv.
+    p. 171, note 2.
+
+[Illustration: _Mus�e de Chantilly._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.
+
+_To face page 162._]
+
+Of the miniatures at Chantilly, the whole series of which forms a most
+tender and rare tribute to wife and friend, only brief mention can
+here be made of those concerning Agnes. The most simple and beautiful
+in sentiment and design is that of the _Annunciation_, in which the
+seated Virgin, in the likeness of Agnes Sorel, with bowed head
+receives the angel's message. The scene is laid in a Gothic chapel
+(perhaps the Sainte Chapelle with slight adaptations to suit the
+artist's fancy),[41] with statues of the Prophets all around, and
+Moses, holding the Books of the Law, as the central figure of the
+group. This assemblage of Old Testament seers certainly typified the
+Old dispensation, whilst the Annunciation prefigures the New, and to
+us the whole may not unfitly form an allegory of the new order which
+Agnes Sorel was to help to bring about. In another miniature--the
+_Visit of the Magi_--Charles the Seventh, accompanied by his
+Scottish guard, and with the Castle of Loches in the background,
+himself kneels as one of the kings before the Virgin, here also
+represented in the likeness of Agnes. And so on, throughout the
+series, in many of the scenes of the Virgin's life we find her bearing
+the features of Agnes until an older and sadder type becomes necessary
+in the _Crucifixion_, the _Entombment_, and the _Announcement of the
+Death_ and the _Death_ of the Virgin. When, however, death has
+transfigured age and sorrow, the likeness of Agnes reappears in the
+_Assumption_, and _Coronation_, and, the crowning glory, the
+_Enthronement_ of the Virgin.
+
+    [41] Cf. _Grandes Chroniques de France_, fol. 292, Bib. Nat.
+
+[Illustration: _Mus�e de Chantilly._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.
+
+_To face page 163._]
+
+In a Book of Hours, at Munich, painted about 1500 A.D. for Jacques
+Coeur's grandson (in part perhaps by Jean Bourdichon, the artist of the
+superb Book of Hours of Anne de Bretagne now in the Biblioth�que
+Nationale, or at least by some pupil or follower of his), there are
+three miniatures that seem of special interest in connection with
+Agnes Sorel. One is a representation of the Virgin of the
+Annunciation, and another that of the Madonna with the Holy Child. In
+both these the features of the Virgin Mother appear to faintly echo
+those of Agnes as we know her, as the crowned and ermined queen in the
+picture at Antwerp. Still more interesting is the third miniature,
+giving a view--here used as a setting for the _Procession to
+Calvary_--of the front of Jacques Coeur's stately dwelling at Bourges.
+Here doubtless many a time Agnes and the king were entertained. Hither
+Jacques returned from sundry journeys to the East, laden with
+treasures to beautify his surroundings. Hence he fled, the victim of
+success. Over the principal entrance is a canopied recess, once
+sheltering an equestrian statue destroyed during the Revolution. This
+now empty space once held a statue of King Charles the Seventh, armed
+cap-�-pie on a galloping caparisoned charger, as he may be seen
+represented on medals of the period. It is not a little significant of
+this thankless monarch that he here seems to be turning his back on
+the house of his faithful servant and supporter, and to be riding
+away. Other details worthy of mention in this Book of Hours are the
+realistic background to the picture of the _Visit of the Magi_, with
+its snow-covered village church, houses, and fields; the Italian
+drug-pot in the Magdalen's hands in the scene of the Crucifixion,
+showing the intimate intercourse with Italy; and the Mater Dolorosa
+seated _alone_ at the foot of the Cross,--a tragic note taken from the
+_Mystery of the Passion_.
+
+There is only one unanimous opinion concerning Agnes Sorel, and that
+is as to her beauty. For the rest, it would seem as if prejudice and
+flattery held the scales. The mean is difficult to discover, and
+perhaps it is only possible to get somewhere near it by studying
+results--the remarkable change, as already noticed, in Charles's life
+and conduct whilst under her influence.
+
+In the face of conflicting records it is no easy matter to determine
+when Agnes Sorel first became the king's mistress. In 1435, when the
+Treaty of Arras was concluded between Charles and the Duke of
+Burgundy, Cardinal de Sainte-Croix (afterwards Pope Pius the Second)
+was Papal legate at the French Court, and aided in the negotiations.
+He tells in his memoirs that the relation between Charles and Agnes
+was known publicly at the time, and that the king could do nothing
+without her, even having her at his side at the royal councils. The
+trustworthiness of this statement has, however, been so questioned,
+that it seems safer to endeavour to arrive at the truth from other
+sources, although, if the statement can be relied on, it seems to
+follow, almost as a matter of course, that Agnes must have been born
+earlier than 1422. It is an admitted fact that between 1433 and 1438
+the manner of Charles's life entirely changed. In the year 1433 the
+infamous and once all-powerful favourite, La Tremoille, who had been
+the king's evil genius for six years, and was largely responsible for
+the king's treatment of his wife, Marie of Anjou, was dismissed at the
+instance of the politic Yolande. Yet even so, the king often relapsed
+into indolence and apparent indifference to his kingly duties, and it
+was not till after 1438, when he summoned a national Council at
+Bourges, that Charles showed himself to be a new man. It is also not
+long after this that we read of favours granted by the king to
+Agnes's relations. From that time, Charles ceased to spend his time in
+dreamland, as it were, in the sweet Touraine country, and engaged
+himself in affairs of State, listening to and accepting wise counsels,
+favouring the restoration of schools and universities--which, in the
+uncertain state of the country, had almost ceased to exist--and
+encouraging the final efforts to expel the national enemy, even at
+times personally joining in the fight. If we see in this, in a measure
+at all events, the guiding spirit of Agnes, the secret of her
+influence is not very difficult to discover. Apart from her beauty,
+which, with Charles, would be a potent factor, Agnes had a woman's
+insight and skill in her relation with him, ever holding up to him the
+glory and obligations of kingship, at the same time herself entering,
+with all the vitality of her extraordinary nature, into his favourite
+pastimes. We know that in one or other of her many residences near
+Chinon or Loches, she and the king often spent the evening playing
+piquet or chess (the latter being his favourite game), and then, on
+the morrow, rode forth together to the chase. So the days were passed
+in work and simple outdoor pleasures, Agnes taking no recognised
+public part in the king's life, but devoting herself heart and soul to
+the task she had in hand. But besides these relaxations of peace,
+there was also the reality of war; for the war still lingered on,
+though feebly. The English had lost their ally, the Duke of Burgundy,
+as well as Bedford, the able Regent, and there was no fit man to take
+the latter's place. Paris opened her gates to Charles in 1436, and in
+the following year Charles, after having reigned for fourteen years,
+made his first State entry into the capital of his kingdom, mounted on
+a white charger, the sign of sovereignty. In 1444 a treaty was
+concluded at Tours with the English, and, to make the compact doubly
+sure, Margaret of Anjou, a niece of the king, was married to Henry the
+Sixth of England. For about a month the Court and its princely
+visitors gave themselves up to f�tes and pageants, and it was during
+this time of rejoicing that the position of Agnes was officially
+recognised. She was made lady-in-waiting to the queen, and took a
+prominent part throughout the festival. Charles gave her the royal
+castle of Beaut�, on the Marne, near the Bois de Vincennes, "le plus
+bel chastel et joly et le mieux assis qui fust en l'Isle de France,"
+desiring, as was said, that she should be "Dame de Beaut� de nom comme
+de fait." From the time of her public recognition she appeared with
+the king at all the brilliant festivities celebrated in honour of
+treaties and marriages. She also sat in the royal council, a position
+which, as a king's mistress, she was the first to occupy, though we
+know that Henri II. took no step without first conferring with Diane
+de Poitiers, and that Madame de Maintenon sat in Louis the
+Fourteenth's privy council.
+
+The change which came over France after the Treaty of Tours was
+marvellous, alike in its extent and its rapidity. Commerce was again
+resumed between the two nations; men and women once again ventured
+without the city walls, to breathe, as it were, the fresh air of
+liberty; and those who had been called upon to fight, returned to
+their work in the fields or the towns. We cannot better voice the
+feeling of the people than by borrowing the song of a poet of the day:
+
+    Le temps a laiss� son manteau
+    De vent, de froidure et de pluie,
+    Et s'est v�tu de broderie,
+    De soleil rayant, clair et beau;
+    Il n'y a beste ne oiseau
+    Qu'en son jargon ne chante ou crie:
+    Le temps a laiss� son manteau.
+
+Now that Agnes had assumed a definite r�le at Court, she lived
+principally at Loches, where the king assigned to her "son quartier de
+maison" within the castle, and also gave her a residence without the
+walls. Here she shone like a radiant star; for although the king did
+not have much personal influence on the movement in art and letters,
+his Court was the meeting-place of many distinguished and intellectual
+men. Among them we find the name of Alain Chartier, the poet, and
+sometime secretary to the king, and one of the ambassadors who went to
+Edinburgh to ask the hand of the little Margaret of Scotland for the
+Dauphin. We remember him now chiefly in connection with the charming
+story told of this girl-wife of the Dauphin Louis. Betrothed to Louis
+when she was a child of three, and sent to France to be brought up at
+the Court, she was married at twelve to this boy of thirteen, who
+could not possibly appreciate her simple, sweet nature which endeared
+her to all others. One day as she was passing with her ladies through
+a room in the castle, she saw Alain Chartier lying on a bench asleep.
+She approached quietly, and kissed him, much to the surprise of her
+attendants that she should "kiss so ugly a man." And she made answer:
+"I did not kiss the man, but the precious mouth whence so many
+beautiful and fair words have issued." Poor little poetess!
+Fortunately her life was a short one. She died when she was just
+twenty-one, with these words on her lips: "Fi de la vie de ce monde,
+ne m'en parlez plus." The scientific historian of to-day is inclined
+to dismiss this story as a pleasing though rather foolish romance. But
+even so, Alain Chartier may be remembered as a poet and philosopher,
+as well as a brave and wise patriot during some of France's darkest
+hours--a worthy contemporary of Agnes Sorel and Joan of Arc. Fearing
+neither the nobles nor the people, he blames the former for their love
+of luxury and personal indulgence, and exhorts both to think of the
+public good, and to aid in their country's defence, instead of
+allowing themselves to be engrossed with their private affairs. Then,
+whilst acknowledging that as he has not the strength to bear arms, it
+is only with his pen and his speech that he can serve his country, he
+reminds them that it was the historian's pen and the orator's
+harangue, just as much as the warrior's lance, that made the glory of
+the Romans.
+
+Louis the Dauphin, come to man's estate, and self-seeking and
+treacherous, was no friend to Agnes, who had incurred his hatred by
+her fearless disclosure to the king from time to time of conspiracies
+against his person, in which Louis was the prime mover. After repeated
+reconciliations, the king in despair finally banished him to his
+domain of Dauphin�. The traitor, quitting the royal presence for what
+he deemed exile, swore to be avenged on those who had driven him
+forth, and if some of the records of the time speak truly, four years
+later his opportunity came, and he kept his oath.
+
+The last scene of Agnes's life was pathetically interesting. Her end
+came almost suddenly. The king, listening to advice, had resolved to
+continue the war in Normandy,[42] and, at the instigation of Agnes, if
+we may believe the words of a courtly writer of the time, had himself
+gone to the front. Rouen was taken, and Charles entered in triumph.
+The streets were decked with flowers and branches, and the houses hung
+with rich draperies, and everywhere the leopards and quarterings of
+England had been replaced by the fleur-de-lis. Charles, preceded by a
+gorgeous procession of archers, each company arrayed in the livery of
+its lord, and carrying his special banner, followed, under a canopy,
+on a horse caparisoned to the ground with blue cloth sprinkled with
+fleurs-de-lis of gold, surrounded by princes and the principal
+captains and officers of the Crown. With his wonted observance of
+religious duty, slowly he made his way to the cathedral through the
+shouting multitude, and to the sound of many fiddles and the fanfare
+of trumpets. There he descended, kissed the relics as he knelt beneath
+the great portal, and then entered its hushed and solemn dimness to
+return thanks. But scarce had the air ceased to ring with the plaudits
+of the people, when the report of a plot against the king, devised by
+the Dauphin, is said to have come to the ears of Agnes, and she
+hastened to the king at Jumi�ges, whither he had retired for a short
+rest during the unusual and inclement winter. Here, stricken by a
+mysterious sickness, by some thought to be typhoid fever, by others
+attributed to poison administered at the instigation of Louis, she
+died in February 1450, in her manor of Mesnil, near the Abbey of
+Jumi�ges. The king was with her to the end, and could only be induced
+to withdraw when her lifeless form sank back in his arms. So died this
+wonderful and fascinating woman who had lived and laboured for her
+country through perhaps the most critical period of its history.
+
+    [42] Lavisse, _Hist. de France_, vol. iv. part 2, p. 229, footnote.
+
+It is impossible to entirely ignore what has been written to Agnes's
+personal discredit, though much of it may well be looked upon as
+exaggeration, and open to suspicion. That the king was not her only
+lover may be true, but in the absence of satisfactory documentary
+evidence of this, perhaps the various intrigues attributed to her may,
+for the most part at least, be regarded as the creations of scandal.
+Still, bearing in mind the condition of France at the time of her
+accession to power, the extent of the influence she admittedly
+exercised in the councils of the king, and the great change which came
+over the royal fortunes and the fortunes of the country during the
+years of her ascendancy, it is scarcely possible to refuse to her some
+right to share in the recognition so lavishly bestowed upon the other
+great woman of that time--Joan of Arc. The one may be said to have
+been the complement of the other. Both were necessary to the needs of
+the day, and the glory of successful accomplishment should be shared
+between them.
+
+
+
+
+A NOTE ON MEDI�VAL GARDENS
+
+
+
+
+MEDI�VAL GARDENS[43]
+
+    [43] The quotations from the _Roman de la Rose_ are taken
+    from Mr. F. S. Ellis's translation, published by Messrs. J.
+    M. Dent & Co. in the "Temple Classics."
+
+
+No one can study French medi�val lore, or Gothic cathedral, or Book of
+Hours, without realising how great a love of Nature prevailed in the
+late Middle Ages. The poems tell of spring, "the season of delight,"
+of gardens which suffice "for loss of Paradise," and of birds "with
+soft melodious chant." In the dim stillness of the cathedral, Nature
+is expressed in infinite variety. Foliage grows in the hollows of the
+mouldings, and sometimes, as at Chartres, even the shafts, as they
+tower into the gloom, end in half-opened leaves, suggestive of spring,
+of hope, and of aspiration. Many a sunny fa�ade shows us scenes of
+rural life--sowing, reaping, vine-dressing, and so forth--fashioned as
+a calendar in stone, and many a peasant must have rejoiced as he saw
+himself and his occupation thus represented in effigy. Fortunately for
+the poor toiler, the Church not only taught that "to labour is to
+worship," but further honoured work by thus representing it at the
+very entrance to the sanctuary, so making it, as it were, the "open
+sesame" to higher things.
+
+In Books of Hours and illuminated MSS., before the complete border of
+flowers, birds, and small grotesques was developed, we find ornamental
+flourishes, like the growth of ivy and hawthorn, splendidly free in
+design, and painted with evident joy even in the minutest bud or
+tendril. Everywhere may this love of Nature striving for expression be
+seen. But we must turn to the poems and romances if we would fully
+realise it in all its simplicity and truth, since it is in these alone
+that we get at the actual medi�val feeling unalloyed with all that we
+ourselves have, perhaps unwittingly, read into it.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS.
+
+French, 14th Century, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 176._]
+
+"All hearts are uplifted and made glad in the time of April and May,
+when once again the meadows and the pastures become green." So says
+one of the old romancers. And this joy in returning spring seems to
+have pervaded medi�val thought and expression. Little is this to be
+wondered at when we call to mind the long dreary winters spent in cold
+and ill-lit castles, or in dark, draughty houses and hovels. Before
+glass, long regarded as a luxury, came into general use in dwellings,
+the only protection from rain and cold consisted in wooden shutters,
+or movable frames with horn slabs (necessarily small), or varnished
+parchment. In truth, the only warm, bright place was the chimney
+corner, and here, as near as might be to the blazing logs, the
+long days of winter were spent in chess-playing, broidery,
+lute-playing, and love-making, the monotony of this only occasionally
+broken by the arrival of some wandering minstrel who sang of war and
+love, or of some packman laden with sundry wares prized of womankind.
+But in winter such wayfarers were rare, and life was, perforce, one of
+boredom and discomfort. Thus there was exceeding joy when "woods and
+thickets donned their rich green mantling of resplendent sheen."
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 177._]
+
+It is generally of springtime in a garden--a garden of green glades
+and alleys, fruit-trees and flowers, such as was very dear to the
+medi�val soul--of which we read. The _Roman de la Rose_ opens with a
+description of a garden, hemmed round with castle wall--a pleasaunce
+within a fortress--and planted with trees "from out the land of
+Saracens," and many others, to wit, the pine, the beech (loved of
+squirrels), the graceful birch, the shimmering aspen, the hazel, the
+oak, and many flowers withal--roses and violets and periwinkle, golden
+king-cups, and pink-rimmed daisies. The poet describes with careful
+detail the design of the garden:
+
+    The garden was nigh broad as wide,
+    And every angle duly squared;
+
+how the trees were planted:
+
+    Such skilful art
+    Had planned the trees that each apart
+    Six fathoms stood, yet like a net
+    The interlacing branches met;
+
+and how "channelled brooks" flowed from clear fountains through "thymy
+herbage and gay flowers."
+
+The debt which the medi�val world owed to the East is shown both in
+the fruits and the spices which are described as growing in the
+garden, and in the pastimes said to have been enjoyed in its cool
+shade. We read of pomegranates, nutmegs, almonds, dates, figs,
+liquorice, aniseed, cinnamon, and zedoary, an Eastern plant used as a
+stimulant. When the poet would tell of dance and song, he goes by
+
+    A shaded pathway, where my feet,
+    Bruised mint and fennel savouring sweet,
+
+to a secluded lawn. Here he sees one whose name is "Gladness":
+
+    Gently swaying, rose and fell
+    Her supple form, the while her feet
+    Kept measured time with perfect beat:
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    While minstrels sang, the tambourine
+    Kept with the flute due time I ween.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Then saw I cunning jugglers play,
+    And girls cast tambourines away
+    Aloft in air, then gaily trip
+    Beneath them, and on finger-tip
+    Catch them again.
+
+In every garden there was a fountain or sheet of water with a small
+channelled way carrying the water to the castle and through the
+women's apartment. Sometimes these waterways were made use of by the
+lover as a means of communication with his beloved, as we read in the
+romance of _Tristan and Isolde_, where Tristan, to apprise his
+mistress that he is at their trysting-place in the garden, drops into
+the water small pieces of bark and twigs, which are quickly carried to
+the chamber where Isolde is waiting and watching. And one eventide a
+perilous encounter befalls. Tristan has been banished the Court, for
+evil tongues have whispered in King Mark's ear of his love for Isolde,
+and have further whispered of secret meetings in the garden, beside
+the fountain. Now near the fountain is a pine-tree, into which King
+Mark resolves to climb, and perchance to discover the meeting of the
+lovers. As daylight fades, Tristan scales the wall, and hastens to
+throw into the water the little signals for his lady. But as he stoops
+over the pool he sees, reflected in its clear surface, the image of
+the king, with bow ready bent. Can he stop the floating twigs as they
+are hurried along on their mission? No. The water carries them away
+out of sight, and Isolde must come. She comes, but Tristan does not go
+to meet her as was his wont, but remains standing by the water. She
+wonders at her lover's seeming unconcern, but as she approaches him,
+suddenly, in the bright moonlight, she, too, sees in the water the
+reflection of the king, and the lovers are saved.
+
+A pine-tree is so often mentioned as a special feature in a medi�val
+garden that one is led to think that its use may either have been a
+survival from the days of Tree Worship, seeing that the tree was
+sacred to Adonis, Attis, and Osiris[44] (all, perhaps, varying forms
+of one and the same divinity), or have been suggested by some northern
+Saga. It makes its appearance in the _Chanson de Roland_, which has
+come down to us in a thirteenth-century form, incorporating the
+earlier Epic of _Roland_, probably composed towards the end of the
+eleventh century. In this we find mention of it when Charlemagne,
+after he is said to have taken Cordova, retires to a garden with
+Roland and Oliver and his barons, the elder ones amusing themselves
+with chess and tric-trac, and the younger ones with fencing, the king
+meanwhile looking on, seated under a pine-tree. Later in the day tents
+are set up, in which they pass the night, and in the early morning
+Charlemagne, after hearing mass, again sits under the pine-tree to
+take counsel of his barons.
+
+    [44] J. G. Frazer, _Adonis, Attis, Osiris_, 1906.
+
+In the _Roman de la Rose_, the fateful fountain of Narcissus is
+described as being beneath a pine-tree, which is represented as being
+taller and fairer than any that mortal eye had seen since the glorious
+pine of Charlemagne's time, showing that here at least the poet is
+making use of tradition.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Br�ckmann._
+
+FLEMISH MASTER.
+
+Fifteenth Century. Stephenson Clarke Collection.
+
+_To face page 181._]
+
+But to make our way into a medi�val garden, and see all that grows
+therein, we must needs get within the precincts of the castle, for
+inside its fortified enclosure the castle, like a small village, was
+self-contained. And this was no easy matter, if we may judge from
+the vivid description to be found in _Huon de Bordeaux_, a poem
+concerning a Bordelais lord of the ninth century. After sundry
+adventures, Huon sets out on a journey to Babylon, and seeks an
+audience with the Emir. He tells of his arrival at what he describes
+as the castle, and how, after long parley with the porter, the
+drawbridge is let down and the great gate opened, and he finds himself
+in an arched way, with a series of portcullises showing their teeth
+overhead. After further parley, and further opening of gates, he
+enters a large courtyard, and goes thence into the garden, which is
+planted with every kind of tree, aromatic herb, and sweet-scented
+flower. In the garden is a fountain with its little channelled way,
+supplied with water from the Earthly Paradise. This description may
+seem a little fantastic, but it is only the poet's way of telling us
+what we might ourselves experience if we would go in imagination to
+some thirteenth- or fourteenth-century castle, and seek to gain
+admittance.
+
+Sometimes the garden was within the castle fortifications. It was then
+necessarily circumscribed, and would, more or less, be laid out with
+formal pathways and stone-curbed borders, also with trees cut in
+various devices (a reminder of Rome's once far-reaching influence),
+and a tunnel or pergola of vines or sweet-scented creepers running the
+length of the wall to form a covered walk for shelter against sunshine
+or shower. But where the garden was without the fortifications, but
+yet within the castle enclosure, as was always the arrangement if
+possible, opportunity was afforded for wooded dell and flowery slope,
+as well as for the orchard with its special patch for herb-growing.
+
+The herb-plot was one of the most important items in a medi�val
+garden; for here were grown not only herbs and roots for healing, but
+also sweet-scented mint and thyme for mingling with the rushes strewn
+on the floors. Sometimes the rushes themselves were fragrant, and
+such, lemon-scented when crushed, may even to-day be found in the
+neighbourhood of Oxford, probably growing in the very place which at
+one time supplied many a college hall with its carpet of fresh green.
+
+[Illustration: _Bodician._
+
+MS. ROMANCE OF ALEXANDER.
+
+Fourteenth Century.
+
+_To face page 183._]
+
+In the larger gardens might also be found labyrinths and aviaries,
+with bright-plumaged birds from the East. Here, too, were often
+enclosures for wild beasts, much prized by the lord of the castle, to
+whom they may have been proffered as peace-offerings, or as friendly
+gifts from some neighbouring lord. Strange beasts were royal gifts;
+for kings, we read, made such offerings to each other. Even as early
+as the ninth century, Haroun al Raschid sent an elephant to
+Charlemagne. It was brought to Aix-la-Chapelle by Isaac the Jew, and
+survived its long walk seven years, and it would be interesting to
+know by what route it journeyed thither in those days. These private
+zoological gardens may possibly account for the comparative
+accuracy with which the early miniaturists painted such beasts as
+lions, bears, and leopards, which otherwise they might have had no
+chance of studying.
+
+One of the greatest delights of the garden was the bower in which the
+warm months were passed. Here meals were taken, and merry pastimes
+enjoyed, as long as daylight lasted. Hither came tumblers and
+dancing-girls, and sometimes performing animals. A poor captive bear
+would be made to stumble over the rough roads for miles in order to go
+through its grotesque antics before some joyous company of dames and
+gallants. But spring and youth was the time to be gay, and nothing
+came amiss to these light-hearted folk.
+
+The bower was also the "privy playing place," and all care was taken
+to make its leafy screen grow close and thick. Perhaps one of the most
+interesting references to a green arbour--interesting because of the
+romance which was the cause of its mention--is in a poem by King James
+I. of Scotland, telling of sad years in prison, which ended in love
+and liberty. James, whilst still a young man, was imprisoned in
+Windsor Castle, and writing to solace himself with something more
+tangible than the mere contemplation of his beloved one, and to while
+away time, describes the garden with "herbere green," which he saw
+through the barred window of his prison-house. Leaning his head
+against the cold stone wall, by night he gazed at the stars, by day
+at the garden. And weary and woe-begone as he was, he says, "to look,
+it did me good."
+
+    Now there was made fast by the tower wall
+    A garden fair, and in the corners set
+    A herbere green, with wands so long and small
+    Railed all about: and so with trees close set
+    Was all the place, and hawthorn hedges knit
+    That no one though he were near walking by
+    Might there within scarce any one espy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    So thick the branches and the leafage green.
+    Beshaded all the alleys that there were,
+    And 'midst of ev'ry herbere might be seen
+    The sharp and green sweet-scented juniper,
+    Growing so fair with branches here and there,
+    That, as it seemed to any one without,
+    The branches spread the herbere all about.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    And on the slender green-leaved branches sat
+    The little joyous nightingales, and sang
+    So loud and clear, the carols consecrat
+    To faithful love.[45]
+
+    [45] _King's Quair_, verse 31 _seq._
+
+This "garden fair" was the scene of the romance which solaced this
+royal prisoner, and helped him to bear his irksome lot, and to be able
+to exclaim, after nearly eighteen years' captivity--a captivity since
+boyhood:
+
+    Thanks be to the massive castle wall,
+    From which I eagerly looked forth and leant.
+
+Looking from his window he espied, notwithstanding "hawthorne hedges"
+and "beshaded alleys," Lady Johanna Beaumont (whom he wedded on his
+release) walking in the garden. Neither poet nor historian tells how
+they found means to communicate with one another, but tradition,
+which is sometimes twin-brother to truth, has handed down the story of
+a go-between who conveyed missives and tokens.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Br�ckmann._
+
+RHENISH MASTER.
+
+C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.
+
+_To face page 185._]
+
+In the accompanying picture we see a corner of a medi�val garden,
+hemmed round with castle wall. In it the artist has adapted an
+everyday scene to a religious purpose, by giving my lady a crown, and
+the baby an aureole, to suggest the Holy Mother and Child, whilst one
+of the gentlemen-in-waiting is provided with wings, so as to make him
+more in harmony with such saintly company. But this is only what might
+have been seen on any bright morning in late spring or summer, in some
+castle pleasaunce. My lady reads a book, whilst her maidens amuse
+themselves, one holding a psaltery on which the child tinkles, to its
+evident delight and wonderment; another, with a perverted sporting
+instinct, seems to be trying to catch fish with a ladle (note the
+usual little channelled way, on which a bird is perched, refreshing
+itself), whilst a third is picking fruit. The three squires are
+doubtless talking of the chase, for, in my lady's presence, love would
+hardly be their theme. And all around are beautiful flowers--roses,
+lilies, and irises. Over against the enclosing wall is the usual bank
+of earth, faced with wood to keep it the necessary height, and planted
+with many flowers. This raised portion enabled those in the garden to
+get a view over the surrounding country, and to have a point of
+outlook in case of attack. It also served as a seat; for at
+intervals, between the flowers and sweet-scented herbs, portions were
+covered with turf.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 186._]
+
+Of all the flowers in the garden the rose "red and pale" was the
+greatest favourite, and many different sorts were planted there. To so
+many purposes were they put, and so great was the demand for them,
+that large quantities of roses frequently served as the payment of
+vassals to their lord. They were used for strewing the floor at the
+wedding-feast, or at the entertaining of some great baron. The fresh
+petals were sprinkled over the surface of the water in the bath, and
+were distilled to make the rose-water with which the knights and
+ladies washed their hands and faces when they left their
+much-curtained beds. Further, they were specially prized for garlands,
+the making of which was one of the favourite occupations of the ladies
+of the Middle Ages. Dante, who sums up the spirit of the Middle Ages
+from the simplest reality to the sublimest ideal, alludes to garlands
+and garland-making as amongst the joys of the Earthly Paradise. In his
+poet's vision of the pageant of the Church Militant he sees the last
+company wreathed with red roses, emblems to him of Charity or Love.
+Boccaccio, in a more mundane atmosphere and a less august assemblage,
+also introduces us to this medi�val love of garlands. In a preamble to
+one of his tales he gives a dainty picture of the manners and pastimes
+of the gay folk of his day. Of the merry company,  which his fancy
+makes to quit plague-stricken Florence for the country, where they
+tell stories to prevent monotony, he relates that, after dining in the
+cool shade, and before the story-telling begins, "the gentlemen walked
+with the ladies into a goodly garden, making chaplets and nosegays of
+divers flowers, and singing silently to themselves." Both sexes wore
+them on festive occasions, and in summer young girls wore no
+head-covering save a garland. The knight at the tournament decked his
+helm with a chaplet of some chosen flower, deftly woven by the fair
+one in whose name he made venture; and many a merry company, wreathed
+with flowers or foliage, rode forth on May-day, with trumpets and
+flutes, to celebrate the festival.
+
+Another favourite flower for garlands was the cornflower, as we learn
+from the poets, who tell of ladies dancing the carole (a popular dance
+in which all moved slowly round in a circle, singing at the same
+time), their heads crowned with garlands of cornflower. Violets and
+periwinkles, and meadow flowers, white, red, and blue, were also
+gathered to indulge this pretty fancy.
+
+The gillyflower is another flower frequently mentioned. This name has
+been applied to various flowers, but originally it belonged to the
+carnation, and was used for such in Shakespeare's time. In the _Roman
+de la Rose_ it is called the gillyflower-clove, thus definitely
+defining it. One of its virtues, according to an old writer, was "to
+comfort the spirites by the sence of smelling," and also "to be of
+much use in ornament." But indeed most flowers were not only used for
+chaplets, and for strewing on the floor, but were also painted on the
+chamber walls, and embroidered on the hangings, to serve in winter
+days as sweet memories and as sweeter hopes.
+
+Apparently the earliest records of gardens, after Roman times, date
+from the ninth century, and are mostly to be found amongst monastic
+archives. A garden was an important, and even essential, annex of a
+monastery, not only because of the "herbularis" or physic garden, from
+the herbs of which the monks compounded salves and potions for the
+wounded knight or the plundered wayfarer who might take shelter within
+its protecting walls, but also because of the solace which the shady
+trees and the gay flowers brought to the sick, for a monastery was
+generally a hospital as well. St. Bernard of Clairvaux, speaking of an
+abbey garden, gives a charming picture of one of these cloistered
+pleasaunces for the sick and the aged. He says:
+
+     Within the enclosure of this wall many and various trees,
+     prolific in various fruits, constitute an orchard resembling
+     a wood, which, being near the cell of the sick, lightens the
+     infirmities of the brethren with no moderate solace, while
+     it affords a spacious walking place to those who walk and a
+     sweet place for reclining to those who are overheated. Where
+     the orchard terminates the garden begins. Here also a
+     beautiful spectacle is exhibited to the infirm brethren:
+     while they sit upon the green margin of the huge basin, they
+     see the little fishes playing under the water and
+     representing a military encounter by swimming to meet each
+     other.
+
+This warlike note seems strange and almost discordant in the midst of
+the peace of the cloister; but many, before seeking shelter there, had
+been doughty knights, and St. Bernard, man of the world as he was,
+would realise that even this mimic warfare might bring diversion to
+their tranquil seclusion.
+
+What a contrast to all this joy in the Middle Ages in gardens and
+flowers are the sober reflections of Marcus Aurelius! Philosopher as
+he was, he would have us learn from plants the lesson of cause and
+effect, the continuity of life. He says:
+
+     The destruction of one thing is the making of another; and
+     that which subsists at present is, as it were, the seed of
+     succession, which springs from it. But if you take seed in
+     the common notion, and confine it to the field or the
+     garden, you have a dull fancy.
+
+It is with a sense of relief that we turn from the thoughts which a
+garden suggests to this stoic, to those not less profound, though
+perhaps more simple, of a Chinese writer of the fourth century:
+
+     Ah, how short a time it is that we are here! Why then not
+     set our hearts at rest, ceasing to trouble whether we remain
+     or go? What boots it to wear out the soul with anxious
+     thoughts? Let me stroll through the bright hours as they
+     pass in my garden among my flowers.
+
+
+_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Of Six Medi�val Women, by Alice Kemp-Welch
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+
+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Of Six Mediæval Women, by Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Of Six Mediæval Women
+       To Which Is Added A Note on Mediæval Gardens
+
+Author: Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+Release Date: March 31, 2010 [EBook #31843]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OF SIX MEDIÆVAL WOMEN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Meredith Bach, Irma Spehar and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This
+file was produced from images generously made available
+by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+<h2 class="begin">OF SIX MEDIÆVAL WOMEN<br />
+<span style="font-size: 60%">WITH</span><br />
+<span style="font-size: 85%">A NOTE ON MEDIÆVAL GARDENS</span></h2>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 150px">
+<img style="border-style: none" src="images/imacmillan.jpg" width="150" height="43" alt="" title="" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="publisher">
+MACMILLAN AND CO., <span class="smcap">Limited</span><br />
+<small>LONDON · BOMBAY · CALCUTTA</small><br />
+<small>MELBOURNE</small><br /><br />
+
+THE MACMILLAN COMPANY<br />
+<small>NEW YORK · BOSTON · CHICAGO</small><br />
+<small>DALLAS · SAN FRANCISCO</small><br /><br />
+
+THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, <span class="smcap">Ltd.</span><br />
+<small>TORONTO</small>
+</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;"><a name="frontispiece" id="frontispiece"></a>
+<img src="images/ifrontis.jpg" width="600" height="543" alt="Poet declaiming to accompaniment of Viol" title="Poet and Viol" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Bib. de l’Arsenal, Paris.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">POET DECLAIMING TO ACCOMPANIMENT OF VIOL.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>Frontispiece.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<div class="tpage">
+<h1>OF SIX<br />
+MEDIÆVAL WOMEN<br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 50%">TO WHICH IS ADDED</span><br />
+
+<span style="font-size: 60%">A NOTE ON</span><br />
+<span style="font-size: 80%">MEDIÆVAL GARDENS</span></h1>
+
+<p class="author"><span style="font-size: 60%">BY</span><br />
+ALICE KEMP-WELCH</p>
+
+<p class="center" style="margin-bottom: 4em">WITH INTRODUCTION AND ILLUSTRATIONS</p>
+
+<p class="publisher">MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED<br />
+ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON<br />
+1913</p>
+
+<p class="center">COPYRIGHT</p>
+</div>
+
+<div class="authornote">
+<h2><a name="AUTHORS_NOTE" id="AUTHORS_NOTE"></a>AUTHOR’S NOTE</h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">The</span> Author’s acknowledgments are due to the
+Editor of <i>The Nineteenth Century and After</i> for
+his kind permission to reprint such of the
+following studies as have already appeared in
+that Review, and also to “George Fleming”
+(Miss Constance Fletcher) for her rendering, on
+page 146, of four verses of Christine de Pisan’s
+poem on Joan of Arc.</p>
+</div>
+
+
+<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></h2>
+
+
+
+<table summary="table of contents">
+<tr><td class="lal">&nbsp;</td><td class="ral"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#INTRODUCTION"><span class="smcap">Introduction</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_xi">xi</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#A_TENTH-CENTURY_DRAMATIST"><span class="smcap">A Tenth-Century Dramatist, Roswitha the
+Nun</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#A_TWELFTH-CENTURY_ROMANCE-WRITER"><span class="smcap">A Twelfth-Century Romance-Writer, Marie
+de France</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_29">29</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#A_THIRTEENTH-CENTURY_MYSTIC"><span class="smcap">A Thirteenth-Century Mystic and Beguine,
+Mechthild of Magdeburg</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_57">57</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#A_FOURTEENTH-CENTURY"><span class="smcap">A Fourteenth-Century Art-Patron and Philanthropist,
+Mahaut, Countess of Artois</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_83">83</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#A_FIFTEENTH-CENTURY_FEMINISTE"><span class="smcap">A Fifteenth-Century Feministe, Christine de
+Pisan</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_116">116</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#AGNES_SOREL"><span class="smcap">Agnes Sorel</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_147">147</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal"><a href="#A_NOTE_ON_MEDIAEVAL_GARDENS"><span class="smcap">A Note on Mediæval Gardens</span></a></td><td class="ral"><a href="#Page_173">173</a>
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+
+
+<h2><a name="ILLUSTRATIONS" id="ILLUSTRATIONS"></a>ILLUSTRATIONS<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span></h2>
+
+<table summary="list of illustrations">
+
+<tr><td class="lal">&nbsp;</td><td class="ral"><small>FACE PAGE</small></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Poet declaiming to accompaniment of Viol</td><td class="ral"><a href="#frontispiece"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Roswitha presenting her Poem to the Emperor Otho I.,
+the Abbess of Gandersheim standing at her
+side. A. Dürer, 1501</td><td class="ral"><a href="#rosw">1</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Cover of St. Emmeran Gospels. 10th century</td><td class="ral"><a href="#emmeran">7</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Marriage of Otho II. and Theophano. Byzantine,
+10th century</td><td class="ral"><a href="#theo">7</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Lady playing Harp. Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#harp">32</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Add. MS. 10293, Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#ms10293">34</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Boat with Knights and Lady. Add. MS. 10294,
+Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#boat">49</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Glaukos and Polyeidos in Tomb. Greek Vase, Brit.
+Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#glaukos">52</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Statue of Mahaut in Abbey of La Thieuloye, near
+Arras, now destroyed. From a Drawing, now
+in Brussels, made in 1602</td><td class="ral"><a href="#mahaut">99</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Marriage of Charles le Bel and Marie of Luxemburg.
+Grandes Chrons. de France. Bib. Nat.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#lebel">100</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Thirteenth-Century Treatise on Surgery, in French.
+Sloane MS. 1977</td><td class="ral"><a href="#sloanems">103</a><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Banquet, with Minstrels playing, and Room hung with
+Embroidery. MS. Romance of Alexander,
+14th century. Bodleian, Oxford</td><td class="ral"><a href="#minstrels">104</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#harl4425">105</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Christine de Pisan</td><td class="ral"><a href="#pisan">119</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Lady in Horse-Litter, returning from Tournament.
+Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#horse">132</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">La Cité des Dames</td><td class="ral"><a href="#dames">138</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Setting out for Poissy. Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#poissy">140</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Tomb of Agnes Sorel</td><td class="ral"><a href="#agnes">158</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier</td><td class="ral"><a href="#hours1">162</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier</td><td class="ral"><a href="#hours2">163</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Book of Hours, French, 14th century. Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#hours3">176</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#harl2">177</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Flemish Master, 15th century. Stephenson Clarke
+Collection</td><td class="ral"><a href="#flemish">181</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century</td><td class="ral"><a href="#alex">183</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Rhenish Master, C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#rhen">185</a></td></tr>
+
+<tr><td class="lal">Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.</td><td class="ral"><a href="#harl3">186</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+
+
+<h2><a name="INTRODUCTION" id="INTRODUCTION"></a>INTRODUCTION<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span></h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">The</span> recent researches of scholars and students
+have brought the study of mediæval times
+within the range of almost any one who
+cares to live in imagination in the past. No
+part of this study has been more advanced
+and made more informing to us than
+that which regards the individual. This is
+specially true of womankind, of whom we have
+learnt somewhat, in some instances from their
+own writings, and in others from allusions to
+their work in those of contemporary and later
+writers, and also, incidentally, from the vast
+storehouse of didactic literature, which is so
+suggestive in itself, reflecting through successive
+centuries, as it seems to do, the standard of
+conduct of the large majority. But on this
+subject—a very large one, and only partially
+explored—light can only be thrown gradually.
+For this there are various reasons. One is that,
+until comparatively recent times, the small details
+of everyday life which go so largely to make<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[xii]</a></span>
+up a woman’s life, have generally been taken
+for granted by writers. Then the few mediæval
+historiographers and chroniclers were principally
+engaged in recounting the deeds of kings and
+feats of arms. Then again, although probably
+many MSS. of the time still lie undiscovered in
+libraries, those that are known to us are scattered
+far and wide. Furthermore, self-advertisement
+was not a mediæval fashion. It is perhaps
+difficult for us nowadays to understand a spirit
+of self-effacement. Self-esteem, which may develop
+for either good or ill, has perhaps always
+existed in the human breast, but certainly since
+the time of the Renaissance, when it seemed to
+have its own special revival, it has grown apace,
+and is to-day like unto the Mustard Tree of
+Holy Writ. But it is not proposed to contrast
+this our modern attitude with the impersonal
+one, if so it may be called, of the Middle Ages,
+because, whilst there were many humble, zealous
+workers then, just as there are now, it is possible
+there were other and perhaps more potent factors
+to account for this apparently humble attitude.
+In mediæval days, the subject of a narrative or
+didactic work was considered so important, that
+an author would scarcely venture on any independent
+treatment of a theme for fear of incurring
+censure for a contempt of authority, or, if he did
+so venture, he would probably deem it wiser to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[xiii]</a></span>
+do so anonymously, or by ascription to some
+departed celebrity, who was obviously not in a
+position to gainsay him. The writer was of
+much less interest than his ideas and sentiments.
+Then again there was the intense localisation of
+life. Localities were very independent of one
+another. Each was complete in itself, and
+within it there was no need for self-advertisement.
+It was the same in the wider life of associated
+religious communities, such as Benedictines,
+Cluniacs, and Cistercians, who had so much to
+do with the building of abbeys and cathedrals.
+Within a fraternity, the specially gifted craftsman
+was known, and wherever work was going on
+within the Order, was made use of as needs be,
+not as Brother This, or Brother That, but simply
+as scribe, or as artificer in Madonnas or gargoyles,
+or whatever else was wanted. The glorification
+of the community as a whole, and not the
+advertisement of the individual, was the desired
+goal. This self-effacement was not so much
+humility, though of course that too existed, as
+the special form which communal feeling took
+at that time. Now if this suppression of the
+individual was true of men, how much more
+true must it have been of women, who seldom
+ventured beyond town, or castle, or convent
+walls. In truth, women hardly appear on the
+scene, and English women least of all. It is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</a></span>
+only women who were prominent through their
+high official positions, either political or religious,
+such as Blanche of Castile, or St. Catherine of
+Siena, or the Abbess Hildegarde, or women like
+the Blessed Angela of Foligno,<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> or Julian,
+anchoress of Norwich,<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> or some other of the
+devout women of mediæval Italy, who interpreted
+the mysteries of divine love to mediæval
+society, having in fact, as it were, religious
+salons, from whom the veil has been withdrawn,
+and even amongst such as these it has sometimes
+been only very slightly lifted. With these
+saintly and political women must be mentioned
+the women doctors of Salerno—Trothula, Abella,
+Mercurialis, and others—who played so important
+a part both as professors and practitioners when
+this school of medicine was at its zenith in the
+eleventh and twelfth centuries, and who left
+behind them, as evidence of their learning,
+treatises which are of interest to-day as showing
+mediæval methods in medicine.</p>
+
+<p>Still, even so, the records are scanty. In
+order, therefore, to form some idea and estimate
+of women generally in the Middle Ages, we
+must perforce fall back on reasoning from the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xv" id="Page_xv">[xv]</a></span>known to the unknown, and, by studying the
+few who are recorded in written history, judge
+of that great majority who, though nameless,
+have yet so largely helped to make up the world’s
+unwritten history. Just as many a flower blooms
+and dies unseen, so many a woman must have
+lived her life, serviceable to her special environment,
+but wholly unrecorded. Just as, in the
+course of ages, the seeds of some humble plant
+have been carried by wind or water from some
+lonely region to one less remote, and made to
+serve a purpose by adding to the sum-total of
+beauty and usefulness, so the thoughts and deeds
+of many an unremembered woman have doubtless
+passed into the great ocean of thought, encircling
+us to-day, and influencing us as a living force.</p>
+
+<p>Thus we have the women who figure in
+history, and whom we must take as types of the
+influential woman of the time, and the women
+whom history has not so honoured. Of the
+former, even when only portrayed in outline, we
+can learn something, but how are we to learn
+anything of the latter, whether living in the
+seclusion of religious houses or in the world?
+Of those living in religious houses, we know
+from records that, besides attending to their own
+spiritual and mental education and tending the
+sick, they conducted the cloister schools and
+taught in them needlework, the art of confectionery,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xvi" id="Page_xvi">[xvi]</a></span>
+surgery, writing, and drawing. They
+also wove, and embroidered, and added their mite
+to the sum-total of beauty by transcribing and
+illuminating MSS. of the Gospels and of the
+lives of the Saints. But sometimes such a
+limited sphere of activity was enlarged, and it is
+to an anonymous Anglo-Saxon nun of the eighth
+century, to whom the experiences were related,
+that we owe one of the earliest and most
+interesting accounts extant in Northern Europe
+of a journey to Palestine.</p>
+
+<p>To learn something of those living in the
+world, who were the inspirers, the helpmates,
+and the companions of men in everyday life, we
+must turn to the poems and romances. These
+form the key to the domestic life of the time.
+Though ordinary life may be somewhat idealised
+in them, still it is ordinary life on which they
+are based. Moreover, many of the MSS. in
+which they are written down contain miniatures—a
+legacy of exceeding worth to the student.
+But if we seek some knowledge of mediæval life
+from miniatures, it is not necessary to confine
+our researches to MSS. of romances. Transcripts
+of the classics, of the moralised Bible, and
+of other religious works also supply many
+pictures of everyday life, adapted quite regardless
+of incongruity, for one of the characteristics
+of the Middle Ages was a profound incapacity<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xvii" id="Page_xvii">[xvii]</a></span>
+to picture to itself anything <i>but</i> itself, or to
+reconstitute in any way, as we do to-day, times
+and scenes not its own. This was owing partly
+to its vitality and its youthfulness, which grasped
+at anything and everything without discernment,
+and partly to its lack of reliable material. The
+whole aspect of life, too, was changed and
+enlarged, and for the moment over-charged, for
+the flood-gates of the East, hitherto only
+partially opened, had been rent asunder by the
+traveller and the crusader.</p>
+
+<p>Before we attempt to arrive at some idea of
+the manner of life of the women of the Middle
+Ages, it will be well, if possible, to modify what
+seems to be a general and perhaps a distorted
+impression of these women of bygone days, as
+regards their want of loyalty in their domestic
+relations, and all the deceit and cunning such
+a want led to. Without attempting to justify
+what is fundamentally wrong, let us go if we
+can into the region of fact, and in that region
+there is quite enough romance without introducing
+it from outside.</p>
+
+<p>In the first place, so much more, as a rule, is
+heard of vice than of virtue. “La voix de la
+beauté parle bas: elle ne s’insinue que dans les
+âmes les plus éveillées.” Then the standard of
+life in those days was very different from what
+it is to-day. Manners and customs which were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xviii" id="Page_xviii">[xviii]</a></span>
+accepted facts of everyday life then, would strike
+us as strangely rude and repellent now. Take,
+for instance, the attitude towards his queen of a
+king we have all been taught to revere—Arthur,
+the semi-saint, and the so-called pattern of
+courtesy. When Guinevere deserts him, and
+some of his knights are slain, his remark—not
+whispered into the ear of a confidant, but uttered
+aloud in the presence of all around him—is, “I
+am sorrier for my good knights’ loss than for the
+loss of my fair Queen, for queens I might have
+enow.” Such a sentiment, expressed in public,
+does not seem quite up to our modern standard
+of courteous, or even civilised, conduct, and yet
+here we have the sentiments of the Prince of
+Chivalry, as conceived by the poets of the
+thirteenth century. So it is obvious that before
+passing judgment upon the standard of life of
+the mediæval woman, we must endeavour to
+arrive at the truth by thinking and living in
+imagination on the same plane, as near as may
+be, as she did.</p>
+
+<p>Then again, it is largely owing to certain
+stories in the Middle Ages that the women of
+those times have been defamed. If we consider
+the sources and the transcribers of these stories,
+we shall perhaps find a reason for their distorted
+outlines, filled in with so much imperfectly
+understood detail. Many of these tales originated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xix" id="Page_xix">[xix]</a></span>
+in the East, and particularly in India, where
+the conditions of domestic life led to and
+favoured intrigue, and many of them also were
+mere allegory, in which the Eastern sought to
+hide great truths. These the less meditative
+Western interpreted literally, mistaking the
+outward form for that which it concealed. So
+in passing to the West, Eastern ideas and
+Eastern exaggeration, misconstrued, became
+caricature. Moreover, the compilers of these
+stories were often monks or minstrels who vied
+with each other for popular favour, the monk
+introducing into his legends material which he
+hoped would rival the often shameless outpourings
+of the minstrel, whilst the minstrel,
+for his part, tried to adorn his story with some
+moral. Naturally neither class of such purveyors
+was in the least capable of judging woman
+with respect, or indeed of judging woman at all.</p>
+
+<p>On the other hand, however, it must be
+remembered that there are stories that tell a
+very different tale, a tale of self-sacrifice and
+devotion in face of grievous trial, as, for instance,
+that of Eric and Enide, sung by Chrétien of
+Troyes, and made familiar to us by Tennyson’s
+poem of “Geraint and Enid.” It is impossible
+that such a conception should have been the mere
+outcome of the poet’s imagination, since a poet,
+whilst he may transform, focuses and reflects the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xx" id="Page_xx">[xx]</a></span>
+ideas of his time. In truth, we find mediæval
+literature, if we try to estimate it reasonably,
+gives a quite pleasing impression of womankind,
+whether we turn to some of the royal ladies who
+presided over brilliant Courts, where learning
+was encouraged and poets made welcome, or to
+the lady of lesser degree, who reigned supreme
+in her castle, at any rate when her lord was
+away, as was often the case in time of war or
+during attendance at Court, or to the abbesses
+who governed the religious houses they were set
+over, to their material and mental well-being,
+proving thus their genius for administration, and,
+in many instances, their rare intellectual attainments.
+A record in a chartulary of the Benedictine
+nunnery of Wherwell in Hampshire, now
+in the British Museum (Egerton MS., 2104),
+and accessible to all in translation in the second
+volume of the <i>Victoria History of the County of
+Hampshire</i>, may be mentioned in passing, since
+it gives such a charming picture of mediæval
+convent life. It recounts the life and work of
+the Abbess Euphemia, who presided over the
+house from 1226 to 1257. Amongst her many
+good deeds, it is told of her that “with maternal
+piety and careful forethought, she built, for the
+use of both sick and sound, a new and large
+infirmary away from the main buildings,” and
+that, besides caring thus for the bodily wants of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxi" id="Page_xxi">[xxi]</a></span>
+her community, “she built there a place set
+apart for the refreshment of the soul, namely a
+chapel of the Blessed Virgin.” The writer
+adds that “in numberless ways she provided for
+the worship of God and the welfare of the
+sisters,” and that “she so conducted herself with
+regard to exterior affairs, that she seemed to have
+the spirit of a man rather than of a woman.”
+The account is altogether delightful and informing,
+and should be read by any who would go in
+spirit to a mediæval convent. It is therefore
+not surprising that in the late Middle Ages a
+regard and reverence for womanhood gradually
+arose—a regard and reverence for woman not
+merely as the weaker vessel, but as the principle
+of all good and of moral elevation. This attitude
+was also in large measure due to the inevitable
+fusion of the cult of the Virgin and the cult of
+woman, which in the thirteenth century developed
+into a faith. Then was it that religion
+and chivalry, in combination, formed the solvent
+that disintegrated the layer of selfishness—the
+outcome of the worship of brute force—that had
+settled over man’s nobler instincts, and by their
+appeal to his better nature decided the position
+that woman, not only as an individual, but also
+as a class, was thenceforth to take in the civilised
+world.</p>
+
+<p>Let us now turn, first to the woman of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxii" id="Page_xxii">[xxii]</a></span>
+Romances and then to the woman of History.
+Each completes and is completed by the other.
+For the woman of the Middle Ages there were
+practically only two alternatives—to enter into
+the bonds either of Holy Matrimony or of Holy
+Church. In both cases the vows were, as a rule,
+taken early, especially in the case of marriage, so
+that the woman of the Middle Ages knew little
+of the joys of girlhood, with all its romantic
+castle-building and fondly fostered illusions.
+From playing with dolls, the child of twelve
+or even younger often suddenly found herself
+transformed into a wife. Although the Church
+had decreed that no girl should be wedded
+before the age of fifteen, this mandate was often
+ignored in noble families, where, through death,
+large fiefs had been left without a male representative
+and protector. In such a case the
+over-lord considered it necessary to assert his
+authority, and compel the marriage of some
+young girl of perhaps only twelve, so as to
+secure for her vassals and retainers a qualified
+leader, and for himself the needful and pledged
+military service. Still these marriages of convenience
+were often really happy arrangements,
+for the girl-wife had been trained to altruism,
+and its principles were the very essence of her
+daily life. Love, moreover, is a subtle sprite,
+and just as surely as he can spread his wings and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxiii" id="Page_xxiii">[xxiii]</a></span>
+fly away, so he can come, as if at unconscious
+bidding, and make for himself a dwelling-place.</p>
+
+<p>To get any true insight into the life of the
+woman of the Middle Ages, we must study the
+small everyday affairs, and to this end go, in
+imagination, to some castle, and see how the
+day is passed there by its lady. Perhaps it is a
+day in late spring. The watchman on the tower,
+heralding the day, has sounded his horn, and
+soon all the castle is astir. Leaving her curtained
+bed, she first offers a short prayer at the
+small shrine hanging close by with its flickering
+light. Then the bath, the water scented with
+aromatic roots and covered with rose-petals, is
+taken. Mass and the morning broth follow, and
+the day is considered fitly begun. The poor, or
+any sick and sorry folk, are the first to be considered,
+or perhaps there is some wounded
+knight, who has sought shelter within the
+protecting walls of the castle, for whom soothing
+potions or healing salves have to be compounded.
+This latter service was generally the
+work of the lady of the castle, who as a rule
+possessed sufficient surgical knowledge to bind a
+broken limb. To beguile the weary hours of
+convalescence, she sings to the lute, tells stories,
+recounts legends, or reads aloud a romance lately
+bought from some wayfaring packman. Little
+is it to be wondered at that the convalescence is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxiv" id="Page_xxiv">[xxiv]</a></span>
+protracted, or that the knight delays his departure
+from day to day, sometimes to his own
+and the lady’s undoing.</p>
+
+<p>Beside such varied ministrations, the woman
+of the Middle Ages rode to the chase, went out
+hawking, snared birds with nets, ferreted rabbits,
+spun, wove, and embroidered. Embroidering
+was a really formidable occupation, for the great
+hall, and each room, had its special hangings,
+and on fête-days every inch of wall-space was
+covered. One set would picture an Arthurian
+legend, and others again were made bright with
+flowers, lilies, roses, and columbines. The lady
+and her maidens—often girls of noble birth,
+whom it was customary to send to some castle
+to complete their education—worked at the
+countless yards such decoration involved, and
+chatted the while, it may be, of some coming
+marriage or tourney, or perchance one among
+them would tell a story, and so time passed
+merrily enough. Then for the educated woman,
+of whom there were many, Latin verse offered a
+wide field of delight, and the woman of the
+Middle Ages read and loved her Virgil just as
+we of to-day read and love our Shakespeare.
+When the daylight had faded, there was always
+chess-playing, dancing the carole, and singing,
+and by the thirteenth century little pastoral ballets,
+in which a knight, and a shepherdess and her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxv" id="Page_xxv">[xxv]</a></span>
+lover, took part, began to be produced for the
+diversion of castle-folk. For daily entertainment,
+every castle of any pretension had its own
+minstrel or minstrels, whilst in the smaller castles
+a wandering singer was warmly welcomed.
+Sometimes the lady gave audience to a poet,
+who read his latest idyll, a minstrel, to the
+accompaniment of his viol, singing the interspersed
+lyrics. Such a scene may be found
+depicted in miniatures, and suggests how such a
+story as “Aucassin and Nicolette,” and many
+another, partly in prose, partly in verse, was
+rendered. One such miniature shows a lady reclining
+on a couch, with a lordling seated beside
+her, the poet, with his small parchment leaflets,
+declaiming his story, the minstrel waiting to
+take up the theme in song. It is of interest
+to note that in this particular miniature the
+gown of the lady is ornamented with heraldic
+devices. By such means we are enabled not
+only to identify the person represented—since
+portraiture, even if there was anything worthy of
+the name, was in a very rudimentary condition—and
+thus arrive at the approximate date of the
+picture, but also to verify a custom, and a stage
+in social life. It was not until the end of the
+twelfth century, when some sort of heraldic
+system became necessary owing to the introduction
+of the closed helmet, that armorial bearings,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxvi" id="Page_xxvi">[xxvi]</a></span>
+hitherto mere personal badges, became attached
+to noble families. By the thirteenth century,
+when the bourgeoisie had become rich, they
+were worn by the sumptuously attired wife of
+the lord to distinguish her from the equally
+sumptuously attired wife of the wealthy burgher.</p>
+
+<p>Such, in mere outline, was the daily life of
+the mediæval lady. Descriptions of the lady
+herself seem to be mere replicas of an admired
+and fixed type, for there is in them such a sameness
+of delineation, that we can only imagine
+that poets sang of qualities that pleased, and did
+not attempt to individualise. All are good and
+gracious, beautiful, and slight of figure, with
+delicate hands and tapering fingers, small feet,
+fine and glossy hair, and grey eyes, laughing and
+bright. Only occasionally are these attractions
+varied and enhanced by the telling of beauty
+unaided by paint and hair dye.</p>
+
+<p>It is hardly necessary to speak, save very
+generally, of woman’s dress, for much has already
+been written on the subject. For everyday use,
+garments of wool or linen, according to the
+season, and with much fur in winter, were worn.
+At weddings or tournaments, or on any other kind
+of fête-day, the ladies vied with each other in
+rich cloth of gold and silver, in silks woven with
+threads of gold and patterned with conventional
+design, and in all kinds of iridescent silken stuffs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxvii" id="Page_xxvii">[xxvii]</a></span>
+from the East. From Mosul, on the banks of
+the Tigris, whence the material we call muslin
+takes its name, was brought a fine silk gossamer,
+something like our <i>crêpe de Chine</i>. This was
+used for the finely plaited underdress seen at the
+neck and foot of mediæval costume. Perhaps
+the best representation of this, although stone
+seems hardly the most favourable medium for
+the delineation of so delicate a fabric, can be
+seen in the long slim figures of the queenly ladies
+standing in the niches on either side of the west
+door of Chartres Cathedral.</p>
+
+<p>But when we have contemplated this gorgeous
+and dainty apparel, and all the other personal
+luxury that accompanied it, such as enamelled
+and jewelled gold circlets for the head, jewelled
+girdles with each jewel chosen for its own special
+virtue, carved ivory combs, tablets and hand-mirrors,
+and the like, we are forced to wonder
+how all this refinement and beauty could go
+hand in hand with so much that is unpleasing.
+If we turn to consider the manners of the men,
+we find the same contrasts—on the one hand
+the maximum of gallantry and courtesy, and on
+the other a corresponding churlishness and
+brutality. Metaphorically and actually, the
+lance and the battle-axe were still rivalling each
+other in the warfare of daily life. Although
+the battle-axe must eventually yield to the lance,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxviii" id="Page_xxviii">[xxviii]</a></span>
+still strange extremes have flourished side by
+side all down the ages. Turning to but comparatively
+recent times, the coarseness we associate
+with much of the reign of Charles II. stands
+out in glaring contrast with the delicate, graceful
+poetry that found expression then. And coming
+still nearer to our own days, we think of the
+unseemly manners in the reigns of George III.
+and IV. and the dainty miniatures such as those
+painted by Cosway, and wonder how these could
+exist together. Might we not just as well
+wonder why the olive tree has a gnarled, distorted
+stem, whilst its delicate, symmetrical leaves,
+of the tenderest green grey, glisten in the sunshine
+like silvery shells fresh from ocean’s bed?</p>
+
+<p>Renan, amongst the many thinkers on life’s
+mysteries, tells us that “Life is the result of a
+conflict between contrary forces.” But to philosophise
+is useless, and it is still more useless to
+question life’s seeming anomalies. We can only
+bow in silence before “what Time in mists
+confounds.”</p>
+
+<p>As has been already said, it is only a general
+idea of the women of the Middle Ages that can
+be gleaned from the Romances. For something
+to bring us into more real touch with them, and
+to reveal more of their personality, we must
+consider some who have made themselves known
+to us through their work, since history, until<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xxix" id="Page_xxix">[xxix]</a></span>
+we come to the fourteenth century, is almost
+silent about them. Thus it is that as we study
+these women, it almost seems at first as if we
+were looking at some faded frescoes in a dimly
+lighted church. But just as the half-obliterated
+figures take form and life as our eyes grow
+accustomed to the dimness, and our minds get
+attuned to the days that knew their living
+representatives, so these women of whom we
+are speaking may live again for us if only we
+treat their works as human documents, and not
+as archæological curiosities. The following
+pages tell of six such women who lived between
+the tenth century and the first half of the
+fifteenth—Roswitha, a nun of Germany; Marie
+de France, a lady at the Court of Henry the
+Second of England; Mechthild of Magdeburg,
+mystic and beguine; Mahaut, Countess of
+Artois, a great-niece of St. Louis; Christine de
+Pisan, an Italian by birth, living at the Court of
+Charles the Fifth of France; and Agnes Sorel,
+the Mistress and inspirer of Charles the Seventh.</p>
+
+<p>In trying to evoke the women of these days
+of long ago, it is hardly possible to do more
+than portray them in outline. Yet even so, if
+the outline be true, we may remember, for our
+consolation, that it has been said that we shall
+never, except in outline, see the mysterious
+Goddess Truth.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> <i>The Book of the Divine Consolation of the Blessed Angela of
+Foligno.</i> The New Mediæval Library.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> <i>Revelations of Divine Love recorded by Julian, Anchoress of
+Norwich, 1373.</i></p></div></div>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"><a name="rosw" id="rosw"></a>
+<img src="images/i001.jpg" width="400" height="604" alt="ROSWITHA PRESENTING HER POEM TO THE EMPEROR OTHO I.,
+THE ABBESS OF GANDERSHEIM STANDING AT HER SIDE." title="Roswitha and Otho I." />
+
+<p class="source"> <i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">ROSWITHA PRESENTING HER POEM TO THE EMPEROR OTHO I.,
+THE ABBESS OF GANDERSHEIM STANDING AT HER SIDE.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">A. Dürer, 1501.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 1.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+<h2><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span><a name="A_TENTH-CENTURY_DRAMATIST" id="A_TENTH-CENTURY_DRAMATIST"></a>A TENTH-CENTURY DRAMATIST,<br />
+ROSWITHA THE NUN</h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">In</span> this age of personal curiosity, politely called
+psychological interest, when personalities are
+analysed with all the thoroughness of the dissecting
+theatre, it seems almost courting failure
+to try to call to remembrance one whose
+personality has long since faded away, and of
+whom, apparently, no contemporary writer has
+made mention. Of Roswitha, the woman, we
+know but little, and this little is gathered from
+her own writings.<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> Presumably the date of her
+birth was about <small>A.D.</small> 935, and that of her death
+about <small>A.D.</small> 973. There is a tradition that she
+was connected with the royal house of Germany,
+at that time represented by the enlightened
+Otho the Great. Be this as it may, her life for
+us begins when, probably at an early age, she
+entered the Convent of Gandersheim. Gandersheim
+was a Benedictine nunnery in the Harz
+Mountains, founded in the ninth century by
+Liudolf, Duke of Saxony, and important enough
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span>to entitle its Abbess to a Seat in the Imperial
+Diet, a right perhaps never exercised except by
+proxy. The story of its foundation, as told by
+Roswitha in the unique MS. of her works, is
+of strange beauty. Listen to her own words as
+she tells the tale:—</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>At that time there was, nigh unto the Monastery,<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> a little
+wood, encircled by shady hills, those same hills by the which
+we ourselves are surrounded. And there was, moreover, in the
+wood a small farm where the swineherds of Liudolf were wont
+to dwell, and within the enclosure of which the men, during
+the hours of night, composed to rest their weary bodies until
+the time when they must needs drive forth to pasture the pigs
+committed to their care. Here, on a time, two days before
+the Feast of All Saints, these same herdsmen, in the darkness
+of the night, saw full many bright lights glowing in the wood.
+And they were astonished at the sight, and marvelled what
+could be the purport of this strange vision of blazing light
+cleaving the darkness of the night with its wondrous brilliance.
+And all trembling with fear, they related unto their Master
+that which they had seen, showing unto him the place which
+had been illumined by the light. And he, desiring by very
+sight thereof to put to proof that which he had heard tell,
+joined them without the building, and began the following
+night, without sleeping, to keep watch, closing not his eyes
+though they were weighed down by the desire of slumber.
+And after a while he saw the kindling lights, more in number
+than afore, once again burn with a red glow, in the same place
+forsooth, but at an hour somewhat earlier. And this glad
+sign of happy omen he made known so soon as Phœbus shed
+his first rays from the sky, and the joyous news spread everywhere.
+And this could not be kept back from the worthy
+Duke Liudolf, but swifter than speech did it come to his
+ears. And he, carefully observing on the hallowed eve of the
+approaching festival whether perchance some further like
+heavenly vision would clearly show it to be an omen, with
+much company kept watch on the wood all the night long.
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>And straightway when black night had covered the land with
+darkness, everywhere throughout the wooded valley in the
+which the very noble temple was destined to be built, many
+lights were perceived, the which, with the shining splendour
+of their exceeding brightness, cleft asunder the shades of the
+wood and the darkness of the night alike. And thereupon,
+standing up and rendering praise to God, they all with one
+accord declared it meet that the place should be sanctified to
+the worship of Him who had filled it with the light. And,
+moreover, the Duke, mindful of his duty to Heaven, and with
+the consent of his dear consort Oda, forthwith ordered the
+trees to be felled and the brushwood cut away, and the valley
+to be completely cleared. And this sylvan spot, aforetime
+the home of fauns and monsters, he thus cleared and made
+fitting for the glory of God. And then, before obtaining the
+money needful for the work, he at once set out the lines of
+a noble church as traced by the splendour of the red light.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p>
+
+<p>In suchwise was the building of our second Monastery to
+the glory of God begun. But stone suitable for the structure
+could not be found in those parts, and thus the completion of
+the sanctuary which had been begun, suffered delay. But the
+Abbess Hathumoda, trusting to obtain all things from the
+Lord by faith, oft-times, by serving God both night and day
+with holy zeal, wore herself out with too abundant labour.
+And with many of those placed under her care, she besought
+the solace of speedy help from Heaven, lest the work so well
+begun should be left unfinished. And of a sudden she became
+aware that the divine grace which she sought was present,
+ready to have compassion on her longings. For as she lay one
+day prostrate nigh unto the altar, fasting and giving herself up
+to prayer, she was bidden of a gentle voice to go forth and
+follow a bird she would see sitting on the summit of a certain
+great rock. And she, embracing the command with ready
+mind, went forth, putting her trust in it with all her heart.
+And taking with her very skilled masons, she sped swiftly
+whither the kindly Spirit led her, until she was come to the
+noble sanctuary which had been begun. And there she saw,
+seated on the lofty summit of the self-same rock, a white dove,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>the which, flying with outspread wings, straightway went
+before her, tempering its flight in unwonted way so that the
+virgin, walking with her companions, might be able to follow
+in a straight course its aerial track. And when the dove in
+its flight had come to the place which we now know was not
+wanting in great stones, it descended, and with its beak pierced
+through the ground,<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> where, beneath the soil, many stones
+were disclosed. And assured by this sight, the very worthy
+virgin of Christ bade her companions clear away the heavy
+mass of earth, and lay the spot bare. And this done, supernal
+and devout piety presiding over the work, a great wealth of
+mighty stones was brought to view, whence all the needful
+material for the walls of the monastery already begun, and of
+the church, could be obtained. Then, striving ever more and
+more with all their heart, the builders of the temple destined
+to be consecrated to the glory of God, laboured at the work
+by night and by day.</p></div>
+
+<p>Thus does Roswitha tell how the work of
+the new Foundation was begun, the Duke
+Liudolf and his wife having already journeyed
+to Rome to ask of the Pope his blessing, as well
+as to beg of him, as a token of his favour, some
+sacred relics to deposit there. The Pope, giving
+them his blessing, thus makes answer to their
+request:—</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>There were here, aforetime, two mighty rulers—the most
+holy Anastasius who presided over this See, and his co-apostle,
+the holy Innocent. These, through their services to the
+Church, were the most famous next after St. Peter and
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>St. Paul. With such care have the illustrious bodies of these
+two been heretofore preserved by all the rulers of this city,
+that never has any one been permitted to carry away the least
+portion of them, and thus their sacred limbs remain undiminished.
+But forasmuch as it is meet that I yield to your
+pious request, I will grant you, without recompense, tokens
+from both these sacred bodies, cut before your very eyes from
+off the sacred bodies themselves, if so be that you will make
+solemn oath to me to venerate these relics in your community,
+of the which you have made mention, preserving them for all
+time within your Church, sacred hymns being there sung by
+night and by day, and a light being alway kept burning. And
+of our apostolic right we ordain, according to your request,
+that your community be of our See, to the end that it may be
+secured from all secular rule.</p></div>
+
+<p>And Liudolf, with glad heart, made promise
+of this, and returned home with the coveted
+relics.</p>
+
+<p>The MS., now at Munich, which tells this
+fascinating story of love and faith, was, it is
+considered, written about <small>A.D.</small> 1000, and was
+fortunately preserved in the Benedictine convent
+of St. Emmeran, Ratisbon, where the scholar
+and poet, Conrad Celtes, discovered it at the
+end of the fifteenth century. It also includes
+metrical legends, a fragment of a panegyric on
+the Emperor Otho, and six dramas. Of such
+worth were these latter counted, that when
+Celtes published the MS. in 1501, Albert Dürer
+received a commission for an ornamental title-page,
+and for a frontispiece to each of the
+plays. It is by these dramas that Roswitha has
+distinguished herself in the world of letters;
+for although the legends contain points of
+interest, and are treated with skill, they are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>
+naturally not so unique as the dramas, nor do
+they reflect her personality in the same way.
+She herself tells us that the plays were written
+in imitation of the manner, but not of the matter,
+of Terence, and that her only desire in writing
+them was “to make the small talent given her
+by Heaven to create, under the hammer of
+devotion, a faint sound to the praise of God.”</p>
+
+<p>But before considering her work, let us glance
+at her own life, and the life of contemporary
+Saxon nunneries.</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"><a name="emmeran" id="emmeran"></a>
+<img src="images/i007a.jpg" width="400" height="506" alt="COVER OF ST. EMMERAN GOSPELS." title="St. Emmeran Gospels" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Royal Library, Munich.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">COVER OF ST. EMMERAN GOSPELS.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Tenth Century.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 7.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Nearly one hundred and fifty years before
+the supposed date of Roswitha’s birth, the
+hitherto untamed and warlike Saxons had been
+finally defeated by the mercenaries of Charlemagne,
+and, as one of the signs of submission,
+forced to embrace Christianity. But having
+submitted, they forthwith, and with an aptitude
+suggestive of the spirit of the modern Japanese,
+set themselves to appropriate, assimilate, and
+remodel for their own use, the rudiments of the
+civilisation with which they found themselves
+brought into contact. So speedy and so thorough
+was the transformation, that scarce a century
+passed ere the once powerful Frankish kingdom
+of Charlemagne bowed down before the strenuous
+Saxons, to whom the supreme power was transferred.
+Their Chief was elected king of the
+Germans, and some fifty years later their king,
+Otho the Great, after being crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle,
+the former centre of Frankish rule,
+received the Imperial Crown from the Pope in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span>
+Rome. This displacement of the political
+centre was naturally followed by a complete
+displacement of artistic centres. Both these
+sides of life were fostered by Otho with a keen
+personal interest—the building up of his empire
+and the encouragement of art going hand in
+hand. Moreover, owing to his close ties with
+Italy and the East, and the element of classic
+tradition inevitably induced by such ties, art
+received an added stimulus and grace. Oriental
+monks were to be found in the monasteries.
