and subsisted by this idle trade, brought themselves | already given, the more the works approach in point and their occupation into still greater contempt and of antiquity to the period where the story is laid, the disregard. With them, the long recitations former- more are we likely to find those historical traditions ly made at the tables of the great, were gradually in something approaching to an authentic state. banished into more vulgar society. But those who wrote under the imaginary names of Rustician de Puise, Robert de Borron, and the like, usually seized upon the subject of some old minstrel; and recomposing the whole narrative after their own fashion, with additional characters and adventurers, totally obliterated in that operation any shades which remained of the first, and probable authentic tradition, which was the original source of the elaborate fiction. Amplification was especially employed by the prose romancers, who, having once got hold of a subject, seem never to have parted with it until their power of invention was completely exhausted. The Metrical Romances, in some instances, indeed, ran to great length, but were much exceeded in that particular by the folios which were written on the same or similar topics by their prose successors. Probably the latter judiciously reflected, that a book which addresses itselt only to the eyes, may be laid aside when it becomes tiresome to the reader; whereas it may not always have been so easy to stop the minstrel in the full career of his metrical declamation.

But though the form of those narratives underwent a change of fashion, the appetite for the fictions themselves continued as ardent as ever; and the Prose Romances which succeeded, and finally superseded those composed in verse, had a large and permanent share of popularity. This was, no doubt, in a great degree owing to the important invention of printing, which has so much contributed to alter the destinies of the world. The Metrical Romances, though in some instances sent to the press, were not very fit to be published in this form. The dull amplifications which passed well enough in the course of a half-heard recitation, became intolerable when subjected to the eye; and the public taste gradually growing more fastidious as the language became more copious, and the system of manners more complicated, graces of style and variety of sentiment were demanded instead of a naked and unadorned tale of wonders. The authors of the Prose Romance endeavoured, to the best of their skill, to satisfy this newly awakened and more refined taste. They used, indeed, the same sources of romantic history which had been resorted to by their metrical predecessors; and Arthur, Charlemagne, and all their chivalry, were as much celebrated in prose as ever they had been in poetic narrative. But the new candidates for public favour pretended to have recourse to sources of authentic information, to which their metrical predecessors had no access.. They refer almost always to Latin, and sometimes to Greek originals, which certainly had no existence; and there is little doubt that the venerable names of the alleged authors are invented, as well as the supposed originals from which they are said to have translated their narratives. The following account of the discovery of La tres elegante delicieux melliflue et tres plaisante Hustoire du tres noble Roy Perceforest, (printed at Paris in 1528 by Galliot du Pre,) may serve to show that modern authors were not the first who invented the popular mode of introducing their works to the world as the contents of a newlydiscovered manuscript. In the abridgment to which we are limited, we can give but a faint picture of the minuteness with which the author announces his pretended discovery, and which forms an admirable example of the lie with a circumstance. In the year 1286, Count William of Hainault had, it is averred, crossed the seas in order to be present at the nuptinls of Edward, and in the course of a tour through Britain, was hospitably entertained at an abbey si-inspired writings themselves, were likely to origi tuated on the banks of the Humber, and termed, it seems, Burtimer, because founded by a certain Burtimericus, a monarch of whom our annals are silent, but who had gained, in that place, a victory over the heathens of Germany. Here a cabinet, which was enclosed in a private recess, had been lately discovered within the massive walls of an ancient tower, and was found to contain a Grecian manuscript, along with a royal crown. The abbot had sent the latter to King Edward, and the Count of Hainault with difficulty obtained possession of the manuscript. He had it rendered from Greek into Latin by a monk of the abbey of Saint Landelain, and from that language it is said to have been translated into French by the author, who gives it to the world in honour of the Blessed Virgin, and for the edification of nobleness and chivalry.

