Joseph Roumanille.
the bonds of friendship under so happy a star that for half a century we walked together, devoted to the same patriotic cause, without our affection or our zeal ever knowing diminution.
Roumanille had sent his first verses to a Provençal journal, Boui-Abaisso, which was published weekly at Marseilles by Joseph Désanat, and which for the bards of the day was an admirable outlet. For the language has never lacked exponents, and especially at the time of the Boui-Abaisso (1841-1846) there was a strong movement at Marseilles in favour of the dialect, which, had it done nothing but promote writing in Provençal, deserves our gratitude.
Also we must recognise that such popular poets as Désanat of Tarascon, or Bellot Chailan, Bénédit and Gelu, pre-eminently Gelu, each of whom in his way expressed the buoyant joyous spirit of southern Provence, have never, in their particular line, been surpassed. Another, Camille Reyband, a poet of Carpentras, a poet, too, of noble dimensions, in a grand epistle he addressed to Roumanille, laments the fate of the Provençal speech, neglected by idiots who, declares he, “Follow the example of the gentlemen of the towns, and leave to the wise old forefathers our unfortunate language while they render the French tongue, which they fundamentally distort into the worst of patois.”
Reyband seemed to foretell the Renaissance which was then hatching when he made this appeal to the editor of the Boui-Abaisso:
“Before we separate, my brothers, let us defend ourselves against oblivion. Together let us build up a colossal edifice, some Tower of Babel made from the bricks of Provence. At the summit, whilst singing, engrave your names, for you, my friends, are worthy to be remembered. As for me, whom a grain of praise intoxicates and overcomes, and who only sings as does the cicada, and can but contribute towards your monument a pinch of gravel and a little poor cement, I will dig for my Muse a tomb in the sand, and when, having finished your imperishable work, you look down, my brothers, from the height of your blue sky, you will no longer be able to see me.”
All these gentlemen were, however, imbued with this erroneous idea that the language of the people, good though they felt it to be, was only suitable for common or droll subjects, and hence they took no pains either to purify or to restore it.
Since the time of Louis XIV. the old traditions for the spelling of our language had become almost obsolete. The poets of the meridian had, partly through carelessness or ignorance, adopted the French spelling. And this utterly false system cut at the root of our beautiful speech. Every one began to carry out his own orthographical fancies, until it reached such a point that the various dialects of the Oc language, owing to this constant disfigurement in the writing, no longer bore any resemblance one to another.