+Learned men and artists were summoned from
+Italy and Constantinople. The number and
+influence of these were increased when Otho’s
+son, afterwards Otho the Second, married
+Theophano, a Greek princess, who, bringing
+many compatriots in her train, sought to reflect
+in her German home something of the learning
+and splendour of the Byzantine Court. The
+ivory, shown in illustration, commemorating
+this marriage, is an example of the work of
+some Byzantine craftsman in her employ, whilst
+the jewelled and gold-wrought cover of the
+Gospels of St. Emmeran (now at Munich)
+shows to how high a level the goldsmith’s art
+of the time had been raised by the influences
+alluded to.</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"><a name="theo" id="theo"></a>
+<img src="images/i007b.jpg" width="350" height="580" alt="MARRIAGE OF OTHO II. AND THEOPHANO." title="Otho II. and Theophano" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Musée de Cluny, Paris.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">MARRIAGE OF OTHO II. AND THEOPHANO.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Byzantine, 10th century.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 7.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Perhaps the one place which retains in the
+most varied and concentrated form the traces
+of this wave of artistic development then
+passing over Germany, is Hildesheim. This is
+of interest here because the bishops of Hildesheim<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>
+were specially appointed to perform the office
+of consecration of nuns at Gandersheim. It
+seems hardly possible that Roswitha could have
+seen its gifted bishop Bernward, himself a
+painter, and a worker in mosaic and metals,
+though owing to the uncertainty of the date of
+her death—one chronicler making it as late as
+1002—it is just possible that she may have done
+so. Bernward’s learning and artistic nature
+attracted the attention of the princess Theophano,
+who appointed him tutor to her son, the boy-emperor
+Otho the Third. Brought thus into
+touch with the many gifts presented on special
+occasions to the young Emperor by Greek and
+Oriental princes, as well as by “Scots” (<i>i.e.</i>
+Irish missionaries and emigrants settled in
+Germany), he, by taking with him to Court,
+from the School of Art established in his palace
+at Hildesheim, apt and talented youths, made
+use of these rare and beautiful offerings for the
+encouragement of the study of divers arts.
+Students also accompanied him when he went
+farther afield for study, for it is said of him
+that there was no art which he did not attempt,
+even if he failed to attain perfection.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> Hildesheim
+thus became famous as a working-centre
+of fine art, especially in metals, and remained so
+down to the end of the Middle Ages. After
+a lapse of nearly a thousand years, the result of
+the labours of this artistic prelate and his pupils
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>may still be seen in situ as it were. Besides
+jewelled service-books, there are chalices, incense
+burners, a gold candelabrum, and a jewelled
+crucifix, fashioned, if not in part by him, at
+least under his supervision. The entrance to
+the Cathedral is beautified with delicately
+wrought bronze doors, modelled, it may be,
+from those of Sta. Sabina, Rome, themselves
+considered to be of Oriental origin,<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> and in the
+transept rises a column adorned with bronze
+reliefs from the life of Christ, probably designed
+by the bishop either after his pilgrimage to
+Rome in 1001, when he had seen Trajan’s
+column, or, as a recent writer suggests, from
+the “Juppiter and giant columns” of Roman
+Rhineland.<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a></p>
+
+<p>We are tempted to recall other princesses
+whose marriages, and even more whose personalities,
+have influenced art and letters, but two
+must suffice us—the one, the beautiful and
+cultivated Anne of Bohemia, wife of Richard
+the Second, whose bridal retinue was in reality
+a small Court of literary and artistic personages;
+the other, the brilliant Valentine Visconti of
+Milan, sister-in-law of King Charles the Sixth
+of France, whose influence in matters of art and
+literature alone, at a time when England and
+France were so intimately associated, makes her
+of special interest to us.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p><p>But what bearing, it may be asked, had
+Court life on the life of the nun Roswitha in
+the convent of Gandersheim? To answer this
+question we must recall briefly the position of
+the early religious houses, and especially those
+of Saxony. Many of the foundations were royal,
+and, in return for certain privileges, were obliged
+to entertain the king and his retinue whenever
+he journeyed. Such sojourns naturally brought
+a store of political, intellectual, and other information
+to the favoured house. Added to
+this, the abbess of such a house, generally a
+high-born and influential woman, was, in her
+position as a ruler of lands as well as of communities,
+brought into direct contact with the
+Court and with politics. To her rights of over-lordship
+were attached the same privileges and
+duties as in the case of any feudal baron. She
+issued summonses for attendance at her Courts,
+at which she was represented by a proctor, and,
+when war was declared, she had to provide the
+prescribed number of knights. In some cases
+her influence was supreme, even in imperial
+affairs, extending also to matters social and
+literary. Roswitha tells us how much she
+herself owed to the two successive abbesses
+under whose rule she lived, for suggestion,
+information, and encouragement in her literary
+work.</p>
+
+<p>The convents of Saxony, as many elsewhere
+in the tenth and eleventh centuries, were centres
+of culture in the nature of endowed colleges.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>
+In some of them women resided permanently,
+and besides their religious exercises, devoted
+themselves to learning and the arts, for the
+Church of the Middle Ages took thought for
+the intellect as well as for the soul. In others,
+no irrevocable vows were made, and if desire or
+necessity arose, the student inmate was free to
+return to the world. In others again, though
+residence was permanent, short leave of absence
+from time to time was granted by the abbess,
+and the nun was able to sojourn with her friends,
+or to visit some sister community. But at
+Gandersheim the rule was strict, and a nun, her
+vows once taken, had to remain within the
+convent walls. Yet even so, life there was
+perhaps far less circumscribed than in many a
+castle, where the men gave themselves up to
+war and the chase, and the women perforce spun
+and embroidered and gossiped, since to venture
+without the walls was fraught with difficulty
+and sometimes with danger. Even if there
+were some who cared to read, and who would
+fain go in imagination to other scenes and times,
+MSS. were difficult to come by, and costly
+withal. Wholly different was it in the religious
+houses. In these, women associated with their
+equals, with whom they could interchange ideas,
+and the library was well furnished with MSS. of
+classical and Christian writers. One of the first
+cares of St. Benedict, in the case of every newly
+founded house, was the formation of the library.
+So held in honour did this tradition become, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>
+so assiduously was it pursued, that the status of
+a monastery or a convent, as a centre of learning,
+came to be estimated by its wealth in MSS.
+Besides the mass of transcribing which such
+rivalry occasioned, there was illuminating to be
+done, musical notation to be studied and prepared
+for the services of the Church, chants and choir-singing
+to be practised, and the needful time to
+be devoted to weaving and embroidery—a part
+of every woman’s education. Weaving had of
+necessity to be done in every convent in order to
+provide the requisite clothing for its inmates,
+and the large and often elaborate hangings used
+for covering the walls. Embroidery, on the
+other hand, was no mere occupation, or even a
+craft, but in truth a fine art. The few specimens
+still preserved give some idea of the quality of
+the work, whilst old inventories attest the
+quantity. Illuminated MSS. of the Gospels and
+the Apocalypse were lent from royal treasuries,
+and their miniatures were copied, with needle
+and silk, to adorn vestments and altar hangings.
+Then at Gandersheim, as we have already said,
+the occasional visits of princely travellers brought
+interest and diversion from the outside world.
+It was in an atmosphere such as this that
+Roswitha passed her days.</p>
+
+<p>Of her work, the metrical legends seem her
+earliest effort. In these, though they are mainly
+based on well-known themes, Roswitha shows
+much originality in description. Whilst they
+need not detain us, passing reference may be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span>
+made to two of them—the Passion of St.
+Pelagius of Cordova, and the Fall and Conversion
+of Theophilus—since their subject matter
+is of value to us to-day. The one interests us
+because, in relating that the story was told her
+by an eye-witness of the martyrdom in <small>A.D.</small> 925
+(<i>Acta SS.</i> Jun. V.), she shows that communication
+existed between that great intellectual
+centre, Cordova, and Germany, a fact that
+must have had considerable influence on art and
+literature; the other as being the story out of
+which the Faust legend was developed.</p>
+
+<p>After these legends, we turn to her panegyric
+on the Emperor Otho. This she opens by
+acknowledging her debt to the Abbess Gerberg,
+niece of Otho the Great, for aiding her in her
+literary work with her superior knowledge, and
+for giving her the necessary information concerning
+the royal doings. Then by humbly
+likening her mental perplexity and fear on
+entering upon so vast a subject to the feelings
+of one who has to cross a forest in winter when
+snow has obliterated the track, she in a few
+words pictures for us the natural wooded surroundings
+of the convent. Her poem—for such
+it really is—then sets forth the personal history
+of this monarch and his predecessors, rather than
+public events, and is thus of value more on
+account of its poetical than its historical quality.
+But one episode, picturesque in its quaint setting,
+and interesting historically because its stirring
+details are not to be found elsewhere, is worthy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>
+of record. It centres round Adelheid, the young
+and beautiful widow of Lothair, a Lombard king.
+Taken prisoner by his successor, the tyrant
+Berengarius, she is immured in a castle on the
+Lago di Garda, and threatened with a forced
+marriage with the son of her oppressor. This
+threat seems to endow her with superhuman
+power. Bidding defiance to all difficulty and
+danger, she contrives gradually to dig a secret
+way through the soft earth, and suddenly finds
+herself free. Dawn is just breaking. But how
+can she make use of her freedom before her
+guards awake and discover her escape? Quickly
+is her mind made up. But let Roswitha herself
+tell the story:—</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>As soon as black night yielded to the twilight, and the
+heavens began to pale before the rays of the sun, warily hiding
+herself in secluded caves, now she wanders in the woods, now
+lurks in the furrows amongst the ripe ears of Ceres, until
+returning night, clothed in its wonted gloom, again veils the
+earth in darkness. Then once more is she diligent to pursue
+her way begun. And her guards, not finding her, all-trembling
+make it known to the officer charged with the safe keeping of
+the lady. And he, struck to the heart with the terror of
+grievous fear, set forth with much company to make diligent
+search for her, and when he failed, and moreover could not discover
+whither the most illustrious queen had turned her steps,
+fearful, he made report of the matter to King Berengarius.
+And he, at once filled with exceeding wrath, forthwith sent
+his dependants everywhere around, commanding them not to
+overlook any small place, but cautiously to examine every
+hiding-place, lest perchance the queen might be lying hid in
+any one. And he himself followed with a band of stout-hearted
+troops as if to overcome some fierce enemy in battle.
+And rapidly did he pass on his way through the self-same
+corn-field in the which the lady whom he sought was lurking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>
+in the bent-back furrows, hidden beneath the wings of Ceres.
+Hither and thither forsooth he traversed the very spot where
+she lay, burdened with no little fear, and although, with great
+effort, he essayed with outstretched spear to part the corn
+around, yet he discovered not her whom by the grace of Christ
+it concealed.</p></div>
+
+<p>From the sheltering corn Adelheid effects
+her escape, and after weary wandering, reaches
+the Castle of Canossa, the stronghold of the
+Counts of Tuscany. Any one who has visited
+this now ruined castle, some twenty miles from
+Parma, will remember the threadlike way
+between rocks covered with brambles, by
+which its eyrie height is approached. Up this
+steep track the queen, fearful of any pause,
+hastens, and finds a welcome and ready help. The
+Count becomes her champion, and appeals on
+her behalf to the Emperor Otho. The latter,
+glad of an excuse to further his cause in Italy,
+descends with his troops into the Lombard plain,
+weds the beautiful Adelheid, and receives the
+formal cession of the so-called kingdom of Italy
+from Berengarius and his son, whose power had
+ebbed away in their futile attempts to control
+their feudatories.</p>
+
+<p>Roswitha’s thrilling narrative is amplified
+by the graphic account recorded by St. Odilo,
+Abbot of Cluny, Queen Adelheid’s friend and
+one-time confessor. In this he tells us that
+during Adelheid’s imprisonment in a castle on
+the Lago di Garda, her chaplain Martin succeeds
+in making a hole in the wall, through which the
+queen and her maidservant, disguised as men,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>
+creep. He does not recount the episode of the
+hiding in the corn, but relates another equally
+stirring adventure. He tells us that, in fleeing
+from their persecutor to the safety of Canossa,
+the fugitives become involved in a swamp.
+After two days, they are rescued from their
+perilous position by a fisherman who, passing
+near by, and hearing sounds of distress, goes to
+their aid. Their deliverer, finding them faint
+with hunger and cold, lights a fire with the
+flint he carries in his wallet, and cooks some
+small fish, the only food he has to offer them.
+Once more they start on their way, and eventually
+reach Canossa. But hardly do they gain admittance,
+ere the castle is surrounded by the
+soldiery of the outwitted and wrathful Berengarius.
+A knight, carrying a message from the
+Emperor Otho of promised deliverance, essays
+to enter the castle, but finding this impossible
+owing to the hostile troops encamped around,
+he fastens the letter to an arrow, and shoots it
+over the wall. A strong force sent by Otho
+is near at hand, and speedily puts the enemy to
+flight. Adelheid is rescued, and is brought
+with rejoicing to Pavia, her dower city, which
+had already opened its gates to the Emperor, and
+she and the Emperor enter the city together in
+triumph. Much has been written of the illustrious
+Adelheid, but perhaps she would best like
+to be remembered by the eulogy of her confessor—the
+saintly Odilo—that she never forgot a
+kindness, or remembered an injury.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>It is in a spirit far different from that of her
+panegyric on the emperor Otho that Roswitha
+writes her dramas. Fear and mental perplexity
+no longer possess her. Though humbly begging
+the reader not to “despise these strains drawn
+from a fragile reed,” she has no misgiving, for
+she feels that herein lies her mission. She
+explains her reason for using the dramatic form,
+and for taking Terence as her model. There
+are many, she says,—and she does not entirely
+exonerate herself,—who, beguiled by the elegant
+diction of the Classics, prefer them to religious
+writings, whilst there are others who, though
+generally condemning heathen works, eagerly
+peruse the poetic creations of Terence because
+of the special beauty of his language. She
+further expresses the hope that by trying to
+imitate his manner, and by at the same time
+dramatising legends calculated to edify, she
+may induce readers to turn from the “godless
+contents of his works” to the contemplation
+of virtuous living. Emboldened by this pious
+hope, Roswitha shrinks from no difficulties
+or details, details which might well have made
+her hesitate, and which, betraying a knowledge
+of the world, have raised the question as to
+whether she made her profession as early as was
+customary. This solicitude of Roswitha for the
+welfare of frail and all too human mankind
+recalls St. Bernard’s condemnation, some hundred
+and fifty years later, of all carving in church or
+cloister, when he says, “one reads with more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>
+pleasure what is carven in stones than what is
+written in books, and would rather gaze all day
+upon these singular creations than meditate upon
+the Divine Word.”</p>
+
+<p>It has been maintained that the classic
+theatre decayed and disappeared as Christianity
+became all-powerful in Europe, and that the
+modern theatre seemingly arose in the twelfth
+century out of the services of the Church, and
+owed no debt to the past. But neither Nature
+nor Art works in this way except to our own
+unperceiving minds. After the fall of the
+Roman Empire, and the consequent disruption
+of society, classic civilisation gradually withdrew
+into the security of the religious communities,
+seeking, like distraught humanity,
+shelter and protection. It was in such tranquil
+atmosphere as this that Latin drama, though condemned
+in substance, was fostered and favoured
+as an education in style. Roswitha’s plays may,
+as has been said, have been the last ray of classical
+antiquity, but if so, it was a ray, like the pillar
+of fire, bright enough to guide through the
+dark night of feudalism to the coming day.</p>
+
+<p>Whether her dramatic efforts were an
+isolated phenomenon or not, must remain
+undecided, but it is reasonable to assume that
+any work surviving to the present day is but a
+sample of much else of the same sort that has
+disappeared in the course of time. Still all we
+would claim for them, apart from their intrinsic
+value and interest, is that they helped to keep<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>
+up continuity in the tradition of drama. The
+gradual movement in the Church towards
+elaboration in its services which began in the
+ninth century,—a movement which led to the
+dramatising of the Mass, out of which the
+liturgical drama, and eventually the miracle-play,
+were evolved,—was a popular movement.
+To a people ignorant of Latin, yet fond of shows,
+it provided instruction and diversion alike.
+Roswitha, on the other hand, avowedly wrote
+for the literary world, and with a special end
+in view as regards that world. To attain this
+end, she set before her, as her master in style,
+Terence, who himself had aimed at a high ideal
+of artistic perfection, and of whom it has been
+said that he perpetuated the art and genius of
+Menander just as a master engraver perpetuates
+the designs of a great painter whose works have
+since perished. Still, in spite of the glamour
+of the style to which she aspires, and poetess
+though she is by nature, her plays reflect the
+handiwork of the moralist rather than that of
+the artist, for though beauty charms her by the
+way, her goal is moral truth, and to this all else
+must yield. If we would see the beauty of
+holiness as she saw it, we must enter in spirit
+within the shrine of her thought and feeling,
+just as the traveller, standing without the simple
+brick exterior of the tomb of Galla Placidia, at
+Ravenna, must penetrate within if he would
+know of the beauty there enshrined. “Il faut
+être saint, pour comprendre la sainteté.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>”</p>
+
+<p>The subject which dominates her horizon is
+that of Chastity. Treated by her with didactic
+intent, this really resolves itself into a conflict
+between Christianity and Paganism,—in other
+words, between Chastity and Passion,—in which
+Christianity triumphs through the virtue of
+Woman. But at the same time Roswitha
+neither contemns marriage nor generally advocates
+celibacy. She merely counsels, as the
+more blessed, the unmarried state. Yet even
+so, we feel that beneath her nun’s garb there
+beats the heart of a sympathetic woman, whose
+emotional self-expression is but tempered by the
+ideals of her time and her surroundings.</p>
+
+<p>Another important element to be taken into
+account in her plays is the part she assigns to
+the supernatural. It is impossible to develop
+character with any continuity when the supernatural,
+like some sword of Damocles, hovers
+continually overhead, ready to descend at any
+moment and sever cause from effect. Such a
+sword was the Divine Presence to Roswitha.
+When her plot requires it, she introduces a
+miracle, converting a character, at a moment’s
+notice, and in a way that no evolution could
+possibly effect, into one of a totally different
+kind. Still to her audience such a <i>dénouement</i>
+would be quite satisfactory. With her,
+sudden changes and conversions but reflect the
+ideas which possessed the minds of her contemporaries,
+who realised God more in deviations
+from, than in manifestations of, law and order.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Were her plays ever performed? To this
+question no certain answer can be given, since
+no record has yet been found of their performance,
+and the best critics are at variance on the
+subject. But judging from analogy, there seems
+to be no reason why they should not have been.
+We know that as early as the fifth and sixth
+centuries the monks played Terence, probably
+on some fête-day, or before their scholars as a
+means of instruction, and doubtless Roswitha’s
+plays were also acted on special occasions, such as
+when the Emperor sojourned at Gandersheim,
+or the Bishop made a visitation. As they were
+written in Latin, the literary language of the
+time, this in itself, even if their themes had
+appealed to the people, would have prevented
+them from being performed save before the
+educated few. So if we would picture to
+ourselves a performance of one of them by her
+companion nuns in the Chapter House, or it
+may be in the refectory, it must be before the
+Bishop and his clergy, and perhaps also some
+members of the Imperial family, and lords and
+ladies of the Court. How refreshing must
+such an entertainment have been to this distinguished
+company as it found itself carried
+away into an atmosphere of poetry and passion,
+of movement and colour, in place of the sobriety
+induced by the stiff liturgical dramas that
+probably formed the usual diversion! Such a
+drama was that of <i>The Wise and Foolish
+Virgins</i>, a specially favourite old-world dramatic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>
+exercise, dispensed as a sort of religious tonic
+to womankind, calculated to arouse slumbering
+souls, or to quicken to still further effort those
+that did not slumber. For us, its chief interest
+lies in the antiphonic arrangement of the
+dialogue, in which we may trace the first germs
+of characterisation, and in the music, the refrains
+of which contain the first suggestions, as far as
+we know, of the principle of the leitmotiv, a
+principle carried to its most complete development
+by Wagner. Although the earliest known
+MS. of it is of the eleventh century, so finished,
+yet so simple, are its dialogues and refrains, that
+it seems not unreasonable to infer that the form
+of the play was well known, either through
+some earlier MS. or through oral tradition.
+It is only a slight development of the elegy in
+dialogue which was performed in <small>A.D.</small> 874, at
+the funeral of Hathumoda, the first abbess of
+Gandersheim. This dialogue takes place between
+the sorrow-stricken nuns, who speak
+in chorus of their loss, and the monk Wichbert,
+who acts as consoler. Although its form is
+liturgical, its subject entitles it to be considered
+the earliest known mediæval dramatic work
+extant.</p>
+
+<p>Of Roswitha’s dramas, three seem to stand
+out as of special interest—<i>Abraham</i>, <i>Callimachus</i>,
+and <i>Paphnutius</i>. All of these are more or less
+patchwork adaptations from the legendary débris
+of antiquity. The first appears to have been
+taken by Roswitha from a Latin translation of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>
+fourth-century Greek legend.<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> Whilst she does
+not display any originality in elaborating the
+story, but keeps carefully to the text—so much
+so that at times she merely transcribes—she
+reveals her artistic as well as her psychological
+instinct by concentrating the essentials, thereby
+transforming a rather discursive composition into
+a poignant picture. The subtle touches, the
+sentiment, and the dialogue so pathetic and so
+true to nature, make this drama verily her
+masterpiece, and one worthy of a place beside
+the delicate and dramatic miniatures of the time.
+In a few words, here is the story. A holy man,
+by name Abraham, has abandoned a life of solitude
+in order to take care of his young orphaned
+niece. After a few years, she is tempted to a
+house of ill fame. Some two years later, her
+uncle, having discovered her whereabouts, determines
+to exchange his hermit garb for that of a
+man of the world, and go to the house in the
+guise of a lover, so as to get an opportunity of
+speaking with his niece alone. Of course she
+does not recognise him in his change of costume,
+and when he asks for a kiss, she puts her arms
+round his neck, and suddenly detects a strange
+perfume. Instantly a change comes over her.
+The scent recalls to her her former unsullied life,
+and tears fill her eyes. At the fitting moment
+the uncle makes himself known, and showing
+her with sweet words of sympathy and encouragement
+that sin is natural to humanity, and that
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span>what is evil is to continue in it, takes her back
+with him to begin afresh the simple good life.</p>
+
+<p>The second play recounts an incident taken
+from the apocryphal Acts of the Apostles, supposed
+to take place in the first century. A young
+heathen, Callimachus, falls in love with a young
+married woman, a Christian. She dies, and is
+buried the same day. That night Callimachus
+goes to the grave, and with the help of a slave
+disinters the body. Holding it in his arms, and
+triumphing in the embrace denied to him in life,
+he suddenly falls dead. In the morning the
+husband and St. John, coming to the cemetery
+to pray for her soul, see the rifled grave and the
+two dead bodies. St. John, at the command of
+Christ, who appears for but a moment, restores
+them both to life, and brings to repentance the
+young man, who, in further amendment of his
+ways, becomes a Christian. This mere outline of
+the play is given to suggest points of resemblance
+between it—the first sketch of this kind of drama
+of passion, the frenzy of the soul and senses—and
+the masterpiece of this type, <i>Romeo and Juliet</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Many passages in the plays of Roswitha
+remind us of Shakespeare, but it is not possible
+to deal adequately with them here, nor does it
+seem material to do so. There is no reason why
+Shakespeare should not have seen a printed
+collection of her dramas. He, like Dante,
+seems to have had the power of attracting
+material from every possible source, and it should
+not be forgotten what a sensation was caused by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>
+Celtes printing in 1501 Roswitha’s MS. But,
+on the other hand, the similarities we notice
+may be a mere coincidence, or, as is much more
+likely, the details in each case may have been
+common property handed down from one generation
+to another.</p>
+
+<p>In her play of <i>Paphnutius</i>, Roswitha made
+use of a story taken from the <i>Historia Monachorum</i>
+of Rufinus, a contemporary of St. Jerome, who
+had journeyed through Palestine and Egypt to
+visit the Hermits of the Desert. The mention,
+too, at the beginning of Rufinus’s account, of a
+musician who tells of his retirement to a hermitage
+in order to change the harmony of music
+into that of the spirit, evidently suggested to her
+a discussion on music and harmony, probably
+adapted from Boëthius’s <i>De Musica</i>. In this
+discussion lies the chief interest of the play as
+giving us some idea of the sort of intellectual
+exercises probably practised by women in convents
+in the tenth century. The play opens
+with a truly mediæval scene,—a disputation
+between a hermit and his disciples on the question
+of harmony between soul and body, suggested
+by the want of it in the life of the courtesan
+Thais. Such harmony <i>should</i> exist, says the holy
+man, for though the soul is not mortal like the
+body, nor the body spiritual like the soul, we
+shall, if we follow the method of the dialecticians,
+find that such differences do not necessarily
+render the two inharmonious. Harmony cannot
+be produced from like elements or like sounds,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>
+but only by the right adjustment of those which
+are dissimilar. This discussion on harmony
+naturally leads to one on music, which is divided,
+according to the then received writers on the
+subject, into three kinds—celestial, human, and
+instrumental. Music, in the Middle Ages, was,
+for dialectical purposes, treated in accordance
+with the Pythagorean theory as interpreted by
+Cicero in his <i>Somnium Scipionis</i>, who represented
+the eight revolving spheres of heaven—the
+Earth being fixed—as forming a complete
+musical octave. Such celestial music forms the
+subject of the argument in Roswitha’s play, the
+music of Earth being merely touched upon.
+Why, it is asked, do we not hear this music of
+the spheres if it exists? To this comes the
+answer that some think it is because of its continuity,
+others because of the density of the
+atmosphere, and others again because the volume
+of sound cannot penetrate the narrow passage of
+the human ear. And so with subtle argument,
+the music of Heaven was often drowned in the
+din of Earth. Dante, in the <i>Paradiso</i>, lifted the
+idea once more from Earth to Heaven, and
+clothed it in a wealth of gorgeous imagery.
+But it is Shakespeare who, with the magic of a
+few words, has given the thought immortality.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">There’s not the smallest orb which thou behold’st<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But in his motion like an angel sings,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Such harmony is in immortal souls;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">But whilst this muddy vesture of decay<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.<br /></span>
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></div></div>
+
+<p>In judging of Roswitha’s dramatic work it
+must be remembered that, in true mediæval
+spirit fearing to profane what she venerates, she
+allows herself but little licence with the legends
+she dramatises. Nevertheless, as has been said,
+she from time to time shows, in psychological
+touches, a capacity for originality quite phenomenal
+for her time and for the literature of the
+cloister. Still her plays express but a very small
+part of the whole gamut of human emotions and
+experiences, just as her life was lived in an
+intellectual world narrow from the point of view
+of to-day or of the great intellectual age of
+antiquity. Many causes contributed to this.
+Intellectually, the Christian world shrank as
+Paganism was superseded by Christianity, a
+supersession by no means complete in Roswitha’s
+day. Of course this nascent Christianity was
+inconsistent with much of the intellectual life of
+the ancient world, which was either inextricably
+interwoven with Paganism, or essentially anti-religious.
+With its task of laying afresh the
+foundations of education, politics, and morality,
+it had to take root and become established in a
+relatively narrow intellectual field, the boundaries
+of which had gradually to be broken down,
+sometimes with violence.</p>
+
+<p>Time, like some lens which clears our vision,
+makes it an easy task to criticise and condemn a
+phase of religious life which, having essayed to
+tranquillise and sweeten existence, was, under
+altered conditions of civilisation, bound to pass<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>
+away. We of to-day pride ourselves on a wider
+view of life, on a higher conception of duty,
+expressed in lives dedicated to public work as
+a necessary complement to private virtue. Still,
+if we would judge fairly this age of contemplation
+and faith within the convent walls, and
+all that, even if done mistakenly and imperfectly,
+it aspired to do, we must realise, as best we can,
+the world without those walls. One of our
+poets has vividly reflected it for us when he
+speaks of man’s life as made up of “whole
+centuries of folly, noise, and sin.” So bitter was
+life then and even later, that by the thirteenth
+and fourteenth centuries, when mysticism had
+claimed many votaries, eternal rest, even at the
+cost of personal annihilation, was the whispered
+desire of many devout souls.</p>
+
+<p>“A Simple Stillness.” “An Eternal Silence.”
+These are the words that float across the centuries
+to us, like echoes from troubled, longing
+hearts. These are the words that give us the
+key to the understanding of the choice of
+vocation of the mediæval woman. The spiritual
+need for harmony and peace may have been
+great; the practical need was perhaps even
+greater; for in its accomplishment the spiritual
+found its consummation.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> The authenticity of these has been called in question by some
+critics, but apparently upon insufficient data.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> The first foundation, afterwards removed to Gandersheim.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> For other instances of churches laid out on lines said to have
+been revealed in dreams or visions, see Didron, <i>Christian Iconography</i>,
+vol. i. (1886) pp. 381, 382, 460, and Sta. Maria Maggiore, Rome.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> The intervention of a bird to aid in discovery was a favourite
+tradition derived from antiquity. We may recall, amongst many
+variants of the theme, the story of the celebrated expedition of the
+Athenians to the Island of Scyros to find and recover the body of
+Theseus. Theseus, being a hero, the agent employed in the quest
+must likewise be distinguished, and so the eagle, Zeus’s bird, is
+alone thought worthy to peck the earth and indicate the resting-place
+of the demi-god.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Thangmarus, “Vita Sti. Bernwardi,” Migne, <i>Patrol. Lat.</i> 140,
+col. 397. 6.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> Michel, <i>Histoire de l’Art</i>, 1905, Tome I. i. p. 258.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> <i>Journal of Studies</i>, vol. i. part i., 1911, article by
+E. Strong, p. 24.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Migne, <i>Patrol. Lat.</i> lxxiii.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<h2><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span><a name="A_TWELFTH-CENTURY_ROMANCE-WRITER" id="A_TWELFTH-CENTURY_ROMANCE-WRITER"></a>A TWELFTH-CENTURY ROMANCE-WRITER,<br />
+MARIE DE FRANCE</h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">“Marie</span> ai nom, si sui de France.” Thus, more
+than seven centuries ago, wrote Marie de France.
+What an unpretentious autobiography! Yet
+these few simple words, which seem to tell so
+little, but in reality suggest so much, are the
+counterpart of her work, and form its fitting
+crown.</p>
+
+<p>But who was this modest writer, and why does
+her work interest us to-day? Around Marie de
+France there must always remain an atmosphere
+of doubt and mystery, since she is only mentioned
+by an anonymous thirteenth-century poet,
+and by one of her contemporaries—an Anglo-Norman
+poet, Denys Pyramus by name—who
+speaks of her in the most flattering terms, and
+from whom we learn that her lays were much
+appreciated by the noblesse, especially the ladies.
+That these should take rare delight in them
+may well be, seeing how monotonous life must
+have been to many a woman shut up with her
+maidens and her needlework in a dismal castle,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>
+or perhaps in but one tower of it, whilst her
+lord went forth to the chase or to war, his
+home-coming meaning merely the wine-cup
+and war-songs, or tedious epic. Many a one
+must have read or listened to Marie’s love idylls,
+and longed, and perhaps even hoped, as in the story
+of “Yonec,” that a fair and gentle knight, in the
+form of some beautiful bird, might fly in at her
+window and bring her some diversion from the
+outside world. With nothing before us but her
+own poems and the scant recognition of Denys
+Pyramus, she seems like some old portrait in
+which the delicate pigments that once glowed in
+the face and made it live have, owing to their
+very delicacy, long since faded away, leaving
+behind only the stronger and less volatile colours
+of the dark background from which we in vain
+try to wrest more than one or two fragments of
+the secret it holds.</p>
+
+<p>Judging from internal evidence, it would seem
+that Marie was born in Normandy, about the
+middle of the twelfth century, but settled in
+England, where since the Conquest, and indeed
+since the time of Edward the Confessor, many
+Norman families had made their home. Not only
+does she make occasional use of English words,
+and translate from English into French the fables
+known as Æsop’s, but in the prologue to her
+<i>Lays</i>, which she dedicates to “the noble King,”
+generally considered to be Henry the Second,
+she expresses fear lest her work should not find
+favour in a foreign land. In this prologue she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>
+also gives her reason for abandoning classical
+translation, which, as a Latin scholar, she had
+contemplated making, not only for the use of the
+less learned, but also, as she tells us, for personal
+discipline, since “he who would keep himself
+from sin, should study and learn and undertake
+difficult tasks. In suchwise he may the more
+withdraw him and save himself from much
+sorrow.” The twelfth century was a time of
+extraordinary intellectual activity, and Marie
+tells us that she suffered from what we are apt
+to regard as a special evil of our own day—the
+overcrowding of the literary market. So she
+wisely turned aside from the Classics and the
+crowd, and set herself to give literary expression
+to the old Celtic folk-lore, hitherto perhaps
+unrecorded save in song.</p>
+
+<p>Of Marie’s work that has come down to
+us we have <i>The Fables</i>, already mentioned,
+dedicated to Count William, surnamed Longsword,
+and son of Henry the Second and Fair
+Rosamond;<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> <i>The Lays</i>, dedicated to the king,
+Henry the Second, and doubtless read by Fair
+Rosamond in her retreat at Woodstock; and
+<i>The Purgatory of St. Patrick</i>, translated from the
+Latin at the request of an anonymous benefactor.
+Of these only <i>The Lays</i> need here concern
+us, as it is in them that our interest lies,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>since they are perhaps among the first stories,
+given literary form, which tell of love “for
+love’s sake only,”—love unqualified and unquestioning.
+They form, perhaps, the only
+collection of lays now extant, and it is to them,
+therefore, that we must turn to get some idea of
+the style of narration that gradually replaced the
+taste for the epic as Norman influence grew and
+spread in England. Beside the sensualism of the
+<i>Chansons de Geste</i>, the sentiment expressed in
+them may seem naïve; beside the gallantry of
+the Provençal poetry, it may seem primitive;
+but nevertheless it is, in its very simplicity, the
+profoundest note that can be struck in this world
+of men and women. Marie makes no pretence
+to originality, but even if she did not possess the
+supreme gift of creating beauty, she at least
+possessed the lesser gift of perceiving it where
+it existed and of making it her own, and her
+stories glow with colour, and enchant by their
+simple yet dramatic appeal to the imagination.
+She declares that <i>The Lays</i> were made “for
+remembrance” by “Le ancien Bretun curteis,”
+and that “Folks tell them to the harp and the
+rote, and the music is sweet to hear.” Doubtless
+it was this sweet music which both soothed
+and thrilled even before the words were understood,
+for on sad and festive days alike, the sweet
+lays of Brittany were always to be heard.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">La reine chante doucement,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">La voiz acorde a l’estrument:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Les mains sont belles, li lais bons,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Douce la voiz et bas li tons.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;"><a name="harp" id="harp"></a>
+<img src="images/i032.jpg" width="450" height="563" alt="LADY PLAYING HARP." title="Lady playing harp" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">LADY PLAYING HARP.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 32.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Whether Marie was connected with the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
+Court of Henry the Second and his brilliant
+and artistic queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, where
+learned men and poets congregated, we do not
+know, but it seems a very fair conjecture that
+she was. Not only does she dedicate her
+principal work to the king and his son, Count
+William, but her stories are coloured with the
+courtly life and ideas of her time, notwithstanding
+the simplicity of the fundamental
+theme. It is doubtful whether any one unacquainted
+with the teaching of the Courts of
+Love, such as they were in the twelfth century,
+would have made the compulsory quest of love
+the keynote of a story, as, for instance, Marie
+does in the “Lay of Guigemar.” These Courts of
+Love, though not so elaborate, yet seemingly as
+imperious, as those of the fourteenth century,
+formed one of the semi-serious pastimes of the
+Middle Ages, and although it may be that they
+were often mere forms of entertainment, no self-respecting
+person could afford to disregard their
+rules or decisions. The cardinal doctrine was
+that love was necessary to a man’s moral, social,
+and æsthetic training. Hence if it did not arise
+of itself, it must be sought for, and, like its
+counterpart in the spiritual world, come at, if
+needs be, through much tribulation.</p>
+
+<p>Owing to Henry’s possessions in France
+through inheritance, marriage, and the many
+ties of relationship which united the royal
+families of both countries, England and France<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>
+were never more closely allied than they were at
+that time. French was established by them as
+the speech of the cultured and the high-born.
+The Norman Conquest had made us more
+cosmopolitan in both manners and ideas. May
+we not look on the victory at Hastings as a
+symbol as well as a reality? Did it not mean
+for us a spiritual as well as a material conquest,
+since, mingled with the clashing of battle-axes,
+was to be heard the chanting of the <i>Chanson de
+Roland</i>? Moreover, through a desire to bring
+about uniformity of sentiment and service, the
+Church, though perhaps unconsciously, aided
+this good work of general enlargement of outlook
+by appointing outsiders to control our
+abbeys and religious foundations. Thus, in the
+latter half of the twelfth century, the romantic
+movement which characterised late mediæval
+literature stirred in England and France alike,
+and Marie was one of its truest and daintiest
+exponents. Although what she relates may be
+fiction intermingled with myth and magic, she
+all the same pictures on her somewhat small
+canvases the ideas of her time, and so helps to
+make history.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"><a name="ms10293" id="ms10293"></a>
+<img src="images/i034.jpg" width="500" height="523" alt="Add. MS. 10293, Brit. Mus." title="Manuscript 10293" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="illoaut"><span class="smcap">Add</span>. MS. 10293, <span class="smcap">Brit. Mus.</span></p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 34.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Marie’s readers and hearers were naturally to
+be found amongst castle-folk. That these were
+many we may conclude from the fact that the
+number of castles had already come to be
+regarded as a menace to the central government,
+and a royal command had gone forth for the
+demolition of many of them. That her stories<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>
+were read and prized for at least a century and
+more is evident from the manuscripts—five in
+number, and all of the thirteenth, or the beginning
+of the fourteenth, century—which still exist.
+Her renown, too, had travelled even beyond the
+seas, for in about <small>A.D.</small> 1245 a translation of
+her lays into Norse was made by order of the
+king, Haakon the Fourth. The fact that their
+popularity began to wane after a hundred years
+or so is in no wise an adverse criticism of their
+intrinsic worth, for in the fourteenth century
+English was, in high places, beginning to take
+the place of French, and naturally the demand
+created a supply. But even if this had not been
+so, Marie’s work had served its purpose, and of
+necessity passed into the crucible of human
+thought and expression, to be resolved into
+matter suited to other needs and conditions. As
+has been well said, “les siècles se succèdent, et
+chacun porte son fruit, qui n’est pas celui du
+siècle précédent: les livres sont les fruits des
+mœurs.”</p>
+
+<p>Of the five manuscripts still extant, two are
+in the British Museum. One of these is the
+most complete that has come down to us, seeing
+that, in addition to its including the largest
+number of lays—twelve in all,—it alone contains
+the prologue, in which for a moment the illusive
+Marie lifts, as it were, her all-enshrouding veil.
+It is a small manuscript, beautifully inscribed,
+and even after its seven hundred years of
+existence, as fresh as is the love enshrined in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span>
+its parchment pages. How strange a feeling
+possesses us as we turn over its leaves, leaves
+across which the shadows of readers of bygone
+days still seem to flit! Could these pages speak,
+of what would they tell? Of desires that die
+not, of longings that are immortal, of love enthroned.</p>
+
+<p>When first read, these stories, so simply are
+they told, may seem somewhat slight and superficial.
+But this is the general characteristic of
+mediæval literature, which, for the most part,
+recognised things in outline only, and sought,
+and perhaps possessed, but little knowledge of
+the hidden springs of motive. The writers of
+those times troubled as little about moral, as
+the early painters did about physical, anatomy.
+Still, in spite of this indifference to what has
+become almost a craze in our own day, Marie’s
+lays are so full of charming detail, deftly handled,
+that they give much the same sense of delight as
+do delicate ivories or dainty embroidery. Sometimes,
+it is true, she scarcely, despite all this
+outward charm, seems to touch the world of
+fact. Yet in this ideal atmosphere which she so
+essentially made her own, she contrives to convey
+such a sense of reality, that for the moment
+we are wholly possessed by it and carried away,
+without questioning, into her fairyland. And a
+beautiful fairyland it is, where love triumphs for
+the most part, not in heedless ecstasy along
+flower-bestrewn ways, but through self-sacrifice
+and suffering mutually accepted and mutually<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span>
+endured. Listen to the words spoken to the
+knight Guigemar, wounded by a chance arrow
+as he rides through a wood. “Never shalt thou
+be healed of thy wound, not even by herb, or
+root, or leach, or potion, until thou art healed by
+her who, for love of thee, shall suffer such great
+pain and sorrow as never woman has suffered
+before: and thou shalt bear as much for her.”
+Equality in love! Such is the vital note struck
+amid the artificial and soul-enfeebling atmosphere
+of mediæval love-poetry! This is the
+note which Marie set ringing down the centuries
+whilst her manuscripts lay unused on library
+shelves. This is Marie’s gift to the world, and
+this it is that gives her stories immortality.
+Not only do they possess this immortality in
+themselves, but they have also been immortalised
+by poets and writers both in days long past
+and in those more within our ken. All who
+know her stories will recall Chaucer’s indebtedness
+to incidents and descriptions in them, and
+coming to our own time, we find Sir Walter
+Scott taking his ballad of “Lord Thomas and
+Fair Annie” from the lay of “The Ash Tree,”
+although it is possible, as has been suggested,<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a>
+that his ballad may have been founded on some
+Scotch folk-song having a common origin with
+Marie’s lay. When her lays were first published
+in Germany in 1820, Goethe wrote thus: “The
+mist of years that mysteriously envelops Marie
+de France makes her poems more exquisite and
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>precious to us.” Yes, it is this all-pervading
+mystery which, though so tantalising, is yet so
+attractive. It is in vain that, in studying them,
+we try to penetrate somewhat beyond our
+normal atmosphere, for we only find ourselves
+lost in vague possibilities and hazy distances.
+Brittany has kept her secret concerning such of
+these lays as were hers just as jealously as she
+has kept her secret of the long avenues of great
+lichened stones which make Carnac look like
+the burial-place of some giant host. Marie’s
+lays are stories of deep meaning, which each
+reader must interpret for himself.</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible to do more here than just
+touch upon Marie’s ideal conception of love, for
+to realise it fully it is necessary to read the
+stories themselves.<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> Allusion has been made to
+the wounded knight in the “Lay of Guigemar,”
+who can only be healed through mutual love
+sanctified by mutual suffering. In the lay of
+“The Ash Tree” a maiden of noble birth,
+abandoned in infancy and brought up in a
+convent, is loved by a lord, and returns his love,
+and goes with him to his castle. After a time
+the knights who owe him fealty complain that
+as through his love for his mistress he has
+neither wife nor child, he does them wrong, and
+protest that if he does not wed some noble lady,
+they will no longer serve him or hold him for
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>lord. The knight has to yield to their demands
+and to consent to accept in marriage the daughter
+of a neighbouring noble who had made it known
+that he desired him for son-in-law. Neither
+lover utters any complaint or reproach, and the
+needful sacrifice is about to be made. But
+fortune, sometimes kind, intervenes ere it is too
+late, and reveals the noble birth of the loved
+one. The knight weds her with great joy, and
+to complete this happy picture we read that the
+other lady returned with her parents to her
+own domain, and was there well bestowed in
+marriage.</p>
+
+<p>This idea of mutual sympathy and sacrifice
+gives meaning also to the lay of “The Two
+Lovers,” and to that of “Yonec,” but perhaps it
+is most simply, yet forcibly, summed up in the
+lay of “The Honeysuckle,” an episode taken
+from the Tristan story. Tristan, hearing that
+Isolde is to ride through a certain wood on her
+way to Tintagel to attend the Pentecostal Court
+held by the King, hides in the wood. Here he
+cuts a branch of hazel round which honeysuckle
+has twined, and carving his name and certain
+letters on it, he lays it in the way by which the
+Queen must pass, knowing that she will recognise
+it as a sign that her lover is near, since they
+have met before in suchwise. The import of
+the writing is that he has long been waiting to
+see her, since without her he cannot live, and
+that they two are like the hazel branch with
+the encircling honeysuckle, the which, as long<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>
+as they are intertwined, thrive, but as soon as
+they are separated, both perish. Says Tristan,
+“Sweet Love, so is it with us—nor you without
+me, nor I without you.”</p>
+
+<p>But besides this conception of love which
+Marie had simply found awaiting expression,
+when we turn to examine the stories somewhat
+in detail, we find legend and poetry, Eastern
+magic and Christian symbolism, mingled with
+strange ingenuity. Whence came all these
+divers threads which Marie has so dexterously
+interwoven? It is very difficult to tell whether
+we are wholly in a world of romance, accepted
+by her without question, or whether she had
+some understanding of the divers matters she
+touches upon, and shaped them into a new form
+to suit new hearers. The answer to this question
+seems to depend on whether Marie recounted
+the lays from hearsay, or whether they had been
+already written down, and were merely retold
+by her, she colouring them with the atmosphere
+of her time, which was charged with strange
+incongruities of religion and magic. To this
+we can give no certain answer, since Marie
+herself gives no hint, and only tells us that the
+ancient Bretons made the lays. But whatever
+may have been her contribution, Christian or
+otherwise, to the original matter she worked
+upon, we cannot help feeling that we have
+before us the remains of some primitive
+mythology overlaid and interpenetrated with
+Eastern lore, especially that of India, which, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>
+the Middle Ages, was spread broadcast in the
+West. This Indian thought, itself borrowed in
+a measure from Egypt, had also been tempered
+by the Hellenism which, after the conquests of
+Alexander the Great in Asia, had filtered through
+India, and had on the way become tinged with
+its colour and its mystery. It was from the
+matter of these Indian stories that so much was
+learnt, for whilst, in the West, the national epic
+and the chivalrous romance had been alone
+considered worthy of record, in the Indian stories
+all social conditions were revealed, and poets
+thus learnt little by little to observe and portray
+the manners and sentiments of the people generally,
+changing social conditions also acting in
+the same direction. All such influences must be
+taken into consideration in studying mediæval
+literature generally, but particularly the occult
+element in Oriental thought which presents
+such difficulties to the less meditative Western
+mind, and has in consequence given rise to
+much misconception.</p>
+
+<p>In the “Lay of Guigemar,” which we take first
+because it is the first in the manuscript, we find
+Marie making use of a subject, in gorgeous
+setting, of Christian symbolism, but using it
+apparently so unconsciously that it is only from
+one or two details that we realise what is really
+lurking in disguise. Guigemar, the wounded
+knight already referred to, to whom naught but
+love, and sorrow endured for love, can bring any
+alleviation, sets forth for his healing. He comes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>
+across a ship into which he enters, and which
+by unseen means carries him to the desired
+haven. As we read the description of the ship,
+our thoughts at once revert to the picture of the
+barge in which Cleopatra goes to meet Antony.
+Marie tells us that the fittings are of ebony, and
+the unfurled sail of silk. Amid the vessel is a
+bed on to which the wounded knight sinks in
+anguish. This is of cypress and white ivory
+inlaid with gold, the quilt of silk and gold
+tissue, and the coverlet of sable lined with
+Alexandrian purple.<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> All this we might regard
+as merely a poet’s fancy were it not that we go
+on to read that there were set two candlesticks
+of fine gold with lighted tapers. Here we have
+the clue. Doubtless the ship, a favourite theme
+of Christian symbolism, and one which delighted
+poets and painters and workers in mosaic alike,
+represented the Church. It is not to be
+necessarily inferred that Marie, when giving
+her hero so rare a means of transit, had in her
+mind all the elaborate symbolism connected
+with it; but she had probably read or heard
+tell of it, and made use of it simply for the
+enhancement of her story. It is in such ways
+that we find mysteries embedded, the real significance
+of them being lost or misunderstood or
+unheeded, just as the Renaissance painters, without
+any knowledge of Arabic characters, and
+solely on account of the ornamental quality of the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>lettering, used texts from the Koran, and distorted
+into mere design the sayings of Mahomet.</p>
+
+<p>In the lay of “The Two Lovers” we again
+find Christian symbolism in disguise. Here is
+the old theme of a difficult task to be accomplished
+by the lover before he can win his lady.<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a>
+The undertaking imposed is the carrying of the
+loved one to the top of a hill, and our interest
+in it is enhanced by the fact that the trial was
+to be made near Pitres, a few miles from Rouen,
+where there is a green hill, still known as “La
+Côte des Deux Amans.” In Rouen there lived
+a king who had an only daughter, very fair and
+beautiful, whose hand was sought in marriage
+of many. Loath to part with her, he bethought
+him how he could thwart her suitors. To this
+end he caused it to be proclaimed far and wide
+that he would have for son-in-law only him
+who could carry his daughter to the top of the
+hill without pausing to rest. Many came, but
+each in turn failed, greatly to the content of the
+princess, since secretly she loved, and was loved
+by, a young knight who frequented her father’s
+Court. At last, constrained by love, the knight,
+though with much misgiving, determines to
+undertake the adventure. Before allowing him
+to do this, the maiden, in order to ensure his
+success, and herself fasting meanwhile, bids him
+go to Salerno,<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> near Naples, a school of medicine
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>famous in the Middle Ages, and ask of her
+kinswoman there, who was well practised in
+medicine, a draught to give him the needful
+strength for his task. Returned with this
+potion, he makes the attempt, but so great is his
+desire to reach the goal quickly, that he will
+not slacken his speed to drink from the phial
+carried by his Love, but hastens forward, only
+to fall dead as he reaches the summit of the
+hill.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span></p><p>In this strength-giving potion we may
+perhaps see the expression of a Christian, and
+the survival of a pre-Christian belief, where the
+getting of strength and life is only possible
+through a direct act of communion, either
+material or spiritual, with the god. Such world-old
+beliefs, in which the supernatural intervenes
+to help the natural, are also intimately connected,
+even if they are not identical, with the magic of
+philtres and charms.</p>
+
+<p>We pass from Christian symbolism to magic
+in the lay of “Yonec.” The delightful ease
+with which mediæval folk turned from magic
+to religion, or <i>vice versa</i>, shows how simply they
+accepted what they did not understand. At the
+same time it proves how intermingled the two
+were, and that what some are inclined to separate
+now, were once regarded as one and the same
+thing, the eccentricities and impositions which
+have developed in both being of mere external
+growth, and to be treated accordingly. In the
+lay of “Yonec” a young wife, passing fair, is
+shut up by her jealous old husband in a great
+paved chamber in a tower of his castle, to which
+no one save an ancient dame and a priest has
+admittance. After seven years of this isolation
+and uncongenial company, the lady remembers
+that she has heard tell that means have been
+found to rescue the unhappy, and she wishes
+with all her heart that deliverance may come
+to her. Suddenly a shadow comes across the
+window, and into her chamber there flies a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>
+falcon, which forthwith changes into a knight.
+As soon as the lady has recovered from her
+surprise, the knight tells her that he has long
+loved her, but could not come until she wished
+for him. Here we have an incident, borrowed
+direct from Oriental magic, in which a modern
+believer in psychical phenomena might find an
+element of telepathy. The will, as in all magic,
+is the motive power which acts sympathetically
+on the object of desire, that object being in a
+receptive condition. Quickly we turn from
+magic, and the story goes on to tell that the
+lady, before accepting the knight as her lover,
+makes it a condition that he believes in God,
+and the knight offers to prove his belief by
+taking the Sacrament. This demand is evidently
+in the nature of a protective test. It was very
+usual to try some means of discovering whether
+a person was in league with the powers of evil
+or not; for if any one unworthy touched holy
+things, retribution came at once, either by death
+or some dire visitation. But how is the priest
+to administer the Sacrament without seeing the
+knight? The latter tells her that he will make
+himself like her in appearance; in other words,
+that he will hypnotise the priest, and make him
+see what he, the knight, wishes him to. The
+ruse succeeds, and for a time all goes well;
+then comes discovery, despair, and death. The
+whole story is a most extraordinary medley of
+fairy-lore, religion, and magic, and most characteristic
+of the mediæval mind.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The lay of “Eliduc,” the last in the manuscript,
+is also the longest and most elaborate.
+Marie unfolds her story with so certain yet so
+subtle a hand, that the reading of it is like the
+unwinding of some finely illuminated parchment-roll
+where miniature follows miniature, each
+perfect in itself, yet all needful to the whole.
+To the charm of its pictures of mediæval life,
+with the fine scene between the two women,
+and their final reunion in the same convent,
+there is added an incident which gives special
+interest and importance to the story, since it
+brings us into touch with one of the oldest and
+most widespread of traditions—the restoration
+to life, from apparent death, by means of a
+flower. There are few pursuits more fascinating
+than the tracing of traditions, except, it may be,
+that of symbols, with which they have so much
+in common. We find the same traditions, just
+as we find the same symbolic figures, common
+to the most widely separated peoples, and the
+real interest in the case of each lies in trying to
+discover how and why in the course of their
+migrations their form and their significance
+have been varied or modified. But before
+considering the tradition, let us first hear the
+story.</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"><a name="boat" id="boat"></a>
+<img src="images/i049.jpg" width="500" height="481" alt="BOAT WITH KNIGHTS AND LADY." title="Boat, knights and lady, Manuscript 10294" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">BOAT WITH KNIGHTS AND LADY.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Add. MS. 10294, Brit. Mus.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 49.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Eliduc, a knight of Brittany, whose wife,
+Guildeluëc, was very dear to him, had for over-lord
+one of the kings of Brittany, with whom,
+owing to faithful service, he had gained high
+favour. Being defamed on this account by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>
+envious tongues, he was banished from Court,
+and thereupon determined to quit his country
+for a while and seek service in the West of
+England. With many promises to his wife to
+be faithful to her, he set out for Totnes, where
+he found many kings ruling in the land, all at
+war with one another. One of them, a very old
+man, was ruler in the province of Exeter, and at
+war with a neighbouring king on account of
+his refusal to give to the latter his daughter,
+Guilliadun, in marriage. So Eliduc determined
+to offer his services to the old king, by whom
+they were accepted, and by his tact and prowess
+he soon proved himself worthy of the trust reposed
+in him. Through a skilful ambush,
+planned and conducted by him, he defeated the
+enemy. Guilliadun, hearing of his deeds, sought
+an interview with him, and at once fell in love
+with him, and after certain maidenly reserve and
+hesitation, made her love known to him. This
+Eliduc secretly returned, but, troubled at the
+remembrance of his wife and of his pledge to
+her, his courage failed him to confess that he
+was already wedded. In order to escape from
+his dilemma, he sought and obtained the permission
+of the old king to avail himself of the
+entreaty of his liege-lord to return to his own
+country to fight against the enemies who were
+desolating the kingdom. This permission was
+granted under his promise to come back if his
+services were again required. After pledging
+himself to Guilliadun to do this on such a day<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>
+as she should name, Eliduc, having exchanged
+rings with her, and she having named the day for
+his return, departed. Having speedily reduced
+the enemies of his liege-lord to submission, he
+came once more to England, and immediately
+sent to Guilliadun to apprise her of this, and to
+beg her to be ready to start on the morrow.
+Guilliadun secretly left the castle the next night
+and joined her lover, and together they hurried to
+Totnes, whence they at once set sail. But as
+they were nearing land, a violent storm arose.
+Finding that prayers were of no avail, one of
+the company cried out, “We shall never make
+the land, for you have a lawful wife, and you
+are taking with you another woman, setting at
+naught God, the law, and uprightness. Let us
+cast her into the sea, and anon we shall get to
+land.” On hearing these words Guilliadun fell
+as one dead, whereupon Eliduc in anger struck
+the esquire on the head and hurled him into
+the sea. When the ship was brought to port
+Guilliadun showed no sign of life. So Eliduc,
+believing her to be dead, lifted her in his arms,
+carried her ashore, and, mounting his horse,
+sadly bore her to a small chapel in a forest
+adjoining his own lands. Here he laid her in
+front of the altar, and covered her with his cloak,
+and then returned to his home. Filled with sadness,
+he arose early each morning and went to
+the chapel to pray for her soul, marvelling
+nevertheless to find that the face of his Love
+suffered no change except to become a little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>
+paler. His wife, made anxious by his melancholy
+and silence, and wondering whither he
+went, had him watched, and soon discovered
+the truth. Taking a varlet with her, she went
+to the chapel, and there discovered the beautiful
+maiden, looking like a new-blown rose, and at
+once guessed the cause of her husband’s sadness
+and gloom. As she sat watching and weeping
+out of sheer pity, a weasel ran from behind the
+altar and passed over the body of Guilliadun,
+and the varlet struck it with a stick and killed
+it. Then its mate came in and walked round it
+several times, and finding that it could not rouse
+it, made sign of great sorrow and ran out into
+the wood, and returning with a red flower
+between its teeth put it into the mouth of its
+dead companion, which within an hour came
+to life again. Guildeluëc, seeing this, seized the
+flower and laid it in the mouth of the maiden,
+who after a short time sighed and opened her
+eyes. Then she told Guildeluëc that she was
+a king’s daughter, and had been deceived by a
+knight called Eliduc, whom she loved, and who
+returned her love, but who had hidden from her
+that he was already married. Guildeluëc thereupon
+made known to her who she was, and sent
+at once for her husband. When he came, she
+begged him to build a nunnery, and to allow
+her to retire from the world, as she would fain
+give herself to the service of God. When the
+nunnery was ready, Guildeluëc took the veil,
+with some thirty nuns, of whom she became the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>
+Superior. Then Eliduc wedded his love, and
+after some years of happiness they too resolved
+to retire from the world, Guilliadun joining
+Guildeluëc, who received her as a sister, and
+Eliduc going to a monastery which he had
+founded near by.<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a></p>
+
+<p>In this charming romance, given here in
+epitome only, the two most interesting points,
+after noting the mutual suffering of the lovers
+for love’s sake, are the episode of the sacrifice
+to the sea, and that of the weasel and the life-giving
+flower. Both these incidents point to
+the great antiquity of the fundamental theme
+of the story, which Marie, possibly like many
+another before her, merely reclothed in garments
+suited to the fancy of the time. In most stories
+where the sea has to be appeased by the sacrifice
+of some one, it is the guilty person who is thrown
+overboard, or if the offender is not known, lots
+are cast to determine who shall be the one to
+make expiation to the god. In the present
+instance Eliduc is clearly the wrong-doer, but
+he is the hero, and must be treated as such, and
+accordingly the hostile voice is the one to be
+silenced in the depths of the sea.</p>
+
+<p>The other incident—the restoration to life by
+means of a flower or a herb—frequently occurs
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>in classical stories and folk-lore.<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> Perhaps the
+most familiar example, and, owing to the recent
+excavations in Crete, the most interesting one,
+is that connected with Glaucos, son of Minos,
+king of Crete. In the story (Apollod. iii. 3)
+Glaucos when a boy fell into a cask of honey
+and was smothered. His father, ignorant of his
+fate, consulted the oracle to ascertain what had
+become of him, and the seer Polyeidos of Argos
+was named to discover him. When he had
+found him, Minos shut Polyeidos up in the
+tomb with the dead body of the boy until
+he should restore the latter to life. Whilst
+Polyeidos was watching the body, a serpent
+suddenly came towards it and touched it.
+Polyeidos killed the serpent, and immediately a
+second one came, which, seeing the other one
+lying dead, disappeared and soon returned with
+a certain herb in its mouth. This it laid on the
+mouth of the dead serpent, which immediately
+came to life again. Polyeidos seized the herb
+and placed it on the mouth of the dead boy,
+who was thereupon restored to life.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 558px;"><a name="glaukos" id="glaukos"></a>
+<img src="images/i052.jpg" width="558" height="350" alt="GLAUKOS AND POLYEIDOS IN TOMB." title="Glaukos and Polyeidos" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">GLAUKOS AND POLYEIDOS IN TOMB.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Greek Vase, Brit. Mus.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 52.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This story is most graphically depicted on a
+fifth-century Greek vase in the British Museum,
+and, whatever its real interpretation may be, it
+has gained in significance since the life of the
+distant past of the island has been laid bare, and
+large jars, which in all probability were used for
+storing wine and honey and other necessaries,
+and from their size and contents might well
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span>have proved a snare to a venturesome and greedy
+boy, have been discovered <i>in situ</i>. After a lapse
+of many centuries we find this idea of the life-giving
+plant reappearing in mediæval garb,
+daintily fashioned by Marie de France.</p>
+
+<p>Marie, in her story, tells us that the weasel
+brings a <i>red</i> flower. This was possibly the
+verbena, well known in folk-medicine as vervain,
+and much used in the Middle Ages. According
+to one writer, the weasel uses vervain as a
+preservative against snake-bites, and this idea of
+its effect might easily have been extended to
+include death. Even so great an authority as
+Aristotle mentions that the weasel understood
+the potent effects of certain herbs. The intervention
+of a weasel instead of the usual serpent
+opens up the further interesting question as to
+whether this weasel incident was not imported
+from India, where Greek stories had become
+alloyed with Indian lore. Even to-day, in
+India, a mongoose, a species of weasel, is sometimes
+taken on expeditions by any one fearful
+of snakes, and kept at night in the tent as a
+protection against them.</p>
+
+<p>In addition to the choice of a weasel as
+medium, the unusual colour of the flower is also
+of interest. Giraldus Cambrensis, writing in
+the twelfth century on the subject of weasels,
+after remarking that they have more heart than
+body (<i>plus cordis habens quam corporis</i>), goes on
+to say that they restore their dead by means of a
+<i>yellow</i> flower, and in the still earlier record of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>
+the Lydian hero Tylon, where a serpent is the
+intermediary—and serpents are often credited
+with a knowledge of life-giving plants,—reference
+is made to a <i>golden</i> flower.<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a> This may
+possibly be connected with the idea of the life-giving
+power of the god, since the golden flower
+is dedicated to Zeus. Professor J.&nbsp;G. Frazer
+thinks that a red flower may perhaps have been
+chosen to suggest a flow of blood—an infusion
+of fresh life into the veins of the dead. It is
+also possible that red and yellow may have been
+interchangeable terms, just as they are to-day
+amongst the Italian peasantry. The choice of
+colour may, however, have been derived from
+the red anemone, which is said to have sprung
+from the blood of Adonis, with whom love and
+life are traditionally associated. There are some,
+on the other hand, who ascribe to the story a
+deep spiritual meaning. With them it is not
+the flower itself which brings about resurrection
+from apparent death, but the spiritual truth of
+which the flower is but the outward symbol.
+It may be that the red blossom represents the
+joys of earth which Eliduc’s wife voluntarily
+renounces, and which, surrendered to her rival,
+in time became like a burning thing whose fiery
+touch awakens to life the sleeping conscience.
+In a story such as this, which has evidently
+travelled far and wide before we find it in
+England in the eleventh century, it is possible
+that any or all of these surmises may be true.
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>The whole of this incident of the weasel and the
+flower, read in the original, is of extraordinary
+interest and beauty. What a touching picture
+of animal sensibility is the account of the despair
+of the weasel on finding its dead mate, and its
+tender display of solicitude and sympathy, raising
+the lifeless head and trying to reanimate the
+small inert body! Only one who loved animals
+and knew their habits well could have told thus
+tenderly and graphically a story so simple, yet
+so suggestive, of the love of two sentient things,
+a love which runs like a thread of gold through
+all creation and makes it one.</p>
+
+<p>The twelfth century was an age of humanism
+as well as feudalism. As often happens in times
+of comparative peace, a growth of interest in
+the individual was springing up and finding
+expression in lyric poetry and stories. The day
+of epics was waning. Those vast and involved
+poems, like to huge and complex frescoes, found
+little favour at a time when men and women, or
+at least women, had more leisure and inclination
+to try to get below the surface of things. Heroes
+had been glorified till they had almost become
+deified, and something more personal, more
+individual, was wanted. By the side of modern
+romance, where the most sacred and secret intricacies
+of human nature are, as it were, displayed
+under the microscope, Marie’s narrations may
+seem somewhat artless. But in putting into
+words the dawning desires of her time she
+gave form and impetus to feeling and thought<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>
+struggling for expression, and gained for her
+work a definite place in the development of
+human utterance. Evolution, whether of the
+spirit or of matter, is the supreme law of things.
+Marie struck a spark from the ideal which poets
+and writers down the ages have fanned into a
+flame.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> Marie thus refers to Count William:—
+</p>
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">“Pur amur le cumte Willaume,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Le plus vaillant de cest royaume,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">M’entremis de cest livre feire,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">E de l’Angleiz en Roman treire.”<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+</div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> Warnke. <i>Die lais der Marie de France</i>, p. lxiii.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Marie de France, <i>Seven of her Lays</i>, trans. E. Rickert, 1901;
+Warnke, <i>Die lais der Marie de France</i>, Halle, 1885; Hertz, <i>Spielmannsbuch</i>,
+1905.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> Compare with this the bed of “King Fisherman” described in
+<i>Holy Grail</i>, vol. i. p. 137, trans. Sebastian Evans, 1898.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> Hertz, <i>op. cit.</i> p. 396.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> This mention of Salerno is of interest on account of the
+reference to women practising there as medical experts. The
+origin of the School remains in obscurity, and it is not until the
+ninth century, when the names of certain Salerno physicians appear
+in the archives, that we get any definite information with regard
+to it. It seems to have been a purely secular institution, but it is
+quite possible that its development was aided by the Benedictines,
+who became established there in the seventh century, and who
+made medical science one of their principal studies. Before the
+middle of the eleventh century there were many women there
+who either practised medicine or acted as professors of the science,
+and some of the latter even combined surgery with medicine in
+their teaching and treatises. These women doctors were much
+sought after by the sick, and were much esteemed by their brother-professionals,
+who cited them as authorities. That the sexes were
+on an equal footing we infer from the fact that the title of “master”
+(Magister) was applied to men and women alike, the term “doctor”
+not having come into use, apparently, before the thirteenth
+century. Besides the general practitioners and the professors,
+there were others who fitted themselves specially for military
+service, as well as priests who added medical knowledge to their
+holy calling. The teaching followed that of Hippocrates and Galen,
+and the Salerno school was world-renowned in the art of drug
+preparation. In the thirteenth century, however, Arab medical
+writings began to be known in Europe through Latin translations,
+and Arab practice in medicine, though based on Greek teaching,
+initiated a new departure. As a result of this, the glory of Salerno
+waned. Another cause of its decline in fame and popularity was
+the founding by the Emperor Frederick the Second of a school of
+medicine at Naples, which he richly endowed, and the rise, unencumbered
+by old traditions—for medicine, like scholasticism,
+could be hampered by dialectical subtlety—of the school of
+Montpelier.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> M. Gaston Paris (<i>Poésie du Moyen Age</i>, vol. ii.), in recalling
+various legends of “Le Mari aux deux femmes,” suggests that the
+present story, borrowed by Marie from Celtic tradition, is probably
+of Occidental, and not Oriental, origin, since in the polygamous
+East the story of two wives would not have furnished a sufficient
+motive for a special narration.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> Warnke, <i>op. cit.</i> civ.; Hertz, <i>op. cit.</i> p. 409.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> J.&nbsp;G. Frazer, <i>Adonis, Attis, Osiris</i>, p. 98.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<h2><a name="A_THIRTEENTH-CENTURY_MYSTIC" id="A_THIRTEENTH-CENTURY_MYSTIC"></a>A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY MYSTIC
+AND BEGUINE,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span><br />
+MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG</h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">The</span> triumphant ecclesiasticism of the thirteenth
+century, manifested in the forms of political
+power, material wealth, splendid architecture,
+and worldly positions sufficiently commanding to
+satisfy even the most ambitious, was, perhaps
+naturally, accompanied by a gross materialism.
+Against this the truly pious-minded revolted,
+thereby causing a reaction towards mysticism.
+Whilst before the eyes of some there floated, as
+the ideal, the material ladder leading to fame
+and power, before those of others there arose, as
+in a vision, the “Ladder of Perfection,” each
+rung of which gained brought them nearer
+to the object of their quest—Divine Reality.
+These latter, whether of great, or lesser, or even
+of no renown, and amongst whom women played
+a great and very notable part, were scattered far
+and wide; but each one cultivated some little
+corner of the mystic garden. One such garden
+was the Cistercian convent of Helfta, near
+Eisleben, in Saxony, in the thirteenth century a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>
+centre of mystic tendencies. It was here that,
+harassed and ill, Mechthild of Magdeburg took
+refuge, and entered as a nun in 1270. But we
+are anticipating.</p>
+
+<p>Mechthild, at first a beguine, and afterwards
+a nun, but a visionary from the days of her
+childhood, was born, most probably of noble
+parents, in the diocese of Magdeburg, in 1212.
+That she is perhaps better known to the general
+reader than are other contemplatives of her day
+is probably due to the suggestion that she may
+be the Matilda immortalised by Dante in the
+“Earthly Paradise” (<i>Purg.</i> xxviii. 22 <i>seq.</i>),
+rather than to her own writings. This may be
+partly because the personality of that supreme
+visionary and poet tended, as does all superlative
+genius, to cast a shadow over the lesser lights of
+both earlier and later times, and partly because,
+although Mechthild’s works were early translated
+into Latin, she wrote in Low German.
+Though this original MS. has not yet been
+found, there exists one, translated into High
+German in 1345 at Basle (a centre of the
+“Friends of God”) by the Dominican, Heinrich
+von Nördlingen, by which Mechthild’s work
+has been made known to us, but the language
+even of this proves a very real stumbling-block
+to the most strenuous student. Still, by recording
+her thoughts and visions in the language
+of her country and her day, she gained a lay
+audience, a result which would have been hardly
+possible if she herself had been a classic. But<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>
+though no classic—for she says Latin was difficult
+to her—she evidently, as her work shows,
+grew up under the influence of courtly life, and
+knew the language of minstrels. She tells us
+that her mind was turned to the spiritual life
+when she was but twelve years of age, and that
+from that time worldly glory and riches became
+distasteful to her. Like the visionary and Saint,
+Theresa of Avila, of 300 years later, she took
+into her confidence her younger brother, Baldwin,
+who later, perhaps under her influence, became
+a Dominican. What we know of her, we know
+from her writings, which exist in the above-mentioned
+unique MS. (No. 277) now in the
+monastery Library of Einsiedeln, a foundation
+south of the Lake of Zurich, and still one of the
+most famous of pilgrim resorts. In seeking to
+know more of the history of this MS. we get a
+most interesting and intimate glimpse of the
+methods in religious centres in bygone days,
+when MSS. were few. In quite early times—how
+early is not known—there dwelt in the
+valleys round about Einsiedeln certain devout
+women-recluses, who later lived, as a community,
+in four houses, and, ultimately, in a convent.
+They were called “Forest Sisters,” a name
+which may well express the poetry and peace
+of their life and surroundings. Whilst they
+were still living in the detached houses, the
+MS. was, through Heinrich von Rumerschein of
+Basle, sent by Margaret of the Golden Ring, a
+beguine of that town, to the one called “The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>
+Front Meadow.” Heinrich addresses the gift
+“To the Sisters in the Front Meadow.” “You
+shall know that the book that is sent by her
+of the Golden Ring is called <i>The Light of the
+Godhead</i>, and to this you shall give good heed.
+It shall also serve in all the houses of the wood,
+and shall never leave the wood, and shall remain
+a month in each house. Also it shall go from
+one to another as required, and you shall take
+special care of it. Pray for me who was your
+Confessor, though, alas, unworthy.”</p>
+
+<p>In 1235, at the age of twenty-three,
+Mechthild—not without many a heart-pang, and
+prompted to this determination by a troubled
+conscience, a determination doubtless brought
+about by the preaching of the Dominican friars,
+who were stirring all classes by their impassioned
+zeal—left her home and went to Magdeburg,
+where she entered a settlement of beguines.
+These settlements, semi-monastic in character,
+were provided to afford some protection, by
+living in community, for women who, whilst
+devoting themselves to a religious life, did not
+wish to separate themselves wholly from the
+world. It was at the time of the Crusades,
+when the land teemed with desolate women,
+that their numbers increased so greatly, and the
+first beguinage was founded about the beginning
+of the thirteenth century. The beguine took no
+vows, could return to the world and marry if
+she so desired, and did not renounce her property.
+If she was without means, she neither<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>
+asked nor accepted alms, but supported herself
+by manual labour or by teaching the children of
+burghers, whilst those who were able to do so
+spent their time in taking care of the sick or in
+other charitable offices. Each community, with
+a “Grand-Mistress” at its head, was complete in
+itself, and regulated its own order of living,
+though, later, many of them adopted the rule of
+the Third Order of St. Francis.</p>
+
+<p>Mechthild tells us that she knew but one
+person in Magdeburg, and that even from this
+one she kept away for fear lest she might waver
+in her determination. In this very human way
+she indicated that her spiritual adventure was
+no easy matter to her, as, indeed, it could not be
+so long as her temperament and ideals were at
+variance. But gradually, she says, she got so
+much joy from communion with God that she
+could dispense with the world. As has been
+well said, “La loi des lois c’est que tout morceau
+de l’univers venu de Dieu retourne à Dieu et
+veut retourner à lui.”</p>
+
+<p>The book of her writings, which, under
+divine direction as she opens by saying, she calls
+<i>The Flowing Light of the Godhead</i>,<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> is composed
+of seven parts, of which six appear to have
+been written down during the time she was a
+beguine at Magdeburg, and were collected and
+arranged by a Dominican friar, Heinrich von
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>Halle, whilst the seventh, consisting of sundry
+visions and teachings during the last years of her
+life, was put together just before her death at
+Helfta in 1282, and, as she pathetically adds,
+“by strange eyes and hands.” In all of these,
+whilst reflecting in them her inmost feelings, she
+expresses her entire dependence on spiritual help
+and inspiration. “The writing of this book,” she
+says, “is seen and heard and felt in every limb.
