34] Ed. Michelant. Stuttgart, 1862.

[35] Ed. Michel. Paris, 1839.

[36] Ed. Scheler. Brussels, 1874.

[37] Ed. Pey. Paris, 1859.

[38] Ed. Tarbe. Rheims, 1850.

[39] Ed. Michel. London, 1836.

[40] It is very commonly said that this feature is confined to the later
Chansons. This is scarcely the fact, unless by 'later' we are to
understand all except _Roland_. In _Roland_ itself the presentment is by
no means wholly complimentary.

[41] The Turoldus of _Roland_ has been already noticed. Of certain or
tolerably certain authors, Graindor de Douai (revisions of the early
crusading Chansons of 'Richard the Pilgrim,' _Antioche_, &c.), Jean de
Flagy (_Garin_), Bodel (_Les Saisnes_), and Adenes le Roi, a fertile
author or adapter of the thirteenth century, are the most noted.

[42] _Ferabras_ and _Betonnet d'Hanstone_. M. Paul Meyer has recently
edited this latter poem under the title of _Daurel et Beton_ (Paris,
1880). To these should be added a fragment, _Aigar et Maurin_, which
seems to rank with _Girartz_.

[43] There has been some reaction of late years against the scepticism
which questioned the 'Provencal Epic.' I cannot however say, though I
admit a certain disqualification for judgment (see note at beginning of
next chapter), that I see any valid reason for this reaction.

CHAPTER III.

PROVENCAL LITERATURE.

[Sidenote: Langue d'Oc.]

The Romance language, spoken in the country now called France, has two
great divisions, the Langue d'Oc and the Langue d'Oil[44], which stand
to one another in hardly more intimate relationship than the first of
them does to Spanish or Italian. In strictness, the Langue d'Oc ought
not to be called French at all, inasmuch as those who spoke it applied
that term exclusively to Northern speech, calling their own Limousin, or
Provencal, or Auvergnat. At the time, moreover, when Provencal
literature flourished, the districts which contributed to it were in
very loose relationship with the kingdom of France; and when that
relationship was drawn tighter, Provencal literature began to wither and
die. Yet it is not possible to avoid giving some sketch of the literary
developments of Southern France in any history of French literature, as
well because of the connection which subsisted between the two branches,
as because of the altogether mistaken views which have been not
unfrequently held as to that connection. Lord Macaulay[45] speaks of
Provencal in the twelfth centur