the reason why. They have had their jame Villemarqué was so struck by the popular chansons for at least three hundred beauty of the poetry, that she cultivated a years, yet it would puzzle a conjuror to closer acquaintance with these wild lyrics; find a verbal joke, or a flash of heedless vivacity of any kind in any one of them. The fact is there is no such thing. They do condescend sometimes, however, to be merry after their own fashion; but it is a fashion not very likely to find favor elsewhere, nor is it always intelligible out of the immediate district to which it especially applies. This merriment, if it may be called so, consists in quaint philosophical quibbles, broad jokes, often of the coarsest kind, adroitly addressed to the actual mode of living and direct experiences of the people, and the collection rapidly increased, but she died in the midst of her labors. Thus this anthology was born. M. Villemarqué succeeded to the treasures and the enthusiasm of his mother, and embarked in the design with a larger ambition and greater means of execution. For many years hetraversed every corner of Brittany, entered thoroughly into the pastimes and re-unions of the people their fêtes, religious and festive, pardons, fairs, and wakes:-the bards, beggars, millers, laborers, were his most active collaborateurs; and he frequently con allusions that are sure to tell amongst the sulted with advantage old women, nurses, hearers, although, lacking the universality and young girls; even the children, in of wit, they are little else than conun- their plays, sometimes revealed information drums to every body else. It is doubtful unconsciously to him; and he adds the whether the Bretons could give expression curious fact, already referred to, that to more aerial pleasantries, even if they while the degrees of intelligence varied had them in their songs. Their style of amongst his informants, he confidently afdelivery is heavy and solemn; they are too firms that not one of them knew how to read. grave and ponderous for the light and rapid The quantity of ballads he thus gathered passages of the ordinary French chanson. was immense. He obtained enough of Such are the principal characteristics of matter to fill twenty volumes-all oral trathe popular poetry of the Bretons. From ditions of the country, collected from the this general introductory view, the reader lips of the peasantry. From this vast mass will be better prepared for a few selections he has made the selection which occupies from the volumes of M. Villemarqué, which the two volumes before us a selection diswe shall now introduce without further commentary. Perhaps we ought to explain to the English reader the meaning of the title adopted by M. Villemarqué. Barzas-Breiz is pure Breton, and may be rendered into a 'Poetical History of Bretagne.' Now the work is certainly not a poetical history of Brittany, and the title is therefore a misnomer. But it contains a valuable collection of Breton popular lyrical poems, and may be accepted as something better than a history. Well-selected specimens of a national literature, with such judicious notes as our author has industriously supplied, will be found more acceptable to most readers, as they are unquestionably more curious and instructive, than an elaborate historical disquisition on speculative questions, frequently founded in error, and generally ending in smoke. tinguished by excellent judgment and good taste. A glance at a few of the more remarkable will convey a tolerably correct notion of the predominant f features of the whole. There are four distinct dialects in Brittany-the dialects of Treguiér, Leon, Cornouaille, and Vannes. The songs are all composed in one or other of these dialects (some of which have close affinities), and are given by M. Villemarqué on one page in their original words, and on the opposite page in modern French. Here is a specimen from the dialect of Leon. The piece, of which these are the opening lines, is called'Ann Eostik,' 'Le Rossignol,' or the nightingale: Ar greg iaouank a Zant-Malo, La jeune épouse de Saint-Malo pleurait hier -Helas! helas! je suis perdue! mon pauvre rossignol est tué! This collection had its origin upwards of thirty years ago, and has been accumulating ever since. M. Villemarqué's mother had her attention drawn to the subject by a poor mendicant singer who had received This specimen will be enough to show the some kindnesses from her, and who desired essential difference between these dialects to express her gratitude in a song. Mad- and modern French; a difference which will be found to be much greater in other young man to his mother, to let him visit cases. The extraordinary metrical precision of the original is, also, worthy of observation. We have not found an instance throughout the whole work in which