It went to one remember'd spot, And thought again the thoughts of love A thousand years to me it seems, Is not my choice, but fate: Since then I have not seen the flowers, The following are by Arnaud de Marveil:-- 1823. All I behold recalls the memory Of her I love. The freshness of the hour, I could not now have render'd thee the praise Oh! how sweet the breath of April, Revelling in joy and gladness By his happy partner's side. When around me all is smiling, When to life the young birds spring, Thoughts of love, I cannot hinder, In such joy to bear my part: Fairer than the far-famed Helen, 0 Golden Golden hair, and fresh bright roses,--- Lived, who can with her compare. The following beautiful Elegy is by Ausias March :-- The hands, which never spare, have snatch'd thee hence, And bearing thee from out this scene of strife, All that I see and feel now turns to pain, He fades in breasts which guilty thoughts distress, But lives, when rich in virtuous qualities. The war against the Albigenses was the principal cause of the destruction of Provençal poetry, and ruin of the Troubadours; a war undertaken against religion, and carried on with the most unrelenting malignity and annihilating devastation. The clergy had fallen by their vices into utter contempt: the Troubadours satirized them. "If," said Raymond de Castelnau, "God has willed the Black Monks to be unrivalled in their good eat ing and in their amours, and the White Monks in their lying bulls, and the Templars and Hospitallers in pride, and the Canons in usury; I hold St. Peter and St. Andrew to have been egregious fools, for suffering so many torments for the sake of God; since all these people also are to be saved." The gentry granted the bene fices in their gifts to their servants and bailiffs, and it was with them a proverbial expression, "I had rather have been a priest than have done so disgraceful a thing." Innocent III. proclaimed a crusade against those who ventured to separate from the Romish Church: he addressed a letter to the King of France, and to all princes and most powerful barons, as well as to the metropolitans and the bishops, exhorting them to avenge the blood which had been shed, (Pierre de Castelnau, the legate of the Pope,) and to extirpate the heresy. All the indulgences and pardons usually granted to the crusaders were promised to those who exterminated these unbelievers, a thousand times more detestable than the Turks and Saracens. More than than 300,000 men appeared in arms, to accomplish this butchery; and the first nobles of France, the most virtuous, and perhaps the mildest of her aristocracy, believed that they were rendering an acceptable service to God, in thus arming themselves against their brethren. Raymond VI. Count of Toulouse, one of whose gentlemen had killed the priest before mentioned, and who was accused of favouring the heretics, terrified at this storm, submitted to every thing that was required of him. He delivered up his fortresses, and even marched to the crusade against the most faithful of his own subjects; and yet, notwithstanding this disgraceful weakness, he did not escape the hatred or the vengeance of the clergy. But Raymond Roger, Viscount of Beziers, his youthful and generous nephew, without sharing himself in the heretical opinions, would not consent to the atrocities which were about to be committed in his states. He encouraged his subjects to defend themselves; and shutting himself up in Carcassone, and delivering Beziers to the care of his lieutenants, awaited with firmness the attack of the crusaders. Beziers was taken by assault, on the 22d July, 1209, and with this city fell Provençal poetry. 15,000 inhabitants, according to the narrative which the abbot of the Cistercians transmitted to the Pope, or 60,000, according to other contemporary writers, were put to the sword. The city itself, after a general massacre, not only of its inhabitants but likewise of the neighbouring peasantry, who had thrown themselves into it, was reduced to ashes. An old Provençal historian has augmented, by the sim plicity of his language, the horror of this picture. 66 They entered the city of Beziers, where they murdered more people than was ever known in the world: for they spared neither young nor old, nor infants at the breast. They killed and murdered all of them; which being seen by the said people of the city, they that were able did retreat into the great church of St. Nazarius, both men and women. The chaplains thereof, when they retreated, caused the bells to ring until every body was dead. But neither the sound of the bells, nor the chaplains in their priestly habits, nor the clerks, could hinder all from being put to the sword; one only escaped, for all the rest were slain, and died. Nothing so pitiable was ever heard of or done; and when the city had been pillaged, it was set on fire, so that it was all pillaged and burned, even as it appears at this day. No living thing was left; which was a cruel vengeance, seeing that the said Viscount was neither a heretic nor of their sect." The same tremendous war devastated the whole of the South of France. They who escaped from the sacking of the towns, were sacrificed by the faggot. From 1209 to 1229 nothing was seen but massacres and tortures. The Muses fled from a soil polluted with carnage. Among the persecutors a few Troubadours were found, the most celebrated of whom was the abominable Folquet, bishop of Toulouse, who betrayed alike his prince and his flock; and Izarn, a Dominican missionary and inquisitor, who among others has left us the following beautiful relic !— As you declare you Which ne'er was found within your heart, nor pass'd your teeth at all, That through these tortures, for your sins, a passage you may take. The greater part of the Troubadours beheld, however, with equal detestation, both the crusade and the domination of the French. The following martial ballad was written at this time, calling the persecuted Provençals to resist the plundering invasion which St. Louis was directing against them, under the pretence of a zeal for religion and social order. It is now very curious, as shewing the light in which some of his contemporaries viewed the hypocrisy and cruelty of this St. Louis, whose God is, in the year 1823, invoked in support of similar projects. I'll make a song shall body forth My full and free complaint, Of coward souls, whose vows were made Yet, noble Sirs, we will not fear, Yes! full and ample help for us Shall come, so trusts my heart; Then, noble Sirs, we will not fear, Then, noble Sirs, we will not fear, And ev'n if Frederic, on the throne Of Louis' hosts to see; Yet, in the breast of England's king, Though Though from our hands the sepulchre But, noble Sirs, we will not fear, But, noble Sirs, we will not fear, In this our cause, so ardently Then shame to him who will not bear Strong in the hope of succours near. We make the following as our last extract. It is the Lay de departie of Raoul de Coucy, who was killed in 1229, at the Battle of Massoura. How cruel is it to depart, Lady! who causest all my grief. My body to it's Lord's relief Must but thou retain'st my To Syria now I wend my way, heart. Where Paynim swords no terror move : Yet sad shall be each lingering day, Far from the side of her I love. We learn from many a grave divine, No goods have I, nor castle fair; I should not know regret nor care. On her whose smile is ever bland. CHAP |