Chapter III: Part 3

But old charters are not to be found every day, even if monasteries—which is greatly to be wished—were every day demolished; and yet the daily bread is to be procured. Buonaparte is in the first dash of youthful power. Nothing escapes him; no amount of bushels can hide any candles which can light his way to empire. The laborious student, the groper among old documents, the retiring antiquary is discovered, and is installed Professor of History at the Military School. No man in France knew more of history than Amans Alexis Monteil; but it was the history of the citizen, not of the soldier. He knew what was the position of the grocer, of the shoe-black, of the petty tradesman, since grocers and shoe-blacks and petty tradesmen were created. He dwelt on the family circle gathered round the cottage-fire in the year 1450. He could tell of every article of furniture in the castle of the noble, and also all the circumstances of the carpenters who made them. He knew the habits of the scholars of Amboise or of Paris in the days of Joan of Arc; but the wars of Frederick of Prussia, the wars of Charles the Twelfth of Sweden! he hated wars; he was the biographer of the people, and did not concern himself much about the great ones of the earth. So his pupils were rather inattentive; they did not care much for the simple annals of workmen and labourers who had been dead four hundred years; and, besides, they were listening for the guns which were thundering all over the world. How could they hear a dissertation on the quarrels of the Benedictines and the Cordeliers, when they were in momentary expectation of a bulletin from the Army of Italy? How could they listen to a description of the agricultural labourers of Provence on the day after the news of Marengo? They went off and were killed, or rose to be generals, governors, marshals. And Alexis plodded on. He gathered materials in all directions for the great work that was never absent from his thoughts—pondered—inquired—compared, and finally completed the most marvellous reproduction of the past which any country possesses. It is, in fact, a minute detail of the humble ranks in France, the inhabitants of obscure towns and farms and hamlets. What Monfaucon is to the nobility, with his fourteen folio volumes of emblazoned arms, and vivid representation of the life in hall and palace, the glitter of the tilt-yard, the mustering of knights and squires for battle, the gentle Alexis is for the peasant, for the roturier, the bourgeois, and the serf. He erects his tent in the market, in front of the monastery, at the great gate of the chateau, or in the fair, where he is surrounded by mountebanks and ballad-singers and jugglers, and writes down exactly what he sees. He sees a leper sitting at the gate, veiled and guarded. He meets a funeral—he meets a wedding; he accompanies the corpse to the church, and the bride to her chamber. He omits nothing; and he supports every statement by the most amazing array of documents. There are writings and inscriptions, and medals of brass, and carved pieces of stone, and fragments of chests of drawers, all giving confirmation strong to whatever fact he states. And this minute supervision he extends over four centuries. The tradesman is followed from the time of the domination of the English to the time of the domination of Louis the Fourteenth. The noble is seen, over all that lapse of time, governing, quarrelling, trampling, oppressing; and you soon see that the Revolution of 1789 was a great revenge for centuries of wrong; that the guillotine of 1793 was built out of timber planted by feudal barons, when Francis the First was king; and you wonder no longer at the inhuman ferocity of a peasantry and a middle class, equally despised and equally hated by the spurred and feathered oligarchy who ground them to the dust, and insulted them in their dearest relations. Happily for us, feudalism died a natural death, or was put an end to like a gentleman in fair fight at Naseby and elsewhere, or scientifically bled into its grave by acts of Parliament, or John Bull would have torn it in pieces like a tiger; for the _History of the French of Various Conditions_ would apply equally well during the first century of the record (the fourteenth) to our English trades. But in the sixteenth the divergence is complete. Nobles in England are tyrants no more, nor the lower classes slaves. When Leicester was entertaining Elizabeth at Kenilworth, an Englishman’s house was his castle. When Sully was raising adherents for Henry the Fourth, the French peasant had no property and no rights. Leicester would have been tried for robbery if he had taken forcible possession of John Smith’s ox or cow. Sully would have passed scot-free if he had burned Jacques Bonhomme’s cottage about his ears, and tossed that starveling individual into the flames on the point of his lance. There is such an impression of truth and reality about these revelations of Monteil, that we never have a doubt on the smallest incident of his details. If for a moment we pause in our perusal, and say, “Can this possibly be correct? Can such things be?” What is the use of farther hesitation? You turn to the note at the end of the volume. You find voucher after voucher, from all manner of people—priests, lawyers, and judges. You might as well doubt your own marriage, with the certificate of that stupendous fact before your eyes, signed by parson and clerk, two bridesmaids, and the Best Man. It is better to read on with unhesitating belief. You will only get into a cloud of witnesses which will throw you positively into the dark ages, as if you had been a spectator of the scene. And the author all this time—is he a mere machine—a mill for the grinding of old facts into new and contemporary pieces of knowledge, as an old bronze statue may be coined into current money? Alexis is married; Alexis has a child—such a wife and such a child no man was ever blessed with before. His father, our deceased acquaintance, the former aristocrat of Rhodez, Monsieur Jean Monteil, married his student son, shortly after the tempest burst out upon the throne and nobility of France, to a charming creature, young, innocent, and an heiress, daughter of a gentleman who, long before this, had retired to enjoy his fortune with dignity—a Monsieur Rivié, a little man, but strong—strong as a blacksmith. And this was lucky, for he was a blacksmith by trade. Not a common blacksmith, be it understood, but so clever, so sharp, so knowing, and withal such a dreadfully hard hitter, that he was a very uncommon blacksmith indeed. Little Rivié was the name he was known by all over the part of the country where his anvil rung. But little Rivié rose to be great Rivié before long. He shod horses for great men; he shod a war-horse for the Prince of Conti; he shod a charger for Marshal Saxe; he shod a lame horse so skilfully for a certain colonel that the colonel got him the contract for supplying the regiment with its remounts. He bought lame horses, of course, cured them, and sent them capering and caracolling to the barracks. It was the best-horsed regiment at Dettingen, and ran away at the first fire. So the smith grew rich, and married, and retired, as was said above, to show his well-earned wealth and his delightful family to his admiring townsfolk. As he rattled through the street, he became so inflated with pride and happiness that the axle of his carriage broke, and he was forced to alight. Luckily the accident happened just opposite a smithy. The mulciber was an old fellow-apprentice, but could not recognise his ancient comrade in the person of the great seignor who had crushed his axle-tree by the mere weight of his importance. He also could not mend the fracture. In a moment the noble stranger pulled off his embroidered coat, tucked up his fine-linen sleeves, seized the sledge, and, O heavens! wasn’t there a din?