By such details, the authors of the Prose Romances endeavoured to obtain for their works a credit for authenticity which had been denied to the rhythmical legends. But in this particular they did great injustice to their contemned predecessors, whose reputations they murdered in order to rob them with impunity. Whatever fragments or shadowings of true history may yet remain hidden under the mass of accumulated fable, which had been heaped on them during successive ages, must undoubtedly be sought in the Metrical Romances; and according to the view of the subject which we have

Who, then, the reader may be disposed to inquire, can have been the real authors of those prolix works, who, shrouding themselves under borrowed names, derived no renown from their labours, if successful, and who. certainly, in the infant state of the press, were not rewarded with any emolument? This question cannot, perhaps, be very satisfactorily answered; but we may reasonably sus pect that the long hours of leisure which the cloister permitted to its votaries, were often passed away in this manner; and the conjecture is rendered more probable, when it is observed that matters are introduced into those works which have an especial connexion with sacred history, and with the traditions of the church. Thus, in the curious Romance of Huon de Bourdeaux, a sort of second part is added to that delightful history, in which the hero visits the terrestrial paradise, encounters the first murderer Cain, in the performance of his penance, with more matter to the same purpose, not likely to occur to the imagination of a layman; besides that the laity of the period were, in general, too busy and too ignorant to engage in literary tasks of any kind. The mystical portion of the Romance of the Round Table seems derived from the same source. It may also be mentioned, that the audacious and sometimes blasphemous assertions, which claimed for these fictions the credit due even to the

nate amongst Roman Catholic churchmen, who were but too familiar with such forgeries for the purpose of authenticating the legends of their su perstition. One almost incredible instance of this impious species of imposture occurs in the history of the Saint Graal, which curious mixture of mys ticism and chivalry is ascribed by the unfearing and unblushing writer to the Second Person of the Trinity.

Churchmen, however, were by no means the only authors of these legends, although the Sires Cleres, as they were sometimes termed, who were accounted the chronicles of the times in which they lived, were usually in orders; and although it appears that it was upon them that the commands of the sove reigns whom they served often imposed the task of producing new Romances, under the usual disguise of ancient chronicles translated from the learned languages, or otherwise collected from the ruins of antiquity. As education became improved, and knowledge began to be more generally diffused, individuals among the laity, and those of no mean rank, began to feel the necessity, as it may be called, of putting into a permanent form the thick-coming fancies" which gleam along the imagination of men of genius. Sir Thomas Malony, who compiled the Morte d'Arthur from the French originals, was a person of honour and worship; and Lord Berners, the excellent translator of Froissart, and author of

a Romance called The Chevalier de la Cygne, is an illustrious example that a nobleman of high estimation did not think his time misemployed on this species of composition. Some literary fame must therefore have attended these efforts; and perhaps less eminent authors might, in the later ages, receive some pecuniary adyantages. The translator of Perceforest, formerly mentioned, who appears to have been an Englishman or Fleming, in his address to the warlike and invincible nobility of France, holds the language of a professional author, who expected some advantage besides that of pleasing those whom he addressed; and who expresses proportional gratitude for the favourable reception of his former feeble attempts to please them. It is possible, therefore, that the publishers, these lions of literature, had begun already to admit the authors into some share of their earnings. Other printers, like the venerable Caxton, compiled themselves, or translated from other languages, the Romances which they sent to the press; thus uniting in their own persons the three separate departments of author, printer, and publisher.

