[376] "Amis and Amiloun," ed. Kölbing, Heilbronn, 1884, 8vo, French and English texts, in verse. French text in prose, in Moland and d'Héricault, "Nouvelles ... du XIII^e. Siècle," 1856, 16mo.—French text of "Floire" in Edelstand du Méril, "Poèmes du XIII^e. Siècle," Paris, 1856. English text: "Floris and Blauncheflur, mittelenglisches Gedicht aus dem 13 Jahrhundert," ed. Hausknecht, Berlin, 1885, 8vo; see also Lumby, "Horn ... with fragments of Floriz," E.E.T.S., 1886. The popularity of this tale is shown by the fact that four or five different versions of it in English have come down to us.—Lays by Marie de France were also translated into English: "Le Lay le Freine," in verse, of the beginning of the fourteenth century. English text in "Anglia," vol. iii. p. 415; "Sir Launfal," by Thomas Chestre, fifteenth century, in "Ritson's Metrical Romances," 1802.
[377] Examples of "estrifs," debates or "disputoisons": "The Thrush and the Nightingale," on the merits of women, time of Edward I. (with a title in French: "Si comence le cuntent par entre le mauvis et la russinole"); "The Debate of the Carpenter's Tools" (both in Hazlitt's "Remains," vol. i. p. 50, and i. p. 79); "The Debate of the Body and the Soul" (Matzner's "Altenglische Sprachproben," part i. p. 90), same subject in French verse, thirteenth century, "Monumenta Franciscana," vol. i. p. 587; "The Owl and the Nightingale" (ed. Stevenson, Roxburghe Club, 1838, 4to). This last, one of the most characteristic of all, belongs to the thirteenth century, and consists in a debate between the two birds concerning their respective merits; they are very learned, and quote Alfred's proverbs, but they are not very well bred, and come almost to insults and blows.
[378] Litanies of love:
Love is wele, love is wo, love is geddede,
Love is lif, love is deth, &c.
Th. Wright, "Anecdota Literaria," London, 1844, 8vo, p. 96, time of Edward I., imitated from the "Chastoiement des Dames," in Barbazan and Méon, vol. ii.
[379] Th. Wright, "Specimens of Lyric Poetry, composed in England in the reign of Edward I.," Percy Society, 1842, 8vo, p. 43.
[380] They wrote in French, Latin, and English, using sometimes the three languages in the same song, sometimes only two of them:
Scripsi hæc carmina in tabulis!
Mon ostel est en mi la vile de Paris:
May y sugge namore, so wel me is;
Yef hi deye for love of hire, duel hit ys.
Wright, "Specimens of Lyric Poetry," p. 64.