—a hail of blows?—a storm of sparkles?—a rat-a-tat on the end, on the side, on the middle, and still the twelve-pound hammer went on. “By St Eloi!” said the owner of the instrument, “you are either the d—l himself or little Rivié.” And little Rivié it was. And little Rivié he continued to the end, for all his grandeur disappeared. That dreadful Revolution meets us at every turn. It broke the axle-tree of Monsieur Rivié’s carriage, beyond the power of Vulcan himself to mend—it took off his embroidered coat, which nobody could ever restore—it tucked up his fine-linen shirt-sleeves, and nothing could ever bring them down again. In the days of his prosperity he had given his eldest daughter (and a dowry) to the Marquis de Lusignan—a nobleman who advanced claims to the island of Cyprus and the kingdom of Jerusalem, but was delighted to accept a few thousand francs as “tocher” with the daughter of a contractor. He borrowed a few thousands more on the income of the baronial estates of the Lusignans, besides a collateral security on the revenues of the Holy City when it was restored to its legitimate king. This mortgage was settled as the marriage fortune of the younger daughter, the sweet and excellent Annette. But the barony of Lusignan followed the example of Cyprus and Jerusalem, and vanished into thin air at a twist of the necromantic wand of Danton and Robespierre. Little Rivié was too old to resume the hammer. He retired, with his sons and daughters, to a small farm in the neighbourhood of Rhodez; and the ex-beadle and the ex-blacksmith arranged a marriage between the historian of the trades and the sister of the Queen of Cyprus. Her majesty had died, and her royal lord was flourishing a pair of scissors, and occasionally a razor, in the Burlington Arcade. Did the gentle Annette repine at her change of fortune? Did she mourn over the days of her father’s grandeur, and despise the queer, learned, modest, loving being she had enriched with her first affection? Ah! never for an hour. They sometimes had a dinner, sometimes not; but always mutual trust, always perfect love. Occasionally, when fortune smiled more than usual, Alexis would address a letter to her as “Her Royal Highness the Princess of Lusignan, in her patrimonial Realm of Cyprus;” but this was only when a manuscript had put them in funds. At other times they were sad enough. With the amount of their united fortunes they had bought a small cottage and garden near Fontainebleau. Here he resided, walking every day six miles to his class and six miles back. Annette regularly met him, on his return, a mile or two from home, and arm-inarm they re-entered their own domain. But the class disappeared, the chair of history was suppressed, and the house was offered for sale. A purchaser appeared, and Alexis, in the interest of some future antiquarian of two thousand three hundred and nine, preserved the “Agreement to buy.” It was between “Dame Monteil and his majesty Napoleon the Great, Emperor of the French, King of Italy, and Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine.” It is a pity that the sum agreed on was not so magnificent as the titles of the buyer. It was only two hundred pounds—“a small price,” says Alexis, with a sigh, “out of the contributions of all Europe.” They now removed into a garret in a suburb of Paris, and day by day the husband put on his hat and traversed the great dark streets in search of something to do, but got no comfort from the interminable lines of narrow-windowed houses; for not a door was opened, not an offer was made, and, weary and disheartened, he found his way back to his attic, to the suffering smile of Annette, and the playful caresses of his boy. His Alexis was now two years old, and with these two the heart of the simple student was completely filled. There never had been such a child before, except among the cherubs of Murillo. He would make him such a scholar! such a Christian! such a man!—but in the mean time their two hundred pounds (diminished by the expenses of the sale) were rapidly disappearing. The time of the green leaves was coming on. They heard birds whistling in the dusty trees on the road before their windows—they thought of the chestnuts, and limes, and hedgerows of Rouergue. “Come,” said Alexis, “Paris has no need of such a useless fellow as I am. Let us go home.” Annette packed up her small possessions, took the young Alexis in her arms, and away they go in the first sunny days of the month of May. Away they go on foot, Alexis generally bestriding his father’s shoulders as if he felt Bucephalus beneath him, and through the smiling plains: through Nemours, Montargis, Cosne, Pouilly, lies their course, and Paris gradually is forgotten. They walked at a good pace, for they liked to have an hour or two to spare when they came to a shady place and a spring. Then they undid the knapsack, and bread soaked in the fountain became ambrosia, and they did not envy the gods. Through Moulins, Clermont, Issoire, on they go, talking, arranging, hoping. And at last they see the chestnut trees, the limes, the hedgerows—they are in the paradise of their youth: they know the names of every field—they are beloved by all that see them—and they live on sixty francs (two pounds eight and fourpence) a-month. The vegetables are delightful, the milk plentiful, the loaf abundant, and they never think of meat. Amans Alexis writes—writes—writes. Annette sits beside him, and listens with entranced ears as he reads to her, chapter by chapter, the history of her countrymen who lived, and worked, and hungered so long ago. His great book is now begun, and his life is happy. Scraps of paper with perfectly illegible lines furnish him with a hint, which he works up into a statement. The statement grows a story, the story grows a picture, and we become as familiarly acquainted with Friar John, Cordelier of Tours, and Friar Andrew, Cordelier of Thoulouse, as with any of our friends. And such a correspondent as Friar John of Tours has seldom been met with since he started on his memorable journey to Paris in the year 1340. Then all the personages introduced are as real as a lord mayor. Where Alexis got his knowledge of character, his sly observation, his exquisite touches of humour, is a puzzle to those who know his story. But it was not in Stratford that Shakespeare got his knowledge of the tortures of a successful usurper like Macbeth; nor in London that he repeated at second hand the wit of Benedict or Mercutio. Alexis found the grave dignity of the Sire de Montbason, the ill-repressed ardour of the soldier-monk Friar William, and the noble lessons in chivalry given by the Commander of Rhodes, in the same wonderful reservoir of unacted experience in which Shakespeare found the jealousy of the Moor and the philosophic wanderings of Hamlet. The family group in the Castle of Montbason is worthy of Sterne, and the warrior-colouring of Scott.

