might still be innocent, and the willingness to believe it, in spite of most conclusive evidence, when he finds that the Fox has still valuable jewels which he promises to give him, are painted by the hand of one who has deeply studied human nature; while the circumstance of a culprit at the bar, telling one entertaining tale after another, as Reynard on this occasion does, reminds us forcibly of the simple state of society, and the eager thirst for 'some new story,' which distinguished those times, when the disour was the most cherished companion of princes. Here is a specimen, an old fable, but never has it been told with more spirit.

'When Reynard thus perceived the sport
His tales afforded to the Court,
And how they riveted attention,
There seemed no end to his invention,-
He told them stories short and long;
They seemed like Cantos to a Song,
Each of the other quite suggestive,
Converting gloomy thoughts to festive-
As how the Stork was once provoked
By Isengrim, when well-nigh choked
With some great bone: for Long-bill he
Sent off, to come immediately.
The Doctor to his roost had ta'en,
But quickly rose, and grasped his cane;
Slipped on his shoes and shovel hat,
And sought the Wolf, who moaning sat :
He could not speak, but pointed to
His throat.-The Stork, as wont to do,
First felt his pulse, then shook his head,
Cried hem!' and said, 'you must be bled!'
Whereat the Wolf, in angry wise,

Unto the Doctor's wondering_eyes

Made plain the grievance-Is it there?'
Quoth Long-bill, and began to stare
Adown his gorge-' I'll have it out
In no time!' Then, to feel about
For spectacles he did begin,

And asked Who could have put it in ?'
The Wolf could make no answer, so
The Stork had nothing more to do
Than operate; though much it went
Against his inclination's bent,

To prætermit what forms prescribe-
Like all the Apothecary tribe !—
With bill for forceps, leisurely,
The sticking bone he then did free;
And held his hand out for the fee.

Quoth Isengrim: No fee is due!

The luckiest leech alive are you!

Within my jaws your sconce hath lain

Yet see! thou hast it whole again!'-pp. ccv-ccvii.

At length Reynard, emboldened by the interest taken both by the king and queen in his pleasant stories, assumes a loftier tone, and demands that strict legal proof shall be brought of the truth of each and all of his numerous iniquities. King Noble is sorely puzzled how to act; but not knowing what to do, he makes a right royal speech.

'Reynard! I'd have you understand,

That whilst I over this wide land

Bear sway, none who for justice ask
Shall go unheeded. Hard the task
To arbitrate 'twixt right and wrong !
You must have seen that all along,
In your own case. Both sides I hear,
But neither makes the matter clear.

The Hare is killed-that's certain! granted!
Who killed him? Here the answer's wanted.
Some link is missing in the chain;
Therefore, at present, I refrain
From further comment—nothing less
I like, than law that's made to guess

At guilt; and the accused, 'tis writ,
Of doubt shall have the benefit.'

Quoth Reynard then: My King hath won
A victory o'er Solomon,

In wisdom, equity, and law!'

He turned, and by his side he saw

The Badger, who, from first to last,
Had marked with interest the cast
Of all the dice: he had reliance
On Reynard's tact, and looked defiance
To all around-their glances met-
At their embrace each eye was wet!
With smothered laughter bursting nigh,
Reynard made feint a deep-drawn sigh
To heave, whilst (winking all the while)
He whispered to his friend Old File!

We've done 'em!'-then aloud, 'One kiss!

Oh! Greybeard, what a world is this!'-pp. ccxiij, ccxiv.

The result of this eventful history is, that the wolf Isengrim, Reynard's especial dupe, demands trial by battle. He flings down his glove, and the fox, sorely against his inclination, is compelled to take it up. The whole of this last 'fytte,' is a

keen satire upon chivalry; and the burgher poet, evidently enjoys the unfair and mean tricks which his hero plays off against his more valiant foeman. Reynard, eventually gains the victory, but as may be supposed, by most unfair means, and the king conferring knighthood upon him, creates him chancellor, in reward of his successful villainies. It was surely therefore in a vein of bitter irony, that the concluding lines of this delectable history' were written.

The world and all its ways' is here

(For money, and the cost not dear!)

In pleasant masque: read it! 't will cheer

Your Christmas hearth, for many a year!'-p. ccli.

'That unholy

Thus ends the story of Reynard the Fox.' bible of the world,' as it has been forcibly, but perhaps almost too severely called. The fate of the hero, certainly sets at naught every notion alike of poetical and common justice, for the proper reward of Reynard, was undoubtedly a halter. But then, the satire, keen and bitter, upon the world's ways,-on the triumph of fraud, even more than of might over right, the success of the wicked at the expense of the innocent, the present ascendancy of evil over good, that deep and vexing mystery to the merely worldly man, would have all lost their force, and the gall in which the satirist dipt his shafts, its significance.

