the place pleasant and agreeable. Torches were kindled, and placed within the entrance, and beside them the mariners and soldiers stood, expecting the storm to subside, and uttering profane jests, and singing licentious songs. Beatrice sat at a considerable distance from this rude groupe,-a small torch burned beside her, and before her stood Sir Aymer, silent and thoughtful,—a dark flush was on his face, he seemed forming some evil resolution. She watched his looks; he was ever a man of few words, and now his power of speech seemed o'ermastered by some internal commotion. Sir Aymer,' said she, this fearful storm, and the perils to which Lady Heron is exposed, trouble you sore; look out on the night, and tell me if the tempest is likely soon to abate.' Ho there, Stephen,' said Sir Aymer, look to sea and sky, and say what further they bode." A step was heard, and a hoarse voice answered, The sky is black as hell, and the sea seethes like a cauldron of pitch,-can't say when the storm may slacken." Sir Aymer strode a pace or two, and said, By the might of heaven, lady, love for you troubles me more than a thousand storms;-I have loved you fondly, and I have loved you long.' Sir Knight,' said Beatrice, have you forgot your vows of honour and arms, and have you forgot Sir Hugh Heron? But you wish to be pleasant of speech in this dreary hour;-I am glad to hear you speak, and if you will describe one of your well-fought battles, you will find me a patient listener,-but talk not of love.' Lady,' said he, I have ever lost the love of my bosom for lack of honeyed words,-and I must plead my cause in the way that fortune wills; warrior than a bard, and the music was all of a rough and martial kind. It was with a heart free of all suspicion that Beatrice gave her hand to Sir Aymer, and was placed on the prow of his barge on a cushion of velvet, and under a canopy of silk. Her lover's stag hound, the faithful companion of all her journies, was at her side; and she sat and looked on the darkening waters and the receding shore with a heart ill at rest. More visible cause for alarm soon came. Since mid-day the distant clouds had began to gather themselves together over the bosom of the sea;-a dark cloud had descended among the neighbouring mountains, and as the procession moved, the cloud moved, and hung dark and vast over a line of steep and lofty rocks at a little distance. The sun, which seemed with its fervent light to keep the clouds of sea and land asunder, now sunk fairly down, the gloom of twilight came, the clouds increased and came rolling together, and when they met, the wind rose with a rush, the lightning flashed, and the sea swelled and heaved,-and there was a thick darkness, in which no man could see a lance's length. The mirth of the minstrel, and the merry songs of the mariners, were drowned in the gusts of wind, and in the chafing of the waves on beach and cliff. The coast along which they sailed was dangerous and rocky, with sharp headlands, and wild caverns, in which the storm moaned and roved by fits, -still the sea itself was not violently agitated, and they moved away with oar and with sail. All at once, however, the tempest stooped down to the water, and heaved it midmast high, and the big and thick-descending drops of rain made the decks reek as if the barge had been on fire. The death-shrieks of creatures drowning were heard for a moment above the noise of the storm, and Sir Aymer directed his barge to the shelter of a little bay, scooped out of the rocks, overhung with trees, and terminating in a wild and beautiful cavern. "It was with an involuntary shudder that Beatrice submitted to be borne into this lonely and beautiful cavern; cushions were placed in one of the recesses for her accommodation, and the rude followers of Sir Aymer busied themselves to render those arms, and he held out his hands towards her,-can fold ye and guard ye against all who either love or hate you.' And he seized her suddenly by the mantle. In a moment the stag hound which lay at her feet sprung at his throat, and had not a thick hunting dress of buff, ornamented with chains of steel and gold, which reached high up his neck, protected him, the bite had been deadly. He seized the stag hound with one hand,-uttered a deep imprecation, and