Deprived him of his life.
——:o:——
Ménage introduces Le Chanson de la Galisse without any other explanation than that it relates to the adventures of an imaginary character, he does not mention the Author’s name, nor does he refer to any other poem having any resemblance to it. Yet there was a “Chanson” written in exactly the same style and metre, recording (in burlesque it is true) the adventures of a brave French officer, named La Palice. And what makes it more remarkable is, that this poem was written by a friend of M. Gilles de Ménage, the grave and religious Bernard de la Monnoye, who conceived the idea of personifying nonsensical truths in his Complaint upon the Life and Death of La Palice; careless of attaching popular ridicule to a name which should excite only recollections of heroic and military virtue.
Concerning this Chanson de la Palice there was a long article in Chambers’s Edinburgh Journal, as far back as July, 1845, from which the following notes are extracted:—
“Thanks to this strange production, we know that the famous La Palice died in losing his life, and that he would not have had his equal had he been alone in the world. Doubtless it is satisfactory to know that he could never make up his mind to load his pistols when he had no powder; and that when he wrote verse he did not write prose; or that while drinking he never spoke a word. These are certainly notable details concerning the habits and character of this great man, but it is also certain that La Palice had greater claims to admiration which may be brought to light in illustrating some stanzas of the biographical ballad. The song begins thus:—
‘Please you, gentlemen, to hear
The song of La Palice;
It surely will delight you all,
Provided that it please,’
Besides this proposition, the historian would have done well to tell us that La Palice was of noble race, for his grandfather, an earlier Jacques de Chabannes, after valiantly defending Castillon against Talbot, the English Achilles, died of his wounds at the siege of this city, which, two years afterwards (17th July, 1453), cost the life of his illustrious enemy.