halls and bustling crowds; a slende. thread of common sense has ingeniously crept along the transparent golden mist which they amuse themselves with following. That suffices; they are pleased with their fleeting fancies, and ask no more. ou will meet more on your advance | to the Renaissance. But the show is splendid. Chaucer is transported in a dream to a temple of glass,* on the walls of which are figured in gold all the legions of Ovid and Virgil, an infinite train of characters and dresses, like that which, on the painted glass in the churches, occupied then the gaze of the faithful. Suddenly a golden eagle which sirs near the sun, and glitters like a carbuncle, descends with the swiftness of lightning, and carries him off in his talons above the stars, dropping him at last before the House of Fame, splendidly built of beryl, with shining windows and lofty turrets, and situated on a high rock of almost inaccessible ice. All the southern side was graven with the names of famous men, but the sun was continuously melting them. On the northern side, the names, better protected still remained. On the turrets appeared the minstrels and "gestiours," with Orpheus, Arion, and the great harpers, and behind them myriads of musicians, with horns, flutes, bag-pipes, and reeds, on which they played, and which filled the air; then all the charmers, magicians, and prophets. He enters, and in a high hall, plated with gold, embossed with pearls, on a throne of carbuncle, he sees a woman seated, a "noble quene," amidst an infinite number of heralds, whose embroidered cloaks bore the arms of the most famous knights in the world, and heard the sounds of instruments, and the celestial melody of Calliope and her sisters. From her throne to the gate was a row of pillars, on which stood the great historians and poets; Josephus on a pillar of lead and iron; Statius on a pillar of iron stained with tiger's blood; Ovid, "Venus' clerk," on a pillar of copper; then, on one higher than the rest, Homer and Livy, Dares the Phrygian, Guido Colonna, Geoffrey of Monmouth, and the other historians of the war of Troy. Must I go on copying this phantasmagoria, in which confused erudition mars picturesque invention, and frequent banter shows sign that the vision is only a planned amusement? The poet and his reader have imagined for half-an-hour decorated The House of Fame. can Amid this exuberancy of mind, ani these refined cravings, and this insati ate exaltation of imagination and the senses, there was one passion, that of love, which, combining all, was developed in excess, and displayed in miniature the sickly charm, the fundamen tal and fatal exaggeration, which are the characteristics of the age, and which, later, the Spanish civilization exhibits both in its flower and its decay. Long ago, the courts of love in Provence had established the theory. "Each one who loves," they said, "grows pale at the sight of her whom he loves; each action of the lover ends in the thought of her whom he loves. Love refuse nothing to love."* This search after excessive sensation had ended in the ecstasies and transports of Guido Cavalcanti, and of Dante; and in Languedoc a company of enthusiasts had established themselves, love-penitents, who, in order to prove the violence of their passion, dressed in summer in furs and heavy garments, and in winter in light gauze, and walked thus about the country, so that several of them fell ill and died. Chaucer, in their wake, explained in his verses the craft of love,† the ten commandments, the twenty statutes of love; and praised his lady, his "daieseye," his " Margarite,' his "vermeil rose;" depicted love in ballads, visions, allegories, didactic poems, in a hundred guises. This is chivalrous, lofty love, as it was conceived in the middle age; above all, tender love. Troilus loves Cressida like a troubadour; without Pandarus, her uncle, he would have languished, and ended by dying in silence. He will not reveal the name of her he loves Pandarus has to tear it from him, per. form all the bold actions himself, plan every kind of stratagem. Troilus, how. ever brave and strong in battle, can but weep before Cressida, ask her pardon, and faint. Cressida, on her side, has every delicate feeling. When Pandarus brings her Troilus' first letter, she begins by refusing it, and is ashamed to open it she opens only because she is told the poor knight is about to die. At the first words "all rosy hewed tho woxe she;" and though the letter is