Chapter IV: Part III: No. 29

On their steeds the ladies ride,
Two fair girls and slender;
Modest are their eyes and mild,
And their cheeks are tender.
Thus young lilies break the sheath,
Budding roses render
Blushes, and twinned pairs of stars
Climb the heavens with splendour.

Toward Love's Paradise they fare,
Such, I ween, their will is;
While the strife between the pair
Turns their cheeks to lilies;
Phyllis Flora flouts, and fair
Flora flouteth Phyllis;
Flora's hand a hawk doth bear,
And a goshawk Phyllis.

After a short space they came
Where a grove was growing;
At the entrance of the same
Rills with murmur flowing;
There the wind with myrrh and spice
Redolent was blowing,
Sounds of timbrel, harp, and lyre
Through the branches going.

All the music man could make
There they heard in plenty;
Timbrel, psaltery, lyre, and lute,
Harp and viol dainty;
Voices that in part-song meet
Choiring forte, lente;
Sounds the diatesseron,
Sounds the diapente.

All the tongues of all the birds
With full cry were singing;
There the blackbird's melody
Sweet and true was ringing;
Wood-dove, lark, and thrush on high
Jocund anthems flinging,
With the nightingale, who still
To her grief was clinging.

When the girls drew nigh the grove,
Some fear came upon them;
Further as they fared, the charm
Of the pleasance won them;
All the birds so sweetly sang
That a spell was on them,
And their bosoms warmed with love
At the welcome shown them.

Man would be immortal if
He could there be dwelling:
Every branch on every tree
With ripe fruit is swelling;
All the ways with nard and myrrh
And with spice are smelling:
How divine the Master is
All the house is telling.

Blithesome bands arrest their gaze,
Youths and maidens dancing;
Bodies beauteous as the stars,
Eyes with heaven's light glancing
And the bosoms of the girls,
At the sight entrancing,
Leap to view such marvels new,
Joy with joy enhancing!

They their horses check, and light,
Moved with sudden pleasure;
Half forget what brought them here,
Thralled by love and leisure;
Till once more the nightingale
Tuned her thrilling measure;
At that cry each girl again
Hugs her hidden treasure.

Round the middle of the grove
Was a place enchanted,
Which the god for his own rites
Specially had planted;
Fauns and nymphs and satyrs here
Flowery alleys haunted,
And before the face of Love
Played and leaped and chaunted.

In their hands they carry thyme,
Crowns of fragrant roses;
Bacchus leads the choir divine
And the dance composes;
Nymphs and fauns with feet in tune
Interchange their posies;
But Silenus trips and reels
When the chorus closes.

On an ass the elder borne
All the mad crew guideth;
Mirth and laughter at the view
Through Love's glad heart glideth.
"Io!" shouts the eld; that sound
In his throat subsideth,
For his voice in wine is drowned,
And his old age chideth.

'Mid these pleasant sights appears
Love, the young joy-giver;
Bright as stars his eyes, and wings
On his shoulders shiver;
In his left hand is the bow,
At his side the quiver;
From his state the world may know
He is lord for ever.

Leans the boy upon a staff
Intertwined with flowers,
Scent of nectar from his hair
Breathes around the bowers;
Hand in hand before him kneel
Three celestial Hours,
Graces who Love's goblet fill
From immortal showers.

It would surely be superfluous to point out the fluent elegance of this poem, or to dwell farther upon the astonishing fact that anything so purely Renaissance in tone should have been produced in the twelfth century.

Cupid, as was natural, settles the dispute of the two girls by deciding that scholars are more suitable for love than soldiers.

This would be the place to introduce another long descriptive poem, if the nature of its theme rendered it fit for translation. It relates the visit of a student to what he calls the _Templum Veneris_; in other words, to the house of a courtesan. Her attendants are sirens; and the whole poem, dealing with a vulgar incident, is conducted in this mock-heroic strain.[31]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 31: _Carmina Burana_, p. 138.]

XVII.

We pass now to love-poems of a more purely personal kind. One of these, which is too long for translation and in some respects ill-suited to a modern taste, forms the proper transition from the descriptive to the lyrical section. It starts with phrases culled from hymns to the Virgin:--

"Si linguis angelicis
Loquar et humanis."

"Ave formosissima,
Gemma pretiosa;
Ave decus virginum,
Virgo gloriosa!"

These waifs and strays of religious diction are curiously blent with romantic and classical allusions. The girl is addressed in the same breath as--

"Blanziflor et Helena,
Venus generosa."

Toward the close of the poem, the lover, who at length has reached the object of his heart's desire, breaks into this paean of victorious passion:--

"What more? Around the maiden's neck
My arms I flung with yearning;
Upon her lips I gave and took
A thousand kisses burning:
Again and yet again I cried,
With whispered vows and sighing,
This, this alone, sure, sure it was
For which my heart was dying!

"Who is the man that does not know
The sweets that followed after?
My former pains, my sobs and woe,
Were changed for love and laughter:
The joys of Paradise were ours
In overflowing measure;
We tasted every shape of bliss
And every form of pleasure."

The next piece which I shall quote differs in some important respects from the general style adopted by the Goliardi in their love-poetry. It is written in rhyming or leonine hexameters, and is remarkable for its quaint play on names, conceived and executed in a truly medieval taste.

FLOS FLORAE.

No. 30.

Take thou this rose, O Rose! the loves in the rose repose:
I with love of the rose am caught at the winter's close:
Take thou this flower, my flower, and cherish it in thy bower:
Thou in thy beauty's power shalt lovelier blow each hour:
Gaze at the rose, and smile, my rose, in mine eyes the while:
To thee the roses belong, thy voice is the nightingale's song:
Give thou the rose a kiss, it blushes like thy mouth's bliss:
Flowers in a picture seem not flowers, but flowers in a dream:
Who paints the rose's bloom, paints not the rose's perfume.

In complete contrast to this conceited and euphuistic style of composition stands a slight snatch of rustic melody, consisting of little but reiteration and refrain.

A BIRD'S SONG OF LOVE.

No. 31.

Come to me, come, O come!
Let me not die, but come!
Hyria hysria nazaza
Trillirivos.

Fair is thy face, O fair!
Fair thine eyes, O how fair!
Hyria hysria nazaza
Trillirivos.

Fair is thy flowing hair!
O fair, O fair, how fair!
Hyria hysria nazaza
Trillirivos.

Redder than rose art thou,
Whiter than lily thou!
Hyria hysria nazaza
Trillirivos.

Fairer than all, I vow,
Ever my pride art thou!
Hyria hysria nazaza
Trillirivos.

The following displays an almost classical intensity of voluptuous passion, and belongs in all probability to a period later than the _Carmina Burana_. I have ventured, in translating it, to borrow the structure of a song which occurs in Fletcher's _Rollo_ (act v. scene 2), the first stanza of which is also found in Shakespeare's _Measure for Measure_ (act iv. scene 1), and to insert one or two phrases from Fletcher's version. Whether the composer of that song had ever met with the Latin lyric to Lydia can scarcely form the subject of critical conjecture. Yet there is a faint evanescent resemblance between the two poems.

TO LYDIA.

No. 32.

Lydia bright, thou girl more white
Than the milk of morning new,
Or young lilies in the light!
Matched with thy rose-whiteness, hue
Of red rose or white rose pales,
And the polished ivory fails,
Ivory fails.

Spread, O spread, my girl, thy hair,
Amber-hued and heavenly bright,
As fine gold or golden air!
Show, O show thy throat so white,
Throat and neck that marble fine
Over thy white breasts incline,
Breasts incline.

Lift, O lift thine eyes that are
Underneath those eyelids dark,
Lustrous as the evening star
'Neath the dark heaven's purple arc!
Bare, O bare thy cheeks of rose,
Dyed with Tyrian red that glows,
Red that glows.

