When Sir William heard it, he said to the governor, “Let us go out of the second gate, for the chess-men are arrived.” Sir William passed the wicket, and remained without. In following him the governor stooped and put out his head. Sir William drew a small battle-axe from under his cloak, and therewith smote to death his defenceless foe. He then opened the first gate, the burgesses entered in numerous and gallant array, and incontinently the castle was taken.[184]
Minstrelsy.
The minstrel’s lay, the poetry of the troubadour, the romance of the learned clerk, all spoke of war and love, of the duties and sports of chivalry. Every baronial knight had his gay troop of minstrels that accompanied him to the field, and afterwards chaunted in his hall, whether in their own or another’s verse, the martial deeds which had renowned his house. A branch of the minstrelsy art consisted of reciting tales; and such persons as practised it were called jesters.
“I warn you first at the beginning,
That I will make no vain carping
Of deeds of arms nor of amours
As do minstrelles and jestours,
That make carping in many a place
Of Octoviane and Isembrase,
And of many other jestes,
And namely when they come to festes;
Nor of the life of Bevis of Hampton,
That was a knight of great renown;
Nor of Sir Guy of Warwick,
All if it might some men like.”[185]
Minstrels played on various musical instruments during dinner, and chaunted or recited their verses and tales afterwards both in the hall, and in the chamber to which the barons and knights retired for amusement.
“Before the king he set him down,
And took his harp of merry soun,
And, as he full well can,
Many merry notes he began.
The king beheld, and sat full still,
To hear his harping he had good will.
When he left off his harping,
To him said that rich king,
Minstrel, me liketh well thy glee,
What thing that thou ask of me
Largely I will thee pay;
Therefore ask now and asay.”[186]
A minstrel’s lay generally accompanied the wine and spices which concluded the entertainment.[187] Kings and queens had their trains of songsters, and partly from humour and partly from contempt, the head of the band was called king of the minstrels.[188] But men of the first quality, particularly the younger sons and brothers of great houses, followed the profession of minstrelsy, and no wonder, if it be true that they gained the guerdon without having encountered the dangers of war; for many a doughty knight complained that the smiles for which he had perilled himself in the battle field were bestowed upon some idle son of peace at home. The person of a minstrel was sacred, and base and barbarian the man would have been accounted, who did not venerate him that sang the heroic and the tender lay, the magic strains of chivalry, and could shed a romantic lustre over fierce wars and faithful loves.
“In days of yore how fortunately fared
The minstrel! wandering on from hall to hall,
Baronial court or royal; cheered with gifts
Munificent, and love, and ladies’ praise:
Now meeting on his road an armed knight,
Now resting with a pilgrim by the side
Of a clear brook: beneath an abbey’s roof
One evening sumptuously lodg’d; the next
Humbly, in a religious hospital;
Or with some merry outlaws of the wood;
Or haply shrouded in a hermit’s cell.
Him, sleeping or awake, the robber spared;
He walk’d—protected from the sword of war
By virtue of that sacred instrument
His harp, suspended at the traveller’s side;
His dear companion wheresoe’er he went,
Opening from land to land an easy way
By melody, and by the charm of verse.”[189]
Every page of early European history attests the sacred consideration of the minstrel, and the romances are full of stories, which at least our imagination can credit, of many a knight telling his soft tale in the dress of a love-singing poet. That dress had another claim to respect, for it was fashioned like a sacerdotal robe, as we learn from the story of two itinerant priests gaining admittance to a monastery, on the supposition of their being minstrels; but as soon as the fraud was discovered the poor ecclesiastics were beaten and driven from the monastery by their happier brethren.[190] The minstrel also was often arrayed in a dress of splendour, given to him by a baron in a moment of joyous generosity. The Earl of Foix, after a great festival, gave to heralds and minstrels the sum of five hundred franks; and he gave to the minstrels of his guest, the Duke of Tourrain, gowns of cloth of gold, furred with ermine, valued at two hundred franks.[191]
Romances.