respectful, she will not answer it. She yields at last t› the importunities of her uncle, and answers Troilus that she will feel for him the affection of a sister. As to Troilus, he trembles all over, grows pale when he sees the messenger return, doubts his happiness, and will not believe the assurance which is given him: "But right so as these holtes and these hayis That han in winter dead ben and dry, Revesten hem in grene, whan that May is.. Right in that selfe wise, sooth for to sey, Woxe suddainly his herte full of joy." Slowly, after many troubles, and thanks to the efforts of Pandarus, he obtains her confession; and in this confession what a delightful charm! "And as the newe abashed nightingale, That stinteth first, whan she beginneth sing, He, as soon as he perceived a hope from afar, "In chaunged voice, right for his very drede, Which voice eke quoke, and thereto his manere, Goodly abasht, and now his hewes rede, Lo, the alderfirst word that him astart Was twice: 'Mercy, mercy, O my sweet herte!" + This ardent love breaks out in impassioned accents, in bursts of happiness. Far from being regarded as a fault, it is the source of all virtue. Troilus becomes braver, more genero is, more upright, through it; his speech runs now on love and virtue; he scorns all villany; he honors those who possess merit, succors those who are in dis'tress; and Cressida, delighted, repeats * Troilus and Cressida, vol. v. bk. 3, p. 12. Ibid. p. 40. Ibid. p. 4. all day, with exceeding liveliness, this song, which is like the warbling of a nightingale : "Whom should I thanken but you, god of love, But I with all mine Lerte and all my might, As I have saied, wel love unto my last, My owne dere harte,and all mine owne knight In whiche mine her growen is so fast, And his in me, that it shall ever last.” * But misfortune comes. Her father Calchas demands her back, and the Trojans decide that they will give her up in exchange for prisoners. At this news she swoons, and Troilus is about to slay himself. Their love at this time seems imperishable; it sports with death, because it constitutes the whole of life. Beyond that better and delicious life which it created, it seeme there can be no other : "But as God would, of swough she abraide, And asked him why had he it out draw. For which Creseide upon him gar behold At last thev are separated, with what Ibid. vol. iv. bk. 2, p. 292. ↑ Ibid. vol. v. bk. 4, P 97. That he ne sayd: O lovesome lady bright, mede, So very good and wholsome be the shoures, Under the which the grasse so fresh of hew He must forget himself in the vague elicity of the country, and, like Dante, lose himself in ideal light and allegory. The dreams of love, to continue true, anch not take too visible a form, nor uter into a too consecutive history; tney must float in a misty distance; the soul in which they hover can no longer think of the laws of existence; it in habits another world; it forgets itself in the ravishing emotion which troubles it, and sees its well-loved visions rise, mingle, come and go, as in summer we Troilus and Cressida, vol. v. bk. 5, p. 119 et passim. see the bees on a h 1l-slope flutter in a haze of light, and circle round and round the flowers. One morning,* a lady sings, at the dawn of day, I entered an oak-grove "With branches brode, laden with leves new, That sprongen out ayen the sunne-shene, Some very red, and some a glad lige grene. .t And I, that all this pleasaunt signt sie, And as I stood, and cast aside mine eie, And as I sat, the birds harkening thus, set with emerauds . . . as of great pearles round and orient, and diamonds fine and rubies red." And all had on their head "a rich fret of gold... full of stately riche stones set," with "a chapelet of branches fresh and grene some of laurer, some of woodbind, some of agnus castus ;" and at the same time came a train of valiant knights in splendid array, with "harneis" of red gold, shining in the sun, and noble steeds, with trappings "of cloth of gold, and furred with ermine." These of the Leaf, and they sate under a knights and ladies were the servants great oak, at the feet of their queen. ladies as resplendent as the first, but From the other side came a bevy of crowned with fresh flowers. These were the servants of the Flower. They alighted, and began to dance in the meadow. But heavy clouds appeared in the sky, and a storm broke out, They wished to shelter themselves un der the oak, but there was no more *The Flower and the Leaf,. p. 244, * 6-32. † Ibid. p. 245, 4. 