Singing he was, or floyting alle the day,
He was as freshe as is the month of May.
There is one name I must mention here, that of ‘Peter le Organer,’[[312]] perhaps connected with ‘Orger’ of the same date. The owner of this more modern-looking term may either have been organist at some monastery or abbey-church, or he may have played upon the portable regal, in which latter case he too might possibly have been seen here. But ‘organ’ was a very general term. In the old psalters it seems to have been used for nearly every species of instrument. We should scarcely speak now of ‘hanging up our “organs” upon the willows,’ but so an old version of the Psalms has it. Did we not know they were a modern invention we might have been inclined to suspect ‘le Organer’ to have been but a strolling performer upon the ‘hurdy-gurdy.’ That, however, was an infliction mercifully spared to our forefathers. In concluding this brief survey of mediæval music, I cannot, I think, do better than quote, as I have done partially once before, Robert de Brunne’s account of the coronation of King Arthur, wherein we shall find many, if not most, of the professional characters I have been mentioning familiarly spoken of. He says—
Jogelours weren there enow
That their quaintise forthe drew:
Minstrels many with divers glew (glee)
Sounds of bemes (trumps) that men blew,
Harpes, pipes, and tabours,
Fithols (fiddles), citolles (cymbals), sautreours,
Belles, chimès and synfan