these songs violate this structural regularity. a fête about to be given by the king: As might be expected, Merlin, the famous enchanter, is celebrated among these songs; but he does not make a very conspicuous figure after all, and is by no means so distinguished a personage in Armorica as he is in Wales. It has been remarked by a German critic* as rather a suspicious circumstance, calculated to throw a doubt upon the antiquity of the Round Table legends, that Arthur and his companions are nowhere alluded to in the Breton The youth springs on his red filley, and popular poems. This is a mistake, and we flies off to the festival. The horn sounds may, probably, avail ourselves of another just as he arrives at the field, and the heropportunity to discuss the question involved ald announces, that whoever clears the in the doubt of the German critic. But barrier at a single leap, shall have the we may observe, en passant, that the infer- daughter of the king in marriage. ence he draws from his assumed fact, - course the red filley performs this feat to namely, that the Round Table must there- admiration, and the youth claims his bride. fore be a fiction of the middle ages, -is curi- The king is indignant, thinking that a filley Of could not make such a leap except by sor- "Dear mother, if you love me, speak, ously fallacious, seeing that most of these very poems are themselves of a still later date. Merlin does not seem to have much credit as a sorcerer in Brittany; but to be remembered rather as a sage and a bard, with a sort of vague reverence, hinting rather than avowing a faith in his superhumanity. There were, in fact, two Merlins, and the Breton traditions seemed to have confounded them, so that it is not very easy to distinguish which of them is intended to be embalmed in the ballads. One of them lived about the tenth century, and was the son of a vestal and a Roman consul, and became distinguished as one of the greatest soothsayers of his time; the other, who lived in the sixth century, had the misfortune to kill his nephew in battle, lost his reason in consequence, and buried himself for the rest of his life in a wood, passing in history under the name to the court. But the king is not satisfied of Merlin the Savage. The Welsh pos- yet. He requires also the ring which Mersess fragments of the poetry of Merlin, but lin wears on his right hand. It will be the Bretons know him only by the ballads remembered that the heart and ring were in which he is commemorated, and these the emblems of the bards of old, the harp are not numerous. M. Villemarqué gives being the gift of the king, and the ring that us two. From one of them called 'Merlin of the queen. This still more difficult task the Bard,' we will give one or two pas- the old lady enables the youth to accomsages, rendered into the metres of the ori- plish, with the help of a palm branch with ginal with as much verbal fidelity as the different genius of the language will admit. The poem opens with an appeal from a * Wiener Jahrbücher der Literatur,' 1843. Armed with this hammer he succeeds in obtaining the harp, and returns in triumph twelve leaves, which she declares she had been seven nights to seek in seven woods, in seven years. At the crowing of the cock at midnight, the bold feat is accomplished, and the youth goes back again to court, pretty confident this time, at least, "Oh! Merlin, whither dost thou go, "Where go you thus, 'tis all unmeet, rosy mouth and blue eyes, that she thinks it would be no bad thing to make an exchange for her own son, as black and spiteful as a cat. No sooner said than done. The false child grows up, the poor mother never suspecting the imposition. As it grows in stature, so its genius for evil trickery expands, confounding lovers at their secret meetings, tying logs to the tails of cattle, overturning honest women's pitchers, and doing all sorts of mischief. At last the distracted mother begins to think that it is a sheer impossibility such a destructive imp can be her natural-born child, and she communicates her doubts to her husband. But he, good, easy man, stretches his great hands before ths fire, knocks the cinders out of his pipe, strokes his beard, and says nothing. Then comes a butcher with a horse and a calf one evening, when the poulpican is alone, and knocking at the a beast to sell. The poulpican seeing their heads through He is searching for his lost harp and ring; and thus he is hospitably waylaid by the youth, who prevails upon him to enter his cottage, and finally he is carried to the court. His approach is announced by loud cries of joy that awaken the royal household; and the king, finding it useless to contend any longer, window, inquires is there out himself and calls up the crier to summon the people to the wedding. the window in the twilight, and