Give, O give those lips of love
That the coral boughs eclipse;
Give sweet kisses, dove by dove,
Soft descending on my lips.
See my soul how forth she flies!
'Neath each kiss my pierced heart dies,
Pierced heart dies.

Wherefore dost thou draw my life,
Drain my heart's blood with thy kiss?
Scarce can I endure the strife
Of this ecstasy of bliss!
Set, O set my poor heart free,
Bound in icy chains by thee,
Chains by thee.

Hide, O hide those hills of snow,
Twinned upon thy breast that rise,
Where the virgin fountains flow
With fresh milk of Paradise!
Thy bare bosom breathes of myrrh,
From thy whole self pleasures stir,
Pleasures stir.

Hide, O hide those paps that tire
Sense and spirit with excess
Of snow-whiteness and desire
Of thy breast's deliciousness!
See'st thou, cruel, how I swoon?
Leav'st thou me half lost so soon?
Lost so soon?

In rendering this lyric to Lydia, I have restored the fifth stanza, only one line of which,

"Quid mihi sugis vivum sanguinem,"

remains in the original. This I did because it seemed necessary to effect the transition from the stanzas beginning _Pande, puella, pande_, to those beginning _Conde papillas, conde_.

Among these more direct outpourings of personal passion, place may be found for a delicate little _Poem of Privacy_, which forms part of the _Carmina Burana_. Unfortunately, the text of this slight piece is very defective in the MS., and has had to be conjecturally restored in several places.

A POEM OF PRIVACY.

No. 33.

When a young man, passion-laden,
In a chamber meets a maiden,
Then felicitous communion,
By love's strain between the twain,
Grows from forth their union;
For the game, it hath no name,
Of lips, arms, and hidden charms.

Nor can I here forbear from inserting another _Poem of Privacy_, bolder in its openness of speech, more glowing in its warmth of colouring. If excuse should be pleaded or the translation and reproduction of this distinctly Pagan ditty, it must be found in the singularity of its motive, which is as unmedieval as could be desired by the bitterest detractor of medieval sentiment. We seem, while reading it, to have before our eyes the Venetian picture of a Venus, while the almost prosaic particularity of description illustrates what I have said above about the detailed realism of the Goliardic style.

FLORA.

No. 34.

Rudely blows the winter blast,
Withered leaves are falling fast,
Cold hath hushed the birds at last.
While the heavens were warm and glowing,
Nature's offspring loved in May;
But man's heart no debt is owing
To such change of month or day
As the dumb brute-beasts obey.
Oh, the joys of this possessing!
How unspeakable the blessing
That my Flora yields to-day!

Labour long I did not rue,
Ere I won my wages due,
And the prize I played for drew.
Flora with her brows of laughter,
Gazing on me, breathing bliss,
Draws my yearning spirit after,
Sucks my soul forth in a kiss:
Where's the pastime matched with this?
Oh, the joys of this possessing!
How unspeakable the blessing
Of my Flora's loveliness!

Truly mine is no harsh doom,
While in this secluded room
Venus lights for me the gloom!
Flora faultless as a blossom
Bares her smooth limbs for mine eyes;
Softly shines her virgin bosom,
And the breasts that gently rise
Like the hills of Paradise.
Oh, the joys of this possessing!
How unspeakable the blessing
When my Flora is the prize!

From her tender breasts decline,
In a gradual curving line,
Flanks like swansdown white and fine.
On her skin the touch discerneth
Naught of rough; 'tis soft as snow:
'Neath the waist her belly turneth
Unto fulness, where below
In Love's garden lilies blow.
Oh, the joys of this possessing!
How unspeakable the blessing!
Sweetest sweets from Flora flow!

Ah! should Jove but find my fair,
He would fall in love, I swear,
And to his old tricks repair:
In a cloud of gold descending
As on Danae's brazen tower,
Or the sturdy bull's back bending,
Or would veil his godhood's power
In a swan's form for one hour.
Oh, the joys of this possessing!
How unspeakable the blessing!
How divine my Flora's flower!

A third "poem of privacy" may be employed to temper this too fervid mood. I conceive it to be meant for the monologue of a lover in the presence of his sweetheart, and to express the varying lights and shades of his emotion.

THE LOVER'S MONOLOGUE.

No. 35.

Love rules everything that is:
Love doth change hearts in a kiss:
Love seeks devious ways of bliss:
Love than honey sweeter,
Love than gall more bitter.
Blind Love hath no modesties.
Love is lukewarm, fiery, cold;
Love is timid, overbold;
Loyal, treacherous, manifold.

Present time is fit for play:
Let Love find his mate to-day:
Hark, the birds, how sweet their lay!
Love rules young men wholly;
Love lures maidens solely.
Woe to old folk! sad are they.
Sweetest woman ever seen,
Fairest, dearest, is my queen;
And alas! my chiefest teen.

Let an old man, chill and drear,
Never come thy bosom near;
Oft he sleeps with sorry cheer,
Too cold to delight thee:
Naught could less invite thee.
Youth with youth must mate, my dear.
Blest the union I desire;
Naught I know and naught require,
Better than to be thy squire.

Love flies all the world around:
Love in wanton wiles is wound:
Therefore youth and maid are bound
In Love's fetters duly.
She is joyless truly
Who no lover yet hath found!
All the night in grief and smart
She must languish, wear her heart;
Bitter is that woman's part.

Love is simple, Love is sly;
Love is pale, of ruddy dye:
Love is all things, low and high:
Love is serviceable,
Constant and unstable:
Love obeys Art's empery.
In this closed room Love takes flight,
In the silence of the night,
Love made captive, conquered quite.

The next is singularly, quaintly musical in the original, but for various reasons I have not been able to adhere exactly to its form. I imagine that it is the work of the same poet who composed the longer piece which I shall give immediately after. Both are addressed to Caecilia; I have used the name Phyllis in my version.

THE INVITATION TO LOVE.

No. 36.

List, my girl, with words I woo;
Lay not wanton hands on you:
Sit before you, in your face
Gazing, ah! and seeking grace:
Fix mine eyes, nor let them rove
From the mark where shafts of love
Their flight wing.
Try, my girl, O try what bliss
Young men render when they kiss!
Youth is alway sturdy, straight;
Old age totters in its gait.
These delights of love we bring
Have the suppleness of spring,
Softness, sweetness, wantoning;
Clasp, my Phyllis, in their ring
Sweeter sweets than poets sing,
Anything and everything!

After daytime's heat from heaven
Dews on thirsty fields are given;
After verdant leaf and stem
Shoots the white flower's diadem;
After the white flower's bloom
To the night their faint perfume
Lilies fling.
Try, my girl, etc., _da capo_.

The poem, _Ludo cum Caecilia_, which comes next in order, is one of the most perfect specimens of Goliardic writing. To render its fluent, languid, and yet airy grace, in any language but the Latin, is, I think, impossible. Who could have imagined that the subtlety, the refinement, almost the perversity of feeling expressed in it, should have been proper to a student of the twelfth century? The poem is spoiled toward its close by astrological and grammatical conceits; and the text is corrupt. That part I have omitted, together with some stanzas which offend a modern taste.

PHYLLIS.

No. 37.

Think no evil, have no fear,
If I play with Phyllis;
I am but the guardian dear
Of her girlhood's lilies,
Lest too soon her bloom should swoon
Like spring's daffodillies.

All I care for is to play,
Gaze upon my treasure,
Now and then to touch her hand,
Kiss in modest measure;
But the fifth act of love's game,
Dream not of that pleasure!

For to touch the bloom of youth
Spoils its frail complexion;
Let the young grape gently grow
Till it reach perfection;
Hope within my heart doth glow
Of the girl's affection.