In looking over this curious and valuable monument of an age which has never received an hundredth part of the attention its importance deserves, we have been greatly struck with its general similarity to another great work of a rather later period, our own noble vision of Piers Ploughman. And well, after contemplating the wondrous life-like creations of each great poet-satirist, may we exclaim with the fervent Görres What a marvellous period is this middle age! How strong were then

the people, shooting and unfolding like vigorous buds, all fresh and full of sap. Then, with energetic, truthful, life-reality, idealizing, spiritualizing poetry, stood in intimate union.' Yes, it is strange to those who look at the middle age period, as a dreary, misty, almost lifeless interval, between the stir and

commotion of the irruptions of the northern tribes, and the deeper stir, and more intense commotion at the period of the revival of letters, to find in the very midst of these dark ages, two satires, unexampled in the history of any other period, two satirical epics!

And how wide is the sphere of these two poems-human nature in all its weaknesses and in all its crimes; how extended the pictures,-classes of men, not insulated individuals; and above all, what bold enunciation of truths, which even in the present day, have yet a struggle to maintain their hold. Indeed, more surprising to the reader, unacquainted with the real character of the middle ages, than aught else, is the bold assertion of free principles, which characterizes alike Reynard the Fox,' and our own Piers Ploughman.' Much respect have each for the divine right' of king or priest; and it is a proof to how wide an extent the feeling of contempt for the established priesthood, and of very moderate respect for monarchs prevailed, when we find the Flemish minstrel of the twelfth century, and the recluse of Malvern in the fourteenth, holding the self-same views and expressing them with the self-same earnestness.

There is indeed a ruder spirit, a more scoffing, Mephistophiles character, speaking out in the earlier work, as though the Flemish bard who had seen his rights trampled under foot alike by a crushing native aristocracy and a foreign monarch, could give no quarter to king or noble; and as though he believed not only the priesthood, but religion itself, might perhaps after all be little more than a thing to conjure with; while a more gentle, and in consequence a more enlightened spirit, and a far deeper moral feeling, pervades the allegory of the Monk of Malvern. Still in the grand principles-that all government is for the benefit of the many, not for the gain of the few, and that the clergy form no class professing exclusive rights, but that they are to be judged of just as other men the two satirical epics of the middle age wholly coincide.

At the present time, the works to which we refer possess a great historical importance. Those reverend gentlemen who are now so persistingly demanding from the public a homage which it is perhaps wise in them to claim, on some mysterious grounds, since obvious reasons there are none,-are always pointing us to these 'dim ages of faith,' as the period when the holy priest walked the earth, the gazed at, and admired of all beholders. Alas! for them-how does Reynard the Fox,' the very handbook of the people, loudly laugh down their claims. But in France and Flanders, a scoffing, an infidel, spirit prevailed, it may be said; so no wonder the holy priest was an object of ridicule. Well then, turn to moral and religious England,-we

speak not scoffingly, for again and again, when comparing the early literature of England with that of France and Flanders, have we been proud to mark the superior moral feeling of our early writers, but as though on this very account, the feeling against the established clergy developes itself with increased bitterness.

It may be well to give an insulated passage from a chronicle, proving how some feeble old baron humbly did penance at the command of his confessor; how some dying usurer, fearful of purgatorial retribution for his ill-gotten wealth, joyfully gave up, not merely his tithes, but all he possessed, to the priesthood; or, even how some weak-minded princess might constitute her favorite chaplain keeper of her conscience, and far more gratifying,-of her purse also; but what was the general feeling in 'those ages of faith'?-the public, the popular opinion, for there was a public opinion then, although there were no newspapers to set it forth. Shall we discover much reverence for holy church in the persons of her ministers,' in the scoffing ballads of the de Montfort-rising; in the nick-names bestowed upon the bishops of Hereford and Winchester, or the abuse, how awful! heaped upon the venerable Boniface, primate of all England? Or will these reverend gentlemen, turning with scorn, from the sayings and doings' of rebels, as they would call the followers of de Montfort, point us to the following century. Why then things were worse, for the respect in which prelacy was held was rather curiously exemplified by the Londoners when they publicly beheaded one of Bishop Philpots's predecessors, Walter de Stapleton, on plea that he was an enemy to the liberties of the land.

But this execution, it may be said, took place during a period of great excitement. It did so, but had the mass of the people held the clergy in that mysterious respect which their successors claim, they would never have dared to drag a bishop to the scaffold. Men possessed discrimination in the middle ages, and where the clergy were respectable, and consequently respected, they were safe in times of wildest commotion. The rude mob of Wat Tyler, burnt down the palace of the bishop of London, but though encamped in Smithfield, laid not a hand on the plate or money belonging to the priory of St. Bartholomew the Great, that refuge for the sick and destitute; nor, although they burnt and spoiled the Commandery of St. John of Jerusalem, did they touch the convent of the nuns of Clerkenwell. It was against the lordly, the wealthy, the overbearing clergy, that the hostility of the middle ages was directed.

But then, the 'burgher spirit,' we may be told, has always been insubordinate and insolent; and the dwellers in cities