gueilleuse Pucelle. It was literally for love of them,-for, as she could have no joy of them in life, she was determined to have joy of them in death, and so in her chapel she prepared four magnificent coffins for them and for herself. Gawain was her guest, and by good fortune this pious Pucelle was so proud that she never asked any guest his name; so she took him into the chapel and showed him the coffins, and told him why they were made, and then showing him some relics, she made him observe her device, which was that when she had these knights here she would lead them to adore these relics, and as soon as they had put their heads through the window by which they were to be seen, she would then take out a peg, and a knife, sharp as a razor, would fall upon their necks.

Through great part of this book the name is written Parlevaulx-but at the close Perceval. Is this proof of two authors? Sic opinor.

Ships and sepulchres the favourite objects of the author's fancy.

Few or no moralizations in the second part, which seems to be by a different hand, or perhaps by many. The first is clearly one man's work, and very Gestaish.

"How Parlevaulx had a tub made ready, and made all the knights of the Sire des Mares be beheaded before him, so that their blood should run into the tub; and how he had the Sire des Mares drowned in this tub in the blood of his knights."

Loheant, the only son of Arthur and Guenever, had a custom that whenever he killed a man he lay down to sleep upon his body. He was taking his nap one day upon a giant whom he had just demolished, when Sir Keux, the seneschal came by, and for the sake of getting credit, killed him in his sleep, then cut off the giant's head and carried it to court, to claim the merit of having slain him and revenged Loheac. But a damsel had seen all. 165.

L'Opere Magnanime dei due Tristani, CAVA

LIERI DELLE TAVOLA RITONDA, Co'l Privilegio del sommo Pontefice et dell' illustriss. Senato Veneto per anni xx. In Venetia per Michele Tramezino 1555. THE first part is made from the French romance, with an interpolation about the birth of the second Tristan, parts of which the author did not bear in mind when he returned to the thread of the original story.

P. 173. So good a journey that she was not more than four months going from Cornwall to Britanny.

Don Chehai, my old acquaintance, is called.

229. Here is the old knight from Giron. The second part is original, and very worthless.

22. "Ella cavalco su un bonissimo cavallo Armellino come neve, co crini & coda falsi, ch'era maraviglia à vederlo ?"

64. A lady who has been long ill grows fat with joy after her recovery, so that in the course of a day it is perceptible, and she is complimented upon it.

114. "La Infanta et l'altre signore le trassero l'elmo di testa, et li nettarono il viso con le maniche delle loro camicie." Had they no handkerchiefs, that shift sleeves were used for this purpose? Again, 171, "cosi cavatoli l'elmo gli ascuigaron il volto con le lor sottili maniche delle camicie."

176. From Cornwall to Camelot a journey of 1000 leagues!

193. King Tristan asks why King Arthur took a castle from a certain Phebus, in which quarrel he is about to fight a combat in the King's cause. "Sire rispose Don Galasso, per due cause principali, la prima perche Phebro era infidele inimico della nostra santa fede catholica. Non me ne dite piu, rispose il Re, che questa basta."

207. Coarse and witless satire upon the Portugueze. The Spanish geography in this book is correct.

236. Elisandro, performing his vigil before knighthood, past the night agreeably,

"nondimeno il peso dell' arme havra fatta l'operation sua su le carni et su l'ossa de Elisandro."

245. "La salsa de S. Bernardo" -a phrase for hunger.

250. All the women fall in love with the inexorable Tristan at first sight, and one of them dies of love in the course of an hour or two.

Perceval le Galloys.

THE Preface calls it " ung ancien livre intitule Lhystoire de Perceval le gallois faict en ryme et langaige non usité, lesquelz ilz avoient faict traduyte de ryme en prose et langaige moderne pour imprimer."

The prologue states that Philip, Count of Flanders, gave orders to bring to light the life and chivalrous deeds of Percival "suyvant | le chronique diceluy Prince et traictie du S. Graal." Both he and his chronicler died before this could be accomplished; and a long time after Madame Jehanne, Countess of Flanders, seeing the beginning of the Chronicle, and knowing the intention of Count Philip her "ayeul," ordered "ung sien familier orateur" named Mennessier "traduire et achever" this work. The which he did, but because his language and that of his predecessor is not in usage in our common French but "fort non acoustumete estrange," to satisfy the desires, pleasures, and will of the princes, lords, and others following the mother tongue of France, I have employed myself" a traduire et mectre de Rithme en prose" the book, following closely according to my possibility and power the sense of my predecessor-translators.

tement proprement vestue et par especial manches serrees et estroictes portoit, parquoy les aultres la nommerent la pucelle aux manches estroictes."

30. "Le superlatif du tournoy."

44. Arthur's mother turns out to be alive in this romance, living in a castle, where Gavain by great adventure discovers her. Mother and son, however, meet afterwards with great unconcern.

