l language had ever quite died out
even as a written language. Since the days of the Troubadours there had
been a continuous succession of writers in the various dialects of
southern France, but very few of them were men of power and talent.
Among the immediate predecessors of the Felibres must be mentioned
Saboly, whose _Noels_, or Christmas songs, are to-day known all over the
region, and Jasmin, who, however, wrote in a different dialect. Jasmin's
fame extended far beyond the limited audience for which he wrote; his
work came to the attention of the cultured through the enthusiastic
praise of Sainte-Beuve, and he is to-day very widely known. The
English-speaking world became acquainted with him chiefly through the
translations of Longfellow. Jasmin, however, looked upon himself as the
last of a line, and when, in his later years, he heard of the growing
fame of the new poets of the Rhone country, it is said he looked upon
them with disfavor, if not jealousy. Strange to say, he was, in the
early days, unknown to those whose works, like his, have now attained
well-nigh world-wide celebrity.

The man who must justly be looked upon as the father of the present
movement was Joseph Roumanille. He was born in 1818, in the little town
of Saint-Remy, a quaint old place, proud of some remarkable Roman
remains, situated to the south of Avignon. Roumanille was far from
foreseeing the consequences of the impulse he had given in arousing
interest in the old dialect, and, until he beheld the astonishing
successes of Mistral, strongly disapproved the ambitions of a number of
his fellow-poets to seek an audience for their productions outside of
the immediate region. He had no more ambitious aim than to raise the
patois of Saint-Remy out of the veritable mire into which it had sunk;
it pained him to see that the speech of his fireside was never used in
writing except for trifles and obscenities. Of him is told the touching
story that one day, while reciting in his home before a company of
friends some poems in French that he had written, he observed tears in
his mother's eyes. She could not understand the poetry his friends so
much admired. Roumanille, much moved, resolved to write no verses that
his mother could not enjoy, and henceforth devoted himself ardently to
the task of purifying and perfecting the dialect of Saint-Remy. It has
been said, no less truthfully than poetically, that from a mother's tear
was born the new Provencal