Many romantic traditions have been handed down to us of that adventurous monarch and Blondel de Nesle, his favorite minstrel. We read in the records of our ancient chroniclers, a simple tale of the latter's long pilgrimage in search of the captive king his master. How Blondel came one evening as the sun went down among the hills of the Rhine, to the solitary castle of Trifels, where the monarch lay in a damp cold dungeon. How he seated himself at the dungeon grate, and taking his harp from his shoulder, began a song which Richard and he had made together in Palestine; and how the overjoyed king took up the words as they reached his ear, and chanted to the top of his full voice in answer. And farthermore, how Blondel returned to England, and went 'shoonless and unhooded' through all parts of the land, until the captive's loyal subjects were aroused; and until the great ransom was gathered together by which those subjects bought his freedom. Many such stories are told of the time of the chivalric Richard; and the devoted fidelity of his dependents will ever be a bright spot on the page of that history into which their names have stolen, and through which they are now receiving—reward dearest to noble spirits,—virtuous and stainless renown.
In the reign of John Lackland, the minstrels were the means of saving the life and fortunes of an Earl of Chester, by stirring up the rabble, who had gathered to a fair in the border of Wales, to go to his rescue. This they did under one Dutton, at sight of whom and his followers, the Welsh besiegers retired from before the Earl's castle.
In the time of Edward I, "a multitude of minstrels attended at the knighting of his son."
Under the reign of Edward II, such privileges were claimed by this class, that it became necessary to restrain them by a particular statute. Yet notwithstanding this, towards the latter part of this reign, we find that the minstrels still retained the liberty of entrance at will into the royal presence, and were still remarkable for splendor of dress.
During the short rule of Richard II, John of Gaunt instituted a court of minstrels at Tutbury in Staffordshire. They had a charter, empowering them variously, and bestowing inter alia the right of appointing "a king of the minstrels with four subordinate officers."
Under the usurper Bolingbroke—Henry the Fourth—the profession maintained its dignity and importance, and met with favor from king and noble, notwithstanding the contempt of the stuttering Hotspur.
| I had rather be a kitten and cry—mew, Than one of these same metre ballad mongers; I had rather hear a brazen canstick turned Or a dry wheel grate on an axletree, Etc. |
Alcibiades cried down lute playing—because, though he excelled his comrades in beauty, eloquence, and gallantry, in this one little thing his skill failed him. Percy "spoke thick" and so song did not suit him. Even as late as Henry VIII, we find minstrels attached in licensed capacities, to the households of the great nobles. But the profession was fast sinking into disrepute; and in the great entertainment at Kenilworth Castle in 1575, a caricature copy of the old minstrel appeared among the sources of amusement prepared by the gallant Leicester for his royal mistress.
Thus had the profession completed a circle, and, in name at least, returned to its primitive state. Centuries before among the Saxons the singer was called mimus, joculator, histrio, indiscriminately. And though these words, like parasite, demagogue, tyrant, sophist and others, bore a respectable meaning at the period of their first use, the minstrel in the course of time adapted himself to the meaning which time and change had given them, and in the reign of Elizabeth had become a mere 'jester.' He turned the circle and went back to the titles of his progenitors, adding to the ignominy of those titles by wearing them. An act was at length passed, in the thirty-ninth year of the queen just mentioned, classing "all wandering minstrels, with rogues, vagabonds and sturdy beggars," and ordering them to be punished as such. From this severe judgment, however, those, attached by peculiar circumstances to the house of that Dutton spoken of above as the preserver of Ranulph the last Earl of Chester, were particularly excepted. This statute was the death blow to the few remnants of the genuine old minstrelsy.
I can now proceed undividedly in tracing out my slight sketch of English classic poets and written poetry.