+I see it with the eyes of my soul, and hear it with
+the ears of my eternal spirit, and feel in every
+part of my body the power of the Holy Ghost.”</p>
+
+<p>The general tenor of her writings is contemplative
+and prophetic. Whilst, as a contemplative,
+she reminds us of Suso, as a reformer,
+proclaiming her prophetic warnings, she recalls
+to us St. Hildegarde, though the latter was a
+more astute and powerful reasoner. It would
+seem as if, in general, there are two conflicting
+tendencies in minds such as Mechthild’s, a tendency
+to tradition—in her case, of course, church
+tradition—and a tendency to definite self-expression.
+With Mechthild it was certainly that of
+self-expression which predominated, for whilst,
+with her, both co-operated to make a beautiful
+whole, it was in detail and ornament, so to
+speak, rather than in the design itself, that she
+showed her special qualities and gifts. Further,
+as a mystic, she may be classed with those “for
+whom mysticism is above all things an intimate
+and personal relation, the satisfaction of a deep
+desire,” and who therefore fall back “upon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>
+imagery drawn largely from the language of
+earthly passion,” as opposed to the mystic whose
+“longing is to go out from his normal world in
+search of a lost home, a better country,” as well
+as to the one whose “craving is for inward
+purity and perfection.”<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a></p>
+
+<p>In order to enter into the spirit of her
+writings, and particularly the prophetic ones,
+it is necessary to consider how the character and
+style of her work was induced and affected, on
+the one hand by her environment and her time,
+and on the other by her saintly nature and
+poetic temperament, as well as by her intimate
+and personal attitude towards things touching
+the inner life.</p>
+
+<p>The world, in Mechthild’s day, was in a
+state of unrest and of looked-for change. Mankind
+was ever haunted by forebodings of the
+approaching happening of something momentous.
+Whole-hearted faith in the Church was waning,
+and although outward conformity still prevailed,
+there existed very diverse opinions, tolerated so
+long as they did not become too obtrusive.
+Prophetic writings, giving expression to the
+yearnings of the time—yearnings fomented and
+fostered by the prevailing misery caused, in no
+small degree, by the wars between Pope and
+Emperor—taught that the world was on the
+brink of a new era. One of the most influential
+of these writings, entitled <i>The Eternal Gospel</i>,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span>and said to embody the revelations of Abbot
+Joachim of Flora (1130-1202), proclaimed that
+the dispensations of God the Father and God
+the Son—the first two eras of the Church—were
+past or passing, and that these would be
+succeeded by a third era—that of the Holy
+Ghost—when men’s eyes would be opened by
+the Spirit, and when there would be a time of
+perfection and freedom, without the necessity
+of disciplinary institutions. In this fair age it
+was the hermits, monks, and nuns who, whilst
+not superseding the rulers of the Church, were
+to lead it into new paths, for to Joachim the
+visible Church could not, where all is moving,
+remain unchanged, and his counsel was, to keep
+pace with the advancing world. Naturally such
+sentiments aroused ecclesiastical alarm, and, later,
+were condemned by the fourth Lateran Council
+(1215), though Dante, withal a good son of the
+Church, made bold to see in Paradise the
+“Abbott Joachim, endowed with prophetic
+Spirit” (<i>Par.</i> xii. 140).<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> When Mechthild
+wrote her predictions on the last days, Joachim’s
+teachings, owing to the stir which their unorthodoxy
+had created—not only in the Church
+and amongst the preaching friars, but also in the
+University of Paris, whence all manner of
+polemical discussions freely circulated—were
+well known in Germany, and there can be but
+little doubt that Mechthild knew of them, probably
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>from the Dominicans, who found special
+favour in her sight, and that they greatly
+influenced her own prophetic warnings to the
+Church.</p>
+
+<p>From these objective conditions which, whilst
+influencing Mechthild’s own thoughts and works,
+might and did, however differently, influence
+the work of others as well, we turn to the
+consideration of her work as the expression of
+her own poetic soul, welling up from depths
+filled with love for the highest and most divine
+things. Before all else we recognise how richly
+endowed she was with visionary powers and
+poetic feeling. She revels in beautiful fantasies,
+as, for instance, when she says, “If I were to
+speak one little word of the choirs of heaven, it
+would be no more than the honey that a bee can
+carry away on its feet from a full-blown flower.”
+With rapture she touches upon the deepest
+questions of the soul’s life, and the highest
+truths and mysteries of belief, so that in her
+flights of contemplation her prose becomes
+poetry, impelled, like some torrent, by the rush
+of her emotion.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">O thou God, out-pouring in thy gift!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">O thou God, o’erflowing in thy love!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">O thou God, all burning in thy desire!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">O thou God, melting in union with thy body!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">O thou God, reposing on my breast!<br /></span>
+<span class="i2">Without Thee, never could I live.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">But even so, she does not lose the sense of form
+or of the picturesque. Some of her writings are
+clothed in language recalling the Song of Songs,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>
+and are, perhaps, echoes of St. Bernard’s sermons
+on that wondrous allegory of the Spiritual Bridegroom
+and Bride, as when, in a transport, and
+attempting to express how God comes to the
+Soul, she exclaims—</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">I come to my Beloved<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Like dew upon the flowers.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">Others suggest reflections of courtly life and
+poetry, and at the same time seem to anticipate
+pictures of the Celestial Garden, bright and
+blossoming, where Saints tread in measured
+unison, symbolic of their spiritual felicity and
+harmony. So with her didactic writings, or
+with her predictions concerning the decay and
+corruption in the Church, in which, like some
+prophet of old, she declaims against such evils in
+no sparing terms, all alike are fraught with a
+special grace. In them all the most intimate
+and the most sublime meet in one expression—the
+expression of a soul which sees God in all
+things, and all things in God.</p>
+
+<p>During the thirty years which Mechthild
+spent as a beguine at Magdeburg, she lived an
+austere life, and one beset with difficulties,
+largely created by the fearless way in which she
+warned and denounced those in high places
+in the Church. In such denunciations she was
+not alone, or without good example, for—to
+name two only of those who stand out pre-eminently
+on account of their positions and
+personalities—St. Bernard and St. Hildegarde<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>
+had both sternly denounced the evils in the
+Church. “The insolence of the Clergy,” says
+St. Bernard, “troubles the earth, and molests
+the Church. The Bishops give what is holy to
+the dogs, and pearls to swine.” But the poor
+beguine, Mechthild, was not in the same powerful
+position to stay, or even to modify, the resentment
+which her attacks occasioned. “For
+more than twenty years was I bound with thee
+on a hideous gridiron,” she writes, likening her
+anguish to that of St. Lawrence. Nevertheless
+solace came to her troubled spirit, for, having
+been warned that it had been said of her writings
+that they deserved to be burnt, she tells how she
+prayed to God, as had been her wont when in
+trouble, and that He told her not to mistrust her
+powers, since they were from Him, and that no
+one can burn the Truth.</p>
+
+<p>In many passages Mechthild dwells on the
+clergy, and her reflections—some very practical,
+others, to those not versed in symbolism, very
+quaint—seem to suggest how grievously lacking
+she considered them to be. Writing in God’s
+name to a canon, she begins by saying that we
+should, in common with all men, give thanks to
+our Heavenly Father for the Divine gift which
+day by day, and without ceasing, pours forth
+from the Holy Trinity into sinful hearts, and
+then she quaintly adds, “For that it soars so
+high, the Eagle owes no thanks to the Owl.”
+Furthermore, she calls upon the priest to pray
+more, to pay his debts in full, and to live<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span>
+simply, and thus, with humble heart, to set a
+good example, and, with many other admonitions,
+she also counsels him to have two rods
+by his bedside, so that he may chastise himself
+when he awakes. Mechthild adds that she
+asked of God how such an one could keep
+himself without sin in this earthly state, and
+that God made answer: “He shall keep himself
+always in fear, like a mouse that sits in a trap
+and awaits its death. When he eats, he shall be
+frugal and meek, and when he sleeps, he shall
+be chaste, and alone with Me.”</p>
+
+<p>Touching upon some of the duties of a prior—and
+here she shows herself eminently practical—she
+writes: “Thou shalt go every day to the
+infirmary, and soothe the sick with the solace
+of God’s word, and comfort them bounteously
+with earthly things, for God is rich beyond all
+richness. Thou shalt keep the sick cleanly, and
+be merry with them in a godly manner. Thou
+shalt also go into the kitchen, and see that the
+needs of the brethren are well cared for, and that
+thy parsimony, and the cook’s laziness, rob not our
+Lord of the sweet song of the choir, for never
+did starving priest sing well. Moreover, a hungry
+man can do no deep study, and thus must God,
+through such default, lose the best prayers.”
+From advice to the priesthood, Mechthild turns
+to warning, and pours forth her reproaches
+and forebodings with poetic intensity. “Alas,
+O thou Crown of Holy Christendom, how
+greatly hast thou lost lustre! Thy jewels are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>
+fallen out, since thou dost outrage and bring
+dishonour on the holy Christian vows. Thy
+gold has become tarnished in the morass of
+unchastity, for thou art become degenerate, and
+art lacking in true love. Thy abstinence is
+consumed by the ravenous fire of gluttony, thy
+humility is drowned in the slough of the flesh,
+thy word no longer avails against the lies of the
+world, the flowers of all the virtues have fallen
+from thee. Alas, O thou Crown of the holy
+Priesthood, how diminished thou art, and verily
+thou now possessest naught but priestly power,
+with the which thou fightest against God and
+His elect. For this will God humble thee, ere
+thou learnest wisdom. For thus saith the Lord:
+‘My shepherds of Jerusalem have become murderers
+and wolves, for that they slay before My
+very eyes the white lambs, and the sheep are all
+sickly for that they may not eat of the wholesome
+pasture that grows on the high mountains,
+the which is godly love and holy doctrine.’ He
+who knows not the way that leads to Hell, let
+him give heed to the unholy clergy, who, with
+wives and children and many heinous sins, go
+straightway thither.”</p>
+
+<p>Whilst condemning the priesthood, Mechthild
+eulogises nunnery life in an allegory entitled
+“The Ghostly Cloister,” in which she pictures
+the virtues as dwelling. “Charity” is the abbess,
+who with zeal takes care of the congregation in
+both body and soul; “Godly Humility” is the
+chaplain; “The Holy Peace of God” is the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>
+prioress; and “Loving Kindness” is the sub-prioress.
+“Hope” is the chantress, filled with
+holy, humble devotion, that the heart’s feebleness
+may sound beautiful in song before God, so that
+God may love the notes that sing in the heart;
+“Wisdom” is the schoolmistress, who with all
+good-will teaches the ignorant, so that the
+convent is held holy and honoured; “Bounty”
+is the cellaress; “Mercy” the stewardess; and
+“Pity” the sick-nurse. The provost, or priest,
+is “Godly Obedience,” to whom all these
+virtues are subject. “Thus does the convent
+abide in God, and happy are they who dwell
+therein.”</p>
+
+<p>From this spiritual abode of the virtues we
+turn to one of Mechthild’s earliest recorded
+visions—that of Hell, with its flame and flare.
+Whilst Death was perhaps man’s first mystery,
+the Hereafter has been his endless pre-occupation.
+Whatever his country or his time, he has
+ever sought to lift the veil which hides the
+future, portraying his vain efforts in symbol.
+In Mechthild’s time her world was engrossed
+with thoughts and speculations concerning the
+Hereafter, for Death, which at the end of
+the next century was to take dramatic and
+pictorial form in the weird and all-embracing
+“Dance of Death,” although its earliest known
+poetic form is of 1160, ever hovered near in
+pestilence, war, and tumult. Whilst some expressed
+themselves in carved stone, or on painted
+wall, others, as did Mechthild, realised their<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>
+visions and ideas in a wealth of word-pictures.
+Such visions and ideas had accumulated adown
+the ages, varying but slightly one from another,
+and Mechthild, in making use of this stereotyped
+material, only took from, or added to, the general
+sum. Yet even so, she contrives to make her
+personality felt. She begins: “I have seen a
+place whose name is Eternal Hatred.” Lucifer,
+farthest removed from the source of Light, forms
+the foundation-stone, and around him are arranged
+the deadly sins. Above him are the Christians,
+then the Jews, and, farthest removed from Hell’s
+dire depths, the Heathen. Horror upon horror
+follows, like those pictured a hundred years
+before by Herrad von Landsperg, abbess at
+Hohenburg, in Alsace, and, fifty years later, by
+Dante, and when she concludes by saying that,
+after seeing the terrors of Hell, all her five senses
+were paralysed for three days, as if struck by
+lightning, it is significant that Dante tells that,
+overwhelmed with sorrow for the lovers, doomed
+for ever to be borne upon the winds, he “fainted
+with pity ... and fell, as a dead body falls.”</p>
+
+<p>It is with a sense of relief that we leave such
+sad scenes, to glance at her vision of Paradise,
+although it does not follow in this sequence in
+her recorded revelations, for, as seems fitting, it is
+one of the very latest. Calling it “a glimpse of
+Paradise,” she says that “of the length and breadth
+of Paradise there is no end.” Then she continues—and
+this is especially interesting because it is in
+this opening that some commentators have seen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>
+the connecting link with Dante<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a>—that between
+this world and it, she came to a spot—the Earthly
+Paradise—where she saw trees and fresh grass
+and no weeds. Some of the trees bore apples,
+but most of them sweetly scented leaves. Swift
+streams flowed through it, and warm winds were
+wafted from the north. The air was sweeter
+than words can tell. Here, she adds, there were
+no animals or birds, for God has reserved it for
+mankind alone, so that he may dwell there undisturbed.
+This seems to strike a strange note
+coming from the poetess Mechthild. How
+different is her sentiment from that of her
+brother-mystic, St. Francis, to whom the birds
+were his “little sisters,” and who “loved above
+all other birds a certain little bird which is called
+the lark.” But though, with apparent satisfaction,
+Mechthild saw no birds, she did see Enoch and
+Elias, and greeted the former by questioning him
+as to how he came there. Holy Writ has supplied
+the only answer, “He walked with God,
+and he was not, for God took him.” Having
+spoken thus of the Earthly Paradise, Mechthild
+goes on to tell of the Heavenly, where she sees,
+“floating in rapture, as the air floats in the
+sunshine,” the souls which, though not deserving
+of Purgatory, are not yet come into God’s
+kingdom, and to whom rewards and crowns
+come not until they enter that kingdom. She
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>then concludes by saying that “all the kingdoms
+of this world shall perish, and the earthly and
+the heavenly Paradise shall pass away, and all
+shall dwell together in God”—the Empyrean
+of Dante, where he “saw ingathered, bound by
+love in one volume, the scattered leaves of all
+the universe; substance and accidents and their
+relations, as though together fused, after such
+fashion that what I tell of is one simple flame.”</p>
+
+<p>In her very varied writings many beautiful and
+suggestive thoughts are to be found, as, for instance,
+when “Understanding” converses with “Conscience,”
+and accuses Conscience of being at the
+same time both proud and humble, and Conscience
+explains that she is proud because she is in touch
+with God, and humble because she has done so
+few good works. And again, when “Understanding”
+and “the Soul” hold converse. Understanding,
+desirous of knowing everything, asks
+the Soul why such brilliant light radiates from
+her, and the Soul replies by inquiring why
+Understanding asks this, seeing that she is so
+much wiser than the Soul. When Understanding
+would still penetrate the unspeakable
+secrecy between God and the Soul, the Soul
+refuses to answer, since, as she explains, to her
+alone is given union with God, to which Understanding
+can never attain. Or, again, when
+Mechthild, telling how the Soul, no longer led
+by the Senses, but leading them to the desired
+goal, says, “It is a wondrous journey along
+which the true soul progresses, and leads with it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>
+the senses, as a man with sight leads one who
+is blind. On this journey the soul is free and
+without sorrow, since it desires naught but to
+serve its Lord, who orders all things for the
+best.”</p>
+
+<p>Of Prayer, which to her was “naught else
+but yearning of soul,” she says, “It makes a
+sour heart sweet, a sad heart merry, a poor
+heart rich, a dull heart wise, a timid heart bold,
+a weak heart strong, a blind heart seeing, a cold
+heart burning. It draws the great God down
+into the small heart, it drives the hungry soul
+out to the full God, it brings together the two
+lovers, God and the soul, into a blissful place,
+where they speak much of love.”</p>
+
+<p>Again, in a spirit of self-examination, she
+writes: “What most of all hinders the
+spiritually-minded from full perfection is, that
+they pay so little heed to small sins. I tell
+you, of a truth, that when I abstain from a
+laugh that would hurt no one, or hide some
+soreness of heart, or feel a little impatience at
+my own pain, my soul becomes so dark, and my
+mind so dull, and my heart so cold, that I am
+constrained to pray heartily and long, and humbly
+to make confession of all my faults. Then grace
+comes again to wretched me, and I creep back
+like a beaten dog into the kitchen.”</p>
+
+<p>But all these and kindred thoughts pale
+before her discourses on love. Love was the
+keynote of her life. She was born a poetess;
+she became a saint. How sorely she strove<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>
+towards this end, and spent herself in conflict
+between self-control and ecstasy, no words can
+tell. It was only when Purgation’s way was
+partly trod, and she had “found in Pain the
+grave but kindly teacher of immortal secrets,”
+that she could say, “Lord, I bring Thee my
+treasure, which is greater than the mountains,
+wider than the world, deeper than the sea,
+higher than the clouds, more beautiful than
+the sun, more manifold than the stars, and
+which outweighs all the earth.” Then asks
+the voice of God: “How is this thy treasure
+called, oh Image of my Divinity?”</p>
+
+<p>“Lord, it is called my heart’s desire. I
+have withdrawn it from the world, kept it to
+myself, and denied it to all creatures. Now no
+longer would I carry it. Lord, where shall I
+lay it?”</p>
+
+<p>“Nowhere shalt thou lay thy heart’s desire
+save in My own Divine heart. There only
+wilt thou find comfort.”</p>
+
+<p>Love and knowledge, the two aspirations of
+the soul after ultimate truth, are her frequent
+theme. Sometimes she contrasts Love with the
+knowledge of the understanding: “Those who
+would know much, and love little, will ever
+remain at but the beginning of a godly life.
+So we must have a constant care how we may
+please God therein. Simple love, with but
+little knowledge, can do great things”; sometimes
+with the knowledge of the heart—“To
+the wise soul, love without knowledge seems<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>
+darkness, knowledge without fruition, the very
+pain of Hell. Fruition can be reached only
+through Death.” In one of her visions she,
+in an exquisite simile, describes how love flows
+from the Godhead to mankind, penetrating both
+body and soul. “It goes without effort,” she
+says, “as does a bird in the air when it does not
+move its wings.” In the same vision she sees
+the Holy Mother, with uncovered breasts,
+standing on God’s left hand, and Christ on the
+right, showing his still-open wounds, both
+pleading for sinful humanity, and she adds that
+as long as sin endures on earth, so long will
+Christ’s wounds remain open and bleeding,
+though painless, but that after the Day of
+Judgment they will heal, and it will be as though
+there was a rose-leaf instead of the wounds.<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a></p>
+
+<p>Of Love, as she conceived it in relation to
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>herself individually, she can never write enough.
+“I also may not suffer that any single comfort
+move me, save my love alone. I love my
+earthly friends in a heavenly fellowship, and I
+love my enemies with a holy longing for their
+salvation. God has enough of all good things,
+save of union with the soul.”</p>
+
+<p>But where Mechthild seems to strike an
+original note for her time is in her insistence
+on God’s craving for the soul, as well as the
+soul’s craving for God. We find the same
+insistence in Meister Eckhart, who followed
+her closely in time, and perhaps, in this respect,
+in thought also. “God needs man,” says
+Eckhart, quite simply. And again, “God can
+do as little without us as we without Him.”
+With Mechthild it is from ecstasy to ecstasy
+that “heart speaks to heart.” Says the soul of
+Mechthild: “Lord, Thou art ever sick of love for
+me, and that hast Thou Thyself well proved. Thou
+hast written me in the Book of the Godhead.
+Thou hast fashioned me after Thine own image.
+Thou hast bound me hand and foot to Thy side.
+O grant it to me, Beloved, to anoint Thee.”</p>
+
+<p>“Where wilt thou get thine ointment, dear
+one?”</p>
+
+<p>“Lord, I will tear my happy heart in twain,
+and lay Thee therein.”</p>
+
+<p>“It is the most precious ointment thou
+couldest give Me, that I should evermore hover
+in thy soul.”</p>
+
+<p>Further God says: “I longed for thee ere<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>
+the world was. I long for thee, and thou
+longest for me. When two burning desires
+come together, then is love perfected.”</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes the loving soul traverses a dark
+way, and cries out in desolation and despair:
+“Lord, since Thou hast taken from me all that
+I had of Thee, yet of Thy grace leave me that
+gift which every dog has by nature—that in
+my distress I may be true to Thee, without any
+ill-will. This do I truly desire more than all
+Thy heavenly kingdom.”</p>
+
+<p>And Divine Love makes answer: “Sweet
+Dove, now list to me. Thy secret seeking must
+needs find me, thy heart’s distress must needs
+compel me, thy loving pursuit has so wearied
+me, that I long to cool myself in thy pure soul
+in the which I am imprisoned. The throbbing
+sighs of thy sore heart have driven my justice
+from thee. All is right between me and thee.
+I cannot be sundered from thee. However far
+we are parted, never can we be separated. I
+cause thee extreme pain of body. If I gave
+myself to thee as oft as thou wouldst, I should
+thus deprive myself of the sweet shelter I have
+in thee in this world.”</p>
+
+<p>Again the soul cries out—but now discomfited
+by the Divine Love from whose tireless quest
+there is no escape—“Thou hast pursued and
+captured and bound me, and hast wounded me
+so deeply that never shall I be healed. Thou
+hast given me many a hard blow. Tell me,
+shall I ever get whole from Thee? Shall I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>
+not be slain by Thee? Thus would it have
+been better for me if that I had never known
+Thee.”</p>
+
+<p>Then answers Love: “That I pursued thee
+gave me delight. That I made thee captive
+was my desire. That I bound thee was my
+joy. When I wounded thee, then did I become
+one with thee. Thus I give thee hard blows
+so that I may be possessed of thee. I drove
+Almighty God from His heavenly kingdom, and
+took from Him His mortal life, and have restored
+Him with honour to His Father. How canst
+thou, poor worm, save thyself from me?”</p>
+
+<p>Of all Mechthild’s visions, there is none
+that seems to reach a greater height of supreme
+beauty than that in which the loving soul learns
+the way to its Divine Lover. It is strangely
+reminiscent of courtly life and courtly poetry,
+translated into the ecstatic state, and etherealised
+into the very perfume of spirituality as the soul
+becomes one with God. Having passed the
+distress of repentance, the pain of confession,
+and the labour of penance, and having overcome
+the love of the World, the tempting of the
+Devil, and its own self-will, the soul, weary,
+and longing for her Divine Lover and God,
+cries out: “Beautiful Youth, I long for thee.
+Where shall I find thee?”</p>
+
+<p>Then says the youth: “I hear a voice which
+speaks somewhat of love. Many days have I
+wooed her, but never have I heard her voice.
+Now I am moved. I must go to meet her.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>
+She it is who bears grief and love together.
+In the morning in the dew is the most intimate
+rapture which first penetrates the soul.”</p>
+
+<p>Then speak her Chamberlains, which are the
+live senses: “Lady, thou must adorn thyself.
+We have heard a whisper that the Prince comes
+to meet thee in the dew, and the sweet song of
+the birds. Tarry not, Lady.”</p>
+
+<p>So she puts on a shift of gentle humility, so
+humble that nothing could be more so, and over
+it a white robe of pure chastity, so pure that
+she cannot endure thoughts, words, or desires
+which might stain it. Then she wraps herself
+in a cloak of holy desire, which she has wrought
+in gold with all the virtues. So she goes into
+the wood, which is the company of holy people.
+The sweetest nightingales sing there, day and
+night, of the right union with God. She tries
+to join in the festal dance, that is, to imitate
+the example of the elect. Then comes the
+youth and says to her: “Thou shalt dance
+merrily even as my Elect.” And she answers:
+“I cannot dance, Lord, if Thou dost not lead
+me. If Thou wilt that I leap joyfully, Thou
+must first Thyself sing. Then will I leap for
+love, from love to knowledge, from knowledge
+to fruition, from fruition to beyond all human
+senses. There will I remain, and circle evermore.”<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a></p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span></p>
+<p>Then speaks the youth: “Thy dance of
+praise is well done. Thou shalt have thy will,
+for thou art heartily wearied. Come at mid-day
+to the shady fountain, to the bed of love. There
+shalt thou be refreshed.”</p>
+
+<p>Then, weary of the dance, the soul says to
+her Chamberlains, the senses: “Withdraw from
+me, I must go where I may cool myself.”</p>
+
+<p>Then say the senses: “Lady, wilt thou be
+refreshed with the loving tears of St. Mary
+Magdalene? They may well suffice thee.”</p>
+
+<p>“Be silent, sirs; you know not what I mean.
+Hinder me not. I would drink for a space of
+the unmingled wine.”</p>
+
+<p>“Lady, in the Virgin’s chastity the great
+love is reached.”</p>
+
+<p>“That may be. For me it is not the
+highest.”</p>
+
+<p>“Lady, thou mightst cool thyself in the
+martyrs’ blood.”</p>
+
+<p>“I have been martyred many a day, so that
+I have no need to come to that now.”</p>
+
+<p>“Lady, bright are the angels, and lovely
+in love’s hue. Wouldst thou cool thyself, be
+lifted up with them.”</p>
+
+<p>“The bliss of the angels brings me love’s
+woe unless I see their Lord, my Bridegroom.”</p>
+
+<p>“Lady, if thou comest there, thou wilt be
+blinded quite, so fiery hot is the Godhead, as
+thou thyself well knowest, for the fire and the
+glow which make heaven and all the holy
+ones burn and shine, all flow from His divine<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>
+breath, and from His human mouth, through
+the wisdom of the Holy Ghost. How couldest
+thou endure it for an hour?”</p>
+
+<p>And the soul answers: “The fish cannot
+drown in the water, the bird cannot sink in the
+air, gold cannot perish in the fire, where it
+gains its clear and shining worth. God has
+granted to each creature to cherish its own
+nature. How can I withstand my nature?
+I must go from all things to God, who is my
+Father by Nature, my Brother through His
+Humanity, my Bridegroom through Love, and
+I am His for ever.”</p>
+
+<p>Silenced by this wondrous flight of holy
+passion, we bid farewell to Mechthild. She
+lived for her time, and she lives for us, as one
+of “humanity’s pioneers on the only road to
+rest.” “Out of the depths,” she cried to Heaven.
+We leave her in the music of the spheres.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> P. Gall. Morel, <i>Offenbarungen der Schwester Mechthild von
+Magdeburg, oder das fliessende Licht der Gottheit</i>, Regensburg,
+1869.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> For the suggestive elaboration of this threefold classification,
+see Evelyn Underhill, <i>Mysticism</i>, chap. vi. p. 151 <i>seq.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> Cf. Edmund G. Gardner, <i>Joachim of Flora and the Everlasting
+Gospel</i>. Franciscan Essays, Bri. Soc. of Fran. Studies, extra series, vol. i.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> The tendency of present-day Italian scholarship seems in
+favour of identifying Mechthild of Hackeborn, rather than
+Mechthild of Magdeburg, with Dante’s Matelda.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> The first of these subjects—the Holy Mother and Christ
+pleading for sinners—is to be found in a miniature in King Henry
+VI.’s Psalter (Brit. Mus. Cotton MS. Domitian. A. xvii. <i>circ.</i>
+1430, fol. 205), and the two intercessions separately form two of the
+subjects in the <i>Speculum Humanae Salvationis</i> (fourteenth century).
+Though the <i>S.H.S.</i> is of later date than the time of Mechthild
+the literary source of the subject appears to be a passage in the
+<i>De laudibus B.M.V.</i> of Arnaud of Chartres, abbot of Bonneval
+1138-1156 (J. Lutz and P. Perdrizet, <i>Spec. Hum. Sal.</i> vol. i.,
+Mulhouse, 1907), which might quite well have been known to
+her, especially if, as Messrs. Lutz and Perdrizet consider, the <i>S.H.S.</i>
+was written by a Dominican, who would naturally make use of
+Dominican teaching and tradition, and we know that Mechthild,
+even if not, as has been suggested, a tertiary of that Order, was
+in constant and close touch with it. The second subject, the
+reference to rose-leaves and Christ’s wounds, seems to be a purely
+original thought, and one amongst the many fascinating ideas that
+have centred round the rose ever since Aphrodite anointed the
+dead body of Hector with rose-scented oil (<i>Iliad</i>, xxiii. 186).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> It may be recalled that Dante (<i>Par.</i> xxiv.) sees the Saints in
+Paradise as circling lights from whence issues divine song, and
+again (<i>Par.</i> xxv.) “wheeling round in such guise as their burning
+love befitted.”</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<h2><a name="A_FOURTEENTH-CENTURY" id="A_FOURTEENTH-CENTURY"></a>A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span><br />
+ART-PATRON AND PHILANTHROPIST,<br />
+MAHAUT, COUNTESS OF ARTOIS</h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">It</span> has been well said that “out of things
+unlikely and remote may be won romance and
+beauty.” Perhaps the truth of this reflection
+has never been more signally exemplified than
+in the case of Mahaut, Countess of Artois and
+Burgundy, the record of whose life, in the
+absence of any contemporary biographer, has
+been ably deciphered from such commonplace
+material as the household accounts of her
+stewards.<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> This great lady, one of the greatest
+patrons of art of her time, lived at the end of the
+thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth
+century. She was a great-niece of St. Louis.
+No poet has sung of her. It is merely through
+the prose of daily expenditure that she is made
+known to us. She stands before us, not the
+ideal creation of the mediæval romancer, but a
+real woman, with her virtues and failings, her
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>joys and sorrows, real by very reason of this
+union of contrasts, a woman trying to grapple
+with difficulties forced upon her by her position,
+and by an age when intrigue and cunning were
+as freely resorted to, and as deftly handled, as
+the sword and the lance.</p>
+
+<p>Mahaut was the daughter of Robert the
+Second, Count of Artois, a valiant and chivalrous
+man, and of Amicie de Courtenay, of whom it
+was said that she was esteemed whilst she lived,
+and mourned of all when she died. Her brother,
+Philip, predeceased his father, leaving one son,
+Robert. In accordance with local custom,
+Mahaut, on the death of her father, inherited
+Artois, but her nephew, Robert, on attaining
+his majority at the age of fourteen, set up a
+counter-claim. This family feud was a constant
+source of trouble and vexation to her, since
+Robert again and again returned to the attack,
+not only appealing to the king to consider his
+cause, and fabricating spurious documents as a
+means of gaining his end, but also employing
+unscrupulous agents to spread false charges
+against her. He further took advantage of the
+growing discontent amongst the nobles, who
+were gradually realising that their power was
+waning, to attach them to his cause, and to
+induce them to join him in harassing Mahaut
+by making raids upon her lands and her
+castles. She, however, through her extraordinary
+personality, was able to triumph over
+all this opposition, which, far from marring,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>
+only seemed to add lustre to the work she had
+set herself to do.</p>
+
+<p>Mahaut was religious, artistic, and literary.
+All these characteristics, together with the
+circumstance of wealth, she inherited, and right
+well did she make use of her inheritance.</p>
+
+<p>Being religious, and living in an age when the
+frenzy for crusading had subsided and when architecture
+was the ruling passion, she expended her
+zeal in building religious houses and hospitals.</p>
+
+<p>Being artistic, she made her favourite castle
+at Hesdin, and the town around its walls, a
+centre of art life. Here, seemingly, she favoured
+all the arts, including to a certain extent music,
+then still in its infancy, for although she
+apparently had no regular minstrel or minstrels
+in her employ as was customary in the houses
+of the noblesse, she seems to have engaged them
+for Church festivals and sundry fêtes, and we
+know that on one occasion she hired a minstrel
+to soothe her sick child with the sweet soft
+music of the harp, thus suggesting that she
+herself had felt the power of music to minister
+to both body and soul.</p>
+
+<p>Being literary, Mahaut collected what MSS.
+and books she could, and the list of them serves
+to show what might be found in a library of the
+early fourteenth century. Her religious books
+included a Bible in French,<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> a Psalter, a Gradual,
+various Books of Hours for private devotion,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>Lives of the Saints and of the Fathers, and the
+Miracles of Our Lady. Philosophy was represented
+by a French translation of Boëthius
+(probably a copy of a translation made by order
+of King Philip le Bel, by Jean de Meun, the
+writer of the second portion of <i>The Romance of
+the Rose</i>), Law by a verse translation of the laws
+of Normandy, History by the Chronicles of the
+Kings of France, and Travel by <i>The Romance
+of the Great Kan</i>, known to us as <i>The Travels
+of Marco Polo</i>. But by far the largest category
+consisted of Romances, such as that of Oger le
+Danois from the national Epic, and another of
+Tancred, a hero of the first Crusade, the Romance
+of Troy, Percival le Gallois, Tristan, Renart, and
+the Violet, the story which forms the chief
+episode in the play of Cymbeline. Of course
+there was no great choice, but that Mahaut read
+them and loved them we may be certain, since
+we know that she took some with her on her
+journeyings, and to preserve them from the wear
+and tear of travel, had leather wallets made to
+protect them. Mahaut was, in truth, the first
+wealthy individual of the age to spend her
+substance with the express purpose of surrounding
+herself with beauty of every kind. The
+foremost thought of a man in a like case would
+probably have been to add to his power. <i>Her</i>
+thought was of beauty, a quality much more far-reaching
+and less transient, and one which, even
+like Time itself, triumphs over the changes of
+fame and fortune.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Though Mahaut did not live the allotted
+three score years and ten, she lived long enough
+to see seven kings on the throne of France, two
+of whom—Philip the Fifth and Charles the
+Fourth—were her sons-in-law. She was a mere
+child when her great-uncle, King Louis, died in
+1270. In 1285, the year in which Philip the
+Fourth, surnamed le Bel, ascended the throne,
+she wedded Otho, Count Palatine of Burgundy,
+a widower of forty-five, a companion in arms of her
+father, and a brave and generous man, who died
+fighting for his country, but one absolutely incapable
+in administration, and, as a consequence,
+always in debt and in the clutches of the usurer.
+There are few documents to throw any light on
+her life until after Otho’s death in 1303. This
+may be due partly to the fact that she only came
+into her great possessions on her father’s death in
+1302, and partly to the circumstance that the
+careless and luxurious expenditure of her husband
+in no small degree dissipated her resources, and
+naturally prevented, for the time, any material
+encouragement of art. Doubtless also much of
+her time was spent in superintending the education
+of her children—two daughters who were
+destined to marry kings of France, and a son who
+was born a peer of the realm, and inheritor of
+one of its richest territories. But adverse fate,
+by the disgrace of one of her daughters, and the
+death of her son, intervened to darken these
+brilliant prospects, and forms a grey background
+to her otherwise wonderful and glorious career.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The more the life of this remarkable woman
+is studied, the more apparent it becomes that
+what gives it its peculiar charm and worth is
+the sense she possessed of the value of all human
+endeavour, whether in great things or in simple.
+To her the humblest matters of home life, and
+the affairs connected with the administration of
+her domains, had each their particular significance.
+The ordering of a small grooved tablet
+on which her little boy could arrange the letters
+of the alphabet claimed her attention equally
+with the founding and arranging of a hospital.
+In her capacity as ruler we see the same wide
+and reasonable outlook on life, for whilst strict
+as an administrator, in personal relations she
+was charitable and sympathetic. Sometimes a
+rebellious baron was deprived of his fief and
+banished, or was condemned to expiate his misdeed
+by making a pilgrimage to sundry shrines.
+But Mahaut was practical withal, and recognised
+human frailty, and as the pilgrimage was for
+correction, no pardon was granted unless the
+offender brought from each of the sanctuaries
+a certificate that his vow had been fulfilled.
+On the other hand, if any were sick or in
+trouble, she was solicitous for their relief, and
+even aided them personally where possible. She
+thus put into practice the charge of her saintly
+kinsman, King Louis the Ninth, who always
+counselled those about him to have compassion
+on all mental or physical suffering, since the
+heart may be stricken as well as the body.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>As Mahaut had no biographer, and contemporary
+history merely treats her as if she were
+one of many pawns on a chess-board, her
+stewards’ entries furnish the only materials from
+which we can weave some outline of her life,
+an outline, nevertheless, which enables us to
+reason somewhat concerning her inner life, the
+pattern, as it were, that is not wrought for the
+world.</p>
+
+<p>When, in 1302, Mahaut took over the reins of
+government in Artois, Paris was the great centre
+of art and literature as well as of the science of
+the day, a condition largely due to the genius
+of Philip Augustus, and fostered by succeeding
+kings. Thither, from far and near, flocked
+scholars, poets, and artists alike. Some of these
+took up their abode permanently within its
+walls. Others passed to and fro, thus creating
+that constant interchange of thought which is
+essential to vitality, so that it was said that “the
+goddess of Wisdom, after having dwelt in Athens
+and Rome, had taken up her abode in Paris.”
+There, at least twice a year, came Mahaut to
+her sumptuous dwelling, the Hôtel d’Artois,
+situated near the Temple, and extending with
+its gardens and its outbuildings to the walls
+built by Philip Augustus. Here all who loved
+the arts and learning were made welcome, and it
+is interesting to think it possible, nay even probable,
+that during one of her many sojourns there
+she may have met and talked with Dante.</p>
+
+<p>Amongst the special treasures to be found<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>
+there, mention is made of four figure-pictures,
+one of which is said to have been of Roman
+workmanship, and round in form—certainly, as
+far as is known, a rarity at that time. We also
+find a record of finely wrought embroideries and
+tapestries on the walls, and of windows painted
+either with armorial bearings and figures, or with
+simple foliage like the delicate ivy and hawthorn
+to be seen enriching the pages of Books
+of Hours of the fourteenth century. Special
+mention is made of a window, evidently over
+the altar in the private Chapel, in which was
+represented the Crucifixion. In the large hall
+were tables on trestles, easily removed before the
+dance began or minstrels or jugglers displayed
+their skill, dressers to hold the gold and silver
+plate and from which to serve the banquet, and
+settles with footboards so necessary when the
+rushes were only renewed at lengthy intervals.
+But if the hall was somewhat sparsely furnished,
+its ceiling and walls (the latter on occasions
+hung with embroideries carried from castle to
+castle as the Countess journeyed) were made
+bright with colour, and beautiful with design.
+How bright, and how beautiful, we can infer
+almost with certainty from examples in the
+Castle of Chillon of thirteenth and fourteenth
+century decoration lately rescued from under a
+coat of whitewash,<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a> and from the comparison
+made by Brunetto Latini (1230-1294), in his
+<i>Tesoro</i>, of the Italian with the French feudal
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>castle, in which he says of the one that it is only
+built for war, with ditches, palisades, and high
+towers and walls, and of the other that it lies in
+the midst of meadows and gardens, <i>with large
+painted chambers</i>.</p>
+
+<p>Mahaut’s cousin, the cold and impersonal
+Philip le Bel, was on the throne. For the
+most part war had ceased in the land, but still
+there was war in high places, for Philip,
+avaricious by nature, and finding himself a
+king under altering conditions—the Papacy
+fallen into disregard, the Nobility weakened,
+and the Nation growing, but without any adequate
+provision made to meet the needs of this growth—left
+no stone unturned to supply this want
+and gratify his greed. On the question of the
+subsidies of the clergy and the relation between
+things spiritual and temporal, he quarrelled with
+the Pope, Boniface the Eighth, and brought
+about the removal of the Holy See from
+Rome to Avignon. He robbed and ruined the
+Templars, and despoiled the Jews and Lombards,
+the financiers of the day. With him no trickery
+was too base, no cruelty too cold-blooded.
+Gold was his God. Dante, who was his contemporary,
+refers (<i>Purg.</i> vii. 109) to “his wicked
+and foul life” (<i>la vita sua viziata e lorda</i>), and
+(<i>Par.</i> xix. 118) to his “debasement of the
+coinage” (<i>falseggiando la moneta</i>), as well as to
+his self-seeking greed. Such, with the added
+glamour of art and learning, was the courtly
+atmosphere of the Time. The bourgeoisie,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>
+encouraged by the king who sought to aggrandise
+the monarchy at the expense of the nobles,
+was growing rich, and politically gaining in
+power, and Philip ere long discovered that he
+had helped merely to change the centre of
+power, and not to crush it.</p>
+
+<p>But Paris does not seem to have attracted
+Mahaut as did her castle at Hesdin. Here she
+was in the midst of her own domains, surrounded
+by her liegemen and retainers, and able to be in
+constant touch with her artificers and workers,
+whatever their art or industry. By the thirteenth
+century the dwelling of the Noble was no longer
+a grim castle, suggestive only of a place of
+defence, with narrow slits in the walls for the
+admission of air and light and for the discharge
+of arrows, but was more like a fortified country-house.
+The encompassing walls enclosed a wide
+area, within which was sheltered a village and
+everything necessary to the growth and development
+of a community.</p>
+
+<p>From Hesdin Mahaut journeyed constantly
+through her County of Artois, visiting her
+castles, the towns or villages around them, and
+the various religious houses and hospitals she
+had founded, and attending in general to the
+well-being of her subjects. For her it was not
+enough that she was born to reign. She realised
+that, without administration, reigning through
+the accident of birth is mere puppet’s work, and
+leads to naught. Her daily life was the visible
+expression of this belief, as she herself was an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>
+example of the woman who comprehends the
+just proportion between personal and public
+work. That her subjects responded to her
+sympathy, and held her in affectionate regard,
+is proved by their kindly and sympathetic concern
+if she were ill or on a journey, and by the
+offerings they made to her on special anniversaries
+and other festive occasions. We read of
+gifts not only of herrings, sturgeon, game, wine,
+dogs, peacocks, swans, pasties, and whipped cream,
+but also of the strangely assorted tribute of a
+dead bear and twelve cheeses, as well as of one
+which must have contrasted pleasantly with this
+sundry and singular good cheer—a parrakeet in
+a beautifully painted cage. Mahaut, as we have
+said, was a constant traveller, and though travelling
+was then no easy matter, the roads could
+not have been over-much beset with difficulties
+seeing that she journeyed in all weathers, either
+on horseback or in a horse-litter, or in a chariot
+without springs, and with no mean retinue. In
+truth, her following was like a glorified Canterbury
+pilgrimage. First came the Countess, accompanied
+by one or more knights, her ladies-in-waiting,
+her chaplain and confessor, her
+physician, her secretary, her treasurer and
+steward, and sundry petty officers of her household.
+Then followed the servants, the cook
+with his scullions, the shoemaker who could
+also do necessary repairs to the harness, the
+laundress riding astride as was the manner of
+serving-women, and a score of lackeys and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>
+dependants of all sorts in charge of the carts
+containing the necessaries of travel. These
+necessaries were generally packed in wooden
+coffers, some of which were simple chests,
+whilst others opened like a cupboard and were
+fitted with drawers. To preserve such coffers
+from damp and damage, they were put into osier
+cases covered with cow-hide. And with all this
+motley company and baggage, there are but few
+records of accidents. The accounts tell of a
+small occasional expenditure in consequence of
+the breakdown of a chariot, or the fall of a valet
+from his horse, or the upsetting into a river of a
+cart conveying the Countess’s wardrobe. But
+such misadventures were not taken very seriously
+by these folk, seasoned to discomfort. Valet or
+chariot was mended, or the floating garments
+were recovered, and on went the easy-going
+company, singing by the way, and with horns
+blowing as they neared some castle or village
+where a halt was to be made for the night.
+The absence of any mention of the removal of
+furniture from castle to castle during these
+periodical wanderings, save a small bed for
+Mahaut’s own use, leads us to infer that greater
+luxury then prevailed than in the days of her
+great-uncle, Louis the Ninth, when even Royalty
+itself thought it no hardship to have beds and
+other necessary pieces of furniture carried by
+beasts of burden from place to place according
+to the movements of the Court. This frugal
+and homely custom on one occasion very nearly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>
+ended in a tragedy. The devout Isabelle, Louis’s
+sister, was praying in the early morning, as was
+her wont, within her curtained bed, and either
+lost in prayer or overcome with fatigue by the
+length of her orisons, did not notice the arrival
+of the packers, who rolled up the bed without
+drawing the curtains, and the praying Princess
+within must have been smothered had not her
+lady-in-waiting, Agnes de Harcourt, heard her
+stifled cries, and hastened to her rescue. This
+quaint episode so amused Louis, that he ever
+after recounted it when telling of the piety of
+his sister.</p>
+
+<p>Let us now go in imagination to the Castle
+of Hesdin, and see something of its treasures and
+of the daily life of the Countess Mahaut.</p>
+
+<p>Soon after her accession to Artois, her two
+daughters married sons of King Philip le Bel,
+and her little son, Robert, then became her
+principal care. A little boy of noble family had
+been chosen as his companion to share in his
+education and to join with him in play. It would
+seem that the two were treated on an absolute
+equality, even to having their doublets cut from
+the same piece of cloth, and their tunics and
+cloaks trimmed with the same fur. Beyond
+their ordinary lessons, they were early taught
+the games of tables and chess, both of which
+were considered essential to a knight’s education.
+They also rode to the chase and attended tournaments,
+and at the age of fourteen themselves
+held the lance as part of their training in the art<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>
+of war. Robert seems to have been of a most
+inquiring and intelligent nature, but when he
+had scarce passed his seventeenth year, Mahaut,
+with scant warning, saw this her only son
+stricken in death just as he was about to enter
+the ranks of knighthood. In the archives of
+Arras, the Capital of Artois, may be found a
+discoloured parchment containing the inventory
+of the equipment provided for the youthful
+Robert in anticipation of his initiation. What
+sorrow is enshrined in these faded pages! It is
+not sorrow for death, but the bitterer sorrow for
+something that has never lived, or, rather, that
+has lived only in the heart, like spring blossom
+blighted ere fruiting-time. In the Church of
+St. Denis, where modern restoration has but
+emphasised the transitoriness and vanity of
+human glory, there can still be seen the tomb of
+this youth, carved soon after his death by Pepin
+de Huy, and once painted, as was all such carved
+work. Even to the mere student it is interesting
+as being the only existing monument that can
+with certainty be attributed to this celebrated
+sculptor, and also as being, in Gothic art, one of
+the first essays in portraiture in recumbent figures
+of the dead, as contrasted with mere effigy. For
+the deeper thinker it has even greater significance.
+Of all the good and great works that
+Mahaut conceived and initiated—the churches,
+castles, hospitals, which she built and enriched
+for the glory of God and the safety and solace of
+mankind—all have passed away. This simple<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>
+tomb alone remains. But its very simplicity
+is eloquent, for around it there seems to hover
+that never-dying spirit of love and goodness and
+beauty to which, throughout her life, Mahaut
+contributed in such large measure, and which
+was her real and lasting gift to the world.</p>
+
+<p>Life as mirrored in the Castle records gives
+little else than a pleasing picture of Mahaut’s
+relations with all her dependants, as well as with
+those with whom she was connected, whether
+by ties of friendship, of politics, or of the
+common courtesies of life. Her immediate
+household was naturally her first care. Twice a
+year, at Easter and All Saints, a distribution was
+made of cloth and furs. Some of these, fine and
+costly, were for those in personal attendance on
+the Countess, whilst others were in the nature
+of liveries. Others, again, of still coarser make,
+such as Irish serge, with sheep or rabbit skin for
+warmth in winter, were given to those of lowly
+service or who had specially rough work to
+perform. Her ladies-in-waiting, of whom there
+were always two or three, appear to have received
+for their services no money payment, but, over
+and above the cloth and fur already alluded to,
+gifts, on special occasions, of girdles and satchels
+(very often jewelled), gold chaplets, and gold
+and silver braid, jewelled, and used for twining
+in the hair. In addition to this, presents of
+jewels and silver cups were made to them by the
+noble ladies who came to stay with the Countess,
+just as she, on her part, presented similar gifts to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>
+those who accompanied her guests. How well
+we can picture to ourselves these maidens (for
+such is all they were), decking themselves in
+their girdles and jewelled braid, comparing their
+gifts, and perhaps even standing on some oaken
+bench the better to get a view of their finery,
+for the mirrors were small, and the girdles were
+long, and could not otherwise be seen in all
+their glory. When they married, the Countess
+made gifts to them without stint, not only of
+the beautiful and the needful for their wardrobes,
+but also of household goods, and sometimes,
+when she knew their parents or kinsmen to be
+too poor to provide the usual dowry, even of a
+sum of money. To the retainers also we find
+the same kind and helping hand held out. If
+any were sick they were taken care of, and, if
+needs be, sent to some place where they could
+the better be cured, as we read of one who,
+suffering from gout, was sent to take healing
+waters. To another retainer was given the
+necessary money to pay for his son on entering
+a monastery, another receiving the wherewithal
+to go to his native village to attend his mother’s
+burial. Old servants, past work, were cared for
+in the monasteries or hospitals, or given some
+post suitable to their years. To a poor knight
+was given money to enable him to buy a good
+horse and armour, for poverty of purse was no
+disgrace in the thirteenth century. At the
+beginning of winter a distribution, organised by
+the clergy and stewards of the rural communities<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>
+in Artois, but superintended by the Countess
+herself, was made to the poor of blankets,
+garments, and shoes, and so arranged that the
+same person did not receive the like gift two
+years in succession. In truth, no details seemed
+too small, none too onerous, for Mahaut’s untiring
+solicitude. She had heart and brain for
+everything. It is these intimate touches which
+make the time so living and present to us, and
+which seem, as it were, to place this wonderful
+woman in a charmed and tranquil circle, in spite
+of the trouble and turmoil incidental to her life
+and her position.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 577px;"><a name="mahaut" id="mahaut"></a>
+<img src="images/i099.jpg" width="577" height="400" alt="STATUE OF MAHAUT IN ABBEY OF LA THIEULOYE, NEAR ARRAS, NOW DESTROYED." title="Drawing of the statue of Mahaut" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">STATUE OF MAHAUT IN ABBEY OF LA THIEULOYE, NEAR ARRAS, NOW DESTROYED.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">From a Drawing, now in Brussels, made in 1602.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 99.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Amongst Mahaut’s many good works was
+the keeping in repair of existing religious houses,
+hospitals, and lazar-houses, and the building and
+maintenance of new ones. Of all the religious
+houses which she founded, her special care was
+for the Dominican convent of La Thieuloye,
+near Arras, the equipment of which, as set out
+in the accounts, may well serve as an example of
+that of the others. The items for the furnishing
+and instalment of the house and chapel
+include everything needful for the community,
+from gold and silver vessels, silver-gilt images of
+St. Louis, the Trinity, and St. John, for the
+sanctuary, and samite and velvet for chasubles,
+down to the bowls and platters for the nuns,
+the woollen material for their garments, and all
+the simple necessaries of everyday life. In the
+chapel of this nunnery was preserved a kneeling
+statue of Mahaut, representing her as foundress,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>
+in the habit of the Order strewn with the arms
+of Artois. Jean Aloul, of Tournai, has been
+suggested as the sculptor, since it is known
+from the accounts that he was working for the
+Countess at Arras in 1323. This statue (known
+to us through a drawing, now at Brussels, made
+in 1602) is of interest to-day because, judging
+from the character expressed in the face, it
+seems probable that it was a portrait, and not
+simply imagery. This conjecture seems all the
+more likely when we compare the statue with a
+miniature painted more than a hundred years
+later by Jean Fouquet in <i>Les Grandes Chroniques
+de France</i> (Bib. Nat.), portraying the marriage
+of King Charles the Fourth with his second
+wife, Marie de Luxembourg. In this picture a
+lady, heavily coiffed, and with features suggestive
+of those of the statue, but with anguish written
+upon them, turns away from the ceremony as if
+it were all too painful. If this unwilling guest
+represents Mahaut, her woeful look is intelligible
+when we recall the sad story connected with
+Charles’s first wife, Mahaut’s daughter Blanche,
+married when she was but fifteen, and whose
+beauty was so dazzling that Froissart records
+that “she was one of the most beautiful women
+in the world.” Accused of an intrigue with a
+gentleman of the Court, she was imprisoned in
+the Château-Gaillard, where she remained, with
+shorn head, until, shortly after Charles ascended
+the throne, the Pope declared the marriage null.
+Then, whilst the king wedded another, the sad<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>
+Blanche exchanged her castle prison-house for a
+convent one, where she died a year after she had
+taken the vows. There is no reason for supposing
+that Mahaut was at the wedding of Blanche’s
+successor save in the imagination of the artist;
+but for him the inclusion of such a tragic figure
+would add a dramatic touch to the representation
+of an otherwise conventional ceremony.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;"><a name="lebel" id="lebel"></a>
+<img src="images/i100.jpg" width="450" height="542" alt="MARRIAGE OF CHARLES LE BEL AND MARIE OF LUXEMBURG." title="Charles le Bel and Marie of Luxemburg" />
+
+<p class="caption" style="margin-top: 0.5em">MARRIAGE OF CHARLES LE BEL AND MARIE OF LUXEMBURG.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Grandes Chrons. de France, Bib. Nat.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 100.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>It almost takes us aback to read that in
+Mahaut’s domain of Artois there were at least
+eighty hospitals and thirty lazar-houses, without
+counting those attached to the monasteries. But
+these numbers will not surprise us so much
+when we remember that almost every small
+community had its little hospital, used not only
+for the sick and as a lying-in hospital, but also
+as a shelter for the poor and the pilgrim. In
+the towns they were often built and supported
+by the Corporations or by rich merchants.
+Evidently some were in the nature of hospitals
+for incurables, for there were special clauses
+in the deeds of gift providing that a certain
+specified number of beds were to be kept for
+the sick until they were either cured or released
+by death. Besides building two hospitals in
+the County of Burgundy in fulfilment of the
+dying wishes of her husband, Mahaut built and
+maintained two in her own County of Artois.
+The one at Hesdin was the more important,
+and we can get some idea of it from the documents
+of the time. The deed relating to it
+tells that over the large entrance gate there was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>
+carved in stone a figure of St. John, the patron
+of hospitals and of the needy generally, with a
+poor man and woman on either side of him.
+The principal ward was 160 feet long and
+34 feet wide, with walls 16 feet high ending in
+a gabled roof, with two windows in each gable,
+and this, coupled with the fact that the sick
+were sometimes laid on cushions by the open
+windows, goes to show that what we pride
+ourselves on as a special discovery in modern
+hygiene—the benefit of fresh air—was known
+and applied even in what we are wont to consider
+a very benighted age in such matters.</p>
+
+<p>Whilst touching upon such a subject as this,
+it may be a surprise to some to learn that in
+large towns baths were provided for those who
+could not afford to have them in their own
+homes, and that there were also professional
+women hair-washers.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"><a name="sloanems" id="sloanems"></a>
+<img src="images/i103.jpg" width="400" height="547" alt="THIRTEENTH-CENTURY TREATISE ON SURGERY, IN FRENCH." title="Treatise on Surgery, Sloane MS." />
+
+<p class="caption" style="margin-top: 0.5em">THIRTEENTH-CENTURY TREATISE ON SURGERY, IN FRENCH.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Sloane MS. 1977.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 103.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>But to return to the hospital. On one side
+of the ward were ten windows, each four feet
+square, and on the opposite side was a large
+door leading into the cloister with its garden,
+where the convalescents and the old people,
+whilst sheltered, could enjoy the sunshine and
+see the flowers and the birds. In addition to
+this there was a smaller ward for women, a
+chapel, a kitchen, and a room for the matron,
+as well as accommodation for the resident doctor,
+Maître Robert, and the serving-women. It is
+some consolation to think that these poor suffering
+folk of centuries ago were even thus well<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>
+tended, but when we look at contemporary
+representations of the surgery of the day,<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> we
+tremble at the mere thought of the heroic
+methods adopted. Besides the actual necessaries
+which she provided for the hospital at Hesdin,
+Mahaut constantly sent gifts of fish, game, and
+wine. Similar gifts she likewise made to the
+hospitals in Artois generally, as well as to those
+in Paris, and, on fête-days, to the poorer religious
+houses.</p>
+
+<p>From her beneficence to the sick and sorry,
+the aged and the poor, we turn to her hospitality
+to her relations and friends, and to all those in
+spiritual or temporal authority in the towns
+or villages of Artois. The Castle of Hesdin,
+destroyed in the sixteenth century—only a few
+stones remaining to mark the site,—was situated
+a few miles from the present modern town of
+Hesdin. It must have been not only a scene
+of constant festivity and social intercourse, and
+a treasure-house withal, but also a veritable hive
+of industry, with workers and workshops within
+the Castle enclosure as well as in the town
+nestling beneath its walls. Here might be
+found artists and craftsmen of all sorts and
+degrees—sculptors and workers in stone, ivory-workers,
+wood-carvers, carpenters, artificers in
+silver and precious stones as well as in copper,
+forgers of iron, painters of wall-decoration,
+stonework, saddle-bows, and even masquerading-masks,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span>illuminators of MSS., workers and
+painters of glass, harness-makers, armourers,
+tailors, and embroiderers—the whole forming a
+rare and remarkable centre of activity for a
+woman to have developed and ruled and made
+into a living force.</p>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"><a name="minstrels" id="minstrels"></a>
+<img src="images/i104.jpg" width="500" height="512" alt="BANQUET, WITH MINSTRELS PLAYING, AND ROOM HUNG
+WITH EMBROIDERY." title="Banquet with minstrels, MS. Romance of Alexander" />
+
+<p class="caption" style="margin-top: 0.5em">BANQUET, WITH MINSTRELS PLAYING, AND ROOM HUNG
+WITH EMBROIDERY.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century, Bodleian, Oxford.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 104.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>It is a fête-day within the Castle. The
+horns have sounded. The feast is ready. To
+the great hall repair the knights and the ladies,
+the esquires and the damsels, two and two,
+according to their rank, dipping their hands,
+as they pass in, into silver basins of rose-water.
+They are gorgeously apparelled in silken garments
+and cloth of gold and silver, upon which are
+embroidered their coats of arms, for by the
+end of the thirteenth century armorial bearings,
+which by then had become attached to families,
+were used as a sign of nobility and rank.
+Mahaut, as hostess, takes her seat last. Adown
+the table are specimens of silver-plate, some the
+work of her own craftsmen, others the offerings
+of friendship or of courtesy. They are fashioned
+variously, and used for sweetmeats of all kinds,
+spices, almonds, and dainties made of orange
+and pomegranate. A favourite form is that of
+a ship, such as may be seen in <i>Les Très Riches
+Heures</i> of Jean, Duc de Berri, at Chantilly, in a
+representation of a feast given by the Duke.
+There are, besides, salt-cellars and sauce-boats,
+flagons and drinking-cups, and a bowl between
+every two guests, from which they eat, handing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>
+each other dainty morsels. Such, with a knife
+and a spoon for each, is their equipment for the
+meal, for none, save the carver, has both knife
+and fork. In a corner of the hall is a basket
+for the broken-meats destined for the poor, a
+leathern sack being also provided for foods with
+gravy or sauce. Neither at festivals nor in
+daily life would a meal have been considered
+complete if the poor were not remembered.
+Perhaps a messenger arrives during the feast
+with the news of a birth or a marriage in
+Mahaut’s circle of relations or friends, and he
+is rewarded with a gift of money, and possibly
+receives a silver cup to carry back to the nurse,
+or a jewelled chaplet to take to the bride.
+Meanwhile the music of trumpets, drums, viols,
+and flutes resounds from the minstrels’ gallery.
+Later, when the feast is ended, and before the
+company disperses to walk in the garden if it
+is spring or summer, or to look at the beautiful
+things in the castle, or to dance or sing or play
+chess if it be winter, some one perchance chants
+a plaintive ditty to the music of the regal, or
+some knight tunes his harp and sings of valiant
+deeds, or, may be, of some peerless lady.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;"><a name="harl4425" id="harl4425"></a>
+<img src="images/i105.jpg" width="450" height="572" alt="Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus." title="Manuscript 4425" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="illoaut"><span class="smcap">Harl.</span> MS. 4425, <span class="smcap">Brit. Mus.</span></p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 105.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>But let us look at the rooms of the Castle
+and their beautiful contents—the paintings and
+embroideries on the walls, the ivories, and the
+illuminated Psalters and MSS. And let us go
+first into the Countess’s own room, which doubtless
+was near the chapel. We can form some
+idea of its decoration and contents from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>
+accounts, and of its probable arrangement from
+contemporary plans, illuminated MSS., and
+pictures. Its walls were adorned with a frieze
+composed of heads of the kings of France,
+moulded in plaster and surmounted by crowns
+of gilded or lacquered tin, below which, on a
+coloured ground, were fastened fleurs-de-lis,
+likewise of tin similarly treated. At the end of
+the room was a bed, a large wooden structure
+surrounded by a footboard and laced across with
+cords on which were laid mattresses, a feather
+bed (sometimes, if we may judge from miniatures,
+used during the day as a seat on the floor),
+many cushions, linen or silk sheets, and a fur-lined
+coverlet. From rods on the ceiling hung
+curtains which completely enclosed it at night,
+but which were drawn back and looped up
+during the day, when the bed was used as a
+divan. At night a small oil lamp with a floating
+wick was hung within the curtains, and
+near the bed was a <i>bénitier</i>. At the side,
+separated by a narrow space, there were fixed
+seats for the accommodation of those who interviewed
+the Countess before she rose. There
+was a large open fireplace with a bench in front
+of it which had a movable back, so that the
+occupant could sit either facing the fire or with
+his back to it. Close by were wickerwork fire-screens,
+capable of being raised or lowered at
+will. Against the walls there were carved
+chests, enriched with colour, and chairs with
+leather seats and wickerwork backs, as well as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>
+three-legged and folding stools, were placed
+about the room. At one side of the room was
+a large oak chair of state with a cushioned seat,
+and possibly canopied, and close to it a lectern,
+with hinged candle-brackets, from which Mahaut
+could the more easily read her MSS., which
+were often rolled, and difficult to manipulate.
+In front of this seat was a table, at which any
+messengers or retainers stood when they sought
+an interview, or the Countess demanded one.
+Here also she transacted with her stewards and
+other agents the business connected with her
+various castles and her many philanthropic
+undertakings. Other rooms were painted in
+plain colour, and hung on special occasions with
+embroideries and tapestries. Others, again, were
+decorated with set designs, square or zigzag, in
+imitation of brickwork, such as may be seen in
+the Chapel of St. Faith, Westminster Abbey, or
+with subjects or colour after which they were
+named. Thus we find mention of the “Parrakeet”
+room, from the birds painted on the walls,
+the “Blue” room, from its colour, the rooms of
+“Roses,” of “Vines,” and of “Fleurs-de-lis,”
+the room of “Shields,” from its frieze of
+armorial bearings, and that of “Song,” from
+verses traced on the walls, taken from the
+favourite pastoral of “Robin and Marion,” and
+probably associated with little scenes from the
+same idyll. The ceilings, with beams and joists
+painted red, were coloured either green or blue,
+and strewn with tin stars coated with yellow or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>
+white varnish to simulate gold or silver. The
+lower portions of the walls were often painted
+in imitation of short curtains, sometimes of but
+one colour, sometimes gorgeously decorated,
+but in either case reminiscent of the real
+draperies hung on festal days. Immediately
+above there might have been, as in other
+examples, a border painted with coats of arms,
+or with a foliated design interspersed with
+mottoes.</p>
+
+<p>During Mahaut’s lifetime this decorative
+work seems to have been undertaken principally
+by one special family or community of artists
+from Boulogne, of which a certain “Jacques”
+was the leading spirit. In those days artist
+and craftsman were one and the same. It was
+the quality, and not the particular subject, of
+the work that mattered, and thus we find that
+the painting of a parrot’s cage, or of the shafts
+of a litter, was not considered derogatory for
+even the most skilled to undertake. From the
+accounts it would seem that linseed oil was used
+to mix with the colours, cherry gum or white
+of egg being added to make them dry more
+quickly. Payment for work was made three
+times a year—at Candlemas, Ascension-tide, and
+All-Saints—or by the day or piece, the last
+being the form preferred by the business-like
+Mahaut. Besides such payment, presents were
+occasionally given for specially fine work, and,
+if a man was married, a gift to his wife of a
+gown, or of a cloak with fur, was sometimes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>
+added. One of this company of Boulogne artists
+later on became Court-painter to the Dukes of
+Burgundy, and took with him not only his
+trained apprentices from the towns and villages
+of Artois, and from those bordering on Flanders,
+but also, doubtless, certain traditions. It is such
+early migrations of artists, when schools were
+forming, that have helped to create the difficult
+problems which confront the student of all early
+schools of art.</p>
+
+<p>Of embroidery there was such profusion
+that it is indeed no exaggeration to say that the
+needle vied with the sword. There were not
+only wall and bed hangings, embroidered with
+flowers to brighten winter days, cloaks, gowns,
+and tunics patterned with gold thread and
+coloured silks, and beaver hats wrought with
+gold lace and pearls and sometimes precious
+stones, but also girdles, satchels, purses, and
+pennons resplendent with heraldic device, and
+caparison and harness for the horses. From the
+East were brought velvets, silks, and stuffs interwoven
+with gold and silver thread, and used not
+only for personal adornment, but also for vestments,
+Church-hangings, and the coverings of
+litters. As regards tapestry as we understand
+it—<i>i.e.</i> woven in a <i>high</i> warp loom—there is
+apparently no definite mention of its being made
+at Arras before 1313, so that the numerous
+allusions to tapestry must refer to stuffs woven
+in the <i>low</i> warp loom. These stuffs would
+seem to have been of two kinds, the one woven<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>
+with some simple pattern, the other with
+heraldic designs of animals or other conventional
+forms copied from Oriental models. Hence the
+term “Saracenic” applied to both the workers
+and their handiwork.</p>
+
+<p>In order to realise the Ivories which were
+probably to be seen in the Castle of Hesdin, we
+must go to the Louvre or the British Museum,
+where may be found a few rare examples of the
+work of the period, such as caskets carved with
+scenes from the life of Christ or the Virgin if
+they were to hold some sacred treasure, or with
+scenes from some Romance or from daily life if
+to contain jewels or other mundane objects. In
+addition to such caskets, often painted, Mahaut
+had, to hang from her girdle, as was customary
+with all ladies in the Middle Ages, a daintily
+wrought ivory writing-tablet, and a small mirror
+in an ivory case. These mirror-cases were
+generally carved with a scene from some love-story,
+such as two lovers playing chess, or going
+a-hawking, or some detail from the favourite
+romance of Tristan and Isolde. Possibly amongst
+these treasures was a saddle-bow, with a wondrous
+wealth of carving, or chess-men finely modelled,
+and inlaid with mother-of-pearl, or a triptych
+with scenes from the Passion, represented under
+Gothic arches of most superb and delicate workmanship.
+But it is perhaps in the Chapel that
+we must seek the finest work, for here both
+Mahaut and her father, Count Robert, were
+lavish with unsparing hand. One Jean le<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>
+Scelleur, of Paris, a carver of combs and toilet
+articles as well as of crucifixes and Virgins, is
+named as her principal craftsman. Mention is
+made of a Cross carved by him in cedar-wood
+with an ivory figure of the Christ, and of two
+ivory figures of the Virgin, one under a canopy,
+and the other with the Holy Child poised upon
+the hip, that sublime motive belonging more
+especially to the thirteenth century. The chapel
+itself was beautified with carved work in stone.
+Over the Altar, and in front of it, were painted
+panels, enriched with gold, and translucent
+enamel over colour. If we could picture to
+ourselves the manner of the sculptor’s work we
+may recall the “Vine-Capital” in Rheims
+Cathedral, where the very stone itself seems
+to have been metamorphosed into tender foliage
+by the unknown artist.</p>
+
+<p>Of wood-carving, the accounts tell of Choir-stalls,
+presses for vestments and various vessels
+and ornaments, and also of Angels, gilded and
+painted and bearing the emblems of the Passion,
+for standing round the High Altar. These are
+described as being raised on slender columns,
+connected by a bar on which were laced fringed
+silk curtains, thus forming a recess for the Altar.
+We can get some idea of the simple beauty of
+this arrangement from a drawing, still preserved
+in the sacristy of Arras Cathedral, of the High
+Altar in the old Cathedral, and fortunately made
+before the latter, with all its contents, was
+destroyed in the sixteenth century. It accords<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>
+in every detail with the inventory record of the
+Chapel of Hesdin. We may also compare a
+picture (No. 783, “The Exhumation of St.
+Hubert”) in the Flemish room in the National
+Gallery, where a somewhat similar scheme is
+shown.</p>
+
+<p>Of the MSS. and Illuminations only brief
+mention can be made. Surviving examples, and
+the records of the time, testify to the splendour
+and the sum of them. At the beginning of
+the thirteenth century, the French miniature
+was influenced in no small degree, both in
+technique and in colour, by glass painting.
+Towards the end of the century this influence
+yielded to the prevailing enthusiasm for architecture
+and sculpture, and in Bibles and Psalters
+alike there appear scenes with figures as in
+bas-relief, with architectural backgrounds and
+decorative details. The same spirit that evolved
+tender foliage out of the hard stone of cathedral
+and church evolved also the delicate hawthorn-leaf
+enriching the initial letter of the MS. It
+mattered little whether the material worked on
+was stone or parchment. Each was but a means
+for giving expression to a newly discovered
+scheme of beauty—the beauty of Nature. In
+the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries a renewed
+impetus had been given to the arts of
+writing and illumination. This was partly
+because a demand had arisen for a secular literature
+to supersede the tiresome and time-worn
+recitations of minstrels, and partly because, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>
+the fourteenth century, Books of Hours, instead
+of the Psalter alone as had hitherto been customary,
+came into general use in private devotion.
+This created a fresh want, and at the same time
+supplied a number of new subjects in which
+the artist could reveal his skill. Arras was one
+of the chief centres of this new movement,
+a movement which Mahaut continued and
+stimulated. She employed artists to illuminate
+both sacred and secular works for her own use
+as well as for gifts—gifts counted beyond
+compare and beside which even precious stones
+were deemed of less worth. To Mahaut this
+desire for beauty was a very lode-star. To
+glance at a list of the gold- and silver-smiths’
+work—the jewelled and enamelled chaplets of
+gold, the jewelled girdles, and buckles, and
+braids for the hair, and the cups, some of
+silver with crystal covers or wrought with
+enamel and precious stones, and others of jasper
+mounted with silver work—reads like a fantasy
+of hidden treasure in some fairy tale. Even her
+chess-boards—and she was a devotee of the
+game—were of silver or ivory, and one, we read,
+was of jasper and chalcedony mounted with
+silver and gems, the chess-men being of jasper
+and crystal.</p>
+
+<p>For the younger folk about her there was
+tennis, and also games of hazard with forfeits
+of girdles and coifs to the ladies. In the Castle
+garden were certain mechanical contrivances
+which, by their sudden and unexpected action,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>
+were supposed to amuse the unwary guests.
+One sprinkled them with water, another with
+black or white powder, as they passed by, and
+yet another, in the form of a monkey, struck
+them with a stick, whilst in a bower might be
+seen a mirror wherein all who looked saw only
+the distorted semblance of themselves. These
+unwelcome pleasantries were a part of the
+miscellaneous borrowings from the East. But
+for the easily amused folk of the Middle Ages,
+time passed merrily enough in the midst of
+such pastimes, and only the shadow on the dial
+seemed to mark its flight.</p>
+
+<p>But Mahaut, amid the manifold claims on
+her time and talent, had seen the shadow
+lengthening. From time to time she had been
+attacked by illness, to which blood-letting and
+other remedies of the day had brought relief.
+But on the 25th November 1329, when in
+Paris, she was seized with a sudden sickness, so
+sudden that sinister rumours were noised abroad.
+Human aid was of no avail. Two days later
+there was general lamentation. The shadow had
+lengthened into the night. Mahaut was dead.
+In accordance with her wishes, she was buried
+at the foot of her father’s grave in the Abbey of
+Maubuisson, near Paris, her heart being placed
+in the Church of the Franciscans in Paris,
+beside the remains of her son, whose tomb there
+was afterwards removed to St. Denis. Her
+possession of Artois, for which she had laboured
+devotedly, became annexed to the Duchy of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>
+Burgundy through the marriage of her granddaughter
+with its Duke.</p>
+
+<p>Here, though only a tithe has been told, we
+must take leave of this cultivated woman of the
+fourteenth century, a type of the time and for
+all time. Her aim was the aim of all culture—the
+attainment of as complete a life as possible.
