g" and some of Wagner's operas. We must not
omit to note the magnificent life-sized ideal bronze figure of Arthur,
cast for the monument of Maximilian I., now in the Franciscan church at
Innsbruck, and regarded as the finest among the series of heroes there
represented.

[Illustration: The Ruins of King Arthur's Castle.]

ROLAND

(740-778)

"O, for a blast of that dread horn,
On Fontarabian echoes borne
That to King Charles did come,
When Rowland brave, and Olivier,
And every paladin and peer
On Roncesvalles died!"--_Marmion._

"When Charlemain with all his peerage fell,
By Fontarabbia."--_Paradise Lost._

[Illustration: Roland.]

"A Roland for an Oliver!" Saving the passing reference by Scott and
Milton, quoted above, Roland and Olivier are almost unknown to English
readers, and yet their once familiar names, knit together for centuries,
have passed into a proverb, to be remembered as we remember the
friendship of David and Jonathan, or to be classed by the scholar with
Pylades, and Orestes of classic story, or with Amys and Amylion of
romance.

The "Song of Roland" might be called the national epic of France. It
corresponds to the "Mort d'Arthur" of England, the "Cid Chronicles" of
Spain, the "Nibelungen Lied" of Germany, and the Longobardian legends of
North Italy. Italian mediaeval literature is rich in the Roland romances,
founded on the fabulous "Chronicle of John Turpin" and the "Chansons de
Gestes," of which the "Song of Roland" is one. Of the Italian romances
the "Morgante Maggiore" of Pulci was published as early as 1488,
Boyardo's "Orlando Innamorata" in 1496, and Ariosto's "Orlando Furioso"
in 1515. English versions of Boyardo and Ariosto have since been
translated into the rhyming couplets of Hoole, and as late as 1831 into
the _ottava rima_ stanzas of W. S. Rose. It was not, however, till
April, 1880, that a full English translation of the original "Song of
Roland," from MSS. written in the old _langue d'oil_ of Northern France,
was published by Kegan, Paul & Co., from the pen of Mr. O'Hagan, Q.C.,
of Dublin. Most probably it was a curtailed version of this romance that
is referred to by Wace in his "Roman le Rou," when he records how, as
the Normans marched to Senlac Hill, in 1066, the minstrel Taillefer
sang,

"Of Roland and the heroes all
Who fell at fatal Roncesvall."

Turning to the historical data on which the romance is based, it will be
fou