Sweet above all sweets that are
'Tis to play with Phyllis;
For her thoughts are white as snow,
In her heart no ill is;
And the kisses that she gives
Sweeter are than lilies.

Love leads after him the gods
Bound in pliant traces;
Harsh and stubborn hearts he bends,
Breaks with blows of maces;
Nay, the unicorn is tamed
By a girl's embraces.

Love leads after him the gods,
Jupiter with Juno;
To his waxen measure treads
Masterful Neptune O!
Pluto stern to souls below
Melts to this one tune O!

Whatsoe'er the rest may do,
Let us then be playing:
Take the pastime that is due
While we're yet a-Maying;
I am young and young are you;
'Tis the time for playing.

Up to this time, the happiness of love returned and satisfied has been portrayed. The following lyric exhibits a lover pining at a distance, soothing his soul with song, and indulging in visions of happiness beyond his grasp--[Greek: eidolois kalleus kopha chliainomenos], as Meleager phrased it on a similar occasion.

LOVE LONGINGS.

No. 38.

With song I seek my fate to cheer,
As doth the swan when death draws near;
Youth's roses from my cheeks retire,
My heart is worn with fond desire.
Since care and woe increase and grow, while
light burns low,
Poor wretch I die!
Heigho! I die, poor wretch I die!
Constrained to love, unloved; such luck have I!

If she could love me whom I love,
I would not then exchange with Jove:
Ah! might I clasp her once, and drain
Her lips as thirsty flowers drink rain!
With death to meet, his welcome greet, from
life retreat,
I were full fain!
Heigho! full fain, I were full fain,
Could I such joy, such wealth of pleasure gain!

When I bethought me of her breast,
Those hills of snow my fancy pressed;
Longing to touch them with my hand,
Love's laws I then did understand.
Rose of the south, blooms on her mouth; I felt
love's drouth
That mouth to kiss!
Heigho! to kiss, that mouth to kiss!
Lost in day-dreams and vain desires of bliss.

The next is the indignant repudiation by a lover of the calumny that he has proved unfaithful to his mistress. The strongly marked double rhymes of the original add peculiar vehemence to his protestations; while the abundance of cheap mythological allusions is emphatically Goliardic.

THE LOVER'S VOW.

No. 39.

False the tongue and foul with slander,
Poisonous treacherous tongue of pander,
Tongue the hangman's knife should sever,
Tongue in flames to burn for ever;

Which hath called me a deceiver,
Faithless lover, quick to leave her,
Whom I love, and leave her slighted,
For another, unrequited!

Hear, ye Muses nine! nay, rather,
Jove, of gods and men the father!
Who for Danae and Europa
Changed thy shape, thou bold eloper!

Hear me, god! ye gods all, hear me!
Such a sin came never near me.
Hear, thou god! and gods all, hear ye!
Thus I sinned not, as I fear ye.

I by Mars vow, by Apollo,
Both of whom Love's learning follow;
Yea, by Cupid too, the terror
Of whose bow forbids all error!

By thy bow I vow and quiver,
By the shafts thou dost deliver,
Without fraud, in honour duly
To observe my troth-plight truly.

I will keep the troth I plighted,
And the reason shall be cited:
'Tis that 'mid the girls no maiden
Ever met I more love-laden.

'Mid the girls thou art beholden
Like a pearl in setting golden;
Yea, thy shoulder, neck, and bosom
Bear of beauty's self the blossom.

Oh, her throat, lips, forehead, nourish
Love, with food that makes him flourish!
And her curls, I did adore them--
They were blonde with heaven's light o'er them.

Therefore, till, for Nature's scorning,
Toil is rest and midnight morning,
Till no trees in woods are growing,
Till fire turns to water flowing;

Till seas have no ships to sail them,
Till the Parthians' arrows fail them,
I, my girl, will love thee ever,
Unbetrayed, betray thee never!

In the following poem a lover bids adieu for ever to an unworthy woman, who has betrayed him. This is a remarkable specimen of the songs written for a complicated melody. The first eight lines seem set to one tune; in the next four that tune is slightly accelerated, and a double rhyme is substituted for a single one in the tenth and twelfth verses. The five concluding lines go to a different kind of melody, and express in each stanza a changed mood of feeling.

I have tried in this instance to adopt the plaster-cast method of translation, as described above,[32] and have even endeavoured to obtain the dragging effect of the first eight lines of each strophe, which are composed neither of exact accentual dactyls nor yet of exact accentual anapaests, but offer a good example of that laxity of rhythm permitted in this prosody for music.

Comparison with the original will show that I was not copying Byron's _When we Two Parted_; yet the resemblance between that song and the tone which my translation has naturally assumed from the Latin, is certainly noticeable. That Byron could have seen the piece before he wrote his own lines in question is almost impossible, for this portion of the _Carmina Burana_ had not, so far as I am aware, been edited before the year 1847. The coincidence of metrical form, so far as it extends, only establishes the spontaneity of emotion which, in the case of the medieval and the modern poet, found a similar rhythm for the utterance of similar feeling.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 32: Page 38.]

FAREWELL TO THE FAITHLESS.

No. 40.

A mortal anguish
How often woundeth me;
Grieving I languish,
Weighed down with misery;

Hearing the mournful
Tale of thy fault and fall
Blown by Fame's scornful
Trump to the ears of all!

Envious rumour
Late or soon will slay thee:
Love with less humour,
Lest thy love betray thee.

Whate'er thou dost, do secretly,
Far from Fame's curiosity;
Love in the dark delights to be,
His sports are wiles and witchery,
With laugh of lovers greeting.

Thou wert not slighted,
Stained in thine honour, when
We were united,
Lovers unknown to men;
But when thy passion
Grew like thy bosom cold,
None had compassion,
Then was thy story told.

Fame, who rejoiceth
New amours to utter,
Now thy shame voiceth,
Wide her pinions flutter.

The palace home of modesty
Is made a haunt for harlotry;
The virgin lily you may see
Defiled by fingers lewd and free,
With vile embraces meeting.

I mourn the tender
Flower of the youth of thee,
Brighter in splendour
Than evening's star can be.
Pure were thy kisses,
Dove-like thy smile;
As the snake hisses
Now is thy guile.

Lovers who pray thee
From thy door are scattered;
Lovers who pay thee
In thy bed are flattered.

Thou bidst them from thy presence flee
From whom thou canst not take thy fee;
Blind, halt, and lame thy suitors be;
Illustrious men with subtlety
And poisonous honey cheating.

I may add that a long soliloquy printed in _Carmina Burana_, pp. 119-121, should be compared with the foregoing lyric. It has a similar motive, though the lover in this case expresses his willingness for reconciliation. One part of its expostulation with the faithless woman is beautiful in its simplicity:--

"Amaveram prae caeteris
Te, sed amici veteris
Es jam oblita! Superis
Vel inferis
Ream te criminamur."

I will close this section with the lament written for a medieval Gretchen whose fault has been discovered, and whose lover has been forced to leave the country. Its bare realism contrasts with the lyrical exuberance of the preceding specimens.

GRETCHEN.

No. 41.

Up to this time, well-away!
I concealed the truth from day,
Went on loving skilfully.
Now my fault at length is clear:
That the hour of need is near,
From my shape all eyes can see.
So my mother gives me blows,
So my father curses throws;
They both treat me savagely.
In the house alone I sit,
Dare not walk about the street,
Nor at play in public be.

If I walk about the street,
Every one I chance to meet
Scans me like a prodigy:
When they see the load I bear,
All the neighbours nudge and stare,
Gaping while I hasten by;
With their elbows nudge, and so
With their finger point, as though
I were some monstrosity;
Me with nods and winks they spurn,
Judge me fit in flames to burn
For one lapse from honesty.