+To this she aspired, and to this in large measure
+she attained. What more can be said of even
+those we count the greatest?</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> Richard (Jules Marie), <i>Une Petite Nièce de S. Louis: Mahaut,
+Comtesse d’Artois</i>.
+</p><p>
+Dehaisnes (M. le Chanoine), <i>L’Histoire de l’art dans la Flandre,
+l’Artois, et le Hainaut avant le XV<sup>me</sup> siècle</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> The Bible was first translated into French, and reduced in size
+so that it could be carried in the hand, between 1200 and 1250.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> <i>Chillon</i>, Albert Naef, Genève, 1908.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> See Roger of Parma, <i>Treatise on Surgery</i>. French thirteenth
+century. Brit. Mus., Sloane MS., 1977.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<h2><a name="A_FIFTEENTH-CENTURY_FEMINISTE" id="A_FIFTEENTH-CENTURY_FEMINISTE"></a>A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY FEMINISTE,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span><br />
+CHRISTINE DE PISAN</h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">Christine de Pisan</span>, Italian by birth, French
+by adoption, may be regarded not merely as a
+forerunner of true feminism, but also as one of
+its greatest champions, seeing that in her judgment
+of the sexes she endeavours to hold the
+scales evenly. Possessed of profound common
+sense and of a generous-hearted nature, she
+is wholly free from that want of fairness in
+urging woman’s claims which is so fatally prejudicial
+to their just consideration. Although,
+strictly speaking, Christine was not original, she
+was representative, and interests us for that very
+reason. She was perhaps one of the most
+complete exponents of the finer strain of thought
+of her time. She stands before us, at the dawn
+of the fifteenth century, Janus-headed, looking
+to the past and to the future, a woman typical
+of a time of transition, on the one hand showing,
+in her writings, a clinging to old beliefs, and on
+the other hand asserting, in her contact with
+real life, independence of thought in the discussion
+of still unsolved questions.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Christine was born at Venice in 1363, where
+her father, Thomas de Pisan, of Bologna, distinguished
+for his knowledge of medicine and
+astrology, had settled on his marriage with a
+daughter of one of the Councillors of the
+Republic. When five years of age, she was
+taken by her mother to Paris to join her father,
+who had been summoned thither some time
+before by the King, Charles the Fifth, to serve
+as his astrologer. At the end of the fourteenth
+century astrology played a very real and important
+part in men’s lives. Before wars or journeys
+were undertaken, or additions to castle or chapel
+made, or even a new garment put on, the stars
+were consulted for the propitious day and hour.
+So deeply was Charles the Fifth imbued with a
+belief in the efficacy of this occult art that
+when he wished to confer some special honour,
+or to express his gratitude for some service
+rendered to him or to the State, he sought to
+enhance his bounty by sending an astrologer
+as part of his gift. By the time little Christine
+arrived in Paris her father had gained the
+confidence and esteem of the King, and was
+settled at Court with substantial maintenance.
+Here she was brought up as a maiden of quality,
+surrounded by much magnificence, for Charles
+loved beautiful things, and never stayed his hand
+to procure them, even when the gratification of
+his desires involved hardship to his people. He
+possessed many virtues, but economy was not
+one of them. The dismal castle of the Louvre,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>
+which had been the home of the French kings
+since the days of Philip Augustus, found no
+favour in his sight as a place of residence, and
+he quickly set about building the sumptuous
+Hôtel de St. Paul, in what is now known as the
+“Quartier de l’Arsenal.” The Louvre he destined
+for official functions, for an arsenal, and for his
+library. To form a library was no new thing in
+Paris. Some thirty years earlier Richard de
+Bury, Bishop of Durham (1333) and sometime
+Chancellor of England, speaks of his frequent
+ambassadorial visits to “Paris, the Paradise of
+the World, with its delightful libraries, where
+the days seemed ever few, for the greatness
+of our love.” And he adds, “unfastening our
+purse-strings, we scattered money with joyous
+heart, and purchased inestimable books.” But
+whilst it is true that Charles’s predecessors had
+collected books, none before had thought of
+forming a library for public use, and Charles’s
+work, as M. Delisle remarks, was really the
+first germ of the Bibliothèque Nationale.<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a>
+To collect books was one of his greatest delights,
+and he spared no trouble or money to make his
+library as complete as possible. This taste for
+books he may have inherited from his father,
+King John, who, learning to read from a beautiful
+Book of Hours, early acquired a love of books
+from his mother, Jeanne of Burgundy. Charles
+also loved to lend or make presents of books,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>and among his many gifts, one—an offering to
+Richard the Second—may be seen in the British
+Museum (Royal 20, B VI.). The library was
+considerably depleted during the reign of Charles
+the Sixth, when it was used as a sort of storehouse
+from which presents were made to prince
+and prelate, or to any to whom it was desired
+to make a gift, or a recognition of services
+rendered. On the death of Charles the Sixth,
+in 1425, it was bought by the Duke of Bedford,
+Regent of France, and doubtless some
+of its treasures were transferred by him into
+England. Those that were left, and some that
+gradually found their way back to France, may
+now be seen in the Bibliothèque Nationale and
+in other libraries of France, and also in various
+libraries in other countries, but out of the 1200
+books collected by Charles the Fifth, rather less
+than a hundred are now known to us.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"><a name="pisan" id="pisan"></a>
+<img src="images/i119.jpg" width="350" height="520" alt="CHRISTINE DE PISAN." title="Christine de Pisan" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Bib. Royale, Brussels.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">CHRISTINE DE PISAN.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 119.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>To increase the usefulness of his library,
+Charles employed a number of translators, not
+only of Greek and Latin authors, but also of the
+most important Arabic writings, thus bringing
+both the classics and the science of the day
+within the reach of the many students privileged
+to make use of it. It was in this library that
+Christine spent long days reading and meditating
+on the thoughts of the greatest minds, thus fitting
+herself for the part she had to play when life
+had ceased to be a gay dream. We can get
+from a miniature in a Book of Hours, now at
+Chantilly, and painted by the brothers Limbourg<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>
+for Jean, Duc de Berri, a brother of the King,
+some idea of what this old residence of the
+Louvre was like. In this miniature we see
+represented a square grim castle, with a large
+tower at each corner and narrow slits for
+windows, suggestive more of a place of refuge
+in time of war and tumult than the home of a
+peace-loving, enlightened king. When Charles
+determined to beautify this sombre structure,
+statues were set up without and tapestries hung
+within. One of the towers was fitted up for the
+library, panelled with rare woods and furnished
+with some thirty small chandeliers and a large
+central silver lamp, kept lighted both night and
+day so that work could go on at all hours. In
+the courtyard an outside circular staircase (one
+of the earliest, if not <i>the</i> earliest, of the kind)
+was added to give, as was said, a note of gaiety.
+But the idea of gaiety seems somewhat ironical
+when we learn that as it was difficult to get a
+sufficient number of large slabs quarried quickly,
+headstones from the cemetery of the Holy
+Innocents were taken for the purpose!</p>
+
+<p>Christine, as a child, showed an extraordinary
+capacity for learning, and this her
+father zealously fostered and developed. At
+the age of fifteen she married, and married for
+love, the King’s notary and secretary, Etienne
+de Castel, a gentleman of Picardy. Her happiness
+and well-being seemed assured, but Fortune,
+whose wheel is ever revolving, though sometimes
+so slowly as to lull us into forgetfulness,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>
+had decreed otherwise. For Christine it revolved
+all too quickly. Two years after her
+marriage the King died (1380), and her husband
+and father lost their appointments. Gradually
+anxiety and sorrow crept like some baneful
+atmosphere into the once happy home. First
+she lost her father, and then, two or three
+years later, her husband died, leaving her, at the
+age of twenty-five, with three children to provide
+for. Like many another, she turned to letters
+as both a material and a mental support. Endowed
+with an extraordinary gift of versification,
+she began by writing short poems, chiefly on
+the joys and sorrows of love, expressing sometimes
+her own sentiments, sometimes those of
+others for whom she wrote. But she tells us
+that often when she made merry she would fain
+have wept. How many a one adown the
+centuries has re-echoed the same sad note!</p>
+
+<p>“Men must work and women must weep.”
+So says the poet. But life shows us that men
+and women alike must needs do both. And so
+the sad Christine set to work to fit herself, by
+the study of the best ancient and modern writers,
+to produce more serious matter than love-ballads,
+turning, in her saddest moments, to Boëthius
+and Dante for inspiration and solace. “I betook
+myself,” she says, “like the child who at first is
+set to learn its A B C, to ancient histories from
+the beginning of the world—histories of the
+Hebrews and the Assyrians, of the Romans, the
+French, the Bretons, and diverse others—and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>
+then to the deductions of such sciences as I
+had time to give heed to, as well as to a study
+of the poets.” Her master was Aristotle, and
+she made his ethics her gospel. “Ancelle de
+science,” she calls herself, and remains a humble
+worshipper at the shrine of knowledge, for
+knowledge, she says, is “that which can change
+the mortal into the immortal.” We can picture
+her to ourselves at work in the library of the
+Louvre, amidst its 900 precious MSS., and in
+the library of the University of Paris, to which
+she had access through her friend Gerson, the
+renowned Chancellor. In a miniature at the
+beginning of one of her MSS. she is seen seated,
+in a panelled recess, on a carved wooden bench,
+dressed in a simple blue gown and a high white
+coif. She is working at a folio on a large table
+covered with tapestry, with a greyhound lying
+at her feet. It is quite possible that this may be
+either a conventional setting, or one due to the
+imagination of the artist, but as the miniaturists
+of those days were, as far as they could be,
+realists, it is more than possible that we here see
+her represented at work in her favourite nook in
+the Louvre library, together with the favourite
+dog who shared her lonely hours. Gradually
+solace came to her through work, and having
+found so precious a treasure for herself, she, like
+our own modern sage, never tired of preaching
+to others the gospel of its blessedness.</p>
+
+<p>Whilst Christine wrote and lived her student
+life—“son cuer hermit dans l’ermitage de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>
+Pensée”—her fame went forth, and princes
+sought, by tempting offers, to attach her to
+their courts, but without success. Of these,
+Henry the Fourth of England, already acquainted
+with her poems, and Gian Galleazo Visconti,
+Duke of Milan, were the most importunate, and
+particularly the former, who was unaccustomed
+to rebuff and failure. But Christine, with
+repeated gracious thanks and guarded refusals,
+remained firm. No reason for her decision is
+recorded, but it may well be believed that her
+patriotism would not allow her, even with the
+certainty of ease and emolument, to quit France
+at that critical time, or to serve the enemy of
+her adopted country.</p>
+
+<p>Although Christine’s reading was very varied
+and extensive, there were two subjects—the
+amelioration of her war-distraught country, then
+in the throes of the Hundred Years’ War, and
+the championship of the cause of womankind—which
+specially appealed to her as a patriot
+and a woman, and for which she strove with
+unceasing ardour. In all her writings she so
+interweaves these two causes that it is only by
+approaching them in the same way that we can
+understand her view of their psychological unity.
+To Christine these interests were essentially
+identical, for she recognised how paramount is
+woman’s influence in the making or marring of
+the world—how, in truth, in woman’s hand lies
+a key which can unlock a Heaven or a Hell.</p>
+
+<p>There was sore need of a patriot, and in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>
+Christine one was found. It has been well said
+of her, and by a Frenchman too, that “though
+born a woman and an Italian, she alone at the
+Court of France seemed to have manly qualities
+and French sentiments.” France was in a sorry
+plight. There was war in the land, there was
+war in the palace. The sick King suffered more
+and more from attacks of madness, and during
+these periods the Dukes of Orleans and Burgundy
+fought for the regency. Christine began her
+patriotic work by fervent appeals to Isabella, the
+Queen (to whom she offered a MS. now in the
+British Museum),<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> to use her influence to put
+an end to these dissensions which so greatly
+added to the troubles of the kingdom. She also
+lost no opportunity of proclaiming in her various
+writings the duties and responsibilities of kings
+and nobles to the people, and the necessity, if
+there was ever to be peace and prosperity, of
+winning their regard. At the command of
+Philip le Hardi, Duke of Burgundy, and uncle
+of the King, she wrote in prose, from chronicles
+of the time and from information obtained from
+many connected with the King’s household, <i>Le
+Livre des faits et bonnes mœurs du roi Charles V</i>,
+recounting his virtuous life and deeds and their
+advantage to the realm, and introducing a
+remarkable dissertation on the benefit to a
+country of a strong middle-class. She, of course,
+reasoned from Aristotle. The subject is a
+commonplace one now, but in the case of any
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>one living at the beginning of the fifteenth
+century, and brought up, as Christine had
+been, at a magnificent Court, it shows rare
+independence and breadth of thought to have
+grasped and proclaimed with such firmness and
+clearness as is displayed in her treatise the germ
+of the policy of all modern civilised nations—that
+a middle-class is essential to bring into
+touch those placed at the opposite extremes, the
+rich and the poor.</p>
+
+<p>To Christine belongs an honour beyond that
+of having been a patriot and a champion of her
+sex—the honour of having revealed Dante to
+France.<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> Scattered up and down her writings
+are many allusions to the <i>Divina Commedia</i>,
+showing how real a place it must have filled in
+her soul’s life. She especially recommends it
+for profitable study in the place of the “hateful”
+<i>Romance of the Rose</i>, concerning which she gave
+the warning to her son:—</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Se bien veulx et chastement vivre,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">De la Rose ne lis le livre.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">Like Dante, sad and lonely—“souvent seulete
+et pensive, regretant le temps passé”—like him
+she also realised the thirst for knowledge as an
+ever-present want of the soul, and that its ultimate
+perfection is only to be attained by following
+after virtue and knowledge. Although, as
+regards profundity, her conception of the world
+and of life cannot be compared with that of her
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>great prototype, or even with that of such an
+one as St. Hildegarde, still she had read with
+unflagging diligence a vast number of profane
+and ecclesiastical writers, and seems to have been
+well versed in the varied knowledge of her time,
+especially history. But whilst it is possible to
+criticise her learning, tempered as this was by
+her character and the needs of her day, it is
+at the same time possible to acknowledge that
+in spite of flaws and an often over-elaborated
+setting, moral truth sparkles gemlike throughout
+her writings. One of her biographers speaks
+of her thus: “Her morale is so pure and so
+universally human that not only does it remain
+true to-day, but it will retain imperishable value
+as long as ever human society is based on a pure
+and healthy moral foundation.”</p>
+
+<p>In her poem <i>Le Chemin de long Estude</i>—a
+title taken from Dante’s appeal to Virgil at the
+opening of the <i>Inferno</i>—Christine begins by
+acknowledging her debt to the immortal poet,
+saying that much that she has to tell has already
+been told by “Dante of Florence in his book.”
+Virgil as guide is replaced by the Cumean Sibyl,
+who appears to Christine in a dream, and offers
+to conduct her to another and a more perfect
+world, one where there is no pain and misery.
+To this Christine consents on condition that
+“sad Hades, whither Æneas once was taken,” is
+not included in the journey. The Sibyl therefore
+promises to reveal to her, instead, in what
+manner misfortune came upon earth, whilst at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>
+the same time showing her on the way all that
+is worth seeing in this world, from the Pillars
+of Hercules, “the end of the world,” to distant
+Cathay. However exhausting this programme
+may appear to us, Christine, knowing the real
+passion of the late Middle Ages for travel—for
+even those who could not travel in reality did so
+in imagination,—makes use of it as a setting for
+the introduction of a discussion on the qualities
+most necessary to good government. This she
+does, even at the risk of incurring displeasure in
+high quarters, recalling how Dante’s patriotism
+led to banishment and death in exile, but she
+adds, “Qui bien ayme, tout endure.” She pours
+forth her classical examples in a chaotic stream,
+but when she leaves earth, and ascends to the
+celestial regions, she not only shows herself
+versed in the astronomy of the time, but also
+expresses some beauty of thought. The order
+of the firmament, where all obey law without
+ceasing, so that harmony ensues “like sweet
+melody,” reminds her of Pythagoras and Plato,
+and suggests to her what life on earth might be
+if good laws were made and observed. In
+furtherance of her idea, she appeals to Reason,
+who presides over the Virtues or Divine Powers,
+to interrogate the three earthly disputants,
+Nobility, Riches, and Wisdom. In the end
+Reason awards the prize to Wisdom, condemning
+Riches as the great enemy of mankind.
+Thereupon Wisdom appeals to the verdicts of
+Juvenal, Boëthius, St. Jerome, and others to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span>
+establish that it is Virtue alone that is of worth,
+and ennobles a man, and then sets forth the
+qualities of a good sovereign. But as this leads
+to some difference of opinion, Christine, who
+was withal a courtly lady, descends to earth in
+order to ask the King, Charles the Sixth, to
+decide the matter. This dream-poem she
+dedicates to her royal master for his diversion in
+his saner moments, and thus once again introduces
+into high places the subject so near to her
+heart. She lets it be seen that she herself, like
+Dante, did not believe in the blending of the
+spiritual and the temporal powers. And as
+regards temporal power she adds—perhaps
+borrowing the idea from Dante’s <i>De Monarchia</i>,
+and anticipating Napoleon’s dream—that in
+order to ensure peace on earth, it is necessary
+that one supreme ruler should reign over the
+whole world. “La sua volontade e nostra pace,”
+sang a soul in Dante’s heaven of the Moon—the
+lowest in the celestial system—when questioned
+whether it was content with its lowly place.
+The poet therefore adds, “ogni dove in cielo e
+paradiso.” Christine, echoing these thoughts,
+would fain apply them to life on earth, giving
+them their deepest and fullest meaning.</p>
+
+<p>Though she laboured so unceasingly for the
+good of her country, she also did her utmost to
+defend her sex from the indiscriminate censure
+which had been heaped upon it, for the evil
+spoken seemed to her far to outweigh the good.
+A century before, Dante had also idealised<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>
+woman—even if, as some think, he personified
+some abstract quality—and placed her in heaven
+beside the Deity. Chivalry had also idealised
+woman, but in an exotic, exaggerated manner,
+which was bound to reach its zenith, and bound
+also to have its darker side. So we find that to
+speak good or ill of womankind became a conventionalism
+in the Middle Ages. Black or
+white was the tone chosen by the artist in
+words. There was no blending, no shading.
+Women were either deified, or held to be evil
+incarnate. The material side of life men understood,
+and could depict with some exactness, but
+to grasp in any way its subtler aspects required
+an education which could be attained only by
+slow degrees, since it meant the gradual modification
+of the long-cherished illusion that brute
+force is the world’s only weapon. A want of
+capacity to discern is often responsible for a
+depreciatory opinion, and we can but ascribe
+this strangely narrow-minded and superficial
+attitude towards woman to some such want.
+Christine set herself the task of trying to remedy
+this evil, not by shouting in the market-place,
+but by studying men and women as God made
+them and as she found them. Before she began
+her work, a new day seemed to be dawning.
+Just as, when classicism was in full decadence,
+Plutarch wrote <i>De mulierum virtutibus</i> (of the
+virtue of women), so, in the fourteenth century,
+Boccaccio gave to the world <i>De claris mulieribus</i>
+(of right-renowned women). We do not expect<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>
+to find woman treated on a very high plane by
+Boccaccio, but we recognise that, in a way, this
+work forms a fresh starting-point in the eternal
+controversy. Perhaps we should not have had
+this curious collection of stories of women,
+virtuous and vicious, mythological and historical—stories
+which are certainly very inferior as
+art to those of the <i>Decameron</i>—had not a
+crisis occurred in Boccaccio’s life. One day a
+Carthusian monk came to him with a warning
+message from the dead, and, much troubled in
+mind, he resolved to try to begin life afresh.
+But he was a better story-teller than a moraliser.
+He would fain save his soul, but he liked and
+courted popularity, and knew well the deeper
+meaning of the proverb, “A terreno dolce,
+vanga di legno.” And so he mingles virtue and
+vice, hoping, as he says, that “some utility
+and profit shall come of the same.” To us of
+to-day, the chief interest of this work is that
+Boccaccio’s fame perhaps gave a definite impetus
+to the discussion of the sex, instead of
+wholesale assertion, and also that it probably
+suggested to Chaucer the idea for his <i>Legend of
+Good Women</i>. How refreshing to find ourselves
+in the atmosphere of the kindly Chaucer! Let
+us pause for a moment, and recall what he says
+of women, he who was not only a knightly
+Court-poet, but also a popular singer, well
+versed in the practical wisdom of life. In the
+prologue we read, “Let be the chaf, and wryt
+wel of the corn,” and in allusion to his library<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>
+of sixty books, old and new, of history and love-stories,
+he says that for every bad woman,
+mention was duly made of a hundred good ones.
+Time and experience in no way dull this appreciation,
+for when, later, <i>The Canterbury Tales</i>
+appear, his estimate has risen ten-fold, since in
+the prologue to “The Miller’s Tale” we read,
+“and ever a thousand gode ageyn one badde.”
+From this time onwards, literature on the subject
+increases almost <i>ad infinitum</i>. Treatises and
+imaginary debates seem to vie with each other for
+popularity. All these make intensely interesting
+reading, for these fanciful discussions, which are
+supposed to take place, sometimes between a
+man and a woman, sometimes between a mixed
+company in a garden or villa or some bath resort
+where many are gathered together, are really a
+record of the intellectual amusements of the late
+Middle Ages and the Renaissance. “Que devez-vous
+préférer, du plaisir qui va vous échapper
+bientôt, ou d’une espérance toujours vive, quoique
+toujours trompée?” “Which sex loves the more
+easily or can do the better without love?” “It is not
+enough to know how to win love, but one must
+also know how to keep such love when it has been
+won.” Such-like were the subtle problems which
+on these occasions folk set themselves to solve.</p>
+
+<p>But whilst love problems could be treated as
+a pastime, they also had their serious side. Of
+this there is an example in Christine’s story of
+<i>The Duke of True Lovers</i>. Although much in
+its narration is evidently the mere invention of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>
+the poetess, it is quite possible, nay even
+probable, that it has some historical basis.
+Christine begins her story by saying that it had
+been confided to her by a young prince who
+did not wish his name to be divulged, and who
+desired only to be known as “The Duke of
+True Lovers.” It has been suggested, with
+much likelihood, that this is in truth the love-story
+of Jean, Duc de Bourbon, and of Marie,
+Duchesse de Berri, daughter of the famous
+Jean, Duc de Berri, and the inheritor of his MSS.
+When the story opens, the heroine of it, whoever
+she may have been, is already wedded.
+Hence all the difficulties of the hero, and indeed
+of both. Christine, with her womanly sympathy
+and psychological insight, makes all so intensely
+real that we are quite carried away in imagination
+to the courtly life of the fifteenth century.
+We read of the first meeting; of the Duke’s
+love at first sight; of Castle daily life; of a
+three days’ tournament given in honour of the
+lady; of devices for secret meetings and the
+interchange of letters; of the inevitable scandal-monger;
+of a letter from a former <i>gouvernante</i>—whose
+aid as go-between had been sought—containing
+a most comprehensive and remarkable
+treatise on feminine morality, the dangers of
+illicit love, and the satisfaction of simple wifely
+duty; of the separation which the position of
+the lady, and the gallantry of her lover, alike
+demanded; of meetings at intervals; of the
+mutual solace of short love-poems; and then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>
+the story, perhaps to evade identification, ends
+vaguely. But as we finish the story, we cannot
+help feeling that even if Christine’s setting is
+fiction, she yet gives us a glance of real life.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 450px;"><a name="horse" id="horse"></a>
+<img src="images/i132.jpg" width="450" height="545" alt="LADY IN HORSE-LITTER, RETURNING FROM TOURNAMENT." title="Lady in horse-litter, MS. 4431" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">LADY IN HORSE-LITTER, RETURNING FROM TOURNAMENT.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 132.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>When Christine turned to her serious work
+in the cause of womankind, she began by
+attacking two books, Ovid’s <i>Art of Love</i>, and
+<i>The Romance of the Rose</i>, both of which, in the
+Middle Ages, it was deemed wellnigh sacrilegious
+to decry. Her challenge, <i>L’Epistre au
+Dieu d’Amours</i>, took the form of an address to the
+God of Love, professing to come from women
+of all conditions, imploring Cupid’s aid against
+disloyal and deceitful lovers, whose base behaviour
+she largely attributes to the false teaching
+of these two books. This argument appeared
+in 1399, and she soon discovered that she had
+stirred up a hornet’s nest. But she had attacked
+advisedly and fearlessly, and was quite prepared
+for any counter onslaught. Her position was
+considerably strengthened by the alliance and
+co-operation of her staunch friend Gerson, the
+Chancellor, who himself, in the name of the
+clergy, took up arms against the flagrant scurrility
+to be found in the portion of <i>The Romance
+of the Rose</i> contributed by Jean de Meun. Other
+powerful allies joined the cause, and, to help to
+crystallise their efforts, species of “Courts of
+Love” were instituted, not alone for discourse
+on love, as heretofore, but also in the defence
+of women. All who united in this meritorious
+fellowship undertook to wear a distinctive badge,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>
+and thus proclaim their confession of faith.
+Among these Orders one was styled “L’Escu
+vert à la dame blanche,” another, “L’Ordre de la
+Rose,” and so on, suggestive of their purport.
+The first-named was founded by the brave
+soldier Jean le Meingre, Maréchal de Boucicaut,
+whose portrait may be seen in his superb Book of
+Hours, painted between 1399 and 1407, now
+in the Musée Jacquemart-André, Paris.<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> Its
+membership was restricted to thirteen knights,
+who swore to defend the honour of women
+against all detractors. To distinguish them
+from others less gallantly disposed, they wore
+on the sleeve an ornament in the shape of a
+small shield, enamelled green on the outside,
+and with the representation, on the underside,
+of a woman, enamelled in white.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">... Vous portez la dame en verde targe<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Pour démonstrer que de hardi visage<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Vous vous voulez pour les dames tenir<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Contre ceulz qui leur porteront dommage!<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">Of the Order of the Rose and its foundation,
+Christine, in one of her poems, gives most
+picturesque and interesting particulars, interesting
+because they are evidently taken from an
+actual scene, though Christine, in her rôle as
+poetess, feels it necessary to add touches
+suggestive of fairyland rather than of real life.
+A numerous assembly, with goodwill at heart,
+has met together in the magnificent dwelling
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>of Louis, Duke of Orleans, the King’s brother,
+Christine being one of the number. Suddenly
+there comes into their midst one personifying
+the Goddess Venus, surrounded by maidens
+garlanded with roses and carrying golden bowls
+filled with them. The bowls placed on the
+table, the Goddess proceeds to announce the
+rules of the Order, above all enjoining those
+present to avoid envy, and in no way to perjure
+themselves, since this would be a most heinous
+and hateful sin. The badge chosen is a fresh
+rose, but if any member of the Order should
+happen to be in a country where such is not
+attainable, or when the season is unpropitious,
+then a rose fashioned in gold or silver, or one
+embroidered in silk, will suffice. With pledges
+of loyalty,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">A bonne amour je fais veu et promesse<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Et à la fleur qui est rose clamée,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A la vaillant de Loyauté deesse,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Par qui nous est ceste chose informée,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Qu’à tous jours mais la bonne renommée<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Je garderay de dame en toute chose<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Ne par moy ja femme n’yert diffamée:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Et pour ce prens je L’Ordre de la Rose,<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">all the company deck themselves with roses.
+The charter is given by the Goddess into the
+safe-keeping of Christine, who describes it as
+written on fine parchment in letters of azure,
+and fastened with a silken cord of the same
+colour. From this cord hangs a rare gem, on
+one side of which their patroness, the Goddess
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span>of Love, and on the other Cupid, with his feet
+on a leopard, are depicted. This moral and
+literary contest is perhaps the most brilliant of
+the many discussions that took place in the
+Middle Ages in honour of women. The
+highest and the wisest in the land joined in it,
+but all the honour must be given to Christine
+for having, by her brave and reasonable attitude,
+caused the problem, which henceforth was to
+evolve like truth itself, to be treated on a
+rational basis. “Toute la foy remaint en une
+femme,” says Christine. Were not her words,
+nearly 500 years later, echoed by Renan when
+he says, “Après Jésus, c’est Marie de Magdale
+qui a le plus fait pour la fondation du Christianisme”?</p>
+
+<p><i>L’Epistre au Dieu d’Amours</i> is an extraordinary
+product of worldly wisdom and common sense,
+seasoned with satire. One of the complaints
+against disloyal suitors, and one which strikes
+a singularly modern note, is that they make
+protests of love, and false promises, which must
+be either paid for dearly, or rejected with scorn.
+Then the hero, if he has won the day, proclaims
+his victory in taverns and other places of resort,
+and even in mixed company. Or if, as is more
+often the case, he has lost it, he still tries, by
+suggestive hints, to appear to his fellows a
+successful gallant. Surely the worldling of to-day
+does not seem to differ very essentially from
+his brother of the fifteenth century, or to have
+progressed any farther along the path of loyalty!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Christine’s line of argument is that the many
+must not be condemned for the shortcomings of
+the few, and that even when God made the
+angels, some were bad. To the charge that
+books are full of the condemnation of women,
+she replies with the simple remark that books
+were not written by women. Where is the
+shade of the worthy Christine to-day? Does
+it walk the earth with a flag of triumph or a
+laurel wreath whilst its sisters in the flesh are
+writing on every subject in heaven and earth
+and sea? “De nos jours, le monde est aux
+femmes.”</p>
+
+<p>Is it marvellous, asks Christine, that a
+woman—“une chose simplète, une ignorante
+petite femmellette,” as she expresses it—should
+be betrayed by man, when even the great city of
+Troy was, and when all the books and romances
+are full of the betrayal of kings and kingdoms?
+And if a woman is not constant by nature, why
+should Jean de Meun, in <i>The Romance of the Rose</i>,
+devise so many tricks to deceive her, seeing
+that it is not necessary to make a great assault
+upon a feeble place? Then she deftly turns the
+tables on the other sex, reminding each that he
+is the son of his mother, and that</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Se mauvaise est il ne peut valor rien,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Car nul bon fruit de mal arbre ne vient.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">And so on to the end, all is argument and banter.
+The repute of her letter must have travelled
+quickly, for whilst Christine was still combating<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>
+with dissentients, an epitomised rendering of it
+appeared (1402) in English from the pen of
+Hoccleve, the pupil of Chaucer, entitled <i>The
+Lettre of Cupide, God of Love</i>.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"><a name="dames" id="dames"></a>
+<img src="images/i138.jpg" width="400" height="565" alt="LA CITÉ DES DAMES." title="La Cité des Dames" />
+
+<p class="source">Bib. Royale, Munich.</p>
+
+<p class="caption">LA CITÉ DES DAMES.</p>
+
+<p class="toface">To face page 138.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Later, Christine, with Boccaccio’s <i>De claris
+mulieribus</i> before her, writes <i>La Cité des Dames</i>,
+an account of the building of an imaginary city
+which is to shelter within its strong ramparts
+the women of all times and all countries who
+have distinguished themselves by good and
+heroic deeds. This has been aptly called “The
+Golden Book of Heroines.” It may certainly
+be considered her masterpiece on her favourite
+subject. She urges that philosophers and poets,
+with one accord, have defamed women, and she
+appeals to God, asking why such a thing should
+be, seeing that He Himself made them and gave
+them such inclinations as seemed good to Him,
+and that in no way could He err. She maintains
+that God created the soul, and made it as good
+in woman as in man, and that it is not the sex,
+but the perfection of virtue, that is material.
+Combating the suggestion that women are not
+fit to plead in Court because they have not
+sufficient intelligence to apply the law when
+they have learnt it, she refers to history to prove
+that women who have had the management of
+affairs have shown that, far from lacking intelligence
+and judgment, they have possessed
+both in large measure. At the same time,
+whilst defending their capability when necessity
+arises, she does not think it necessary for women<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>
+to interfere in matters which seem essentially
+man’s business. Her remarks on the subject of
+marriage are certainly practical, and at the same
+time disclose a strange unloveliness in contemporary
+manners. She is not of St. Paul’s
+opinion that it is better not to marry, but all
+the same she suggests that, unless without
+means, that woman is happier who does not
+marry a second time, seeing that the life of a
+married woman is often worse than if she were
+in the hands of the Saracens—the terror of the
+Middle Ages,—and that frequently after her
+husband has been out enjoying himself, her only
+supper, on his return, is a beating. She counsels
+the education of women, and condemns those
+who suggest that this will conduce to unseemly
+ways. In truth, her wonderful sense of justice,
+and her enlightened opinions generally, make it
+a marvellous résumé of statesmanship as far as it
+goes. It is a real Utopia. Perhaps to Christine
+it was a glimpse of the Promised Land! As
+we read her views on the education of boys and
+girls together, in this happy city, we feel that
+she might be discussing with us the problems
+of to-day. She says that if boys and girls are
+taught the same subjects, girls can, as a rule,
+learn just as well, and just as intelligently, as
+boys, and so on. In this conclusion she forestalls
+the learned Cornelius Agrippa, a doctor
+and philosopher of the sixteenth century, and
+one of the most original and remarkable men of
+his time, who boldly asserts that sex is merely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>
+physical, and does not extend to soul or rational
+power. She sums up by strongly advocating
+study and learning, both for self-improvement
+and as a consolation and possession for all time.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"><a name="poissy" id="poissy"></a>
+<img src="images/i140.jpg" width="400" height="572" alt="SETTING OUT FOR POISSY." title="Setting out for Poissy, Harl. MS." />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">SETTING OUT FOR POISSY.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 140.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Of her poetical writings on love and the
+sexes, perhaps the most enchanting is <i>Le Livre
+du Dit de Poissy</i>. In it she takes us, on a bright
+spring morning, with a joyous company, from
+Paris to the royal convent of Poissy, where her
+child is at school. She describes all the beauties
+of the country, the fields gay with flowers, the
+warbling of the birds, the shepherdesses with
+their flocks, the willow-shaded river bank along
+which they ride, the magic of the forest of St.
+Germain, a little world apart of greenery and
+shade, filled with the song of the nightingales.
+Laughing and singing by the way, they reach
+the convent gate. Then follows a description
+of the beautiful carved cloisters, the chapter-house,
+the nuns’ dress and their dormitory, the
+garden scented with lavender and roses, with one
+part, where small animals are allowed to run
+wild, left uncultivated, and the ponds well
+stocked with fish. As the day wanes, they bid
+farewell to the nuns, who offer them gifts of
+purses and girdles embroidered in silk and gold,
+worked by their own hands. They return to
+the inn where they are to spend the night, and
+after supper wander forth to listen to the nightingales,
+then dance a carole, and so to bed.
+The ride back to Paris in the morning, during
+which a discussion on love matters is introduced,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>
+is painted with the same impressionist touch,
+and it is with real regret that we take leave of
+these happy folk as they alight in Paris city
+from their stout nags.</p>
+
+<p>Another similar discourse, <i>Le Débat de deux
+amants</i>, has for setting a gala entertainment,
+taking place, like the founding of the “Order of
+the Rose,” under the auspices of Louis, Duke of
+Orleans, who ever extended a princely protection
+to Christine. Louis had married Valentine
+Visconti, daughter of Gian Galleazo Visconti,
+founder of the Certosa, near Pavia, a princess
+well versed in art and letters, and withal in
+pomp and splendour. It is on a day in May,
+the garden gay with gallants and fair ladies.
+We hear the minstrels play, and watch some of
+the company, decked with garlands, dancing
+under the trees. In the palace there is music
+and singing. Christine is seated in a tapestried
+hall with one or two esquires who prefer to
+discourse of love to joining in the jollity. After
+a time the talk turns on fickle men, and Christine
+brings forth from her vast storehouse of knowledge
+classical and mediæval examples. As she
+mentions Theseus, and recalls his baseness to
+Ariadne, she points to the tapestry on the wall
+before them, where the story is woven. This
+little touch makes the scene very real to us, for
+the record of the purchase of this tapestry, with
+the price of twelve hundred francs paid for it,
+may still be found amongst the royal inventories.</p>
+
+<p>There is such a volume and variety of works<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>
+from Christine’s pen that it is no easy task to
+make a fair selection. One of the most significant,
+since it deals with a subject which permeated
+mediæval thought, and on which she was wont
+to dwell, is <i>La Mutation de fortune</i>, “Fortune
+more inconstant than the moon,” says Christine.
+In it she writes with her heart in her hand, as it
+were, telling first of the sore havoc Fortune has
+wrought amongst those most dear to her. Yet
+though her own heart has been torn on the
+Wheel of Fortune, she stands before her fellow
+sufferers like some figure of Hope pointing upward,
+where, she says, wrong is surely righted.
+And thus she turns to the world in general, not
+in the spirit of the pessimist, but rather in that
+of the philosopher. She well knows that
+Fortune is no blindfolded goddess turning writhing
+humanity on a wheel, but a something
+rooted in ourselves, and she has pity for “la
+povre fragilité humaine.” Though so independent
+and advanced in thought, she is still
+found clinging in her writings to mediæval forms.
+As a setting for her thoughts on Fortune’s
+changes, she makes use of the favourite simile of
+a castle—here the Castle of Fortune—as representing
+the world, wherein the rich and the
+poor, the strong and the weak, jostle one another.
+She criticises all men, from the prince to the
+pauper, but not women, since these have been
+sufficiently criticised and decried. It is like the
+prelude to a <i>Dance of Death</i>. Then she tells of
+the paintings on the walls of this imaginary<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>
+castle, and uses this mediæval fancy, itself
+borrowed from the classics (<i>Met.</i> ii. 5. 770),
+to give what is really a history of the world
+as she knew it, written to demonstrate the instability
+of all earthly conditions.</p>
+
+<p>Once again, with her versatile gifts, she turns
+from philosophy to a treatise on military tactics
+and justice, <i>Le Livre des faits d’armes et de
+chevalerie</i>. However devoid of interest, except
+as a landmark in the history of military strategy
+and customs, this work may be to-day, it was
+thought of sufficient importance in the reign
+of our Henry the Seventh for the king to command
+Caxton to translate and print it (1489)
+with the title of <i>The Book of Faytes of Arms</i>,
+a book still sought after by our bibliophiles.
+It was further honoured by being quoted as an
+authority in the reign of Henry the Eighth.
+Considering the nature of its contents, this
+seems quite an extraordinary tribute to the
+judgment and ability of the writer.</p>
+
+<p>But the misery of France is ever increasing.
+Ceaseless civil war and foreign invasion impoverish
+the people, and make desolate the
+land. The dissolute Court is extravagant and
+filled with discord. Christine, fired with
+patriotic fervour, once more makes an effort,
+which proves to be her final one, to arouse the
+pleasure-loving nobility to some sense of its
+obligations to the nation. <i>Le Livre des trois
+vertues</i>, and <i>Le Livre de la paix</i>, appear one
+after the other. In the former, which she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>
+dedicates to the Dauphine, Margaret of
+Burgundy, she merely adds another to the long
+list of discourses for the guidance of women
+which, in Christian times, begins as early as
+the second century.<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> This theme forms the
+subject of so considerable a didactic literature
+that it can only be hinted at here. Whether
+treated from a religious or from a social point
+of view, or the two combined, the sum-total
+of the teaching is moral training with a view
+to self-restraint and subordination. Christine
+addresses herself to all women, from the highest
+to the lowest, but her principal theme is the
+influence a princess may and should have on
+Court life. She further counsels not princesses
+alone, but all well-born women, not to attach
+too much importance to the things of this world,
+to be charitable, and to see to the education of
+their children, and so to inform themselves
+that they may be capable of filling their
+husbands’ place when they are obliged to be
+absent at war or at the Court. She adds a plea
+for the country, that war should be opposed, and
+one for the poor, that pity should be shown to
+them. Then she addresses herself to the townswoman,
+advising her to see to her household,
+not to fear to go into the kitchen, and to avoid
+all luxury; then to servants, counselling them
+on no account to take bribes, adding the practical
+touch that as God is everywhere, and only asks
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span>of each a good heart, it is not necessary for them
+to go to Mass every day; then to the wife of
+the labourer, bidding her to guard well her
+master’s flocks and to encourage her husband
+to work; and, finally, she has a word of sympathy
+for the poor, holding out to them hope of
+recompense in heaven for misery endured here,
+and exhorting them to have patience meanwhile.
+From this patriotic and practical advice to
+women she turns to men, and in <i>Le Livre de la
+Paix</i> sets forth the duties of princes and of those
+in power to the people, importuning them to
+exercise clemency, liberality, and justice.</p>
+
+<p>But it is too late. The sand in the hour-glass
+is running low. Disaster follows disaster,
+until the final blow is struck at Agincourt (1415),
+where the flower of the French nation is cut
+off, and princes of the blood are carried away
+into exile. Christine, with bleeding heart, and
+worn with trouble and disappointment, retires
+to the convent of Poissy, “un très doux paradis,”
+perchance to find peace and consolation within
+its tranquil walls, and to implore Heaven’s aid
+for her sore-stricken country. For fourteen
+years no sound from her reaches the outside
+world. Then, inspired by the glorious advent
+and deeds of Joan of Arc, with all her old passion
+she pours forth a final hymn of praise and
+thanksgiving to the woman who has at last
+aroused France to patriotism, and so dies in
+peace at the solemn moment of Charles the
+Seventh’s consecration at Rheims.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">O Thou! ordainèd Maid of very God!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Joanna! born in Fortune’s golden hour,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">On thee the Holy Spirit pours His Flood<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And His high grace is given thee for dower.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Now all great gifts are thine:—O blessed be He<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That lent thee life!—how word my grateful prayer?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">—No prayer of thine was spoken fruitlessly,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">O Maid of God! O Joan! O Virgin rare!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 3em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Mark me this portent! strange beyond all telling!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">How this despoilèd Kingdom stricken lay,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And no man raised his hand to guard his dwelling,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Until a Woman came to show the way.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Until a Woman (since no man dare try)<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Rallied the land and bade the traitors fly.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Honour to Womankind! It needs must be<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That God loves Woman, since He fashioned Thee!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 3em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">O strange! This little maid sixteen years old<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">On whom no harness weigheth overmuch.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So strong the little hands! enduring hold<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">She seemeth fed by that same armour’s touch,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Nurtured on iron—as before her vanish<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The enemies of her triumphal day;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And this by many men is witnessèd;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Yea, many eyes be witness of that fray!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 3em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Castles and towns, she wins them back for France,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And France is free again, and this her doing!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Never was power given as to her lance!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A thousand swords could do no more pursuing.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of all staunch men and true she is the Chief,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Captain and Leader, for that she alone<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Is braver than Achilles the brave Greek.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">All praise be given to God who leadeth Joan!<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> L. Delisle, <i>Recherches sur la libraire de Charles V</i>, Paris,
+1907.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Harley, 4431.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> A. Farinelli, <i>Dante e la Francia</i>, vol. i. p. 192, 1908.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> “Le Musée Jacquemart-André,” <i>Gazette des Beaux-Arts</i>,
+August 1912.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> “Le Dit de la Rose,” 197-204, <i>Œuvres poétiques de Christine
+de Pisan</i>, t. ii., pub. par Maurice Roy, 1891.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> A.&nbsp;A. Hentsch, <i>De la littérature du moyen âge
+s’adressant spécialement aux femmes</i>, Cahors, 1903.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<h2><a name="AGNES_SOREL" id="AGNES_SOREL"></a>AGNES SOREL<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span></h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">So</span> much glamour has attached, and rightly so,
+to Joan of Arc, the soldier-saviour of Charles the
+Seventh of France, that another woman, Agnes
+Sorel—Charles’s good angel of a less militant
+order—has been almost entirely overlooked, and
+where she has been remembered, has been treated
+by the few with the honour due to her, and by
+the many merely as Charles’s mistress. But to
+her it was given to be a great inspirer of Charles,
+and much of the good that this weak king and
+ungrateful man did for his country may assuredly
+be in large measure attributed to her influence,
+just as the greatest merit that can be recorded of
+him personally was his devotion to her whilst
+she lived, though the memory of her availed
+naught after she had passed away. Agnes Sorel
+came as it were between the ebb and flow of the
+late Middle Ages and the Renaissance, when
+chivalry, not as a passing emotion but as an
+education, still lingered in men’s relation with
+women. Respect for womankind grew in the
+Middle Ages in France under the double influence
+of religion and chivalry, of which the cult of the
+Virgin and the cult of woman were the outcome.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>
+In honour of both, men strove in tournament
+and fought in battle. With the cry, “For our
+Lady,” or “For God and my Lady,” men hurled
+themselves into the thick of the strife as if the
+goddess, whether divine or human, in whose
+name they ventured, had made her champions
+invulnerable. And, in a manner as it would
+seem of action and re-action, the goddess became
+humanised and the woman deified. The former
+tendency may be traced in miracles attributed to
+the Virgin, and, later, in the “Mysteries,” and
+the latter in tales of chivalry, where love is
+treated as a gift from Heaven, and the recipients
+of it are idealised. Stories which seem to contradict
+this, and to refute all accepted ideas of
+chivalry and honour, are frequently original only
+in details, the bases being borrowed from Oriental
+tales. Buddha’s country, the land of the Zenana,
+supplied much material of an exaggerated nature
+which in the West became mere travesty.</p>
+
+<p>It is always difficult to determine exactly the
+origin of anything so subtle as a sentiment,
+especially one which gradually pervades and
+influences a people. It is, in its way, at first
+like a soft breeze, of which we can only see the
+effect. But as we try to discover some definite,
+if only partial, reason for this interchange of
+simple human relations between the Virgin and
+her votaries, we remember that St. Francis, the
+embodiment of exalted human sentiment, had
+lived, and that scholasticism, in that phase of it
+which treated the dialectical subtleties of words<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>
+as paramount, was on the wane. Hence spirit,
+which had so long been restrained, and which is
+ever in conflict with form, again prevailed, and
+mankind discovered that a loving Mother had
+taken the place of a stately Queen in the Heavens.
+This attitude towards the Virgin is revealed in
+the miracles attributed to her agency. It is also
+shown in one of the greatest works of piety of
+the thirteenth century, the <i>Meditations on the Life
+of Jesus Christ</i>,<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> which, through the medium of
+the “Mysteries,” introduced into sacred pictorial
+art some of its most dramatic and appealing
+scenes. Where is there to be found anything
+more tenderly human than the incident of
+“Christ taking leave of His Mother” before
+His journey to Jerusalem to consummate His
+mission?</p>
+
+<p>This note of the womanly element in its
+fairest form, gradually insinuating itself more
+and more, and permeating life, art, and literature,
+is the key to the right understanding of
+the position which woman had attained in the
+civilised world.</p>
+
+<p>Before turning our special attention to Agnes
+Sorel, let us recall the condition of France at the
+beginning of the fifteenth century.</p>
+
+<p>When the lunatic King Charles the Sixth
+died in 1422, and Charles, his son, at the age
+of nineteen, succeeded under the title of “King
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>of Bourges,” Paris was held by the Burgundians,
+who were in league with the English. The
+Dukes of Burgundy and of Brittany were alike
+vacillating in their policy, being at one time
+attached to the king’s party, and at another
+allied to the English. With the exception of
+a few castles, the strongholds of lords loyal to
+the Crown, the English possessed the whole of
+France north of the Loire, from the Meuse to the
+Bay of Mont St. Michel. Hither the Duke of
+Bedford was sent as regent for the English king,
+Henry the Sixth, then ten months old, who, by
+the terms of the Treaty of Troyes (1420), was
+the lawful king, the right of succession having
+been conferred on his father, Henry the Fifth,
+when he married Catherine, the daughter of
+Charles the Sixth of France.</p>
+
+<p>Charles the Seventh divided his time between
+Bourges and Poitiers, where the government
+was carried on, and Loches, Chinon, and Tours,
+the places he dearly loved, and in which he
+sought the solitude he craved for. But even in
+these seemingly peaceful retreats his lethargy
+and indolence were disturbed by perpetual
+intrigues, which it must be admitted were
+largely fostered by his own caprices and fickle
+affections. Meanwhile a cry of misery was
+arising from the war-devastated land. Churches
+and convents, castles and cottages, were all fallen
+into ruin, and brambles grew on the untilled
+land where once golden corn had waved.
+Peasants hid their horses during the day and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>
+brought them out to graze at night. As Alain
+Chartier wrote at the time, “Les pays champestres
+sont tournez à l’estat de la mer, où chascun a
+tant de seigneurie comme il a de force.” Men
+of all conditions, from the proudest lord to the
+poorest peasant, joined in spasmodic and detached
+efforts to drive out the English, but with the
+result that they did little else than harass them.
+Want of cohesion was the characteristic of the
+national resistance until, from a small village in
+the east of France, there appeared a deliverer in
+the person of Joan of Arc. Instantly, as if her
+sword were a magic wand, all the fighting men,
+impelled and inspired by the strength of her
+personality, rallied around her, and victory was
+assured.</p>
+
+<p>The story of the siege and surrender of
+Orleans, of the crowning of Charles in Rheims
+Cathedral, of Joan subsequently falling into the
+hands of the Burgundians, who sold her to their
+allies, the English, of her shameful trial and
+cruel death, are facts so well known that they
+may well be passed over here as briefly as
+possible. Suffice it to say, that, except for a
+time, even the triumph of this maiden-patriot
+did little to rouse the indolent king, who
+speedily returned to his selfish life in Touraine.
+War, pillage, and anarchy again devastated
+France. But gradually a change came over
+Charles. He seemed to awake as from a stupor.
+Dissolute and self-seeking favourites were dismissed,
+and the king was surrounded by able<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span>
+and high-minded men. He bestirred himself
+to make a final peace with Burgundy and
+Brittany, and to take part in the war which
+was still smouldering, though there were signs
+of its approaching end.</p>
+
+<p>What was the secret of such a change?
+That it was due, in the first instance, partly
+to the wise influence of his mother-in-law,
+Yolande of Aragon, and partly also to that of
+his wife, Marie of Anjou, sister of the good
+Duke René, seems almost certain, but that it
+was intensified when Agnes Sorel came into
+his life, there can be no doubt. When we
+consider the king’s earlier life, and what it
+was whilst he was under the influence of Agnes,
+and his relapse into indolence and debauchery
+after her death, we can only attribute much
+of this change to her sympathetic and wise
+guidance. Joan of Arc had represented the
+popular element, Agnes Sorel represented the
+aristocratic. Joan of Arc aroused the people
+to united action by her enthusiasm and success,
+Agnes Sorel, in her time, helped to complete
+the consolidation of the kingdom, by inspiring
+and sustaining the king. Perhaps no one man
+could have accomplished such a revolution. It
+took two women to do this, and what they
+did was not of mere passing worth. Phœnix-like,
+France arose from the ashes of the
+Hundred Years’ War, and it was Agnes Sorel,
+as priestess, who stirred the embers which hid
+the new life.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Voltaire, generally more ready to scoff than
+to approve, wrote thus of Agnes Sorel:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Le bon roi Charles, au printemps de ses jours,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Avait trouvé, <i>pour le bien de la France</i>,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Une beauté, nommée Agnes Sorel.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">Was it for the good of France? Let us disregard
+prejudices, and examine facts. Even then, if all
+that is known of her were written, it could only
+bear to this rare personality the resemblance
+which a faint reflection does to reality.</p>
+
+<p>Agnes Sorel was probably born about 1420 or
+1422, in the Castle of Fromenteau in Touraine.<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a>
+Her father, Jean Soreau, or Sorel, was Lord of
+Coudon, and belonged to the lesser nobility.
+It was in this beautiful country of forest and
+meadow-land, of silvery rivers and meandering
+streams, that Agnes spent her early years, her
+education being principally religious, for religion
+naturally held the first place in a society which
+still retained faith in the supernatural. It was
+customary at that time for girls of noble birth
+to complete their education either at Court or
+at the castle of some princely person, for such
+places were considered excellent schools of
+courtesy and other virtues for the daughters
+as well as for the sons of the nobility.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span></p>
+<p>Though the date is uncertain, it was at the
+Court of Lorraine that Agnes became maid-of-honour
+to the Duchess Isabelle, wife of René,
+Duke of Anjou and Lorraine, and Count of
+Provence, a prince distinguished for chivalry
+and learning. This intellectual and chivalrous
+atmosphere must have been peculiarly congenial
+to the sympathetic and versatile nature of Agnes
+Sorel. We can picture her listening to the
+Duke René reading his latest poem to one or
+two of his brother-poets in the castle pleasaunce,
+or discoursing on philosophy or statecraft, or
+attending some brilliant pageant or sumptuous
+fête. Chivalry, though dead as an institution,
+still survived as a recreation, and as an appeal
+from the past to the cultured imagination, and
+René, mediæval knight that he was in sentiment,
+dearly loved the gorgeous spectacle of a tournament,
+with the knight jousting in honour of his
+chosen lady. At this Court Agnes also came
+under the influence of Yolande of Aragon,
+widow of Louis, King of Naples and Sicily,
+great-granddaughter of King John of France,
+mother of the Duke René, and mother-in-law
+of King Charles the Seventh, a woman renowned
+for her extraordinary political capacity. All
+these ties, and the remembrance of the French
+blood in her veins, emphasised Yolande’s dominant
+passion—the love of France,—and it may
+well be that in this patriotic atmosphere Agnes
+Sorel became imbued with a like passion, which
+later she was to develop in all its perfection,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>
+rivalled only by her devotion to the well-being
+and glory of her royal lover.</p>
+
+<p>Patriotism was a virtue of recent growth in
+France, for, in order to thrive, it requires unity
+of idea, and during the Middle Ages the only
+idea common to all was Christianity, which,
+from the nature of its teaching of humility and
+fraternity, does not make for patriotism. It
+may cement the structure, but it does not form
+the basis. It was only after years of suffering
+and unrest that men learned to sink their
+individual and local interests in those of the
+nation as a whole. Then, and only then, could
+patriotism arise, and only under such conditions
+could it flourish.</p>
+
+<p>How long Agnes lived at the Court of
+Lorraine (one of the most refined and cultured
+Courts of the time), and how her first meeting
+with the king came about, is uncertain. It has
+been considered likely that between 1431 and 1435
+Isabelle of Lorraine went to Chinon to beseech
+the king to use his influence to obtain the release
+of her husband, imprisoned by his cousin, a rival
+claimant to the duchy of Lorraine. It is possible
+that Agnes, even if only born in 1422, may have
+accompanied her, but even if she did not, this
+visit of Isabelle’s may, indirectly, have led to
+the meeting between the king and Agnes.
+Whilst still a prisoner, René succeeded to the
+crown of Naples on the death of his brother,
+Louis d’Anjou, and as the country was in a
+disturbed condition it was deemed prudent for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>
+Isabelle, his wife, to act as his substitute, and,
+as <i>lieutenante générale</i>, she set forth to establish
+his claim. History is silent on the point as to
+whether Agnes accompanied her or not. It
+may be, as some seem to think, that she
+remained in Anjou with Isabelle’s eldest
+daughter, Marguerite, afterwards Queen of
+England. We should like to think that it
+was during this time that she attracted the
+notice of Charles, for this would lend additional
+interest to the exquisite miniature in the
+Musée du Louvre (at one time in the Book of
+Hours of Etienne Chevalier, now for the most
+part at Chantilly), which it seems probable
+represents Agnes Sorel as a youthful shepherdess,
+with the Castle of Loches in the background
+and Charles the Seventh riding towards her.
+As we have already suggested elsewhere,<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> this
+may have been a poetical rendering of their
+first meeting. However this may be, it seems
+probable that it was soon after the year 1435<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a>
+that she first attracted the notice of Charles,
+and that, later, she took up her residence in
+Touraine, no doubt gaining her influence over
+the king at first by her beauty, which all her
+contemporaries proclaim, and afterwards by that
+mysterious combination of ability and grace, of
+intelligence and physical vitality, which held
+him captive for many years. During this time
+she, like a true woman, and no ordinary place-hunter,
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>made his devotion to her react upon
+himself, for the good of his country and to his
+own honour. She not only counselled him
+wisely herself, but persuaded him to surround
+himself with wise counsellors.</p>
+
+<p>Of these counsellors, and the able and devoted
+men who served the king in divers ways, some
+few stand out more prominently than the rest,
+because of their position of intimacy in the royal
+circle, and their special and enduring friendship
+with Agnes Sorel. Such were Etienne
+Chevalier, Treasurer of France; Pierre de Brézé,
+of a noble Angevin family, and Sénéchal of
+Normandy after the expulsion of the English;
+and Jacques Cœur, the king’s superintendent of
+Finance, whose house at Bourges, with its angel-ceiled
+chapel, still delights the traveller.</p>
+
+<p>Etienne Chevalier was for some time secretary
+to the king, and after filling one or two smaller
+posts connected with finance, was made Treasurer
+of France, and member of the Grand Council.
+In addition to administrative capacity, he possessed
+a brilliant intellect and a great love of
+art. It is to his initiative that we owe the
+only suggestions in portraiture of Agnes Sorel.
+It was to him also that the king confided the
+supervision of the erection of the monuments to
+her memory at Jumièges and Loches—Jumièges
+where she died in 1449, and where her heart
+was buried, and Loches her favourite place of
+sojourn, and to whose church and chapter she
+had made large gifts. To Loches her body was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
+borne in royal splendour, and there laid to rest
+in the choir of the church in a simple tomb.
+We can imagine the loving care with which
+Etienne Chevalier watched the sculptor, and
+possibly even gave him suggestions, as he
+fashioned in alabaster her recumbent effigy
+representing her with hands clasped as if in
+prayer, her feet resting against two lambs, and
+her head guarded by two angels with outstretched
+wings. Perhaps this stone effigy was
+the one true portrait of Agnes, but the head and
+face were partially destroyed during the Revolution,
+and restored in their present form in 1806,
+so that little of the original now remains.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 572px;"><a name="agnes" id="agnes"></a>
+<img src="images/i158.jpg" width="572" height="350" alt="TOMB OF AGNES SOREL." title="Tomb of Agnes Sorel" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Loches.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">TOMB OF AGNES SOREL.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 158.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>This tomb, which to-day may be seen in a
+small vestibule of the Château Royale (now the
+Sous-Préfecture), has a strange and chequered
+history. Perhaps scarce another has suffered
+such singular vicissitudes, so many removals, or
+more ruthless violations. Soon after the death
+of Charles the Seventh (1461), the canons of
+Loches, whom Agnes had largely endowed and
+of whom she asked naught save to be remembered
+in their prayers, petitioned Louis the
+Eleventh for its transfer to a side chapel, since
+they considered it unfitting for the dust of such
+an one to repose in the choir. Louis, using his
+subtlety to better purpose than was his wont,
+replied that if they removed the tomb, they
+must return her gifts. Naturally these worthy
+ecclesiastics silenced their consciences and kept
+the tomb where it was. However, in the year<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>
+1777, in the reign of Louis the Sixteenth, the
+priestly conscience again awoke to the enormity
+of its presence within the choir, and, with the
+king’s consent, it was removed to the nave.
+Before re-burial the coffin was opened in the
+presence of various church dignitaries and State
+officials. Among the latter was a doctor who
+left an authoritative account of the proceedings,
+from which we can approximately surmise the
+height of La Dame de Beauté, and verify the
+record of her abundant fair hair. The exterior
+coffin of oak was only 5 feet 6 inches long.
+Within this, and protected by another of lead,
+was a shell of cedar wood in which, after the
+lapse of more than three centuries, lay all that
+was mortal of Agnes Sorel. Her fair hair was
+plaited in a long tress, and two curls rested on her
+forehead. As one of those present, more curious
+than his fellows, stretched out his hand to touch,
+all fell to dust. Death and Time were her
+guardian angels. But even this desecration did
+not suffice to drain the cup of unmerited
+vengeance. In 1793 the tomb was rifled, the
+sculptured features, so lovingly wrought,
+defaced, and her dust cast to the winds. But
+what matter? Agnes had done her work—work
+which had to be done, and which she
+alone could do.</p>
+
+<p>Another of the little band of chosen spirits
+of which Agnes was the soul and centre, was
+Pierre de Brézé, Lord of Varenne and Brissac,
+who early showed himself a man of affairs,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>
+and was admitted to the King’s Council when he
+was but twenty-seven. In war, administration,
+and finance, he proved himself equally trustworthy
+and skilful, and to these qualities he
+added others of a brilliant intellectual nature.
+He advanced from one post of trust to another,
+until the king himself presented him with the
+keys of the city and castle of Rouen. Thus he
+became Sénéchal of Normandy, an honour which
+remained in his family. One of his grandsons,
+Louis de Brézé, a son of Charlotte, daughter of
+Agnes Sorel and Charles the Seventh, was the
+husband of Diane de Poitiers.</p>
+
+<p>Jacques Cœur, whose life was so intimately
+associated with the Court during Agnes’s lifetime,
+and so sadly marred and ended after her
+death, was the son of a simple merchant of
+Bourges. Following in the wake of many
+adventurous and ambitious merchants of the
+time, he journeyed to the East and amassed a
+large fortune, which he placed at the disposal
+of the king. This enabled Charles to carry on
+the war in spite of his impoverished exchequer,
+and to make a final and successful effort against
+the English. But, like many another on whom
+Fortune has smiled, evil tongues and envious
+hearts began, ere long, their vampire work, and
+after the death of his friend and patroness, Agnes
+Sorel, Charles made no effort on his behalf, but
+left him at the mercy of his calumniators in the
+same base and heartless way in which he had
+abandoned Joan of Arc. Jacques, his goods<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>
+confiscated, and his life in danger, was obliged
+to fly the country, and died fighting, in the
+Pope’s service, against the Turk.</p>
+
+<p>Of the beauty of Agnes Sorel there can be
+no doubt, for all contemporary chroniclers and
+poets tell of it. Even the Pope, Pius the Second,
+allowed himself to add his tribute of praise to
+the general homage. Considering that there
+are so many types of physical beauty, appealing
+to as many different temperaments, there must
+have been something rare and remarkable in
+Agnes to have attracted and held bound all who
+came in contact with her. We can but conclude
+that this unanimous judgment could only have
+been the result of that mysterious union, so
+illusive, so indefinable, of spiritual with physical
+beauty. The records of the time merely tell us
+that she had blue eyes, and fair hair in abundance.
+The only picture, and this not done from
+life, by which we can judge her—for the miniatures
+by Fouquet, at Chantilly, from Etienne
+Chevalier’s Book of Hours, though exquisite in
+delicacy, are too minute for much characterisation—is,
+even if we accept it as the original
+from Fouquet’s hand, an overcleaned work in
+the Museum at Antwerp.<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> This, or the original
+painting, formed a wing of the so-called diptych
+painted to adorn the tomb of Etienne Chevalier
+and his wife in the Cathedral of Melun, the
+other wing—now in the Royal Museum, Berlin—representing
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>Etienne Chevalier himself, in the
+attitude of prayer, his patron saint, St. Stephen,
+beside him. There seems reason, however, to
+suppose that this offering of Etienne’s was in
+fact a triptych, and that the missing wing
+pictured his young wife, then lately dead (1452).
+If this was so, Etienne and his wife would have
+appeared in adoration on either side of the
+Queen of Heaven, here personated by Agnes
+Sorel, thus bringing the panel with Etienne’s
+portrait into harmony with the central panel,
+which otherwise it fails to be.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"><a name="hours1" id="hours1"></a>
+<img src="images/i162.jpg" width="400" height="572" alt="BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER." title="Book of Hours, Chevalier" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Musée de Chantilly.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 162.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Of the miniatures at Chantilly, the whole
+series of which forms a most tender and rare
+tribute to wife and friend, only brief mention
+can here be made of those concerning Agnes.
+The most simple and beautiful in sentiment and
+design is that of the <i>Annunciation</i>, in which the
+seated Virgin, in the likeness of Agnes Sorel,
+with bowed head receives the angel’s message.
+The scene is laid in a Gothic chapel (perhaps
+the Sainte Chapelle with slight adaptations to
+suit the artist’s fancy),<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a> with statues of the
+Prophets all around, and Moses, holding the
+Books of the Law, as the central figure of the
+group. This assemblage of Old Testament
+seers certainly typified the Old dispensation,
+whilst the Annunciation prefigures the New,
+and to us the whole may not unfitly form an
+allegory of the new order which Agnes Sorel
+was to help to bring about. In another miniature—the
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span><i>Visit of the Magi</i>—Charles the Seventh,
+accompanied by his Scottish guard, and with the
+Castle of Loches in the background, himself
+kneels as one of the kings before the Virgin,
+here also represented in the likeness of Agnes.
+And so on, throughout the series, in many of
+the scenes of the Virgin’s life we find her bearing
+the features of Agnes until an older and sadder
+type becomes necessary in the <i>Crucifixion</i>, the
+<i>Entombment</i>, and the <i>Announcement of the Death</i>
+and the <i>Death</i> of the Virgin. When, however,
+death has transfigured age and sorrow, the likeness
+of Agnes reappears in the <i>Assumption</i>,
+and <i>Coronation</i>, and, the crowning glory, the
+<i>Enthronement</i> of the Virgin.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"><a name="hours2" id="hours2"></a>
+<img src="images/i163.jpg" width="400" height="552" alt="BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER." title="Book of Hours, Chevalier" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Musée de Chantilly.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 163.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>In a Book of Hours, at Munich, painted
+about 1500 <small>A.D.</small> for Jacques Cœur’s grandson
+(in part perhaps by Jean Bourdichon, the artist
+of the superb Book of Hours of Anne de
+Bretagne now in the Bibliothèque Nationale, or
+at least by some pupil or follower of his), there
+are three miniatures that seem of special interest
+in connection with Agnes Sorel. One is a
+representation of the Virgin of the Annunciation,
+and another that of the Madonna with the Holy
+Child. In both these the features of the Virgin
+Mother appear to faintly echo those of Agnes as
+we know her, as the crowned and ermined queen
+in the picture at Antwerp. Still more interesting
+is the third miniature, giving a view—here
+used as a setting for the <i>Procession to Calvary</i>—of
+the front of Jacques Cœur’s stately dwelling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>
+at Bourges. Here doubtless many a time Agnes
+and the king were entertained. Hither Jacques
+returned from sundry journeys to the East, laden
+with treasures to beautify his surroundings.
+Hence he fled, the victim of success. Over the
+principal entrance is a canopied recess, once
+sheltering an equestrian statue destroyed during
+the Revolution. This now empty space once
+held a statue of King Charles the Seventh, armed
+cap-à-pie on a galloping caparisoned charger, as
+he may be seen represented on medals of the
+period. It is not a little significant of this
+thankless monarch that he here seems to be
+turning his back on the house of his faithful
+servant and supporter, and to be riding away.
+Other details worthy of mention in this Book of
+Hours are the realistic background to the picture
+of the <i>Visit of the Magi</i>, with its snow-covered
+village church, houses, and fields; the Italian
+drug-pot in the Magdalen’s hands in the scene
+of the Crucifixion, showing the intimate intercourse
+with Italy; and the Mater Dolorosa
+seated <i>alone</i> at the foot of the Cross,—a tragic
+note taken from the <i>Mystery of the Passion</i>.</p>
+
+<p>There is only one unanimous opinion concerning
+Agnes Sorel, and that is as to her beauty.
+For the rest, it would seem as if prejudice and
+flattery held the scales. The mean is difficult
+to discover, and perhaps it is only possible to
+get somewhere near it by studying results—the
+remarkable change, as already noticed, in Charles’s
+life and conduct whilst under her influence.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>In the face of conflicting records it is no easy
+matter to determine when Agnes Sorel first
+became the king’s mistress. In 1435, when
+the Treaty of Arras was concluded between
+Charles and the Duke of Burgundy, Cardinal de
+Sainte-Croix (afterwards Pope Pius the Second)
+was Papal legate at the French Court, and aided
+in the negotiations. He tells in his memoirs
+that the relation between Charles and Agnes
+was known publicly at the time, and that the
+king could do nothing without her, even having
+her at his side at the royal councils. The trustworthiness
+of this statement has, however, been
+so questioned, that it seems safer to endeavour to
+arrive at the truth from other sources, although,
+if the statement can be relied on, it seems to
+follow, almost as a matter of course, that Agnes
+must have been born earlier than 1422. It is
+an admitted fact that between 1433 and 1438
+the manner of Charles’s life entirely changed.
+In the year 1433 the infamous and once all-powerful
+favourite, La Tremoille, who had been
+the king’s evil genius for six years, and was
+largely responsible for the king’s treatment
+of his wife, Marie of Anjou, was dismissed at
+the instance of the politic Yolande. Yet even
+so, the king often relapsed into indolence and
+apparent indifference to his kingly duties, and it
+was not till after 1438, when he summoned a
+national Council at Bourges, that Charles showed
+himself to be a new man. It is also not long
+after this that we read of favours granted by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>
+king to Agnes’s relations. From that time,
+Charles ceased to spend his time in dreamland,
+as it were, in the sweet Touraine country, and
+engaged himself in affairs of State, listening to
+and accepting wise counsels, favouring the
+restoration of schools and universities—which,
+in the uncertain state of the country, had almost
+ceased to exist—and encouraging the final efforts
+to expel the national enemy, even at times
+personally joining in the fight. If we see in
+this, in a measure at all events, the guiding
+spirit of Agnes, the secret of her influence is not
+very difficult to discover. Apart from her
+beauty, which, with Charles, would be a potent
+factor, Agnes had a woman’s insight and skill in
+her relation with him, ever holding up to him
+the glory and obligations of kingship, at the
+same time herself entering, with all the vitality
+of her extraordinary nature, into his favourite
+pastimes. We know that in one or other of
+her many residences near Chinon or Loches, she
+and the king often spent the evening playing
+piquet or chess (the latter being his favourite
+game), and then, on the morrow, rode forth
+together to the chase. So the days were passed
+in work and simple outdoor pleasures, Agnes
+taking no recognised public part in the king’s
+life, but devoting herself heart and soul to the
+task she had in hand. But besides these relaxations
+of peace, there was also the reality of war;
+for the war still lingered on, though feebly.
+The English had lost their ally, the Duke of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>
+Burgundy, as well as Bedford, the able Regent,
+and there was no fit man to take the latter’s
+place. Paris opened her gates to Charles in
+1436, and in the following year Charles, after
+having reigned for fourteen years, made his first
+State entry into the capital of his kingdom,
+mounted on a white charger, the sign of
+sovereignty. In 1444 a treaty was concluded
+at Tours with the English, and, to make the
+compact doubly sure, Margaret of Anjou, a
+niece of the king, was married to Henry the
+Sixth of England. For about a month the
+Court and its princely visitors gave themselves
+up to fêtes and pageants, and it was during this
+time of rejoicing that the position of Agnes was
+officially recognised. She was made lady-in-waiting
+to the queen, and took a prominent
+part throughout the festival. Charles gave her
+the royal castle of Beauté, on the Marne, near
+the Bois de Vincennes, “le plus bel chastel et
+joly et le mieux assis qui fust en l’Isle de France,”
+desiring, as was said, that she should be “Dame
+de Beauté de nom comme de fait.” From the
+time of her public recognition she appeared with
+the king at all the brilliant festivities celebrated
+in honour of treaties and marriages. She also
+sat in the royal council, a position which, as a
+king’s mistress, she was the first to occupy,
+though we know that Henri II. took no step
+without first conferring with Diane de Poitiers,
+and that Madame de Maintenon sat in Louis
+the Fourteenth’s privy council.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The change which came over France after
+the Treaty of Tours was marvellous, alike in
+its extent and its rapidity. Commerce was
+again resumed between the two nations; men
+and women once again ventured without the
+city walls, to breathe, as it were, the fresh air
+of liberty; and those who had been called
+upon to fight, returned to their work in the
+fields or the towns. We cannot better voice
+the feeling of the people than by borrowing the
+song of a poet of the day:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Le temps a laissé son manteau<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">De vent, de froidure et de pluie,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Et s’est vêtu de broderie,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">De soleil rayant, clair et beau;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Il n’y a beste ne oiseau<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Qu’en son jargon ne chante ou crie:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Le temps a laissé son manteau.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Now that Agnes had assumed a definite
+rôle at Court, she lived principally at Loches,
+where the king assigned to her “son quartier de
+maison” within the castle, and also gave her a
+residence without the walls. Here she shone
+like a radiant star; for although the king did
+not have much personal influence on the movement
+in art and letters, his Court was the
+meeting-place of many distinguished and intellectual
+men. Among them we find the
+name of Alain Chartier, the poet, and sometime
+secretary to the king, and one of the ambassadors
+who went to Edinburgh to ask the hand of the
+little Margaret of Scotland for the Dauphin.