manners and habits of Chivalry continued to animate them. Even the sagacious Catharine of Medicis considered the Romance of Perceforest as the work best qualified to form the manners and amuse the leisure of a young prince; since she impressed on Charles IX, the necessity of studying it with attention. But by degrees the progress of new opinions in religion, the promulgation of a stricter code of morality, together with the important and animating discussions which began to be carried on by means of the press, diverted the public attention from these antiquated legends. The Protestants of England, and the Huguenots of France, were rigorous in their censure of books of chivalry, in proportion as they had been patronised formerly under the Catholic system; perhaps because they helped to arrest men's thoughts from inore serious subjects of occupation. The learned Aschain thus inveighs against the Romance of Morte d' Arthur, and at the same time acquaints us with its having passed out of fashion: "In our forefathers' tyme, when Papistrie, as a standyng poole, covered and overflowed all Englande, fewe bookes were read in our tongue, savying certaine bookes of chevalrie, as they said for pastime and pleasure; which, as some say, were made in monasteries by idle monks, or wanton chanons. As for example, La Morte d'Arthur, the whole pleasure of which booke standeth in two speciall poyntes, in open manslaughter, and bold bawdrye: in which booke they are counted the noblest knightes that do kill most men without any quarrell, and commit fowlest adulteries by sutlest shiites; as Sir Launcelote, with the wife of King Arthur his master; Sir Tristram, with the wife of King Marke his uncle; Sir Lamerocke, with the wife of King Lote, that was his own aunt. This is goode stuffe for wise men to laughe at, or honest men to take pleasure at; yet I know, when God's Bible was banished the court, and La Morte d'Arthur received into the prince's chamber."*

The Prose Romance did not, in the general conduct of the story, where digressions are heaped on digressions, without the least respect to the principal narrative, greatly differ from that of their nietrical predecessors, being, to the full, as tedious and inartificial; nay, more so, in proportion as the new Romances were longer than the old. In the transference from verse to prose, and the amplification which the scenes underwent in the process, many strong, forcible, and energetic touches of the original author have been weakened, or altogether lost; and the reader misses with regret some of the redeeming bursts of rude poetry which, in the Metrical Romance, make amends for many hundred lines of bald and rude versification. But, on the other hand, the Prose Romances were written for a more advanced stage of society, and by authors whose language was much more copious, and who certainly The brave and religious La Noue is not more fabelonged to a more educated class than the ancient vourable to the perusal of Romances than the learnminstrels. Men were no longer satisfied with hear- ed Ascham; attributing to the public taste for these ing of hard battles and direful wounds; they de- compositions the decay of morality among the French manded, at the hand of those who professed to en- nobility. "The ancient fables whose relikes doe yet tertain them, some insight into nature, or at least remaine, namely Lancelot of the Lake, Pierceforest, into manners; some description of external scene Tristran, Giron the Courteous, and such others, ry, and a greater regard to probability both in respect doe beare witnesse of this olde vanitie; herewith of the characters which are introduced, and the were men fed for the space of 500 yeeres, untill our events which are narrated. These new demands language growing more polished, and our mindes the Prose Romancers endeavoured to supply to the more ticklish, they were driven to invent some noubest of their power. There was some attention elties wherewith to delight us. Thus came ye bookes shown to relieve their story, by the introduction of of Amadis into light among us in this last age. But to new characters, and to illustrate these personages say ye truth, Spaine bred the, and France new clothby characteristic dialogue. The lovers conversed ed the in gay garments. In y daies of Henric the Sewith each other in the terms of metaphysical gal-cond did they beare chiefest sway, and I think if any lantry, which were used in real life; and, from being a mere rhapsody of warlike feats, the Romance began to assume the nobler and more artificial form of a picture of manners. It is in the prose folios of Lancelot du Lac, Perceforest, and others, that antiquarians find recorded the most exact accounts of fights, tournaments, feasts, and other magnificent displays of chivalric splendour; and as they descend into more minute description than the historians of the time thought worthy of their pains, they are a mine from which the painful student may extract much valuable information This, however, is not the full extent of their inerit. These ancient books, amid many pages of dull repetition and uninteresting dialect, and notwithstanding the languor of an inartificial, protracted, and confused story, exhibit from time to time passages of deep interest, and situations of much novelty, as well as specimens of spirited and masculine writing. The general reader, who dreads the labour of winnowing out these valuable passages from the steril chaff through which they are scattered, will receive an excellent idea of the beauties and defects of the Romance from Tressan's Corps & Extraits de Romans de Chevalrie, from Mr. Ellis's Specimens of Early English Romances, and from Mr. Dunlop's History of Fiction. These works continued to furnish the amusement of the most polished courts in Europe so long as the