The book grows—it takes shape—visions of wealth and honour look out in every page; and again to Paris must they go. They go—and the same wretched life comes upon them again. They are again in a garret. Again Alexis walks through desolate streets; again his misery is cheered by his wife and the prattle of his son: but he does not see a hectic colour on Annette’s cheek, or hear a cough which shakes her frame. She never mentions how weak she is growing—till at last concealment is impossible. She languishes in the town air, and pants once more for the fields and gardens. She sees, when lying on her sleepless bed, the whole district rise before her as if she were there. She sees the church—the farm—the cottage where they were so happy. Nothing will keep her in Paris; she must die in her native village. Alexis is broken-hearted. It is impossible for them all to travel so far; the journey by coach is too expensive, on foot too far; but Annette must be gratified in all. It seems a small favour to give to so good a wife—the choice of a place to die in.

“There are three spots,” says Alexis, “which I never pass without thinking of Annette—the Rue de Seine, at the corner of the Rue de Tournon. It was there that she all of a sudden began to limp, attacked by rheumatism. ‘Ah!’ she cried, ‘’tis the last of my happy walks.’ Another time, on the Pont Royal, a band of music passed, followed by the Imperial Guards. Annette said to me, ‘I scarcely see them; there is a cloud before my eyes.’ Alas, alas! my last recollection of her is at the coach-office, where I saw her take her departure. ‘Adieu, adieu!’ she said to me over and over with her sweet voice—and I was never to see her again!” Alexis took no warning from the limping in the Rue de Seine, or the blindness on the Pont Royal. She stayed with him, cheering him, soothing him, sustaining him to the last; and then, when she could only be a burden and a care to him, she unfolded her wings like a dove, and flew away and was at rest.

Alexis was very desolate now, but he laboured on; he lavished on his son all the affection that formerly was spread over two. He educated him himself—made him the sharer of his studies, the partner of his pursuits. Brought up in such poverty, and accustomed only to his parents, he never was a child. At thirteen he was grave, thoughtful, laborious, and had the feelings of a man of middle age. The government did not altogether pass over the claims to compensation for the suppression of the Historic Chair which Alexis now advanced. He was made a sub-librarian at the school of St Cyr, and ate his bread in faith; and he published his volume, but got nothing for all his toil. It was in a style so new, and on a subject so generally neglected, that it had a small circulation, though highly esteemed by all who had the power to appreciate the skill of the workman and the value of the work. Still he toiled on, for he had his son to provide for; and the boy was now grown up—a fine stately young man, reminding Alexis of his mother by the sweetness of his temper and the beauty of his features. There were other points of resemblance which he did not perceive. The youth was his father’s only companion, the father was the youth’s only friend; and great was the pride of Alexis when he was told that his comrade was in love, was loved, and was soon about to marry. A bright prospect for poor old Monteil! who saw a renewal of his own youth, and the tenderness of Annette, in the happiness of his son and the attentions of his daughter-in-law. The son was admitted as clerk of the historical archives of France, and his salary was enough for his wants. The audience, fit, though few, which approved of the father’s volumes, encouraged him to proceed. There was at last a prospect of a brilliant fame and a comfortable income. They could buy a small house at Fontainebleau; they would all live together: when children came, there would be new editions of the Fourteenth Century, to be a portion for the girl; the Fifteenth Century should educate the boy; the Sixteenth should go into a fund for saving; and the other centuries could surely be a provision for the author’s old age. Could anything be more delightful or more true? But young Monteil grew weak, no one knew why. He walked home in the rain one evening, and dried himself at the stove: he shivered as he stood before it, and then went to bed—and then was in a fever—and in three days he died!