+We remember him now chiefly in connection<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>
+with the charming story told of this girl-wife
+of the Dauphin Louis. Betrothed to Louis
+when she was a child of three, and sent to
+France to be brought up at the Court, she was
+married at twelve to this boy of thirteen, who
+could not possibly appreciate her simple, sweet
+nature which endeared her to all others. One
+day as she was passing with her ladies through
+a room in the castle, she saw Alain Chartier
+lying on a bench asleep. She approached
+quietly, and kissed him, much to the surprise of
+her attendants that she should “kiss so ugly a
+man.” And she made answer: “I did not
+kiss the man, but the precious mouth whence
+so many beautiful and fair words have issued.”
+Poor little poetess! Fortunately her life was
+a short one. She died when she was just
+twenty-one, with these words on her lips: “Fi
+de la vie de ce monde, ne m’en parlez plus.”
+The scientific historian of to-day is inclined to
+dismiss this story as a pleasing though rather
+foolish romance. But even so, Alain Chartier
+may be remembered as a poet and philosopher,
+as well as a brave and wise patriot during some
+of France’s darkest hours—a worthy contemporary
+of Agnes Sorel and Joan of Arc. Fearing
+neither the nobles nor the people, he blames
+the former for their love of luxury and personal
+indulgence, and exhorts both to think of the
+public good, and to aid in their country’s
+defence, instead of allowing themselves to be
+engrossed with their private affairs. Then,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>
+whilst acknowledging that as he has not the
+strength to bear arms, it is only with his pen
+and his speech that he can serve his country, he
+reminds them that it was the historian’s pen
+and the orator’s harangue, just as much as the
+warrior’s lance, that made the glory of the
+Romans.</p>
+
+<p>Louis the Dauphin, come to man’s estate, and
+self-seeking and treacherous, was no friend to
+Agnes, who had incurred his hatred by her
+fearless disclosure to the king from time to
+time of conspiracies against his person, in
+which Louis was the prime mover. After
+repeated reconciliations, the king in despair
+finally banished him to his domain of Dauphiné.
+The traitor, quitting the royal presence for
+what he deemed exile, swore to be avenged on
+those who had driven him forth, and if some
+of the records of the time speak truly, four
+years later his opportunity came, and he kept
+his oath.</p>
+
+<p>The last scene of Agnes’s life was pathetically
+interesting. Her end came almost suddenly.
+The king, listening to advice, had
+resolved to continue the war in Normandy,<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a>
+and, at the instigation of Agnes, if we may believe
+the words of a courtly writer of the time, had
+himself gone to the front. Rouen was taken,
+and Charles entered in triumph. The streets
+were decked with flowers and branches, and the
+houses hung with rich draperies, and everywhere
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>the leopards and quarterings of England had
+been replaced by the fleur-de-lis. Charles,
+preceded by a gorgeous procession of archers,
+each company arrayed in the livery of its lord,
+and carrying his special banner, followed, under
+a canopy, on a horse caparisoned to the ground
+with blue cloth sprinkled with fleurs-de-lis of
+gold, surrounded by princes and the principal
+captains and officers of the Crown. With his
+wonted observance of religious duty, slowly he
+made his way to the cathedral through the
+shouting multitude, and to the sound of many
+fiddles and the fanfare of trumpets. There he
+descended, kissed the relics as he knelt beneath
+the great portal, and then entered its hushed
+and solemn dimness to return thanks. But
+scarce had the air ceased to ring with the
+plaudits of the people, when the report of a plot
+against the king, devised by the Dauphin, is
+said to have come to the ears of Agnes, and she
+hastened to the king at Jumièges, whither he
+had retired for a short rest during the unusual
+and inclement winter. Here, stricken by a
+mysterious sickness, by some thought to be
+typhoid fever, by others attributed to poison
+administered at the instigation of Louis, she
+died in February 1450, in her manor of Mesnil,
+near the Abbey of Jumièges. The king was
+with her to the end, and could only be induced
+to withdraw when her lifeless form sank back
+in his arms. So died this wonderful and fascinating
+woman who had lived and laboured for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>
+her country through perhaps the most critical
+period of its history.</p>
+
+<p>It is impossible to entirely ignore what has
+been written to Agnes’s personal discredit, though
+much of it may well be looked upon as exaggeration,
+and open to suspicion. That the king
+was not her only lover may be true, but in the
+absence of satisfactory documentary evidence of
+this, perhaps the various intrigues attributed to
+her may, for the most part at least, be regarded
+as the creations of scandal. Still, bearing in
+mind the condition of France at the time of her
+accession to power, the extent of the influence
+she admittedly exercised in the councils of the
+king, and the great change which came over
+the royal fortunes and the fortunes of the country
+during the years of her ascendancy, it is scarcely
+possible to refuse to her some right to share in
+the recognition so lavishly bestowed upon the
+other great woman of that time—Joan of Arc.
+The one may be said to have been the complement
+of the other. Both were necessary to
+the needs of the day, and the glory of successful
+accomplishment should be shared between them.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> These meditations, attributed in the past, and by some even
+now, to St. Bonaventura, are considered by other scholars to be
+of Cistercian inspiration. P. Perdrizet, <i>La Vierge de Miséricorde</i>,
+1908, p. 15.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> Both the date and the place of her birth seem uncertain.
+Some writers suggest 1415, and some 1420 or 1422, as the date;
+whilst Froidmantel, in Picardy, is conjectured by some, and
+Fromenteau, in Touraine, by others, as the place. (Du Fresne de
+Beaucourt, <i>Hist. de Charles VII</i>, t. iv. p. 171, note 4.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> <i>Athenæum</i>, June 25, 1904.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> Du Fresne de Beaucourt, <i>Hist. de Charles VII</i>, t. iii. p. 286.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> Du Fresne de Beaucourt, <i>Hist. de Charles VII</i>, t. iv. p. 171,
+note 2.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> Cf. <i>Grandes Chroniques de France</i>, fol. 292, Bib. Nat.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> Lavisse, <i>Hist. de France</i>, vol. iv. part 2, p. 229, footnote.</p></div>
+</div>
+
+
+<h2><a name="A_NOTE_ON_MEDIAEVAL_GARDENS" id="A_NOTE_ON_MEDIAEVAL_GARDENS"></a>A NOTE ON MEDIÆVAL GARDENS<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span></h2>
+
+<p>&nbsp;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<h2><a name="MEDIAEVAL_GARDENS43" id="MEDIAEVAL_GARDENS43"></a>MEDIÆVAL GARDENS<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span></h2>
+
+
+<p class="ni"><span class="smcap">No</span> one can study French mediæval lore, or
+Gothic cathedral, or Book of Hours, without
+realising how great a love of Nature prevailed
+in the late Middle Ages. The poems tell of
+spring, “the season of delight,” of gardens which
+suffice “for loss of Paradise,” and of birds “with
+soft melodious chant.” In the dim stillness of
+the cathedral, Nature is expressed in infinite
+variety. Foliage grows in the hollows of the
+mouldings, and sometimes, as at Chartres, even
+the shafts, as they tower into the gloom, end in
+half-opened leaves, suggestive of spring, of hope,
+and of aspiration. Many a sunny façade shows
+us scenes of rural life—sowing, reaping, vine-dressing,
+and so forth—fashioned as a calendar
+in stone, and many a peasant must have rejoiced
+as he saw himself and his occupation thus
+represented in effigy. Fortunately for the poor
+toiler, the Church not only taught that “to
+labour is to worship,” but further honoured
+work by thus representing it at the very entrance
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>to the sanctuary, so making it, as it were, the
+“open sesame” to higher things.</p>
+
+<p>In Books of Hours and illuminated MSS.,
+before the complete border of flowers, birds, and
+small grotesques was developed, we find ornamental
+flourishes, like the growth of ivy and
+hawthorn, splendidly free in design, and painted
+with evident joy even in the minutest bud or
+tendril. Everywhere may this love of Nature
+striving for expression be seen. But we must
+turn to the poems and romances if we would
+fully realise it in all its simplicity and truth,
+since it is in these alone that we get at the
+actual mediæval feeling unalloyed with all that
+we ourselves have, perhaps unwittingly, read
+into it.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"><a name="hours3" id="hours3"></a>
+<img src="images/i176.jpg" width="350" height="568" alt="BOOK OF HOURS." title="Book on Hours, French" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">BOOK OF HOURS.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">French, 14th Century, Brit. Mus.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 176.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>“All hearts are uplifted and made glad in the
+time of April and May, when once again the
+meadows and the pastures become green.” So
+says one of the old romancers. And this joy
+in returning spring seems to have pervaded
+mediæval thought and expression. Little is
+this to be wondered at when we call to mind the
+long dreary winters spent in cold and ill-lit
+castles, or in dark, draughty houses and hovels.
+Before glass, long regarded as a luxury, came into
+general use in dwellings, the only protection
+from rain and cold consisted in wooden shutters,
+or movable frames with horn slabs (necessarily
+small), or varnished parchment. In truth, the
+only warm, bright place was the chimney
+corner, and here, as near as might be to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>
+blazing logs, the long days of winter were spent
+in chess-playing, broidery, lute-playing, and love-making,
+the monotony of this only occasionally
+broken by the arrival of some wandering minstrel
+who sang of war and love, or of some packman
+laden with sundry wares prized of womankind.
+But in winter such wayfarers were rare, and life
+was, perforce, one of boredom and discomfort.
+Thus there was exceeding joy when
+“woods and thickets donned their rich green
+mantling of resplendent sheen.”</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"><a name="harl2" id="harl2"></a>
+<img src="images/i177.jpg" width="500" height="531" alt="Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus." title="Manuscript 4425" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="illoaut"><span class="smcap">Harl.</span> MS. 4425, <span class="smcap">Brit. Mus.</span></p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 177.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>It is generally of springtime in a garden—a
+garden of green glades and alleys, fruit-trees and
+flowers, such as was very dear to the mediæval
+soul—of which we read. The <i>Roman de la
+Rose</i> opens with a description of a garden,
+hemmed round with castle wall—a pleasaunce
+within a fortress—and planted with trees “from
+out the land of Saracens,” and many others, to
+wit, the pine, the beech (loved of squirrels), the
+graceful birch, the shimmering aspen, the hazel,
+the oak, and many flowers withal—roses and
+violets and periwinkle, golden king-cups, and
+pink-rimmed daisies. The poet describes with
+careful detail the design of the garden:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">The garden was nigh broad as wide,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And every angle duly squared;<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">how the trees were planted:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i4">Such skilful art<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Had planned the trees that each apart<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Six fathoms stood, yet like a net<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The interlacing branches met;<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">and how “channelled brooks” flowed from clear<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>
+fountains through “thymy herbage and gay
+flowers.”</p>
+
+<p>The debt which the mediæval world owed
+to the East is shown both in the fruits and the
+spices which are described as growing in the
+garden, and in the pastimes said to have been
+enjoyed in its cool shade. We read of pomegranates,
+nutmegs, almonds, dates, figs, liquorice,
+aniseed, cinnamon, and zedoary, an Eastern plant
+used as a stimulant. When the poet would tell
+of dance and song, he goes by</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">A shaded pathway, where my feet,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Bruised mint and fennel savouring sweet,<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">to a secluded lawn. Here he sees one whose
+name is “Gladness”:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Gently swaying, rose and fell<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Her supple form, the while her feet<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Kept measured time with perfect beat:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 2.5em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">While minstrels sang, the tambourine<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Kept with the flute due time I ween.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 2.5em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Then saw I cunning jugglers play,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And girls cast tambourines away<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Aloft in air, then gaily trip<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Beneath them, and on finger-tip<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Catch them again.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>In every garden there was a fountain or sheet
+of water with a small channelled way carrying
+the water to the castle and through the women’s
+apartment. Sometimes these waterways were
+made use of by the lover as a means of communication
+with his beloved, as we read in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>
+romance of <i>Tristan and Isolde</i>, where Tristan,
+to apprise his mistress that he is at their trysting-place
+in the garden, drops into the water
+small pieces of bark and twigs, which are
+quickly carried to the chamber where Isolde is
+waiting and watching. And one eventide a
+perilous encounter befalls. Tristan has been
+banished the Court, for evil tongues have
+whispered in King Mark’s ear of his love for
+Isolde, and have further whispered of secret
+meetings in the garden, beside the fountain.
+Now near the fountain is a pine-tree, into which
+King Mark resolves to climb, and perchance to
+discover the meeting of the lovers. As daylight
+fades, Tristan scales the wall, and hastens to
+throw into the water the little signals for his
+lady. But as he stoops over the pool he sees,
+reflected in its clear surface, the image of the
+king, with bow ready bent. Can he stop the
+floating twigs as they are hurried along on their
+mission? No. The water carries them away
+out of sight, and Isolde must come. She comes,
+but Tristan does not go to meet her as was his
+wont, but remains standing by the water. She
+wonders at her lover’s seeming unconcern, but
+as she approaches him, suddenly, in the bright
+moonlight, she, too, sees in the water the
+reflection of the king, and the lovers are saved.</p>
+
+<p>A pine-tree is so often mentioned as a special
+feature in a mediæval garden that one is led to
+think that its use may either have been a survival
+from the days of Tree Worship, seeing that the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
+tree was sacred to Adonis, Attis, and Osiris<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a> (all,
+perhaps, varying forms of one and the same
+divinity), or have been suggested by some
+northern Saga. It makes its appearance in the
+<i>Chanson de Roland</i>, which has come down to
+us in a thirteenth-century form, incorporating
+the earlier Epic of <i>Roland</i>, probably composed
+towards the end of the eleventh century. In
+this we find mention of it when Charlemagne,
+after he is said to have taken Cordova, retires to
+a garden with Roland and Oliver and his barons,
+the elder ones amusing themselves with chess
+and tric-trac, and the younger ones with fencing,
+the king meanwhile looking on, seated under a
+pine-tree. Later in the day tents are set up, in
+which they pass the night, and in the early
+morning Charlemagne, after hearing mass, again
+sits under the pine-tree to take counsel of his
+barons.</p>
+
+<p>In the <i>Roman de la Rose</i>, the fateful
+fountain of Narcissus is described as being
+beneath a pine-tree, which is represented as
+being taller and fairer than any that mortal eye
+had seen since the glorious pine of Charlemagne’s
+time, showing that here at least the poet is
+making use of tradition.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 350px;"><a name="flemish" id="flemish"></a>
+<img src="images/i181.jpg" width="350" height="533" alt="FLEMISH MASTER." title="Flemish painting" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Brückmann.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">FLEMISH MASTER.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Fifteenth Century. Stephenson Clarke Collection.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 181.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>But to make our way into a mediæval
+garden, and see all that grows therein, we must
+needs get within the precincts of the castle, for
+inside its fortified enclosure the castle, like a
+small village, was self-contained. And this was
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>no easy matter, if we may judge from the vivid
+description to be found in <i>Huon de Bordeaux</i>,
+a poem concerning a Bordelais lord of the ninth
+century. After sundry adventures, Huon sets
+out on a journey to Babylon, and seeks an
+audience with the Emir. He tells of his
+arrival at what he describes as the castle, and
+how, after long parley with the porter, the
+drawbridge is let down and the great gate
+opened, and he finds himself in an arched way,
+with a series of portcullises showing their teeth
+overhead. After further parley, and further
+opening of gates, he enters a large courtyard,
+and goes thence into the garden, which is
+planted with every kind of tree, aromatic herb,
+and sweet-scented flower. In the garden is a
+fountain with its little channelled way, supplied
+with water from the Earthly Paradise. This
+description may seem a little fantastic, but it is
+only the poet’s way of telling us what we might
+ourselves experience if we would go in imagination
+to some thirteenth- or fourteenth-century
+castle, and seek to gain admittance.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes the garden was within the castle
+fortifications. It was then necessarily circumscribed,
+and would, more or less, be laid out
+with formal pathways and stone-curbed borders,
+also with trees cut in various devices (a reminder
+of Rome’s once far-reaching influence), and a
+tunnel or pergola of vines or sweet-scented
+creepers running the length of the wall to form
+a covered walk for shelter against sunshine or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
+shower. But where the garden was without the
+fortifications, but yet within the castle enclosure,
+as was always the arrangement if possible, opportunity
+was afforded for wooded dell and flowery
+slope, as well as for the orchard with its special
+patch for herb-growing.</p>
+
+<p>The herb-plot was one of the most important
+items in a mediæval garden; for here were
+grown not only herbs and roots for healing, but
+also sweet-scented mint and thyme for mingling
+with the rushes strewn on the floors. Sometimes
+the rushes themselves were fragrant, and
+such, lemon-scented when crushed, may even
+to-day be found in the neighbourhood of Oxford,
+probably growing in the very place which at
+one time supplied many a college hall with its
+carpet of fresh green.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 550px;"><a name="alex" id="alex"></a>
+<img src="images/i183.jpg" width="550" height="371" alt="MS. ROMANCE OF ALEXANDER." title="Romance of Alexander" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Bodician.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">MS. ROMANCE OF ALEXANDER.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">Fourteenth Century.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 183.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the larger gardens might also be found
+labyrinths and aviaries, with bright-plumaged
+birds from the East. Here, too, were often
+enclosures for wild beasts, much prized by the
+lord of the castle, to whom they may have been
+proffered as peace-offerings, or as friendly gifts
+from some neighbouring lord. Strange beasts
+were royal gifts; for kings, we read, made such
+offerings to each other. Even as early as the
+ninth century, Haroun al Raschid sent an
+elephant to Charlemagne. It was brought to
+Aix-la-Chapelle by Isaac the Jew, and survived
+its long walk seven years, and it would be
+interesting to know by what route it journeyed
+thither in those days. These private zoological<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>
+gardens may possibly account for the comparative
+accuracy with which the early miniaturists
+painted such beasts as lions, bears, and leopards,
+which otherwise they might have had no chance
+of studying.</p>
+
+<p>One of the greatest delights of the garden
+was the bower in which the warm months were
+passed. Here meals were taken, and merry
+pastimes enjoyed, as long as daylight lasted.
+Hither came tumblers and dancing-girls, and
+sometimes performing animals. A poor captive
+bear would be made to stumble over the rough
+roads for miles in order to go through its
+grotesque antics before some joyous company
+of dames and gallants. But spring and youth
+was the time to be gay, and nothing came amiss
+to these light-hearted folk.</p>
+
+<p>The bower was also the “privy playing
+place,” and all care was taken to make its leafy
+screen grow close and thick. Perhaps one of
+the most interesting references to a green arbour—interesting
+because of the romance which was
+the cause of its mention—is in a poem by King
+James I. of Scotland, telling of sad years in prison,
+which ended in love and liberty. James, whilst
+still a young man, was imprisoned in Windsor
+Castle, and writing to solace himself with something
+more tangible than the mere contemplation
+of his beloved one, and to while away time,
+describes the garden with “herbere green,”
+which he saw through the barred window of
+his prison-house. Leaning his head against the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>
+cold stone wall, by night he gazed at the stars, by
+day at the garden. And weary and woe-begone
+as he was, he says, “to look, it did me good.”</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Now there was made fast by the tower wall<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A garden fair, and in the corners set<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A herbere green, with wands so long and small<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Railed all about: and so with trees close set<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Was all the place, and hawthorn hedges knit<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That no one though he were near walking by<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Might there within scarce any one espy.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 2.5em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So thick the branches and the leafage green.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Beshaded all the alleys that there were,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And ’midst of ev’ry herbere might be seen<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The sharp and green sweet-scented juniper,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Growing so fair with branches here and there,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That, as it seemed to any one without,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The branches spread the herbere all about.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0"><span style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 2.5em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span><span style="padding-right: 2em">•</span>•<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And on the slender green-leaved branches sat<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The little joyous nightingales, and sang<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So loud and clear, the carols consecrat<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To faithful love.<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">This “garden fair” was the scene of the romance
+which solaced this royal prisoner, and helped
+him to bear his irksome lot, and to be able to
+exclaim, after nearly eighteen years’ captivity—a
+captivity since boyhood:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Thanks be to the massive castle wall,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">From which I eagerly looked forth and leant.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p class="ni">Looking from his window he espied, notwithstanding
+“hawthorne hedges” and “beshaded
+alleys,” Lady Johanna Beaumont (whom he
+wedded on his release) walking in the garden.
+Neither poet nor historian tells how they found
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>means to communicate with one another, but
+tradition, which is sometimes twin-brother to
+truth, has handed down the story of a go-between
+who conveyed missives and tokens.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"><a name="rhen" id="rhen"></a>
+<img src="images/i185.jpg" width="500" height="387" alt="RHENISH MASTER." title="Rhenish painting" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Brückmann.</i></p>
+
+<p class="caption">RHENISH MASTER.</p>
+
+<p class="illoaut">C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.</p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 185.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>In the accompanying picture we see a corner
+of a mediæval garden, hemmed round with castle
+wall. In it the artist has adapted an everyday
+scene to a religious purpose, by giving my lady
+a crown, and the baby an aureole, to suggest the
+Holy Mother and Child, whilst one of the
+gentlemen-in-waiting is provided with wings, so
+as to make him more in harmony with such
+saintly company. But this is only what might
+have been seen on any bright morning in late
+spring or summer, in some castle pleasaunce.
+My lady reads a book, whilst her maidens amuse
+themselves, one holding a psaltery on which the
+child tinkles, to its evident delight and wonderment;
+another, with a perverted sporting instinct,
+seems to be trying to catch fish with a ladle (note
+the usual little channelled way, on which a bird
+is perched, refreshing itself), whilst a third is
+picking fruit. The three squires are doubtless
+talking of the chase, for, in my lady’s presence,
+love would hardly be their theme. And all
+around are beautiful flowers—roses, lilies, and
+irises. Over against the enclosing wall is the
+usual bank of earth, faced with wood to keep it
+the necessary height, and planted with many
+flowers. This raised portion enabled those in
+the garden to get a view over the surrounding
+country, and to have a point of outlook in case of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>
+attack. It also served as a seat; for at intervals,
+between the flowers and sweet-scented herbs,
+portions were covered with turf.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"><a name="harl3" id="harl3"></a>
+<img src="images/i186.jpg" width="500" height="558" alt="Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus." title="Manuscript 4425" />
+
+<p class="source"><i>Photo. Macbeth.</i></p>
+
+<p class="illoaut"><span class="smcap">Harl.</span> MS. 4425, <span class="smcap">Brit. Mus.</span></p>
+
+<p class="toface"><i>To face page 186.</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<p>Of all the flowers in the garden the rose
+“red and pale” was the greatest favourite, and
+many different sorts were planted there. To so
+many purposes were they put, and so great was
+the demand for them, that large quantities of
+roses frequently served as the payment of vassals
+to their lord. They were used for strewing the
+floor at the wedding-feast, or at the entertaining
+of some great baron. The fresh petals were
+sprinkled over the surface of the water in the
+bath, and were distilled to make the rose-water
+with which the knights and ladies washed their
+hands and faces when they left their much-curtained
+beds. Further, they were specially
+prized for garlands, the making of which was
+one of the favourite occupations of the ladies of
+the Middle Ages. Dante, who sums up the
+spirit of the Middle Ages from the simplest
+reality to the sublimest ideal, alludes to garlands
+and garland-making as amongst the joys of the
+Earthly Paradise. In his poet’s vision of the
+pageant of the Church Militant he sees the last
+company wreathed with red roses, emblems to
+him of Charity or Love. Boccaccio, in a more
+mundane atmosphere and a less august assemblage,
+also introduces us to this mediæval love of
+garlands. In a preamble to one of his tales he
+gives a dainty picture of the manners and pastimes
+of the gay folk of his day. Of the merry company,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>
+which his fancy makes to quit plague-stricken
+Florence for the country, where they tell
+stories to prevent monotony, he relates that, after
+dining in the cool shade, and before the story-telling
+begins, “the gentlemen walked with the
+ladies into a goodly garden, making chaplets and
+nosegays of divers flowers, and singing silently
+to themselves.” Both sexes wore them on festive
+occasions, and in summer young girls wore no
+head-covering save a garland. The knight at
+the tournament decked his helm with a chaplet
+of some chosen flower, deftly woven by the fair
+one in whose name he made venture; and many
+a merry company, wreathed with flowers or
+foliage, rode forth on May-day, with trumpets
+and flutes, to celebrate the festival.</p>
+
+<p>Another favourite flower for garlands was the
+cornflower, as we learn from the poets, who tell
+of ladies dancing the carole (a popular dance in
+which all moved slowly round in a circle, singing
+at the same time), their heads crowned with
+garlands of cornflower. Violets and periwinkles,
+and meadow flowers, white, red, and blue, were
+also gathered to indulge this pretty fancy.</p>
+
+<p>The gillyflower is another flower frequently
+mentioned. This name has been applied to
+various flowers, but originally it belonged to the
+carnation, and was used for such in Shakespeare’s
+time. In the <i>Roman de la Rose</i> it is called the
+gillyflower-clove, thus definitely defining it. One
+of its virtues, according to an old writer, was
+“to comfort the spirites by the sence of smelling,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>”
+and also “to be of much use in ornament.”
+But indeed most flowers were not only used
+for chaplets, and for strewing on the floor, but
+were also painted on the chamber walls, and
+embroidered on the hangings, to serve in winter
+days as sweet memories and as sweeter hopes.</p>
+
+<p>Apparently the earliest records of gardens,
+after Roman times, date from the ninth century,
+and are mostly to be found amongst monastic
+archives. A garden was an important, and even
+essential, annex of a monastery, not only because
+of the “herbularis” or physic garden, from the
+herbs of which the monks compounded salves
+and potions for the wounded knight or the
+plundered wayfarer who might take shelter
+within its protecting walls, but also because of
+the solace which the shady trees and the gay
+flowers brought to the sick, for a monastery was
+generally a hospital as well. St. Bernard of
+Clairvaux, speaking of an abbey garden, gives
+a charming picture of one of these cloistered
+pleasaunces for the sick and the aged. He
+says:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Within the enclosure of this wall many and various trees,
+prolific in various fruits, constitute an orchard resembling a
+wood, which, being near the cell of the sick, lightens the
+infirmities of the brethren with no moderate solace, while it
+affords a spacious walking place to those who walk and a
+sweet place for reclining to those who are overheated. Where
+the orchard terminates the garden begins. Here also a
+beautiful spectacle is exhibited to the infirm brethren: while
+they sit upon the green margin of the huge basin, they see
+the little fishes playing under the water and representing a
+military encounter by swimming to meet each other.</p></div><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>This warlike note seems strange and almost discordant
+in the midst of the peace of the cloister;
+but many, before seeking shelter there, had been
+doughty knights, and St. Bernard, man of the
+world as he was, would realise that even this
+mimic warfare might bring diversion to their
+tranquil seclusion.</p>
+
+<p>What a contrast to all this joy in the Middle
+Ages in gardens and flowers are the sober reflections
+of Marcus Aurelius! Philosopher as he
+was, he would have us learn from plants the
+lesson of cause and effect, the continuity of life.
+He says:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>The destruction of one thing is the making of another;
+and that which subsists at present is, as it were, the seed of
+succession, which springs from it. But if you take seed in the
+common notion, and confine it to the field or the garden, you
+have a dull fancy.</p></div>
+
+<p>It is with a sense of relief that we turn from
+the thoughts which a garden suggests to this
+stoic, to those not less profound, though perhaps
+more simple, of a Chinese writer of the fourth
+century:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>Ah, how short a time it is that we are here! Why then
+not set our hearts at rest, ceasing to trouble whether we remain
+or go? What boots it to wear out the soul with anxious
+thoughts? Let me stroll through the bright hours as they
+pass in my garden among my flowers.</p></div>
+
+
+<p class="center" style="padding-top: 2em; font-size: 70%"><i>Printed by</i> <span class="smcap">R. &amp; R. Clark, Limited</span>, <i>Edinburgh</i>.</p>
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> The quotations from the <i>Roman de la Rose</i> are taken from
+Mr. F.&nbsp;S. Ellis’s translation, published by Messrs. J.&nbsp;M. Dent &amp; Co.
+in the “Temple Classics.”</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> J.&nbsp;G. Frazer, <i>Adonis, Attis, Osiris</i>, 1906.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> <i>King’s Quair</i>, verse 31 <i>seq.</i></p></div>
+
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
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+</body>
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@@ -0,0 +1,5693 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Of Six Mediaeval Women, by Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Of Six Mediaeval Women
+       To Which Is Added A Note on Mediaeval Gardens
+
+Author: Alice Kemp-Welch
+
+Release Date: March 31, 2010 [EBook #31843]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OF SIX MEDIAEVAL WOMEN ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Meredith Bach, Irma Spehar and the Online
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+
+
+
+                         OF SIX MEDIAEVAL WOMEN
+                                 WITH
+                      A NOTE ON MEDIAEVAL GARDENS
+
+
+                      MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+                      LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA
+                               MELBOURNE
+
+                         THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
+                      NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO
+                        DALLAS . SAN FRANCISCO
+
+                   THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.
+                                TORONTO
+
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. de l'Arsenal, Paris._
+
+POET DECLAIMING TO ACCOMPANIMENT OF VIOL.
+
+_Frontispiece._]
+
+
+                         OF SIX MEDIAEVAL WOMEN
+                           TO WHICH IS ADDED
+                               A NOTE ON
+                           MEDIAEVAL GARDENS
+
+
+                                  BY
+                           ALICE KEMP-WELCH
+
+
+                  WITH INTRODUCTION AND ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+
+                      MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+                      ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON
+                                 1913
+
+
+COPYRIGHT
+
+
+
+
+AUTHOR'S NOTE
+
+
+The Author's acknowledgments are due to the Editor of _The Nineteenth
+Century and After_ for his kind permission to reprint such of the
+following studies as have already appeared in that Review, and also to
+"George Fleming" (Miss Constance Fletcher) for her rendering, on page
+146, of four verses of Christine de Pisan's poem on Joan of Arc.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+                                                                     PAGE
+
+INTRODUCTION                                                          xi
+
+A TENTH-CENTURY DRAMATIST, ROSWITHA THE NUN                            1
+
+A TWELFTH-CENTURY ROMANCE-WRITER, MARIE DE FRANCE                     29
+
+A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY MYSTIC AND BEGUINE, MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG       57
+
+A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY ART-PATRON AND PHILANTHROPIST, MAHAUT,
+  COUNTESS OF ARTOIS                                                  83
+
+A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY FEMINISTE, CHRISTINE DE PISAN                    116
+
+AGNES SOREL                                                          147
+
+A NOTE ON MEDIAEVAL GARDENS                                           173
+
+
+
+
+ILLUSTRATIONS
+
+                                                               FACE PAGE
+
+Poet declaiming to accompaniment of Viol                _Frontispiece_
+
+Roswitha presenting her Poem to the Emperor Otho I.,
+  the Abbess of Gandersheim standing at her side.
+  A. Duerer, 1501                                                     1
+
+Cover of St. Emmeran Gospels. 10th century                           7
+
+Marriage of Otho II. and Theophano. Byzantine, 10th century          7
+
+Lady playing Harp. Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.                       32
+
+Add. MS. 10293, Brit. Mus.                                          34
+
+Boat with Knights and Lady. Add. MS. 10294, Brit. Mus.              49
+
+Glaukos and Polyeidos in Tomb. Greek Vase, Brit. Mus.               52
+
+Statue of Mahaut in Abbey of La Thieuloye, near Arras, now
+  destroyed. From a Drawing, now in Brussels, made in 1602          99
+
+Marriage of Charles le Bel and Marie of Luxemburg. Grandes
+  Chrons. de France. Bib. Nat.                                     100
+
+Thirteenth-Century Treatise on Surgery, in French.
+  Sloane MS. 1977                                                  103
+
+Banquet, with Minstrels playing, and Room hung with
+  Embroidery. MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century.
+  Bodleian, Oxford                                                 104
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         105
+
+Christine de Pisan                                                 119
+
+Lady in Horse-Litter, returning from Tournament.
+  Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.                                       132
+
+La Cite des Dames                                                  138
+
+Setting out for Poissy. Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.                 140
+
+Tomb of Agnes Sorel                                                158
+
+Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier                                 162
+
+Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier                                 163
+
+Book of Hours, French, 14th century. Brit. Mus.                    176
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         177
+
+Flemish Master, 15th century. Stephenson Clarke Collection         181
+
+MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century                             183
+
+Rhenish Master, C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.                      185
+
+Harl. MS. 4425, Brit. Mus.                                         186
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+The recent researches of scholars and students have brought the study
+of mediaeval times within the range of almost any one who cares to live
+in imagination in the past. No part of this study has been more
+advanced and made more informing to us than that which regards the
+individual. This is specially true of womankind, of whom we have
+learnt somewhat, in some instances from their own writings, and in
+others from allusions to their work in those of contemporary and later
+writers, and also, incidentally, from the vast storehouse of didactic
+literature, which is so suggestive in itself, reflecting through
+successive centuries, as it seems to do, the standard of conduct of
+the large majority. But on this subject--a very large one, and only
+partially explored--light can only be thrown gradually. For this there
+are various reasons. One is that, until comparatively recent times,
+the small details of everyday life which go so largely to make up a
+woman's life, have generally been taken for granted by writers. Then
+the few mediaeval historiographers and chroniclers were principally
+engaged in recounting the deeds of kings and feats of arms. Then
+again, although probably many MSS. of the time still lie undiscovered
+in libraries, those that are known to us are scattered far and wide.
+Furthermore, self-advertisement was not a mediaeval fashion. It is
+perhaps difficult for us nowadays to understand a spirit of
+self-effacement. Self-esteem, which may develop for either good or
+ill, has perhaps always existed in the human breast, but certainly
+since the time of the Renaissance, when it seemed to have its own
+special revival, it has grown apace, and is to-day like unto the
+Mustard Tree of Holy Writ. But it is not proposed to contrast this our
+modern attitude with the impersonal one, if so it may be called, of
+the Middle Ages, because, whilst there were many humble, zealous
+workers then, just as there are now, it is possible there were other
+and perhaps more potent factors to account for this apparently humble
+attitude. In mediaeval days, the subject of a narrative or didactic
+work was considered so important, that an author would scarcely
+venture on any independent treatment of a theme for fear of incurring
+censure for a contempt of authority, or, if he did so venture, he
+would probably deem it wiser to do so anonymously, or by ascription
+to some departed celebrity, who was obviously not in a position to
+gainsay him. The writer was of much less interest than his ideas and
+sentiments. Then again there was the intense localisation of life.
+Localities were very independent of one another. Each was complete in
+itself, and within it there was no need for self-advertisement. It was
+the same in the wider life of associated religious communities, such
+as Benedictines, Cluniacs, and Cistercians, who had so much to do with
+the building of abbeys and cathedrals. Within a fraternity, the
+specially gifted craftsman was known, and wherever work was going on
+within the Order, was made use of as needs be, not as Brother This, or
+Brother That, but simply as scribe, or as artificer in Madonnas or
+gargoyles, or whatever else was wanted. The glorification of the
+community as a whole, and not the advertisement of the individual, was
+the desired goal. This self-effacement was not so much humility,
+though of course that too existed, as the special form which communal
+feeling took at that time. Now if this suppression of the individual
+was true of men, how much more true must it have been of women, who
+seldom ventured beyond town, or castle, or convent walls. In truth,
+women hardly appear on the scene, and English women least of all. It
+is only women who were prominent through their high official
+positions, either political or religious, such as Blanche of Castile,
+or St. Catherine of Siena, or the Abbess Hildegarde, or women like the
+Blessed Angela of Foligno,[1] or Julian, anchoress of Norwich,[2] or
+some other of the devout women of mediaeval Italy, who interpreted the
+mysteries of divine love to mediaeval society, having in fact, as it
+were, religious salons, from whom the veil has been withdrawn, and
+even amongst such as these it has sometimes been only very slightly
+lifted. With these saintly and political women must be mentioned the
+women doctors of Salerno--Trothula, Abella, Mercurialis, and
+others--who played so important a part both as professors and
+practitioners when this school of medicine was at its zenith in the
+eleventh and twelfth centuries, and who left behind them, as evidence
+of their learning, treatises which are of interest to-day as showing
+mediaeval methods in medicine.
+
+    [1] _The Book of the Divine Consolation of the Blessed Angela
+    of Foligno._ The New Mediaeval Library.
+
+    [2] _Revelations of Divine Love recorded by Julian, Anchoress
+    of Norwich, 1373._
+
+Still, even so, the records are scanty. In order, therefore, to form
+some idea and estimate of women generally in the Middle Ages, we must
+perforce fall back on reasoning from the known to the unknown, and,
+by studying the few who are recorded in written history, judge of that
+great majority who, though nameless, have yet so largely helped to
+make up the world's unwritten history. Just as many a flower blooms
+and dies unseen, so many a woman must have lived her life, serviceable
+to her special environment, but wholly unrecorded. Just as, in the
+course of ages, the seeds of some humble plant have been carried by
+wind or water from some lonely region to one less remote, and made to
+serve a purpose by adding to the sum-total of beauty and usefulness,
+so the thoughts and deeds of many an unremembered woman have doubtless
+passed into the great ocean of thought, encircling us to-day, and
+influencing us as a living force.
+
+Thus we have the women who figure in history, and whom we must take as
+types of the influential woman of the time, and the women whom history
+has not so honoured. Of the former, even when only portrayed in
+outline, we can learn something, but how are we to learn anything of
+the latter, whether living in the seclusion of religious houses or in
+the world? Of those living in religious houses, we know from records
+that, besides attending to their own spiritual and mental education
+and tending the sick, they conducted the cloister schools and taught
+in them needlework, the art of confectionery, surgery, writing, and
+drawing. They also wove, and embroidered, and added their mite to the
+sum-total of beauty by transcribing and illuminating MSS. of the
+Gospels and of the lives of the Saints. But sometimes such a limited
+sphere of activity was enlarged, and it is to an anonymous Anglo-Saxon
+nun of the eighth century, to whom the experiences were related, that
+we owe one of the earliest and most interesting accounts extant in
+Northern Europe of a journey to Palestine.
+
+To learn something of those living in the world, who were the
+inspirers, the helpmates, and the companions of men in everyday life,
+we must turn to the poems and romances. These form the key to the
+domestic life of the time. Though ordinary life may be somewhat
+idealised in them, still it is ordinary life on which they are based.
+Moreover, many of the MSS. in which they are written down contain
+miniatures--a legacy of exceeding worth to the student. But if we seek
+some knowledge of mediaeval life from miniatures, it is not necessary
+to confine our researches to MSS. of romances. Transcripts of the
+classics, of the moralised Bible, and of other religious works also
+supply many pictures of everyday life, adapted quite regardless of
+incongruity, for one of the characteristics of the Middle Ages was a
+profound incapacity to picture to itself anything _but_ itself, or to
+reconstitute in any way, as we do to-day, times and scenes not its
+own. This was owing partly to its vitality and its youthfulness, which
+grasped at anything and everything without discernment, and partly to
+its lack of reliable material. The whole aspect of life, too, was
+changed and enlarged, and for the moment over-charged, for the
+flood-gates of the East, hitherto only partially opened, had been rent
+asunder by the traveller and the crusader.
+
+Before we attempt to arrive at some idea of the manner of life of the
+women of the Middle Ages, it will be well, if possible, to modify what
+seems to be a general and perhaps a distorted impression of these
+women of bygone days, as regards their want of loyalty in their
+domestic relations, and all the deceit and cunning such a want led to.
+Without attempting to justify what is fundamentally wrong, let us go
+if we can into the region of fact, and in that region there is quite
+enough romance without introducing it from outside.
+
+In the first place, so much more, as a rule, is heard of vice than of
+virtue. "La voix de la beaute parle bas: elle ne s'insinue que dans
+les ames les plus eveillees." Then the standard of life in those days
+was very different from what it is to-day. Manners and customs which
+were accepted facts of everyday life then, would strike us as
+strangely rude and repellent now. Take, for instance, the attitude
+towards his queen of a king we have all been taught to revere--Arthur,
+the semi-saint, and the so-called pattern of courtesy. When Guinevere
+deserts him, and some of his knights are slain, his remark--not
+whispered into the ear of a confidant, but uttered aloud in the
+presence of all around him--is, "I am sorrier for my good knights'
+loss than for the loss of my fair Queen, for queens I might have
+enow." Such a sentiment, expressed in public, does not seem quite up
+to our modern standard of courteous, or even civilised, conduct, and
+yet here we have the sentiments of the Prince of Chivalry, as
+conceived by the poets of the thirteenth century. So it is obvious
+that before passing judgment upon the standard of life of the mediaeval
+woman, we must endeavour to arrive at the truth by thinking and living
+in imagination on the same plane, as near as may be, as she did.
+
+Then again, it is largely owing to certain stories in the Middle Ages
+that the women of those times have been defamed. If we consider the
+sources and the transcribers of these stories, we shall perhaps find a
+reason for their distorted outlines, filled in with so much
+imperfectly understood detail. Many of these tales originated in the
+East, and particularly in India, where the conditions of domestic life
+led to and favoured intrigue, and many of them also were mere
+allegory, in which the Eastern sought to hide great truths. These the
+less meditative Western interpreted literally, mistaking the outward
+form for that which it concealed. So in passing to the West, Eastern
+ideas and Eastern exaggeration, misconstrued, became caricature.
+Moreover, the compilers of these stories were often monks or minstrels
+who vied with each other for popular favour, the monk introducing into
+his legends material which he hoped would rival the often shameless
+outpourings of the minstrel, whilst the minstrel, for his part, tried
+to adorn his story with some moral. Naturally neither class of such
+purveyors was in the least capable of judging woman with respect, or
+indeed of judging woman at all.
+
+On the other hand, however, it must be remembered that there are
+stories that tell a very different tale, a tale of self-sacrifice and
+devotion in face of grievous trial, as, for instance, that of Eric and
+Enide, sung by Chretien of Troyes, and made familiar to us by
+Tennyson's poem of "Geraint and Enid." It is impossible that such a
+conception should have been the mere outcome of the poet's
+imagination, since a poet, whilst he may transform, focuses and
+reflects the ideas of his time. In truth, we find mediaeval
+literature, if we try to estimate it reasonably, gives a quite
+pleasing impression of womankind, whether we turn to some of the royal
+ladies who presided over brilliant Courts, where learning was
+encouraged and poets made welcome, or to the lady of lesser degree,
+who reigned supreme in her castle, at any rate when her lord was away,
+as was often the case in time of war or during attendance at Court, or
+to the abbesses who governed the religious houses they were set over,
+to their material and mental well-being, proving thus their genius for
+administration, and, in many instances, their rare intellectual
+attainments. A record in a chartulary of the Benedictine nunnery of
+Wherwell in Hampshire, now in the British Museum (Egerton MS., 2104),
+and accessible to all in translation in the second volume of the
+_Victoria History of the County of Hampshire_, may be mentioned in
+passing, since it gives such a charming picture of mediaeval convent
+life. It recounts the life and work of the Abbess Euphemia, who
+presided over the house from 1226 to 1257. Amongst her many good
+deeds, it is told of her that "with maternal piety and careful
+forethought, she built, for the use of both sick and sound, a new and
+large infirmary away from the main buildings," and that, besides
+caring thus for the bodily wants of her community, "she built there a
+place set apart for the refreshment of the soul, namely a chapel of
+the Blessed Virgin." The writer adds that "in numberless ways she
+provided for the worship of God and the welfare of the sisters," and
+that "she so conducted herself with regard to exterior affairs, that
+she seemed to have the spirit of a man rather than of a woman." The
+account is altogether delightful and informing, and should be read by
+any who would go in spirit to a mediaeval convent. It is therefore not
+surprising that in the late Middle Ages a regard and reverence for
+womanhood gradually arose--a regard and reverence for woman not merely
+as the weaker vessel, but as the principle of all good and of moral
+elevation. This attitude was also in large measure due to the
+inevitable fusion of the cult of the Virgin and the cult of woman,
+which in the thirteenth century developed into a faith. Then was it
+that religion and chivalry, in combination, formed the solvent that
+disintegrated the layer of selfishness--the outcome of the worship of
+brute force--that had settled over man's nobler instincts, and by
+their appeal to his better nature decided the position that woman, not
+only as an individual, but also as a class, was thenceforth to take in
+the civilised world.
+
+Let us now turn, first to the woman of the Romances and then to the
+woman of History. Each completes and is completed by the other. For
+the woman of the Middle Ages there were practically only two
+alternatives--to enter into the bonds either of Holy Matrimony or of
+Holy Church. In both cases the vows were, as a rule, taken early,
+especially in the case of marriage, so that the woman of the Middle
+Ages knew little of the joys of girlhood, with all its romantic
+castle-building and fondly fostered illusions. From playing with
+dolls, the child of twelve or even younger often suddenly found
+herself transformed into a wife. Although the Church had decreed that
+no girl should be wedded before the age of fifteen, this mandate was
+often ignored in noble families, where, through death, large fiefs had
+been left without a male representative and protector. In such a case
+the over-lord considered it necessary to assert his authority, and
+compel the marriage of some young girl of perhaps only twelve, so as
+to secure for her vassals and retainers a qualified leader, and for
+himself the needful and pledged military service. Still these
+marriages of convenience were often really happy arrangements, for the
+girl-wife had been trained to altruism, and its principles were the
+very essence of her daily life. Love, moreover, is a subtle sprite,
+and just as surely as he can spread his wings and fly away, so he can
+come, as if at unconscious bidding, and make for himself a
+dwelling-place.
+
+To get any true insight into the life of the woman of the Middle Ages,
+we must study the small everyday affairs, and to this end go, in
+imagination, to some castle, and see how the day is passed there by
+its lady. Perhaps it is a day in late spring. The watchman on the
+tower, heralding the day, has sounded his horn, and soon all the
+castle is astir. Leaving her curtained bed, she first offers a short
+prayer at the small shrine hanging close by with its flickering light.
+Then the bath, the water scented with aromatic roots and covered with
+rose-petals, is taken. Mass and the morning broth follow, and the day
+is considered fitly begun. The poor, or any sick and sorry folk, are
+the first to be considered, or perhaps there is some wounded knight,
+who has sought shelter within the protecting walls of the castle, for
+whom soothing potions or healing salves have to be compounded. This
+latter service was generally the work of the lady of the castle, who
+as a rule possessed sufficient surgical knowledge to bind a broken
+limb. To beguile the weary hours of convalescence, she sings to the
+lute, tells stories, recounts legends, or reads aloud a romance lately
+bought from some wayfaring packman. Little is it to be wondered at
+that the convalescence is protracted, or that the knight delays his
+departure from day to day, sometimes to his own and the lady's
+undoing.
+
+Beside such varied ministrations, the woman of the Middle Ages rode to
+the chase, went out hawking, snared birds with nets, ferreted rabbits,
+spun, wove, and embroidered. Embroidering was a really formidable
+occupation, for the great hall, and each room, had its special
+hangings, and on fete-days every inch of wall-space was covered. One
+set would picture an Arthurian legend, and others again were made
+bright with flowers, lilies, roses, and columbines. The lady and her
+maidens--often girls of noble birth, whom it was customary to send to
+some castle to complete their education--worked at the countless yards
+such decoration involved, and chatted the while, it may be, of some
+coming marriage or tourney, or perchance one among them would tell a
+story, and so time passed merrily enough. Then for the educated woman,
+of whom there were many, Latin verse offered a wide field of delight,
+and the woman of the Middle Ages read and loved her Virgil just as we
+of to-day read and love our Shakespeare. When the daylight had faded,
+there was always chess-playing, dancing the carole, and singing, and
+by the thirteenth century little pastoral ballets, in which a knight,
+and a shepherdess and her lover, took part, began to be produced for
+the diversion of castle-folk. For daily entertainment, every castle of
+any pretension had its own minstrel or minstrels, whilst in the
+smaller castles a wandering singer was warmly welcomed. Sometimes the
+lady gave audience to a poet, who read his latest idyll, a minstrel,
+to the accompaniment of his viol, singing the interspersed lyrics.
+Such a scene may be found depicted in miniatures, and suggests how
+such a story as "Aucassin and Nicolette," and many another, partly in
+prose, partly in verse, was rendered. One such miniature shows a lady
+reclining on a couch, with a lordling seated beside her, the poet,
+with his small parchment leaflets, declaiming his story, the minstrel
+waiting to take up the theme in song. It is of interest to note that
+in this particular miniature the gown of the lady is ornamented with
+heraldic devices. By such means we are enabled not only to identify
+the person represented--since portraiture, even if there was anything
+worthy of the name, was in a very rudimentary condition--and thus
+arrive at the approximate date of the picture, but also to verify a
+custom, and a stage in social life. It was not until the end of the
+twelfth century, when some sort of heraldic system became necessary
+owing to the introduction of the closed helmet, that armorial
+bearings, hitherto mere personal badges, became attached to noble
+families. By the thirteenth century, when the bourgeoisie had become
+rich, they were worn by the sumptuously attired wife of the lord to
+distinguish her from the equally sumptuously attired wife of the
+wealthy burgher.
+
+Such, in mere outline, was the daily life of the mediaeval lady.
+Descriptions of the lady herself seem to be mere replicas of an
+admired and fixed type, for there is in them such a sameness of
+delineation, that we can only imagine that poets sang of qualities
+that pleased, and did not attempt to individualise. All are good and
+gracious, beautiful, and slight of figure, with delicate hands and
+tapering fingers, small feet, fine and glossy hair, and grey eyes,
+laughing and bright. Only occasionally are these attractions varied
+and enhanced by the telling of beauty unaided by paint and hair dye.
+
+It is hardly necessary to speak, save very generally, of woman's
+dress, for much has already been written on the subject. For everyday
+use, garments of wool or linen, according to the season, and with much
+fur in winter, were worn. At weddings or tournaments, or on any other
+kind of fete-day, the ladies vied with each other in rich cloth of
+gold and silver, in silks woven with threads of gold and patterned
+with conventional design, and in all kinds of iridescent silken
+stuffs from the East. From Mosul, on the banks of the Tigris, whence
+the material we call muslin takes its name, was brought a fine silk
+gossamer, something like our _crepe de Chine_. This was used for the
+finely plaited underdress seen at the neck and foot of mediaeval
+costume. Perhaps the best representation of this, although stone seems
+hardly the most favourable medium for the delineation of so delicate a
+fabric, can be seen in the long slim figures of the queenly ladies
+standing in the niches on either side of the west door of Chartres
+Cathedral.
+
+But when we have contemplated this gorgeous and dainty apparel, and
+all the other personal luxury that accompanied it, such as enamelled
+and jewelled gold circlets for the head, jewelled girdles with each
+jewel chosen for its own special virtue, carved ivory combs, tablets
+and hand-mirrors, and the like, we are forced to wonder how all this
+refinement and beauty could go hand in hand with so much that is
+unpleasing. If we turn to consider the manners of the men, we find the
+same contrasts--on the one hand the maximum of gallantry and courtesy,
+and on the other a corresponding churlishness and brutality.
+Metaphorically and actually, the lance and the battle-axe were still
+rivalling each other in the warfare of daily life. Although the
+battle-axe must eventually yield to the lance, still strange extremes
+have flourished side by side all down the ages. Turning to but
+comparatively recent times, the coarseness we associate with much of
+the reign of Charles II. stands out in glaring contrast with the
+delicate, graceful poetry that found expression then. And coming still
+nearer to our own days, we think of the unseemly manners in the reigns
+of George III. and IV. and the dainty miniatures such as those painted
+by Cosway, and wonder how these could exist together. Might we not
+just as well wonder why the olive tree has a gnarled, distorted stem,
+whilst its delicate, symmetrical leaves, of the tenderest green grey,
+glisten in the sunshine like silvery shells fresh from ocean's bed?
+
+Renan, amongst the many thinkers on life's mysteries, tells us that
+"Life is the result of a conflict between contrary forces." But to
+philosophise is useless, and it is still more useless to question
+life's seeming anomalies. We can only bow in silence before "what Time
+in mists confounds."
+
+As has been already said, it is only a general idea of the women of
+the Middle Ages that can be gleaned from the Romances. For something
+to bring us into more real touch with them, and to reveal more of
+their personality, we must consider some who have made themselves
+known to us through their work, since history, until we come to the
+fourteenth century, is almost silent about them. Thus it is that as we
+study these women, it almost seems at first as if we were looking at
+some faded frescoes in a dimly lighted church. But just as the
+half-obliterated figures take form and life as our eyes grow
+accustomed to the dimness, and our minds get attuned to the days that
+knew their living representatives, so these women of whom we are
+speaking may live again for us if only we treat their works as human
+documents, and not as archaeological curiosities. The following pages
+tell of six such women who lived between the tenth century and the
+first half of the fifteenth--Roswitha, a nun of Germany; Marie de
+France, a lady at the Court of Henry the Second of England; Mechthild
+of Magdeburg, mystic and beguine; Mahaut, Countess of Artois, a
+great-niece of St. Louis; Christine de Pisan, an Italian by birth,
+living at the Court of Charles the Fifth of France; and Agnes Sorel,
+the Mistress and inspirer of Charles the Seventh.
+
+In trying to evoke the women of these days of long ago, it is hardly
+possible to do more than portray them in outline. Yet even so, if the
+outline be true, we may remember, for our consolation, that it has
+been said that we shall never, except in outline, see the mysterious
+Goddess Truth.
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+ROSWITHA PRESENTING HER POEM TO THE EMPEROR OTHO I., THE ABBESS OF
+GANDERSHEIM STANDING AT HER SIDE.
+
+A. Duerer, 1501.
+
+_To face page 1._]
+
+
+
+
+A TENTH-CENTURY DRAMATIST, ROSWITHA THE NUN
+
+
+In this age of personal curiosity, politely called psychological
+interest, when personalities are analysed with all the thoroughness of
+the dissecting theatre, it seems almost courting failure to try to
+call to remembrance one whose personality has long since faded away,
+and of whom, apparently, no contemporary writer has made mention. Of
+Roswitha, the woman, we know but little, and this little is gathered
+from her own writings.[3] Presumably the date of her birth was about
+A.D. 935, and that of her death about A.D. 973. There is a tradition
+that she was connected with the royal house of Germany, at that time
+represented by the enlightened Otho the Great. Be this as it may, her
+life for us begins when, probably at an early age, she entered the
+Convent of Gandersheim. Gandersheim was a Benedictine nunnery in the
+Harz Mountains, founded in the ninth century by Liudolf, Duke of
+Saxony, and important enough to entitle its Abbess to a Seat in the
+Imperial Diet, a right perhaps never exercised except by proxy. The
+story of its foundation, as told by Roswitha in the unique MS. of her
+works, is of strange beauty. Listen to her own words as she tells the
+tale:--
+
+    [3] The authenticity of these has been called in question by
+    some critics, but apparently upon insufficient data.
+
+     At that time there was, nigh unto the Monastery,[4] a little
+     wood, encircled by shady hills, those same hills by the
+     which we ourselves are surrounded. And there was, moreover,
+     in the wood a small farm where the swineherds of Liudolf
+     were wont to dwell, and within the enclosure of which the
+     men, during the hours of night, composed to rest their weary
+     bodies until the time when they must needs drive forth to
+     pasture the pigs committed to their care. Here, on a time,
+     two days before the Feast of All Saints, these same
+     herdsmen, in the darkness of the night, saw full many bright
+     lights glowing in the wood. And they were astonished at the
+     sight, and marvelled what could be the purport of this
+     strange vision of blazing light cleaving the darkness of the
+     night with its wondrous brilliance. And all trembling with
+     fear, they related unto their Master that which they had
+     seen, showing unto him the place which had been illumined by
+     the light. And he, desiring by very sight thereof to put to
+     proof that which he had heard tell, joined them without the
+     building, and began the following night, without sleeping,
+     to keep watch, closing not his eyes though they were weighed
+     down by the desire of slumber. And after a while he saw the
+     kindling lights, more in number than afore, once again burn
+     with a red glow, in the same place forsooth, but at an hour
+     somewhat earlier. And this glad sign of happy omen he made
+     known so soon as Phoebus shed his first rays from the sky,
+     and the joyous news spread everywhere. And this could not be
+     kept back from the worthy Duke Liudolf, but swifter than
+     speech did it come to his ears. And he, carefully observing
+     on the hallowed eve of the approaching festival whether
+     perchance some further like heavenly vision would clearly
+     show it to be an omen, with much company kept watch on the
+     wood all the night long. And straightway when black night
+     had covered the land with darkness, everywhere throughout
+     the wooded valley in the which the very noble temple was
+     destined to be built, many lights were perceived, the which,
+     with the shining splendour of their exceeding brightness,
+     cleft asunder the shades of the wood and the darkness of the
+     night alike. And thereupon, standing up and rendering praise
+     to God, they all with one accord declared it meet that the
+     place should be sanctified to the worship of Him who had
+     filled it with the light. And, moreover, the Duke, mindful
+     of his duty to Heaven, and with the consent of his dear
+     consort Oda, forthwith ordered the trees to be felled and
+     the brushwood cut away, and the valley to be completely
+     cleared. And this sylvan spot, aforetime the home of fauns
+     and monsters, he thus cleared and made fitting for the glory
+     of God. And then, before obtaining the money needful for the
+     work, he at once set out the lines of a noble church as
+     traced by the splendour of the red light.[5]
+
+    [4] The first foundation, afterwards removed to Gandersheim.
+
+    [5] For other instances of churches laid out on lines said to
+    have been revealed in dreams or visions, see Didron,
+    _Christian Iconography_, vol. i. (1886) pp. 381, 382, 460,
+    and Sta. Maria Maggiore, Rome.
+
+     In suchwise was the building of our second Monastery to the
+     glory of God begun. But stone suitable for the structure
+     could not be found in those parts, and thus the completion
+     of the sanctuary which had been begun, suffered delay. But
+     the Abbess Hathumoda, trusting to obtain all things from the
+     Lord by faith, oft-times, by serving God both night and day
+     with holy zeal, wore herself out with too abundant labour.
+     And with many of those placed under her care, she besought
+     the solace of speedy help from Heaven, lest the work so well
+     begun should be left unfinished. And of a sudden she became
+     aware that the divine grace which she sought was present,
+     ready to have compassion on her longings. For as she lay one
+     day prostrate nigh unto the altar, fasting and giving
+     herself up to prayer, she was bidden of a gentle voice to go
+     forth and follow a bird she would see sitting on the summit
+     of a certain great rock. And she, embracing the command with
+     ready mind, went forth, putting her trust in it with all her
+     heart. And taking with her very skilled masons, she sped
+     swiftly whither the kindly Spirit led her, until she was
+     come to the noble sanctuary which had been begun. And there
+     she saw, seated on the lofty summit of the self-same rock, a
+     white dove, the which, flying with outspread wings,
+     straightway went before her, tempering its flight in
+     unwonted way so that the virgin, walking with her
+     companions, might be able to follow in a straight course its
+     aerial track. And when the dove in its flight had come to
+     the place which we now know was not wanting in great stones,
+     it descended, and with its beak pierced through the
+     ground,[6] where, beneath the soil, many stones were
+     disclosed. And assured by this sight, the very worthy virgin
+     of Christ bade her companions clear away the heavy mass of
+     earth, and lay the spot bare. And this done, supernal and
+     devout piety presiding over the work, a great wealth of
+     mighty stones was brought to view, whence all the needful
+     material for the walls of the monastery already begun, and
+     of the church, could be obtained. Then, striving ever more
+     and more with all their heart, the builders of the temple
+     destined to be consecrated to the glory of God, laboured at
+     the work by night and by day.
+
+    [6] The intervention of a bird to aid in discovery was a
+    favourite tradition derived from antiquity. We may recall,
+    amongst many variants of the theme, the story of the
+    celebrated expedition of the Athenians to the Island of
+    Scyros to find and recover the body of Theseus. Theseus,
+    being a hero, the agent employed in the quest must likewise
+    be distinguished, and so the eagle, Zeus's bird, is alone
+    thought worthy to peck the earth and indicate the
+    resting-place of the demi-god.
+
+Thus does Roswitha tell how the work of the new Foundation was begun,
+the Duke Liudolf and his wife having already journeyed to Rome to ask
+of the Pope his blessing, as well as to beg of him, as a token of his
+favour, some sacred relics to deposit there. The Pope, giving them his
+blessing, thus makes answer to their request:--
+
+     There were here, aforetime, two mighty rulers--the most holy
+     Anastasius who presided over this See, and his co-apostle,
+     the holy Innocent. These, through their services to the
+     Church, were the most famous next after St. Peter and St.
+     Paul. With such care have the illustrious bodies of these
+     two been heretofore preserved by all the rulers of this
+     city, that never has any one been permitted to carry away
+     the least portion of them, and thus their sacred limbs
+     remain undiminished. But forasmuch as it is meet that I
+     yield to your pious request, I will grant you, without
+     recompense, tokens from both these sacred bodies, cut before
+     your very eyes from off the sacred bodies themselves, if so
+     be that you will make solemn oath to me to venerate these
+     relics in your community, of the which you have made
+     mention, preserving them for all time within your Church,
+     sacred hymns being there sung by night and by day, and a
+     light being alway kept burning. And of our apostolic right
+     we ordain, according to your request, that your community be
+     of our See, to the end that it may be secured from all
+     secular rule.
+
+And Liudolf, with glad heart, made promise of this, and returned home
+with the coveted relics.
+
+The MS., now at Munich, which tells this fascinating story of love and
+faith, was, it is considered, written about A.D. 1000, and was
+fortunately preserved in the Benedictine convent of St. Emmeran,
+Ratisbon, where the scholar and poet, Conrad Celtes, discovered it at
+the end of the fifteenth century. It also includes metrical legends, a
+fragment of a panegyric on the Emperor Otho, and six dramas. Of such
+worth were these latter counted, that when Celtes published the MS. in
+1501, Albert Duerer received a commission for an ornamental title-page,
+and for a frontispiece to each of the plays. It is by these dramas
+that Roswitha has distinguished herself in the world of letters; for
+although the legends contain points of interest, and are treated with
+skill, they are naturally not so unique as the dramas, nor do they
+reflect her personality in the same way. She herself tells us that the
+plays were written in imitation of the manner, but not of the matter,
+of Terence, and that her only desire in writing them was "to make the
+small talent given her by Heaven to create, under the hammer of
+devotion, a faint sound to the praise of God."
+
+But before considering her work, let us glance at her own life, and
+the life of contemporary Saxon nunneries.
+
+[Illustration: _Royal Library, Munich._
+
+COVER OF ST. EMMERAN GOSPELS.
+
+Tenth Century.
+
+_To face page 7._]
+
+Nearly one hundred and fifty years before the supposed date of
+Roswitha's birth, the hitherto untamed and warlike Saxons had been
+finally defeated by the mercenaries of Charlemagne, and, as one of the
+signs of submission, forced to embrace Christianity. But having
+submitted, they forthwith, and with an aptitude suggestive of the
+spirit of the modern Japanese, set themselves to appropriate,
+assimilate, and remodel for their own use, the rudiments of the
+civilisation with which they found themselves brought into contact. So
+speedy and so thorough was the transformation, that scarce a century
+passed ere the once powerful Frankish kingdom of Charlemagne bowed
+down before the strenuous Saxons, to whom the supreme power was
+transferred. Their Chief was elected king of the Germans, and some
+fifty years later their king, Otho the Great, after being crowned at
+Aix-la-Chapelle, the former centre of Frankish rule, received the
+Imperial Crown from the Pope in Rome. This displacement of the
+political centre was naturally followed by a complete displacement of
+artistic centres. Both these sides of life were fostered by Otho with
+a keen personal interest--the building up of his empire and the
+encouragement of art going hand in hand. Moreover, owing to his close
+ties with Italy and the East, and the element of classic tradition
+inevitably induced by such ties, art received an added stimulus and
+grace. Oriental monks were to be found in the monasteries. Learned men
+and artists were summoned from Italy and Constantinople. The number
+and influence of these were increased when Otho's son, afterwards Otho
+the Second, married Theophano, a Greek princess, who, bringing many
+compatriots in her train, sought to reflect in her German home
+something of the learning and splendour of the Byzantine Court. The
+ivory, shown in illustration, commemorating this marriage, is an
+example of the work of some Byzantine craftsman in her employ, whilst
+the jewelled and gold-wrought cover of the Gospels of St. Emmeran (now
+at Munich) shows to how high a level the goldsmith's art of the time
+had been raised by the influences alluded to.
+
+[Illustration: _Musee de Cluny, Paris._
+
+MARRIAGE OF OTHO II. AND THEOPHANO.
+
+Byzantine, 10th century.
+
+_To face page 7._]
+
+Perhaps the one place which retains in the most varied and
+concentrated form the traces of this wave of artistic development then
+passing over Germany, is Hildesheim. This is of interest here because
+the bishops of Hildesheim were specially appointed to perform the
+office of consecration of nuns at Gandersheim. It seems hardly
+possible that Roswitha could have seen its gifted bishop Bernward,
+himself a painter, and a worker in mosaic and metals, though owing to
+the uncertainty of the date of her death--one chronicler making it as
+late as 1002--it is just possible that she may have done so.
+Bernward's learning and artistic nature attracted the attention of the
+princess Theophano, who appointed him tutor to her son, the
+boy-emperor Otho the Third. Brought thus into touch with the many
+gifts presented on special occasions to the young Emperor by Greek and
+Oriental princes, as well as by "Scots" (_i.e._ Irish missionaries and
+emigrants settled in Germany), he, by taking with him to Court, from
+the School of Art established in his palace at Hildesheim, apt and
+talented youths, made use of these rare and beautiful offerings for
+the encouragement of the study of divers arts. Students also
+accompanied him when he went farther afield for study, for it is said
+of him that there was no art which he did not attempt, even if he
+failed to attain perfection.[7] Hildesheim thus became famous as a
+working-centre of fine art, especially in metals, and remained so down
+to the end of the Middle Ages. After a lapse of nearly a thousand
+years, the result of the labours of this artistic prelate and his
+pupils may still be seen in situ as it were. Besides jewelled
+service-books, there are chalices, incense burners, a gold
+candelabrum, and a jewelled crucifix, fashioned, if not in part by
+him, at least under his supervision. The entrance to the Cathedral is
+beautified with delicately wrought bronze doors, modelled, it may be,
+from those of Sta. Sabina, Rome, themselves considered to be of
+Oriental origin,[8] and in the transept rises a column adorned with
+bronze reliefs from the life of Christ, probably designed by the
+bishop either after his pilgrimage to Rome in 1001, when he had seen
+Trajan's column, or, as a recent writer suggests, from the "Juppiter
+and giant columns" of Roman Rhineland.[9]
+
+    [7] Thangmarus, "Vita Sti. Bernwardi," Migne, _Patrol. Lat._
+    140, col. 397. 6.
+
+    [8] Michel, _Histoire de l'Art_, 1905, Tome I. i. p. 258.
+
+    [9] _Journal of Studies_, vol. i. part i., 1911, article by
+    E. Strong, p. 24.
+
+We are tempted to recall other princesses whose marriages, and even
+more whose personalities, have influenced art and letters, but two
+must suffice us--the one, the beautiful and cultivated Anne of
+Bohemia, wife of Richard the Second, whose bridal retinue was in
+reality a small Court of literary and artistic personages; the other,
+the brilliant Valentine Visconti of Milan, sister-in-law of King
+Charles the Sixth of France, whose influence in matters of art and
+literature alone, at a time when England and France were so intimately
+associated, makes her of special interest to us.
+
+But what bearing, it may be asked, had Court life on the life of the
+nun Roswitha in the convent of Gandersheim? To answer this question we
+must recall briefly the position of the early religious houses, and
+especially those of Saxony. Many of the foundations were royal, and,
+in return for certain privileges, were obliged to entertain the king
+and his retinue whenever he journeyed. Such sojourns naturally brought
+a store of political, intellectual, and other information to the
+favoured house. Added to this, the abbess of such a house, generally a
+high-born and influential woman, was, in her position as a ruler of
+lands as well as of communities, brought into direct contact with the
+Court and with politics. To her rights of over-lordship were attached
+the same privileges and duties as in the case of any feudal baron. She
+issued summonses for attendance at her Courts, at which she was
+represented by a proctor, and, when war was declared, she had to
+provide the prescribed number of knights. In some cases her influence
+was supreme, even in imperial affairs, extending also to matters
+social and literary. Roswitha tells us how much she herself owed to
+the two successive abbesses under whose rule she lived, for
+suggestion, information, and encouragement in her literary work.
+
+The convents of Saxony, as many elsewhere in the tenth and eleventh
+centuries, were centres of culture in the nature of endowed colleges.
+In some of them women resided permanently, and besides their religious
+exercises, devoted themselves to learning and the arts, for the Church
+of the Middle Ages took thought for the intellect as well as for the
+soul. In others, no irrevocable vows were made, and if desire or
+necessity arose, the student inmate was free to return to the world.
+In others again, though residence was permanent, short leave of
+absence from time to time was granted by the abbess, and the nun was
+able to sojourn with her friends, or to visit some sister community.
+But at Gandersheim the rule was strict, and a nun, her vows once
+taken, had to remain within the convent walls. Yet even so, life there
+was perhaps far less circumscribed than in many a castle, where the
+men gave themselves up to war and the chase, and the women perforce
+spun and embroidered and gossiped, since to venture without the walls
+was fraught with difficulty and sometimes with danger. Even if there
+were some who cared to read, and who would fain go in imagination to
+other scenes and times, MSS. were difficult to come by, and costly
+withal. Wholly different was it in the religious houses. In these,
+women associated with their equals, with whom they could interchange
+ideas, and the library was well furnished with MSS. of classical and
+Christian writers. One of the first cares of St. Benedict, in the case
+of every newly founded house, was the formation of the library. So
+held in honour did this tradition become, and so assiduously was it
+pursued, that the status of a monastery or a convent, as a centre of
+learning, came to be estimated by its wealth in MSS. Besides the mass
+of transcribing which such rivalry occasioned, there was illuminating
+to be done, musical notation to be studied and prepared for the
+services of the Church, chants and choir-singing to be practised, and
+the needful time to be devoted to weaving and embroidery--a part of
+every woman's education. Weaving had of necessity to be done in every
+convent in order to provide the requisite clothing for its inmates,
+and the large and often elaborate hangings used for covering the
+walls. Embroidery, on the other hand, was no mere occupation, or even
+a craft, but in truth a fine art. The few specimens still preserved
+give some idea of the quality of the work, whilst old inventories
+attest the quantity. Illuminated MSS. of the Gospels and the
+Apocalypse were lent from royal treasuries, and their miniatures were
+copied, with needle and silk, to adorn vestments and altar hangings.
+Then at Gandersheim, as we have already said, the occasional visits of
+princely travellers brought interest and diversion from the outside
+world. It was in an atmosphere such as this that Roswitha passed her
+days.
+
+Of her work, the metrical legends seem her earliest effort. In these,
+though they are mainly based on well-known themes, Roswitha shows much
+originality in description. Whilst they need not detain us, passing
+reference may be made to two of them--the Passion of St. Pelagius of
+Cordova, and the Fall and Conversion of Theophilus--since their
+subject matter is of value to us to-day. The one interests us because,
+in relating that the story was told her by an eye-witness of the
+martyrdom in A.D. 925 (_Acta SS._ Jun. V.), she shows that
+communication existed between that great intellectual centre, Cordova,
+and Germany, a fact that must have had considerable influence on art
+and literature; the other as being the story out of which the Faust
+legend was developed.
+
+After these legends, we turn to her panegyric on the Emperor Otho.
+This she opens by acknowledging her debt to the Abbess Gerberg, niece
+of Otho the Great, for aiding her in her literary work with her
+superior knowledge, and for giving her the necessary information
+concerning the royal doings. Then by humbly likening her mental
+perplexity and fear on entering upon so vast a subject to the feelings
+of one who has to cross a forest in winter when snow has obliterated
+the track, she in a few words pictures for us the natural wooded
+surroundings of the convent. Her poem--for such it really is--then
+sets forth the personal history of this monarch and his predecessors,
+rather than public events, and is thus of value more on account of its
+poetical than its historical quality. But one episode, picturesque in
+its quaint setting, and interesting historically because its stirring
+details are not to be found elsewhere, is worthy of record. It
+centres round Adelheid, the young and beautiful widow of Lothair, a
+Lombard king. Taken prisoner by his successor, the tyrant Berengarius,
+she is immured in a castle on the Lago di Garda, and threatened with a
+forced marriage with the son of her oppressor. This threat seems to
+endow her with superhuman power. Bidding defiance to all difficulty
+and danger, she contrives gradually to dig a secret way through the
+soft earth, and suddenly finds herself free. Dawn is just breaking.
