One Hundred Merrie And Delightsome Stories / Right Pleasaunte To Relate In All Goodly Companie By Way Of Joyance And Jollity
The highest living authority on French Literature—Professor George Saintsbury—has said:
“The Cent Nouvelles is undoubtedly the first work of literary prose in French, and the first, moreover, of a long and most remarkable series of literary works in which French writers may challenge all comers with the certainty of victory. The short prose tale of a comic character is the one French literary product the pre-eminence and perfection of which it is impossible to dispute, and the prose tale first appears to advantage in the Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles . The subjects are by no means new. They are simply the old themes of the fabliaux treated in the old way. The novelty is in the application of prose to such a purpose, and in the crispness, the fluency, and the elegance, of the prose used.”
Besides the literary merits which the eminent critic has pointed out, the stories give us curious glimpses of life in the 15th Century. We get a genuine view of the social condition of the nobility and the middle classes, and are pleasantly surprised to learn from the mouths of the nobles themselves that the peasant was not the down-trodden serf that we should have expected to find him a century after the Jacquerie, and 350 years before the Revolution.
In fact there is an atmosphere of tolerance, not to say bonhommie about these stories which is very remarkable when we consider under what circumstances they were told, and by whom, and to whom.
This seems to have struck M. Lenient, a French critic, who says:
“Generally the incidents and personages belong to the bourgeoisée ; there is nothing chivalric, nothing wonderful; no dreamy lovers, romantic dames, fairies, or enchanters. Noble dames, bourgeois, nuns, knights, merchants, monks, and peasants mutually dupe each other. The lord deceives the miller’s wife by imposing on her simplicity, and the miller retaliates in much the same manner. The shepherd marries the knight’s sister, and the nobleman is not over scandalized.
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ONE HUNDRED MERRIE AND DELIGHTSOME STORIES
Edited by Antoine de la Salle
Illustrated by Léon Lebèque
Contents
List of Illustrations
DETAILED CONTENTS CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
STORY THE SECOND — THE MONK-DOCTOR.
STORY THE SEVENTH — THE WAGGONER IN THE BEAR.
STORY THE FIFTEENTH — THE CLEVER NUN.
STORY THE SEVENTEENTH — THE LAWYER AND THE BOLTING-MILL.
STORY THE TWENTIETH — THE HUSBAND AS DOCTOR.
STORY THE TWENTY-NINTH — THE COW AND THE CALF.
STORY THE THIRTIETH — THE THREE CORDELIERS
STORY THE THIRTY-THIRD — THE LADY WHO LOST HER HAIR.
STORY THE THIRTY-FIFTH — THE EXCHANGE.
STORY THE THIRTY-SIXTH — AT WORK.
STORY THE THIRTY-SEVENTH — THE USE OF DIRTY WATER.
STORY THE FORTY-FIRST — LOVE IN ARMS.
STORY THE FORTY-THIRD — A BARGAIN IN HORNS.
STORY THE FORTY-FOURTH — THE MATCH-MAKING PRIEST.
STORY THE FORTY-FIFTH — THE SCOTSMAN TURNED WASHERWOMAN
STORY THE FORTY-EIGHTH — THE CHASTE MOUTH.
STORY THE FORTY-NINTH — THE SCARLET BACKSIDE.
STORY THE FIFTY-FIRST — THE REAL FATHERS.
STORY THE FIFTY-THIRD — THE MUDDLED MARRIAGES.
STORY THE FIFTY FOURTH — THE RIGHT MOMENT.
STORY THE FIFTY-FIFTH — A CURE FOR THE PLAGUE.
STORY THE FIFTY-SIXTH — THE WOMAN, THE PRIEST, THE SERVANT, AND THE
STORY THE FIFTY-SEVENTH — THE OBLIGING BROTHER.
STORY THE FIFTY-EIGHTH — SCORN FOR SCORN.
STORY THE SIXTY-SECOND — THE LOST RING.
STORY THE SIXTY-FIFTH — INDISCRETION REPROVED, BUT NOT PUNISHED.
STORY THE SIXTY-SIXTH — THE WOMAN AT THE BATH.
STORY THE SIXTY-SEVENTH — THE WOMAN WITH THREE HUSBANDS.
STORY THE SIXTY-EIGHTH — THE JADE DESPOILED.
STORY THE SEVENTIETH — THE DEVIL’S HORN.
STORY THE SEVENTY-FIRST — THE CONSIDERATE CUCKOLD
STORY THE SEVENTY-SECOND — NECESSITY IS THE MOTHER OF INVENTION.
STORY THE SEVENTY-THIRD — THE BIRD IN THE CAGE.
STORY THE SEVENTY-FOURTH — THE OBSEQUIOUS PRIEST.
STORY THE SEVENTY-SEVENTH — THE SLEEVELESS ROBE.
STORY THE EIGHTY-THIRD — THE GLUTTONOUS MONK.
STORY THE EIGHTY-SIXTH — FOOLISH FEAR.
STORY THE EIGHTY-SEVENTH — WHAT THE EYE DOES NOT SEE.
STORY THE EIGHTY-NINTH — THE FAULT OF THE ALMANAC.
STORY THE NINETY-SECOND — WOMEN’S QUARRELS.
STORY THE NINETY-FOURTH — DIFFICULT TO PLEASE.
STORY THE NINETY-SEVENTH — BIDS AND BIDDINGS.
STORY THE NINETY-EIGHTH — THE UNFORTUNATE LOVERS.
STORY THE HUNDREDTH AND LAST — THE CHASTE LOVER.
NOTES.