man would then have reproved the, he should have bene spit at, because they were of themselves playfellowes and maintainers to a great sort of persons; whereof some, after they had learned to amize in speech, their teeth watered, so desirous were they even to taste of some small morsels of the delicacies therein most livelie and naturally represented."+ The gallant Marechal proceeds at considerable length to refute the arguments of those who contended, that these books were intended as a spur to the practice of arms and honourable exercises amongst youth, and labours hard to show that they teach dishonest practices both in love and in arms. It is impossible to suppress a smile when we find such an author as La Noue denouncing the introduction of spells, witchcrafts, and enchantments, into these volumes, not because such themes are absurd and nonsensical, but because the representing such beneficent enchanters as Alquife and Urganda, is, in fact, a vindication of those who traffic with the powers of darkness; and because those who love to read about sorceries and enchantments become, by degrees, familiarized with those devilish mysteries, and may at length be induced to have recourse to them in good earnest.

* Works of Roger Ascham, p. 254. Fourth edition. The Politicke and Militaire Discourses of the Lord Do La Nowe, pp. 87, 88. Quarto, Lond. 1587.

phe, which destroys the whole ring of chivalry whose feats they had commemorated. The ruin which Roncesvalles brought to the Paladins of Charlemagne, and the fatal battle of Camlan to the Knights of the Round Table, fell upon the warriors of Diderick through the revengeful treachery of Crimhilda, the wife of Ezzel; who, in revenge for the death of her first husband, and in her inordinate desire to possess the treasures of the Niflunga or Burgundians, brought destruction on all those celebrated champions. Mr. Weber observes, that these German fictions differ from the Romances of French Chivalry, in the greater ferocity and less refinement of sentiment ascribed to the heroes; and also in their employing to a great extent the machinery of the Duergar, or Dwarfs, a subterranean people to whom the Helden-Buch ascribes much strength and subtlety, as well as profound skill in the magic art; and who seem, to a certain extent, the predecessors of the European fairy. The same excellent authority affords us another curious Romance of German origin, entitled Duke Ernest of Bavaria, which appears deeply tinged with Oriental learning and imagination. The hero, at no greater distance than the Isle of Crete, has the good fortune, such at least he must have esteemed it, in his capacity of a knight-errant, to meet with a people having necks and heads like storks. He is in danger of being shipwrecked in a mountain of adamant-is carried away by a roc, and meets with sundry other adventures, which remind us of those of the celebrated Sinbad.

Italy, so long the seat of classical learning, and where that learning was first revived, seems never to have strongly embraced the taste for the Gothic Romance. They received, indeed, the forms and institutions of chivalry; but the Italians seem to have been in a considerable degree, strangers to its spirit, and not to have become deeply enamoured of its literature. There is an old Romance of Chivalry proper to Italy, called Guerino the Wretched, but we doubt if even this be of indigenous growth. Indeed, when they did adopt from the French the fashionable tales of Charlemagne and his Paladins, they did not attract the attention of the classical Italians, until Boyardo, Berni, Pulci, and, above all, the divine Ariosto, condescended to use them as the basis of their well-known romantic poems; and thus the fictitious narratives originally composed in metre, and after re-written in prose, were anew decorated with the honours of verse. The romantic poets of Italy did not even disdain to imitate the rambling, diffuse, and episodical style proper to the old Romance; and Ariosto, in particular, although he torments the reader's attention by digressing from one adventure to another, delights us, upon frequent perusals, by the extreme ingenuity with which he gathers up th broken ends of his narrative, and finally weaves them all handsomely together in the same piece. But the merits and faults of romantic poetry form themselves the fruitful subject of a long essay. We here only notice the origin of those celebrated works, as a species of composition arising out of the old Romance, though surpassing it in regularity, as well as in all the beauties of style and diction.

scribing the adventures of the Cid, should be supposed to have any affinity to that class of composition. The Peninsula, however, though late in adopting the prevailing taste for romantic fiction, gave origin to one particular class, which was at least as popular as any which had preceded it. Ama dis de Gaul, the production, it would seem, of Vasco de Lobeira, a Portuguese knight, who lived in the fourteenth century, gave a new turn to the tales of chivalry; and threw into the shade the French Prose Romances, which, until the appearance of this distinguished work, had been the most popular in Europe.