+But how can she make use of her freedom before her guards awake and
+discover her escape? Quickly is her mind made up. But let Roswitha
+herself tell the story:--
+
+     As soon as black night yielded to the twilight, and the
+     heavens began to pale before the rays of the sun, warily
+     hiding herself in secluded caves, now she wanders in the
+     woods, now lurks in the furrows amongst the ripe ears of
+     Ceres, until returning night, clothed in its wonted gloom,
+     again veils the earth in darkness. Then once more is she
+     diligent to pursue her way begun. And her guards, not
+     finding her, all-trembling make it known to the officer
+     charged with the safe keeping of the lady. And he, struck to
+     the heart with the terror of grievous fear, set forth with
+     much company to make diligent search for her, and when he
+     failed, and moreover could not discover whither the most
+     illustrious queen had turned her steps, fearful, he made
+     report of the matter to King Berengarius. And he, at once
+     filled with exceeding wrath, forthwith sent his dependants
+     everywhere around, commanding them not to overlook any small
+     place, but cautiously to examine every hiding-place, lest
+     perchance the queen might be lying hid in any one. And he
+     himself followed with a band of stout-hearted troops as if
+     to overcome some fierce enemy in battle. And rapidly did he
+     pass on his way through the self-same corn-field in the
+     which the lady whom he sought was lurking in the bent-back
+     furrows, hidden beneath the wings of Ceres. Hither and
+     thither forsooth he traversed the very spot where she lay,
+     burdened with no little fear, and although, with great
+     effort, he essayed with outstretched spear to part the corn
+     around, yet he discovered not her whom by the grace of
+     Christ it concealed.
+
+From the sheltering corn Adelheid effects her escape, and after weary
+wandering, reaches the Castle of Canossa, the stronghold of the Counts
+of Tuscany. Any one who has visited this now ruined castle, some
+twenty miles from Parma, will remember the threadlike way between
+rocks covered with brambles, by which its eyrie height is approached.
+Up this steep track the queen, fearful of any pause, hastens, and
+finds a welcome and ready help. The Count becomes her champion, and
+appeals on her behalf to the Emperor Otho. The latter, glad of an
+excuse to further his cause in Italy, descends with his troops into
+the Lombard plain, weds the beautiful Adelheid, and receives the
+formal cession of the so-called kingdom of Italy from Berengarius and
+his son, whose power had ebbed away in their futile attempts to
+control their feudatories.
+
+Roswitha's thrilling narrative is amplified by the graphic account
+recorded by St. Odilo, Abbot of Cluny, Queen Adelheid's friend and
+one-time confessor. In this he tells us that during Adelheid's
+imprisonment in a castle on the Lago di Garda, her chaplain Martin
+succeeds in making a hole in the wall, through which the queen and her
+maidservant, disguised as men, creep. He does not recount the episode
+of the hiding in the corn, but relates another equally stirring
+adventure. He tells us that, in fleeing from their persecutor to the
+safety of Canossa, the fugitives become involved in a swamp. After two
+days, they are rescued from their perilous position by a fisherman
+who, passing near by, and hearing sounds of distress, goes to their
+aid. Their deliverer, finding them faint with hunger and cold, lights
+a fire with the flint he carries in his wallet, and cooks some small
+fish, the only food he has to offer them. Once more they start on
+their way, and eventually reach Canossa. But hardly do they gain
+admittance, ere the castle is surrounded by the soldiery of the
+outwitted and wrathful Berengarius. A knight, carrying a message from
+the Emperor Otho of promised deliverance, essays to enter the castle,
+but finding this impossible owing to the hostile troops encamped
+around, he fastens the letter to an arrow, and shoots it over the
+wall. A strong force sent by Otho is near at hand, and speedily puts
+the enemy to flight. Adelheid is rescued, and is brought with
+rejoicing to Pavia, her dower city, which had already opened its gates
+to the Emperor, and she and the Emperor enter the city together in
+triumph. Much has been written of the illustrious Adelheid, but
+perhaps she would best like to be remembered by the eulogy of her
+confessor--the saintly Odilo--that she never forgot a kindness, or
+remembered an injury.
+
+It is in a spirit far different from that of her panegyric on the
+emperor Otho that Roswitha writes her dramas. Fear and mental
+perplexity no longer possess her. Though humbly begging the reader not
+to "despise these strains drawn from a fragile reed," she has no
+misgiving, for she feels that herein lies her mission. She explains
+her reason for using the dramatic form, and for taking Terence as her
+model. There are many, she says,--and she does not entirely exonerate
+herself,--who, beguiled by the elegant diction of the Classics, prefer
+them to religious writings, whilst there are others who, though
+generally condemning heathen works, eagerly peruse the poetic
+creations of Terence because of the special beauty of his language.
+She further expresses the hope that by trying to imitate his manner,
+and by at the same time dramatising legends calculated to edify, she
+may induce readers to turn from the "godless contents of his works" to
+the contemplation of virtuous living. Emboldened by this pious hope,
+Roswitha shrinks from no difficulties or details, details which might
+well have made her hesitate, and which, betraying a knowledge of the
+world, have raised the question as to whether she made her profession
+as early as was customary. This solicitude of Roswitha for the welfare
+of frail and all too human mankind recalls St. Bernard's condemnation,
+some hundred and fifty years later, of all carving in church or
+cloister, when he says, "one reads with more pleasure what is carven
+in stones than what is written in books, and would rather gaze all day
+upon these singular creations than meditate upon the Divine Word."
+
+It has been maintained that the classic theatre decayed and
+disappeared as Christianity became all-powerful in Europe, and that
+the modern theatre seemingly arose in the twelfth century out of the
+services of the Church, and owed no debt to the past. But neither
+Nature nor Art works in this way except to our own unperceiving minds.
+After the fall of the Roman Empire, and the consequent disruption of
+society, classic civilisation gradually withdrew into the security of
+the religious communities, seeking, like distraught humanity, shelter
+and protection. It was in such tranquil atmosphere as this that Latin
+drama, though condemned in substance, was fostered and favoured as an
+education in style. Roswitha's plays may, as has been said, have been
+the last ray of classical antiquity, but if so, it was a ray, like the
+pillar of fire, bright enough to guide through the dark night of
+feudalism to the coming day.
+
+Whether her dramatic efforts were an isolated phenomenon or not, must
+remain undecided, but it is reasonable to assume that any work
+surviving to the present day is but a sample of much else of the same
+sort that has disappeared in the course of time. Still all we would
+claim for them, apart from their intrinsic value and interest, is that
+they helped to keep up continuity in the tradition of drama. The
+gradual movement in the Church towards elaboration in its services
+which began in the ninth century,--a movement which led to the
+dramatising of the Mass, out of which the liturgical drama, and
+eventually the miracle-play, were evolved,--was a popular movement. To
+a people ignorant of Latin, yet fond of shows, it provided instruction
+and diversion alike. Roswitha, on the other hand, avowedly wrote for
+the literary world, and with a special end in view as regards that
+world. To attain this end, she set before her, as her master in style,
+Terence, who himself had aimed at a high ideal of artistic perfection,
+and of whom it has been said that he perpetuated the art and genius of
+Menander just as a master engraver perpetuates the designs of a great
+painter whose works have since perished. Still, in spite of the
+glamour of the style to which she aspires, and poetess though she is
+by nature, her plays reflect the handiwork of the moralist rather than
+that of the artist, for though beauty charms her by the way, her goal
+is moral truth, and to this all else must yield. If we would see the
+beauty of holiness as she saw it, we must enter in spirit within the
+shrine of her thought and feeling, just as the traveller, standing
+without the simple brick exterior of the tomb of Galla Placidia, at
+Ravenna, must penetrate within if he would know of the beauty there
+enshrined. "Il faut etre saint, pour comprendre la saintete."
+
+The subject which dominates her horizon is that of Chastity. Treated
+by her with didactic intent, this really resolves itself into a
+conflict between Christianity and Paganism,--in other words, between
+Chastity and Passion,--in which Christianity triumphs through the
+virtue of Woman. But at the same time Roswitha neither contemns
+marriage nor generally advocates celibacy. She merely counsels, as the
+more blessed, the unmarried state. Yet even so, we feel that beneath
+her nun's garb there beats the heart of a sympathetic woman, whose
+emotional self-expression is but tempered by the ideals of her time
+and her surroundings.
+
+Another important element to be taken into account in her plays is the
+part she assigns to the supernatural. It is impossible to develop
+character with any continuity when the supernatural, like some sword
+of Damocles, hovers continually overhead, ready to descend at any
+moment and sever cause from effect. Such a sword was the Divine
+Presence to Roswitha. When her plot requires it, she introduces a
+miracle, converting a character, at a moment's notice, and in a way
+that no evolution could possibly effect, into one of a totally
+different kind. Still to her audience such a _denouement_ would be
+quite satisfactory. With her, sudden changes and conversions but
+reflect the ideas which possessed the minds of her contemporaries, who
+realised God more in deviations from, than in manifestations of, law
+and order.
+
+Were her plays ever performed? To this question no certain answer can
+be given, since no record has yet been found of their performance, and
+the best critics are at variance on the subject. But judging from
+analogy, there seems to be no reason why they should not have been. We
+know that as early as the fifth and sixth centuries the monks played
+Terence, probably on some fete-day, or before their scholars as a
+means of instruction, and doubtless Roswitha's plays were also acted
+on special occasions, such as when the Emperor sojourned at
+Gandersheim, or the Bishop made a visitation. As they were written in
+Latin, the literary language of the time, this in itself, even if
+their themes had appealed to the people, would have prevented them
+from being performed save before the educated few. So if we would
+picture to ourselves a performance of one of them by her companion
+nuns in the Chapter House, or it may be in the refectory, it must be
+before the Bishop and his clergy, and perhaps also some members of the
+Imperial family, and lords and ladies of the Court. How refreshing
+must such an entertainment have been to this distinguished company as
+it found itself carried away into an atmosphere of poetry and passion,
+of movement and colour, in place of the sobriety induced by the stiff
+liturgical dramas that probably formed the usual diversion! Such a
+drama was that of _The Wise and Foolish Virgins_, a specially
+favourite old-world dramatic exercise, dispensed as a sort of
+religious tonic to womankind, calculated to arouse slumbering souls,
+or to quicken to still further effort those that did not slumber. For
+us, its chief interest lies in the antiphonic arrangement of the
+dialogue, in which we may trace the first germs of characterisation,
+and in the music, the refrains of which contain the first suggestions,
+as far as we know, of the principle of the leitmotiv, a principle
+carried to its most complete development by Wagner. Although the
+earliest known MS. of it is of the eleventh century, so finished, yet
+so simple, are its dialogues and refrains, that it seems not
+unreasonable to infer that the form of the play was well known, either
+through some earlier MS. or through oral tradition. It is only a
+slight development of the elegy in dialogue which was performed in
+A.D. 874, at the funeral of Hathumoda, the first abbess of
+Gandersheim. This dialogue takes place between the sorrow-stricken
+nuns, who speak in chorus of their loss, and the monk Wichbert, who
+acts as consoler. Although its form is liturgical, its subject
+entitles it to be considered the earliest known mediaeval dramatic work
+extant.
+
+Of Roswitha's dramas, three seem to stand out as of special
+interest--_Abraham_, _Callimachus_, and _Paphnutius_. All of these are
+more or less patchwork adaptations from the legendary debris of
+antiquity. The first appears to have been taken by Roswitha from a
+Latin translation of a fourth-century Greek legend.[10] Whilst she
+does not display any originality in elaborating the story, but keeps
+carefully to the text--so much so that at times she merely
+transcribes--she reveals her artistic as well as her psychological
+instinct by concentrating the essentials, thereby transforming a
+rather discursive composition into a poignant picture. The subtle
+touches, the sentiment, and the dialogue so pathetic and so true to
+nature, make this drama verily her masterpiece, and one worthy of a
+place beside the delicate and dramatic miniatures of the time. In a
+few words, here is the story. A holy man, by name Abraham, has
+abandoned a life of solitude in order to take care of his young
+orphaned niece. After a few years, she is tempted to a house of ill
+fame. Some two years later, her uncle, having discovered her
+whereabouts, determines to exchange his hermit garb for that of a man
+of the world, and go to the house in the guise of a lover, so as to
+get an opportunity of speaking with his niece alone. Of course she
+does not recognise him in his change of costume, and when he asks for
+a kiss, she puts her arms round his neck, and suddenly detects a
+strange perfume. Instantly a change comes over her. The scent recalls
+to her her former unsullied life, and tears fill her eyes. At the
+fitting moment the uncle makes himself known, and showing her with
+sweet words of sympathy and encouragement that sin is natural to
+humanity, and that what is evil is to continue in it, takes her back
+with him to begin afresh the simple good life.
+
+    [10] Migne, _Patrol. Lat._ lxxiii.
+
+The second play recounts an incident taken from the apocryphal Acts of
+the Apostles, supposed to take place in the first century. A young
+heathen, Callimachus, falls in love with a young married woman, a
+Christian. She dies, and is buried the same day. That night
+Callimachus goes to the grave, and with the help of a slave disinters
+the body. Holding it in his arms, and triumphing in the embrace denied
+to him in life, he suddenly falls dead. In the morning the husband and
+St. John, coming to the cemetery to pray for her soul, see the rifled
+grave and the two dead bodies. St. John, at the command of Christ, who
+appears for but a moment, restores them both to life, and brings to
+repentance the young man, who, in further amendment of his ways,
+becomes a Christian. This mere outline of the play is given to suggest
+points of resemblance between it--the first sketch of this kind of
+drama of passion, the frenzy of the soul and senses--and the
+masterpiece of this type, _Romeo and Juliet_.
+
+Many passages in the plays of Roswitha remind us of Shakespeare, but
+it is not possible to deal adequately with them here, nor does it seem
+material to do so. There is no reason why Shakespeare should not have
+seen a printed collection of her dramas. He, like Dante, seems to have
+had the power of attracting material from every possible source, and
+it should not be forgotten what a sensation was caused by Celtes
+printing in 1501 Roswitha's MS. But, on the other hand, the
+similarities we notice may be a mere coincidence, or, as is much more
+likely, the details in each case may have been common property handed
+down from one generation to another.
+
+In her play of _Paphnutius_, Roswitha made use of a story taken from
+the _Historia Monachorum_ of Rufinus, a contemporary of St. Jerome,
+who had journeyed through Palestine and Egypt to visit the Hermits of
+the Desert. The mention, too, at the beginning of Rufinus's account,
+of a musician who tells of his retirement to a hermitage in order to
+change the harmony of music into that of the spirit, evidently
+suggested to her a discussion on music and harmony, probably adapted
+from Boethius's _De Musica_. In this discussion lies the chief
+interest of the play as giving us some idea of the sort of
+intellectual exercises probably practised by women in convents in the
+tenth century. The play opens with a truly mediaeval scene,--a
+disputation between a hermit and his disciples on the question of
+harmony between soul and body, suggested by the want of it in the life
+of the courtesan Thais. Such harmony _should_ exist, says the holy
+man, for though the soul is not mortal like the body, nor the body
+spiritual like the soul, we shall, if we follow the method of the
+dialecticians, find that such differences do not necessarily render
+the two inharmonious. Harmony cannot be produced from like elements or
+like sounds, but only by the right adjustment of those which are
+dissimilar. This discussion on harmony naturally leads to one on
+music, which is divided, according to the then received writers on the
+subject, into three kinds--celestial, human, and instrumental. Music,
+in the Middle Ages, was, for dialectical purposes, treated in
+accordance with the Pythagorean theory as interpreted by Cicero in his
+_Somnium Scipionis_, who represented the eight revolving spheres of
+heaven--the Earth being fixed--as forming a complete musical octave.
+Such celestial music forms the subject of the argument in Roswitha's
+play, the music of Earth being merely touched upon. Why, it is asked,
+do we not hear this music of the spheres if it exists? To this comes
+the answer that some think it is because of its continuity, others
+because of the density of the atmosphere, and others again because the
+volume of sound cannot penetrate the narrow passage of the human ear.
+And so with subtle argument, the music of Heaven was often drowned in
+the din of Earth. Dante, in the _Paradiso_, lifted the idea once more
+from Earth to Heaven, and clothed it in a wealth of gorgeous imagery.
+But it is Shakespeare who, with the magic of a few words, has given
+the thought immortality.
+
+    There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st
+    But in his motion like an angel sings,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Such harmony is in immortal souls;
+    But whilst this muddy vesture of decay
+    Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
+
+In judging of Roswitha's dramatic work it must be remembered that, in
+true mediaeval spirit fearing to profane what she venerates, she allows
+herself but little licence with the legends she dramatises.
+Nevertheless, as has been said, she from time to time shows, in
+psychological touches, a capacity for originality quite phenomenal for
+her time and for the literature of the cloister. Still her plays
+express but a very small part of the whole gamut of human emotions and
+experiences, just as her life was lived in an intellectual world
+narrow from the point of view of to-day or of the great intellectual
+age of antiquity. Many causes contributed to this. Intellectually, the
+Christian world shrank as Paganism was superseded by Christianity, a
+supersession by no means complete in Roswitha's day. Of course this
+nascent Christianity was inconsistent with much of the intellectual
+life of the ancient world, which was either inextricably interwoven
+with Paganism, or essentially anti-religious. With its task of laying
+afresh the foundations of education, politics, and morality, it had to
+take root and become established in a relatively narrow intellectual
+field, the boundaries of which had gradually to be broken down,
+sometimes with violence.
+
+Time, like some lens which clears our vision, makes it an easy task to
+criticise and condemn a phase of religious life which, having essayed
+to tranquillise and sweeten existence, was, under altered conditions
+of civilisation, bound to pass away. We of to-day pride ourselves on
+a wider view of life, on a higher conception of duty, expressed in
+lives dedicated to public work as a necessary complement to private
+virtue. Still, if we would judge fairly this age of contemplation and
+faith within the convent walls, and all that, even if done mistakenly
+and imperfectly, it aspired to do, we must realise, as best we can,
+the world without those walls. One of our poets has vividly reflected
+it for us when he speaks of man's life as made up of "whole centuries
+of folly, noise, and sin." So bitter was life then and even later,
+that by the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, when mysticism had
+claimed many votaries, eternal rest, even at the cost of personal
+annihilation, was the whispered desire of many devout souls.
+
+"A Simple Stillness." "An Eternal Silence." These are the words that
+float across the centuries to us, like echoes from troubled, longing
+hearts. These are the words that give us the key to the understanding
+of the choice of vocation of the mediaeval woman. The spiritual need
+for harmony and peace may have been great; the practical need was
+perhaps even greater; for in its accomplishment the spiritual found
+its consummation.
+
+
+
+
+A TWELFTH-CENTURY ROMANCE-WRITER, MARIE DE FRANCE
+
+
+"Marie ai nom, si sui de France." Thus, more than seven centuries ago,
+wrote Marie de France. What an unpretentious autobiography! Yet these
+few simple words, which seem to tell so little, but in reality suggest
+so much, are the counterpart of her work, and form its fitting crown.
+
+But who was this modest writer, and why does her work interest us
+to-day? Around Marie de France there must always remain an atmosphere
+of doubt and mystery, since she is only mentioned by an anonymous
+thirteenth-century poet, and by one of her contemporaries--an
+Anglo-Norman poet, Denys Pyramus by name--who speaks of her in the
+most flattering terms, and from whom we learn that her lays were much
+appreciated by the noblesse, especially the ladies. That these should
+take rare delight in them may well be, seeing how monotonous life must
+have been to many a woman shut up with her maidens and her needlework
+in a dismal castle, or perhaps in but one tower of it, whilst her
+lord went forth to the chase or to war, his home-coming meaning merely
+the wine-cup and war-songs, or tedious epic. Many a one must have read
+or listened to Marie's love idylls, and longed, and perhaps even
+hoped, as in the story of "Yonec," that a fair and gentle knight, in
+the form of some beautiful bird, might fly in at her window and bring
+her some diversion from the outside world. With nothing before us but
+her own poems and the scant recognition of Denys Pyramus, she seems
+like some old portrait in which the delicate pigments that once glowed
+in the face and made it live have, owing to their very delicacy, long
+since faded away, leaving behind only the stronger and less volatile
+colours of the dark background from which we in vain try to wrest more
+than one or two fragments of the secret it holds.
+
+Judging from internal evidence, it would seem that Marie was born in
+Normandy, about the middle of the twelfth century, but settled in
+England, where since the Conquest, and indeed since the time of Edward
+the Confessor, many Norman families had made their home. Not only does
+she make occasional use of English words, and translate from English
+into French the fables known as AEsop's, but in the prologue to her
+_Lays_, which she dedicates to "the noble King," generally considered
+to be Henry the Second, she expresses fear lest her work should not
+find favour in a foreign land. In this prologue she also gives her
+reason for abandoning classical translation, which, as a Latin
+scholar, she had contemplated making, not only for the use of the less
+learned, but also, as she tells us, for personal discipline, since "he
+who would keep himself from sin, should study and learn and undertake
+difficult tasks. In suchwise he may the more withdraw him and save
+himself from much sorrow." The twelfth century was a time of
+extraordinary intellectual activity, and Marie tells us that she
+suffered from what we are apt to regard as a special evil of our own
+day--the overcrowding of the literary market. So she wisely turned
+aside from the Classics and the crowd, and set herself to give
+literary expression to the old Celtic folk-lore, hitherto perhaps
+unrecorded save in song.
+
+Of Marie's work that has come down to us we have _The Fables_, already
+mentioned, dedicated to Count William, surnamed Longsword, and son of
+Henry the Second and Fair Rosamond;[11] _The Lays_, dedicated to the
+king, Henry the Second, and doubtless read by Fair Rosamond in her
+retreat at Woodstock; and _The Purgatory of St. Patrick_, translated
+from the Latin at the request of an anonymous benefactor. Of these
+only _The Lays_ need here concern us, as it is in them that our
+interest lies, since they are perhaps among the first stories, given
+literary form, which tell of love "for love's sake only,"--love
+unqualified and unquestioning. They form, perhaps, the only collection
+of lays now extant, and it is to them, therefore, that we must turn to
+get some idea of the style of narration that gradually replaced the
+taste for the epic as Norman influence grew and spread in England.
+Beside the sensualism of the _Chansons de Geste_, the sentiment
+expressed in them may seem naive; beside the gallantry of the
+Provencal poetry, it may seem primitive; but nevertheless it is, in
+its very simplicity, the profoundest note that can be struck in this
+world of men and women. Marie makes no pretence to originality, but
+even if she did not possess the supreme gift of creating beauty, she
+at least possessed the lesser gift of perceiving it where it existed
+and of making it her own, and her stories glow with colour, and
+enchant by their simple yet dramatic appeal to the imagination. She
+declares that _The Lays_ were made "for remembrance" by "Le ancien
+Bretun curteis," and that "Folks tell them to the harp and the rote,
+and the music is sweet to hear." Doubtless it was this sweet music
+which both soothed and thrilled even before the words were understood,
+for on sad and festive days alike, the sweet lays of Brittany were
+always to be heard.
+
+    La reine chante doucement,
+    La voiz acorde a l'estrument:
+    Les mains sont belles, li lais bons,
+    Douce la voiz et bas li tons.
+
+    [11] Marie thus refers to Count William:--
+
+         "Pur amur le cumte Willaume,
+          Le plus vaillant de cest royaume,
+           M'entremis de cest livre feire,
+           E de l'Angleiz en Roman treire."
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+LADY PLAYING HARP.
+
+Add. MS. 38117, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 32._]
+
+Whether Marie was connected with the Court of Henry the Second and his
+brilliant and artistic queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, where learned men
+and poets congregated, we do not know, but it seems a very fair
+conjecture that she was. Not only does she dedicate her principal work
+to the king and his son, Count William, but her stories are coloured
+with the courtly life and ideas of her time, notwithstanding the
+simplicity of the fundamental theme. It is doubtful whether any one
+unacquainted with the teaching of the Courts of Love, such as they
+were in the twelfth century, would have made the compulsory quest of
+love the keynote of a story, as, for instance, Marie does in the "Lay
+of Guigemar." These Courts of Love, though not so elaborate, yet
+seemingly as imperious, as those of the fourteenth century, formed one
+of the semi-serious pastimes of the Middle Ages, and although it may
+be that they were often mere forms of entertainment, no
+self-respecting person could afford to disregard their rules or
+decisions. The cardinal doctrine was that love was necessary to a
+man's moral, social, and aesthetic training. Hence if it did not arise
+of itself, it must be sought for, and, like its counterpart in the
+spiritual world, come at, if needs be, through much tribulation.
+
+Owing to Henry's possessions in France through inheritance, marriage,
+and the many ties of relationship which united the royal families of
+both countries, England and France were never more closely allied
+than they were at that time. French was established by them as the
+speech of the cultured and the high-born. The Norman Conquest had made
+us more cosmopolitan in both manners and ideas. May we not look on the
+victory at Hastings as a symbol as well as a reality? Did it not mean
+for us a spiritual as well as a material conquest, since, mingled with
+the clashing of battle-axes, was to be heard the chanting of the
+_Chanson de Roland_? Moreover, through a desire to bring about
+uniformity of sentiment and service, the Church, though perhaps
+unconsciously, aided this good work of general enlargement of outlook
+by appointing outsiders to control our abbeys and religious
+foundations. Thus, in the latter half of the twelfth century, the
+romantic movement which characterised late mediaeval literature stirred
+in England and France alike, and Marie was one of its truest and
+daintiest exponents. Although what she relates may be fiction
+intermingled with myth and magic, she all the same pictures on her
+somewhat small canvases the ideas of her time, and so helps to make
+history.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+ADD. MS. 10293, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 34._]
+
+Marie's readers and hearers were naturally to be found amongst
+castle-folk. That these were many we may conclude from the fact that
+the number of castles had already come to be regarded as a menace to
+the central government, and a royal command had gone forth for the
+demolition of many of them. That her stories were read and prized
+for at least a century and more is evident from the manuscripts--five
+in number, and all of the thirteenth, or the beginning of the
+fourteenth, century--which still exist. Her renown, too, had travelled
+even beyond the seas, for in about A.D. 1245 a translation of her lays
+into Norse was made by order of the king, Haakon the Fourth. The fact
+that their popularity began to wane after a hundred years or so is in
+no wise an adverse criticism of their intrinsic worth, for in the
+fourteenth century English was, in high places, beginning to take the
+place of French, and naturally the demand created a supply. But even
+if this had not been so, Marie's work had served its purpose, and of
+necessity passed into the crucible of human thought and expression, to
+be resolved into matter suited to other needs and conditions. As has
+been well said, "les siecles se succedent, et chacun porte son fruit,
+qui n'est pas celui du siecle precedent: les livres sont les fruits
+des moeurs."
+
+Of the five manuscripts still extant, two are in the British Museum.
+One of these is the most complete that has come down to us, seeing
+that, in addition to its including the largest number of lays--twelve
+in all,--it alone contains the prologue, in which for a moment the
+illusive Marie lifts, as it were, her all-enshrouding veil. It is a
+small manuscript, beautifully inscribed, and even after its seven
+hundred years of existence, as fresh as is the love enshrined in its
+parchment pages. How strange a feeling possesses us as we turn over
+its leaves, leaves across which the shadows of readers of bygone days
+still seem to flit! Could these pages speak, of what would they tell?
+Of desires that die not, of longings that are immortal, of love
+enthroned.
+
+When first read, these stories, so simply are they told, may seem
+somewhat slight and superficial. But this is the general
+characteristic of mediaeval literature, which, for the most part,
+recognised things in outline only, and sought, and perhaps possessed,
+but little knowledge of the hidden springs of motive. The writers of
+those times troubled as little about moral, as the early painters did
+about physical, anatomy. Still, in spite of this indifference to what
+has become almost a craze in our own day, Marie's lays are so full of
+charming detail, deftly handled, that they give much the same sense of
+delight as do delicate ivories or dainty embroidery. Sometimes, it is
+true, she scarcely, despite all this outward charm, seems to touch the
+world of fact. Yet in this ideal atmosphere which she so essentially
+made her own, she contrives to convey such a sense of reality, that
+for the moment we are wholly possessed by it and carried away, without
+questioning, into her fairyland. And a beautiful fairyland it is,
+where love triumphs for the most part, not in heedless ecstasy along
+flower-bestrewn ways, but through self-sacrifice and suffering
+mutually accepted and mutually endured. Listen to the words spoken to
+the knight Guigemar, wounded by a chance arrow as he rides through a
+wood. "Never shalt thou be healed of thy wound, not even by herb, or
+root, or leach, or potion, until thou art healed by her who, for love
+of thee, shall suffer such great pain and sorrow as never woman has
+suffered before: and thou shalt bear as much for her." Equality in
+love! Such is the vital note struck amid the artificial and
+soul-enfeebling atmosphere of mediaeval love-poetry! This is the note
+which Marie set ringing down the centuries whilst her manuscripts lay
+unused on library shelves. This is Marie's gift to the world, and this
+it is that gives her stories immortality. Not only do they possess
+this immortality in themselves, but they have also been immortalised
+by poets and writers both in days long past and in those more within
+our ken. All who know her stories will recall Chaucer's indebtedness
+to incidents and descriptions in them, and coming to our own time, we
+find Sir Walter Scott taking his ballad of "Lord Thomas and Fair
+Annie" from the lay of "The Ash Tree," although it is possible, as has
+been suggested,[12] that his ballad may have been founded on some
+Scotch folk-song having a common origin with Marie's lay. When her
+lays were first published in Germany in 1820, Goethe wrote thus: "The
+mist of years that mysteriously envelops Marie de France makes her
+poems more exquisite and precious to us." Yes, it is this
+all-pervading mystery which, though so tantalising, is yet so
+attractive. It is in vain that, in studying them, we try to penetrate
+somewhat beyond our normal atmosphere, for we only find ourselves lost
+in vague possibilities and hazy distances. Brittany has kept her
+secret concerning such of these lays as were hers just as jealously as
+she has kept her secret of the long avenues of great lichened stones
+which make Carnac look like the burial-place of some giant host.
+Marie's lays are stories of deep meaning, which each reader must
+interpret for himself.
+
+    [12] Warnke. _Die lais der Marie de France_, p. lxiii.
+
+It is impossible to do more here than just touch upon Marie's ideal
+conception of love, for to realise it fully it is necessary to read
+the stories themselves.[13] Allusion has been made to the wounded
+knight in the "Lay of Guigemar," who can only be healed through mutual
+love sanctified by mutual suffering. In the lay of "The Ash Tree" a
+maiden of noble birth, abandoned in infancy and brought up in a
+convent, is loved by a lord, and returns his love, and goes with him
+to his castle. After a time the knights who owe him fealty complain
+that as through his love for his mistress he has neither wife nor
+child, he does them wrong, and protest that if he does not wed some
+noble lady, they will no longer serve him or hold him for lord. The
+knight has to yield to their demands and to consent to accept in
+marriage the daughter of a neighbouring noble who had made it known
+that he desired him for son-in-law. Neither lover utters any complaint
+or reproach, and the needful sacrifice is about to be made. But
+fortune, sometimes kind, intervenes ere it is too late, and reveals
+the noble birth of the loved one. The knight weds her with great joy,
+and to complete this happy picture we read that the other lady
+returned with her parents to her own domain, and was there well
+bestowed in marriage.
+
+    [13] Marie de France, _Seven of her Lays_, trans. E. Rickert,
+    1901; Warnke, _Die lais der Marie de France_, Halle, 1885;
+    Hertz, _Spielmannsbuch_, 1905.
+
+This idea of mutual sympathy and sacrifice gives meaning also to the
+lay of "The Two Lovers," and to that of "Yonec," but perhaps it is
+most simply, yet forcibly, summed up in the lay of "The Honeysuckle,"
+an episode taken from the Tristan story. Tristan, hearing that Isolde
+is to ride through a certain wood on her way to Tintagel to attend the
+Pentecostal Court held by the King, hides in the wood. Here he cuts a
+branch of hazel round which honeysuckle has twined, and carving his
+name and certain letters on it, he lays it in the way by which the
+Queen must pass, knowing that she will recognise it as a sign that her
+lover is near, since they have met before in suchwise. The import of
+the writing is that he has long been waiting to see her, since without
+her he cannot live, and that they two are like the hazel branch with
+the encircling honeysuckle, the which, as long as they are
+intertwined, thrive, but as soon as they are separated, both perish.
+Says Tristan, "Sweet Love, so is it with us--nor you without me, nor I
+without you."
+
+But besides this conception of love which Marie had simply found
+awaiting expression, when we turn to examine the stories somewhat in
+detail, we find legend and poetry, Eastern magic and Christian
+symbolism, mingled with strange ingenuity. Whence came all these
+divers threads which Marie has so dexterously interwoven? It is very
+difficult to tell whether we are wholly in a world of romance,
+accepted by her without question, or whether she had some
+understanding of the divers matters she touches upon, and shaped them
+into a new form to suit new hearers. The answer to this question seems
+to depend on whether Marie recounted the lays from hearsay, or whether
+they had been already written down, and were merely retold by her, she
+colouring them with the atmosphere of her time, which was charged with
+strange incongruities of religion and magic. To this we can give no
+certain answer, since Marie herself gives no hint, and only tells us
+that the ancient Bretons made the lays. But whatever may have been her
+contribution, Christian or otherwise, to the original matter she
+worked upon, we cannot help feeling that we have before us the remains
+of some primitive mythology overlaid and interpenetrated with Eastern
+lore, especially that of India, which, in the Middle Ages, was spread
+broadcast in the West. This Indian thought, itself borrowed in a
+measure from Egypt, had also been tempered by the Hellenism which,
+after the conquests of Alexander the Great in Asia, had filtered
+through India, and had on the way become tinged with its colour and
+its mystery. It was from the matter of these Indian stories that so
+much was learnt, for whilst, in the West, the national epic and the
+chivalrous romance had been alone considered worthy of record, in the
+Indian stories all social conditions were revealed, and poets thus
+learnt little by little to observe and portray the manners and
+sentiments of the people generally, changing social conditions also
+acting in the same direction. All such influences must be taken into
+consideration in studying mediaeval literature generally, but
+particularly the occult element in Oriental thought which presents
+such difficulties to the less meditative Western mind, and has in
+consequence given rise to much misconception.
+
+In the "Lay of Guigemar," which we take first because it is the first
+in the manuscript, we find Marie making use of a subject, in gorgeous
+setting, of Christian symbolism, but using it apparently so
+unconsciously that it is only from one or two details that we realise
+what is really lurking in disguise. Guigemar, the wounded knight
+already referred to, to whom naught but love, and sorrow endured for
+love, can bring any alleviation, sets forth for his healing. He comes
+across a ship into which he enters, and which by unseen means carries
+him to the desired haven. As we read the description of the ship, our
+thoughts at once revert to the picture of the barge in which Cleopatra
+goes to meet Antony. Marie tells us that the fittings are of ebony,
+and the unfurled sail of silk. Amid the vessel is a bed on to which
+the wounded knight sinks in anguish. This is of cypress and white
+ivory inlaid with gold, the quilt of silk and gold tissue, and the
+coverlet of sable lined with Alexandrian purple.[14] All this we might
+regard as merely a poet's fancy were it not that we go on to read that
+there were set two candlesticks of fine gold with lighted tapers. Here
+we have the clue. Doubtless the ship, a favourite theme of Christian
+symbolism, and one which delighted poets and painters and workers in
+mosaic alike, represented the Church. It is not to be necessarily
+inferred that Marie, when giving her hero so rare a means of transit,
+had in her mind all the elaborate symbolism connected with it; but she
+had probably read or heard tell of it, and made use of it simply for
+the enhancement of her story. It is in such ways that we find
+mysteries embedded, the real significance of them being lost or
+misunderstood or unheeded, just as the Renaissance painters, without
+any knowledge of Arabic characters, and solely on account of the
+ornamental quality of the lettering, used texts from the Koran, and
+distorted into mere design the sayings of Mahomet.
+
+    [14] Compare with this the bed of "King Fisherman" described
+    in _Holy Grail_, vol. i. p. 137, trans. Sebastian Evans,
+    1898.
+
+In the lay of "The Two Lovers" we again find Christian symbolism in
+disguise. Here is the old theme of a difficult task to be accomplished
+by the lover before he can win his lady.[15] The undertaking imposed
+is the carrying of the loved one to the top of a hill, and our
+interest in it is enhanced by the fact that the trial was to be made
+near Pitres, a few miles from Rouen, where there is a green hill,
+still known as "La Cote des Deux Amans." In Rouen there lived a king
+who had an only daughter, very fair and beautiful, whose hand was
+sought in marriage of many. Loath to part with her, he bethought him
+how he could thwart her suitors. To this end he caused it to be
+proclaimed far and wide that he would have for son-in-law only him who
+could carry his daughter to the top of the hill without pausing to
+rest. Many came, but each in turn failed, greatly to the content of
+the princess, since secretly she loved, and was loved by, a young
+knight who frequented her father's Court. At last, constrained by
+love, the knight, though with much misgiving, determines to undertake
+the adventure. Before allowing him to do this, the maiden, in order to
+ensure his success, and herself fasting meanwhile, bids him go to
+Salerno,[16] near Naples, a school of medicine famous in the Middle
+Ages, and ask of her kinswoman there, who was well practised in
+medicine, a draught to give him the needful strength for his task.
+Returned with this potion, he makes the attempt, but so great is his
+desire to reach the goal quickly, that he will not slacken his speed
+to drink from the phial carried by his Love, but hastens forward, only
+to fall dead as he reaches the summit of the hill.
+
+    [15] Hertz, _op. cit._ p. 396.
+
+    [16] This mention of Salerno is of interest on account of the
+    reference to women practising there as medical experts. The
+    origin of the School remains in obscurity, and it is not
+    until the ninth century, when the names of certain Salerno
+    physicians appear in the archives, that we get any definite
+    information with regard to it. It seems to have been a purely
+    secular institution, but it is quite possible that its
+    development was aided by the Benedictines, who became
+    established there in the seventh century, and who made
+    medical science one of their principal studies. Before the
+    middle of the eleventh century there were many women there
+    who either practised medicine or acted as professors of the
+    science, and some of the latter even combined surgery with
+    medicine in their teaching and treatises. These women doctors
+    were much sought after by the sick, and were much esteemed by
+    their brother-professionals, who cited them as authorities.
+    That the sexes were on an equal footing we infer from the
+    fact that the title of "master" (Magister) was applied to men
+    and women alike, the term "doctor" not having come into use,
+    apparently, before the thirteenth century. Besides the
+    general practitioners and the professors, there were others
+    who fitted themselves specially for military service, as well
+    as priests who added medical knowledge to their holy calling.
+    The teaching followed that of Hippocrates and Galen, and the
+    Salerno school was world-renowned in the art of drug
+    preparation. In the thirteenth century, however, Arab medical
+    writings began to be known in Europe through Latin
+    translations, and Arab practice in medicine, though based on
+    Greek teaching, initiated a new departure. As a result of
+    this, the glory of Salerno waned. Another cause of its
+    decline in fame and popularity was the founding by the
+    Emperor Frederick the Second of a school of medicine at
+    Naples, which he richly endowed, and the rise, unencumbered
+    by old traditions--for medicine, like scholasticism, could be
+    hampered by dialectical subtlety--of the school of
+    Montpelier.
+
+In this strength-giving potion we may perhaps see the expression of a
+Christian, and the survival of a pre-Christian belief, where the
+getting of strength and life is only possible through a direct act of
+communion, either material or spiritual, with the god. Such world-old
+beliefs, in which the supernatural intervenes to help the natural, are
+also intimately connected, even if they are not identical, with the
+magic of philtres and charms.
+
+We pass from Christian symbolism to magic in the lay of "Yonec." The
+delightful ease with which mediaeval folk turned from magic to
+religion, or _vice versa_, shows how simply they accepted what they
+did not understand. At the same time it proves how intermingled the
+two were, and that what some are inclined to separate now, were once
+regarded as one and the same thing, the eccentricities and impositions
+which have developed in both being of mere external growth, and to be
+treated accordingly. In the lay of "Yonec" a young wife, passing fair,
+is shut up by her jealous old husband in a great paved chamber in a
+tower of his castle, to which no one save an ancient dame and a priest
+has admittance. After seven years of this isolation and uncongenial
+company, the lady remembers that she has heard tell that means have
+been found to rescue the unhappy, and she wishes with all her heart
+that deliverance may come to her. Suddenly a shadow comes across the
+window, and into her chamber there flies a falcon, which forthwith
+changes into a knight. As soon as the lady has recovered from her
+surprise, the knight tells her that he has long loved her, but could
+not come until she wished for him. Here we have an incident, borrowed
+direct from Oriental magic, in which a modern believer in psychical
+phenomena might find an element of telepathy. The will, as in all
+magic, is the motive power which acts sympathetically on the object of
+desire, that object being in a receptive condition. Quickly we turn
+from magic, and the story goes on to tell that the lady, before
+accepting the knight as her lover, makes it a condition that he
+believes in God, and the knight offers to prove his belief by taking
+the Sacrament. This demand is evidently in the nature of a protective
+test. It was very usual to try some means of discovering whether a
+person was in league with the powers of evil or not; for if any one
+unworthy touched holy things, retribution came at once, either by
+death or some dire visitation. But how is the priest to administer the
+Sacrament without seeing the knight? The latter tells her that he will
+make himself like her in appearance; in other words, that he will
+hypnotise the priest, and make him see what he, the knight, wishes him
+to. The ruse succeeds, and for a time all goes well; then comes
+discovery, despair, and death. The whole story is a most extraordinary
+medley of fairy-lore, religion, and magic, and most characteristic of
+the mediaeval mind.
+
+The lay of "Eliduc," the last in the manuscript, is also the longest
+and most elaborate. Marie unfolds her story with so certain yet so
+subtle a hand, that the reading of it is like the unwinding of some
+finely illuminated parchment-roll where miniature follows miniature,
+each perfect in itself, yet all needful to the whole. To the charm of
+its pictures of mediaeval life, with the fine scene between the two
+women, and their final reunion in the same convent, there is added an
+incident which gives special interest and importance to the story,
+since it brings us into touch with one of the oldest and most
+widespread of traditions--the restoration to life, from apparent
+death, by means of a flower. There are few pursuits more fascinating
+than the tracing of traditions, except, it may be, that of symbols,
+with which they have so much in common. We find the same traditions,
+just as we find the same symbolic figures, common to the most widely
+separated peoples, and the real interest in the case of each lies in
+trying to discover how and why in the course of their migrations their
+form and their significance have been varied or modified. But before
+considering the tradition, let us first hear the story.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+BOAT WITH KNIGHTS AND LADY.
+
+Add. MS. 10294, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 49._]
+
+Eliduc, a knight of Brittany, whose wife, Guildeluec, was very dear to
+him, had for over-lord one of the kings of Brittany, with whom, owing
+to faithful service, he had gained high favour. Being defamed on this
+account by envious tongues, he was banished from Court, and thereupon
+determined to quit his country for a while and seek service in the
+West of England. With many promises to his wife to be faithful to her,
+he set out for Totnes, where he found many kings ruling in the land,
+all at war with one another. One of them, a very old man, was ruler in
+the province of Exeter, and at war with a neighbouring king on account
+of his refusal to give to the latter his daughter, Guilliadun, in
+marriage. So Eliduc determined to offer his services to the old king,
+by whom they were accepted, and by his tact and prowess he soon proved
+himself worthy of the trust reposed in him. Through a skilful ambush,
+planned and conducted by him, he defeated the enemy. Guilliadun,
+hearing of his deeds, sought an interview with him, and at once fell
+in love with him, and after certain maidenly reserve and hesitation,
+made her love known to him. This Eliduc secretly returned, but,
+troubled at the remembrance of his wife and of his pledge to her, his
+courage failed him to confess that he was already wedded. In order to
+escape from his dilemma, he sought and obtained the permission of the
+old king to avail himself of the entreaty of his liege-lord to return
+to his own country to fight against the enemies who were desolating
+the kingdom. This permission was granted under his promise to come
+back if his services were again required. After pledging himself to
+Guilliadun to do this on such a day as she should name, Eliduc,
+having exchanged rings with her, and she having named the day for his
+return, departed. Having speedily reduced the enemies of his
+liege-lord to submission, he came once more to England, and
+immediately sent to Guilliadun to apprise her of this, and to beg her
+to be ready to start on the morrow. Guilliadun secretly left the
+castle the next night and joined her lover, and together they hurried
+to Totnes, whence they at once set sail. But as they were nearing
+land, a violent storm arose. Finding that prayers were of no avail,
+one of the company cried out, "We shall never make the land, for you
+have a lawful wife, and you are taking with you another woman, setting
+at naught God, the law, and uprightness. Let us cast her into the sea,
+and anon we shall get to land." On hearing these words Guilliadun fell
+as one dead, whereupon Eliduc in anger struck the esquire on the head
+and hurled him into the sea. When the ship was brought to port
+Guilliadun showed no sign of life. So Eliduc, believing her to be
+dead, lifted her in his arms, carried her ashore, and, mounting his
+horse, sadly bore her to a small chapel in a forest adjoining his own
+lands. Here he laid her in front of the altar, and covered her with
+his cloak, and then returned to his home. Filled with sadness, he
+arose early each morning and went to the chapel to pray for her soul,
+marvelling nevertheless to find that the face of his Love suffered no
+change except to become a little paler. His wife, made anxious by his
+melancholy and silence, and wondering whither he went, had him
+watched, and soon discovered the truth. Taking a varlet with her, she
+went to the chapel, and there discovered the beautiful maiden, looking
+like a new-blown rose, and at once guessed the cause of her husband's
+sadness and gloom. As she sat watching and weeping out of sheer pity,
+a weasel ran from behind the altar and passed over the body of
+Guilliadun, and the varlet struck it with a stick and killed it. Then
+its mate came in and walked round it several times, and finding that
+it could not rouse it, made sign of great sorrow and ran out into the
+wood, and returning with a red flower between its teeth put it into
+the mouth of its dead companion, which within an hour came to life
+again. Guildeluec, seeing this, seized the flower and laid it in the
+mouth of the maiden, who after a short time sighed and opened her
+eyes. Then she told Guildeluec that she was a king's daughter, and had
+been deceived by a knight called Eliduc, whom she loved, and who
+returned her love, but who had hidden from her that he was already
+married. Guildeluec thereupon made known to her who she was, and sent
+at once for her husband. When he came, she begged him to build a
+nunnery, and to allow her to retire from the world, as she would fain
+give herself to the service of God. When the nunnery was ready,
+Guildeluec took the veil, with some thirty nuns, of whom she became
+the Superior. Then Eliduc wedded his love, and after some years of
+happiness they too resolved to retire from the world, Guilliadun
+joining Guildeluec, who received her as a sister, and Eliduc going to
+a monastery which he had founded near by.[17]
+
+    [17] M. Gaston Paris (_Poesie du Moyen Age_, vol. ii.), in
+    recalling various legends of "Le Mari aux deux femmes,"
+    suggests that the present story, borrowed by Marie from
+    Celtic tradition, is probably of Occidental, and not
+    Oriental, origin, since in the polygamous East the story of
+    two wives would not have furnished a sufficient motive for a
+    special narration.
+
+In this charming romance, given here in epitome only, the two most
+interesting points, after noting the mutual suffering of the lovers
+for love's sake, are the episode of the sacrifice to the sea, and that
+of the weasel and the life-giving flower. Both these incidents point
+to the great antiquity of the fundamental theme of the story, which
+Marie, possibly like many another before her, merely reclothed in
+garments suited to the fancy of the time. In most stories where the
+sea has to be appeased by the sacrifice of some one, it is the guilty
+person who is thrown overboard, or if the offender is not known, lots
+are cast to determine who shall be the one to make expiation to the
+god. In the present instance Eliduc is clearly the wrong-doer, but he
+is the hero, and must be treated as such, and accordingly the hostile
+voice is the one to be silenced in the depths of the sea.
+
+The other incident--the restoration to life by means of a flower or a
+herb--frequently occurs in classical stories and folk-lore.[18]
+Perhaps the most familiar example, and, owing to the recent
+excavations in Crete, the most interesting one, is that connected with
+Glaucos, son of Minos, king of Crete. In the story (Apollod. iii. 3)
+Glaucos when a boy fell into a cask of honey and was smothered. His
+father, ignorant of his fate, consulted the oracle to ascertain what
+had become of him, and the seer Polyeidos of Argos was named to
+discover him. When he had found him, Minos shut Polyeidos up in the
+tomb with the dead body of the boy until he should restore the latter
+to life. Whilst Polyeidos was watching the body, a serpent suddenly
+came towards it and touched it. Polyeidos killed the serpent, and
+immediately a second one came, which, seeing the other one lying dead,
+disappeared and soon returned with a certain herb in its mouth. This
+it laid on the mouth of the dead serpent, which immediately came to
+life again. Polyeidos seized the herb and placed it on the mouth of
+the dead boy, who was thereupon restored to life.
+
+    [18] Warnke, _op. cit._ civ.; Hertz, _op. cit._ p. 409.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+GLAUKOS AND POLYEIDOS IN TOMB.
+
+Greek Vase, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 52._]
+
+This story is most graphically depicted on a fifth-century Greek vase
+in the British Museum, and, whatever its real interpretation may be,
+it has gained in significance since the life of the distant past of
+the island has been laid bare, and large jars, which in all
+probability were used for storing wine and honey and other
+necessaries, and from their size and contents might well have
+proved a snare to a venturesome and greedy boy, have been discovered
+_in situ_. After a lapse of many centuries we find this idea of the
+life-giving plant reappearing in mediaeval garb, daintily fashioned by
+Marie de France.
+
+Marie, in her story, tells us that the weasel brings a _red_ flower.
+This was possibly the verbena, well known in folk-medicine as vervain,
+and much used in the Middle Ages. According to one writer, the weasel
+uses vervain as a preservative against snake-bites, and this idea of
+its effect might easily have been extended to include death. Even so
+great an authority as Aristotle mentions that the weasel understood
+the potent effects of certain herbs. The intervention of a weasel
+instead of the usual serpent opens up the further interesting question
+as to whether this weasel incident was not imported from India, where
+Greek stories had become alloyed with Indian lore. Even to-day, in
+India, a mongoose, a species of weasel, is sometimes taken on
+expeditions by any one fearful of snakes, and kept at night in the
+tent as a protection against them.
+
+In addition to the choice of a weasel as medium, the unusual colour of
+the flower is also of interest. Giraldus Cambrensis, writing in the
+twelfth century on the subject of weasels, after remarking that they
+have more heart than body (_plus cordis habens quam corporis_), goes
+on to say that they restore their dead by means of a _yellow_ flower,
+and in the still earlier record of the Lydian hero Tylon, where a
+serpent is the intermediary--and serpents are often credited with a
+knowledge of life-giving plants,--reference is made to a _golden_
+flower.[19] This may possibly be connected with the idea of the
+life-giving power of the god, since the golden flower is dedicated to
+Zeus. Professor J. G. Frazer thinks that a red flower may perhaps have
+been chosen to suggest a flow of blood--an infusion of fresh life into
+the veins of the dead. It is also possible that red and yellow may
+have been interchangeable terms, just as they are to-day amongst the
+Italian peasantry. The choice of colour may, however, have been
+derived from the red anemone, which is said to have sprung from the
+blood of Adonis, with whom love and life are traditionally associated.
+There are some, on the other hand, who ascribe to the story a deep
+spiritual meaning. With them it is not the flower itself which brings
+about resurrection from apparent death, but the spiritual truth of
+which the flower is but the outward symbol. It may be that the red
+blossom represents the joys of earth which Eliduc's wife voluntarily
+renounces, and which, surrendered to her rival, in time became like a
+burning thing whose fiery touch awakens to life the sleeping
+conscience. In a story such as this, which has evidently travelled far
+and wide before we find it in England in the eleventh century, it is
+possible that any or all of these surmises may be true. The whole of
+this incident of the weasel and the flower, read in the original, is
+of extraordinary interest and beauty. What a touching picture of
+animal sensibility is the account of the despair of the weasel on
+finding its dead mate, and its tender display of solicitude and
+sympathy, raising the lifeless head and trying to reanimate the small
+inert body! Only one who loved animals and knew their habits well
+could have told thus tenderly and graphically a story so simple, yet
+so suggestive, of the love of two sentient things, a love which runs
+like a thread of gold through all creation and makes it one.
+
+    [19] J. G. Frazer, _Adonis, Attis, Osiris_, p. 98.
+
+The twelfth century was an age of humanism as well as feudalism. As
+often happens in times of comparative peace, a growth of interest in
+the individual was springing up and finding expression in lyric poetry
+and stories. The day of epics was waning. Those vast and involved
+poems, like to huge and complex frescoes, found little favour at a
+time when men and women, or at least women, had more leisure and
+inclination to try to get below the surface of things. Heroes had been
+glorified till they had almost become deified, and something more
+personal, more individual, was wanted. By the side of modern romance,
+where the most sacred and secret intricacies of human nature are, as
+it were, displayed under the microscope, Marie's narrations may seem
+somewhat artless. But in putting into words the dawning desires of her
+time she gave form and impetus to feeling and thought struggling for
+expression, and gained for her work a definite place in the
+development of human utterance. Evolution, whether of the spirit or of
+matter, is the supreme law of things. Marie struck a spark from the
+ideal which poets and writers down the ages have fanned into a flame.
+
+
+
+
+A THIRTEENTH-CENTURY MYSTIC AND BEGUINE, MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG
+
+
+The triumphant ecclesiasticism of the thirteenth century, manifested
+in the forms of political power, material wealth, splendid
+architecture, and worldly positions sufficiently commanding to satisfy
+even the most ambitious, was, perhaps naturally, accompanied by a
+gross materialism. Against this the truly pious-minded revolted,
+thereby causing a reaction towards mysticism. Whilst before the eyes
+of some there floated, as the ideal, the material ladder leading to
+fame and power, before those of others there arose, as in a vision,
+the "Ladder of Perfection," each rung of which gained brought them
+nearer to the object of their quest--Divine Reality. These latter,
+whether of great, or lesser, or even of no renown, and amongst whom
+women played a great and very notable part, were scattered far and
+wide; but each one cultivated some little corner of the mystic garden.
+One such garden was the Cistercian convent of Helfta, near Eisleben,
+in Saxony, in the thirteenth century a centre of mystic tendencies.
+It was here that, harassed and ill, Mechthild of Magdeburg took
+refuge, and entered as a nun in 1270. But we are anticipating.
+
+Mechthild, at first a beguine, and afterwards a nun, but a visionary
+from the days of her childhood, was born, most probably of noble
+parents, in the diocese of Magdeburg, in 1212. That she is perhaps
+better known to the general reader than are other contemplatives of
+her day is probably due to the suggestion that she may be the Matilda
+immortalised by Dante in the "Earthly Paradise" (_Purg._ xxviii. 22
+_seq._), rather than to her own writings. This may be partly because
+the personality of that supreme visionary and poet tended, as does all
+superlative genius, to cast a shadow over the lesser lights of both
+earlier and later times, and partly because, although Mechthild's
+works were early translated into Latin, she wrote in Low German.
+Though this original MS. has not yet been found, there exists one,
+translated into High German in 1345 at Basle (a centre of the "Friends
+of God") by the Dominican, Heinrich von Noerdlingen, by which
+Mechthild's work has been made known to us, but the language even of
+this proves a very real stumbling-block to the most strenuous student.
+Still, by recording her thoughts and visions in the language of her
+country and her day, she gained a lay audience, a result which would
+have been hardly possible if she herself had been a classic. But
+though no classic--for she says Latin was difficult to her--she
+evidently, as her work shows, grew up under the influence of courtly
+life, and knew the language of minstrels. She tells us that her mind
+was turned to the spiritual life when she was but twelve years of age,
+and that from that time worldly glory and riches became distasteful to
+her. Like the visionary and Saint, Theresa of Avila, of 300 years
+later, she took into her confidence her younger brother, Baldwin, who
+later, perhaps under her influence, became a Dominican. What we know
+of her, we know from her writings, which exist in the above-mentioned
+unique MS. (No. 277) now in the monastery Library of Einsiedeln, a
+foundation south of the Lake of Zurich, and still one of the most
+famous of pilgrim resorts. In seeking to know more of the history of
+this MS. we get a most interesting and intimate glimpse of the methods
+in religious centres in bygone days, when MSS. were few. In quite
+early times--how early is not known--there dwelt in the valleys round
+about Einsiedeln certain devout women-recluses, who later lived, as a
+community, in four houses, and, ultimately, in a convent. They were
+called "Forest Sisters," a name which may well express the poetry and
+peace of their life and surroundings. Whilst they were still living in
+the detached houses, the MS. was, through Heinrich von Rumerschein of
+Basle, sent by Margaret of the Golden Ring, a beguine of that town, to
+the one called "The Front Meadow." Heinrich addresses the gift "To
+the Sisters in the Front Meadow." "You shall know that the book that
+is sent by her of the Golden Ring is called _The Light of the
+Godhead_, and to this you shall give good heed. It shall also serve in
+all the houses of the wood, and shall never leave the wood, and shall
+remain a month in each house. Also it shall go from one to another as
+required, and you shall take special care of it. Pray for me who was
+your Confessor, though, alas, unworthy."
+
+In 1235, at the age of twenty-three, Mechthild--not without many a
+heart-pang, and prompted to this determination by a troubled
+conscience, a determination doubtless brought about by the preaching
+of the Dominican friars, who were stirring all classes by their
+impassioned zeal--left her home and went to Magdeburg, where she
+entered a settlement of beguines. These settlements, semi-monastic in
+character, were provided to afford some protection, by living in
+community, for women who, whilst devoting themselves to a religious
+life, did not wish to separate themselves wholly from the world. It
+was at the time of the Crusades, when the land teemed with desolate
+women, that their numbers increased so greatly, and the first
+beguinage was founded about the beginning of the thirteenth century.
+The beguine took no vows, could return to the world and marry if she
+so desired, and did not renounce her property. If she was without
+means, she neither asked nor accepted alms, but supported herself by
+manual labour or by teaching the children of burghers, whilst those
+who were able to do so spent their time in taking care of the sick or
+in other charitable offices. Each community, with a "Grand-Mistress"
+at its head, was complete in itself, and regulated its own order of
+living, though, later, many of them adopted the rule of the Third
+Order of St. Francis.
+
+Mechthild tells us that she knew but one person in Magdeburg, and that
+even from this one she kept away for fear lest she might waver in her
+determination. In this very human way she indicated that her spiritual
+adventure was no easy matter to her, as, indeed, it could not be so
+long as her temperament and ideals were at variance. But gradually,
+she says, she got so much joy from communion with God that she could
+dispense with the world. As has been well said, "La loi des lois c'est
+que tout morceau de l'univers venu de Dieu retourne a Dieu et veut
+retourner a lui."
+
+The book of her writings, which, under divine direction as she opens
+by saying, she calls _The Flowing Light of the Godhead_,[20] is
+composed of seven parts, of which six appear to have been written down
+during the time she was a beguine at Magdeburg, and were collected and
+arranged by a Dominican friar, Heinrich von Halle, whilst the
+seventh, consisting of sundry visions and teachings during the last
+years of her life, was put together just before her death at Helfta in
+1282, and, as she pathetically adds, "by strange eyes and hands." In
+all of these, whilst reflecting in them her inmost feelings, she
+expresses her entire dependence on spiritual help and inspiration.
+"The writing of this book," she says, "is seen and heard and felt in
+every limb. I see it with the eyes of my soul, and hear it with the
+ears of my eternal spirit, and feel in every part of my body the power
+of the Holy Ghost."
+
+    [20] P. Gall. Morel, _Offenbarungen der Schwester Mechthild
+    von Magdeburg, oder das fliessende Licht der Gottheit_,
+    Regensburg, 1869.
+
+The general tenor of her writings is contemplative and prophetic.
+Whilst, as a contemplative, she reminds us of Suso, as a reformer,
+proclaiming her prophetic warnings, she recalls to us St. Hildegarde,
+though the latter was a more astute and powerful reasoner. It would
+seem as if, in general, there are two conflicting tendencies in minds
+such as Mechthild's, a tendency to tradition--in her case, of course,
+church tradition--and a tendency to definite self-expression. With
+Mechthild it was certainly that of self-expression which predominated,
+for whilst, with her, both co-operated to make a beautiful whole, it
+was in detail and ornament, so to speak, rather than in the design
+itself, that she showed her special qualities and gifts. Further, as a
+mystic, she may be classed with those "for whom mysticism is above all
+things an intimate and personal relation, the satisfaction of a deep
+desire," and who therefore fall back "upon imagery drawn largely from
+the language of earthly passion," as opposed to the mystic whose
+"longing is to go out from his normal world in search of a lost home,
+a better country," as well as to the one whose "craving is for inward
+purity and perfection."[21]
+
+    [21] For the suggestive elaboration of this threefold
+    classification, see Evelyn Underhill, _Mysticism_, chap. vi.
+    p. 151 _seq._
+
+In order to enter into the spirit of her writings, and particularly
+the prophetic ones, it is necessary to consider how the character and
+style of her work was induced and affected, on the one hand by her
+environment and her time, and on the other by her saintly nature and
+poetic temperament, as well as by her intimate and personal attitude
+towards things touching the inner life.
+
+The world, in Mechthild's day, was in a state of unrest and of
+looked-for change. Mankind was ever haunted by forebodings of the
+approaching happening of something momentous. Whole-hearted faith in
+the Church was waning, and although outward conformity still
+prevailed, there existed very diverse opinions, tolerated so long as
+they did not become too obtrusive. Prophetic writings, giving
+expression to the yearnings of the time--yearnings fomented and
+fostered by the prevailing misery caused, in no small degree, by the
+wars between Pope and Emperor--taught that the world was on the brink
+of a new era. One of the most influential of these writings, entitled
+_The Eternal Gospel_, and said to embody the revelations of Abbot
+Joachim of Flora (1130-1202), proclaimed that the dispensations of God
+the Father and God the Son--the first two eras of the Church--were
+past or passing, and that these would be succeeded by a third
+era--that of the Holy Ghost--when men's eyes would be opened by the
+Spirit, and when there would be a time of perfection and freedom,
+without the necessity of disciplinary institutions. In this fair age
+it was the hermits, monks, and nuns who, whilst not superseding the
+rulers of the Church, were to lead it into new paths, for to Joachim
+the visible Church could not, where all is moving, remain unchanged,
+and his counsel was, to keep pace with the advancing world. Naturally
+such sentiments aroused ecclesiastical alarm, and, later, were
+condemned by the fourth Lateran Council (1215), though Dante, withal a
+good son of the Church, made bold to see in Paradise the "Abbott
+Joachim, endowed with prophetic Spirit" (_Par._ xii. 140).[22] When
+Mechthild wrote her predictions on the last days, Joachim's teachings,
+owing to the stir which their unorthodoxy had created--not only in the
+Church and amongst the preaching friars, but also in the University of
+Paris, whence all manner of polemical discussions freely
+circulated--were well known in Germany, and there can be but little
+doubt that Mechthild knew of them, probably from the Dominicans, who
+found special favour in her sight, and that they greatly influenced
+her own prophetic warnings to the Church.
+
+    [22] Cf. Edmund G. Gardner, _Joachim of Flora and the
+    Everlasting Gospel_. Franciscan Essays, Bri. Soc. of Fran.
+    Studies, extra series, vol. i.
+
+From these objective conditions which, whilst influencing Mechthild's
+own thoughts and works, might and did, however differently, influence
+the work of others as well, we turn to the consideration of her work
+as the expression of her own poetic soul, welling up from depths
+filled with love for the highest and most divine things. Before all
+else we recognise how richly endowed she was with visionary powers and
+poetic feeling. She revels in beautiful fantasies, as, for instance,
+when she says, "If I were to speak one little word of the choirs of
+heaven, it would be no more than the honey that a bee can carry away
+on its feet from a full-blown flower." With rapture she touches upon
+the deepest questions of the soul's life, and the highest truths and
+mysteries of belief, so that in her flights of contemplation her prose
+becomes poetry, impelled, like some torrent, by the rush of her
+emotion.
+
+    O thou God, out-pouring in thy gift!
+    O thou God, o'erflowing in thy love!
+    O thou God, all burning in thy desire!
+    O thou God, melting in union with thy body!
+    O thou God, reposing on my breast!
+        Without Thee, never could I live.
+
+But even so, she does not lose the sense of form or of the
+picturesque. Some of her writings are clothed in language recalling
+the Song of Songs, and are, perhaps, echoes of St. Bernard's sermons
+on that wondrous allegory of the Spiritual Bridegroom and Bride, as
+when, in a transport, and attempting to express how God comes to the
+Soul, she exclaims--
+
+    I come to my Beloved
+    Like dew upon the flowers.
+
+Others suggest reflections of courtly life and poetry, and at the same
+time seem to anticipate pictures of the Celestial Garden, bright and
+blossoming, where Saints tread in measured unison, symbolic of their
+spiritual felicity and harmony. So with her didactic writings, or with
+her predictions concerning the decay and corruption in the Church, in
+which, like some prophet of old, she declaims against such evils in no
+sparing terms, all alike are fraught with a special grace. In them all
+the most intimate and the most sublime meet in one expression--the
+expression of a soul which sees God in all things, and all things in
+God.
+
+During the thirty years which Mechthild spent as a beguine at
+Magdeburg, she lived an austere life, and one beset with difficulties,
+largely created by the fearless way in which she warned and denounced
+those in high places in the Church. In such denunciations she was not
+alone, or without good example, for--to name two only of those who
+stand out pre-eminently on account of their positions and
+personalities--St. Bernard and St. Hildegarde had both sternly
+denounced the evils in the Church. "The insolence of the Clergy," says
+St. Bernard, "troubles the earth, and molests the Church. The Bishops
+give what is holy to the dogs, and pearls to swine." But the poor
+beguine, Mechthild, was not in the same powerful position to stay, or
+even to modify, the resentment which her attacks occasioned. "For more
+than twenty years was I bound with thee on a hideous gridiron," she
+writes, likening her anguish to that of St. Lawrence. Nevertheless
+solace came to her troubled spirit, for, having been warned that it
+had been said of her writings that they deserved to be burnt, she
+tells how she prayed to God, as had been her wont when in trouble, and
+that He told her not to mistrust her powers, since they were from Him,
+and that no one can burn the Truth.
+
+In many passages Mechthild dwells on the clergy, and her
+reflections--some very practical, others, to those not versed in
+symbolism, very quaint--seem to suggest how grievously lacking she
+considered them to be. Writing in God's name to a canon, she begins by
+saying that we should, in common with all men, give thanks to our
+Heavenly Father for the Divine gift which day by day, and without
+ceasing, pours forth from the Holy Trinity into sinful hearts, and
+then she quaintly adds, "For that it soars so high, the Eagle owes no
+thanks to the Owl." Furthermore, she calls upon the priest to pray
+more, to pay his debts in full, and to live simply, and thus, with
+humble heart, to set a good example, and, with many other admonitions,
+she also counsels him to have two rods by his bedside, so that he may
+chastise himself when he awakes. Mechthild adds that she asked of God
+how such an one could keep himself without sin in this earthly state,
+and that God made answer: "He shall keep himself always in fear, like
+a mouse that sits in a trap and awaits its death. When he eats, he
+shall be frugal and meek, and when he sleeps, he shall be chaste, and
+alone with Me."
+
+Touching upon some of the duties of a prior--and here she shows
+herself eminently practical--she writes: "Thou shalt go every day to
+the infirmary, and soothe the sick with the solace of God's word, and
+comfort them bounteously with earthly things, for God is rich beyond
+all richness. Thou shalt keep the sick cleanly, and be merry with them
+in a godly manner. Thou shalt also go into the kitchen, and see that
+the needs of the brethren are well cared for, and that thy parsimony,
+and the cook's laziness, rob not our Lord of the sweet song of the
+choir, for never did starving priest sing well. Moreover, a hungry man
+can do no deep study, and thus must God, through such default, lose
+the best prayers." From advice to the priesthood, Mechthild turns to
+warning, and pours forth her reproaches and forebodings with poetic
+intensity. "Alas, O thou Crown of Holy Christendom, how greatly hast
+thou lost lustre! Thy jewels are fallen out, since thou dost outrage
+and bring dishonour on the holy Christian vows. Thy gold has become
+tarnished in the morass of unchastity, for thou art become degenerate,
+and art lacking in true love. Thy abstinence is consumed by the
+ravenous fire of gluttony, thy humility is drowned in the slough of
+the flesh, thy word no longer avails against the lies of the world,
+the flowers of all the virtues have fallen from thee. Alas, O thou
+Crown of the holy Priesthood, how diminished thou art, and verily thou
+now possessest naught but priestly power, with the which thou fightest
+against God and His elect. For this will God humble thee, ere thou
+learnest wisdom. For thus saith the Lord: 'My shepherds of Jerusalem
+have become murderers and wolves, for that they slay before My very
+eyes the white lambs, and the sheep are all sickly for that they may
+not eat of the wholesome pasture that grows on the high mountains, the
+which is godly love and holy doctrine.' He who knows not the way that
+leads to Hell, let him give heed to the unholy clergy, who, with wives
+and children and many heinous sins, go straightway thither."
+
+Whilst condemning the priesthood, Mechthild eulogises nunnery life in
+an allegory entitled "The Ghostly Cloister," in which she pictures the
+virtues as dwelling. "Charity" is the abbess, who with zeal takes care
+of the congregation in both body and soul; "Godly Humility" is the
+chaplain; "The Holy Peace of God" is the prioress; and "Loving
+Kindness" is the sub-prioress. "Hope" is the chantress, filled with
+holy, humble devotion, that the heart's feebleness may sound beautiful
+in song before God, so that God may love the notes that sing in the
+heart; "Wisdom" is the schoolmistress, who with all good-will teaches
+the ignorant, so that the convent is held holy and honoured; "Bounty"
+is the cellaress; "Mercy" the stewardess; and "Pity" the sick-nurse.
+The provost, or priest, is "Godly Obedience," to whom all these
+virtues are subject. "Thus does the convent abide in God, and happy
+are they who dwell therein."
+
+From this spiritual abode of the virtues we turn to one of Mechthild's
+earliest recorded visions--that of Hell, with its flame and flare.
+Whilst Death was perhaps man's first mystery, the Hereafter has been
+his endless pre-occupation. Whatever his country or his time, he has
+ever sought to lift the veil which hides the future, portraying his
+vain efforts in symbol. In Mechthild's time her world was engrossed
+with thoughts and speculations concerning the Hereafter, for Death,
+which at the end of the next century was to take dramatic and
+pictorial form in the weird and all-embracing "Dance of Death,"
+although its earliest known poetic form is of 1160, ever hovered near
+in pestilence, war, and tumult. Whilst some expressed themselves in
+carved stone, or on painted wall, others, as did Mechthild, realised
+their visions and ideas in a wealth of word-pictures. Such visions
+and ideas had accumulated adown the ages, varying but slightly one
+from another, and Mechthild, in making use of this stereotyped
+material, only took from, or added to, the general sum. Yet even so,
+she contrives to make her personality felt. She begins: "I have seen a
+place whose name is Eternal Hatred." Lucifer, farthest removed from
+the source of Light, forms the foundation-stone, and around him are
+arranged the deadly sins. Above him are the Christians, then the Jews,
+and, farthest removed from Hell's dire depths, the Heathen. Horror
+upon horror follows, like those pictured a hundred years before by
+Herrad von Landsperg, abbess at Hohenburg, in Alsace, and, fifty years
+later, by Dante, and when she concludes by saying that, after seeing
+the terrors of Hell, all her five senses were paralysed for three
+days, as if struck by lightning, it is significant that Dante tells
+that, overwhelmed with sorrow for the lovers, doomed for ever to be
+borne upon the winds, he "fainted with pity ... and fell, as a dead
+body falls."
+
+It is with a sense of relief that we leave such sad scenes, to glance
+at her vision of Paradise, although it does not follow in this
+sequence in her recorded revelations, for, as seems fitting, it is one
+of the very latest. Calling it "a glimpse of Paradise," she says that
+"of the length and breadth of Paradise there is no end." Then she
+continues--and this is especially interesting because it is in this
+opening that some commentators have seen the connecting link with
+Dante[23]--that between this world and it, she came to a spot--the
+Earthly Paradise--where she saw trees and fresh grass and no weeds.
+Some of the trees bore apples, but most of them sweetly scented
+leaves. Swift streams flowed through it, and warm winds were wafted
+from the north. The air was sweeter than words can tell. Here, she
+adds, there were no animals or birds, for God has reserved it for
+mankind alone, so that he may dwell there undisturbed. This seems to
+strike a strange note coming from the poetess Mechthild. How different
+is her sentiment from that of her brother-mystic, St. Francis, to whom
+the birds were his "little sisters," and who "loved above all other
+birds a certain little bird which is called the lark." But though,
+with apparent satisfaction, Mechthild saw no birds, she did see Enoch
+and Elias, and greeted the former by questioning him as to how he came
+there. Holy Writ has supplied the only answer, "He walked with God,
+and he was not, for God took him." Having spoken thus of the Earthly
+Paradise, Mechthild goes on to tell of the Heavenly, where she sees,
+"floating in rapture, as the air floats in the sunshine," the souls
+which, though not deserving of Purgatory, are not yet come into God's
+kingdom, and to whom rewards and crowns come not until they enter that
+kingdom. She then concludes by saying that "all the kingdoms of this
+world shall perish, and the earthly and the heavenly Paradise shall
+pass away, and all shall dwell together in God"--the Empyrean of
+Dante, where he "saw ingathered, bound by love in one volume, the
+scattered leaves of all the universe; substance and accidents and
+their relations, as though together fused, after such fashion that
+what I tell of is one simple flame."