“I lost him,” says Alexis, “on the 21st September 1833, at eleven o’clock at night. I closed his eyes. Oh, misery! Oh, my child!—my second self! Hearest thou the cries and sobs of the wretched being who was once thy father? Dost thou recognise the voice of the poor old man whom thou so lovedst—who loved thee so? Thou leavest him alone upon the earth, and his hair is now white, and his arms empty!”

And his house was empty, and his purse, but not his cup of suffering. Away went all his dreams of buying the little villa at Fontainebleau, with its garden and paddock, its cow-shed and hen-roost. A vault was now to be purchased, and Monteil had not the necessary sum. But was his son, the hope of his old age, the tenderest and most affectionate of children, to be committed to the common grave, tossed in without a name, without a headstone, without a flower above his head? No! he would beg, he would pray—he would implore as a favour that a little spot of earth should be given him to be the resting-place of his boy till he joined him in the tomb—together the loving two, in death as in life. He wrote to the prefecture of the Seine with his simple request; but not a clerk in all that establishment had heard of his book. He got no answer. Still he did not despair. He left the corpse for an hour—he walked to the prefect—he saw him, he said to him, bare-headed, broken-voiced, “Monsieur, I am Monteil;” but a look at the dignitary’s face showed him that there was no response to the announcement. “Perhaps,” he said, “you never heard my name?” And it was too true. He turned away, staggered blindly down the stair, with his hand before his eyes. And he saw his son cast carelessly, disdainfully, into the vast ditch—into which the penniless are thrown.

Amans Alexis Monteil wrote at his great work no more. Fortune so far smiled on him that he succeeded to a sum of £300. With this he bought a cottage at Cely, a pretty village near Fontainebleau, and lived on hermit’s fare. He wandered and mused in the Bois de Boulogne; he sat on the stone seats of the gardens of the Luxembourg; but he saw no one at home, visited no one abroad. He had ventured all the happiness of his life on two frail barks, and both had foundered. Annette and Alexis, both had gone, and why should he labour more? The villagers saluted him as he passed, out of respect to age and sorrow, and he repaid them after his kind. He traced up their genealogies—discovered for them where their ancestors had come from, and finished by composing a veritable History of the hamlet where he lived. The historian of the commons of France became also historian of Cely, and more—he became its benefactor and friend. Just before his death, he founded recompenses for good conduct. He consented to the sale of a certain portion of his domain, and with the interest of the money so raised he ordered medals of honour—silver, with an inscription—to be given annually to the man who should drain a marshy piece of ground—to him who should plant the finest vine round his cottage—to the best labourer—to the village crone or washerwoman who should amuse her circle of listeners with the most entertaining (and innocent) stories—and to the shepherd who should show the kindest treatment of his flock, _remembering that all have the same Creator_. And thus mindful of his poorer neighbours, and just and benevolent to the end, Amans Alexis Monteil closed his honourable life. His work has been twice crowned by the Institute of France; it is in its fourth edition; it has been eulogised by Guizot—it will be the delight of many generations. But what cares Amans Alexis for favour that comes so late? Sufficient for him is the neglected turf grave in the churchyard of Cely, with the short inscription of his name and the record of his seventy-five years of pain. “Requiescat in pace.”