67. Gawain cut off a man's head-" actaignit ung de telle sorte que la teste envoia par terre, qui si doulcement et vistement fust decollé, que bien petit ne sentit lespee."

71. "Tristan qui jamais ne rist."

112. After a long battle,-" il est assez a croire et a considerer que les deux chevalliers furent lors fort foibles et petit vertueux, car tant avoient de sang perdu qua grand peine se soubstenoient."

126. A chapter begins thus-"Icy fine et fault le compte delescu,"-but no tale of a shield has been told.

133. A chess board, where one set play themselves. It seems they were made at London.

146. Fighting with a knight whose sword breaks, Perceval throws away his own sword, and proposes to finish the battle with fists, so they set to and box, knock one another's helmets off (not considering the knuckles), and then hammer away at the face and the teeth, till the knight loses his wind and yields. This is the only boxing match I have met with.

There are no regular squires in these ro

mances.

P. 71-2.Le Roy commande que les mangonneaulx que vault a dire les pionniers."

Perceval in this romance is without one of the virtues which the S. Greall imputes to him.

ff. 28. A lady at a tournament "fort coin

peche mortel."

157. A huntsman "bien botté dugnes bottes dengleterre."

175. "Le beau descongneu is Guiglaius," son of Gavain.

177. "Gauchier de Doudain qui ceste hystoire nous a commemoree."

196. Here we have the Dame de Male

hault, whose brother is here made the king of the hundred knights.

196. "Les oysillons chantent en leur latin divers mottetz en leur ramage."

At the end Perceval has a brother called Agloal-the author forgetting that all his brothers had been killed at the beginning. He turns hermit, and when he dies the Graal and the Lana and "le digne tailloir dargent" are carried up to heaven with his soul.

There are some good adventures of Gavan, whose history takes up as great a part of the work as Perceval's. One of these represents him as behaving very ill. This story is grossly inconsistent, strangely so; but on the whole the author considers him as a perfect knight.

Perceval is by no means a hero who attracts the reader; he is far too indifferent to his plighted Blanchefleur.

"Hast thou an ear

To listen but to what thou shouldst not hear ?"

No chronological order is observed in these extracts, but they are given as they appear to have been written.--J. W. W.

Suffice the vast triangled heart of man."

40." And antedate my own damnation by despair."

Here, I think, Penn found his title.1

Job.

P. 179. SATAN's account of his employment on earth. A stroke of satire, hardly to have been looked for here.

185. Alexander.

"Wouldst thou by conquest win more fame than he?

Subdue thyself; thyself's a world to thee."

But this whole Meditation is impressive

as well as characteristic.

206. Meditation 8.

213. "What refuge hast thou then, but to present

A heart inricht with the sad complement Of a true convert, on thy bended knee Before thy God, t'atone2 thy God and thee."

234. "To Athens, gown'd, he goes, and

from that school

Returns unsped, a more instructed fool."

234. "The swelling of an outward for

tune can

Create a prosperous, not a happy man.
A peaceful conscience is the true content,
And wealth is but her golden ornament."

234. "I am to God, I only seem to man." All these scriptural poems of his are di

The title alluded to is his No Cross no Crown, &c. 1682. 8vo. It is Jeremy Taylor that says (I quote memoriter), "Every person shall in some sort bear his cross, and it is not well with those who do it not."

2 This is the old sense of the word. I instance the following, not found in NARES' Gloss. or elsewhere,

"Which union must all divers things attone," &c.

LORD BROOKE, Treat. of Monarchie.

"And if some kind wight goe not to attone My surly master with me, wretched maid, I shall be beaten dead."

BROWNE, Britannia's Pastorals.
J. W. W.

vided into short sections, followed each by a meditation.

Samson.

JUSTIFICATION in the preface of certain passages at which "extreme severity might shock."

P. 268." Even when her bed-rid faith was grown so frail,

That very hope grew heartless to prevail.”

The weakness of a lonely woman's breast." 276.-"some false delusion that possest

278. "her breathless tongue disjoins Her broken words."

282. A catalogue of birds, &c. in the manner of Chaucer and Spenser.

"The cuckoo, ever telling of one tale."

313. Luxuries of the table. Viper-wines mentioned as aphrodisiacs. 327. Some of his oddities in the description of Samson killing the Philistines.

355. "Where Heaven doth please to
ruin, human wit

Must fail, and deeper policy submit;
There wisdom must be fool'd, and strength
of brain

Must work against itself, or work in vain." "the silly ass's bone,

Not worth the spurning."

365. Gold,-why so rarely produced by

nature.

381. Here is Cowley's conceit, speaking of the temple which Samson pulled down, the ruins, he says,

"with an unexpected blow, Gave every one his death and burial too." 382. The concluding Meditation.

Sion's Sonnets.

THIS is a paraphrase of Solomon's Song, cut into shreds of four couplets, in which I have not found a single line or expression worth noting.