It would be quite hopeless to attempt a defence of ROBERT OF GLOUCESTER's poetry: perhaps his own wish was merely to render more generally intelligible a body of history which he considered as curious, and certainly believed to be authentic, because it was written in Latin, the language of truth and religion. Addressing himself to his illiterate countrymen, he employed the vulgar language as he found it, without any attempt at embellishment or refinement; and, perhaps, wrote in rhyme, only because it was found to be an useful help to the memory, and gave his work a chance of being recited in companies where it could not be read. The latter part of his poem, in which he relates the events of his own time, will not appear quite uninteresting to those who prefer the simple and desultory narratives of contemporary writers to the philosophical abridgments of the moderns; and a great part of his obscurity will be found to result from that unnecessary mixture of the German or black letter with the Saxon characters, in which Mr. Hearne, from his inordinate appetite for antiquity, has thought proper to dress this ancient English author. Robert of Gloucester, though cold and prosaic, is not quite deficient in the valuable talent of arresting the attention; and the orations, with which he occasionally diversifies the thread of his story, are in general appropriate and dramatic, and not only prove his good sense, but exhibit no unfavourable specimens of his eloquence. In his description of the first crusade he seems to change his usual character, and becomes not only entertaining, but even animated; and the vision, in which a 66 holy man" is ordered to reproach the Christians with their departure from their duty, and at the same time to promise them the divine intervention, to extricate them from a situation in which the exertions of human valour were apparently fruitless, would not, perhaps, to contemporary readers appear less poetical, nor less sublime and impressive, than the introduction of the heathen mythology into the works of the early classics. The expectations awakened by this grand incident are, indeed, miserably disappointed by the strange morality which our monk ascribes to the Supreme Being, who declares himself offended, not by the unnecessary cruelties of the crusaders, nor by the general profligacy of their manners, so much as by the reflection, that they "With women of Paynim did their foul kind, "Whereof the stench came into heaven on high." But these absurdities and inconsistencies present, perhaps, a more lively picture of the reigning man ners and opinions than could have been intentionally delineated by a writer of much superior abilities to Robert of Gloucester. Our sententious annalist has given in the following few lines the same description which we have already examined, as exhibited more at length by Wace, and imitated by Layamon. 2 The king was to his palace, tho' the service was y-do, Y-lad with his menye, and the queen to hers also. For hii 3 held the old usages, that men with men were By hem selve, and women by hem selve also there. Tho hii were each one y-set, as it to her 5 state become, KAY, king of Anjou, a thousand knights nome Of one suit, for to serve of the butlery. Before the queen it was also of all such courtesy. 1 When, sometimes then, but never though, which our old authors sometimes spell they, sometimes thogh, &c. &c. 2 Fr. Attendants. 3 They. 4 Them 7 In the same dress. The use of the several prepositions was not fixed as it now is, but many of them For to tell all the nobleye' that there was y-do, Though my tongue were of steel, me should nought dure thereto. Women ne kept of3 no knight as in druery,4 But 5 he were in arms well y-proved, and at least thrye. 6 That made, lo, the women the chaster life lead, And the knights the stalworder,7 and the better in her deed. Soon after this noble meat, as right was of such tide, The knights atyled 9 hem about, in each side, 10 In fields and in meads to prove her bachelry,' were used indifferently. Repeated proofs of this occur in the present extract, and they are therefore marked in italics. 9 Prepared, or perhaps armed. It seems to be the French word atteller; and the English word harness was also synonymous with armour. 12 Or. 11 Meanness. Fr. 13 Chess. Chekere is properly a chess-board. 14 This may possibly refer to tric-trac, or back-gammon; but casting and setting may also relate to throwing the bar. 15 Other. And which-so of any game had the mastery, All the three hext days y-laste this nobleye, In halls and in fields, of meat, and eke of play. These men came the fourth day before the king there, And he gave hem large gifts, ever as hii worth were, Bishopricks and churches clerks he gave some, And castles and towns knights that were y-come.* *For the purpose of shewing how exactly Robert of Gloucester translates from his original, I shall here add the whole corresponding passage from Geoffrey of Monmouth. Rex et regina diademata sua deponunt, assumptisque levioribus ornamentis, ille ad suum palatium cum viris, hæc ad aliud cum mulieribus, epulatum incedunt: antiquam namque consuetudinem Trojæ servantes Britones, consueverant mares cum maribus, mulieres cum mulieribus, festivos dies separatim celebrare. Collocatis postmodum cunctis ut singulorum dignitas expetebat, Caius dapifer, herminio ornatus, mille vero nobilissimis juvenibus comitatus est, qui omnes, herminio induti, fercula cum ipso ministrabant. Ex aliâ vero parte Beduerum pincernam totidem vario amicti sequuntur, qui u |