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RAOUL COMTE DE SOISSONS.

RAOUL appears to have been another cotemporary and friend of Thibaud king of Navarre. The following piece is taken from the "Anthologie Françoise;" but some alteration may be suspected. Ravallière (vol. ii. p. 213) gives, from an anonymous poet of the age, one stanza, of which the song in the Anthologie" appears to be a rifacciamento.

66

Ha belle blonde
Au cors si gent

Perle du monde

Que j'aime tant!

D'un chose ay bien grand desir,

C'est un doux baiser vous tollir.
Oui, belle blonde, &c.

Si par fortune

Courouceriez,

Cent fois pur une

Le vous rendrois volentiers;

Belle blonde, &c.

АH! beauteous maid,

Of form so fair!
Pearl of the world,

Beloved and dear!

How does my spirit eager pine,

But once to press those lips of thine ;-
Yes, beauteous maid,

Of form so fair!
Pearl of the world,

Beloved and dear!

And if the theft

Thine ire awake,

A hundred fold

I'd give it back *.
Thou beauteous maid,

Of form so fair!
Pearl of the world,

Beloved and dear!

• The Troubadour Peyrols has the same thought :

Gran talen ai qu'un baisar
Li pogues tolre o emblar;
E si pueis s'en iraissia,
Volentiers lo li rendria.

I'm pining, from that lady gay

A kiss to take or steal away;

And should the deed her coyness pain,

I'd freely give it back again.

JAQUES DE CHISON.

THIS poet also belongs to the first half of the 13th century.

Quant recommence et revient beaux estez,
Que foille et flor resplendit par boschage,
Que li froiz tanz de l'hyver est passez
Et cil oisel chantent en lor langage,
Lou chanterai,

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WHEN the sweet days of summer come at last,
And leaves and flowers are in the forest springing;
When the cold time of winter's overpast,

And every bird his own sweet song is singing;
Then will I sing,

And joyous be,

Of careless heart,

Elate and free;

For she, my lady sweet and sage,

Bids me, as ever wont, engage
In joyful mood to be.

Nor is it yet the spirit of the season

The summer time-that makes my song so gay; But softer thoughts, and yet a sweeter reason— Love, that o'er all my happy heart hath sway; That with delight my soul will ceaseless turn

Tow'rd her, I ween of all the world the best: And if my songs be sweet, well may they learn Sweetness from her whose love my heart has blest.

And since that love is rightfully my boon,
Well may I hold her chief within my soul,
Who helps my numbers, gives me song and tune,
And her own grace diffuses o'er the whole.
For when I think of those dear eyes of hers,
Whence the bright light of love is ever breaking,
Delight and hope that happy thought confers,

And I am blest beyond the power of speaking.

DOETE DE TROIES.

FAUCHET mentions this ancient "Chanteresse et Trouverre." That singular and interesting poem, the "Bible Guyot de Provins," (published in Barbazan,) which well deserves a careful commentator, thus mentions her as having been present at the court of the Emperor Conrad at Mentz :—

De Troye la bele Doete

Y chantait cette chansonette,
Quant revient la saison
Que l'herbe reverdoie.'

In the "Poésies de Marguerite-Éléonore Clotilde de Vallon-Chalys, depuis Madame de Surville, Poëte François du XV. siècle," is published the following piece, ascribed to Doete, and stated to have existed in MS. among the other specimens there given of a series of early French poetry. What degree of authenticity belongs to this book we do not know: undoubtedly, even if originals really existed, considerable liberties have been taken in their publication, as is plain from the extracts from Marie de France, which have since been correctly printed from the MSS. But the degree of coincidence with the undoubted originals that remains in those extracts, would incline the reader to believe that the basis of

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