Why this tedious tale prolong?
Short, I am become a song,
In all mouths a mockery.
By this am I done to death,
Sorrow kills me, chokes my breath,
Ever weep I bitterly.
One thing makes me still more grieve,
That my friend his home must leave
For the same cause instantly;
Therefore is my sadness so
Multiplied, weighed down with woe,
For he too will part from me.

XVIII.

A separate section should be assigned to poems of exile. They are not very numerous, but are interesting in connection with the wandering life of their vagrant authors. The first has all the dreamy pathos felt by a young German leaving his beloved home in some valley of the Suabian or Thuringian hills.

ADIEU TO THE VALLEY.

No. 42.

Oh, of love twin-brother anguish!
In thy pangs I faint and languish,
Cannot find relief from thee!
Nay, no marvel! I must grieve her,
Wander forth in exile, leave her,
Who hath gained the heart of me;
Who of loveliness so rare is
That for her sake Trojan Paris
Would have left his Helene.

Smile, thou valley, sweetest, fairest,
Wreathed with roses of the rarest,
Flower of all the vales that be!
Vale of vales, all vales excelling,
Sun and moon thy praise are telling,
With the song-birds' melody;
Nightingales thy praise are singing,
O thou soothing solace-bringing
To the soul's despondency!

The second was probably intended to be sung at a drinking-party by a student taking leave of his companions. It is love that forces him to quit their society and to break with his studies. The long rhyming lines, followed by a sharp drop at the close of each stanza upon a short disjointed phrase, seem to indicate discouragement and melancholy.

THE LOVER'S PARTING.

No. 43.

Sweet native soil, farewell! dear country of my birth!
Fair chamber of the loves! glad home of joy and mirth!
To-morrow or to-day I leave you, o'er the earth
To wander struck with love, to pine with rage and dearth
In exile!

Farewell, sweet land, and ye, my comrades dear, adieu!
To whom with kindly heart I have been ever true;
The studies that we loved I may no more pursue;
Weep then for me, who part as though I died to you,
Love-laden!

As many as the flowers that Hybla's valley cover,
As many as the leaves that on Dodona hover,
As many as the fish that sail the wide seas over,
So many are the pangs that pain a faithful lover,
For ever!

With the new fire of love my wounded bosom burns;
Love knows not any ruth, all tender pity spurns;
How true the proverb speaks that saith to him that yearns,
"Where love is there is pain; thy pleasure love returns
With anguish!"

Ah, sorrow! ah, how sad the wages of our bliss!
In lovers' hearts the flame's too hot for happiness;
For Venus still doth send new sighs and new distress
When once the enamoured soul is taken with excess
Of sweetness!

The third introduces us to a little episode of medieval private life which must have been frequent enough. It consists of a debate between a father and his son upon the question whether the young man should enter into a monastic brotherhood. The youth is lying on a sickbed, and thinks that he is already at the point of death. It will be noticed that he is only diverted from his project by the mention of a student friend (indicated, as usual, by an N), whom he would never be able to see again if he assumed the cowl. I suspect, however, that the poem has not been transmitted to us entire.

IN ARTICULO MORTIS.

No. 44.

_Son_.
Oh, my father! help, I pray!
Death is near my soul to-day;
With your blessing let me be
Made a monk right speedily!

See the foe my life invade!
Haste, oh haste, to give me aid!
Bring me comfort and heart's ease,
Strengthen me in this disease!

_Father_.
Oh, my best-beloved son,
What is this thou wouldst have done?
Weigh it well in heart and brain:
Do not leave me here in pain.

_Son_.
Father, this thy loving care
Makes me weep full sore, I swear;
For you will be childless when
I have joined those holy men.

_Father_.
Therefore make a little stay,
Put it off till the third day;
It may be your danger is
Not unto the death, I wis.

_Son_.
Such the anguish that I feel
Through my inmost entrails steal,
That I bide in doubt lest death
Ere to-morrow end my breath.

_Father_.
Those strict rules that monks observe,
Well I know them! They must serve
Heaven by fasting every day,
And by keeping watch alway.

_Son_.
Who for God watch through the night
Shall receive a crown of light;
Who for heaven's sake hungers, he
Shall be fed abundantly.

_Father_.
Hard and coarse the food they eat,
Beans and pottage-herbs their meat;
After such a banquet, think,
Water is their only drink!

_Son_.
What's the good of feasts, or bright
Cups of Bacchus, when, in spite
Of all comforts, at the last
This poor flesh to worms is cast?

_Father_.
Well, then, let thy parent's moan
Move thee in thy soul, my son!
Mourning for thee made a monk,
Dead-alive in darkness sunk.

_Son_.
They who father, mother love,
And their God neglect, will prove
That they are in error found
When the judgment trump shall sound.

_Father_.
Logic! would thou ne'er hadst been
Known on earth for mortal teen!
Many a clerk thou mak'st to roam
Wretched, exiled from his home.--

Never more thine eyes, my son,
Shall behold thy darling one,
Him, that little clerk so fair,
N., thy friend beyond compare!

_Son_.
Oh, alas! unhappy me!
What to do I cannot see;
Wandering lost in exile so,
Without guide or light I go!--

Dry your tears, my father dear,
Haply there is better cheer;
Now my mind on change is set,
I'll not be a monk, not yet.

XIX.

The order adopted in this essay brings us now to drinking-songs. Next to spring and love, our students set their affections principally on the tavern and the winebowl. In the poems on the Order we have seen how large a space in their vagrant lives was occupied by the tavern and its jovial company of topers and gamesters. It was there that--

"Some are gaming, some are drinking,
Some are living without thinking;
And of those who make the racket,
Some are stripped of coat and jacket;
Some get clothes of finer feather,
Some are cleaned out altogether;
No one there dreads death's invasion,
But all drink in emulation."

The song from which I have extracted this stanza contains a parody of S. Thomas Aquinas' hymn on the Eucharist.[33] To translate it seemed to me impossible; but I will cite the following stanza, which may be compared with stanzas ix. and x. of _Lauda Sion_:--

"Bibit hera, bibit herus,
Bibit miles, bibit clerus,
Bibit ille, bibit illa,
Bibit servus cum ancilla,
Bibit velox, bibit piger,
Bibit albus, bibit niger,
Bibit constans, bibit vagus,
Bibit rudis, bibit magus."

Several of the best anacreontics of the period are even more distinctly parodies. The following panegyric of wine, for example, is modelled upon a hymn to the Virgin:--

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 33: _In Taberna, Carm. Bur_., p. 235.]

A SEQUENCE IN PRAISE OF WINE.

No. 45.

Wine the good and bland, thou blessing
Of the good, the bad's distressing,
Sweet of taste by all confessing,
Hail, thou world's felicity!
Hail thy hue, life's gloom dispelling;
Hail thy taste, all tastes excelling;
By thy power, in this thy dwelling
Deign to make us drunk with thee!

Oh, how blest for bounteous uses
Is the birth of pure vine-juices!
Safe's the table which produces
Wine in goodly quality.
Oh, in colour how auspicious!
Oh, in odour how delicious!
In the mouth how sweet, propitious
To the tongue enthralled by thee!

Blest the man who first thee planted,
Called thee by thy name enchanted!
He whose cups have ne'er been scanted
Dreads no danger that may be.
Blest the belly where thou bidest!
Blest the tongue where thou residest!
Blest the mouth through which thou glidest,
And the lips thrice blest by thee!

Therefore let wine's praise be sounded,
Healths to topers all propounded;
We shall never be confounded,
Toping for eternity!
Pray we: here be thou still flowing,
Plenty on our board bestowing,
While with jocund voice we're showing
How we serve thee--Jubilee!

Another, regarding the date of which I have no information, is an imitation of a well-known _Christmas Carol_.

A CAROL OF WINE.

No. 46.