+
+    [23] The tendency of present-day Italian scholarship seems in
+    favour of identifying Mechthild of Hackeborn, rather than
+    Mechthild of Magdeburg, with Dante's Matelda.
+
+In her very varied writings many beautiful and suggestive thoughts are
+to be found, as, for instance, when "Understanding" converses with
+"Conscience," and accuses Conscience of being at the same time both
+proud and humble, and Conscience explains that she is proud because
+she is in touch with God, and humble because she has done so few good
+works. And again, when "Understanding" and "the Soul" hold converse.
+Understanding, desirous of knowing everything, asks the Soul why such
+brilliant light radiates from her, and the Soul replies by inquiring
+why Understanding asks this, seeing that she is so much wiser than the
+Soul. When Understanding would still penetrate the unspeakable secrecy
+between God and the Soul, the Soul refuses to answer, since, as she
+explains, to her alone is given union with God, to which Understanding
+can never attain. Or, again, when Mechthild, telling how the Soul, no
+longer led by the Senses, but leading them to the desired goal, says,
+"It is a wondrous journey along which the true soul progresses, and
+leads with it the senses, as a man with sight leads one who is blind.
+On this journey the soul is free and without sorrow, since it desires
+naught but to serve its Lord, who orders all things for the best."
+
+Of Prayer, which to her was "naught else but yearning of soul," she
+says, "It makes a sour heart sweet, a sad heart merry, a poor heart
+rich, a dull heart wise, a timid heart bold, a weak heart strong, a
+blind heart seeing, a cold heart burning. It draws the great God down
+into the small heart, it drives the hungry soul out to the full God,
+it brings together the two lovers, God and the soul, into a blissful
+place, where they speak much of love."
+
+Again, in a spirit of self-examination, she writes: "What most of all
+hinders the spiritually-minded from full perfection is, that they pay
+so little heed to small sins. I tell you, of a truth, that when I
+abstain from a laugh that would hurt no one, or hide some soreness of
+heart, or feel a little impatience at my own pain, my soul becomes so
+dark, and my mind so dull, and my heart so cold, that I am constrained
+to pray heartily and long, and humbly to make confession of all my
+faults. Then grace comes again to wretched me, and I creep back like a
+beaten dog into the kitchen."
+
+But all these and kindred thoughts pale before her discourses on love.
+Love was the keynote of her life. She was born a poetess; she became a
+saint. How sorely she strove towards this end, and spent herself in
+conflict between self-control and ecstasy, no words can tell. It was
+only when Purgation's way was partly trod, and she had "found in Pain
+the grave but kindly teacher of immortal secrets," that she could say,
+"Lord, I bring Thee my treasure, which is greater than the mountains,
+wider than the world, deeper than the sea, higher than the clouds,
+more beautiful than the sun, more manifold than the stars, and which
+outweighs all the earth." Then asks the voice of God: "How is this thy
+treasure called, oh Image of my Divinity?"
+
+"Lord, it is called my heart's desire. I have withdrawn it from the
+world, kept it to myself, and denied it to all creatures. Now no
+longer would I carry it. Lord, where shall I lay it?"
+
+"Nowhere shalt thou lay thy heart's desire save in My own Divine
+heart. There only wilt thou find comfort."
+
+Love and knowledge, the two aspirations of the soul after ultimate
+truth, are her frequent theme. Sometimes she contrasts Love with the
+knowledge of the understanding: "Those who would know much, and love
+little, will ever remain at but the beginning of a godly life. So we
+must have a constant care how we may please God therein. Simple love,
+with but little knowledge, can do great things"; sometimes with the
+knowledge of the heart--"To the wise soul, love without knowledge
+seems darkness, knowledge without fruition, the very pain of Hell.
+Fruition can be reached only through Death." In one of her visions
+she, in an exquisite simile, describes how love flows from the Godhead
+to mankind, penetrating both body and soul. "It goes without effort,"
+she says, "as does a bird in the air when it does not move its wings."
+In the same vision she sees the Holy Mother, with uncovered breasts,
+standing on God's left hand, and Christ on the right, showing his
+still-open wounds, both pleading for sinful humanity, and she adds
+that as long as sin endures on earth, so long will Christ's wounds
+remain open and bleeding, though painless, but that after the Day of
+Judgment they will heal, and it will be as though there was a
+rose-leaf instead of the wounds.[24]
+
+    [24] The first of these subjects--the Holy Mother and Christ
+    pleading for sinners--is to be found in a miniature in King
+    Henry VI.'s Psalter (Brit. Mus. Cotton MS. Domitian. A. xvii.
+    _circ._ 1430, fol. 205), and the two intercessions separately
+    form two of the subjects in the _Speculum Humanae
+    Salvationis_ (fourteenth century). Though the _S.H.S._ is of
+    later date than the time of Mechthild the literary source of
+    the subject appears to be a passage in the _De laudibus
+    B.M.V._ of Arnaud of Chartres, abbot of Bonneval 1138-1156
+    (J. Lutz and P. Perdrizet, _Spec. Hum. Sal._ vol. i.,
+    Mulhouse, 1907), which might quite well have been known to
+    her, especially if, as Messrs. Lutz and Perdrizet consider,
+    the _S.H.S._ was written by a Dominican, who would naturally
+    make use of Dominican teaching and tradition, and we know
+    that Mechthild, even if not, as has been suggested, a
+    tertiary of that Order, was in constant and close touch with
+    it. The second subject, the reference to rose-leaves and
+    Christ's wounds, seems to be a purely original thought, and
+    one amongst the many fascinating ideas that have centred
+    round the rose ever since Aphrodite anointed the dead body of
+    Hector with rose-scented oil (_Iliad_, xxiii. 186).
+
+Of Love, as she conceived it in relation to herself individually, she
+can never write enough. "I also may not suffer that any single comfort
+move me, save my love alone. I love my earthly friends in a heavenly
+fellowship, and I love my enemies with a holy longing for their
+salvation. God has enough of all good things, save of union with the
+soul."
+
+But where Mechthild seems to strike an original note for her time is
+in her insistence on God's craving for the soul, as well as the soul's
+craving for God. We find the same insistence in Meister Eckhart, who
+followed her closely in time, and perhaps, in this respect, in thought
+also. "God needs man," says Eckhart, quite simply. And again, "God can
+do as little without us as we without Him." With Mechthild it is from
+ecstasy to ecstasy that "heart speaks to heart." Says the soul of
+Mechthild: "Lord, Thou art ever sick of love for me, and that hast
+Thou Thyself well proved. Thou hast written me in the Book of the
+Godhead. Thou hast fashioned me after Thine own image. Thou hast bound
+me hand and foot to Thy side. O grant it to me, Beloved, to anoint
+Thee."
+
+"Where wilt thou get thine ointment, dear one?"
+
+"Lord, I will tear my happy heart in twain, and lay Thee therein."
+
+"It is the most precious ointment thou couldest give Me, that I should
+evermore hover in thy soul."
+
+Further God says: "I longed for thee ere the world was. I long for
+thee, and thou longest for me. When two burning desires come together,
+then is love perfected."
+
+Sometimes the loving soul traverses a dark way, and cries out in
+desolation and despair: "Lord, since Thou hast taken from me all that
+I had of Thee, yet of Thy grace leave me that gift which every dog has
+by nature--that in my distress I may be true to Thee, without any
+ill-will. This do I truly desire more than all Thy heavenly kingdom."
+
+And Divine Love makes answer: "Sweet Dove, now list to me. Thy secret
+seeking must needs find me, thy heart's distress must needs compel me,
+thy loving pursuit has so wearied me, that I long to cool myself in
+thy pure soul in the which I am imprisoned. The throbbing sighs of thy
+sore heart have driven my justice from thee. All is right between me
+and thee. I cannot be sundered from thee. However far we are parted,
+never can we be separated. I cause thee extreme pain of body. If I
+gave myself to thee as oft as thou wouldst, I should thus deprive
+myself of the sweet shelter I have in thee in this world."
+
+Again the soul cries out--but now discomfited by the Divine Love from
+whose tireless quest there is no escape--"Thou hast pursued and
+captured and bound me, and hast wounded me so deeply that never shall
+I be healed. Thou hast given me many a hard blow. Tell me, shall I
+ever get whole from Thee? Shall I not be slain by Thee? Thus would it
+have been better for me if that I had never known Thee."
+
+Then answers Love: "That I pursued thee gave me delight. That I made
+thee captive was my desire. That I bound thee was my joy. When I
+wounded thee, then did I become one with thee. Thus I give thee hard
+blows so that I may be possessed of thee. I drove Almighty God from
+His heavenly kingdom, and took from Him His mortal life, and have
+restored Him with honour to His Father. How canst thou, poor worm,
+save thyself from me?"
+
+Of all Mechthild's visions, there is none that seems to reach a
+greater height of supreme beauty than that in which the loving soul
+learns the way to its Divine Lover. It is strangely reminiscent of
+courtly life and courtly poetry, translated into the ecstatic state,
+and etherealised into the very perfume of spirituality as the soul
+becomes one with God. Having passed the distress of repentance, the
+pain of confession, and the labour of penance, and having overcome the
+love of the World, the tempting of the Devil, and its own self-will,
+the soul, weary, and longing for her Divine Lover and God, cries out:
+"Beautiful Youth, I long for thee. Where shall I find thee?"
+
+Then says the youth: "I hear a voice which speaks somewhat of love.
+Many days have I wooed her, but never have I heard her voice. Now I am
+moved. I must go to meet her. She it is who bears grief and love
+together. In the morning in the dew is the most intimate rapture which
+first penetrates the soul."
+
+Then speak her Chamberlains, which are the live senses: "Lady, thou
+must adorn thyself. We have heard a whisper that the Prince comes to
+meet thee in the dew, and the sweet song of the birds. Tarry not,
+Lady."
+
+So she puts on a shift of gentle humility, so humble that nothing
+could be more so, and over it a white robe of pure chastity, so pure
+that she cannot endure thoughts, words, or desires which might stain
+it. Then she wraps herself in a cloak of holy desire, which she has
+wrought in gold with all the virtues. So she goes into the wood, which
+is the company of holy people. The sweetest nightingales sing there,
+day and night, of the right union with God. She tries to join in the
+festal dance, that is, to imitate the example of the elect. Then comes
+the youth and says to her: "Thou shalt dance merrily even as my
+Elect." And she answers: "I cannot dance, Lord, if Thou dost not lead
+me. If Thou wilt that I leap joyfully, Thou must first Thyself sing.
+Then will I leap for love, from love to knowledge, from knowledge to
+fruition, from fruition to beyond all human senses. There will I
+remain, and circle evermore."[25]
+
+    [25] It may be recalled that Dante (_Par._ xxiv.) sees the
+    Saints in Paradise as circling lights from whence issues
+    divine song, and again (_Par._ xxv.) "wheeling round in such
+    guise as their burning love befitted."
+
+Then speaks the youth: "Thy dance of praise is well done. Thou shalt
+have thy will, for thou art heartily wearied. Come at mid-day to the
+shady fountain, to the bed of love. There shalt thou be refreshed."
+
+Then, weary of the dance, the soul says to her Chamberlains, the
+senses: "Withdraw from me, I must go where I may cool myself."
+
+Then say the senses: "Lady, wilt thou be refreshed with the loving
+tears of St. Mary Magdalene? They may well suffice thee."
+
+"Be silent, sirs; you know not what I mean. Hinder me not. I would
+drink for a space of the unmingled wine."
+
+"Lady, in the Virgin's chastity the great love is reached."
+
+"That may be. For me it is not the highest."
+
+"Lady, thou mightst cool thyself in the martyrs' blood."
+
+"I have been martyred many a day, so that I have no need to come to
+that now."
+
+"Lady, bright are the angels, and lovely in love's hue. Wouldst thou
+cool thyself, be lifted up with them."
+
+"The bliss of the angels brings me love's woe unless I see their Lord,
+my Bridegroom."
+
+"Lady, if thou comest there, thou wilt be blinded quite, so fiery hot
+is the Godhead, as thou thyself well knowest, for the fire and the
+glow which make heaven and all the holy ones burn and shine, all flow
+from His divine breath, and from His human mouth, through the wisdom
+of the Holy Ghost. How couldest thou endure it for an hour?"
+
+And the soul answers: "The fish cannot drown in the water, the bird
+cannot sink in the air, gold cannot perish in the fire, where it gains
+its clear and shining worth. God has granted to each creature to
+cherish its own nature. How can I withstand my nature? I must go from
+all things to God, who is my Father by Nature, my Brother through His
+Humanity, my Bridegroom through Love, and I am His for ever."
+
+Silenced by this wondrous flight of holy passion, we bid farewell to
+Mechthild. She lived for her time, and she lives for us, as one of
+"humanity's pioneers on the only road to rest." "Out of the depths,"
+she cried to Heaven. We leave her in the music of the spheres.
+
+
+
+
+A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY ART-PATRON AND PHILANTHROPIST, MAHAUT, COUNTESS
+OF ARTOIS
+
+
+It has been well said that "out of things unlikely and remote may be
+won romance and beauty." Perhaps the truth of this reflection has
+never been more signally exemplified than in the case of Mahaut,
+Countess of Artois and Burgundy, the record of whose life, in the
+absence of any contemporary biographer, has been ably deciphered from
+such commonplace material as the household accounts of her
+stewards.[26] This great lady, one of the greatest patrons of art of
+her time, lived at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the
+fourteenth century. She was a great-niece of St. Louis. No poet has
+sung of her. It is merely through the prose of daily expenditure that
+she is made known to us. She stands before us, not the ideal creation
+of the mediaeval romancer, but a real woman, with her virtues and
+failings, her joys and sorrows, real by very reason of this union of
+contrasts, a woman trying to grapple with difficulties forced upon her
+by her position, and by an age when intrigue and cunning were as
+freely resorted to, and as deftly handled, as the sword and the lance.
+
+    [26] Richard (Jules Marie), _Une Petite Niece de S. Louis:
+    Mahaut, Comtesse d'Artois_.
+
+    Dehaisnes (M. le Chanoine), _L'Histoire de l'art dans la
+    Flandre, l'Artois, et le Hainaut avant le XVme siecle_.
+
+Mahaut was the daughter of Robert the Second, Count of Artois, a
+valiant and chivalrous man, and of Amicie de Courtenay, of whom it was
+said that she was esteemed whilst she lived, and mourned of all when
+she died. Her brother, Philip, predeceased his father, leaving one
+son, Robert. In accordance with local custom, Mahaut, on the death of
+her father, inherited Artois, but her nephew, Robert, on attaining his
+majority at the age of fourteen, set up a counter-claim. This family
+feud was a constant source of trouble and vexation to her, since
+Robert again and again returned to the attack, not only appealing to
+the king to consider his cause, and fabricating spurious documents as
+a means of gaining his end, but also employing unscrupulous agents to
+spread false charges against her. He further took advantage of the
+growing discontent amongst the nobles, who were gradually realising
+that their power was waning, to attach them to his cause, and to
+induce them to join him in harassing Mahaut by making raids upon her
+lands and her castles. She, however, through her extraordinary
+personality, was able to triumph over all this opposition, which, far
+from marring, only seemed to add lustre to the work she had set
+herself to do.
+
+Mahaut was religious, artistic, and literary. All these
+characteristics, together with the circumstance of wealth, she
+inherited, and right well did she make use of her inheritance.
+
+Being religious, and living in an age when the frenzy for crusading
+had subsided and when architecture was the ruling passion, she
+expended her zeal in building religious houses and hospitals.
+
+Being artistic, she made her favourite castle at Hesdin, and the town
+around its walls, a centre of art life. Here, seemingly, she favoured
+all the arts, including to a certain extent music, then still in its
+infancy, for although she apparently had no regular minstrel or
+minstrels in her employ as was customary in the houses of the
+noblesse, she seems to have engaged them for Church festivals and
+sundry fetes, and we know that on one occasion she hired a minstrel to
+soothe her sick child with the sweet soft music of the harp, thus
+suggesting that she herself had felt the power of music to minister to
+both body and soul.
+
+Being literary, Mahaut collected what MSS. and books she could, and
+the list of them serves to show what might be found in a library of
+the early fourteenth century. Her religious books included a Bible in
+French,[27] a Psalter, a Gradual, various Books of Hours for private
+devotion, Lives of the Saints and of the Fathers, and the Miracles of
+Our Lady. Philosophy was represented by a French translation of
+Boethius (probably a copy of a translation made by order of King
+Philip le Bel, by Jean de Meun, the writer of the second portion of
+_The Romance of the Rose_), Law by a verse translation of the laws of
+Normandy, History by the Chronicles of the Kings of France, and Travel
+by _The Romance of the Great Kan_, known to us as _The Travels of
+Marco Polo_. But by far the largest category consisted of Romances,
+such as that of Oger le Danois from the national Epic, and another of
+Tancred, a hero of the first Crusade, the Romance of Troy, Percival le
+Gallois, Tristan, Renart, and the Violet, the story which forms the
+chief episode in the play of Cymbeline. Of course there was no great
+choice, but that Mahaut read them and loved them we may be certain,
+since we know that she took some with her on her journeyings, and to
+preserve them from the wear and tear of travel, had leather wallets
+made to protect them. Mahaut was, in truth, the first wealthy
+individual of the age to spend her substance with the express purpose
+of surrounding herself with beauty of every kind. The foremost thought
+of a man in a like case would probably have been to add to his power.
+_Her_ thought was of beauty, a quality much more far-reaching and less
+transient, and one which, even like Time itself, triumphs over the
+changes of fame and fortune.
+
+    [27] The Bible was first translated into French, and reduced
+    in size so that it could be carried in the hand, between 1200
+    and 1250.
+
+Though Mahaut did not live the allotted three score years and ten, she
+lived long enough to see seven kings on the throne of France, two of
+whom--Philip the Fifth and Charles the Fourth--were her sons-in-law.
+She was a mere child when her great-uncle, King Louis, died in 1270.
+In 1285, the year in which Philip the Fourth, surnamed le Bel,
+ascended the throne, she wedded Otho, Count Palatine of Burgundy, a
+widower of forty-five, a companion in arms of her father, and a brave
+and generous man, who died fighting for his country, but one
+absolutely incapable in administration, and, as a consequence, always
+in debt and in the clutches of the usurer. There are few documents to
+throw any light on her life until after Otho's death in 1303. This may
+be due partly to the fact that she only came into her great
+possessions on her father's death in 1302, and partly to the
+circumstance that the careless and luxurious expenditure of her
+husband in no small degree dissipated her resources, and naturally
+prevented, for the time, any material encouragement of art. Doubtless
+also much of her time was spent in superintending the education of her
+children--two daughters who were destined to marry kings of France,
+and a son who was born a peer of the realm, and inheritor of one of
+its richest territories. But adverse fate, by the disgrace of one of
+her daughters, and the death of her son, intervened to darken these
+brilliant prospects, and forms a grey background to her otherwise
+wonderful and glorious career.
+
+The more the life of this remarkable woman is studied, the more
+apparent it becomes that what gives it its peculiar charm and worth is
+the sense she possessed of the value of all human endeavour, whether
+in great things or in simple. To her the humblest matters of home
+life, and the affairs connected with the administration of her
+domains, had each their particular significance. The ordering of a
+small grooved tablet on which her little boy could arrange the letters
+of the alphabet claimed her attention equally with the founding and
+arranging of a hospital. In her capacity as ruler we see the same wide
+and reasonable outlook on life, for whilst strict as an administrator,
+in personal relations she was charitable and sympathetic. Sometimes a
+rebellious baron was deprived of his fief and banished, or was
+condemned to expiate his misdeed by making a pilgrimage to sundry
+shrines. But Mahaut was practical withal, and recognised human
+frailty, and as the pilgrimage was for correction, no pardon was
+granted unless the offender brought from each of the sanctuaries a
+certificate that his vow had been fulfilled. On the other hand, if any
+were sick or in trouble, she was solicitous for their relief, and even
+aided them personally where possible. She thus put into practice the
+charge of her saintly kinsman, King Louis the Ninth, who always
+counselled those about him to have compassion on all mental or
+physical suffering, since the heart may be stricken as well as the
+body.
+
+As Mahaut had no biographer, and contemporary history merely treats
+her as if she were one of many pawns on a chess-board, her stewards'
+entries furnish the only materials from which we can weave some
+outline of her life, an outline, nevertheless, which enables us to
+reason somewhat concerning her inner life, the pattern, as it were,
+that is not wrought for the world.
+
+When, in 1302, Mahaut took over the reins of government in Artois,
+Paris was the great centre of art and literature as well as of the
+science of the day, a condition largely due to the genius of Philip
+Augustus, and fostered by succeeding kings. Thither, from far and
+near, flocked scholars, poets, and artists alike. Some of these took
+up their abode permanently within its walls. Others passed to and fro,
+thus creating that constant interchange of thought which is essential
+to vitality, so that it was said that "the goddess of Wisdom, after
+having dwelt in Athens and Rome, had taken up her abode in Paris."
+There, at least twice a year, came Mahaut to her sumptuous dwelling,
+the Hotel d'Artois, situated near the Temple, and extending with its
+gardens and its outbuildings to the walls built by Philip Augustus.
+Here all who loved the arts and learning were made welcome, and it is
+interesting to think it possible, nay even probable, that during one
+of her many sojourns there she may have met and talked with Dante.
+
+Amongst the special treasures to be found there, mention is made of
+four figure-pictures, one of which is said to have been of Roman
+workmanship, and round in form--certainly, as far as is known, a
+rarity at that time. We also find a record of finely wrought
+embroideries and tapestries on the walls, and of windows painted
+either with armorial bearings and figures, or with simple foliage like
+the delicate ivy and hawthorn to be seen enriching the pages of Books
+of Hours of the fourteenth century. Special mention is made of a
+window, evidently over the altar in the private Chapel, in which was
+represented the Crucifixion. In the large hall were tables on
+trestles, easily removed before the dance began or minstrels or
+jugglers displayed their skill, dressers to hold the gold and silver
+plate and from which to serve the banquet, and settles with footboards
+so necessary when the rushes were only renewed at lengthy intervals.
+But if the hall was somewhat sparsely furnished, its ceiling and walls
+(the latter on occasions hung with embroideries carried from castle to
+castle as the Countess journeyed) were made bright with colour, and
+beautiful with design. How bright, and how beautiful, we can infer
+almost with certainty from examples in the Castle of Chillon of
+thirteenth and fourteenth century decoration lately rescued from under
+a coat of whitewash,[28] and from the comparison made by Brunetto
+Latini (1230-1294), in his _Tesoro_, of the Italian with the French
+feudal castle, in which he says of the one that it is only built for
+war, with ditches, palisades, and high towers and walls, and of the
+other that it lies in the midst of meadows and gardens, _with large
+painted chambers_.
+
+    [28] _Chillon_, Albert Naef, Geneve, 1908.
+
+Mahaut's cousin, the cold and impersonal Philip le Bel, was on the
+throne. For the most part war had ceased in the land, but still there
+was war in high places, for Philip, avaricious by nature, and finding
+himself a king under altering conditions--the Papacy fallen into
+disregard, the Nobility weakened, and the Nation growing, but without
+any adequate provision made to meet the needs of this growth--left no
+stone unturned to supply this want and gratify his greed. On the
+question of the subsidies of the clergy and the relation between
+things spiritual and temporal, he quarrelled with the Pope, Boniface
+the Eighth, and brought about the removal of the Holy See from Rome to
+Avignon. He robbed and ruined the Templars, and despoiled the Jews and
+Lombards, the financiers of the day. With him no trickery was too
+base, no cruelty too cold-blooded. Gold was his God. Dante, who was
+his contemporary, refers (_Purg._ vii. 109) to "his wicked and foul
+life" (_la vita sua viziata e lorda_), and (_Par._ xix. 118) to his
+"debasement of the coinage" (_falseggiando la moneta_), as well as to
+his self-seeking greed. Such, with the added glamour of art and
+learning, was the courtly atmosphere of the Time. The bourgeoisie,
+encouraged by the king who sought to aggrandise the monarchy at the
+expense of the nobles, was growing rich, and politically gaining in
+power, and Philip ere long discovered that he had helped merely to
+change the centre of power, and not to crush it.
+
+But Paris does not seem to have attracted Mahaut as did her castle at
+Hesdin. Here she was in the midst of her own domains, surrounded by
+her liegemen and retainers, and able to be in constant touch with her
+artificers and workers, whatever their art or industry. By the
+thirteenth century the dwelling of the Noble was no longer a grim
+castle, suggestive only of a place of defence, with narrow slits in
+the walls for the admission of air and light and for the discharge of
+arrows, but was more like a fortified country-house. The encompassing
+walls enclosed a wide area, within which was sheltered a village and
+everything necessary to the growth and development of a community.
+
+From Hesdin Mahaut journeyed constantly through her County of Artois,
+visiting her castles, the towns or villages around them, and the
+various religious houses and hospitals she had founded, and attending
+in general to the well-being of her subjects. For her it was not
+enough that she was born to reign. She realised that, without
+administration, reigning through the accident of birth is mere
+puppet's work, and leads to naught. Her daily life was the visible
+expression of this belief, as she herself was an example of the woman
+who comprehends the just proportion between personal and public work.
+That her subjects responded to her sympathy, and held her in
+affectionate regard, is proved by their kindly and sympathetic concern
+if she were ill or on a journey, and by the offerings they made to her
+on special anniversaries and other festive occasions. We read of gifts
+not only of herrings, sturgeon, game, wine, dogs, peacocks, swans,
+pasties, and whipped cream, but also of the strangely assorted tribute
+of a dead bear and twelve cheeses, as well as of one which must have
+contrasted pleasantly with this sundry and singular good cheer--a
+parrakeet in a beautifully painted cage. Mahaut, as we have said, was
+a constant traveller, and though travelling was then no easy matter,
+the roads could not have been over-much beset with difficulties seeing
+that she journeyed in all weathers, either on horseback or in a
+horse-litter, or in a chariot without springs, and with no mean
+retinue. In truth, her following was like a glorified Canterbury
+pilgrimage. First came the Countess, accompanied by one or more
+knights, her ladies-in-waiting, her chaplain and confessor, her
+physician, her secretary, her treasurer and steward, and sundry petty
+officers of her household. Then followed the servants, the cook with
+his scullions, the shoemaker who could also do necessary repairs to
+the harness, the laundress riding astride as was the manner of
+serving-women, and a score of lackeys and dependants of all sorts in
+charge of the carts containing the necessaries of travel. These
+necessaries were generally packed in wooden coffers, some of which
+were simple chests, whilst others opened like a cupboard and were
+fitted with drawers. To preserve such coffers from damp and damage,
+they were put into osier cases covered with cow-hide. And with all
+this motley company and baggage, there are but few records of
+accidents. The accounts tell of a small occasional expenditure in
+consequence of the breakdown of a chariot, or the fall of a valet from
+his horse, or the upsetting into a river of a cart conveying the
+Countess's wardrobe. But such misadventures were not taken very
+seriously by these folk, seasoned to discomfort. Valet or chariot was
+mended, or the floating garments were recovered, and on went the
+easy-going company, singing by the way, and with horns blowing as they
+neared some castle or village where a halt was to be made for the
+night. The absence of any mention of the removal of furniture from
+castle to castle during these periodical wanderings, save a small bed
+for Mahaut's own use, leads us to infer that greater luxury then
+prevailed than in the days of her great-uncle, Louis the Ninth, when
+even Royalty itself thought it no hardship to have beds and other
+necessary pieces of furniture carried by beasts of burden from place
+to place according to the movements of the Court. This frugal and
+homely custom on one occasion very nearly ended in a tragedy. The
+devout Isabelle, Louis's sister, was praying in the early morning, as
+was her wont, within her curtained bed, and either lost in prayer or
+overcome with fatigue by the length of her orisons, did not notice the
+arrival of the packers, who rolled up the bed without drawing the
+curtains, and the praying Princess within must have been smothered had
+not her lady-in-waiting, Agnes de Harcourt, heard her stifled cries,
+and hastened to her rescue. This quaint episode so amused Louis, that
+he ever after recounted it when telling of the piety of his sister.
+
+Let us now go in imagination to the Castle of Hesdin, and see
+something of its treasures and of the daily life of the Countess
+Mahaut.
+
+Soon after her accession to Artois, her two daughters married sons of
+King Philip le Bel, and her little son, Robert, then became her
+principal care. A little boy of noble family had been chosen as his
+companion to share in his education and to join with him in play. It
+would seem that the two were treated on an absolute equality, even to
+having their doublets cut from the same piece of cloth, and their
+tunics and cloaks trimmed with the same fur. Beyond their ordinary
+lessons, they were early taught the games of tables and chess, both of
+which were considered essential to a knight's education. They also
+rode to the chase and attended tournaments, and at the age of fourteen
+themselves held the lance as part of their training in the art of
+war. Robert seems to have been of a most inquiring and intelligent
+nature, but when he had scarce passed his seventeenth year, Mahaut,
+with scant warning, saw this her only son stricken in death just as he
+was about to enter the ranks of knighthood. In the archives of Arras,
+the Capital of Artois, may be found a discoloured parchment containing
+the inventory of the equipment provided for the youthful Robert in
+anticipation of his initiation. What sorrow is enshrined in these
+faded pages! It is not sorrow for death, but the bitterer sorrow for
+something that has never lived, or, rather, that has lived only in the
+heart, like spring blossom blighted ere fruiting-time. In the Church
+of St. Denis, where modern restoration has but emphasised the
+transitoriness and vanity of human glory, there can still be seen the
+tomb of this youth, carved soon after his death by Pepin de Huy, and
+once painted, as was all such carved work. Even to the mere student it
+is interesting as being the only existing monument that can with
+certainty be attributed to this celebrated sculptor, and also as
+being, in Gothic art, one of the first essays in portraiture in
+recumbent figures of the dead, as contrasted with mere effigy. For the
+deeper thinker it has even greater significance. Of all the good and
+great works that Mahaut conceived and initiated--the churches,
+castles, hospitals, which she built and enriched for the glory of God
+and the safety and solace of mankind--all have passed away. This
+simple tomb alone remains. But its very simplicity is eloquent, for
+around it there seems to hover that never-dying spirit of love and
+goodness and beauty to which, throughout her life, Mahaut contributed
+in such large measure, and which was her real and lasting gift to the
+world.
+
+Life as mirrored in the Castle records gives little else than a
+pleasing picture of Mahaut's relations with all her dependants, as
+well as with those with whom she was connected, whether by ties of
+friendship, of politics, or of the common courtesies of life. Her
+immediate household was naturally her first care. Twice a year, at
+Easter and All Saints, a distribution was made of cloth and furs. Some
+of these, fine and costly, were for those in personal attendance on
+the Countess, whilst others were in the nature of liveries. Others,
+again, of still coarser make, such as Irish serge, with sheep or
+rabbit skin for warmth in winter, were given to those of lowly service
+or who had specially rough work to perform. Her ladies-in-waiting, of
+whom there were always two or three, appear to have received for their
+services no money payment, but, over and above the cloth and fur
+already alluded to, gifts, on special occasions, of girdles and
+satchels (very often jewelled), gold chaplets, and gold and silver
+braid, jewelled, and used for twining in the hair. In addition to
+this, presents of jewels and silver cups were made to them by the
+noble ladies who came to stay with the Countess, just as she, on her
+part, presented similar gifts to those who accompanied her guests.
+How well we can picture to ourselves these maidens (for such is all
+they were), decking themselves in their girdles and jewelled braid,
+comparing their gifts, and perhaps even standing on some oaken bench
+the better to get a view of their finery, for the mirrors were small,
+and the girdles were long, and could not otherwise be seen in all
+their glory. When they married, the Countess made gifts to them
+without stint, not only of the beautiful and the needful for their
+wardrobes, but also of household goods, and sometimes, when she knew
+their parents or kinsmen to be too poor to provide the usual dowry,
+even of a sum of money. To the retainers also we find the same kind
+and helping hand held out. If any were sick they were taken care of,
+and, if needs be, sent to some place where they could the better be
+cured, as we read of one who, suffering from gout, was sent to take
+healing waters. To another retainer was given the necessary money to
+pay for his son on entering a monastery, another receiving the
+wherewithal to go to his native village to attend his mother's burial.
+Old servants, past work, were cared for in the monasteries or
+hospitals, or given some post suitable to their years. To a poor
+knight was given money to enable him to buy a good horse and armour,
+for poverty of purse was no disgrace in the thirteenth century. At the
+beginning of winter a distribution, organised by the clergy and
+stewards of the rural communities in Artois, but superintended by
+the Countess herself, was made to the poor of blankets, garments, and
+shoes, and so arranged that the same person did not receive the like
+gift two years in succession. In truth, no details seemed too small,
+none too onerous, for Mahaut's untiring solicitude. She had heart and
+brain for everything. It is these intimate touches which make the time
+so living and present to us, and which seem, as it were, to place this
+wonderful woman in a charmed and tranquil circle, in spite of the
+trouble and turmoil incidental to her life and her position.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+STATUE OF MAHAUT IN ABBEY OF LA THIEULOYE, NEAR ARRAS, NOW DESTROYED.
+
+From a Drawing, now in Brussels, made in 1602.
+
+_To face page 99._]
+
+Amongst Mahaut's many good works was the keeping in repair of existing
+religious houses, hospitals, and lazar-houses, and the building and
+maintenance of new ones. Of all the religious houses which she
+founded, her special care was for the Dominican convent of La
+Thieuloye, near Arras, the equipment of which, as set out in the
+accounts, may well serve as an example of that of the others. The
+items for the furnishing and instalment of the house and chapel
+include everything needful for the community, from gold and silver
+vessels, silver-gilt images of St. Louis, the Trinity, and St. John,
+for the sanctuary, and samite and velvet for chasubles, down to the
+bowls and platters for the nuns, the woollen material for their
+garments, and all the simple necessaries of everyday life. In the
+chapel of this nunnery was preserved a kneeling statue of Mahaut,
+representing her as foundress, in the habit of the Order strewn with
+the arms of Artois. Jean Aloul, of Tournai, has been suggested as the
+sculptor, since it is known from the accounts that he was working for
+the Countess at Arras in 1323. This statue (known to us through a
+drawing, now at Brussels, made in 1602) is of interest to-day because,
+judging from the character expressed in the face, it seems probable
+that it was a portrait, and not simply imagery. This conjecture seems
+all the more likely when we compare the statue with a miniature
+painted more than a hundred years later by Jean Fouquet in _Les
+Grandes Chroniques de France_ (Bib. Nat.), portraying the marriage of
+King Charles the Fourth with his second wife, Marie de Luxembourg. In
+this picture a lady, heavily coiffed, and with features suggestive of
+those of the statue, but with anguish written upon them, turns away
+from the ceremony as if it were all too painful. If this unwilling
+guest represents Mahaut, her woeful look is intelligible when we
+recall the sad story connected with Charles's first wife, Mahaut's
+daughter Blanche, married when she was but fifteen, and whose beauty
+was so dazzling that Froissart records that "she was one of the most
+beautiful women in the world." Accused of an intrigue with a gentleman
+of the Court, she was imprisoned in the Chateau-Gaillard, where she
+remained, with shorn head, until, shortly after Charles ascended the
+throne, the Pope declared the marriage null. Then, whilst the king
+wedded another, the sad Blanche exchanged her castle prison-house
+for a convent one, where she died a year after she had taken the vows.
+There is no reason for supposing that Mahaut was at the wedding of
+Blanche's successor save in the imagination of the artist; but for him
+the inclusion of such a tragic figure would add a dramatic touch to
+the representation of an otherwise conventional ceremony.
+
+[Illustration: MARRIAGE OF CHARLES LE BEL AND MARIE OF LUXEMBURG.
+
+Grandes Chrons. de France, Bib. Nat.
+
+_To face page 100._]
+
+It almost takes us aback to read that in Mahaut's domain of Artois
+there were at least eighty hospitals and thirty lazar-houses, without
+counting those attached to the monasteries. But these numbers will not
+surprise us so much when we remember that almost every small community
+had its little hospital, used not only for the sick and as a lying-in
+hospital, but also as a shelter for the poor and the pilgrim. In the
+towns they were often built and supported by the Corporations or by
+rich merchants. Evidently some were in the nature of hospitals for
+incurables, for there were special clauses in the deeds of gift
+providing that a certain specified number of beds were to be kept for
+the sick until they were either cured or released by death. Besides
+building two hospitals in the County of Burgundy in fulfilment of the
+dying wishes of her husband, Mahaut built and maintained two in her
+own County of Artois. The one at Hesdin was the more important, and we
+can get some idea of it from the documents of the time. The deed
+relating to it tells that over the large entrance gate there was
+carved in stone a figure of St. John, the patron of hospitals and of
+the needy generally, with a poor man and woman on either side of him.
+The principal ward was 160 feet long and 34 feet wide, with walls 16
+feet high ending in a gabled roof, with two windows in each gable, and
+this, coupled with the fact that the sick were sometimes laid on
+cushions by the open windows, goes to show that what we pride
+ourselves on as a special discovery in modern hygiene--the benefit of
+fresh air--was known and applied even in what we are wont to consider
+a very benighted age in such matters.
+
+Whilst touching upon such a subject as this, it may be a surprise to
+some to learn that in large towns baths were provided for those who
+could not afford to have them in their own homes, and that there were
+also professional women hair-washers.
+
+[Illustration: THIRTEENTH-CENTURY TREATISE ON SURGERY, IN FRENCH.
+
+Sloane MS. 1977.
+
+_To face page 103._]
+
+But to return to the hospital. On one side of the ward were ten
+windows, each four feet square, and on the opposite side was a large
+door leading into the cloister with its garden, where the
+convalescents and the old people, whilst sheltered, could enjoy the
+sunshine and see the flowers and the birds. In addition to this there
+was a smaller ward for women, a chapel, a kitchen, and a room for the
+matron, as well as accommodation for the resident doctor, Maitre
+Robert, and the serving-women. It is some consolation to think that
+these poor suffering folk of centuries ago were even thus well
+tended, but when we look at contemporary representations of the
+surgery of the day,[29] we tremble at the mere thought of the heroic
+methods adopted. Besides the actual necessaries which she provided for
+the hospital at Hesdin, Mahaut constantly sent gifts of fish, game,
+and wine. Similar gifts she likewise made to the hospitals in Artois
+generally, as well as to those in Paris, and, on fete-days, to the
+poorer religious houses.
+
+    [29] See Roger of Parma, _Treatise on Surgery_. French
+    thirteenth century. Brit. Mus., Sloane MS., 1977.
+
+From her beneficence to the sick and sorry, the aged and the poor, we
+turn to her hospitality to her relations and friends, and to all those
+in spiritual or temporal authority in the towns or villages of Artois.
+The Castle of Hesdin, destroyed in the sixteenth century--only a few
+stones remaining to mark the site,--was situated a few miles from the
+present modern town of Hesdin. It must have been not only a scene of
+constant festivity and social intercourse, and a treasure-house
+withal, but also a veritable hive of industry, with workers and
+workshops within the Castle enclosure as well as in the town nestling
+beneath its walls. Here might be found artists and craftsmen of all
+sorts and degrees--sculptors and workers in stone, ivory-workers,
+wood-carvers, carpenters, artificers in silver and precious stones as
+well as in copper, forgers of iron, painters of wall-decoration,
+stonework, saddle-bows, and even masquerading-masks, illuminators of
+MSS., workers and painters of glass, harness-makers, armourers,
+tailors, and embroiderers--the whole forming a rare and remarkable
+centre of activity for a woman to have developed and ruled and made
+into a living force.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+[Illustration: BANQUET, WITH MINSTRELS PLAYING, AND ROOM HUNG WITH
+EMBROIDERY.
+
+MS. Romance of Alexander, 14th century, Bodleian, Oxford.
+
+_To face page 104._]
+
+It is a fete-day within the Castle. The horns have sounded. The feast
+is ready. To the great hall repair the knights and the ladies, the
+esquires and the damsels, two and two, according to their rank,
+dipping their hands, as they pass in, into silver basins of
+rose-water. They are gorgeously apparelled in silken garments and
+cloth of gold and silver, upon which are embroidered their coats of
+arms, for by the end of the thirteenth century armorial bearings,
+which by then had become attached to families, were used as a sign of
+nobility and rank. Mahaut, as hostess, takes her seat last. Adown the
+table are specimens of silver-plate, some the work of her own
+craftsmen, others the offerings of friendship or of courtesy. They are
+fashioned variously, and used for sweetmeats of all kinds, spices,
+almonds, and dainties made of orange and pomegranate. A favourite form
+is that of a ship, such as may be seen in _Les Tres Riches Heures_ of
+Jean, Duc de Berri, at Chantilly, in a representation of a feast given
+by the Duke. There are, besides, salt-cellars and sauce-boats, flagons
+and drinking-cups, and a bowl between every two guests, from which
+they eat, handing each other dainty morsels. Such, with a knife
+and a spoon for each, is their equipment for the meal, for none, save
+the carver, has both knife and fork. In a corner of the hall is a
+basket for the broken-meats destined for the poor, a leathern sack
+being also provided for foods with gravy or sauce. Neither at
+festivals nor in daily life would a meal have been considered complete
+if the poor were not remembered. Perhaps a messenger arrives during
+the feast with the news of a birth or a marriage in Mahaut's circle of
+relations or friends, and he is rewarded with a gift of money, and
+possibly receives a silver cup to carry back to the nurse, or a
+jewelled chaplet to take to the bride. Meanwhile the music of
+trumpets, drums, viols, and flutes resounds from the minstrels'
+gallery. Later, when the feast is ended, and before the company
+disperses to walk in the garden if it is spring or summer, or to look
+at the beautiful things in the castle, or to dance or sing or play
+chess if it be winter, some one perchance chants a plaintive ditty to
+the music of the regal, or some knight tunes his harp and sings of
+valiant deeds, or, may be, of some peerless lady.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 105._]
+
+But let us look at the rooms of the Castle and their beautiful
+contents--the paintings and embroideries on the walls, the ivories,
+and the illuminated Psalters and MSS. And let us go first into the
+Countess's own room, which doubtless was near the chapel. We can form
+some idea of its decoration and contents from the accounts, and of
+its probable arrangement from contemporary plans, illuminated MSS.,
+and pictures. Its walls were adorned with a frieze composed of heads
+of the kings of France, moulded in plaster and surmounted by crowns of
+gilded or lacquered tin, below which, on a coloured ground, were
+fastened fleurs-de-lis, likewise of tin similarly treated. At the end
+of the room was a bed, a large wooden structure surrounded by a
+footboard and laced across with cords on which were laid mattresses, a
+feather bed (sometimes, if we may judge from miniatures, used during
+the day as a seat on the floor), many cushions, linen or silk sheets,
+and a fur-lined coverlet. From rods on the ceiling hung curtains which
+completely enclosed it at night, but which were drawn back and looped
+up during the day, when the bed was used as a divan. At night a small
+oil lamp with a floating wick was hung within the curtains, and near
+the bed was a _benitier_. At the side, separated by a narrow space,
+there were fixed seats for the accommodation of those who interviewed
+the Countess before she rose. There was a large open fireplace with a
+bench in front of it which had a movable back, so that the occupant
+could sit either facing the fire or with his back to it. Close by were
+wickerwork fire-screens, capable of being raised or lowered at will.
+Against the walls there were carved chests, enriched with colour, and
+chairs with leather seats and wickerwork backs, as well as
+three-legged and folding stools, were placed about the room. At one
+side of the room was a large oak chair of state with a cushioned seat,
+and possibly canopied, and close to it a lectern, with hinged
+candle-brackets, from which Mahaut could the more easily read her
+MSS., which were often rolled, and difficult to manipulate. In front
+of this seat was a table, at which any messengers or retainers stood
+when they sought an interview, or the Countess demanded one. Here also
+she transacted with her stewards and other agents the business
+connected with her various castles and her many philanthropic
+undertakings. Other rooms were painted in plain colour, and hung on
+special occasions with embroideries and tapestries. Others, again,
+were decorated with set designs, square or zigzag, in imitation of
+brickwork, such as may be seen in the Chapel of St. Faith, Westminster
+Abbey, or with subjects or colour after which they were named. Thus we
+find mention of the "Parrakeet" room, from the birds painted on the
+walls, the "Blue" room, from its colour, the rooms of "Roses," of
+"Vines," and of "Fleurs-de-lis," the room of "Shields," from its
+frieze of armorial bearings, and that of "Song," from verses traced on
+the walls, taken from the favourite pastoral of "Robin and Marion,"
+and probably associated with little scenes from the same idyll. The
+ceilings, with beams and joists painted red, were coloured either
+green or blue, and strewn with tin stars coated with yellow or white
+varnish to simulate gold or silver. The lower portions of the walls
+were often painted in imitation of short curtains, sometimes of but
+one colour, sometimes gorgeously decorated, but in either case
+reminiscent of the real draperies hung on festal days. Immediately
+above there might have been, as in other examples, a border painted
+with coats of arms, or with a foliated design interspersed with
+mottoes.
+
+During Mahaut's lifetime this decorative work seems to have been
+undertaken principally by one special family or community of artists
+from Boulogne, of which a certain "Jacques" was the leading spirit. In
+those days artist and craftsman were one and the same. It was the
+quality, and not the particular subject, of the work that mattered,
+and thus we find that the painting of a parrot's cage, or of the
+shafts of a litter, was not considered derogatory for even the most
+skilled to undertake. From the accounts it would seem that linseed oil
+was used to mix with the colours, cherry gum or white of egg being
+added to make them dry more quickly. Payment for work was made three
+times a year--at Candlemas, Ascension-tide, and All-Saints--or by the
+day or piece, the last being the form preferred by the business-like
+Mahaut. Besides such payment, presents were occasionally given for
+specially fine work, and, if a man was married, a gift to his wife of
+a gown, or of a cloak with fur, was sometimes added. One of this
+company of Boulogne artists later on became Court-painter to the Dukes
+of Burgundy, and took with him not only his trained apprentices from
+the towns and villages of Artois, and from those bordering on
+Flanders, but also, doubtless, certain traditions. It is such early
+migrations of artists, when schools were forming, that have helped to
+create the difficult problems which confront the student of all early
+schools of art.
+
+Of embroidery there was such profusion that it is indeed no
+exaggeration to say that the needle vied with the sword. There were
+not only wall and bed hangings, embroidered with flowers to brighten
+winter days, cloaks, gowns, and tunics patterned with gold thread and
+coloured silks, and beaver hats wrought with gold lace and pearls and
+sometimes precious stones, but also girdles, satchels, purses, and
+pennons resplendent with heraldic device, and caparison and harness
+for the horses. From the East were brought velvets, silks, and stuffs
+interwoven with gold and silver thread, and used not only for personal
+adornment, but also for vestments, Church-hangings, and the coverings
+of litters. As regards tapestry as we understand it--_i.e._ woven in a
+_high_ warp loom--there is apparently no definite mention of its being
+made at Arras before 1313, so that the numerous allusions to tapestry
+must refer to stuffs woven in the _low_ warp loom. These stuffs would
+seem to have been of two kinds, the one woven with some simple
+pattern, the other with heraldic designs of animals or other
+conventional forms copied from Oriental models. Hence the term
+"Saracenic" applied to both the workers and their handiwork.
+
+In order to realise the Ivories which were probably to be seen in the
+Castle of Hesdin, we must go to the Louvre or the British Museum,
+where may be found a few rare examples of the work of the period, such
+as caskets carved with scenes from the life of Christ or the Virgin if
+they were to hold some sacred treasure, or with scenes from some
+Romance or from daily life if to contain jewels or other mundane
+objects. In addition to such caskets, often painted, Mahaut had, to
+hang from her girdle, as was customary with all ladies in the Middle
+Ages, a daintily wrought ivory writing-tablet, and a small mirror in
+an ivory case. These mirror-cases were generally carved with a scene
+from some love-story, such as two lovers playing chess, or going
+a-hawking, or some detail from the favourite romance of Tristan and
+Isolde. Possibly amongst these treasures was a saddle-bow, with a
+wondrous wealth of carving, or chess-men finely modelled, and inlaid
+with mother-of-pearl, or a triptych with scenes from the Passion,
+represented under Gothic arches of most superb and delicate
+workmanship. But it is perhaps in the Chapel that we must seek the
+finest work, for here both Mahaut and her father, Count Robert, were
+lavish with unsparing hand. One Jean le Scelleur, of Paris, a carver
+of combs and toilet articles as well as of crucifixes and Virgins, is
+named as her principal craftsman. Mention is made of a Cross carved by
+him in cedar-wood with an ivory figure of the Christ, and of two ivory
+figures of the Virgin, one under a canopy, and the other with the Holy
+Child poised upon the hip, that sublime motive belonging more
+especially to the thirteenth century. The chapel itself was beautified
+with carved work in stone. Over the Altar, and in front of it, were
+painted panels, enriched with gold, and translucent enamel over
+colour. If we could picture to ourselves the manner of the sculptor's
+work we may recall the "Vine-Capital" in Rheims Cathedral, where the
+very stone itself seems to have been metamorphosed into tender foliage
+by the unknown artist.
+
+Of wood-carving, the accounts tell of Choir-stalls, presses for
+vestments and various vessels and ornaments, and also of Angels,
+gilded and painted and bearing the emblems of the Passion, for
+standing round the High Altar. These are described as being raised on
+slender columns, connected by a bar on which were laced fringed silk
+curtains, thus forming a recess for the Altar. We can get some idea of
+the simple beauty of this arrangement from a drawing, still preserved
+in the sacristy of Arras Cathedral, of the High Altar in the old
+Cathedral, and fortunately made before the latter, with all its
+contents, was destroyed in the sixteenth century. It accords in every
+detail with the inventory record of the Chapel of Hesdin. We may also
+compare a picture (No. 783, "The Exhumation of St. Hubert") in the
+Flemish room in the National Gallery, where a somewhat similar scheme
+is shown.
+
+Of the MSS. and Illuminations only brief mention can be made.
+Surviving examples, and the records of the time, testify to the
+splendour and the sum of them. At the beginning of the thirteenth
+century, the French miniature was influenced in no small degree, both
+in technique and in colour, by glass painting. Towards the end of the
+century this influence yielded to the prevailing enthusiasm for
+architecture and sculpture, and in Bibles and Psalters alike there
+appear scenes with figures as in bas-relief, with architectural
+backgrounds and decorative details. The same spirit that evolved
+tender foliage out of the hard stone of cathedral and church evolved
+also the delicate hawthorn-leaf enriching the initial letter of the
+MS. It mattered little whether the material worked on was stone or
+parchment. Each was but a means for giving expression to a newly
+discovered scheme of beauty--the beauty of Nature. In the thirteenth
+and fourteenth centuries a renewed impetus had been given to the arts
+of writing and illumination. This was partly because a demand had
+arisen for a secular literature to supersede the tiresome and
+time-worn recitations of minstrels, and partly because, in the
+fourteenth century, Books of Hours, instead of the Psalter alone as
+had hitherto been customary, came into general use in private
+devotion. This created a fresh want, and at the same time supplied a
+number of new subjects in which the artist could reveal his skill.
+Arras was one of the chief centres of this new movement, a movement
+which Mahaut continued and stimulated. She employed artists to
+illuminate both sacred and secular works for her own use as well as
+for gifts--gifts counted beyond compare and beside which even precious
+stones were deemed of less worth. To Mahaut this desire for beauty was
+a very lode-star. To glance at a list of the gold- and silver-smiths'
+work--the jewelled and enamelled chaplets of gold, the jewelled
+girdles, and buckles, and braids for the hair, and the cups, some of
+silver with crystal covers or wrought with enamel and precious stones,
+and others of jasper mounted with silver work--reads like a fantasy of
+hidden treasure in some fairy tale. Even her chess-boards--and she was
+a devotee of the game--were of silver or ivory, and one, we read, was
+of jasper and chalcedony mounted with silver and gems, the chess-men
+being of jasper and crystal.
+
+For the younger folk about her there was tennis, and also games of
+hazard with forfeits of girdles and coifs to the ladies. In the Castle
+garden were certain mechanical contrivances which, by their sudden and
+unexpected action, were supposed to amuse the unwary guests. One
+sprinkled them with water, another with black or white powder, as they
+passed by, and yet another, in the form of a monkey, struck them with
+a stick, whilst in a bower might be seen a mirror wherein all who
+looked saw only the distorted semblance of themselves. These unwelcome
+pleasantries were a part of the miscellaneous borrowings from the
+East. But for the easily amused folk of the Middle Ages, time passed
+merrily enough in the midst of such pastimes, and only the shadow on
+the dial seemed to mark its flight.
+
+But Mahaut, amid the manifold claims on her time and talent, had seen
+the shadow lengthening. From time to time she had been attacked by
+illness, to which blood-letting and other remedies of the day had
+brought relief. But on the 25th November 1329, when in Paris, she was
+seized with a sudden sickness, so sudden that sinister rumours were
+noised abroad. Human aid was of no avail. Two days later there was
+general lamentation. The shadow had lengthened into the night. Mahaut
+was dead. In accordance with her wishes, she was buried at the foot of
+her father's grave in the Abbey of Maubuisson, near Paris, her heart
+being placed in the Church of the Franciscans in Paris, beside the
+remains of her son, whose tomb there was afterwards removed to St.
+Denis. Her possession of Artois, for which she had laboured devotedly,
+became annexed to the Duchy of Burgundy through the marriage of her
+granddaughter with its Duke.
+
+Here, though only a tithe has been told, we must take leave of this
+cultivated woman of the fourteenth century, a type of the time and for
+all time. Her aim was the aim of all culture--the attainment of as
+complete a life as possible. To this she aspired, and to this in large
+measure she attained. What more can be said of even those we count the
+greatest?
+
+
+
+
+A FIFTEENTH-CENTURY FEMINISTE, CHRISTINE DE PISAN
+
+
+Christine de Pisan, Italian by birth, French by adoption, may be
+regarded not merely as a forerunner of true feminism, but also as one
+of its greatest champions, seeing that in her judgment of the sexes
+she endeavours to hold the scales evenly. Possessed of profound common
+sense and of a generous-hearted nature, she is wholly free from that
+want of fairness in urging woman's claims which is so fatally
+prejudicial to their just consideration. Although, strictly speaking,
+Christine was not original, she was representative, and interests us
+for that very reason. She was perhaps one of the most complete
+exponents of the finer strain of thought of her time. She stands
+before us, at the dawn of the fifteenth century, Janus-headed, looking
+to the past and to the future, a woman typical of a time of
+transition, on the one hand showing, in her writings, a clinging to
+old beliefs, and on the other hand asserting, in her contact with real
+life, independence of thought in the discussion of still unsolved
+questions.
+
+Christine was born at Venice in 1363, where her father, Thomas de
+Pisan, of Bologna, distinguished for his knowledge of medicine and
+astrology, had settled on his marriage with a daughter of one of the
+Councillors of the Republic. When five years of age, she was taken by
+her mother to Paris to join her father, who had been summoned thither
+some time before by the King, Charles the Fifth, to serve as his
+astrologer. At the end of the fourteenth century astrology played a
+very real and important part in men's lives. Before wars or journeys
+were undertaken, or additions to castle or chapel made, or even a new
+garment put on, the stars were consulted for the propitious day and
+hour. So deeply was Charles the Fifth imbued with a belief in the
+efficacy of this occult art that when he wished to confer some special
+honour, or to express his gratitude for some service rendered to him
+or to the State, he sought to enhance his bounty by sending an
+astrologer as part of his gift. By the time little Christine arrived
+in Paris her father had gained the confidence and esteem of the King,
+and was settled at Court with substantial maintenance. Here she was
+brought up as a maiden of quality, surrounded by much magnificence,
+for Charles loved beautiful things, and never stayed his hand to
+procure them, even when the gratification of his desires involved
+hardship to his people. He possessed many virtues, but economy was not
+one of them. The dismal castle of the Louvre, which had been the home
+of the French kings since the days of Philip Augustus, found no favour
+in his sight as a place of residence, and he quickly set about
+building the sumptuous Hotel de St. Paul, in what is now known as the
+"Quartier de l'Arsenal." The Louvre he destined for official
+functions, for an arsenal, and for his library. To form a library was
+no new thing in Paris. Some thirty years earlier Richard de Bury,
+Bishop of Durham (1333) and sometime Chancellor of England, speaks of
+his frequent ambassadorial visits to "Paris, the Paradise of the
+World, with its delightful libraries, where the days seemed ever few,
+for the greatness of our love." And he adds, "unfastening our
+purse-strings, we scattered money with joyous heart, and purchased
+inestimable books." But whilst it is true that Charles's predecessors
+had collected books, none before had thought of forming a library for
+public use, and Charles's work, as M. Delisle remarks, was really the
+first germ of the Bibliotheque Nationale.[30] To collect books was one
+of his greatest delights, and he spared no trouble or money to make
+his library as complete as possible. This taste for books he may have
+inherited from his father, King John, who, learning to read from a
+beautiful Book of Hours, early acquired a love of books from his
+mother, Jeanne of Burgundy. Charles also loved to lend or make
+presents of books, and among his many gifts, one--an offering to
+Richard the Second--may be seen in the British Museum (Royal 20, B
+VI.). The library was considerably depleted during the reign of
+Charles the Sixth, when it was used as a sort of storehouse from which
+presents were made to prince and prelate, or to any to whom it was
+desired to make a gift, or a recognition of services rendered. On the
+death of Charles the Sixth, in 1425, it was bought by the Duke of
+Bedford, Regent of France, and doubtless some of its treasures were
+transferred by him into England. Those that were left, and some that
+gradually found their way back to France, may now be seen in the
+Bibliotheque Nationale and in other libraries of France, and also in
+various libraries in other countries, but out of the 1200 books
+collected by Charles the Fifth, rather less than a hundred are now
+known to us.
+
+    [30] L. Delisle, _Recherches sur la libraire de Charles V_,
+    Paris, 1907.
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. Royale, Brussels._
+
+CHRISTINE DE PISAN.
+
+_To face page 119._]
+
+To increase the usefulness of his library, Charles employed a number
+of translators, not only of Greek and Latin authors, but also of the
+most important Arabic writings, thus bringing both the classics and
+the science of the day within the reach of the many students
+privileged to make use of it. It was in this library that Christine
+spent long days reading and meditating on the thoughts of the greatest
+minds, thus fitting herself for the part she had to play when life had
+ceased to be a gay dream. We can get from a miniature in a Book of
+Hours, now at Chantilly, and painted by the brothers Limbourg for
+Jean, Duc de Berri, a brother of the King, some idea of what this old
+residence of the Louvre was like. In this miniature we see represented
+a square grim castle, with a large tower at each corner and narrow
+slits for windows, suggestive more of a place of refuge in time of war
+and tumult than the home of a peace-loving, enlightened king. When
+Charles determined to beautify this sombre structure, statues were set
+up without and tapestries hung within. One of the towers was fitted up
+for the library, panelled with rare woods and furnished with some
+thirty small chandeliers and a large central silver lamp, kept lighted
+both night and day so that work could go on at all hours. In the
+courtyard an outside circular staircase (one of the earliest, if not
+_the_ earliest, of the kind) was added to give, as was said, a note of
+gaiety. But the idea of gaiety seems somewhat ironical when we learn
+that as it was difficult to get a sufficient number of large slabs
+quarried quickly, headstones from the cemetery of the Holy Innocents
+were taken for the purpose!
+
+Christine, as a child, showed an extraordinary capacity for learning,
+and this her father zealously fostered and developed. At the age of
+fifteen she married, and married for love, the King's notary and
+secretary, Etienne de Castel, a gentleman of Picardy. Her happiness
+and well-being seemed assured, but Fortune, whose wheel is ever
+revolving, though sometimes so slowly as to lull us into
+forgetfulness, had decreed otherwise. For Christine it revolved all
+too quickly. Two years after her marriage the King died (1380), and
+her husband and father lost their appointments. Gradually anxiety and
+sorrow crept like some baneful atmosphere into the once happy home.
+First she lost her father, and then, two or three years later, her
+husband died, leaving her, at the age of twenty-five, with three
+children to provide for. Like many another, she turned to letters as
+both a material and a mental support. Endowed with an extraordinary
+gift of versification, she began by writing short poems, chiefly on
+the joys and sorrows of love, expressing sometimes her own sentiments,
+sometimes those of others for whom she wrote. But she tells us that
+often when she made merry she would fain have wept. How many a one
+adown the centuries has re-echoed the same sad note!
+
+"Men must work and women must weep." So says the poet. But life shows
+us that men and women alike must needs do both. And so the sad
+Christine set to work to fit herself, by the study of the best ancient
+and modern writers, to produce more serious matter than love-ballads,
+turning, in her saddest moments, to Boethius and Dante for inspiration
+and solace. "I betook myself," she says, "like the child who at first
+is set to learn its A B C, to ancient histories from the beginning of
+the world--histories of the Hebrews and the Assyrians, of the Romans,
+the French, the Bretons, and diverse others--and then to the
+deductions of such sciences as I had time to give heed to, as well as
+to a study of the poets." Her master was Aristotle, and she made his
+ethics her gospel. "Ancelle de science," she calls herself, and
+remains a humble worshipper at the shrine of knowledge, for knowledge,
+she says, is "that which can change the mortal into the immortal." We
+can picture her to ourselves at work in the library of the Louvre,
+amidst its 900 precious MSS., and in the library of the University of
+Paris, to which she had access through her friend Gerson, the renowned
+Chancellor. In a miniature at the beginning of one of her MSS. she is
+seen seated, in a panelled recess, on a carved wooden bench, dressed
+in a simple blue gown and a high white coif. She is working at a folio
+on a large table covered with tapestry, with a greyhound lying at her
+feet. It is quite possible that this may be either a conventional
+setting, or one due to the imagination of the artist, but as the
+miniaturists of those days were, as far as they could be, realists, it
+is more than possible that we here see her represented at work in her
+favourite nook in the Louvre library, together with the favourite dog
+who shared her lonely hours. Gradually solace came to her through
+work, and having found so precious a treasure for herself, she, like
+our own modern sage, never tired of preaching to others the gospel of
+its blessedness.
+
+Whilst Christine wrote and lived her student life--"son cuer hermit
+dans l'ermitage de Pensee"--her fame went forth, and princes sought,
+by tempting offers, to attach her to their courts, but without
+success. Of these, Henry the Fourth of England, already acquainted
+with her poems, and Gian Galleazo Visconti, Duke of Milan, were the
+most importunate, and particularly the former, who was unaccustomed to
+rebuff and failure. But Christine, with repeated gracious thanks and
+guarded refusals, remained firm. No reason for her decision is
+recorded, but it may well be believed that her patriotism would not
+allow her, even with the certainty of ease and emolument, to quit
+France at that critical time, or to serve the enemy of her adopted
+country.
+
+Although Christine's reading was very varied and extensive, there were
+two subjects--the amelioration of her war-distraught country, then in
+the throes of the Hundred Years' War, and the championship of the
+cause of womankind--which specially appealed to her as a patriot and a
+woman, and for which she strove with unceasing ardour. In all her
+writings she so interweaves these two causes that it is only by
+approaching them in the same way that we can understand her view of
+their psychological unity. To Christine these interests were
+essentially identical, for she recognised how paramount is woman's
+influence in the making or marring of the world--how, in truth, in
+woman's hand lies a key which can unlock a Heaven or a Hell.
+
+There was sore need of a patriot, and in Christine one was found. It
+has been well said of her, and by a Frenchman too, that "though born a
+woman and an Italian, she alone at the Court of France seemed to have
+manly qualities and French sentiments." France was in a sorry plight.
+There was war in the land, there was war in the palace. The sick King
+suffered more and more from attacks of madness, and during these
+periods the Dukes of Orleans and Burgundy fought for the regency.
+Christine began her patriotic work by fervent appeals to Isabella, the
+Queen (to whom she offered a MS. now in the British Museum),[31] to
+use her influence to put an end to these dissensions which so greatly
+added to the troubles of the kingdom. She also lost no opportunity of
+proclaiming in her various writings the duties and responsibilities of
+kings and nobles to the people, and the necessity, if there was ever
+to be peace and prosperity, of winning their regard. At the command of
+Philip le Hardi, Duke of Burgundy, and uncle of the King, she wrote in
+prose, from chronicles of the time and from information obtained from
+many connected with the King's household, _Le Livre des faits et
+bonnes moeurs du roi Charles V_, recounting his virtuous life and deeds
+and their advantage to the realm, and introducing a remarkable
+dissertation on the benefit to a country of a strong middle-class.
+She, of course, reasoned from Aristotle. The subject is a commonplace
+one now, but in the case of any one living at the beginning of the
+fifteenth century, and brought up, as Christine had been, at a
+magnificent Court, it shows rare independence and breadth of thought
+to have grasped and proclaimed with such firmness and clearness as is
+displayed in her treatise the germ of the policy of all modern
+civilised nations--that a middle-class is essential to bring into
+touch those placed at the opposite extremes, the rich and the poor.
+
+    [31] Harley, 4431.
+
+To Christine belongs an honour beyond that of having been a patriot
+and a champion of her sex--the honour of having revealed Dante to
+France.[32] Scattered up and down her writings are many allusions to
+the _Divina Commedia_, showing how real a place it must have filled in
+her soul's life. She especially recommends it for profitable study in
+the place of the "hateful" _Romance of the Rose_, concerning which she
+gave the warning to her son:--
+
+    Se bien veulx et chastement vivre,
+    De la Rose ne lis le livre.
+
+    [32] A. Farinelli, _Dante e la Francia_, vol. i. p. 192, 1908.
+
+Like Dante, sad and lonely--"souvent seulete et pensive, regretant le
+temps passe"--like him she also realised the thirst for knowledge as
+an ever-present want of the soul, and that its ultimate perfection is
+only to be attained by following after virtue and knowledge. Although,
+as regards profundity, her conception of the world and of life cannot
+be compared with that of her great prototype, or even with that of
+such an one as St. Hildegarde, still she had read with unflagging
+diligence a vast number of profane and ecclesiastical writers, and
+seems to have been well versed in the varied knowledge of her time,
+especially history. But whilst it is possible to criticise her
+learning, tempered as this was by her character and the needs of her
+day, it is at the same time possible to acknowledge that in spite of
+flaws and an often over-elaborated setting, moral truth sparkles
+gemlike throughout her writings. One of her biographers speaks of her
+thus: "Her morale is so pure and so universally human that not only
+does it remain true to-day, but it will retain imperishable value as
+long as ever human society is based on a pure and healthy moral
+foundation."
+
+In her poem _Le Chemin de long Estude_--a title taken from Dante's
+appeal to Virgil at the opening of the _Inferno_--Christine begins by
+acknowledging her debt to the immortal poet, saying that much that she
+has to tell has already been told by "Dante of Florence in his book."
+Virgil as guide is replaced by the Cumean Sibyl, who appears to
+Christine in a dream, and offers to conduct her to another and a more
+perfect world, one where there is no pain and misery. To this
+Christine consents on condition that "sad Hades, whither AEneas once
+was taken," is not included in the journey. The Sibyl therefore
+promises to reveal to her, instead, in what manner misfortune came
+upon earth, whilst at the same time showing her on the way all that
+is worth seeing in this world, from the Pillars of Hercules, "the end
+of the world," to distant Cathay. However exhausting this programme
+may appear to us, Christine, knowing the real passion of the late
+Middle Ages for travel--for even those who could not travel in reality
+did so in imagination,--makes use of it as a setting for the
+introduction of a discussion on the qualities most necessary to good
+government. This she does, even at the risk of incurring displeasure
+in high quarters, recalling how Dante's patriotism led to banishment
+and death in exile, but she adds, "Qui bien ayme, tout endure." She
+pours forth her classical examples in a chaotic stream, but when she
+leaves earth, and ascends to the celestial regions, she not only shows
+herself versed in the astronomy of the time, but also expresses some
+beauty of thought. The order of the firmament, where all obey law
+without ceasing, so that harmony ensues "like sweet melody," reminds
+her of Pythagoras and Plato, and suggests to her what life on earth
+might be if good laws were made and observed. In furtherance of her
+idea, she appeals to Reason, who presides over the Virtues or Divine
+Powers, to interrogate the three earthly disputants, Nobility, Riches,
+and Wisdom. In the end Reason awards the prize to Wisdom, condemning
+Riches as the great enemy of mankind. Thereupon Wisdom appeals to the
+verdicts of Juvenal, Boethius, St. Jerome, and others to establish
+that it is Virtue alone that is of worth, and ennobles a man, and then
+sets forth the qualities of a good sovereign. But as this leads to
+some difference of opinion, Christine, who was withal a courtly lady,
+descends to earth in order to ask the King, Charles the Sixth, to
+decide the matter. This dream-poem she dedicates to her royal master
+for his diversion in his saner moments, and thus once again introduces
+into high places the subject so near to her heart. She lets it be seen
+that she herself, like Dante, did not believe in the blending of the
+spiritual and the temporal powers. And as regards temporal power she
+adds--perhaps borrowing the idea from Dante's _De Monarchia_, and
+anticipating Napoleon's dream--that in order to ensure peace on earth,
+it is necessary that one supreme ruler should reign over the whole
+world. "La sua volontade e nostra pace," sang a soul in Dante's heaven
+of the Moon--the lowest in the celestial system--when questioned
+whether it was content with its lowly place. The poet therefore adds,
+"ogni dove in cielo e paradiso." Christine, echoing these thoughts,
+would fain apply them to life on earth, giving them their deepest and
+fullest meaning.
+
+Though she laboured so unceasingly for the good of her country, she
+also did her utmost to defend her sex from the indiscriminate censure
+which had been heaped upon it, for the evil spoken seemed to her far
+to outweigh the good. A century before, Dante had also idealised
+woman--even if, as some think, he personified some abstract
+quality--and placed her in heaven beside the Deity. Chivalry had also
+idealised woman, but in an exotic, exaggerated manner, which was bound
+to reach its zenith, and bound also to have its darker side. So we
+find that to speak good or ill of womankind became a conventionalism
+in the Middle Ages. Black or white was the tone chosen by the artist
+in words. There was no blending, no shading. Women were either
+deified, or held to be evil incarnate. The material side of life men
+understood, and could depict with some exactness, but to grasp in any
+way its subtler aspects required an education which could be attained
+only by slow degrees, since it meant the gradual modification of the
+long-cherished illusion that brute force is the world's only weapon. A
+want of capacity to discern is often responsible for a depreciatory
+opinion, and we can but ascribe this strangely narrow-minded and
+superficial attitude towards woman to some such want. Christine set
+herself the task of trying to remedy this evil, not by shouting in the
+market-place, but by studying men and women as God made them and as
+she found them. Before she began her work, a new day seemed to be
+dawning. Just as, when classicism was in full decadence, Plutarch
+wrote _De mulierum virtutibus_ (of the virtue of women), so, in the
+fourteenth century, Boccaccio gave to the world _De claris mulieribus_
+(of right-renowned women). We do not expect to find woman treated on
+a very high plane by Boccaccio, but we recognise that, in a way, this
+work forms a fresh starting-point in the eternal controversy. Perhaps
+we should not have had this curious collection of stories of women,
+virtuous and vicious, mythological and historical--stories which are
+certainly very inferior as art to those of the _Decameron_--had not a
+crisis occurred in Boccaccio's life. One day a Carthusian monk came to
+him with a warning message from the dead, and, much troubled in mind,
+he resolved to try to begin life afresh. But he was a better
+story-teller than a moraliser. He would fain save his soul, but he
+liked and courted popularity, and knew well the deeper meaning of the
+proverb, "A terreno dolce, vanga di legno." And so he mingles virtue
+and vice, hoping, as he says, that "some utility and profit shall come
+of the same." To us of to-day, the chief interest of this work is that
+Boccaccio's fame perhaps gave a definite impetus to the discussion of
+the sex, instead of wholesale assertion, and also that it probably
+suggested to Chaucer the idea for his _Legend of Good Women_. How
+refreshing to find ourselves in the atmosphere of the kindly Chaucer!
+Let us pause for a moment, and recall what he says of women, he who
+was not only a knightly Court-poet, but also a popular singer, well
+versed in the practical wisdom of life. In the prologue we read, "Let
+be the chaf, and wryt wel of the corn," and in allusion to his
+library of sixty books, old and new, of history and love-stories, he
+says that for every bad woman, mention was duly made of a hundred good
+ones. Time and experience in no way dull this appreciation, for when,
+later, _The Canterbury Tales_ appear, his estimate has risen ten-fold,
+since in the prologue to "The Miller's Tale" we read, "and ever a
+thousand gode ageyn one badde." From this time onwards, literature on
+the subject increases almost _ad infinitum_. Treatises and imaginary
+debates seem to vie with each other for popularity. All these make
+intensely interesting reading, for these fanciful discussions, which
+are supposed to take place, sometimes between a man and a woman,
+sometimes between a mixed company in a garden or villa or some bath
+resort where many are gathered together, are really a record of the
+intellectual amusements of the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
+"Que devez-vous preferer, du plaisir qui va vous echapper bientot, ou
+d'une esperance toujours vive, quoique toujours trompee?" "Which sex
+loves the more easily or can do the better without love?" "It is not
+enough to know how to win love, but one must also know how to keep
+such love when it has been won." Such-like were the subtle problems
+which on these occasions folk set themselves to solve.
