Frédéric Mistral / Poet and Leader in Provence

by Charles Alfred Downer

The second canto opens with the exquisite stanza beginning,—

"Cantas, cantas, magnanarello
Que la culido es cantarello!"

and the poet evidently fell in love with its music, for he repeats it, with slight variations, several times during the canto. This second canto is a delight from beginning to end; Mistral is here in his element; he is at his very best. The girls sing merrily in the lovely sunshine as they gather the silkworms, Mirèio among them. Vincèn passes along, and the two engage in conversation. Mistral cannot be praised too highly for the sweetness, the naturalness, the animation of this scene. Mirèio learns of Vincèn's lonely winter evenings, of his sister, who is like Mirèio but not so fair, and they forget to work. But they make good the time lost, only now and then their fingers meet as they put the silkworms into the bag. And then they find a nest of little birds, and the saying goes that when two find a nest at the top of a tree a year cannot pass but that Holy Church unite them. So says Mirèio; but Vincèn adds that this is only true if the young escape before they are put into a cage. "Jesu moun Diéu! take care," cries the young girl, "catch them carefully, for this concerns us." So Vincèn gets the young birds, and Mirèio puts them carefully into her bodice; but they dig and scratch, and must be transferred to Vincèn's cap; and then the branch breaks, and the two fall together in close embrace upon the soft grass. The poet breaks into song:—

"Fresh breezes, that stir the canopy of the woods, let your merry murmur soften into silence over the young couple! Wandering zephyrs, breathe softly, give time to dream, give them time at least to dream of happiness! Thou that ripplest o'er thy bed, go slowly, slowly, little brook! Make not so much sound among the stones, make not so much sound, for the two souls have gone off, in the same beam of fire, like a swarming hive—let them hover in the starry air!"

But Mirèio quickly releases herself; the young man is full of anxiety lest she be hurt, and curses the devilish tree "planted a Friday!" But she, with a trembling she cannot control, tells of an inner torment that takes away hearing and sight, and keeps her heart beating. Vincèn wonders if it may not be fear of a scolding from her mother, or a sunstroke. Then Mirèio, in a sudden outburst, like a Wagnerian heroine, confesses her love to the astonished boy, who remains dazed, and believes for a time that she is cruelly trifling with him. She reassures him, passionately. "Do not speak so," cries the boy, "from me to you there is a labyrinth; you are the queen of the Mas, all bow before you; I, peasant of Valabrègue, am nothing, Mirèio, but a worker in the fields!" "Ah, what is it to me whether my beloved be a baron or a basket-weaver, provided he is pleasing to me. Why, O Vincèn, in your rags do you appear to me so handsome?"

And then the young man is as inspired, and in impassioned, well-nigh extravagant language tells of his love for Mirèio. He is like a fig tree he once saw that grew thin and miserable out of a rock near Vaucluse, and once a year the water comes and the tree quenches its thirst, and renews its life for a year. And the youth is the fig tree and Mirèio the fountain. "And would to Heaven, would to Heaven, that I, poor boy, that I might once a year, as now, upon my knees, sun myself in the beams of thy countenance, and graze thy fingers with a trembling kiss." And then her mother calls. Mirèio runs to the house, while he stands motionless as in a dream.

No résumé or even translation can give the beauty of this canto, its brightness, its music, its vivacity, the perfect harmony between words and sense, the graceful succession of the rhymes and the cadence of the stanzas. Elsewhere in the chapter on versification a reference is made to the mechanical difficulties of translation, but there are difficulties of a deeper order. The Félibres put forth great claims for the richness of their vocabulary, and they undoubtedly exaggerate. Yet, how shall we render into English or French the word embessouna when describing the fall of Mirèio and Vincèn from the tree. Mistral writes:—

"Toumbon, embessouna, sus lou souple margai."

Bessoun (in French, besson) means a twin, and the participle expresses the idea, clasped together like twins. (Mistral translates, "serrés comme deux jumeaux.") An expression of this sort, of course, adds little to the prose language; but this power, untrammelled by academic traditions, of creating a word for the moment, is essential to the freshness of poetic style.

What is to be praised above all in these two exquisite cantos is the pervading naturalness. The similes and metaphors, however bold and original, are always drawn from the life of the speakers. Mèste Ambroi, declining at first to sing, says "Li mirau soun creba!" (The mirrors are broken), referring to the membranes of the locust that make its song. "Like a scythe under the hammer," "Their heads leaning together like two marsh-flowers in bloom, blowing in the merry wind," "His words flowed abundantly like a sudden shower on an aftermath in May," "When your eyes beam upon me, it seems to me I drink a draught of perfumed wine," "My sister is burned like a branch of the date tree," "You are like the asphodel, and the tanned hand of Summer dares not caress your white brow," "Slender as a dragon-fly," are comparisons taken at random. Of Mirèio the poet says, "The merry sun hath hatched her out," "Her glance is like dew, her rounded bosom is a double peach not yet ripe."