In dulci jubilo
Sing we, make merry so!
Since our heart's pleasure
Latet in poculo,
Drawn from the cask, good measure.
Pro hoc convivio,
Nunc, nunc bibito!

O crater parvule!
How my soul yearns for thee!
Make me now merry,
O potus optime,
Claret or hock or sherry!
Et vos concinite:
Vivant socii!

O vini caritas!
O Bacchi lenitas!
We've drained our purses
Per multa pocula:
Yet hope we for new mercies,
Nummoram gaudia:
Would that we had them, ah!

Ubi sunt gaudia? where,
If that they be not there?
There the lads are singing
Selecta cantica:
There are glasses ringing
In villae curia;
Oh, would that we were there!

_In Dulci Jubilo_ yields an example of mixed Latin and German. This is the case too with a comparatively ancient drinking-song quoted by Geiger in his _Renaissance und Humanismus_, p. 414. It may be mentioned that the word _Bursae_, for _Burschen_, occurs in stanza v. This word, to indicate a student, can also be found in _Carm. Bur._, p. 236, where we are introduced to scholars drinking yellow Rhine wine out of glasses of a pale pink colour--already in the twelfth century!

THE STUDENTS' WINE-BOUT.

No. 47.

Ho, all ye jovial brotherhood,
Quos sitis vexat plurima,
I know a host whose wits are good,
Quod vina spectat optima.

His wine he blends not with the juice
E puteo qui sumitur;
Each kind its virtue doth produce
E botris ut exprimitur.

Host, bring us forth good wine and strong,
In cella quod est optimum!
We brethren will our sport prolong
Ad noctis usque terminum.

Whoso to snarl or bite is fain,
Ut canes decet rabidos,
Outside our circle may remain,
Ad porcos eat sordidos,

Hurrah! my lads, we'll merry make!
Levate sursum pocula!
God's blessing on all wine we take,
In sempiterna saecula!

Two lyrics of distinguished excellence, which still hold their place in the _Commersbuch_, cannot claim certain antiquity in their present form. They are not included in the _Carmina Burana_; yet their style is so characteristic of the Archipoeta, that I believe we may credit him with at least a share in their composition. The first starts with an allusion to the Horatian _tempus edax rerum_.

TIME'S A-FLYING.

No. 48.

Laurel-crowned Horatius,
True, how true thy saying!
Swift as wind flies over us
Time, devouring, slaying.
Where are, oh! those goblets full
Of wine honey-laden,
Strifes and loves and bountiful
Lips of ruddy maiden?

Grows the young grape tenderly,
And the maid is growing;
But the thirsty poet, see,
Years on him are snowing!
What's the use on hoary curls
Of the bays undying.
If we may not kiss the girls,
Drink while time's a-flying?

The second consists of a truly brilliant development of the theme which our Herrick condensed into one splendid phrase--"There's no lust like to poetry!"

THERE'S NO LUST LIKE TO POETRY.

No. 49.

Sweet in goodly fellowship
Tastes red wine and rare O!
But to kiss a girl's ripe lip
Is a gift more fair O!
Yet a gift more sweet, more fine,
Is the lyre of Maro!
While these three good gifts were mine,
I'd not change with Pharaoh.

Bacchus wakes within my breast
Love and love's desire,
Venus comes and stirs the blessed
Rage of Phoebus' fire;
Deathless honour is our due
From the laurelled sire:
Woe should I turn traitor to
Wine and love and lyre!

Should a tyrant rise and say,
"Give up wine!" I'd do it;
"Love no girls!" I would obey,
Though my heart should rue it.
"Dash thy lyre!" suppose he saith,
Naught should bring me to it;
"Yield thy lyre or die!" my breath,
Dying, should thrill through it!

A lyric of the elder period in praise of wine and love, which forcibly illustrates the contempt felt by the student class for the unlettered laity and boors, shall be inserted here. It seems to demand a tune.

WINE AND VENUS.

No. 50.

Ho, comrades mine!
What is your pleasure?
What business fine
Or mirthful measure?
Lo, Venus toward our crew advancing,
A choir of Dryads round her dancing!

Good fellows you!
The time is jolly!
Earth springs anew,
Bans melancholy;
Bid long farewell to winter weather!
Let lads and maids be blithe together.

Dame Venus spurns
Her brother Ocean;
To Bacchus turns;
No colder potion
Deserves her godhead's approbation;
On sober souls she pours damnation.

Let then this band,
Imbued with learning,
By Venus stand,
Her wages earning!
Laymen we spurn from our alliance,
Like brutes to art deaf, dumb to science.

Two gods alone
We serve and mate with;
One law we own,
Nor hold debate with:
Who lives the goodly student fashion
Must love and win love back with passion!

Among drinking-songs of the best period in this literature may be reckoned two disputations between water and wine. In the one, Thetis defends herself against Lyaeus, and the poet assists in vision at their contest. The scene is appropriately laid in the third sphere, the pleasant heaven of Venus. The other, which on the whole appears to me preferable, and which I have therefore chosen for translation, begins and ends with the sound axiom that water and wine ought never to be mixed. It is manifest that the poet reserves the honour of the day for wine, though his arguments are fair to both sides. The final point, which breaks the case of water down and determines her utter confusion, is curious, since it shows that people in the Middle Ages were fully alive to the perils of sewage-contaminated wells.

THE CONTEST OF WINE AND WATER.

No. 51.

Laying truth bare, stripped of fable,
Briefly as I may be able,
With good reasons manifold,
I will tell why man should never
Copulate, but rather sever,
Things that strife and hatred hold.

When one cup in fell confusion
Wine with water blends, the fusion,
Call it by what name you will,
Is no blessing, nor deserveth
Any praise, but rather serveth
For the emblem of all ill.

Wine perceives the water present,
And with pain exclaims, "What peasant
Dared to mingle thee with me?
Rise, go forth, get out, and leave me!
In the same place, here to grieve me,
Thou hast no just claim to be.

"Vile and shameless in thy going,
Into cracks thou still art flowing,
That in foul holes thou mayst lie;
O'er the earth thou ought'st to wander,
On the earth thy liquor squander,
And at length in anguish die.

"How canst thou adorn a table?
No one sings or tells a fable
In thy presence dull and drear;
But the guest who erst was jolly,
Laughing, joking, bent on folly,
Silent sits when thou art near.

"Should one drink of thee to fulness,
Sound before, he takes an illness;
All his bowels thou dost stir;
Booms the belly, wind ariseth,
Which, enclosed and pent, surpriseth
With a thousand sighs the ear.

"When the stomach's so inflated,
Blasts are then ejaculated
From both draughts with divers sound;
And that organ thus affected,
All the air is soon infected
By the poison breathed around."

Water thus wine's home-thrust warded:
"All thy life is foul and sordid,
Sunk in misery, steeped in vice;
Those who drink thee lose their morals,
Waste their time in sloth and quarrels,
Rolling down sin's precipice.

"Thou dost teach man's tongue to stutter;
He goes reeling in the gutter
Who hath deigned to kiss thy lips;
Hears men speak without discerning,
Sees a hundred tapers burning
When there are but two poor dips.

"He who feels for thee soul's hunger
Is a murderer or whoremonger,
Davus Geta Birria;
Such are they whom thou dost nourish;
With thy fame and name they flourish
In the tavern's disarray.

"Thou by reason of thy badness
Art confined in prison sadness,
Cramped and small thy dwellings are:
I am great the whole world over,
Spread myself abroad and cover
Every part of earth afar.

"Drink I yield to palates burning;
They who for soul's health are yearning,
Need the aid that I have given;
Since all pilgrims, at their praying,
Far or near, I am conveying
To the palaces of heaven."