The _History of the French of Various Conditions_ extends over the five last centuries, and the plan of each century differs. The Fourteenth is painted in a series of letters, as we have said, from a certain Friar John, a Cordelier of Tours, to a brother of his rule residing at Toulouse. The character of the worthy letter-writer is charmingly sustained. Keen, cautious, observant, and yet with the simplicity natural to the inmate of a cloister, he gives a clear description to his friend of everything he sees, every conversation he hears, every place he visits. He enters the huts where poor men lie, and we learn the state of the labourer; he enters the dungeon, and reveals the secrets of the prison-house; he goes to the Fair of Montrichard, and we walk about among the booths. He gives the minutest details of the royal court—and, in short, manages to lift the reader completely back into the days of rich monasteries and private wars, and tournaments and duels. He has no antiquarian disquisitions or tiresome catalogues of furniture or dress; we rely on the faithfulness of the loquacious and gentlemanly Friar, and feel certain they are real letters written at the dates assigned. The fifteenth century is presented with the same marvellous freshness of detail, but without the individuality of the inimitable Friar John. It is a pity that excellent special correspondent did not turn out to be the Wandering Jew, and traverse all the centuries from first to last. We must suppose he died full of years and honours—let us hope, as head of some noble abbey—before the fifteenth century began. His place, however, is admirably supplied. We perceive a change taking place in the relations of the different classes of society, and the change is traceable in still stronger colours when, in the sixteenth century, we come to the impression produced by his visit to France on a clear-headed unprejudiced Spaniard. His glance is as penetrating, and his inquiries as minute, as those of Friar John and the other; but the same may be said of all the supposed observers. They are all mere secretaries of Monteil, and write the same pure idiomatic and characteristic style. The laughing eyes and scornful lips of the Cordelier of Tours, the Hermit of Cely, come out through all disguise; and the Spaniard of the sixteenth century, and “Memoirist” of the seventeenth, are only admirable continuers of the correspondence commenced between the priests. It will, therefore, be like mounting to the fountain-head if we go back to the fourteenth century, and read the account of Friar John’s visit to the great Castle of Montbason—a perfect representative of a feudal residence just before feudalism began to fall into decay. A dreadful event has happened in the chateau. While the Sire de Montbason is absent at the head of his vassals assisting the king, he left everything in charge of the grand huntsman. The grand huntsman, in pursuing a peasant who had offended him, knocks out his brains on the arch of a gateway, and is found dead on the road. The peasant, as if he had been guilty of murder, is immediately tied up to a gallows and hanged. During the preparations the wife and children of the wretched man stood at the foot of the wall crying “Mercy, mercy!” but the representatives of the grand huntsman are inexorable. The peasant swings off, and the cries of the widow and orphan ascend to Heaven for vengeance. The Curé of the parish hears of the transaction, and excommunicates the revengeful sons of the grand huntsman. The Sire de Montbason returns and compensates the peasant’s family, and founds a perpetual mass for the poor man’s soul. But nothing will do; noises are heard in the castle, furniture moves about, chains rattle; the house is haunted, and the spirits resist the exorcisms of the Curé, and kick up wilder confusion than ever. The Sire sends to the monastery of the Cordeliers at Tours, and Friar John is fixed upon by the prior. There could not have been a better choice. He goes and prays, and burns incense, and lights candles, and the supernatural noises are heard no more. He remains at the chateau an honoured guest, and the almoner even resigns to him the privilege of saying grace before and after meat. John is overwhelmed with the honour, but accepts the duty; and, we doubt not, was the pleasantest ghost-layer the Sire de Montbason had ever seen. His nineteenth letter to Friar Andrew is all about the house he is in:—

“Montbason is one of the finest chateaus in France. Fancy to yourself a superb position—a steep hill rugged with rocks, and indented with deep ravines and precipices. On the ascent is the castle. The little houses at its feet increase its apparent size. The Indre seems to retire respectfully from the walls, and forms a semicircle round its front. You should see it at sunrise, when its outside galleries glitter with the arms and accoutrements of the guard, and its towers are shining in the light. The gate, flanked with little towers, and surmounted by a lofty guard-house, is covered all over with heads of wolves and wild boars. Enter, and you have three enclosures, three ditches, three drawbridges to cross. You find yourself in the great quadrangle where the cisterns are placed, and on right and left the stables, the hen-roosts, the dovecots, the coach-houses. Underground are the cellars, the vaults, the prisons. Above are the living-rooms, and above them the magazines, the larders, the armoury. The roofs are surrounded with parapets and watch-towers. In the middle of the yard is the donjon, which contains the archives and the treasure. It has a deep ditch all round it, and cannot be approached except by a bridge, which is almost always raised. Though the walls, like those of the castle, are six feet thick, it has an external covering of solid hewn stone up to the half of its height.

“The castle has been lately repaired. There is something light and elegant about it which was wanting in the chateaus of old. You may well believe it is finished in the most modern style: great vaulted rooms with arched windows filled with painted glass; large halls paved in squares of different colours; handsome furniture of all kinds; solid stands with bas-reliefs, representing hell or purgatory; presses carved like church-windows; great caskets; immense leather trunks, mounted in iron; great red boxes; mirrors of glass, at least a foot in width, and some of metal of the same size; great sofas with arms, covered with tapestry and ornamented with fringes; benches with trellis-work backs; others, twenty feet long, with hanging covers, or stuffed cushions, embroidered with coats-of-arms. I must tell you, however, that the beds do not seem at all proportioned to the rank of the owner. They are not above ten or eleven feet wide; I have seen much larger in houses of less pretence. But as to the decoration of the apartments, nothing can be more sumptuous. There are show-rooms and chambers of state, which are named from the colour or subjects of the hangings with which they are covered. There are some where the great pillars that support the beams of the ceiling are ornamented with ribbons and flowers in tin. There are some where figures of life-size, painted on the walls, carry in their hands, or projecting from their mouths, scrolls on which texts are written, pleasant to read, and most excellent for the morals of the beholders.

