-Louis III of Anjou, King of Naples, his
son the good King Rene, the count of Saint Pol, and Philip the Good of
Burgundy, who was his natural sovereign. Nothing is known of him after
1461. Of the three prose works which have been attributed to him--there
are others of a didactic character in manuscript--the _Quinze Joyes du
Mariage_ is extremely brief, but it contains the quintessence of all the
satire on that honourable estate which the middle ages had elaborated.
Every chapter--there is one for each 'joy' with a prologue and
conclusion--ends with a variation on this phrase descriptive of the
unhappy Benedict, 'est sy est enclose dans la nasse, et a l'aventure ne
s'en repent point et s'il n'y estait il se y mettroit bientot; la usera
sa vue en languissant, et finira miserablement ses jours.' The satire is
much quieter and of a more humorous and less boisterous character than
was usual at the time. The _Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles_ are to all intents
and purposes prose _fabliaux_. They have the full licence of that class
of composition, its sparkling fun, its truth to the conditions of
ordinary human life. Many of them are taken from the work of the Italian
novelists, but all are handled in a thoroughly original manner. In style
they are perhaps the best of all the late mediaeval prose works, being
clear, precise, and definite without the least appearance of baldness or
dryness. _Petit Jehan de Saintre_ is, together with the _Chronique de
Messire Jacques de Lalaing_[152] of Georges Chastellain (a delightful
biography, which is not a work of fiction), the hand-book of the last
age of chivalry. Jehan de Saintre, who was a real person of the
preceding century, but from whom the novelist borrows little or nothing
but his name, falls in love with a lady who is known by the fantastic
title of 'la dame des belles cousines.' He wins general favour by his
courtesy, true love, and prowess; but during his absence in quest of
adventures, his faithless mistress betrays him for a rich abbot. The
latter part of this book exhibits something of the satiric intention,
which was never long absent from the author's mind; the former contains
a picture, artificial perhaps, but singularly graceful, of the elaborate
religion, as it may almost be called, of chivalry. Strikingly evident in
the book is the surest of all signs of a dying stage of society, the
most delicate observation and sympathetic description joined to
sarcastic and ironical critici