still less the common people. Italy produced the earliest historians of civic communities. Historians just and sympathetic towards the humblest classes have only appeared in recent times. The early French vernacular chroniclers spoken of were, with the exception of Froissart, noblemen; and Froissart, although of plebeian birth and clerical training, was a thorough courtier. They all, therefore, occupied themselves only with the things for which noblemen in those days cared. Their works expressed and reflected the spirit and features of feudalism and chivalry.

The direct originating impulse to these works came from the Crusades. Before the thirteenth century France had acquired a large fund of life and force which she displayed in poetry, in art, in scholastic speculation, and in political activity. She had become a separate, centralised, and organised power, capable of so strongly influencing surrounding peoples that the direction of the Crusades fell chiefly into her hands. No other European country was so much influenced by the contact of the Eastern and Western peoples which then took place. Green, in his 'Short History of the English People,' does not devote a single paragraph to tracing the influence of the Crusades on England; and the omission, if a defect, is not a very serious one. A similar omission in a far shorter History of France would be a conspicuous proof of the ignorance and incompetence of its author. The Crusades affected the social and national development of England comparatively little, and for the most part indirectly; they influenced that of France powerfully and directly.

Geoffrey Villehardouin wrote, or more probably dictated, in the later years of his life, an account of the events which he witnessed, and in which he bore a distinguished part, during the fourth crusade. In a fresh and vivid but crude and unpolished narrative, he has told of the gathering of the crusaders, of the negotiations and alliance with the Venetians, of the differences of party and opinion in the expedition, of the capture of Zara, of the compact with Alexius and its issue, of the taking of Constantinople, and of the establishment of a Latin empire among the Greeks. The recital is artless and unadorned, but not without force, directness, and felicitous

lines and touches. Villehardouin, obviously a man of much practical ability, saw with clearness what came before him, and has left us in no doubt as to what it was that he saw; but his personal impressions suggested to him few general reflections, and of historical or other speculation there are no traces in his pages.1

Joinville was of a finer and richer nature than his predecessor and possessed of true literary genius. In his 'Histoire de St. Louis,' written in 1309, the style is no longer, as in Villehardouin, rough and unpliant, but easy, flowing, and flexible, and capable of expressing reflections and feelings as well as merely conveying events; and the superiority as regards mastery over the materials, the co-ordination of the facts, the disposition of the narrative, is no less decided. He does not proceed simply narrating what he witnessed; he also judges and compares, meditates and moralises, finds expression for the varying moods of his own gay, generous, vivacious spirit, and gradually and skilfully produces an imperishable portraiture of the most conscientious and pious man who ever sat upon the throne of France, or, perhaps, of any nation.2

Villehardouin is little more than a chronicler; Joinville, as an excellent artist, is much more. But Froissart, who laboured for nearly forty years in the latter half of the fourteenth century on the brilliant work which has immortalised his name, daily (to use his own words) "rentrant dedans sa forge, pour ouvrer et forger en la haute et noble matière du temps passé," openly claims to be an historian as distinguished from a chronicler. "If I were merely to say such and such things happened at such times, without entering fully into the matter, which was

1 The best editions of Villehardouin are those of M. Paulin Paris and M. Natalis de Wailly. For a general estimate of his character as a writer, see Daunou, Hist. litt. de France, 1852, xvii. 150-171, and Sainte-Beuve, Causeries du Lundi, ix. 305-330. Recently the trustworthiness of his narrative has been seriously assailed by Count Riant in t. xvii., xviii., and xxiii. of the Rev. d. quest. hist.; by L. Streit and J. Tessier in special brochures; and by E. Pears, The Fall of Constantinople, 1885. There is a sketch of his character taken from the new point of view by M. Ed. Sayons in vol. xxv., 1886, of the Cpte. Rend. d. Séan. et Trav. de l'Acad. d. Sc. Mor. et Pol.

2 On Joinville see Vitet, Rev. d. Deux Mondes, lxxv., 132-163 (1868); N. de Wailly in Comptes Rendus d. Acad. Inscr. et Bel.-Let., 1865; and ChampollionFigeac, Mel. Hist., i. 615-645.

grandly horrible and disastrous, this would be a chronicle, but no history." The work of Froissart describes in detail the great enterprises and deeds of arms done not only in France, but in England, Scotland, and Ireland, Spain and Portugal, Germany and Italy, and even in Poland and Turkey and Africa, from 1326 to 1400, with a liveliness, garrulity, and natural grace, which recall Herodotus, and with a spiritedness of movement and a splendour and variety of incidents which remind us of Walter Scott. Never had been seen before historical painting on so broad a canvas, so crowded, and so richly coloured. All feudalism is there, and in all its magnificence. Yet Froissart, notwithstanding his inexhaustible curiosity, his vast memory, his keen interest in the things he described, his rare power of graphic portraiture, and his skill as a narrator, was not a historian in any strict or high sense. He lacked insight and seriousness; cared little to distinguish between reality and appearance, between the vero and the ben trovato; looked with indifference on oppression and cruelty; and sought as an author only to give pleasure and to gain fame.1

Monstrelet began his Chronicle with the year 1400,―i.e., where that of Froissart had ended. He had none of the brilliant qualities of his predecessor. His prolixity makes him tiresome, notwithstanding the inherent interest of many of the events which he narrates. His general truthfulness is unquestionable, although he favoured the house of Burgundy to the extent of omitting or passing lightly over certain things which were not to its credit. His work contains much valuable historical information, but is not the production of an historical artist, and contains little historical reflection and no historical generalisations.

