THE BALLAD OF DEAD LADIES.

(François Villon, 1450.)

TELL me now in what hidden way is
Lady Flora the lovely Roman?

Where's Hipparchia, and where is Thais,
Neither of them the fairer woman?

Where is Echo, beheld of no man,

Only heard on river and mere,

She whose beauty was more than human?... But where are the snows of yester-year?

Where's Héloise, the learned nun,

For whose sake Abeillard, I ween,

Lost manhood and put priesthood on?
(From Love he won such dule and teen!)

And where, I pray you, is the Queen

Who willed that Buridan should steer

Sewed in a sack's mouth down the Seine?...

But where are the snows of yester-year?

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THE BALLAD OF DEAD LADIES.

White Queen Blanche, like a queen of lilies,
With a voice like any mermaiden,-
Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice,

And Ermengarde the lady of Maine,-
And that good Joan whom Englishmen
At Rouen doomed and burned her there,—
Mother of God, where are they then? . . .
But where are the snows of yester-year?

Nay, never ask this week, fair lord,

Where they are gone, nor yet this year,
Save with thus much for an overword,—

But where are the snows of yester-year?

TO DEATH, OF HIS LADY.

(François Villon.)

DEATH, of thee do I make my moan,
Who hadst my lady away from me,
Nor wilt assuage thine enmity

Till with her life thou hast mine own;

For since that hour my strength has flown.

Lo! what wrong was her life to thee,

Death?

Two we were, and the heart was one;

Which now being dead, dead I must be, Or seem alive as lifelessly

As in the choir the painted stone,

Death!

HIS MOTHER'S SERVICE TO OUR LADY.

(François Villon.)

LADY of Heaven and earth, and therewithal
Crowned Empress of the nether clefts of Hell,-
I, thy poor Christian, on thy name do call,
Commending me to thee, with thee to dwell,
Albeit in nought I be commendable.

But all mine undeserving may not mar
Such mercies as thy sovereign mercies are ;
Without the which (as true words testify)

No soul can reach thy Heaven so fair and far.
Even in this faith I choose to live and die.

Unto thy Son say thou that I am His,

And to me graceless make Him gracious. Sad Mary of Egypt lacked not of that bliss, Nor yet the sorrowful clerk Theophilus, Whose bitter sins were set aside even thus

HIS MOTHER'S SERVICE TO OUR LADY. 283

Though to the Fiend his bounden service was.
Oh help me, lest in vain for me should pass

(Sweet Virgin that shalt have no loss thereby!)
The blessed Host and sacring of the Mass.
Even in this faith I choose to live and die.

A pitiful poor woman, shrunk and old,

I am, and nothing learn'd in letter-lore.

Within my parish-cloister I behold

A painted Heaven where harps and lutes adore,

And eke an Hell whose damned folk seethe full sore:

One bringeth fear, the other joy to me.

That joy, great Goddess, make thou mine to be,—
Thou of whom all must ask it even as I ;

And that which faith desires, that let it see.
For in this faith I choose to live and die.

O excellent Virgin Princess! thou didst bear
King Jesus, the most excellent comforter,
Who even of this our weakness craved a share

And for our sake stooped to us from on high,
Offering to death His young life sweet and fair.
Such as He is, Our Lord, I Him declare,

And in this faith I choose to live and die.