“As to the mode of life, it is pleasant enough, except that we do not dine till nearly twelve o’clock, and never sup till after sunset—which appears to me a little too late. The day, in other respects, is agreeably varied. In the morning the courtyard is filled with squires, huntsmen, and pages, who make their horses go through their evolutions. Then they divide into parties, and defend and attack some staked-off piece of ground with amazing strength and activity, amid the applause of all the spectators. After dinner there is leaping at the bar, quoit-throwing, ninepins, and other games. In addition to all this we have the parrots and monkeys. We have also the old female jester of the late Sire de Montbason and the young fool of the present lord. He is so gay, and so full of tricks and nonsense, that in rainy days he is the life of the whole house.

“The almoner has charge of the evening’s entertainments. He has seen the world, and recounts agreeably; but, as he has never gone on pilgrimage, and has not lived either in convents or monasteries, he cannot give us above three stories in a night, for fear of repeating himself. But, fortunately, we have an ancient Commander of Rhodes, who has visited the Holy Land, and has travelled in the three parts of the world. He is an uncle of the Sire de Montbason. He relates his adventures delightfully. It is only a pity his bad health makes him go to bed so soon. Frequently, also, we have jugglers and vaulters; wandering musicians sometimes come, and we have concerts on the trumpet and flute and tambourine; harps and lutes, cymbals and rebecs. This very day we had a visit from a man who played on the viol, and never could get the strings in harmony. And no wonder; for it was found out that some of the chords were of the gut of a sheep, and others of the gut of a wolf. How could they agree? But he was paid as liberally as the rest.

“Life in these castles would be almost too happy if it were not mixed, like every other, with anxieties and alarms. Sometimes when we least expect it—in the middle of dinner or when we are sound asleep—the alarm-bell is rung. In a moment everything is astir—the bridges are raised—the portcullis falls, the gates are closed—everybody starts up from table or bed, and runs to the turrets, to the machicoulis, to the loopholes, to the barbicans. A few days ago I was witness to one of these “alertes,” and during the space of forty-eight hours nobody was allowed to close an eye but the almoner and me. Every one was kept to his post—but nothing came of it. It was a Vidame of the neighbourhood, who had thought that the Sire de Montbason was levying his retainers, and preparing to attack his chateau; and so, without sending letters of defiance, he had taken the field against us with three hundred men. There were parleyings and explanations on both sides, and everything was arranged. On this subject the Dowager-Lady of Montbason tells us that these private wars are not so frequent as they used to be. She remembers that, in the week of her marriage, there was such a fierce and long-continued attack upon the castle, that not a soul went to bed for eight days.”

This letter is dated the fifteenth day of February; and other experiences are recorded during almost every week of his five months’ residence in the chateau of Montbason. He describes the kitchens, the grates, the cooking apparatus, and all the feeding appliances required for the army which garrisons the castle. In a day or two he is summoned to visit a prisoner in the _souterrain_ or cave, to which he descends, like a pitcher into a well, suspended by a rope; and, by the light of the lantern he carries, he recognises the wretched captive on his handful of straw, with the pan of water near him in which the untasted crust is soaked. He has been condemned to this wretched dungeon for neglect of certain duties; and what they are we learn from the eloquent pleading of Friar John, who intercedes for the unhappy man with the Sire de Montbason. “My lord,” he says, “I come to implore your pardon and compassion for one of your men. It is not true that he has refused to have his wheat ground at your mill, or his meat baked at your ovens; that he cut his hay or his crops, or gathered his grapes, before the publication of your ‘ban;’ that he had his ploughshare sharpened without obtaining your permission and paying you the fee. He can prove all this by a hundred witnesses. He can prove, also, that he has regularly laboured and reaped your lands, and always paid the rates and rent of his holding; that he has carried the wood and water and provisions up to the chateau; that he has never chased upon your grounds, and has always fed your dogs.” These, and many other denials urged by the good-hearted Friar, are nearly losing their effect by the opposition offered to his entreaties by the Commander of Rhodes. That sturdy old knight pertinaciously stands up for the rights of his order, and on all occasions is for the exercise of power. “To the gallows! to the gallows!” he cries; and points to that instrument of paternal government, which consists of two tall uprights before the window. But eloquence has its reward. “The Sire de Montbason,” says Friar John, “has pardoned his unfortunate retainer, and he is now in the midst of his children. That old Commander,” he adds, “his long exercise of authority sometimes makes him harsh, and turns his heart as hard as the steel that covers it.”

But a field-day is at hand, in the description of which there is condensed a whole history of a feudal baron’s relations with his tenants. It is the day when the Sire de Montbason holds his court baron, and a tremendous time it must have been for the holders of his fiefs.

