Montfort. The number of French words which it contains, and the easy way in which they are employed, unite to prove that the new English language was well on in the process of formation, conditioned always by the necessity, which this writer frankly accepts, of incorporating a vast number of French words, expressive of the ideas which England owed to the Norman invasion. Again, the broad, hearty satire, the strong anti-royalist, or rather anti-foreigner, prejudices of the writer, the energy of resolution which the lines convey, point unmistakably to the rise, which indeed must any way be dated from this century, of a distinct English nationality, uniting and reconciling the Norman and Saxon elements. A portion of this poem is subjoined : Sitteth alle still, and herkneth to me; Richard, thah thou be ever trichard,' Sire Simond de Mountfort hath suore bi ys chyn, Should he never more come to is yn," Ne with sheld, ne with spere, ne with other gyn, To helpe of Wyndesore. Richard, &c. 8 1 Treacherous. 2 Weened. 3 Mill. 4 Their. 6 A military engine. 6 Had. 7 His inn. 8 Engine. Be thou lief, be thou loth. 10 Grey horse. 11 Promise. Edward, thou dudest ase a shreward, Richard, thah thou be ever trichard, Tricthen shalt thou never more. 92. To the reign of Henry III. (1216-1272) is supposed to belong the remarkable poem of The Owl and Nightingale, written probably by the Maister Nichole of Guldeforde (Guildford), who is named in it, or else by his brother John of Guildford, the author of the piece which, in the Cottonian MS., precedes that which we have under consideration. Perched on a spray, whence she looks down with sovereign contempt on her unmelodious adversary, the Nightingale challenges the Owl to a contest and controversy regarding their respective qualities of song. The Owl consents; a dialogue follows, in which the Owl stands chiefly on the defensive, maintaining that her song is less harsh, and her appetite for mice and small birds less ravenous, than the proud Nightingale would allow. In the end they agree to go to Portesham, and submit their dispute to Master Nicholas of Guildford. The Owl says that she can repeat all that has been said : 'Telle ich con word after worde; Ah hu heo spedde of heore dome (I can tell word after word, and if it seemeth to thee that I mis-state, do thou stand against me and stop judgment.' With these words forth they fared, all without army and without followers, until they reached Portesham. But how they sped in their judgment, I can no more tell you; here is no more of this story.) The poem is nearly 1,800 lines long; it is in the dialect of the South of England, with many Danish forms. It was probably imitated from the Roman de Rose, or rather suggested by it. In that famous and widely influential poem, frequent mention is made of birds and their singing powers. The garden which the poet sees in his dream is alive with them : In many places were nyghtyngales, 1 Forsake thine uncle's teaching. and various other birds, That songen for to wynne hem prys, 93. In Hickes' Thesaurus, part of a moral poem of 119 stanzas is given, which the learned editor placed just after the Conquest, and to which Warton (Eng. Poetry, § 1) would assign a still earlier date. The progressive changes in the language being now better understood, no modern critic would think of placing this poem much before the middle of the thirteenth century. From a MS. in the Bodleian the following specimen is taken: Early English Prose: The Ancren Riwle; Ayenbite of Inwyt. 94. It would not be easy to point out any considerable work in English prose, belonging to the period between the cessation of the Peterborough Chronicle in 1154 and the end of the twelfth century. Early in the thirteenth, the Ancren Riwle, or rule for Anchorites, was written. This interesting treatise partakes of three characters; it is a rule of daily life, a manual of instruction in those portions of the Christian doctrine which relate to counsels of perfection, and a guide to devotion. It was edited for the Camden Society in 1853. It has been ascribed to Simon of Ghent, who died in 1315; but 4 though. 5 young. The reader will observe how this letter 5, which represented a guttural sound in the early language, was replaced in course of time, in some words by g or gh, in others by y. e earth; A.S. middangeard. 7 through the devil's rancour; A.S. anda. sorrow. ⚫ toil. G considering the very archaic character of the language, the opinion which holds a former bishop of Salisbury, Richard le Poore, to be the author, appears to me preferable. Bishop le Poore, the commencer, and in great part the builder, of the glorious cathedral at Salisbury, died in 1237. The work was written for a small society, consisting of three religious ladies, residing at Tarente, now Tarrant-Kaimes, in Dorsetshire. At a later period their house received the Cistercian rule, but at this time they appear not to have belonged to any regular order. The dialect is considered to be West of England; it much resembles that of Lazamon, but differs from it in respect of the large number of French and Latin words which it admits. I quote a sentence from the extract printed in Mr. Kington Oliphant's Standard English : 'A lefdi [lady) was, pet was mid hire voan [foes] biset al abuten, and hire lond al destrued, and heo [she] al povre, wiðinnen one eordene castle. On [a] mihti kinges luve was pauh [however] biturned upon hire, so un-imete [measureless] swude [very], pet he vor [for] wouhlecchunge [wooing] sende hire his sonden [messengers], on efter oder, and ofte somed [at once] monie [many]: and sende hire beaubelet [baubles, jewels] bode veole [many] and feire, and sukurs of livenes [victuals], and help of his heie hird [army] to holden hire castel.' 95. The Ayenbite of Inwyt, or Remorse of Conscience, is a translation by Dan Michel, of Northgate, Kent, made in 1340, of the French treatise, 'Le Somme des Vices et des Vertus,' composed near the end of the thirteenth century by Frère Lorens. The dialect is the Kentish, and exceedingly rough. It was edited by Dr. Morris for the Early English Text Society in 1866. CHAPTER I. 883 EARLY ENGLISH PERIOD. 1350-1450. 1. HITHERTO Such English writers as we have met with since the Conquest have generally appeared in the humble guise of translators or imitators. In the period before us we at last meet with original invention applied on a large scale this, therefore, is the point at which English literature takes its true commencement. The Latin and French compositions, which engaged so much of our attention in the previous period, may in this be disposed of in a few words. That Englishmen still continued to write French poetry, we have the proof in many unprinted poems by Gower, and might also infer from a passage, often quoted, in the prologue to the Testament of Love. But few such pieces are of sufficient merit to bear printing. In French prose scarcely anything can be mentioned besides the despatches, treaties, &c., contained in Rymer's Fodera and similar compilations, and the original draft of Sir John Maundevile's Travels in the Holy Land. Froissart's famous Chronicle may, indeed, be considered as partly belonging to us, since it treats largely of English feats of arms, and its author-the son of a painter of armorial bearings-entered in early youth the service of Queen Philippa in the capacity of secretary, and held for many years a post in the household of Edward III. 2. In Latin poetry there is nothing that deserves mention except the Liber Metricus of Thomas Elmham, concerning the career of Henry V., edited by Mr. Cole for the Rolls series in 1858. Elmham, who flourished about the year 1440, was a Benedictine monk in the monastery of St. Austin's, Canterbury. The poem contains 1,349 lines, and is, as Byron would have 1 Lette than clerkes enditen in Latin, for they have the propertie of science, and the knowing in that facultie: and lette Frenchmen in their Frenche also enditen their queinte termes, for it is kyndely to their mouthes, and let us showe our fantasies in soche wordes as we lerneden of our dames tonge.' |