FOOTNOTES:

[153]

Villon sut le premier, dans ces siècles grossiers,
Débrouiller l'art confus de nos vieux romanciers.
Art Poét. Ch. 1.

[154] Ed. P. L. Jacob. Paris, 1854. Villon's life has been the subject of numerous elaborate investigations, the latest and best of which is that of A. Longnon. Paris, 1877. Dr. Bijvanck, a Dutch scholar, has dealt since with the MSS.

[155] One of these anecdotes makes him patronised by Edward the Fifth of England. But the very terms of it are unsuitable to that king.

[156] The reader may be reminded that the Testament was a recognised mediaeval style. It was satirical and allegorical, the legacies which it gave being mostly indicative of the legatee's weaknesses or personal peculiarities.

[157] Ed. Chantelauze. Paris, 1881. Also usefully in Michaud et Poujoulat.

[158] Ed. Kervyn de Lettenhove. 2 vols. Brussels, 1867-8.

[159] Ed. Héricault. 2 vols. Paris, 1857.

[160] Edited in part by J. Quicherat. Paris, 1856.

[161] Martial d'Auvergne had the exceptional good luck to be reprinted in the 18th century (Vigilles 1724, Arrêts 1731), but he has not recently found an editor, though an edition of the Amant rendu Cordelier has been for some time due from the Société des Anciens Textes. The notice by M. de Montaiglon (the promised editor of the edition just mentioned) in Crepet's Poètes Français, i. 427, has been chiefly used here for facts.

[162] Ed. Kervyn de Lettenhove, as previously cited. For the remainder of the poets reviewed in this paragraph, few of whom have found modern editors, see Crepet, Poètes Français, vol. i.

[163] iii. 21.

[164] Paris, 1876.