with the other drawing his sword, cleft it in two, and flung it on the floor of the cavern. "With dilated eyes, and hair which seemed moving with horror, and with a shuddering frame, Beatrice gazed upon him for a moment. Villain,' she said, ye know not the might of woman's heroic hate,-ye have never learned to look on her with reverence or with awe, but learn it now,-in the weakest virgin of my father's house there is a courage that scorns ye and defies ye. Dare but to touch me,-and if heaven's fire, which now makes this cavern as bright as noon, strikes ye not to the earth,-a hand ye dread not shall work God's work.' And she put her hand in her bosom, and drawing out a dagger, said, Sir Aymer, see, this lay in my bosom when I was among pirates;-with this the weak is mighty, and woman is equal with man. Another step, and time has done with one of us.' Sir Aymer laughed, and looked on her for a moment,--his frame shook, and his brow darkened,-but grim as his looks grew, he still smiled,-and he sprung towards her like a beast of prey springing on a deer. 'Minion,' he said, ye have drawn blood ;my revenge shall be but a harmless kiss.' And the dagger, as he threw it away, rung against the side of the cavern. She called on God and she called on her love,-her cries of deep and terrible despair were not uttered in vain. "The storm had now subsided,the moon streamed out from among the disparting clouds, and the plash of the thunder-rain, and the howling of the wind, had ceased. A boat pushed suddenly ashore,-hasty words, and heavy blows, and deathgroans were heard, and with the rapidity of light an armed figure came, a heron plume was in his helmet, a sword was gleaming in his hand,—and that light which he - roism and a sense of deep wrong kindle, was burning in his eyes. It was Sir Hugh Heron. He struck Sir Aymer with the side of his sword, and said, Turn, thou only faithless knight of my name,-turn and draw, else I strike ye dead where ye stand.' And Sir Aymer drew his sword, and said, I have longed to wet my sword with thee in this quarrel,and I will wet it in thy heart,' and he made a blow, and there was a sore strife between them. When Beatrice beheld her lover, she fell on her knees, and held up her hands in prayer; she knelt so near, that the blood which the sword drew was sprinkled on her white hands, and on her pale cheeks. She closed her eyes,-and heard for a space the sound of swords, and the moving to and fro of hurried feet;-they were a moment mute, and then the combat grew more fierce than ever. At length Sir Aymer fell pierced through and through, and while he lay in the agonies of death, Beatrice threw herself in her lover's bosom, and sobbed out his name. He sheathed his sword and kissed her forehead and her lips, and said, 'My love-my love, I learned thy danger in a far land, and the first voice I heard when the storm drove our boat into this little lovely bay, was thine calling on God and Hugh Heron.' I made a pause in my narrative, and my companion, who had maintained silence much longer than I expected, looked on me and exclaimed, "Call ye that the Tale of Hugh Heron? The best of the story is to come, and will ye stop when the danger is over, and the mirth, and the minstrels, and the bridal lights, are coming? Ye have not said how his mother came and fell on the neck of her son,-how the body of Sir Aymer was borne into the shrine of our lady, that the vision which Sir Hugh saw might be fulfilled,—the stains of his blood are in the marble floor to this day. And if ye scorn bridal mirth, will ye not tell how many masses were daily said for the repose of the slain man's soul,—and how many stately sons and fair daughters blessed the marriage of Hugh Heron and the fair maid of Moffatdale? Never try to tell a story more." NALLA. BIRTH-DAY VERSES. TRANSLATED FROM THE DUTCH OF TOLLENS. RESTLESS Time! who ne'er abidest, What a viewless distance thou, Five and twenty years thou'st pass'd, Swifter than the lightning flies Yesterday thy wild steeds flew Driver, turn thee quickly back Dost thou thus impetuous drive, Where delight-where rest commences? There, alas! and only there, There repose's goal is won Driver! ride, in God's name, on. V. D. CHARLES, DUKE OF ORLEANS. EARLY FRENCH POETS. It is now (in 