Romans and Lombards though folk renown,

I, at my peril, I say no:

There's no right speech out of Paris town.

The Naples women (so we are told)

Can school all comers in speech and show;
Prussians and Germans were still extolled

For pleasant prattle of friend and foe;

But hail they from Athens or Grand Cairo,
Castile or Hungary, black or brown,

Greeks or Egyptians, high or low,

There's no right speech out of Paris town.

Switzers nor Bretons know how to scold,
Nor Provence nor Gascony women: lo!
Two fishfags in Paris the bridge that hold
Would slang them dumb in a minute or so.
Picardy, England, Lorraine, (heigho!

Enough of places have I set down?)

Valenciennes, Calais, wherever you go,
There's no right speech out of Paris town.

ENVOI

Prince, to the Paris ladies, I trow,

For pleasant parlance I yield the crown.
They may talk of Italians; but this I know,
There's no right speech out of Paris town.

BALLAD THAT VILLON MADE AT THE REQUEST OF HIS MOTHER, WHEREWITHAL TO DO HER HOMAGE

TO OUR LADY

ADY of heaven, Regent of the earth,

L

Empress of all the infernal marshes fell,

Receive me, thy poor Christian, 'spite my dearth,
In the fair midst of thine elect to dwell;
Albeit my lack of grace I know full well:
For that thy grace, my Lady and my Queen,
Aboundeth more than all my misdemean,

Withouten which no soul of all that sigh
May merit heaven. 'Tis sooth I say, for e'en
In this belief I will to live and die.

Say to thy Son I am his,- that by his birth
And death my sins be all redeemable;

As Mary of Egypt's dole he changed to mirth,
And eke Theophilus, to whom befell
Quittance of thee, albeit (so men tell)
To the foul fiend he had contracted been.
Assoilzie me, that I may have no teen,

Maid that without breach of virginity
Didst bear our Lord that in the Host is seen.
In this belief I will to live and die.

A poor old wife I am, and little worth;

Nothing I know, nor letter aye could spell: Where in the church to worship I fare forth,

I see heaven limned with harps and lutes, and hell Where damned folk seethe in fire unquenchable. One doth me fear, the other joy serene:

Grant I may have the joy, O Virgin clean,

To whom all sinners lift their hands on high, Made whole in faith through thee their go-between. In this belief I will to live and die.

ENVOI

Thou didst conceive, Princess most bright of sheen. Jesus the Lord, that hath nor end nor mean, Almighty, that, departing heaven's demesne

To succor us, put on our frailty,

Offering to death his sweet of youth and green:
Such as he is, our Lord he is, I ween!

In this belief I will to live and die.

Hˆ

BALLAD OF VILLON IN PRISON

AVE pity, friends, have pity now, I pray,
If it so please you, at the least, on me!
I lie in fosse, not under holm or may,
In this duresse, wherein, alas! I dree
Ill fate, as God did there anent decree.
Lasses and lovers, younglings manifold,
Dancers and montebanks, alert and bold,

Nimble as quarrel from a crossbow shot;
Singers, that troll as clear as bells of gold,—
Will you all leave poor Villon here to rot?

Clerks, that go caroling the livelong day,

Scant-pursed, but glad and frank and full of glee; Wandering at will along the broad highway,

Harebrained, perchance, but whit-whole too, perdie: Lo! now I die, whilst that you absent be, Song-singers,-when poor Villon's days are told, You will sing psalms for him and candles hold; Here light nor air nor levin enters not, Where ramparts thick are round about him rolled. Will you all leave poor Villon here to rot?

Consider but his piteous array,

High and fair lords, of suit and service free, That nor to king nor kaiser homage pay,

But straight from God in heaven hold your fee! Come fast or feast, all days alike fasts he, Whence are his teeth like rakes' teeth to behold; No table hath he but the sheer black mold;

After dry bread (not manchets), pot on pot They empty down his throat of water cold: Will you all leave poor Villon here to rot?

ENVOI

Princes and lords aforesaid, young and old,
Get me the King his letters sealed and scrolled,
And draw me from this dungeon; for, God wot,
Even swine, when one squeaks in the butcher's fold,
Flock around their fellow and do squeak and scold.
Will you all leave poor Villon here to rot?

THE EPITAPH IN BALLAD FORM THAT VILLON MADE FOR HIMSELF AND HIS COMPANIONS, EXPECTING NO BETTER THAN TO BE HANGED IN THEIR COMPANY

B

ROTHERS, that after us on life remain,

Harden your hearts against us not as stone;
For, if to pity us poor wights you're fain,
God shall the rather grant you benison.
You see us six, the gibbet hereupon:
As for the flesh that we too well have fed,
'Tis all devoured and rotted, shred by shred.

Let none make merry of our piteous case,
Whose crumbling bones the life long since hath fled:
The rather pray, God grant us of his grace!

Yea, we conjure you, look not with disdain,

Brothers, on us, though we to death were done
By justice. Well you know, the saving grain

Of sense springs not in every mother's son;
Commend us, therefore, now we're dead and gone,
To Christ, the Son of Mary's maidenhead,
That he leave not his grace on us to shed

And save us from the nether torture-place.
Let no one harry us,- forsooth, we're sped:
The rather pray, God grant us of his grace!

We are whiles scoured and soddened of the rain,
And whiles burnt up and blackened of the sun;
Corbies and pyets have our eyes out-ta'en,

And plucked our beard and hair out one by one.
Whether by night or day, rest have we none:
Now here, now there, as the wind shifts its stead,
We swing and creak and rattle overhead,

No thimble dinted like our bird-pecked face.
Brothers, have heed and shun the life we led:
The rather pray, God grant us of his grace!

ENVOI

Prince Jesus, over all empowered,

Let us not fall into the Place of Dread,

But all our reckoning with the Fiend efface.
Folk, mock us not that are forspent and dead:
The rather pray, God grant us of his grace!

XXVI-964

BALLAD OF THINGS KNOWN AND UNKNOWN

LIES in the milk I know full well;

I know men by the clothes they wear;

I know the walnut by the shell;

I know the foul sky from the fair;

I know the pear-tree by the pear;

I know the worker from the drone,

And eke the good wheat from the tare:
I know all save myself alone.

I know the pourpoint by the fell,

And by his gown I know the frère;
Master by varlet I can spell;

Nuns by the veils that hide their hair;
I know the sharper and his snare,
And fools that fat on cates have grown;
Wines by the cask I can compare:
I know all save myself alone.

I know how horse from mule to tell;
I know the load that each can bear;

I know both Beatrice and Bell;

I know the hazards, odd and pair;

I know of visions in the air;

I know the power of Peter's throne,
And how misled Bohemians were:
I know all save myself alone.

ENVOI

Prince, I know all things; fat and spare,
Ruddy and pale, to me are known,
And Death that endeth all our care:
I know all save myself alone.

BALLAD AGAINST THOSE WHO MISSAY OF FRANCE

ET him meet beasts that breathe out fiery rain,

L

Even as did Jason hard by Colchis town;

Or seven years changed into a beast remain,
Nebuchadnezzar-like, to earth bowed down;

Or suffer else such teen and mickle bale

As Helen's rape on Trojans did entail;

Or in Hell's marshes fallen let him fare
Like Tantalus and Proserpine, or bear