+
+But whilst love problems could be treated as a pastime, they also had
+their serious side. Of this there is an example in Christine's story
+of _The Duke of True Lovers_. Although much in its narration is
+evidently the mere invention of the poetess, it is quite possible,
+nay even probable, that it has some historical basis. Christine begins
+her story by saying that it had been confided to her by a young prince
+who did not wish his name to be divulged, and who desired only to be
+known as "The Duke of True Lovers." It has been suggested, with much
+likelihood, that this is in truth the love-story of Jean, Duc de
+Bourbon, and of Marie, Duchesse de Berri, daughter of the famous Jean,
+Duc de Berri, and the inheritor of his MSS. When the story opens, the
+heroine of it, whoever she may have been, is already wedded. Hence all
+the difficulties of the hero, and indeed of both. Christine, with her
+womanly sympathy and psychological insight, makes all so intensely
+real that we are quite carried away in imagination to the courtly life
+of the fifteenth century. We read of the first meeting; of the Duke's
+love at first sight; of Castle daily life; of a three days' tournament
+given in honour of the lady; of devices for secret meetings and the
+interchange of letters; of the inevitable scandal-monger; of a letter
+from a former _gouvernante_--whose aid as go-between had been
+sought--containing a most comprehensive and remarkable treatise on
+feminine morality, the dangers of illicit love, and the satisfaction
+of simple wifely duty; of the separation which the position of the
+lady, and the gallantry of her lover, alike demanded; of meetings at
+intervals; of the mutual solace of short love-poems; and then the
+story, perhaps to evade identification, ends vaguely. But as we finish
+the story, we cannot help feeling that even if Christine's setting is
+fiction, she yet gives us a glance of real life.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+LADY IN HORSE-LITTER, RETURNING FROM TOURNAMENT.
+
+Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 132._]
+
+When Christine turned to her serious work in the cause of womankind,
+she began by attacking two books, Ovid's _Art of Love_, and _The
+Romance of the Rose_, both of which, in the Middle Ages, it was deemed
+wellnigh sacrilegious to decry. Her challenge, _L'Epistre au Dieu
+d'Amours_, took the form of an address to the God of Love, professing
+to come from women of all conditions, imploring Cupid's aid against
+disloyal and deceitful lovers, whose base behaviour she largely
+attributes to the false teaching of these two books. This argument
+appeared in 1399, and she soon discovered that she had stirred up a
+hornet's nest. But she had attacked advisedly and fearlessly, and was
+quite prepared for any counter onslaught. Her position was
+considerably strengthened by the alliance and co-operation of her
+staunch friend Gerson, the Chancellor, who himself, in the name of the
+clergy, took up arms against the flagrant scurrility to be found in
+the portion of _The Romance of the Rose_ contributed by Jean de Meun.
+Other powerful allies joined the cause, and, to help to crystallise
+their efforts, species of "Courts of Love" were instituted, not alone
+for discourse on love, as heretofore, but also in the defence of
+women. All who united in this meritorious fellowship undertook to wear
+a distinctive badge, and thus proclaim their confession of faith.
+Among these Orders one was styled "L'Escu vert a la dame blanche,"
+another, "L'Ordre de la Rose," and so on, suggestive of their purport.
+The first-named was founded by the brave soldier Jean le Meingre,
+Marechal de Boucicaut, whose portrait may be seen in his superb Book
+of Hours, painted between 1399 and 1407, now in the Musee
+Jacquemart-Andre, Paris.[33] Its membership was restricted to thirteen
+knights, who swore to defend the honour of women against all
+detractors. To distinguish them from others less gallantly disposed,
+they wore on the sleeve an ornament in the shape of a small shield,
+enamelled green on the outside, and with the representation, on the
+underside, of a woman, enamelled in white.
+
+    ... Vous portez la dame en verde targe
+    Pour demonstrer que de hardi visage
+    Vous vous voulez pour les dames tenir
+    Contre ceulz qui leur porteront dommage!
+
+    [33] "Le Musee Jacquemart-Andre," _Gazette des Beaux-Arts_,
+    August 1912.
+
+Of the Order of the Rose and its foundation, Christine, in one of her
+poems, gives most picturesque and interesting particulars, interesting
+because they are evidently taken from an actual scene, though
+Christine, in her role as poetess, feels it necessary to add touches
+suggestive of fairyland rather than of real life. A numerous assembly,
+with goodwill at heart, has met together in the magnificent dwelling
+of Louis, Duke of Orleans, the King's brother, Christine being one of
+the number. Suddenly there comes into their midst one personifying the
+Goddess Venus, surrounded by maidens garlanded with roses and carrying
+golden bowls filled with them. The bowls placed on the table, the
+Goddess proceeds to announce the rules of the Order, above all
+enjoining those present to avoid envy, and in no way to perjure
+themselves, since this would be a most heinous and hateful sin. The
+badge chosen is a fresh rose, but if any member of the Order should
+happen to be in a country where such is not attainable, or when the
+season is unpropitious, then a rose fashioned in gold or silver, or
+one embroidered in silk, will suffice. With pledges of loyalty,
+
+    A bonne amour je fais veu et promesse
+    Et a la fleur qui est rose clamee,
+    A la vaillant de Loyaute deesse,
+    Par qui nous est ceste chose informee,
+    Qu'a tous jours mais la bonne renommee
+    Je garderay de dame en toute chose
+    Ne par moy ja femme n'yert diffamee:
+    Et pour ce prens je L'Ordre de la Rose,[34]
+
+    [34] "Le Dit de la Rose," 197-204, _OEuvres poetiques de
+    Christine de Pisan_, t. ii., pub. par Maurice Roy, 1891.
+
+all the company deck themselves with roses. The charter is given by
+the Goddess into the safe-keeping of Christine, who describes it as
+written on fine parchment in letters of azure, and fastened with a
+silken cord of the same colour. From this cord hangs a rare gem, on
+one side of which their patroness, the Goddess of Love, and on the
+other Cupid, with his feet on a leopard, are depicted. This moral and
+literary contest is perhaps the most brilliant of the many discussions
+that took place in the Middle Ages in honour of women. The highest and
+the wisest in the land joined in it, but all the honour must be given
+to Christine for having, by her brave and reasonable attitude, caused
+the problem, which henceforth was to evolve like truth itself, to be
+treated on a rational basis. "Toute la foy remaint en une femme," says
+Christine. Were not her words, nearly 500 years later, echoed by Renan
+when he says, "Apres Jesus, c'est Marie de Magdale qui a le plus fait
+pour la fondation du Christianisme"?
+
+_L'Epistre au Dieu d'Amours_ is an extraordinary product of worldly
+wisdom and common sense, seasoned with satire. One of the complaints
+against disloyal suitors, and one which strikes a singularly modern
+note, is that they make protests of love, and false promises, which
+must be either paid for dearly, or rejected with scorn. Then the hero,
+if he has won the day, proclaims his victory in taverns and other
+places of resort, and even in mixed company. Or if, as is more often
+the case, he has lost it, he still tries, by suggestive hints, to
+appear to his fellows a successful gallant. Surely the worldling of
+to-day does not seem to differ very essentially from his brother of
+the fifteenth century, or to have progressed any farther along the
+path of loyalty!
+
+Christine's line of argument is that the many must not be condemned
+for the shortcomings of the few, and that even when God made the
+angels, some were bad. To the charge that books are full of the
+condemnation of women, she replies with the simple remark that books
+were not written by women. Where is the shade of the worthy Christine
+to-day? Does it walk the earth with a flag of triumph or a laurel
+wreath whilst its sisters in the flesh are writing on every subject in
+heaven and earth and sea? "De nos jours, le monde est aux femmes."
+
+Is it marvellous, asks Christine, that a woman--"une chose simplete,
+une ignorante petite femmellette," as she expresses it--should be
+betrayed by man, when even the great city of Troy was, and when all
+the books and romances are full of the betrayal of kings and kingdoms?
+And if a woman is not constant by nature, why should Jean de Meun, in
+_The Romance of the Rose_, devise so many tricks to deceive her,
+seeing that it is not necessary to make a great assault upon a feeble
+place? Then she deftly turns the tables on the other sex, reminding
+each that he is the son of his mother, and that
+
+    Se mauvaise est il ne peut valor rien,
+    Car nul bon fruit de mal arbre ne vient.
+
+And so on to the end, all is argument and banter. The repute of her
+letter must have travelled quickly, for whilst Christine was still
+combating with dissentients, an epitomised rendering of it appeared
+(1402) in English from the pen of Hoccleve, the pupil of Chaucer,
+entitled _The Lettre of Cupide, God of Love_.
+
+[Illustration: _Bib. Royale, Munich._
+
+LA CITE DES DAMES.
+
+_To face page 138._]
+
+Later, Christine, with Boccaccio's _De claris mulieribus_ before her,
+writes _La Cite des Dames_, an account of the building of an imaginary
+city which is to shelter within its strong ramparts the women of all
+times and all countries who have distinguished themselves by good and
+heroic deeds. This has been aptly called "The Golden Book of
+Heroines." It may certainly be considered her masterpiece on her
+favourite subject. She urges that philosophers and poets, with one
+accord, have defamed women, and she appeals to God, asking why such a
+thing should be, seeing that He Himself made them and gave them such
+inclinations as seemed good to Him, and that in no way could He err.
+She maintains that God created the soul, and made it as good in woman
+as in man, and that it is not the sex, but the perfection of virtue,
+that is material. Combating the suggestion that women are not fit to
+plead in Court because they have not sufficient intelligence to apply
+the law when they have learnt it, she refers to history to prove that
+women who have had the management of affairs have shown that, far from
+lacking intelligence and judgment, they have possessed both in large
+measure. At the same time, whilst defending their capability when
+necessity arises, she does not think it necessary for women to
+interfere in matters which seem essentially man's business. Her
+remarks on the subject of marriage are certainly practical, and at the
+same time disclose a strange unloveliness in contemporary manners. She
+is not of St. Paul's opinion that it is better not to marry, but all
+the same she suggests that, unless without means, that woman is
+happier who does not marry a second time, seeing that the life of a
+married woman is often worse than if she were in the hands of the
+Saracens--the terror of the Middle Ages,--and that frequently after
+her husband has been out enjoying himself, her only supper, on his
+return, is a beating. She counsels the education of women, and
+condemns those who suggest that this will conduce to unseemly ways. In
+truth, her wonderful sense of justice, and her enlightened opinions
+generally, make it a marvellous resume of statesmanship as far as it
+goes. It is a real Utopia. Perhaps to Christine it was a glimpse of
+the Promised Land! As we read her views on the education of boys and
+girls together, in this happy city, we feel that she might be
+discussing with us the problems of to-day. She says that if boys and
+girls are taught the same subjects, girls can, as a rule, learn just
+as well, and just as intelligently, as boys, and so on. In this
+conclusion she forestalls the learned Cornelius Agrippa, a doctor and
+philosopher of the sixteenth century, and one of the most original and
+remarkable men of his time, who boldly asserts that sex is merely
+physical, and does not extend to soul or rational power. She sums up
+by strongly advocating study and learning, both for self-improvement
+and as a consolation and possession for all time.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+SETTING OUT FOR POISSY.
+
+Harl. MS. 4431, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 140._]
+
+Of her poetical writings on love and the sexes, perhaps the most
+enchanting is _Le Livre du Dit de Poissy_. In it she takes us, on a
+bright spring morning, with a joyous company, from Paris to the royal
+convent of Poissy, where her child is at school. She describes all the
+beauties of the country, the fields gay with flowers, the warbling of
+the birds, the shepherdesses with their flocks, the willow-shaded
+river bank along which they ride, the magic of the forest of St.
+Germain, a little world apart of greenery and shade, filled with the
+song of the nightingales. Laughing and singing by the way, they reach
+the convent gate. Then follows a description of the beautiful carved
+cloisters, the chapter-house, the nuns' dress and their dormitory, the
+garden scented with lavender and roses, with one part, where small
+animals are allowed to run wild, left uncultivated, and the ponds well
+stocked with fish. As the day wanes, they bid farewell to the nuns,
+who offer them gifts of purses and girdles embroidered in silk and
+gold, worked by their own hands. They return to the inn where they are
+to spend the night, and after supper wander forth to listen to the
+nightingales, then dance a carole, and so to bed. The ride back to
+Paris in the morning, during which a discussion on love matters is
+introduced, is painted with the same impressionist touch, and it is
+with real regret that we take leave of these happy folk as they alight
+in Paris city from their stout nags.
+
+Another similar discourse, _Le Debat de deux amants_, has for setting
+a gala entertainment, taking place, like the founding of the "Order of
+the Rose," under the auspices of Louis, Duke of Orleans, who ever
+extended a princely protection to Christine. Louis had married
+Valentine Visconti, daughter of Gian Galleazo Visconti, founder of the
+Certosa, near Pavia, a princess well versed in art and letters, and
+withal in pomp and splendour. It is on a day in May, the garden gay
+with gallants and fair ladies. We hear the minstrels play, and watch
+some of the company, decked with garlands, dancing under the trees. In
+the palace there is music and singing. Christine is seated in a
+tapestried hall with one or two esquires who prefer to discourse of
+love to joining in the jollity. After a time the talk turns on fickle
+men, and Christine brings forth from her vast storehouse of knowledge
+classical and mediaeval examples. As she mentions Theseus, and recalls
+his baseness to Ariadne, she points to the tapestry on the wall before
+them, where the story is woven. This little touch makes the scene very
+real to us, for the record of the purchase of this tapestry, with the
+price of twelve hundred francs paid for it, may still be found amongst
+the royal inventories.
+
+There is such a volume and variety of works from Christine's pen that
+it is no easy task to make a fair selection. One of the most
+significant, since it deals with a subject which permeated mediaeval
+thought, and on which she was wont to dwell, is _La Mutation de
+fortune_, "Fortune more inconstant than the moon," says Christine. In
+it she writes with her heart in her hand, as it were, telling first of
+the sore havoc Fortune has wrought amongst those most dear to her. Yet
+though her own heart has been torn on the Wheel of Fortune, she stands
+before her fellow sufferers like some figure of Hope pointing upward,
+where, she says, wrong is surely righted. And thus she turns to the
+world in general, not in the spirit of the pessimist, but rather in
+that of the philosopher. She well knows that Fortune is no blindfolded
+goddess turning writhing humanity on a wheel, but a something rooted
+in ourselves, and she has pity for "la povre fragilite humaine."
+Though so independent and advanced in thought, she is still found
+clinging in her writings to mediaeval forms. As a setting for her
+thoughts on Fortune's changes, she makes use of the favourite simile
+of a castle--here the Castle of Fortune--as representing the world,
+wherein the rich and the poor, the strong and the weak, jostle one
+another. She criticises all men, from the prince to the pauper, but
+not women, since these have been sufficiently criticised and decried.
+It is like the prelude to a _Dance of Death_. Then she tells of the
+paintings on the walls of this imaginary castle, and uses this
+mediaeval fancy, itself borrowed from the classics (_Met._ ii. 5. 770),
+to give what is really a history of the world as she knew it, written
+to demonstrate the instability of all earthly conditions.
+
+Once again, with her versatile gifts, she turns from philosophy to a
+treatise on military tactics and justice, _Le Livre des faits d'armes
+et de chevalerie_. However devoid of interest, except as a landmark in
+the history of military strategy and customs, this work may be to-day,
+it was thought of sufficient importance in the reign of our Henry the
+Seventh for the king to command Caxton to translate and print it
+(1489) with the title of _The Book of Faytes of Arms_, a book still
+sought after by our bibliophiles. It was further honoured by being
+quoted as an authority in the reign of Henry the Eighth. Considering
+the nature of its contents, this seems quite an extraordinary tribute
+to the judgment and ability of the writer.
+
+But the misery of France is ever increasing. Ceaseless civil war and
+foreign invasion impoverish the people, and make desolate the land.
+The dissolute Court is extravagant and filled with discord. Christine,
+fired with patriotic fervour, once more makes an effort, which proves
+to be her final one, to arouse the pleasure-loving nobility to some
+sense of its obligations to the nation. _Le Livre des trois vertues_,
+and _Le Livre de la paix_, appear one after the other. In the former,
+which she dedicates to the Dauphine, Margaret of Burgundy, she merely
+adds another to the long list of discourses for the guidance of women
+which, in Christian times, begins as early as the second century.[35]
+This theme forms the subject of so considerable a didactic literature
+that it can only be hinted at here. Whether treated from a religious
+or from a social point of view, or the two combined, the sum-total of
+the teaching is moral training with a view to self-restraint and
+subordination. Christine addresses herself to all women, from the
+highest to the lowest, but her principal theme is the influence a
+princess may and should have on Court life. She further counsels not
+princesses alone, but all well-born women, not to attach too much
+importance to the things of this world, to be charitable, and to see
+to the education of their children, and so to inform themselves that
+they may be capable of filling their husbands' place when they are
+obliged to be absent at war or at the Court. She adds a plea for the
+country, that war should be opposed, and one for the poor, that pity
+should be shown to them. Then she addresses herself to the townswoman,
+advising her to see to her household, not to fear to go into the
+kitchen, and to avoid all luxury; then to servants, counselling them
+on no account to take bribes, adding the practical touch that as God
+is everywhere, and only asks of each a good heart, it is not
+necessary for them to go to Mass every day; then to the wife of the
+labourer, bidding her to guard well her master's flocks and to
+encourage her husband to work; and, finally, she has a word of
+sympathy for the poor, holding out to them hope of recompense in
+heaven for misery endured here, and exhorting them to have patience
+meanwhile. From this patriotic and practical advice to women she turns
+to men, and in _Le Livre de la Paix_ sets forth the duties of princes
+and of those in power to the people, importuning them to exercise
+clemency, liberality, and justice.
+
+    [35] A. A. Hentsch, _De la litterature du moyen age
+    s'adressant specialement aux femmes_, Cahors, 1903.
+
+But it is too late. The sand in the hour-glass is running low.
+Disaster follows disaster, until the final blow is struck at Agincourt
+(1415), where the flower of the French nation is cut off, and princes
+of the blood are carried away into exile. Christine, with bleeding
+heart, and worn with trouble and disappointment, retires to the
+convent of Poissy, "un tres doux paradis," perchance to find peace and
+consolation within its tranquil walls, and to implore Heaven's aid for
+her sore-stricken country. For fourteen years no sound from her
+reaches the outside world. Then, inspired by the glorious advent and
+deeds of Joan of Arc, with all her old passion she pours forth a final
+hymn of praise and thanksgiving to the woman who has at last aroused
+France to patriotism, and so dies in peace at the solemn moment of
+Charles the Seventh's consecration at Rheims.
+
+    O Thou! ordained Maid of very God!
+    Joanna! born in Fortune's golden hour,
+    On thee the Holy Spirit pours His Flood
+    And His high grace is given thee for dower.
+    Now all great gifts are thine:--O blessed be He
+    That lent thee life!--how word my grateful prayer?
+    --No prayer of thine was spoken fruitlessly,
+    O Maid of God! O Joan! O Virgin rare!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Mark me this portent! strange beyond all telling!
+    How this despoiled Kingdom stricken lay,
+    And no man raised his hand to guard his dwelling,
+    Until a Woman came to show the way.
+    Until a Woman (since no man dare try)
+    Rallied the land and bade the traitors fly.
+    Honour to Womankind! It needs must be
+    That God loves Woman, since He fashioned Thee!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    O strange! This little maid sixteen years old
+    On whom no harness weigheth overmuch.
+    So strong the little hands! enduring hold
+    She seemeth fed by that same armour's touch,
+    Nurtured on iron--as before her vanish
+    The enemies of her triumphal day;
+    And this by many men is witnessed;
+    Yea, many eyes be witness of that fray!
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Castles and towns, she wins them back for France,
+    And France is free again, and this her doing!
+    Never was power given as to her lance!
+    A thousand swords could do no more pursuing.
+    Of all staunch men and true she is the Chief,
+    Captain and Leader, for that she alone
+    Is braver than Achilles the brave Greek.
+    All praise be given to God who leadeth Joan!
+
+
+
+
+AGNES SOREL
+
+
+So much glamour has attached, and rightly so, to Joan of Arc, the
+soldier-saviour of Charles the Seventh of France, that another woman,
+Agnes Sorel--Charles's good angel of a less militant order--has been
+almost entirely overlooked, and where she has been remembered, has
+been treated by the few with the honour due to her, and by the many
+merely as Charles's mistress. But to her it was given to be a great
+inspirer of Charles, and much of the good that this weak king and
+ungrateful man did for his country may assuredly be in large measure
+attributed to her influence, just as the greatest merit that can be
+recorded of him personally was his devotion to her whilst she lived,
+though the memory of her availed naught after she had passed away.
+Agnes Sorel came as it were between the ebb and flow of the late
+Middle Ages and the Renaissance, when chivalry, not as a passing
+emotion but as an education, still lingered in men's relation with
+women. Respect for womankind grew in the Middle Ages in France under
+the double influence of religion and chivalry, of which the cult of
+the Virgin and the cult of woman were the outcome. In honour of both,
+men strove in tournament and fought in battle. With the cry, "For our
+Lady," or "For God and my Lady," men hurled themselves into the thick
+of the strife as if the goddess, whether divine or human, in whose
+name they ventured, had made her champions invulnerable. And, in a
+manner as it would seem of action and re-action, the goddess became
+humanised and the woman deified. The former tendency may be traced in
+miracles attributed to the Virgin, and, later, in the "Mysteries," and
+the latter in tales of chivalry, where love is treated as a gift from
+Heaven, and the recipients of it are idealised. Stories which seem to
+contradict this, and to refute all accepted ideas of chivalry and
+honour, are frequently original only in details, the bases being
+borrowed from Oriental tales. Buddha's country, the land of the
+Zenana, supplied much material of an exaggerated nature which in the
+West became mere travesty.
+
+It is always difficult to determine exactly the origin of anything so
+subtle as a sentiment, especially one which gradually pervades and
+influences a people. It is, in its way, at first like a soft breeze,
+of which we can only see the effect. But as we try to discover some
+definite, if only partial, reason for this interchange of simple human
+relations between the Virgin and her votaries, we remember that St.
+Francis, the embodiment of exalted human sentiment, had lived, and
+that scholasticism, in that phase of it which treated the dialectical
+subtleties of words as paramount, was on the wane. Hence spirit,
+which had so long been restrained, and which is ever in conflict with
+form, again prevailed, and mankind discovered that a loving Mother had
+taken the place of a stately Queen in the Heavens. This attitude
+towards the Virgin is revealed in the miracles attributed to her
+agency. It is also shown in one of the greatest works of piety of the
+thirteenth century, the _Meditations on the Life of Jesus Christ_,[36]
+which, through the medium of the "Mysteries," introduced into sacred
+pictorial art some of its most dramatic and appealing scenes. Where is
+there to be found anything more tenderly human than the incident of
+"Christ taking leave of His Mother" before His journey to Jerusalem to
+consummate His mission?
+
+    [36] These meditations, attributed in the past, and by some
+    even now, to St. Bonaventura, are considered by other
+    scholars to be of Cistercian inspiration. P. Perdrizet, _La
+    Vierge de Misericorde_, 1908, p. 15.
+
+This note of the womanly element in its fairest form, gradually
+insinuating itself more and more, and permeating life, art, and
+literature, is the key to the right understanding of the position
+which woman had attained in the civilised world.
+
+Before turning our special attention to Agnes Sorel, let us recall the
+condition of France at the beginning of the fifteenth century.
+
+When the lunatic King Charles the Sixth died in 1422, and Charles, his
+son, at the age of nineteen, succeeded under the title of "King of
+Bourges," Paris was held by the Burgundians, who were in league with
+the English. The Dukes of Burgundy and of Brittany were alike
+vacillating in their policy, being at one time attached to the king's
+party, and at another allied to the English. With the exception of a
+few castles, the strongholds of lords loyal to the Crown, the English
+possessed the whole of France north of the Loire, from the Meuse to
+the Bay of Mont St. Michel. Hither the Duke of Bedford was sent as
+regent for the English king, Henry the Sixth, then ten months old,
+who, by the terms of the Treaty of Troyes (1420), was the lawful king,
+the right of succession having been conferred on his father, Henry the
+Fifth, when he married Catherine, the daughter of Charles the Sixth of
+France.
+
+Charles the Seventh divided his time between Bourges and Poitiers,
+where the government was carried on, and Loches, Chinon, and Tours,
+the places he dearly loved, and in which he sought the solitude he
+craved for. But even in these seemingly peaceful retreats his lethargy
+and indolence were disturbed by perpetual intrigues, which it must be
+admitted were largely fostered by his own caprices and fickle
+affections. Meanwhile a cry of misery was arising from the
+war-devastated land. Churches and convents, castles and cottages, were
+all fallen into ruin, and brambles grew on the untilled land where
+once golden corn had waved. Peasants hid their horses during the day
+and brought them out to graze at night. As Alain Chartier wrote at
+the time, "Les pays champestres sont tournez a l'estat de la mer, ou
+chascun a tant de seigneurie comme il a de force." Men of all
+conditions, from the proudest lord to the poorest peasant, joined in
+spasmodic and detached efforts to drive out the English, but with the
+result that they did little else than harass them. Want of cohesion
+was the characteristic of the national resistance until, from a small
+village in the east of France, there appeared a deliverer in the
+person of Joan of Arc. Instantly, as if her sword were a magic wand,
+all the fighting men, impelled and inspired by the strength of her
+personality, rallied around her, and victory was assured.
+
+The story of the siege and surrender of Orleans, of the crowning of
+Charles in Rheims Cathedral, of Joan subsequently falling into the
+hands of the Burgundians, who sold her to their allies, the English,
+of her shameful trial and cruel death, are facts so well known that
+they may well be passed over here as briefly as possible. Suffice it
+to say, that, except for a time, even the triumph of this
+maiden-patriot did little to rouse the indolent king, who speedily
+returned to his selfish life in Touraine. War, pillage, and anarchy
+again devastated France. But gradually a change came over Charles. He
+seemed to awake as from a stupor. Dissolute and self-seeking
+favourites were dismissed, and the king was surrounded by able and
+high-minded men. He bestirred himself to make a final peace with
+Burgundy and Brittany, and to take part in the war which was still
+smouldering, though there were signs of its approaching end.
+
+What was the secret of such a change? That it was due, in the first
+instance, partly to the wise influence of his mother-in-law, Yolande
+of Aragon, and partly also to that of his wife, Marie of Anjou, sister
+of the good Duke Rene, seems almost certain, but that it was
+intensified when Agnes Sorel came into his life, there can be no
+doubt. When we consider the king's earlier life, and what it was
+whilst he was under the influence of Agnes, and his relapse into
+indolence and debauchery after her death, we can only attribute much
+of this change to her sympathetic and wise guidance. Joan of Arc had
+represented the popular element, Agnes Sorel represented the
+aristocratic. Joan of Arc aroused the people to united action by her
+enthusiasm and success, Agnes Sorel, in her time, helped to complete
+the consolidation of the kingdom, by inspiring and sustaining the
+king. Perhaps no one man could have accomplished such a revolution. It
+took two women to do this, and what they did was not of mere passing
+worth. Phoenix-like, France arose from the ashes of the Hundred Years'
+War, and it was Agnes Sorel, as priestess, who stirred the embers
+which hid the new life.
+
+Voltaire, generally more ready to scoff than to approve, wrote thus of
+Agnes Sorel:
+
+    Le bon roi Charles, au printemps de ses jours,
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Avait trouve, _pour le bien de la France_,
+    Une beaute, nommee Agnes Sorel.
+
+Was it for the good of France? Let us disregard prejudices, and
+examine facts. Even then, if all that is known of her were written, it
+could only bear to this rare personality the resemblance which a faint
+reflection does to reality.
+
+Agnes Sorel was probably born about 1420 or 1422, in the Castle of
+Fromenteau in Touraine.[37] Her father, Jean Soreau, or Sorel, was
+Lord of Coudon, and belonged to the lesser nobility. It was in this
+beautiful country of forest and meadow-land, of silvery rivers and
+meandering streams, that Agnes spent her early years, her education
+being principally religious, for religion naturally held the first
+place in a society which still retained faith in the supernatural. It
+was customary at that time for girls of noble birth to complete their
+education either at Court or at the castle of some princely person,
+for such places were considered excellent schools of courtesy and
+other virtues for the daughters as well as for the sons of the
+nobility.
+
+    [37] Both the date and the place of her birth seem uncertain.
+    Some writers suggest 1415, and some 1420 or 1422, as the
+    date; whilst Froidmantel, in Picardy, is conjectured by some,
+    and Fromenteau, in Touraine, by others, as the place. (Du
+    Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iv. p. 171,
+    note 4.)
+
+Though the date is uncertain, it was at the Court of Lorraine that
+Agnes became maid-of-honour to the Duchess Isabelle, wife of Rene,
+Duke of Anjou and Lorraine, and Count of Provence, a prince
+distinguished for chivalry and learning. This intellectual and
+chivalrous atmosphere must have been peculiarly congenial to the
+sympathetic and versatile nature of Agnes Sorel. We can picture her
+listening to the Duke Rene reading his latest poem to one or two of
+his brother-poets in the castle pleasaunce, or discoursing on
+philosophy or statecraft, or attending some brilliant pageant or
+sumptuous fete. Chivalry, though dead as an institution, still
+survived as a recreation, and as an appeal from the past to the
+cultured imagination, and Rene, mediaeval knight that he was in
+sentiment, dearly loved the gorgeous spectacle of a tournament, with
+the knight jousting in honour of his chosen lady. At this Court Agnes
+also came under the influence of Yolande of Aragon, widow of Louis,
+King of Naples and Sicily, great-granddaughter of King John of France,
+mother of the Duke Rene, and mother-in-law of King Charles the
+Seventh, a woman renowned for her extraordinary political capacity.
+All these ties, and the remembrance of the French blood in her veins,
+emphasised Yolande's dominant passion--the love of France,--and it may
+well be that in this patriotic atmosphere Agnes Sorel became imbued
+with a like passion, which later she was to develop in all its
+perfection, rivalled only by her devotion to the well-being and glory
+of her royal lover.
+
+Patriotism was a virtue of recent growth in France, for, in order to
+thrive, it requires unity of idea, and during the Middle Ages the only
+idea common to all was Christianity, which, from the nature of its
+teaching of humility and fraternity, does not make for patriotism. It
+may cement the structure, but it does not form the basis. It was only
+after years of suffering and unrest that men learned to sink their
+individual and local interests in those of the nation as a whole.
+Then, and only then, could patriotism arise, and only under such
+conditions could it flourish.
+
+How long Agnes lived at the Court of Lorraine (one of the most refined
+and cultured Courts of the time), and how her first meeting with the
+king came about, is uncertain. It has been considered likely that
+between 1431 and 1435 Isabelle of Lorraine went to Chinon to beseech
+the king to use his influence to obtain the release of her husband,
+imprisoned by his cousin, a rival claimant to the duchy of Lorraine.
+It is possible that Agnes, even if only born in 1422, may have
+accompanied her, but even if she did not, this visit of Isabelle's
+may, indirectly, have led to the meeting between the king and Agnes.
+Whilst still a prisoner, Rene succeeded to the crown of Naples on the
+death of his brother, Louis d'Anjou, and as the country was in a
+disturbed condition it was deemed prudent for Isabelle, his wife, to
+act as his substitute, and, as _lieutenante generale_, she set forth
+to establish his claim. History is silent on the point as to whether
+Agnes accompanied her or not. It may be, as some seem to think, that
+she remained in Anjou with Isabelle's eldest daughter, Marguerite,
+afterwards Queen of England. We should like to think that it was
+during this time that she attracted the notice of Charles, for this
+would lend additional interest to the exquisite miniature in the Musee
+du Louvre (at one time in the Book of Hours of Etienne Chevalier, now
+for the most part at Chantilly), which it seems probable represents
+Agnes Sorel as a youthful shepherdess, with the Castle of Loches in
+the background and Charles the Seventh riding towards her. As we have
+already suggested elsewhere,[38] this may have been a poetical
+rendering of their first meeting. However this may be, it seems
+probable that it was soon after the year 1435[39] that she first
+attracted the notice of Charles, and that, later, she took up her
+residence in Touraine, no doubt gaining her influence over the king at
+first by her beauty, which all her contemporaries proclaim, and
+afterwards by that mysterious combination of ability and grace, of
+intelligence and physical vitality, which held him captive for many
+years. During this time she, like a true woman, and no ordinary
+place-hunter, made his devotion to her react upon himself, for the
+good of his country and to his own honour. She not only counselled him
+wisely herself, but persuaded him to surround himself with wise
+counsellors.
+
+    [38] _Athenaeum_, June 25, 1904.
+
+    [39] Du Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iii.
+    p. 286.
+
+Of these counsellors, and the able and devoted men who served the king
+in divers ways, some few stand out more prominently than the rest,
+because of their position of intimacy in the royal circle, and their
+special and enduring friendship with Agnes Sorel. Such were Etienne
+Chevalier, Treasurer of France; Pierre de Breze, of a noble Angevin
+family, and Senechal of Normandy after the expulsion of the English;
+and Jacques Coeur, the king's superintendent of Finance, whose house at
+Bourges, with its angel-ceiled chapel, still delights the traveller.
+
+Etienne Chevalier was for some time secretary to the king, and after
+filling one or two smaller posts connected with finance, was made
+Treasurer of France, and member of the Grand Council. In addition to
+administrative capacity, he possessed a brilliant intellect and a
+great love of art. It is to his initiative that we owe the only
+suggestions in portraiture of Agnes Sorel. It was to him also that the
+king confided the supervision of the erection of the monuments to her
+memory at Jumieges and Loches--Jumieges where she died in 1449, and
+where her heart was buried, and Loches her favourite place of sojourn,
+and to whose church and chapter she had made large gifts. To Loches
+her body was borne in royal splendour, and there laid to rest in the
+choir of the church in a simple tomb. We can imagine the loving care
+with which Etienne Chevalier watched the sculptor, and possibly even
+gave him suggestions, as he fashioned in alabaster her recumbent
+effigy representing her with hands clasped as if in prayer, her feet
+resting against two lambs, and her head guarded by two angels with
+outstretched wings. Perhaps this stone effigy was the one true
+portrait of Agnes, but the head and face were partially destroyed
+during the Revolution, and restored in their present form in 1806, so
+that little of the original now remains.
+
+[Illustration: _Loches._
+
+TOMB OF AGNES SOREL.
+
+_To face page 158._]
+
+This tomb, which to-day may be seen in a small vestibule of the
+Chateau Royale (now the Sous-Prefecture), has a strange and chequered
+history. Perhaps scarce another has suffered such singular
+vicissitudes, so many removals, or more ruthless violations. Soon
+after the death of Charles the Seventh (1461), the canons of Loches,
+whom Agnes had largely endowed and of whom she asked naught save to be
+remembered in their prayers, petitioned Louis the Eleventh for its
+transfer to a side chapel, since they considered it unfitting for the
+dust of such an one to repose in the choir. Louis, using his subtlety
+to better purpose than was his wont, replied that if they removed the
+tomb, they must return her gifts. Naturally these worthy ecclesiastics
+silenced their consciences and kept the tomb where it was. However, in
+the year 1777, in the reign of Louis the Sixteenth, the priestly
+conscience again awoke to the enormity of its presence within the
+choir, and, with the king's consent, it was removed to the nave.
+Before re-burial the coffin was opened in the presence of various
+church dignitaries and State officials. Among the latter was a doctor
+who left an authoritative account of the proceedings, from which we
+can approximately surmise the height of La Dame de Beaute, and verify
+the record of her abundant fair hair. The exterior coffin of oak was
+only 5 feet 6 inches long. Within this, and protected by another of
+lead, was a shell of cedar wood in which, after the lapse of more than
+three centuries, lay all that was mortal of Agnes Sorel. Her fair hair
+was plaited in a long tress, and two curls rested on her forehead. As
+one of those present, more curious than his fellows, stretched out his
+hand to touch, all fell to dust. Death and Time were her guardian
+angels. But even this desecration did not suffice to drain the cup of
+unmerited vengeance. In 1793 the tomb was rifled, the sculptured
+features, so lovingly wrought, defaced, and her dust cast to the
+winds. But what matter? Agnes had done her work--work which had to be
+done, and which she alone could do.
+
+Another of the little band of chosen spirits of which Agnes was the
+soul and centre, was Pierre de Breze, Lord of Varenne and Brissac, who
+early showed himself a man of affairs, and was admitted to the King's
+Council when he was but twenty-seven. In war, administration, and
+finance, he proved himself equally trustworthy and skilful, and to
+these qualities he added others of a brilliant intellectual nature. He
+advanced from one post of trust to another, until the king himself
+presented him with the keys of the city and castle of Rouen. Thus he
+became Senechal of Normandy, an honour which remained in his family.
+One of his grandsons, Louis de Breze, a son of Charlotte, daughter of
+Agnes Sorel and Charles the Seventh, was the husband of Diane de
+Poitiers.
+
+Jacques Coeur, whose life was so intimately associated with the Court
+during Agnes's lifetime, and so sadly marred and ended after her
+death, was the son of a simple merchant of Bourges. Following in the
+wake of many adventurous and ambitious merchants of the time, he
+journeyed to the East and amassed a large fortune, which he placed at
+the disposal of the king. This enabled Charles to carry on the war in
+spite of his impoverished exchequer, and to make a final and
+successful effort against the English. But, like many another on whom
+Fortune has smiled, evil tongues and envious hearts began, ere long,
+their vampire work, and after the death of his friend and patroness,
+Agnes Sorel, Charles made no effort on his behalf, but left him at the
+mercy of his calumniators in the same base and heartless way in which
+he had abandoned Joan of Arc. Jacques, his goods confiscated, and his
+life in danger, was obliged to fly the country, and died fighting, in
+the Pope's service, against the Turk.
+
+Of the beauty of Agnes Sorel there can be no doubt, for all
+contemporary chroniclers and poets tell of it. Even the Pope, Pius the
+Second, allowed himself to add his tribute of praise to the general
+homage. Considering that there are so many types of physical beauty,
+appealing to as many different temperaments, there must have been
+something rare and remarkable in Agnes to have attracted and held
+bound all who came in contact with her. We can but conclude that this
+unanimous judgment could only have been the result of that mysterious
+union, so illusive, so indefinable, of spiritual with physical beauty.
+The records of the time merely tell us that she had blue eyes, and
+fair hair in abundance. The only picture, and this not done from life,
+by which we can judge her--for the miniatures by Fouquet, at
+Chantilly, from Etienne Chevalier's Book of Hours, though exquisite in
+delicacy, are too minute for much characterisation--is, even if we
+accept it as the original from Fouquet's hand, an overcleaned work in
+the Museum at Antwerp.[40] This, or the original painting, formed a
+wing of the so-called diptych painted to adorn the tomb of Etienne
+Chevalier and his wife in the Cathedral of Melun, the other wing--now
+in the Royal Museum, Berlin--representing Etienne Chevalier himself,
+in the attitude of prayer, his patron saint, St. Stephen, beside him.
+There seems reason, however, to suppose that this offering of
+Etienne's was in fact a triptych, and that the missing wing pictured
+his young wife, then lately dead (1452). If this was so, Etienne and
+his wife would have appeared in adoration on either side of the Queen
+of Heaven, here personated by Agnes Sorel, thus bringing the panel
+with Etienne's portrait into harmony with the central panel, which
+otherwise it fails to be.
+
+    [40] Du Fresne de Beaucourt, _Hist. de Charles VII_, t. iv.
+    p. 171, note 2.
+
+[Illustration: _Musee de Chantilly._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.
+
+_To face page 162._]
+
+Of the miniatures at Chantilly, the whole series of which forms a most
+tender and rare tribute to wife and friend, only brief mention can
+here be made of those concerning Agnes. The most simple and beautiful
+in sentiment and design is that of the _Annunciation_, in which the
+seated Virgin, in the likeness of Agnes Sorel, with bowed head
+receives the angel's message. The scene is laid in a Gothic chapel
+(perhaps the Sainte Chapelle with slight adaptations to suit the
+artist's fancy),[41] with statues of the Prophets all around, and
+Moses, holding the Books of the Law, as the central figure of the
+group. This assemblage of Old Testament seers certainly typified the
+Old dispensation, whilst the Annunciation prefigures the New, and to
+us the whole may not unfitly form an allegory of the new order which
+Agnes Sorel was to help to bring about. In another miniature--the
+_Visit of the Magi_--Charles the Seventh, accompanied by his
+Scottish guard, and with the Castle of Loches in the background,
+himself kneels as one of the kings before the Virgin, here also
+represented in the likeness of Agnes. And so on, throughout the
+series, in many of the scenes of the Virgin's life we find her bearing
+the features of Agnes until an older and sadder type becomes necessary
+in the _Crucifixion_, the _Entombment_, and the _Announcement of the
+Death_ and the _Death_ of the Virgin. When, however, death has
+transfigured age and sorrow, the likeness of Agnes reappears in the
+_Assumption_, and _Coronation_, and, the crowning glory, the
+_Enthronement_ of the Virgin.
+
+    [41] Cf. _Grandes Chroniques de France_, fol. 292, Bib. Nat.
+
+[Illustration: _Musee de Chantilly._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS OF ETIENNE CHEVALIER.
+
+_To face page 163._]
+
+In a Book of Hours, at Munich, painted about 1500 A.D. for Jacques
+Coeur's grandson (in part perhaps by Jean Bourdichon, the artist of the
+superb Book of Hours of Anne de Bretagne now in the Bibliotheque
+Nationale, or at least by some pupil or follower of his), there are
+three miniatures that seem of special interest in connection with
+Agnes Sorel. One is a representation of the Virgin of the
+Annunciation, and another that of the Madonna with the Holy Child. In
+both these the features of the Virgin Mother appear to faintly echo
+those of Agnes as we know her, as the crowned and ermined queen in the
+picture at Antwerp. Still more interesting is the third miniature,
+giving a view--here used as a setting for the _Procession to
+Calvary_--of the front of Jacques Coeur's stately dwelling at Bourges.
+Here doubtless many a time Agnes and the king were entertained. Hither
+Jacques returned from sundry journeys to the East, laden with
+treasures to beautify his surroundings. Hence he fled, the victim of
+success. Over the principal entrance is a canopied recess, once
+sheltering an equestrian statue destroyed during the Revolution. This
+now empty space once held a statue of King Charles the Seventh, armed
+cap-a-pie on a galloping caparisoned charger, as he may be seen
+represented on medals of the period. It is not a little significant of
+this thankless monarch that he here seems to be turning his back on
+the house of his faithful servant and supporter, and to be riding
+away. Other details worthy of mention in this Book of Hours are the
+realistic background to the picture of the _Visit of the Magi_, with
+its snow-covered village church, houses, and fields; the Italian
+drug-pot in the Magdalen's hands in the scene of the Crucifixion,
+showing the intimate intercourse with Italy; and the Mater Dolorosa
+seated _alone_ at the foot of the Cross,--a tragic note taken from the
+_Mystery of the Passion_.
+
+There is only one unanimous opinion concerning Agnes Sorel, and that
+is as to her beauty. For the rest, it would seem as if prejudice and
+flattery held the scales. The mean is difficult to discover, and
+perhaps it is only possible to get somewhere near it by studying
+results--the remarkable change, as already noticed, in Charles's life
+and conduct whilst under her influence.
+
+In the face of conflicting records it is no easy matter to determine
+when Agnes Sorel first became the king's mistress. In 1435, when the
+Treaty of Arras was concluded between Charles and the Duke of
+Burgundy, Cardinal de Sainte-Croix (afterwards Pope Pius the Second)
+was Papal legate at the French Court, and aided in the negotiations.
+He tells in his memoirs that the relation between Charles and Agnes
+was known publicly at the time, and that the king could do nothing
+without her, even having her at his side at the royal councils. The
+trustworthiness of this statement has, however, been so questioned,
+that it seems safer to endeavour to arrive at the truth from other
+sources, although, if the statement can be relied on, it seems to
+follow, almost as a matter of course, that Agnes must have been born
+earlier than 1422. It is an admitted fact that between 1433 and 1438
+the manner of Charles's life entirely changed. In the year 1433 the
+infamous and once all-powerful favourite, La Tremoille, who had been
+the king's evil genius for six years, and was largely responsible for
+the king's treatment of his wife, Marie of Anjou, was dismissed at the
+instance of the politic Yolande. Yet even so, the king often relapsed
+into indolence and apparent indifference to his kingly duties, and it
+was not till after 1438, when he summoned a national Council at
+Bourges, that Charles showed himself to be a new man. It is also not
+long after this that we read of favours granted by the king to
+Agnes's relations. From that time, Charles ceased to spend his time in
+dreamland, as it were, in the sweet Touraine country, and engaged
+himself in affairs of State, listening to and accepting wise counsels,
+favouring the restoration of schools and universities--which, in the
+uncertain state of the country, had almost ceased to exist--and
+encouraging the final efforts to expel the national enemy, even at
+times personally joining in the fight. If we see in this, in a measure
+at all events, the guiding spirit of Agnes, the secret of her
+influence is not very difficult to discover. Apart from her beauty,
+which, with Charles, would be a potent factor, Agnes had a woman's
+insight and skill in her relation with him, ever holding up to him the
+glory and obligations of kingship, at the same time herself entering,
+with all the vitality of her extraordinary nature, into his favourite
+pastimes. We know that in one or other of her many residences near
+Chinon or Loches, she and the king often spent the evening playing
+piquet or chess (the latter being his favourite game), and then, on
+the morrow, rode forth together to the chase. So the days were passed
+in work and simple outdoor pleasures, Agnes taking no recognised
+public part in the king's life, but devoting herself heart and soul to
+the task she had in hand. But besides these relaxations of peace,
+there was also the reality of war; for the war still lingered on,
+though feebly. The English had lost their ally, the Duke of Burgundy,
+as well as Bedford, the able Regent, and there was no fit man to take
+the latter's place. Paris opened her gates to Charles in 1436, and in
+the following year Charles, after having reigned for fourteen years,
+made his first State entry into the capital of his kingdom, mounted on
+a white charger, the sign of sovereignty. In 1444 a treaty was
+concluded at Tours with the English, and, to make the compact doubly
+sure, Margaret of Anjou, a niece of the king, was married to Henry the
+Sixth of England. For about a month the Court and its princely
+visitors gave themselves up to fetes and pageants, and it was during
+this time of rejoicing that the position of Agnes was officially
+recognised. She was made lady-in-waiting to the queen, and took a
+prominent part throughout the festival. Charles gave her the royal
+castle of Beaute, on the Marne, near the Bois de Vincennes, "le plus
+bel chastel et joly et le mieux assis qui fust en l'Isle de France,"
+desiring, as was said, that she should be "Dame de Beaute de nom comme
+de fait." From the time of her public recognition she appeared with
+the king at all the brilliant festivities celebrated in honour of
+treaties and marriages. She also sat in the royal council, a position
+which, as a king's mistress, she was the first to occupy, though we
+know that Henri II. took no step without first conferring with Diane
+de Poitiers, and that Madame de Maintenon sat in Louis the
+Fourteenth's privy council.
+
+The change which came over France after the Treaty of Tours was
+marvellous, alike in its extent and its rapidity. Commerce was again
+resumed between the two nations; men and women once again ventured
+without the city walls, to breathe, as it were, the fresh air of
+liberty; and those who had been called upon to fight, returned to
+their work in the fields or the towns. We cannot better voice the
+feeling of the people than by borrowing the song of a poet of the day:
+
+    Le temps a laisse son manteau
+    De vent, de froidure et de pluie,
+    Et s'est vetu de broderie,
+    De soleil rayant, clair et beau;
+    Il n'y a beste ne oiseau
+    Qu'en son jargon ne chante ou crie:
+    Le temps a laisse son manteau.
+
+Now that Agnes had assumed a definite role at Court, she lived
+principally at Loches, where the king assigned to her "son quartier de
+maison" within the castle, and also gave her a residence without the
+walls. Here she shone like a radiant star; for although the king did
+not have much personal influence on the movement in art and letters,
+his Court was the meeting-place of many distinguished and intellectual
+men. Among them we find the name of Alain Chartier, the poet, and
+sometime secretary to the king, and one of the ambassadors who went to
+Edinburgh to ask the hand of the little Margaret of Scotland for the
+Dauphin. We remember him now chiefly in connection with the charming
+story told of this girl-wife of the Dauphin Louis. Betrothed to Louis
+when she was a child of three, and sent to France to be brought up at
+the Court, she was married at twelve to this boy of thirteen, who
+could not possibly appreciate her simple, sweet nature which endeared
+her to all others. One day as she was passing with her ladies through
+a room in the castle, she saw Alain Chartier lying on a bench asleep.
+She approached quietly, and kissed him, much to the surprise of her
+attendants that she should "kiss so ugly a man." And she made answer:
+"I did not kiss the man, but the precious mouth whence so many
+beautiful and fair words have issued." Poor little poetess!
+Fortunately her life was a short one. She died when she was just
+twenty-one, with these words on her lips: "Fi de la vie de ce monde,
+ne m'en parlez plus." The scientific historian of to-day is inclined
+to dismiss this story as a pleasing though rather foolish romance. But
+even so, Alain Chartier may be remembered as a poet and philosopher,
+as well as a brave and wise patriot during some of France's darkest
+hours--a worthy contemporary of Agnes Sorel and Joan of Arc. Fearing
+neither the nobles nor the people, he blames the former for their love
+of luxury and personal indulgence, and exhorts both to think of the
+public good, and to aid in their country's defence, instead of
+allowing themselves to be engrossed with their private affairs. Then,
+whilst acknowledging that as he has not the strength to bear arms, it
+is only with his pen and his speech that he can serve his country, he
+reminds them that it was the historian's pen and the orator's
+harangue, just as much as the warrior's lance, that made the glory of
+the Romans.
+
+Louis the Dauphin, come to man's estate, and self-seeking and
+treacherous, was no friend to Agnes, who had incurred his hatred by
+her fearless disclosure to the king from time to time of conspiracies
+against his person, in which Louis was the prime mover. After repeated
+reconciliations, the king in despair finally banished him to his
+domain of Dauphine. The traitor, quitting the royal presence for what
+he deemed exile, swore to be avenged on those who had driven him
+forth, and if some of the records of the time speak truly, four years
+later his opportunity came, and he kept his oath.
+
+The last scene of Agnes's life was pathetically interesting. Her end
+came almost suddenly. The king, listening to advice, had resolved to
+continue the war in Normandy,[42] and, at the instigation of Agnes, if
+we may believe the words of a courtly writer of the time, had himself
+gone to the front. Rouen was taken, and Charles entered in triumph.
+The streets were decked with flowers and branches, and the houses hung
+with rich draperies, and everywhere the leopards and quarterings of
+England had been replaced by the fleur-de-lis. Charles, preceded by a
+gorgeous procession of archers, each company arrayed in the livery of
+its lord, and carrying his special banner, followed, under a canopy,
+on a horse caparisoned to the ground with blue cloth sprinkled with
+fleurs-de-lis of gold, surrounded by princes and the principal
+captains and officers of the Crown. With his wonted observance of
+religious duty, slowly he made his way to the cathedral through the
+shouting multitude, and to the sound of many fiddles and the fanfare
+of trumpets. There he descended, kissed the relics as he knelt beneath
+the great portal, and then entered its hushed and solemn dimness to
+return thanks. But scarce had the air ceased to ring with the plaudits
+of the people, when the report of a plot against the king, devised by
+the Dauphin, is said to have come to the ears of Agnes, and she
+hastened to the king at Jumieges, whither he had retired for a short
+rest during the unusual and inclement winter. Here, stricken by a
+mysterious sickness, by some thought to be typhoid fever, by others
+attributed to poison administered at the instigation of Louis, she
+died in February 1450, in her manor of Mesnil, near the Abbey of
+Jumieges. The king was with her to the end, and could only be induced
+to withdraw when her lifeless form sank back in his arms. So died this
+wonderful and fascinating woman who had lived and laboured for her
+country through perhaps the most critical period of its history.
+
+    [42] Lavisse, _Hist. de France_, vol. iv. part 2, p. 229, footnote.
+
+It is impossible to entirely ignore what has been written to Agnes's
+personal discredit, though much of it may well be looked upon as
+exaggeration, and open to suspicion. That the king was not her only
+lover may be true, but in the absence of satisfactory documentary
+evidence of this, perhaps the various intrigues attributed to her may,
+for the most part at least, be regarded as the creations of scandal.
+Still, bearing in mind the condition of France at the time of her
+accession to power, the extent of the influence she admittedly
+exercised in the councils of the king, and the great change which came
+over the royal fortunes and the fortunes of the country during the
+years of her ascendancy, it is scarcely possible to refuse to her some
+right to share in the recognition so lavishly bestowed upon the other
+great woman of that time--Joan of Arc. The one may be said to have
+been the complement of the other. Both were necessary to the needs of
+the day, and the glory of successful accomplishment should be shared
+between them.
+
+
+
+
+A NOTE ON MEDIAEVAL GARDENS
+
+
+
+
+MEDIAEVAL GARDENS[43]
+
+    [43] The quotations from the _Roman de la Rose_ are taken
+    from Mr. F. S. Ellis's translation, published by Messrs. J.
+    M. Dent & Co. in the "Temple Classics."
+
+
+No one can study French mediaeval lore, or Gothic cathedral, or Book of
+Hours, without realising how great a love of Nature prevailed in the
+late Middle Ages. The poems tell of spring, "the season of delight,"
+of gardens which suffice "for loss of Paradise," and of birds "with
+soft melodious chant." In the dim stillness of the cathedral, Nature
+is expressed in infinite variety. Foliage grows in the hollows of the
+mouldings, and sometimes, as at Chartres, even the shafts, as they
+tower into the gloom, end in half-opened leaves, suggestive of spring,
+of hope, and of aspiration. Many a sunny facade shows us scenes of
+rural life--sowing, reaping, vine-dressing, and so forth--fashioned as
+a calendar in stone, and many a peasant must have rejoiced as he saw
+himself and his occupation thus represented in effigy. Fortunately for
+the poor toiler, the Church not only taught that "to labour is to
+worship," but further honoured work by thus representing it at the
+very entrance to the sanctuary, so making it, as it were, the "open
+sesame" to higher things.
+
+In Books of Hours and illuminated MSS., before the complete border of
+flowers, birds, and small grotesques was developed, we find ornamental
+flourishes, like the growth of ivy and hawthorn, splendidly free in
+design, and painted with evident joy even in the minutest bud or
+tendril. Everywhere may this love of Nature striving for expression be
+seen. But we must turn to the poems and romances if we would fully
+realise it in all its simplicity and truth, since it is in these alone
+that we get at the actual mediaeval feeling unalloyed with all that we
+ourselves have, perhaps unwittingly, read into it.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+BOOK OF HOURS.
+
+French, 14th Century, Brit. Mus.
+
+_To face page 176._]
+
+"All hearts are uplifted and made glad in the time of April and May,
+when once again the meadows and the pastures become green." So says
+one of the old romancers. And this joy in returning spring seems to
+have pervaded mediaeval thought and expression. Little is this to be
+wondered at when we call to mind the long dreary winters spent in cold
+and ill-lit castles, or in dark, draughty houses and hovels. Before
+glass, long regarded as a luxury, came into general use in dwellings,
+the only protection from rain and cold consisted in wooden shutters,
+or movable frames with horn slabs (necessarily small), or varnished
+parchment. In truth, the only warm, bright place was the chimney
+corner, and here, as near as might be to the blazing logs, the
+long days of winter were spent in chess-playing, broidery,
+lute-playing, and love-making, the monotony of this only occasionally
+broken by the arrival of some wandering minstrel who sang of war and
+love, or of some packman laden with sundry wares prized of womankind.
+But in winter such wayfarers were rare, and life was, perforce, one of
+boredom and discomfort. Thus there was exceeding joy when "woods and
+thickets donned their rich green mantling of resplendent sheen."
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 177._]
+
+It is generally of springtime in a garden--a garden of green glades
+and alleys, fruit-trees and flowers, such as was very dear to the
+mediaeval soul--of which we read. The _Roman de la Rose_ opens with a
+description of a garden, hemmed round with castle wall--a pleasaunce
+within a fortress--and planted with trees "from out the land of
+Saracens," and many others, to wit, the pine, the beech (loved of
+squirrels), the graceful birch, the shimmering aspen, the hazel, the
+oak, and many flowers withal--roses and violets and periwinkle, golden
+king-cups, and pink-rimmed daisies. The poet describes with careful
+detail the design of the garden:
+
+    The garden was nigh broad as wide,
+    And every angle duly squared;
+
+how the trees were planted:
+
+    Such skilful art
+    Had planned the trees that each apart
+    Six fathoms stood, yet like a net
+    The interlacing branches met;
+
+and how "channelled brooks" flowed from clear fountains through "thymy
+herbage and gay flowers."
+
+The debt which the mediaeval world owed to the East is shown both in
+the fruits and the spices which are described as growing in the
+garden, and in the pastimes said to have been enjoyed in its cool
+shade. We read of pomegranates, nutmegs, almonds, dates, figs,
+liquorice, aniseed, cinnamon, and zedoary, an Eastern plant used as a
+stimulant. When the poet would tell of dance and song, he goes by
+
+    A shaded pathway, where my feet,
+    Bruised mint and fennel savouring sweet,
+
+to a secluded lawn. Here he sees one whose name is "Gladness":
+
+    Gently swaying, rose and fell
+    Her supple form, the while her feet
+    Kept measured time with perfect beat:
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    While minstrels sang, the tambourine
+    Kept with the flute due time I ween.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    Then saw I cunning jugglers play,
+    And girls cast tambourines away
+    Aloft in air, then gaily trip
+    Beneath them, and on finger-tip
+    Catch them again.
+
+In every garden there was a fountain or sheet of water with a small
+channelled way carrying the water to the castle and through the
+women's apartment. Sometimes these waterways were made use of by the
+lover as a means of communication with his beloved, as we read in the
+romance of _Tristan and Isolde_, where Tristan, to apprise his
+mistress that he is at their trysting-place in the garden, drops into
+the water small pieces of bark and twigs, which are quickly carried to
+the chamber where Isolde is waiting and watching. And one eventide a
+perilous encounter befalls. Tristan has been banished the Court, for
+evil tongues have whispered in King Mark's ear of his love for Isolde,
+and have further whispered of secret meetings in the garden, beside
+the fountain. Now near the fountain is a pine-tree, into which King
+Mark resolves to climb, and perchance to discover the meeting of the
+lovers. As daylight fades, Tristan scales the wall, and hastens to
+throw into the water the little signals for his lady. But as he stoops
+over the pool he sees, reflected in its clear surface, the image of
+the king, with bow ready bent. Can he stop the floating twigs as they
+are hurried along on their mission? No. The water carries them away
+out of sight, and Isolde must come. She comes, but Tristan does not go
+to meet her as was his wont, but remains standing by the water. She
+wonders at her lover's seeming unconcern, but as she approaches him,
+suddenly, in the bright moonlight, she, too, sees in the water the
+reflection of the king, and the lovers are saved.
+
+A pine-tree is so often mentioned as a special feature in a mediaeval
+garden that one is led to think that its use may either have been a
+survival from the days of Tree Worship, seeing that the tree was
+sacred to Adonis, Attis, and Osiris[44] (all, perhaps, varying forms
+of one and the same divinity), or have been suggested by some northern
+Saga. It makes its appearance in the _Chanson de Roland_, which has
+come down to us in a thirteenth-century form, incorporating the
+earlier Epic of _Roland_, probably composed towards the end of the
+eleventh century. In this we find mention of it when Charlemagne,
+after he is said to have taken Cordova, retires to a garden with
+Roland and Oliver and his barons, the elder ones amusing themselves
+with chess and tric-trac, and the younger ones with fencing, the king
+meanwhile looking on, seated under a pine-tree. Later in the day tents
+are set up, in which they pass the night, and in the early morning
+Charlemagne, after hearing mass, again sits under the pine-tree to
+take counsel of his barons.
+
+    [44] J. G. Frazer, _Adonis, Attis, Osiris_, 1906.
+
+In the _Roman de la Rose_, the fateful fountain of Narcissus is
+described as being beneath a pine-tree, which is represented as being
+taller and fairer than any that mortal eye had seen since the glorious
+pine of Charlemagne's time, showing that here at least the poet is
+making use of tradition.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Brueckmann._
+
+FLEMISH MASTER.
+
+Fifteenth Century. Stephenson Clarke Collection.
+
+_To face page 181._]
+
+But to make our way into a mediaeval garden, and see all that grows
+therein, we must needs get within the precincts of the castle, for
+inside its fortified enclosure the castle, like a small village, was
+self-contained. And this was no easy matter, if we may judge from
+the vivid description to be found in _Huon de Bordeaux_, a poem
+concerning a Bordelais lord of the ninth century. After sundry
+adventures, Huon sets out on a journey to Babylon, and seeks an
+audience with the Emir. He tells of his arrival at what he describes
+as the castle, and how, after long parley with the porter, the
+drawbridge is let down and the great gate opened, and he finds himself
+in an arched way, with a series of portcullises showing their teeth
+overhead. After further parley, and further opening of gates, he
+enters a large courtyard, and goes thence into the garden, which is
+planted with every kind of tree, aromatic herb, and sweet-scented
+flower. In the garden is a fountain with its little channelled way,
+supplied with water from the Earthly Paradise. This description may
+seem a little fantastic, but it is only the poet's way of telling us
+what we might ourselves experience if we would go in imagination to
+some thirteenth- or fourteenth-century castle, and seek to gain
+admittance.
+
+Sometimes the garden was within the castle fortifications. It was then
+necessarily circumscribed, and would, more or less, be laid out with
+formal pathways and stone-curbed borders, also with trees cut in
+various devices (a reminder of Rome's once far-reaching influence),
+and a tunnel or pergola of vines or sweet-scented creepers running the
+length of the wall to form a covered walk for shelter against sunshine
+or shower. But where the garden was without the fortifications, but
+yet within the castle enclosure, as was always the arrangement if
+possible, opportunity was afforded for wooded dell and flowery slope,
+as well as for the orchard with its special patch for herb-growing.
+
+The herb-plot was one of the most important items in a mediaeval
+garden; for here were grown not only herbs and roots for healing, but
+also sweet-scented mint and thyme for mingling with the rushes strewn
+on the floors. Sometimes the rushes themselves were fragrant, and
+such, lemon-scented when crushed, may even to-day be found in the
+neighbourhood of Oxford, probably growing in the very place which at
+one time supplied many a college hall with its carpet of fresh green.
+
+[Illustration: _Bodician._
+
+MS. ROMANCE OF ALEXANDER.
+
+Fourteenth Century.
+
+_To face page 183._]
+
+In the larger gardens might also be found labyrinths and aviaries,
+with bright-plumaged birds from the East. Here, too, were often
+enclosures for wild beasts, much prized by the lord of the castle, to
+whom they may have been proffered as peace-offerings, or as friendly
+gifts from some neighbouring lord. Strange beasts were royal gifts;
+for kings, we read, made such offerings to each other. Even as early
+as the ninth century, Haroun al Raschid sent an elephant to
+Charlemagne. It was brought to Aix-la-Chapelle by Isaac the Jew, and
+survived its long walk seven years, and it would be interesting to
+know by what route it journeyed thither in those days. These private
+zoological gardens may possibly account for the comparative
+accuracy with which the early miniaturists painted such beasts as
+lions, bears, and leopards, which otherwise they might have had no
+chance of studying.
+
+One of the greatest delights of the garden was the bower in which the
+warm months were passed. Here meals were taken, and merry pastimes
+enjoyed, as long as daylight lasted. Hither came tumblers and
+dancing-girls, and sometimes performing animals. A poor captive bear
+would be made to stumble over the rough roads for miles in order to go
+through its grotesque antics before some joyous company of dames and
+gallants. But spring and youth was the time to be gay, and nothing
+came amiss to these light-hearted folk.
+
+The bower was also the "privy playing place," and all care was taken
+to make its leafy screen grow close and thick. Perhaps one of the most
+interesting references to a green arbour--interesting because of the
+romance which was the cause of its mention--is in a poem by King James
+I. of Scotland, telling of sad years in prison, which ended in love
+and liberty. James, whilst still a young man, was imprisoned in
+Windsor Castle, and writing to solace himself with something more
+tangible than the mere contemplation of his beloved one, and to while
+away time, describes the garden with "herbere green," which he saw
+through the barred window of his prison-house. Leaning his head
+against the cold stone wall, by night he gazed at the stars, by day
+at the garden. And weary and woe-begone as he was, he says, "to look,
+it did me good."
+
+    Now there was made fast by the tower wall
+    A garden fair, and in the corners set
+    A herbere green, with wands so long and small
+    Railed all about: and so with trees close set
+    Was all the place, and hawthorn hedges knit
+    That no one though he were near walking by
+    Might there within scarce any one espy.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    So thick the branches and the leafage green.
+    Beshaded all the alleys that there were,
+    And 'midst of ev'ry herbere might be seen
+    The sharp and green sweet-scented juniper,
+    Growing so fair with branches here and there,
+    That, as it seemed to any one without,
+    The branches spread the herbere all about.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+    And on the slender green-leaved branches sat
+    The little joyous nightingales, and sang
+    So loud and clear, the carols consecrat
+    To faithful love.[45]
+
+    [45] _King's Quair_, verse 31 _seq._
+
+This "garden fair" was the scene of the romance which solaced this
+royal prisoner, and helped him to bear his irksome lot, and to be able
+to exclaim, after nearly eighteen years' captivity--a captivity since
+boyhood:
+
+    Thanks be to the massive castle wall,
+    From which I eagerly looked forth and leant.
+
+Looking from his window he espied, notwithstanding "hawthorne hedges"
+and "beshaded alleys," Lady Johanna Beaumont (whom he wedded on his
+release) walking in the garden. Neither poet nor historian tells how
+they found means to communicate with one another, but tradition,
+which is sometimes twin-brother to truth, has handed down the story of
+a go-between who conveyed missives and tokens.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Brueckmann._
+
+RHENISH MASTER.
+
+C. 1420, Frankfort Hist. Mus.
+
+_To face page 185._]
+
+In the accompanying picture we see a corner of a mediaeval garden,
+hemmed round with castle wall. In it the artist has adapted an
+everyday scene to a religious purpose, by giving my lady a crown, and
+the baby an aureole, to suggest the Holy Mother and Child, whilst one
+of the gentlemen-in-waiting is provided with wings, so as to make him
+more in harmony with such saintly company. But this is only what might
+have been seen on any bright morning in late spring or summer, in some
+castle pleasaunce. My lady reads a book, whilst her maidens amuse
+themselves, one holding a psaltery on which the child tinkles, to its
+evident delight and wonderment; another, with a perverted sporting
+instinct, seems to be trying to catch fish with a ladle (note the
+usual little channelled way, on which a bird is perched, refreshing
+itself), whilst a third is picking fruit. The three squires are
+doubtless talking of the chase, for, in my lady's presence, love would
+hardly be their theme. And all around are beautiful flowers--roses,
+lilies, and irises. Over against the enclosing wall is the usual bank
+of earth, faced with wood to keep it the necessary height, and planted
+with many flowers. This raised portion enabled those in the garden to
+get a view over the surrounding country, and to have a point of
+outlook in case of attack. It also served as a seat; for at
+intervals, between the flowers and sweet-scented herbs, portions were
+covered with turf.
+
+[Illustration: _Photo. Macbeth._
+
+HARL. MS. 4425, BRIT. MUS.
+
+_To face page 186._]
+
+Of all the flowers in the garden the rose "red and pale" was the
+greatest favourite, and many different sorts were planted there. To so
+many purposes were they put, and so great was the demand for them,
+that large quantities of roses frequently served as the payment of
+vassals to their lord. They were used for strewing the floor at the
+wedding-feast, or at the entertaining of some great baron. The fresh
+petals were sprinkled over the surface of the water in the bath, and
+were distilled to make the rose-water with which the knights and
+ladies washed their hands and faces when they left their
+much-curtained beds. Further, they were specially prized for garlands,
+the making of which was one of the favourite occupations of the ladies
+of the Middle Ages. Dante, who sums up the spirit of the Middle Ages
+from the simplest reality to the sublimest ideal, alludes to garlands
+and garland-making as amongst the joys of the Earthly Paradise. In his
+poet's vision of the pageant of the Church Militant he sees the last
+company wreathed with red roses, emblems to him of Charity or Love.
+Boccaccio, in a more mundane atmosphere and a less august assemblage,
+also introduces us to this mediaeval love of garlands. In a preamble to
+one of his tales he gives a dainty picture of the manners and pastimes
+of the gay folk of his day. Of the merry company,  which his fancy
+makes to quit plague-stricken Florence for the country, where they
+tell stories to prevent monotony, he relates that, after dining in the
+cool shade, and before the story-telling begins, "the gentlemen walked
+with the ladies into a goodly garden, making chaplets and nosegays of
+divers flowers, and singing silently to themselves." Both sexes wore
+them on festive occasions, and in summer young girls wore no
+head-covering save a garland. The knight at the tournament decked his
+helm with a chaplet of some chosen flower, deftly woven by the fair
+one in whose name he made venture; and many a merry company, wreathed
+with flowers or foliage, rode forth on May-day, with trumpets and
+flutes, to celebrate the festival.
+
+Another favourite flower for garlands was the cornflower, as we learn
+from the poets, who tell of ladies dancing the carole (a popular dance
+in which all moved slowly round in a circle, singing at the same
+time), their heads crowned with garlands of cornflower. Violets and
+periwinkles, and meadow flowers, white, red, and blue, were also
+gathered to indulge this pretty fancy.
+
+The gillyflower is another flower frequently mentioned. This name has
+been applied to various flowers, but originally it belonged to the
+carnation, and was used for such in Shakespeare's time. In the _Roman
+de la Rose_ it is called the gillyflower-clove, thus definitely
+defining it. One of its virtues, according to an old writer, was "to
+comfort the spirites by the sence of smelling," and also "to be of
+much use in ornament." But indeed most flowers were not only used for
+chaplets, and for strewing on the floor, but were also painted on the
+chamber walls, and embroidered on the hangings, to serve in winter
+days as sweet memories and as sweeter hopes.
+
+Apparently the earliest records of gardens, after Roman times, date
+from the ninth century, and are mostly to be found amongst monastic
+archives. A garden was an important, and even essential, annex of a
+monastery, not only because of the "herbularis" or physic garden, from
+the herbs of which the monks compounded salves and potions for the
+wounded knight or the plundered wayfarer who might take shelter within
+its protecting walls, but also because of the solace which the shady
+trees and the gay flowers brought to the sick, for a monastery was
+generally a hospital as well. St. Bernard of Clairvaux, speaking of an
+abbey garden, gives a charming picture of one of these cloistered
+pleasaunces for the sick and the aged. He says:
+
+     Within the enclosure of this wall many and various trees,
+     prolific in various fruits, constitute an orchard resembling
+     a wood, which, being near the cell of the sick, lightens the
+     infirmities of the brethren with no moderate solace, while
+     it affords a spacious walking place to those who walk and a
+     sweet place for reclining to those who are overheated. Where
+     the orchard terminates the garden begins. Here also a
+     beautiful spectacle is exhibited to the infirm brethren:
+     while they sit upon the green margin of the huge basin, they
+     see the little fishes playing under the water and
+     representing a military encounter by swimming to meet each
+     other.
+
+This warlike note seems strange and almost discordant in the midst of
+the peace of the cloister; but many, before seeking shelter there, had
+been doughty knights, and St. Bernard, man of the world as he was,
+would realise that even this mimic warfare might bring diversion to
+their tranquil seclusion.
+
+What a contrast to all this joy in the Middle Ages in gardens and
+flowers are the sober reflections of Marcus Aurelius! Philosopher as
+he was, he would have us learn from plants the lesson of cause and
+effect, the continuity of life. He says:
+
+     The destruction of one thing is the making of another; and
+     that which subsists at present is, as it were, the seed of
+     succession, which springs from it. But if you take seed in
+     the common notion, and confine it to the field or the
+     garden, you have a dull fancy.
+
+It is with a sense of relief that we turn from the thoughts which a
+garden suggests to this stoic, to those not less profound, though
+perhaps more simple, of a Chinese writer of the fourth century:
+
+     Ah, how short a time it is that we are here! Why then not
+     set our hearts at rest, ceasing to trouble whether we remain
+     or go? What boots it to wear out the soul with anxious
+     thoughts? Let me stroll through the bright hours as they
+     pass in my garden among my flowers.
+
+
+_Printed by_ R. & R. CLARK, LIMITED, _Edinburgh_.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Of Six Mediaeval Women, by Alice Kemp-Welch
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