Wine replied: "What thou hast vaunted
Proves thee full of fraud; for granted
That thou earnest ships o'er sea,
Yet thou then dost swell and riot;
Till they wreck thou hast no quiet;
Thus they are deceived through thee.

"He whose strength is insufficient
Thee to slake with heat efficient,
Sunk in mortal peril lies:
Trusting thee the poor wretch waneth,
And through thee at length attaineth
To the joys of Paradise.

"I'm a god, as that true poet
Naso testifies; men owe it
Unto me that they are sage;
When they do not drink, professors
Lose their wits and lack assessors
Round about the lecture-stage.

"'Tis impossible to sever
Truth from falsehood if you never
Learn to drink my juices neat.
Thanks to me, dumb speak, deaf listen,
Blind folk see, the senses glisten,
And the lame man finds his feet.

"Eld through me to youth returneth,
While thine influence o'erturneth
All a young man's lustihead;
By my force the world is laden
With new births, but boy or maiden
Through thy help was never bred."

Water saith: "A god thou! Just men
By thy craft become unjust men,
Bad, worse, worst, degenerous!
Thanks to thee, their words half uttered
Through the drunken lips are stuttered,
And thy sage is Didymus.

"I will speak the truth out wholly:
Earth bears fruit by my gift solely,
And the meadows bloom in May;
When it rains not, herbs and grasses
Dry with drought, spring's beauty passes,
Flowers and lilies fade away.

"Lo, thy crooked mother pining,
On her boughs the grapes declining,
Barren through the dearth of rain;
Mark her tendrils lean and sterile
O'er the parched earth at their peril
Bent in unavailing pain!

"Famine through all lands prevaileth,
Terror-struck the people waileth,
When I choose to keep away;
Christians kneel to Christ to gain me,
Jews and Pagans to obtain me
Ceaseless vows and offerings pay."

Wine saith: "To the deaf thou'rt singing,
Those vain self-laudations flinging!
Otherwhere thou hast been shown!
Patent 'tis to all the races
How impure and foul thy place is;
We believe what we have known!

"Thou of things the scum and rotten
Sewer, where ordures best forgotten
And unmentioned still descend!
Filth and garbage, stench and poison.
Thou dost bear in fetid foison!
Here I stop lest words offend."

Water rose, the foe invaded,
In her own defence upbraided
Wine for his invective base:
"Now at last we've drawn the curtain!
Who, what god thou art is certain
From thy oracle's disgrace.

"This thine impudent oration
Hurts not me; 'tis desecration
To a god, and fouls his tongue!
At the utmost at nine paces
Can I suffer filthy places,
Fling far from me dirt and dung!"

Wine saith: "This repudiation
Of my well-weighed imputation
Doth not clear thyself of crime!
Many a man and oft who swallowed
Thine infected potion, followed
After death in one day's time."

Hearing this, in stupefaction
Water stood; no words, no action,
Now restrained her sobs of woe.
Wine exclaims, "Why art thou dumb then?
Without answer? Is it come then
To thy complete overthrow?"

I who heard the whole contention
Now declare my song's intention,
And to all the world proclaim:
They who mix these things shall ever
Henceforth be accursed, and never
In Christ's kingdom portion claim.

The same precept, "Keep wine and water apart," is conveyed at the close of a lyric distinguished in other respects for the brutal passion of its drunken fervour. I have not succeeded in catching the rollicking swing of the original verse; and I may observe that the last two stanzas seem to form a separate song, although their metre is the same as that of the first four.

BACCHIC FRENZY.

No. 52.

Topers in and out of season!
'Tis not thirst but better reason
Bids you tope on steadily!--
Pass the wine-cup, let it be
Filled and filled for bout on bout
Never sleep!
Racy jest and song flash out!
Spirits leap!

Those who cannot drink their rations,
Go, begone from these ovations!
Here's no place for bashful boys;
Like the plague, they spoil our joys.--
Bashful eyes bring rustic cheer
When we're drunk,
And a blush betrays a drear
Want of spunk.

If there's here a fellow lurking
Who his proper share is shirking,
Let the door to him be shown,
From our crew we'll have him thrown;--
He's more desolate than death,
Mixed with us;
Let him go and end his breath!
Better thus!

When your heart is set on drinking,
Drink on without stay or thinking,
Till you cannot stand up straight,
Nor one word articulate!--
But herewith I pledge to you
This fair health:
May the glass no mischief do,
Bring you wealth!

Wed not you the god and goddess,
For the god doth scorn the goddess;
He whose name is Liber, he
Glories in his liberty.
All her virtue in the cup
Runs to waste,
And wine wedded yieldeth up
Strength and taste.

Since she is the queen of ocean,
Goddess she may claim devotion;
But she is no mate to kiss
His superior holiness.
Bacchus never deigned to be
Watered, he!
Liber never bore to be
Christened, he!

XX.

Closely allied to drinking-songs are some comic ditties which may have been sung at wine-parties. Of these I have thought it worth while to present a few specimens, though their medieval bluntness of humour does not render them particularly entertaining to a modern reader.

The first I have chosen is _The Lament of the Roast Swan_. It must be remembered that this bird was esteemed a delicacy in the Middle Ages, and also that pepper was highly prized for its rarity. This gives a certain point to the allusion in the third stanza.

THE LAMENT OF THE ROAST SWAN.

No. 53.

Time was my wings were my delight,
Time was I made a lovely sight;
'Twas when I was a swan snow-white.
Woe's me! I vow,
Black am I now,
Burned up, back, beak, and brow!

The baster turns me on the spit,
The fire I've felt the force of it,
The carver carves me bit by bit.
I'd rather in the water float
Under the bare heavens like a boat,
Than have this pepper down my throat.

Whiter I was than wool or snow,
Fairer than any bird I know;
Now am I blacker than a crow.

Now in the gravy-dish I lie,
I cannot swim, I cannot fly,
Nothing but gnashing teeth I spy.
Woe's me! I vow, &c.

The next is _The Last Will of the Dying Ass_. There is not much to be said for the wit of this piece.

THE WILL OF THE DYING ASS.

No. 54.

While a boor, as poets tell,
Whacked his patient ass too well,
On the ground half dead it fell.
La sol fa,
On the ground half dead it fell,
La sol fa mi re ut.

Then with gesture sad and low,
Streaming eyes and words of woe,
He at length addressed it so:
"Had I known, my gentle ass,
Thou from me so soon wouldst pass,
I'd have swaddled thee, alas!

"Made for thee a tunic meet,
Shirt and undershirt complete,
Breeches, drawers of linen sweet.

"Rise awhile, for pity's sake,
That ere life your limbs forsake
You your legacies may make!"

Soon the ass stood up, and thus,
With a weak voice dolorous,
His last will proclaimed for us:

"To the magistrates my head,
Eyes to constables," he said,
"Ears to judges, when I'm dead;

"To old men my teeth shall fall,
Lips to wanton wooers all,
And my tongue to wives that brawl.

"Let my feet the bailiffs win,
Nostrils the tobacco-men,
And fat canons take my skin.

"Voice to singing boys I give,
Throat to topers, may they live!
**** to students amative.

"*** on shepherds I bestow,
Thistles on divines, and lo!
To the law my shade shall go.

"Elders have my tardy pace,
Boys my rude and rustic grace,
Monks my simple open face."

He who saith this testament
Will not hold, let him be shent;
He's an ass by all consent.
La sol fa,
He's an ass by all consent,
La sol fa mi re ut.

As a third specimen I select a little bit of mixed prose and verse from the _Carmina Burana_, which is curious from its allusion to the Land of Cockaigne. Goliardic literature, it may be parenthetically observed, has some strong pieces of prose comedy and satire. Of these, the _Mass of Topers_ and _Mass of Gamesters_, the _Gospel according to Marks_, and the description of a fat monk's daily life deserve quotation.[34] They are for the most part, however, too profane to bear translation.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 34: Wright's _Rel. Ant._, ii.; _Carm. Bur._, pp. 248 and 22; Wright's _Mapes_, p. xl.]

