me day hang, accursed of God!' I
rush to the arms of my father-in-law. 'Stop, stop;' but he, leaning down
to my ear, said: 'Without knowing the vine or measuring the furrows,
thou hast bought the wine, mad girl! Go, thou didst not weep all thy
tears in thy swaddling clothes! Knowest thou whom thou hast? a
robber-chief!'"

And the scene continues, weirdly dramatic, like some old romantic tale
of feudal days. Such scenes of gloom and terror are not frequent in
Mistral. This one is probably the best of its kind he has attempted.

On his way to seek Count Severan in his fastness, Calendau "enters,
awestruck, into the stupendous valley, deep, frowning, cold, saturnine,
and fierce; the daylight darts into this enclosure an instant upon the
viper and the lizard, then, behind the jagged peaks, it vanishes. The
Esteron rolls below. Now, Calendau feels a shudder in his soul, and
winds his horn. The call resounds in the depths of the gorges. It seems
as though he calls to his aid the spirits of the place. And he thinks of
the paladin dying at Roncevaux."

For the sake of greater completeness, we summarize briefly the exploits
of the hero. As has been stated, they compose the great body of the
poem, and are narrated by him to the Count and his company of thieves
and women. The narrative begins with the account of the little port of
Cassis, his native place; and one of the stanzas is a setting for the
surprising proverb:--

"Tau qu'a vist Paris,
Se noun a vist Cassis,
Pou dire: N'ai ren vist!"

He who has seen Paris, and has not seen Cassis, may say, "I have
seen nothing."

No less than forty stanzas are taken up with the wonders of Cassis, and
more than half of those are devoted to naming the fish the Cassidians
catch. It is to be feared that other than Provencal readers and students
of natural history will fail to share the enthusiasm of the poet here.
Calendau's father used to read out of an ancient book; and the hero
recounts the history of Provence, going back to the times of the
Ligurians, telling us of the coming of the Greeks, who brought the art
of sculpture for the future Puget. We hear of the founding of
Marseilles, the days of Diana and Apollo, followed by the coming of the
Romans. The victory of Caius Marius is celebrated, the conquest of
Julius Caesar deplored. We learn of the introduction of Christianity. We
come down to the glorious days of Raymond of Toulouse.

"And enraptured to be f