mances or ballads in the form in which they now exist: the Trobador or amatory poetry, of which the Cancioneros are so full, and which were formed on the model of the Provençal school, or rather on the affected style of their Italian imitators, belongs chiefly to the 15th and 16th centuries.

Many of the works of the poets of this class are, however, undoubtedly highly national, and of great and original beauty, especially where they partake of the simple spirit of the ancient ballad. But with these we can have nothing to do here, for they are too late in date to come within the limits proposed for our selections. It would be presumption, too, to venture upon a topic so delightfully illustrated by Mr. Bowring's genius; we shall therefore content ourselves with giving the following verses as a specimen of the earliest form and comparative perfection of the Castilian tongue, in a graver class of poetry. They are from Alexandro Magno, the poem just alluded to, commencing at line 1788:

El mes era de Mayo un tiempo glorioso
Quando facen las aves un solaz deleytoso,
Son vestidos los prados de vestido fremoso
De sospiros la dueña la que non ha esposo.

Tiempo dolce è sabroso por bastir casamientos,
Ca lo tempran las flores è los sabrosos vientos,
Cantan las doncellejas, son muchas a convientos,
Facen unas a otras buenos pronunciamentos.

Caen en el verano las bonas rociadas;

Entran en flor las miesses, ca non ya espigadas,
Entonz casan algunos que pues messan las barbas
Facen las dueñas triscas en camisas delgadas.

Andan mozas è viejas cobertas en amores,
Van coger por la siesta a los prados las flores,
Dicen unas a otras "Bonos son los amores,
Y aquellos plus tiernos tienense por meiores."

Los dias son grandes, los campos reverdidos,
Son los passariellos del mal pelo exidos,
Los tabanos que muerden non son aun venidos,
Luchan los monagones en bragas sen vestidos.

El Rey Alexandre, un corpo acabado,
Al sabor del tiempo que era bien temprado,
Fizo corte general, su corazon pagado :

Non fue varon en Persia que non fus y iuntado.

It was the month of May, in the bright and glorious spring, When the birds in concert sweet on the budding branches sing, When the meadows and the plains are rob'd in verdure green, And the mateless lady sighs, despairing o'er the scene.

A gentle tempting time for loving hearts to meet,

For the flow'rs are blossoming, and the winds are fresh and sweet;
And, gather'd in a ring, the maidens wear away
In mirthful talk and song the blithe and sunny day.

Soft fall the gentle dews, an unfelt freshening rain,
The corn puts forth the hope of harvests rich in grain,
The down-cheek'd stripling now is wedded to his love,
And ladies, lightly clad, in bounding dances move.

For love o'er young and old now holds its mightiest sway;
The siesta's hour to grace they pluck the wild flowers gay,
While each to other tells how love is ever blest,

But the tenderest suit, they own, is the happiest and the best.

The days are long and bright, the fields are green once more, The birds have ceased to moult, and their mourning time is o'er; No gad-fly yet appears with bite of venom keen,

But the youths in wrestling strive half-naked on the green.

'Twas then that Alexander, of Persia conquering king,
Moved by the fragrant call of that delightful spring,
Throughout his wide domain proclaim'd a general court,
And not a lord o' the land but thither made resort.

E

SECTION III.

ITALY.-Comparatively late application of its language to poetic purposes.-Use of other tongues.-Early Italian poets.Sicilian school.-Tuscan school.-Character of early Italian poetry.-Petrarch. NORTHERN FRANCE.-Formation of the Northern Romance.-Intercourse between North and South France. First attempts at poetry in the former.—Patronage of the Anglo-Norman court.-Lais and Fabliaux.—Lyric poetry.-Pastorals.-Comparative merits of the Northern and Southern tongues.

CONSIDERING the perfection in which the earliest known specimens exhibit the language of Italy,—the delight which it is clear its inhabitants felt in the poetry and romances of the North and South French, -and the free intercourse with other nations which existed during their connexion with the Norman princes of Sicily and with the German Empire,

Sotto l' imperio del buon Barbarossa

and his successors,- -it appears strange that Italian li

terature should have been so far behind that of almost every other country;—that its earliest poets should have preferred foreign tongues, without making any attempt to cultivate their own, though in many respects superior; and yet that, after so much torpor, it should at length break forth all at once in such

comparative splendour and perfection. The Provençal writers must have been perfectly familiar to the Italians; for their early writers, such as Guittone d'Arrezzo (in his Letters), Dante, and Petrarch, are full of allusions to them, and of the warmest eulogiums on their works. Several of the Troubadours themselves, for example Sordel, (who is introduced in the 6th and 9th cantos of the Purgatorio,) Boniface Calvo, and Folquet, who, as Petrarch tells us,

-a Marsiglia il nome ha dato,

Ed a Genova tolto

were Italians.

Even the German language,- -so unharmonious as we should conceive to the delicate ears of Italians,—was adopted by at least one of their ancient poets. The poem alluded to is of the 13th century, written probably under the patronage of the Emperor Frederic II., whom it eulogizes, and directed, in the usual strain of invective, against the vices and the follies of the day. It is entitled Der Welsche Gast,-The Welch Guest,-Welch being a name then used by the Germans for all the Southern or Latin nations. The author, who is called Thomasin von Ferrera, with some half-dozen aliases (see Eschenburg's Denkmäler), announces himself thus modestly :

Ich bin von Friul geborn,
Und lazze gar one zorn