“To-day the Sire de Montbason left the chateau, attended by all his suite. He was mounted on a white horse, with a hawk on his wrist, in robe of state, with armorial bearings on his coat, which was one-half red and the other blue. On arriving at the place called the ‘Stone Table,’ he took his seat. All his household, dressed in cloth liveries, ranged themselves behind his chair. A gentleman whose lands are held under Montbason presented himself bare-headed, without spur or sword, and knelt at the Sire de Montbason’s feet, who, having taken his hands in his, said to him, ‘You avow yourself my liegeman in right of your castle, and swear to me, on the faith of your body, that you will serve me as such against all who may live or die, except our lord the king.’ The gentleman having replied, ‘I swear,’ the Sire de Montbason kissed him on the mouth, and ordered the act of homage to be registered.

“There next came forward a gentleman of the neighbourhood and his son, who demanded the right of lower justice over the western half of their great hall, because on the eastern side their manorial rights extended a full league. The Sire de Montbason consented with a good grace to this abridgment of his fief. Scarcely had this gentleman and his son concluded their thanks for this favour, when another gentleman advanced, and said a few words in the Sire de Montbason’s ear, touching the ground with his knee several times while he spoke. ‘I consent,’ said the Sire de Montbason. ‘Since you find your residence too small, I permit you to build a stronghold, with curtains, turrets, and ditch; but no weathercock, no towers, and, above all, no donjon.’

“Meanwhile the Sire de Montbason beckoned a crowd of villagers to approach, who had stood respectfully at a distance, all loaded with provisions and goods of different kinds. Immediately the ground at his feet was covered with wheat, with birds, hams, butter, eggs, wax, honey, vegetables, fruits, cakes, bouquets of flowers, and chaplets of roses. They were instantly carried away by the people of the chateau, and several tenants came forward into the empty space, some making grimaces, and some going through strange contortions of body. Others came, some to kiss the bolt of the principal gate of the dominant fief, some to sing a ludicrous song, and some to have their ears and noses slightly pulled by the _maître d’hôtel_, who also bestowed a few smacks on the right and left cheeks. The Sire de Montbason ordered legal quittance to be given to all. The assembly then formed a circle round him, and the Sire de Montbason spoke. ‘My friends,’ he said, ‘I have received too much money of you this year, to my great regret; the forfeitures for thefts, quarrels, wounds, blows, and bad language, have never come to so much before. I have hitherto remitted the fines for improper conduct and indecency, but I will remit them no more. Ask Friar John if I can conscientiously do so.’ Everybody’s eyes were turned upon me at once; I made a sign of strong negation with a shake of my head. The Sire de Montbason went on. ‘I am very well satisfied with the way in which the statute-labour has been done, but there are still some suits of page’s livery not delivered; a good many boots are required for my people, and a still greater quantity, I hear, need to be mended.’ ‘My lord,’ replied a poor man named Simon, ‘the artisans of your lands, the tailors, shoemakers, and cobblers, have all worked the full week they owe you, and you cannot call upon us for more.’ ‘Ah! very well,’ said the Sire, and cried to a labourer he recognised far off in the crowd, ‘Come on, Jacques, I see you there; advance! I found the south door of my castle of Veigné in a very bad state. You know very well that, according to your tenure, your family is bound to keep it in repair; and besides it is as much your affair as mine, for if the enemy takes the field, as may very likely happen, what will be the use of your right to refuge in a stronghold, if its gates are bad?’ He next addressed a woman who stood near him. ‘Widow Martin, you keep poor guard in my castle of Sorigni. I am told you often sleep instead of watching. You don’t sleep when you have to come for the corn you receive, according to old agreements, for this very duty.’ He then spoke to the whole assembly again. ‘I have further to complain of you, that you are not active in taking arms when my trumpets make proclamation of war; and, moreover, that your weapons are not good. When I make an attack with fire and sword, you enter into arrangements with your friends and relations who occupy the lands of the lords I am at feud with. They are not so complaisant on my grounds, and that is the reason I have so often to build you new houses, or pay you compensation. I have to complain, also, that those who have heritages in other manors go and live on them. Methinks you are well enough treated here, to be content to keep the fire alive. You also let your lands lie fallow for more than three years. I have the right to cultivate them for my own use, and I will exercise it. I blame you further for refusing my purveyors credit for fifty days, as you are bound to do. My good friends, I am bound, indeed, to give you my favour and protection, but you are bound no less to show your affection for me.’

“The tenants now made way for the serfs, and I remarked more familiarity and kindness between them and the Sire de Montbason than I had seen with the others. To all their requests, he answered, ‘With pleasure—with great pleasure: what you lack in the house, you shall find in the castle.’ The Sire de Montbason retired. Scarcely had he gone, when there rushed in a man—fat, breathless, red-faced, with perspiration oozing at every pore. This was the courier of the manor, an office he inherited from his great-grandfather, who had been an active, strong-limbed man, and one of the swiftest runners of his time.” The plethoric Mercury came to render homage for his fief, and would not have had breath to utter his oath even if he had not been too late. The day concludes with the extraordinary performances of the villagers in clearing the moat of Montbason of frogs—a service they are bound to render when the voice of the animals hindered the inhabitants of the castle from repose.