The author of Amadis, in order, perhaps, to facilitate the other changes which he introduced, and to avoid rushing against preconceived ideas of events or character, laid aside the worn out features of Arthur and Charlemagne, and imagined to himself a new dynasty both of sovereigns and of herces, to whom he ascribed a style of manners much more refined, and sentiments much more artificial, than had occurred to the authors of Perceval or Perceforest. Lobeira had also taste enough to perceive, that some unity of design would be a great improvement on the old romance, where one adventure is strung to another with little connexion from the beginning to the end of the volume; which thus concluded, not because the plot was winded up, but because the author's invention, or the printer's patience, was exhausted. In the work of the Portuguese author, on the contrary, he proposes a certain end, to advance or retard which all the incidents of the work have direct reference. This is the marriage of Amadis with Oriana, against which a thou sand difficulties are raised by rivals, giants, sorcerers, and all the race of evil powers unfavourable to chivalry; whilst these obstacles are removed by the valour of the hero, and constancy of the heroine, succoured on their part by those friendly sages, and blameless sorceresses, whose intervention gave so much alarm to the tender conscienced De la Noue. Lobeira also displayed considerable attention to the pleasure which arises from the contrast of character; and to relieve that of Amadis, who is the very essence of chivalrous constancy, he has introduced Don Galaor, his brother, a gay libertine in love, whose adventures form a contrast with those of his more serious relative. Above all, the Amadis displays an attention to the style and conversation of the piece, which, although its effects are now exaggerated and ridiculous, was doubtless at the time considered as the pitch of elegance; and here were, for the first time, introduced those hyperbolical compliments, and that inflated and complicated structure of language, the sense of which walks as in a masquerade.

The Amadis at first consisted only of four books, and in that limited shape may be considered as a very well conducted story; but additions were speedily made, which extended the number to twentyfour; containing the history of Amadis subsequent to his obtaining possession of Oriana, and down to his death, as also of his numerous descendants. The theme was not yet exhausted; for, as the ancient romancers, when they commenced a new With Spain the idea of Romance was particularly work, chose for their hero some newly invented Paconnected; and the associations which are formed ladin of Charlemagne, or knight of King Arthur. so upon perusing the immortal work of Cervantes, in- did their successors adopt a new descendant of the duce us for a long time to believe that the country family of Amadis, whose genealogy was thus mulof Don Quixote must be the very cradle of roman- tiplied to a prodigious degree. For an account of tic fiction. Yet, if we speak of priority of date, Esplandian, Florimond of Greece, Palmerin of Spain was among the last nations in Europe with England, and the other Romancers of this class, whom Romance became popular. It was not in- the reader must be referred to the valuable labours deed possible that, among a people speaking so no- of Mr. Southey, who has abridged both Amadis and ble and poetical a language, engaged in constant Palmerin with the most accurate attention to the wars, which called forth at once their courage and style and manners of the original. The books of their genius, there should not exist many historical Amadis became so very popular as to supersede the and romantic ballads descriptive of their rencount- elder Romances almost entirely, even at the court ers with the Moors. But their native poets seem to of France, where, according to La Noue, already have been too much engaged with the events of quoted, they were introduced about the reign of their own age, or of that which had just preceded Henry II. It was against the extravagance of these them, to permit of their seeking subjects in the re- fictions, in character and in style, that the satire of gions of pure fiction; and we have not heard of a Cervantes was chiefly directed; and almost all the Spanish Metrical Romance, unless the poems dc-library of Don Quixote belongs to this class of Ro