1823) but a few the way place, like the Castle of years since the first publication of Otranto. The manuscript, which some French poems, written at the contains them, was noticed in the beginning of the fifteenth century, Royal Library at Paris, near a cena which not only excel any other of tury back, by the Abbé Sallier, who that time that we are acquainted inserted three papers on the subject, with, but might at any time be re- in the Memoirs of the Academie des garded as patterns of natural ease Inscriptions : * Another, from which and elegance. What makes this long the publication was made, is in the neglect the more difficult to account public library at Grenoble; and, to for, is, that the author of them was a put the matter out of doubt, a third, prince, grandson to one of the French of singular splendour, is to be seen in kings, father to another, and uncle to our own national library of the Bria third ; the first, (Charles V.) re- tish Museum. The last of these was nowned for his wisdom; the next, once the property of Henry VII. of (Louis XII.) for his paternal care of England, whose daughter Mary was his subjects; and the third, (Francis married to the son of the poet him1.) for his courtesy, and his love of self, the above-mentioned Louis XII. letters. When we are told that the The Abbé Sallier remarks, that if writings of a person thus distin- Boileau had seen these productions, guished had been so long suffered to he would not have called Villon the remain in darkness, it is natural to restorer of the French Parnassus. I suspect that some imposition may am not sure of this. The palate of have been practised on the public re- Boileau required something more specting them. But there is no ground poignant. In these there is as much for such suspicion. They have not simplicity as in some of Wordsbeen discovered by some apprentice worth's minor pieces. The chief boy, in an old church coffer, like the difference is that these are almost all poems of Rowley, nor by the son of a love verses. prime minister, in some other out of En songe, souhaid et penser, En songe, souhaid et pensée, Vous voye chacun jour de sepmaine, Vous voy chascun jour de sepmaine. Combien qu'estes de moy loingtaine, Du tout vous ay m'amour donnée, Belle très loyaument amée. Vous en povez estre certaine : Ma seule Dame souveraine, Pour ce qu'estes la mieulx parée, De mon las cueur moult desirée, En songe, souhaid et pensée. Tome xiii. p. 580. Tome xv. p. 795, and Tome xvii . Mars. 1742. In the first of the Abbé's papers here referred to, the manuscript in the Royal Library at Paris is thus described. It had belonged to Catherine of Medicis. The arms of Charles, Duke of Orleans, impressed on the first leaf, together with those of Valentina, of Milan, his mother, showed that Catherine had got it from the library of her husband, Henry II. It contained 131 songs, about 400 rondels; and, lastly, a discourse pronounced before Charles VII. in favour of John II. Duke of Alençon. SEPT. 1923. X No care, no hope, no aim I prove, (Poesies de Charles d'Orléans, p. 208. Paris, small 8vo. 1809.) J'ay fait l'obseque de Madame Et forma merveilleusement ; Dedans le moustier amoureux ; C'estoit a parler plainement Et le service pour son ame Le trésor de tous biens mondains. A chanté penser dóloreux : N'en parlons plus, mon cueur se pame, Maint cierges, de soupirs piteux Quant il oyt les fais vertueux Ont esté en son luminaire : D'elle qui estoit sans nul blame, Aussy j'ay fait la tombe faire, Comme jurent celles et ceulx De regrets tous de larmes paints ; Qui congnoissoient ses conseulx. Et tout en tour moult richement Si croy que Dieu l'a voulu traire Est escript: Cy gist * vraiement Vers luy, pour parer son repaire Le trésor de tous biens mondains. De paradis, où sont les saints : Dessus elle gist une lame Car c'est d'elle bel parement, Faiste d'or et de saffirs bleux : Que l'on nommoit communément Car saffir est nommé la jame Le trésor de tous biens mondains. De Loyauté et l'or cureux : De rien ne servent pleurs ne plains ; Bien luy appartiennent ces deux; Tous mourrons tart ou briefvement, Car Eure et Loyauté pourtraire Nul ne peust garder longuement Voulu en la très-débonnaire, Le trésor de tous biens mondains. (P. 237.) The fairest thing in mortal eyes. |