interest to those of the first. They
consist of _Asseneth_, a graceful legend of the marriage of Joseph with
the daughter of the Egyptian high-priest; _Troilus_, interesting chiefly
as a prose version of Benoist de Ste. More's legend of _Troilus and
Cressida_, through the channel of Guido Colonna and Boccaccio; and a
very curious English story, that of the rebel Fulk Fitzwarine. The
thirteenth-century tales consist of _L'Empereur Constant_, the story
with which Mr. Morris has made English readers familiar under the title
of the 'Man born to be King;' of a prose version of the ubiquitous
legend of _Amis et Amiles_; of _Le roi Flore et la belle Jehanne_, a
kind of version of _Griselda_, though the particular trial and
exhibition of fidelity is quite different; of the _Comtesse de
Ponthieu_, the least interesting of all; and lastly, of the finest prose
tale of the French middle ages, _Aucassin et Nicolette_. In this
exquisite story Aucassin, the son of the count of Beaucaire, falls in
love with Nicolette, a captive damsel. It is very short, and is written
in mingled verse and prose. The theme is for the most part nothing but
the desperate love of Aucassin, which is careless of religion, which
makes him indifferent to the joy of battle and to everything, except
'Nicolette ma tres-douce mie,' and which is, of course, at last
rewarded. But the extreme beauty of the separate scenes makes it a
masterpiece.

[Sidenote: Antoine de la Salle.]

Antoine de la Salle is one of the most fortunate of authors. The
tendency of modern criticism is generally to endeavour to prove that
some famous author has been wrongly credited with some of the work which
has made his fame. Homer, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Rabelais, have all had
to pay this penalty. In the case of Antoine de la Salle, on the
contrary, critics have vied with each other in heaping unacknowledged
masterpieces on his head. His only acknowledged work is the charming
romance of _Petit Jean de Saintre_[148]. The first thing added to this
has been the admirable satire of the _Quinze Joyes du Mariage_[149], the
next the famous collection of the _Cent Nouvelles_[150], and the last
the still more famous farce of _Pathelin_[151]. There are for once few
or no external reasons why these various attributions should not be
admitted, while there are many internal ones why they should. Antoine de
la Salle was born in 1398, and spent his life in the employment of
different kings and princes;-