hich deal with 'minor houses,' as they are called, in contradistinction
to the main Carlovingian cycle. _Gerard de Roussillon_[30] ranks as a
poem with the best of all the Chansons. _Hugues Capet_[31], though very
late, is attractive by reason of the glimpses it gives us of a new
spirit supplanting that of chivalry proper. In it the heroic distinctly
gives place to the burlesque. _Macaire_[32], besides being written in a
singular dialect, in which French is mingled with Italian, supplies the
original of the well-known dog of Montargis. _Huon de Bordeaux_[33],
already mentioned, was not only more than usually popular at the time of
its appearance, but has supplied Shakespeare with some of the dramatis
personae of _A Midsummer Night's Dream_, and Wieland and Weber with the
plot of a well-known poem and opera. _Jourdains de Blaivies_, the sequel
to _Amis et Amiles_, contains, besides much other interesting matter,
the incident which forms the centre of the plot of _Pericles_. _Les
Quatre Fils Aymon_ or _Renaut de Montauban_[34] is the foundation of one
of the most popular French chap-books. _Les Saisnes_[35] deals with
Charlemagne's wars with Witekind. _Berte aus grans Pies_[36] is a very
graceful story of womanly innocence. _Doon de Mayence_[37], though not
early, includes a charming love-episode. _Gerard de Viane_[38] contains
the famous battle of Roland and Oliver. The _Voyage de Charlemagne a
Constantinople_[39] is semi-burlesque in tone and one of the earliest in
which that tone is perceptible.

[Sidenote: Social and Literary Characteristics.]

In these numerous poems there is recognisable in the first place a
distinct family likeness which is common to the earliest and latest, and
in the second, the natural difference of manners which the lapse of
three hundred years might be expected to occasion. There is a sameness
which almost amounts to monotony in the plot of most Chansons de Gestes:
the hero is almost always either falsely accused of some crime, or else
treacherously exposed to the attacks of Saracens, or of his own
countrymen. The agents of this treachery are commonly of the blood of
the arch-traitor Ganelon, and are almost invariably discomfited by the
good knight or his friends and avengers. The part[40] which Charlemagne
plays in these poems is not usually dignified: he is represented as
easily gulled, capricious, and almost ferocious in temper, ungrateful,
and ready to accept bribes and gifts. His good ang