His Grammar was superseded by that of Antoine Oudin—Grammaire Françoise rapportée au langage du temps, Paris, 1632. Oudin's original intention had been merely to enlarge the grammar of his predecessor. But as his work advanced he found "force antiquailles" and many mistakes, besides much confusion, repetition, and pedantry. He felt no compunction in telling the reader that he had enormously improved all he had borrowed from Maupas—although he is careful to note that he has no intention of damaging his rival's reputation, and is proud to share his opinion on several points. He had a great advantage over Maupas in having spent all his life in close connexion with the Court; his father, César, had been interpreter to the French king, and Antoine succeeded him in that office. He also appears to have had continual relations with foreigners, and he tells us on one occasion that he received from them "very considerable benefits." His grammar was certainly much used by foreign students, although it does not seem to have enjoyed as great a popularity in England as that of Maupas. Oudin's Curiositez Françoises (1640) was also addressed "aux estrangers," and his aim was to show his gratitude by attempting to call attention to the mistakes which had made their way into grammars drawn up for their instruction.[644]
L'Eschole Françoise pour apprendre a bien parler et escrire selon l'usage de ce temps et pratique des bons autheurs, divisée en deux livres dont l'un contient les premiers elements, l'autre les parties de l'oraison (Paris, 1604), by Jean Baptiste du Val, avocat en Parlement at Paris and French tutor to Marie de Medicis, was also intended partly for the use of foreigners. He seeks to console foreign students coping with the difficulties of French pronunciation and orthography, by assuring them that though the French themselves may be able to speak correctly, they cannot prescribe rules on this score. As for his grammar, the student will learn more from it in two hours than from any other in two weeks. He also takes up a supercilious attitude, natural in one who exercised his profession in the precincts of the Court, towards anything that resembled a provincial accent; better no teacher at all than one with a provincial accent.
Among other grammars of similar purport is that of Masset in French and Latin, Exact et tres facile acheminement a la langue Françoyse, mis en Latin par le meme autheur pour le soulagement des estrangers (1606);[645] and to the same category belongs also the Praecepta gallici sermonis ad pleniorem perfectioremque eius linguae cognitionem necessaria tum suevissima tum facillima (1607), by Philippe Garnier, who, after teaching French for many years in Germany, settled down at Orleans, his native town, as a language tutor.[646]
Another work widely used by travellers, and well known in England, was the Nouvelle et Parfaite Grammaire Françoise (1659) of Laurent Chiflet, the zealous Jesuit and missionary, which continued to be reprinted until the eighteenth century, and enjoyed for many years the highest reputation among foreign students of French. The Swiss Muralt relates how he FRENCH GRAMMARS FOR TRAVELLERSand a friend were inquiring for some books at one of the booksellers of the Palais, the centre of the trade; and how the bookseller answered them civilly and tried to find what they desired, until his wife interfered, crying, "Ne voiez vous pas que ce sont des etrangers qui ne savent ce qu'ils demandent? Donnez leur la grammaire de Chiflet, c'est là ce qu'il leur faut."[647]
Chiflet is very explicit in his advice to foreign students. In the first place the pronunciation should be learnt by reading a short passage every day with a French master, and the verbs most commonly in use committed to memory. Then the other parts of speech and the rules of syntax should be studied briefly; but care should be taken not to neglect reading, and to practise writing French, in order to become familiar with the orthography. One of his chief recommendations is to avoid learning isolated words; words should always be presented in sentence form, which is a means of learning their construction and of acquiring a good vocabulary at the same time. The rest of the method consists in translating from Latin or some other language into French, and in conversing with a tutor who should correct bad grammar or pronunciation. When once a fair knowledge of French is acquired, it should be strengthened by reading and reflecting upon some good book every day. Such reading is the shortest way of learning the language perfectly. Excellence and fluency in speaking may be attained by repeating or reciting aloud the substance of what has been read.[648]
The acquisition of the French language was not the only ambition of the English gentleman abroad. His aim was also to acquire those polite accomplishments in which the French excelled—dancing, fencing, riding, and so on. For this purpose he either frequented one of the "courtly" academies or engaged private tutors; and "every master of exercise," it was felt, served as a kind of language master.[649] We are indebted to Dallington[650] for an account of the cost of such a course abroad. "Money," he says, "is the soule of travell. If he travel without a servant £80 sterling is a competent proportion, except he learn to ride: if he maintain both these charges, he can be allowed no less than £150: and to allow above £200 were superfluous and to his hurt. The ordinary rate of his expense is 10 gold crowns a month his fencing, as much his dancing, no less his reading, and 10 crowns monthly his riding except in the heat of the year. The remainder of his £150, I allow him for apparell, books, travelling charges, tennis play, and other extraordinary expenses."
Some of the more studious travellers resorted to one or other of the French universities. John Palsgrave and John Eliote, the two best known English teachers of French in the sixteenth century, had both followed this course. Palsgrave was a graduate of Paris, and John Eliote, after spending three years at the College of Montague in Paris, taught for a year in the Collège des Africains at Orleans. The religious question had much influence in determining the plan of study in France. The university towns of Rheims and Douay were the special resorts of English Catholics.[651] On the suppression of the religious houses in England and the persecution of the English Roman Catholics, English seminaries arose at Paris, Louvain, Cambrai, St. Omer, Arras, and other centres in France. English Roman Catholics flocked to the French universities and colleges, and there is in existence a long list of English students who matriculated at the University of Douay.
On the other hand, the schools,[652] colleges,[653] and academies[654] founded by the Huguenots offered many attractions to Protestant England. The colleges had much in common with the modern French lycée, and the chief subjects taught were the classical languages. They did not take boarders, with the exception of that at Metz, and the students lived en pension with families in the town. The same is true of the academies, institutions of university standing. They were eight in number, and situated at Nîmes, Montpellier, Saumur, Montauban, Die, Sedan, Orthez (in the principality of Béarn[655]), and Geneva. Some Englishmen and many Scotchmen[656] held positions in the Protestant colleges and academies. BRITISH STUDENTS AT FRENCH UNIVERSITIESMany English Protestants, during their enforced sojourn on the Continent during the reign of Mary, took advantage of their exile to study at one or other of the Protestant academies, as well as to perfect their knowledge of French. A great number flocked to Geneva, including the Protestant author Michael Cope, who frequently preached in French.[657]
Of the colleges, that of Nîmes attracted a large number of foreigners. Montpellier likewise was very popular during the short period at the beginning of the seventeenth century when the town was Protestant. Among the academies in France, Saumur, Montauban,[658] and Sedan were much frequented by English travellers. Saumur in particular quickly attained to celebrity; its rapid growth may be partly accounted for by the fact that Duplessis Mornay, Governor of the town in 1588, naturally became a zealous patron of the Academy. Three years after its foundation the number of foreign students was considerable, and throughout the seventeenth century students from England, Scotland, Holland, and Switzerland thronged to the town.
The Academy at Geneva likewise was very popular.[659] Though not French, it was largely attended by French students, who had some influence in raising the standard of the French spoken in the town, which was rather unsatisfactory in the sixteenth century. It greatly improved in the following century, and when the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685), which dealt the death-blow to the French Protestant foundations, drove many students to Geneva, their influence in all directions was still more strongly felt. Some years before, in 1654, the regents were enjoined to see to it that their pupils "ne parlent savoyard et ne jurent ou diabloyent," but in 1691 Poulain de la Barre, a doctor of the Sorbonne, could say that "à Geneve on prononce incomparablement mieux que l'on ne fait en plusieurs provinces de France."[660]