ut of Ronsardism. But neither was in the least made
_retenu_ by Ronsard's failure, and it did not enter the head of
themselves or any of their contemporaries, till their last days, that
Ronsard had failed. Philippe Desportes[203] was a very unclerical
cleric, a successful courtier and diplomatist, a great favourite with
the ladies of the court. He was also a poet of little vigour, but of
great sweetness, much elegance of style and form, and extraordinary
neatness, if not originality, of expression. With Jamyn he was the most
prominent of Ronsard's own particular disciples. His poetical works are
sharply divided, like those of Herrick and Donne and some other poets,
on the one hand, into poems of a very mundane character, collections of
sonnets after the Pleiade fashion to real or imaginary heroines,
celebrations of the ladies and the _mignons_ of the court of Henri III.,
imitations of Italian verse, and the like; on the other, into devotional
poems, which include some translations of the Psalms of not a little
merit. Personally Desportes appears to have been a self-seeker and a
sycophant; not without good nature, but covetous, intriguing, corrupt,
given to base compliances. He was Du Bellay's _poete courtisan_ in the
worst sense of the phrase[204]. But working at leisure and with care,
and undistracted by any literary or sentimental enthusiasm, he found
means to give to his work a polish and correctness which many of his
contemporaries of greater talent did not, or could not, give. In this
fact the explanation of Boileau's commendation--for it is no doubt
meant, relatively speaking, for commendation--is probably to be found.

[Sidenote: Bertaut.]

Jean Bertaut was, to use a metaphor frequently employed in literary
history, the 'moon' of Desportes. Like him, he is a poet rather elegant
than vigorous, rather correct than spirited. Like him, he wrote light
verse and devotional poems, and, as in the case of Desportes, the
religious poems are--rather contrary to the reader's expectation--the
best of the two. His work, however, was even more limited in amount than
that of his contemporary.

FOOTNOTES:

[192] The list is sometimes given rather differently; instead of Jodelle
and Pontus de Tyard, Scevole de St. Marthe and Muretus are substituted.
But the enumeration in the text is the accepted one.

[193] Ed. Blanchemain. 8 vols. Paris, 1857-67.

[194] The term usually applied to him by contemporaries.

[195] Ed. Marty-