one could wish to see, we were offered bread, and a kind of pancake, and other eatables. Evidently the good people took in the idea that we had lost our way, and assumed that we must therefore be short of food. At last we left them, bidding them 'good-day,' in their own tongue, and intending to continue our ramble; but unluckily for us, our friend's house was in a commanding situation, and they, full of the imagination that we wanted to be guided back to the place we had come from, shouted after us and pointed and gesticulated, till we were fairly forced to retrace our steps and return to Bédarray by the identical path which had brought us thence. But the whole adventure was an amusing one, and one which made us realise more vividly than ever how rooted the Basque language is among the people, and how far they still are from blending with the French. The emigrants too, as we are told by those who have been among them, keep up the use of their own tongue in their Californian and Mexican and Peruvian homes.

Another 'note' of their nationality is the dance called the sant Basque. We were fortunate enough to witness it on the occasion of a village feast, but it is becoming rare, and we were sadly told by a middle-aged driver, himself a proficient, that the young men do not care to learn it. The reason of this is perhaps that in the old dance the men dance together while the women look on, and it is conceivable that the youths may prefer partners of the fairer sex. Certainly the fact remains that when we saw the dance, the dancers were all men no longer young. A fiddler sat on a barrel, and the dance, which consisted of a rythmical springing into the air, accompanied by appropriate clappings of hands and snappings of fingers, went on gravely around him, while the women were grouped outside the circle of dancers. It all took place in the open air, on a little grass plot just by the churchyard wall, and after inspecting the church, we were amused to find that our driver, a remarkably staid man of about sixty, had joined the dance, and was jumping and snapping his fingers with the best of them.

Of literature the Basques have but little, and such as there is almost entirely consists of translations from other languages. It is as men of action-from the time that they cut off Charlemagne's paladins and piers' in the deadly pass of Roncevalles; as bold navigators even to the frozen shores of Greenland; as generals such as Harispe, who helped to check the advance of Wellington during those months when the French armies were being forced back inch by inch; as missionaries faithful and fearless like Xavier-that this people's greatest lights have shone. And so, as might be expected of such a race, their original literature takes the form of ballads, handed down orally, set to wild melodies which may well have reminded the travellers of their distant mountain homes, and have nerved the arm of the warrior as he sang of love or of war. Some of these ballads have been collected and printed with their music, which has a marked character of its

own; usually the airs are set in minor keys, and the intervals used rather seem to resemble those of the ancient plain-song' than more modern music. A song which was evidently a great favourite with the maid who dusted our rooms in one place, and who was constantly singing it as she swept, reminded us of the old hymn for Easter, O filii et filiæ. The words, however, were purely secular, beginning 'farewell, beloved.' This ballad was only one of a considerable number still commonly sung. Sometimes they are lamentations over the death or defeat of some hero, sometimes they are convivial or comic, but of course the majority are love songs. These frequently take the form of a dialogue between a girl and her lover; she distrusts or scorns his advances, while he vehemently or tenderly urges his suit. There are many references to the palombe, the white mountain dove which is caught with nets in the Pyrenees during the autumn months, and which furnishes a simile ready to the hand of the Basque poet. We give a short specimen of this class of songs, translated from M. Vinson's French version given in his interesting little book Les Basques et le Pays Basque :

'O, white dove, whither wilt thou go?
Each mountain pass is full of snow;
Come, tarry till the morning light
And rest beneath my roof this night.

The snowy drifts I do not fear,
Nor yet the darkness drawing near,
My well-beloved, for thee I'd brave
All dangers of the land or wave.

Fair is the white dove's snowy wing,
But 'tis not of the dove I sing.
Dear one, thy like can ne'er be found

If I should search the whole world round.'

A ballad of very different character recalls some incident of feudal days when the French 'count' exercised some kind of suzerainty over the Basques, and when there was a continual petty warfare between the two races. In the translation an attempt has been made to imitate the roughness of rhyme and rhythm found in the original. The story is suggested rather than told by the poet, who doubtless wrote at a time when it was unnecessary to give more than an outline of the tragedy. It should be mentioned that the sons of Aitor' is the Basque term for the foreign nobles.

'No marrow have the trees

Nor any bones the cheese;

I knew not, I, that Aitor's sons could be as false as these!

Andoce's valley long

Ah, me! the valley long!

My heart is stricken sore with grief, and wrung with anguish strong.

Berterretch from his bed

Soft to his servant said

Go forth and tell me if my cruel foes are gathered.