Leaving unnoticed Christina de Pisa and Alain Chartier, we pass to Philip de Commines, the chamberlain and councillor of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, and afterwards the confident and adviser of the politic and unscrupulous Louis XI. The latter prince, who played the same part in France which his contemporaries Henry VII. and Ferdinand the Catholic did

1 On Froissart see Sainte-Beuve, C. d. L., ix. 63-96; Curne in Mém. Acad. Inscr. et Bel.-Let., x., xiii., xiv. ; and K. de Lettenhove, Froissart, Étude littéraire sur le xive siècle, Bruxelles, 1857.

in England and Spain in destroying the power of the nobles and raising on its ruins the absolute rule of the monarch, is the hero of Commines' Memoirs. It is not the impetuous Charles but this astute Louis that the historian admires, not courage but policy, not brilliant feats of arms but successful intrigues. With him, as I have already had to remark, history first became political and reflective. Unlike the older chroniclers, he was not content to narrate merely in order to narrate and please, but sought even more to explain and instruct. He described incidents briefly, but was careful to indicate why things happened as they did, and what effects they produced. Hence his style was comparatively abstract, and he reasoned as well as recorded. From having been the first to endeavour of set purpose and with conspicuous success to detect and disclose the motive principles of historical personages and the causal connections of historical transactions, he has some right to the title, which has been so often given to him, of father of modern history. He made a distinct step beyond simple chronicling, and towards the mode of writing history in which his younger contemporaries, Guicciardini and Machiavelli, were the first greatly to excel. He was not, however, the intellectual equal of either of these celebrated Italians, and cannot properly be placed on the same level with either as an historian. He wrote only an historical memoir, whereas Guicciardini gave a complete account of one of the most complicated and agitated periods of Italian history. The practical shrewdness and judiciousness of his estimates of persons and actions deserve due appreciation, but they are not to be compared with the genius of a truly scientific kind displayed by Machiavelli in his treatment of Roman and Florentine history. His vision was clear and keen within the narrow range of personal experience, but he had neither conception nor feeling of the working of a general spirit, laws, and tendencies in human affairs. Hence the peculiarity by which Dr Arnold was much impressed, his perfect unconsciousness that the state of things which he described was on the point of passing away. In one respect he strikingly resembled Guicciardini and Machiavelli. In his eyes as in theirs, the political wisdom which it was the chief use of history to teach was to know how to attain political success. He was,

The

like his master the king, a Machiavellian before Machiavelli. Dr Arnold has said, "Philip de Comines praises his master Louis the Eleventh as one of the best of princes, although he witnessed not only the crimes of his life, but the miserable fears and suspicions of his latter end, and has even faithfully recorded them. In this respect Philip de Comines is in no respect superior to Froissart, with whom the crimes committed by his knights and great lords never interfere with his general eulogies of them."1 Along with a correct statement of fact, these words contain a misleading rapprochement of names. conscience of Froissart was perverted by prejudices inherent in the chivalry which he admired; that of Commines by an estimate of statesmanship which naturally gained acceptance in an age in which great and even beneficial social results appeared to have been attained by most immoral means. Commines was not, like Froissart, indifferent to the sufferings and the rights of the common people; he vigorously and feelingly condemned despotic government and arbitrary taxation. Nor was he insensible that the ruler who violates morality, although he may be approved at the bar of history, must be condemned at a higher tribunal. He distinguished between the politician and the man, and admitted that one might be wise as a politician yet foolish as a man. The masterly account which he gave of the last illness and death of King Louis goes far to compensate for the moral laxity which he had shown in the description of some of his actions. His not unfrequent references to God and Providence have been regarded as indications that he had formed a general and so far philosophical conception of history. In reality, they are of that naïve and simple kind which show that he had not. He made such references only when he felt experience and reason fail him in his attempts at historical interpretation.2

The Hundred Years' War between the French and the English on the Continent ended about the middle of the fifteenth cen

1 Lectures on Modern History, p. 119.

2 On Commines may be consulted Sainte-Beuve, Caus. d. Lun., i. 241-257; Baron de Lettenhove, Lettres et Négoc. de Ph. de C., Brux. 1867; and W. Arnold, Die ethisch-politischen Grundanschauungen des Philipp von Comynes, Dresd. 1873. Villehardouin, Joinville, Froissart, Monstrelet, and Commines have all been translated into English.