gnes Bernauerin, the lawful wife of his son. To
this very day the martyred woman is sung in German romance and poetry.
She was the daughter of a barber and surgeon of Augsburg, where prince
Albert, son of Duke Ernst, learned to know and to love her because of
her almost unearthly beauty and charm. He made her in due form his
lawful wife; but the old duke would not recognize the marriage. In the
absence of her husband, Agnes was seized in the castle of Straubing,
dragged upon the bridge of the Danube, and hurled into the stream. She
drifted toward the bank, where one of the hangmen seized her with his
hooked pole by her gold-colored hair, plunged her into deep water, and
held her beneath its surface until she was drowned.

But let us return to Klara Hatzlerin, the nun, who so frequently chooses
scenes from the most licentious poets. _The Song of the Seven Greatest
Pleasures_ is original, but extremely coarse. Eating, drinking, minne
play of the most bestial kind, the natural functions of stomach and
kidneys, sleeping, bathing (as described by Poggio), are the ideals of
fifteenth century materialism.

The most loathsome poem, however, in the collection so foul with obscene
pictures, is the one in which a mother teaches her daughter in
undisguised terms the arduous, though lucrative, art of prostitution. It
is scarcely possible that any other literature should contain a poem so
degraded.

Again, a poem by Hans Rosenpliit is given entirely in the manner of
Boccaccio. The servant of a rich man seeks the favor of his mistress and
finds acceptance. She takes him to her chamber and hides him under the
bed. When the husband retires to his couch, she tells him that the
servant sought her love and that she had invited him for the night to
the garden to have him chastised. She advises her husband to put on her
clothing, to go into the garden, and to chastise the scoundrel with a
heavy club. The husband does as he is bidden. Meanwhile, the wife
bestows her favors upon the man-servant. Thereupon she gives him a stick
with which he belabors his master unmercifully, saying he only wished to
test the fidelity of his mistress toward his beloved master. The latter
barely escapes from the heavy volley of blows, tells his wife the
adventure, and finally thanks God for such a faithful servant. The poet,
Hans Rosenpliit, composed many carnival plays which are filled with
obscene jests, and deal mostly with the lowest peasant elements.

In