The maid makes quick reply

I sce before mine eye

Thrice twelve armed men who into every window look and pry.

Now from his window he
Makes offer courteously

Of five score cows unto the Count if he will set him free.

The traitor Count straightway

To Berterretch did say

Come to the door, thou surely shalt return without delay.

Oh, mother, now give me

My shirt, perchance 'twill be

The last, who lives this Easter morn will keep in memory.

Oh! Mari-Santz ran fast!
Bost-Mendieta past

Upon her knees before Buztanobi she fell at last.

O, young Buztanobi,

O, brother, dear to me,

If thou wilt give no aid my son is lost assuredly.

My sister, hold thy peace

And from thy weeping cease,

Thy son, if still he lives, must be at Mauleon ere this.

Oh! Mari-Santz ran well!

Before the Count she fell,

Ah! ah! my lord, where have you my brave son, I pray you tell.

Is Berterretch thy son?

Is he thine only one?

Near Espeldoy, he now lies dead, if thou canst save him, run.

Espeldoy's hearts of stone

No kindness have they shown,

They had a corpse so near their doors, and yet it was not known!

Espeldoy's maiden sweet

They call her Marguerite

Her hands are full of blood of Berterretch dead at her feet.'

The final verse does not lend itself kindly to translation, at any rate into English. We append the version of M. Sallaberry, the compiler of a volume of Basque songs with their native melodies:

'La lessive des Espeldoy

Oh! la belle lessive!

Il s'y trouve, dit-on, trois douzaines de chemises de Berterretch.'

It must be owned that there is a certain bathos in this conclusion, and it is difficult to see the force of it, unless it be that the coldhearted inhabitants of Espeldoy plundered the goods of the murdered Berterretch and became possessed of the 'trois douzaines de chemises!'

We have tried in this slight sketch to give some of the more salient characteristics of the Basques, such as may be observed by a passing traveller who takes an interest in the diversities of race and language which are to be met with at no great distance from our own shores. Except from philologists, it seems to us that these people have hardly

received as much notice as they deserve. Most of the French writers on the subject try to minimise the differences which to our eyes form so sharp a boundary line between their compatriots and the Escualdunak, as the Basques call themselves. M. Francisque Michel, however, writes sympathetically, even enthusiastically about them, and his book should be studied by all who wish for a full account of the customs, history, and celebrities of this most interesting race, the last remnant, as it would seem, if we except the Finns, of the old pre-Aryan stock in Europe. We have confined ourselves as far as possible to our own experiences among the Basques,' pleasant experiences which it is our hope at some future day to repeat and enlarge.

E. E. K.

THE SPINSTERS.

Ir was a burning summer day, and I was alone in a fragrant firwood, lying at my ease upon a mossy cushion covered with brown fir-needles, and letting my thoughts run without control over the various subjects which had of late most frequently occupied them. One of these was a discussion which I had had with my wife upon the subject of the relative capacities of men and women. We did not agree in our conclusions, and she lost her temper-I never lose mine -and told me that it was quite self-evident that a world composed entirely of women would be a much more successful one than a world composed entirely of men. I told her that the opposite proposition was equally self-evident to me; and then, lest she should be led into a conjugal quarrel of which I was sure she would repent, I walked away without giving her time for an answer.

All at once I looked up and saw standing close beside me a little active middle-aged lady, dressed in a short skirt and close bodice of brown satin, which fitted closely to her neat little figure. On her head she wore a hood of the same material; and her boots, stockings, and gloves all matched exactly with the rest of her dress. The expression on her face was not benevolent, nor unkind, nor domineering, nor could it be described as anything but intensely businesslike. Apparently she had not seen me, for when I rose up, feeling that my easy recumbent attitude was not exactly suited for the presence of a lady, she gave a great start, and apparently would have hastened off if I had not said, 'Pray do not let me disturb you, madam,' which apparently reassured her. She sat down again, and I noticed that she was out of breath, and seemed fatigued.

'I am afraid you are tired,' I said.

Tired? I should think I was. It is our wedding-day.'

Cause and effect did not seem extremely clear to me, and I wondered why the bridegroom had been so ungallant as to leave his bride alone on so interesting an occasion. I suppose,' I said, the happy man is at no great distance. This is a pleasant wood to wander in with-er-one we love.'

She looked at me in bewilderment, till suddenly she seemed to understand what I said, and an indignant flush rose up in her face. 'Sir!' she said, 'do you mean to insult me? or is it possible you take me for one of the brides?'

I did not know what I had done, and remarked that I did not quite see how I should be supposed to know.