THE ABBOT OF COCKAIGNE.

No. 55.

I am the Abbot of Cockaigne,
And this is my counsel with topers;
And in the sect of Decius (gamesters) this is my will;
And whoso shall seek me in taverns before noon;
After evensong shall he go forth naked,
And thus, stripped of raiment, shall lament him:
Wafna! wafna!
O Fate most foul, what hast thou done?
The joys of man beneath the sun
Thou hast stolen, every one!

XXI.

The transition from these trivial and slightly interesting comic songs to poems of a serious import, which played so important a part in Goliardic literature, must of necessity be abrupt. It forms no part of my present purpose to exhibit the Wandering Students in their capacity as satirists. That belongs more properly to a study of the earlier Reformation than to such an inquiry as I have undertaken in this treatise. Satires, especially medieval satires, are apt, besides, to lose their force and value in translation. I have therefore confined myself to five specimens, more or less closely connected with the subjects handled in this study.

The first has the interest of containing some ideas which Villon preserved in his ballad of the men of old time.

DEATH TAKES ALL.

No. 56.

Hear, O thou earth, hear, thou encircling sea,
Yea, all that live beneath the sun, hear ye
How of this world the bravery and the glory
Are but vain forms and shadows transitory,
Even as all things 'neath Time's empire show
By their short durance and swift overthrow!
Nothing avails the dignity of kings,
Naught, naught avail the strength and stuff of things;
The wisdom of the arts no succour brings;
Genus and species help not at death's hour,
No man was saved by gold in that dread stour;
The substance of things fadeth as a flower,
As ice 'neath sunshine melts into a shower.
Where is Plato, where is Porphyrius?
Where is Tullius, where is Virgilius?
Where is Thales, where is Empedocles,
Or illustrious Aristoteles?
Where's Alexander, peerless of might?
Where is Hector, Troy's stoutest knight?
Where is King David, learning's light?
Solomon where, that wisest wight?
Where is Helen, and Paris rose-bright?
They have fallen to the bottom, as a stone rolls:
Who knows if rest be granted to their souls?
But Thou, O God, of faithful men the Lord,
To us Thy favour evermore afford
When on the wicked judgment shall be poured!

The second marks the passage from those feelings of youth and spring-time which have been copiously illustrated in Sections xiv.-xvii., to emotions befitting later manhood and life's autumn.

AUTUMN YEARS.

No. 57.

While life's April blossom blew,
What I willed I then might do,
Lust and law seemed comrades true.
As I listed, unresisted,
Hither, thither, could I play,
And my wanton flesh obey.

When life's autumn days decline,
Thus to live, a libertine,
Fancy-free as thoughts incline,
Manhood's older age and colder
Now forbids; removes, destroys
All those ways of wonted joys.

Age with admonition wise
Thus doth counsel and advise,
While her voice within me cries:
"For repenting and relenting
There is room; forgiveness falls
On all contrite prodigals!"

I will seek a better mind;
Change, correct, and leave behind
What I did with purpose blind:
From vice sever, with endeavour
Yield my soul to serious things,
Seek the joy that virtue brings.

The third would find a more appropriate place in a hymn-book than in a collection of _Carmina Vagorum_. It is, however, written in a lyrical style so closely allied to the secular songs of the _Carmina Burana_ (where it occurs) that I have thought it well to quote its grimly medieval condemnation of human life.

VANITAS VANITATUM.

No. 58.

This vile world
In madness hurled
Offers but false shadows;
Joys that wane
And waste like vain
Lilies of the meadows.

Worldly wealth,
Youth, strength, and health,
Cramp the soul's endeavour;
Drive it down
In hell to drown,
Hell that burns for ever.

What we see,
And what let be,
While on earth we tarry,
We shall cast
Like leaves at last
Which the sere oaks carry.

Carnal life,
Man's law of strife,
Hath but brief existence;
Passes, fades,
Like wavering shades
Without real subsistence.

Therefore bind,
Tread down and grind
Fleshly lusts that blight us;
So heaven's bliss
'Mid saints that kiss
Shall for aye delight us.

The fourth, in like manner, would have but little to do with a Commersbuch, were it not for the fact that the most widely famous modern student-song of Germany has borrowed two passages from its serious and tragic rhythm. Close inspection of _Gaudeamus Igitur_ shows that the metrical structure of that song is based on the principle of quoting one of its long lines and rhyming to it.

ON CONTEMPT FOR THE WORLD.

No. 59.

"De contemptu mundi:" this is the theme I've taken:
Time it is from sleep to rise, from death's torpor waken:
Gather virtue's grain and leave tares of sin forsaken.
Rise up, rise, be vigilant; trim your lamp, be ready.

Brief is life, and brevity briefly shall be ended:
Death comes quick, fears no man, none hath his dart suspended:
Death kills all, to no man's prayer hath he condescended.
Rise up, rise, be vigilant; trim your lamp, be ready.

Where are they who in this world, ere we kept, were keeping?
Come unto the churchyard, thou! see where they are sleeping!
Dust and ashes are they, worms in their flesh are creeping.
Rise up, rise, be vigilant; trim your lamp, be ready.

Into life each man is born with great teen and trouble:
All through life he drags along; toil on toil is double:
When life's done, the pangs of death take him, break the bubble.
Rise up, rise, be vigilant; trim your lamp, be ready.

If from sin thou hast been turned, born a new man wholly,
Changed thy life to better things, childlike, simple, holy;
Thus into God's realm shalt thou enter with the lowly.
Rise up, rise, be vigilant; trim your lamp, be ready.

Having alluded to _Gaudeamus Igitur_, I shall close my translations with a version of it into English. The dependence of this lyric upon the rhythm and substance of the poem on _Contempt for the World_, which I have already indicated, is perhaps the reason why it is sung by German students after the funeral of a comrade. The Office for the Dead sounding in their ears, occasions the startling _igitur_ with which it opens; and their mind reverts to solemn phrases in the midst of masculine determination to enjoy the present while it is yet theirs.

GAUDEAMUS IGITUR.

No. 60.

Let us live then and be glad
While young life's before us!
After youthful pastime had,
After old age hard and sad,
Earth will slumber o'er us.

Where are they who in this world,
Ere we kept, were keeping?
Go ye to the gods above;
Go to hell; inquire thereof:
They are not; they're sleeping.

Brief is life, and brevity
Briefly shall be ended:
Death comes like a whirlwind strong,
Bears us with his blast along;
None shall be defended.

Live this university,
Men that learning nourish;
Live each member of the same,
Long live all that bear its name;
Let them ever flourish!

Live the commonwealth also,
And the men that guide it!
Live our town in strength and health,
Founders, patrons, by whose wealth
We are here provided!

Live all girls! A health to you,
Melting maids and beauteous!
Live the wives and women too,
Gentle, loving, tender, true,
Good, industrious, duteous!

Perish cares that pule and pine!
Perish envious blamers!
Die the Devil, thine and mine!
Die the starch-necked Philistine!
Scoffers and defamers!

XXII.

I have now fulfilled the purpose which I had in view when I began this study of the _Carmina Vagorum_, and have reproduced in English verse what seemed to me the most characteristic specimens of that literature, in so far as it may be considered precursory of the Renaissance.

In spite of novelty, in spite of historical interest, in spite of a certain literary charm, it is not an edifying product of medieval art with which I have been dealing. When I look back upon my own work, and formulate the impression left upon my mind by familiarity with the songs I have translated, the doubt occurs whether some apology be not required for having dragged these forth from antiquarian obscurity.

