And yet some few rays of their former glory linger around the race. Like their ancestors, they celebrate noble and worthy deeds, dispensing praise or blame impartially to small and great. Those of the ancient bards who were blind made use of a sort of tally-stick, of which the arrangement of the notches served to fix certain songs in their memory. This species of mnemonics, which is known in Wales as Coelbren y Beirdd—the Alphabet of the Bards—is still in use among the barz of Brittany. They also invariably observe the old bardic law which forbade them to enter any house without previously asking permission by singing the customary salutation at the door: "God's blessing be upon you, people of this house: God's blessing be upon you, small and great!" and never entering unless they receive the answer: "God's blessing be also upon you, wayfarer, whoever you may be." If they do not hear this speedily, they pass on their way.
Like the ancient Cambrian bards, they are, by virtue of their profession, a necessity at every popular festival. They betroth the future husband and wife, according to antique and unvarying rites, previous to the performance of the religious ceremony; they enjoy great liberty of speech, and exercise a certain amount of moral authority over the minds of the people; they are loved, sought for, and honored almost as much as were their bardic ancestors, though moving in a less elevated sphere.
The name of kloer (kloarek in the singular) is given to the youths who are studying with a prospect of entering the ecclesiastical state. They are identical with the Welsh kler, or school-clerk, and in the time of Taliessin occupied, as they still occupy, the place of bards, forming a class by themselves of scholar-poets.
The Breton kloer generally belong to the peasantry or to the trades-people of the country towns. The ancient episcopal sees of Tréguier and Léon, Quimper and Vannes, attract them in the largest numbers. They arrive there in bands from the depths of the country, in the national costume, with their long hair, and their rustic simplicity and language; most of them being from about eighteen to twenty years old. They live together in the faubourgs; the same garret serves for bed-room, kitchen, dining-room, and study. This is a far different existence from that which they led among the woods and fields, and it is not long before a complete change has come over them. With the lessening of muscular strength, their intellect and imagination develop themselves. The summer vacation takes them back to their village homes at the season in which, says a Breton poet, "young hearts expand with the flowers," and when temptations abound; thus it not unseldom happens that the kloarek returns to his studies with the thorn of a first love in his heart. Then there arises a tempest in his soul—a struggle between the love of the creature and the Creator. Sometimes the former is the stronger; isolation, homesickness, leisure, contribute to develop a sentiment of which the germ only exists. A remembrance, a word, a melody, or the sound of some wild instrument which breaks on his ear and recalls his home, makes it suddenly burst forth. Then he throws his class-books into the fire, renounces the ecclesiastical state, and returns to his native village.
But it is far oftener that the higher devotion wins the day. In either case, however, the scholar-poet must, according to his own expression, "comfort his heart" by making his confidences to the muse.
By an instinct natural to all but truly popular poets, the kloer never write their compositions. They are wise in this. "The memory of hearing," as it was called by the ancient bards, is much more tenacious than the "memory of letters." To write and print their songs would be to give up having them learnt by heart, and repeated by generation after generation.
Once become priests, the kloer burn that which they have worshipped; thus Gildas declaims against the bards, forgetting, in his monk's habit, that in his youth he had made one of their number. As kloer, these scholar-poets disdain the songs of the wandering minstrels; as priests, they equally disdain the lays of the kloer. And yet, as priests, they do not cease to sing; but that which lingered on the earth now finds its wings and takes a heavenward flight, and the sacred songs and canticles which express the warm devotion of their hearts imprint themselves on the memory of the people, and are, like prayers, transmitted from age to age. It is thus impossible to know the date of their compositions, except by knowing the exact period at which their authors lived.
With regard to the religious events which are the theme of the legends, it is different. These compositions belong to the domain of historical songs and ballads, and owe their popularity to their being the expression of traditions already widely known among the people.
We close our notice with the translation of a little poem by a young kloarek of Léon. It is his farewell to earthly love—a farewell which is apparently made more easy by outward accidentals than can always be the case under similar circumstances. It is entitled
ANN DROUK-RANS; OR, THE RUPTURE.