How superior this method of giving a view of some of the peculiarities of feudalism is to the common dissertations we meet with, will be acknowledged by any one who prefers a chapter of _Ivanhoe_ to an explanation by Ducange. We are tempted to make quotation from the conversations between the worthy Friar John and the Commander of Rhodes, in one of which the veteran soldier fights nobly in defence of the right of private war; and there are other incidents in which the two men are brought out with a freshness and individuality not at all to be expected in the lucubrations of the chief of the French Dryasdusts; but we must content ourselves with the last glimpse of knight-errantry. Ill fares it with a period when it can be truly said its days of chivalry are past. But chivalry was a thing and a principle, and knight-errantry a pretence. There is the same difference between them as between the quiet benevolent practice of a physician, and the noisy operations of a quack doctor at a fair. How, in the midst of all that ignorance, and that rough handling of sword and spear, arose the poetic idealisation of personal honour and respect for woman, it is impossible to say. The fact is all we can answer for, and the result. At first the ennobling pictures of unselfishness and courtesy and generosity were viewed by the portly baron, the rough, gruff old head-breaker on the dais, as they were meant to be viewed; namely, as altogether fictitious and imaginary representations of a state of manners which never had real existence. But the young squire his son, the long-haired maiden his daughter, who sat on the tabouret at his feet; the pages who stood open-mouthed behind his chair—were of a very different opinion. They believed in King Arthur, and in Amadis, and in Gualior, and in the peerless damosel who cheered him with such loving caress and such purity of heart; and, in the next generation, they resolved to form themselves on the model set before them in the achievements of these heroes and princesses. And if the state of their quarrels did not allow them to carry out all the refinements practised in those romances—if they were still forced to carry battle into their neighbour’s manor, and carry off their neighbour’s daughter, they did so “with a difference;” they doffed their plumed helmet when they received their vanquished enemy’s sword; they bent knee to ground when they locked the captive maiden into her bower. Chivalry was a recognised fact, and was at all events a standard by which to measure their actions, if not always a barrier against the actions themselves. But its truest merit is the effect it undoubtedly produced on the civilisation of Europe. It supplied the place of religion itself, when religion was either locked up entirely in an unknown tongue, or enveloped in manifold additions which concealed it like the cerements of an Egyptian mummy. The code of honour gradually exerted its sway where civil laws were ineffectual. There were virtues inculcated, and vices condemned by it, which criminal courts could neither reward nor punish. Truth, generosity, temperance, purity, defence of innocent weakness, resistance to strong injustice—these formed the true knights’ system of laws. The opposite evils were forbidden on pain of general censure. And the final effect has been this—that no nation which has not gone through the period of chivalry can give its true and full meaning to the great word “Gentleman.” India, China, Russia, never felt its force; they have, therefore, no civil freedom, no personal self-respect. A system which has given rise to all the gentlemen of Europe should never lightly be talked of; and Amans Alexis in his garret had as high an appreciation of gallant knight and fair ladie as if he had been present, when

“High in the breathless hall the minstrel sate,”

and charmed young and old with the music of harp and song. But knight-errantry—a running to and fro in search of adventures!—a travelling attorney in pursuit of practice in the courts of Honour!—it scarcely needed the genius of Cervantes to bring this extravagance into ridicule; for even the commander of the fourteenth century, himself vowed to the protection of injured innocence, laughs at the pre-Quixotic absurdity as if he had had the knight of La Mancha before his eyes. A specimen of the genus even then was looked on as our naturalists would now look upon a dodo. “I must tell you a curious thing that lately occurred here. A knight-errant is not often seen nowadays, though the genus is not extinct. One came here and wound the horn which hangs before the great gate of the chateau. No trumpet having sounded in reply, as is the rule on these occasions, he turned his horse and rode away. The pages ran after him, and after many excuses for their want of skill on the trumpet, they persuaded him to come back. Meanwhile the ladies had dressed to receive him, and taken their places in state, holding embroidery-frames in their hands. The Lady of Montbason was attired in a robe stiffened with gold, which had been in the house for more than a century. The dowager covered her head with a fur cap according to the fashion of her youth, and loaded herself with ermine. The knight comes in along with his squire, both covered all over with dangling plates of brass, making as much noise as a mule when loaded with copper pots and pans ill packed. The knight having ordered his squire to take off his helmet, revealed a head nearly bald, and fringed with long white hair. His left eye was tied up with a piece of green cloth, of the same colour as his coat. He had made a vow, he said, not to see with his left eye, nor eat with the right side of his mouth, till he had accomplished his enterprise. The ladies offered him refreshment. He replied by throwing himself at their feet, and swearing eternal love to old and young, saying, that though his armour was of truest steel, it could not defend him against their arrows; that he should die of the wounds they inflicted—that he felt himself expiring—and a hundred other follies of the same kind. As he persisted in this style, particularly in his address to the lady of Montbason, whose hand he frequently kissed, I became impatient; the Commander perceived my annoyance. ‘Good!’ he said: ‘these old fools have their set words and phrases like a village lawyer. But keep your temper; perhaps he won’t stay the day.’ And in fact in a few hours he departed. Such are the ridiculous remains of that ancient chivalry which at one time ennobled humanity with so many virtues and so much glory.”