The truth is that there is very little that is elevated in the lyrics of the Goliardi. They are almost wholly destitute of domestic piety, of patriotism, of virtuous impulse, of heroic resolve. The greatness of an epoch which throbbed with the enthusiasms of the Crusades, which gave birth to a Francis and a Dominic, which witnessed the manly resistance offered by the Lombard burghs to the Teutonic Emperor, the formation of Northern France into a solid monarchy, and the victorious struggle of the Papacy against the Empire, finds but rare expression in this poetry. From the _Carmina Burana_ we cull one chant indeed on Saladin, one spirited lament for Richard Coeur de Lion; but their general tone is egotistic.

Even the satires, so remarkable for boldness, are directed against those ecclesiastical abuses which touched the interests of the clerkly classes--against simony, avarice, venality in the Roman Curia, against the ambition of prelates and the effort to make princely benefices hereditary, rather than against the real sins of the Church--her wilful solidification of popular superstitions for the purposes of self-aggrandisement, her cruel persecution of free thought, and her deflection from the spirit of her Founder.

With regard to women, abundant examples have been adduced to illustrate the sensual and unromantic spirit of these lettered lovers. A note of undisguised materialism sounds throughout the large majority of their erotic songs. Tenderness of feeling is rarely present. The passion is one-sided, recognised as ephemeral, without a vista on the sanctities of life in common with the beloved object. Notable exceptions to the general rule are the lyrics I have printed above on pp. 75-78. But it would have been easier to confirm the impression of licentiousness than to multiply specimens of delicate sentiment, had I chosen to ransack the whole stores of the _Carmina Burana_.

It is not necessary to censure their lack of so-called chivalrous woman-worship. That artificial mood of emotion, though glorified by the literary art of greatest poets, has something pitiably unreal, incurably morbid, in its mysticism. But, putting this aside, we are still bound to notice the absence of that far more human self-devotion of man to woman which forms a conspicuous element in the Arthurian romances. The love of Tristram for Iseult, of Lancelot for Guinevere, of Beaumains for his lady, is alien to the Goliardic conception of intersexual relations. Nowhere do we find a trace of Arthur's vow imposed upon his knights: "never to do outrage,... and alway to do ladies, damosels, and gentlewomen succour upon pain of death." This manly respect for women, which was, if not precisely the purest, yet certainly the most fruitful social impulse of the Middle Ages, receives no expression in the _Carmina Vagorum_.

The reason is not far to seek. The Clerici were a class debarred from domesticity, devoted in theory to celibacy, in practice incapable of marriage. They were not so much unsocial or anti-social as extra-social; and while they gave a loose rein to their appetites, they respected none of those ties, anticipated none of those home pleasures, which consecrate the animal desires in everyday existence as we know it. One of their most popular poems is a brutal monastic diatribe on matrimony, fouler in its stupid abuse of women, more unmanly in its sordid imputations, than any satire which emanated from the corruption of Imperial Rome.[35] The cynicism of this exhortation against marriage forms a proper supplement to the other kind of cynicism which emerges in the lyrics of triumphant seducers and light lovers.

But why then have I taken the trouble to translate these songs, and to present them in such profusion to a modern audience? It is because, after making all allowances for their want of great or noble feeling, due to the peculiar medium from which they sprang, they are in many ways realistically beautiful and in a strict sense true to vulgar human nature. They are the spontaneous expression of careless, wanton, unreflective youth. And all this they were, too, in an age which we are apt to regard as incapable of these very qualities.

The defects I have been at pains to indicate render the Goliardic poems remarkable as documents for the right understanding of the brilliant Renaissance epoch which was destined to close the Middle Ages. To the best of them we may with certainty assign the seventy-five years between 1150 and 1225. In that period, so fruitful of great efforts and of great results in the fields of politics and thought and literature, efforts and results foredoomed to partial frustration and to perverse misapplication--in that potent space of time, so varied in its intellectual and social manifestations, so pregnant with good and evil, so rapid in mutations, so indeterminate between advance and retrogression--this Goliardic poetry stands alone. It occupies a position of unique and isolated, if limited, interest; because it was no outcome of feudalism or ecclesiasticism; because it has no tincture of chivalrous or mystic piety; because it implies no metaphysical determination; because it is pagan in the sense of being natural; because it is devoid of allegory, and, finally, because it is emphatically humanistic.

In these respects it detaches itself from the artistic and literary phenomena of the century which gave it birth. In these respects it anticipates the real eventual Renaissance.

There are, indeed, points of contact between the Students' Songs and other products of the Middle Ages. Scholastic quibblings upon words; reiterated commonplaces about spring; the brutal contempt for villeins; the frequent employment of hymn-rhythms and preoccupation with liturgical phrases--these show that the Wandering Scholars were creatures of their age. But the qualities which this lyrical literature shares with that of the court, the temple, or the schools are mainly superficial; whereas the vital inspiration, the specific flavour, which render it noteworthy, are distinct and self-evolved. It is a premature, an unconscious effort made by a limited class to achieve _per saltum_ what was slowly and laboriously wrought out by whole nations in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Too precocious, too complete within too narrow limits, it was doomed to sterility. Not the least singular fact about it is that though the _Carmina Vagorum_ continued to be appreciated, they were neither imitated nor developed to any definite extent after the period which I have indicated. They fell still-born upon the unreceptive soil of European culture at that epoch. Yet they foreshadowed the mental and moral attitude which Europe was destined to assume when Italy through humanism gave its tone to the Renaissance.

The Renaissance, in Italy as elsewhere, had far more serious aims and enthusiasms in the direction of science, refined self-culture, discoveries, analysis of man and nature, than have always been ascribed to it. The men of that epoch did more hard work for the world, conferred more sterling benefits on their posterity, than those who study it chiefly from the point of view of art are ready to admit. But the mental atmosphere in which those heroes lived and wrought was one of carelessness with regard to moral duties and religious aspirations, of exuberant delight in pleasure as an object of existence. The glorification of the body and the senses, the repudiation of an ascetic tyranny which had long in theory imposed impossible abstentions on the carnal man, was a marked feature in their conception of the world; and connected with this was a return in no merely superficial spirit to the antique paganism of Greece and Rome.

These characteristics of the Renaissance we find already outlined with surprising definiteness, and at the same time with an almost childlike naivete, a careless, mirth-provoking nonchalance, in the _Carmina Vagorum_. They remind us of the Italian lyrics which Lorenzo de' Medici and Poliziano wrote for the Florentine populace; and though in form and artistic intention they differ from the Latin verse of that period, their view of life is not dissimilar to that of a Pontano or a Beccadelli.

Some folk may regard the things I have presented to their view as ugly or insignificant, because they lack the higher qualities of sentiment; others may over-value them for precisely the same reason. They seem to me noteworthy as the first unmistakable sign of a change in modern Europe which was inevitable and predestined, as the first literary effort to restore the moral attitude of antiquity which had been displaced by medieval Christianity. I also feel the special relation which they bear to English poetry of the Etizabethan age--a relation that has facilitated their conversion into our language.

That Wandering Students of the twelfth century should have transcended the limitations of their age; that they should have absorbed so many elements of life into their scheme of natural enjoyment as the artists and scholars of the fifteenth; that they should have theorised their appetites and impulses with Valla, have produced masterpieces of poetry to rival Ariosto's, or criticisms of society in the style of Rabelais, was not to be expected. What their lyrics prove by anticipation is the sincerity of the so-called paganism of the Renaissance. When we read them, we perceive that that quality was substantially independent of the classical revival; though the influences of antique literature were eagerly seized upon as useful means for strengthening and giving tone to an already potent revolt of nature against hypocritical and palsy-stricken forms of spiritual despotism.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 35: _Golias de Conjuge non ducenda_, Wright's _Mapes_, p. 77.]