The last verse expresses the same sentiment as the answer of the Emperor Henry when he was told to beware of God's vengeance: "Celum celi Domino, terram autem dedit filiis hominum" (Otton. Frising. Gesta Frid. i. 11).
Li cuens Guillaumes li comença à dire:
—Diva, vilain, par la loi dont tu vives
Fus-tu a Nymes, la fort cité garnie?
—Oïl, voir, sire, le paaige me quistrent;
Ge fui trop poures, si nel poi baillier mie.
Il me lessèrent por mes enfanz qu'il virent.
—Di moi, vilain, des estres de la vile.
Et cil respont:—Ce vos sai-ge bien dire
Por un denier .ii. granz pains i véismes;
La denerée vaut .iii. en autre vile:
Moult par est bone, se puis n'est empirie.
—Fox, dist Guillaume, ce ne demant-je mie,
Mès des paiens chevaliers de la vile,
Del rei Otrant et de sa compaignie.
l.c., ll. 903-916.
[77] Cf. Auguste Longnon, "L'élément historique de Huon de Bordeaux," Romania, viii.
[78] "Pos de chantar m'es pres talens:"—Raynouard, Choix des poésies des Troubadours, iv. p. 83; Bartsch, Chrestomathie provençale.
[79] See the account of the custom in the Saga of Harald Hardrada, c. 16. "Harald entrusted to Jarizleif all the gold that he had sent from Micklegarth, and all sorts of precious things: so much wealth all together, as no man of the North Lands had ever seen before in one man's hands. Harald had thrice come in for the palace-sweeping (Polotasvarf) while he was in Micklegarth. It is the law there that when the Greek king dies, the Varangians shall have a sweep of the palace; they go over all the king's palaces where his treasures are, and every man shall have for his own what falls to his hand" (Fornmanna Sögur, vi. p. 171).
Il ot o lui un saietaire
Qui molt fu fels et deputaire:
Des le nombril tot contreval
Ot cors en forme de cheval:
Il n'est riens nule s'il volsist
Que d'isnelece n'ateinsist:
Cors, chiere, braz, a noz semblanz
Avoit, mes n'ert pas avenanz.
l. 12,207.
[81] Chaucer, who often yields to the temptations of "Hyperbole" in this sense of the word, lays down the law against impertinent decorations, in the rhetorical instruction of Pandarus to Troilus, about Troilus's letter to Cressida (B. ii. l. 1037):—
Ne jompre eek no discordaunt thing yfere
As thus, to usen termes of phisyk;
In loves termes hold of thy matere
The forme alwey, and do that it be lyk;
For if a peyntour wolde peynte a pyk
With asses feet, and hede it as an ape,
It cordeth naught; so nere it but a jape.