33. room; they ensconced themselves as | triumphant notes oll and ring above they could in the hedges and among the leafy canopy; fancy breaks in unthe brushwood; the rain came down sought, and Chaucer hears them dis and spoiled their garlands, stained pute of Love. They sing alternatel their robes, and washed away their an antistrophic song, and the nightin ornaments; when the sun returned, gale weeps for vexation to hear the they went to ask succor from the queen cuckoo speak in depreciation of Love of the Leaf; she, being merciful, con- He is consoled, however, by the poet' soled them, repaired the injury of the voice, seeing that he also suffers with rain, and restored their original beauty. him: Then all disappears as in a dream. The lady was astonished, when suddenly a fair dame appeared and instructed her. She learned that the servants of the Leaf had lived like brave knights, and those of the Flower had loved idleness and pleasure. She promises to serve the Leaf, and came away. Is this an allegory? There is at least a lack of wit. There is no ingenious enigma; it is dominated by fancy, and the poet thinks only of displaying in quiet verse the fleeting and brilliant train which had amused his mind, and charmed his eyes. Chaucer himself, on the first of May, rises and goes out into the meadows. Love enters his heart with the balmy air; the landscape is transfigured, and the birds begin to speak: "There sate I downe among the faire flours, "For love and it hath doe me much wo 'And looke alway that thou be good and And I wol sing one of the songes new, To such exquisite delicacies love, as with Petrarch, had carried poetry; by refinement even, as with Petrarch, it is lost now and then in its wit, conceits, clinches But a marked characteristic at once separates it from Petrarch. If over-excited, it is also graceful, polished, full of archness, banter; fine sen sual gayety, somewhat gossipy, as the French always paint love. Chaucer follows his true masters, and is himself an elegant speaker, facile, ever ready to smile, loving choice pleasures, a disciple of the Roman de la Rose, and much less Italian than French.t The bent of French character makes of love not a passion, but a gay banquet, tastefully arranged, in which the service is elegant, the food exquisite, the silver brilliant, the two guests in full dress, in good humor, quick to anticipate and please each other, knowing how to keep up the gayety, and' when to part In Chaucer, without doubt, this othe altogether worldly vein runs side by side with the sentimental element. This confused harmony of vague noises Troilus is a weeping lover, Pandarus troubles the sense; a secret languoris a lively rascal, who volunteers for a enters the soul. The cuckoo throws singular service with arusing urgency, his monotonous voice like a mournful frank immorality, and carries it out and tender sigh between the white ash-carefully, gratuitously, thoroughly. Ir tree boles; the nightingale make his The proyned hem and made hem right gay, • The Cuckow and Nightingale, vi. p. 121, 67-85. Ibid. p. 126, Z. 230-241. Ii + Stendhal, On Love: the difference of Love taste and Love-passion. hese pretty attempts Chauce accompanies him as far as possible, and is not shocked. On the contrary, he makes fun out of it. At the critical moment, with transparent hypocrisy, he shelters himself behind his " au so writen And lovers not, although they hold her God yeve hem mischaunce, He clearly lacks severity, so rare in IV. ther." If you find the particulars free, There are other characteristics still crops up; obscene tales, practical jokes Ciceronian style of Boccaccio, but reon one's neighbor, not shrouded in the above all, active roguery, the trick of lated lightly by a man in good humor; † Chaucer displays it better than Rute laughing at your neighbor's expense beuf, and sometimes better than La Fontaine. He does not knock his : As wou d God, tho wretches tha. despise To teacnen hem, that they been in the vice The Court of Love, about 1353, et seq. See also the Testament of Love. men down; he pricks them as he pass- "Everich, for the wisdom that he can "His wallet lay beforne him in his lappe, It The mockery_here comes from the *Troilus and Cressida, vol. v. iii. pp. 44, 45. The story of the pear-tree (Merchant' Tale), and of the cradle (Reeve's Tale), for in stance, in the Canterbury Tales. + Canterbury Tales, prologue, p. 10, 2. 323. § 1bid. p. 12, l. 373. Ibid. p. 21,7 6,8% |