supposing runs "Get up, good crier, from thy bed, The crier accordingly goes forth, summons The fairies occupy a large space in the superstitions of the Bretons, and, consequently, make a very important figure in some of their songs. One of the most ake them to belong to one person, screams out, 'Well! I'm a hundred years old, and I never saw the like of that!' The butcher runs away, and informs the mother of what he has heard, Her fears are now almost wrought into certainty; but in order to make all sure, she breaks a hundred eggs, and arranges the shells before the fire-place; then hides and awaits the sequel. The poulpican, perplexed at so strange a proceeding, and fairly taken by surprise, screams out again, 'Well! I'm a hundred years old,' &c. Fully confirmed now, the mother rushes upon the wretch, and is about to kill it, when the fairy appears and ransoms her offspring by by restoring the proper child. In the version of M. Villemarqué these details are omitted, the mother recovering her child by pretending to dress a dinner for ten laborers in an egg-shell. The poulpican seen many things,-but "I've seen, dear mother, Gramercy! popular of these is 'L'Enfant Supposé.' is betrayed into a sudden burst of astonThe story itself is common, with various ishment-'What! dress a dinner for ten versions, to the fairy superstitions of nearly laborers in an egg-shell! Well, I have all countries; and, according to the most approved narrative, which is more circumstantial than that preserved by M. Villemarqué, runs thus:-it is founded upon the strange passion attributed to the fairies for exchanging their own hideous children -poulpicans, as they are called for real flesh-and-blood infants, when they can catch them unguarded. A fairy happening to hear a child cry one day, as she passes by a house, peeps in, and seeing a beautiful fair child in a cot, is so attracted by its It is rather a remarkable characteristic of the Breton fairies that, although they are allowed, on all hands, to possess a great genius for music, and even fine voices, they never dance. They are the only fairies in the world that resemble the 10th Hussars in this particular, that they don't dance. Then again, at night they are beautiful-in the day, wrinkled and ugly. Like certain other fascinating people, they look best by candlelight. The popular notion amongst the peasantry is, that the fairies are great princesses who refused to embrace Christianity when it was introduced into Armorica, and who were struck with the divine malediction for their obstinacy. The Welsh believe them to be the souls of the Druids compelled to do penance. The coincidence is striking. The prohibition against dancing, however, does not extend to the nains, or dwarfs. This happy, mischievous, rollicking race take infinite pleasure in their midnight gambols. They go about with leather purses in their hands, are the hosts of the Druidical altars, which they profess to have built, and dance their merry round by the light of the stars, calling out lundi, mardi, mecredi, sometimes adding joudi and vendredi, but always keeping clear of samedi, which is the virgin's day, and above all of dimanche, which is still more fatal to them. We can fancy them, when they come to Friday, breaking off with a scream of terror, lest, by some sudden impulse, they might be tempted to continue the enumeration. The following ballad is an amusing illustration of this class of superstitions. In rendering it into English, we have clung closely to the text, so that nothing must be looked for in the shape of poetical refinement. The measure is that of the original Breton. THE TAILOR AND THE DWARFS. On a Friday evening see Out of work, his customers Home like mad, and gone to bed. "Shut the door, and bar it well, How the little devils yell!” "Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, too, Thursday also, Friday-heu!" "Shut the door, good people, do! Crowding come the dwarfish crew!" Now they gather in the court, Dancing till their breath grows short. "Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, too, Thursday also, Friday-heu!" To the roof they clamber all, Friend! thou'rt taken by the rout- Ah! poor Paskou's kill'd with fear- Pull the sheet above your head, "Here is one-God save my soul!- "Frisking, bounding, tangled, jangled, Show us but your nose's tip- Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday-hear! "You shall dance until you crack The tailors-that is to say, the working tailors as a craft, are regarded in Brittany much as they are in England; and the old scrap of ridicule prevails there just as it does among ourselves, that it requires no less than nine tailors to make one man. The above story in different shapes, may be found in the fairy mythologies of most countries. In one version, the thief is a baker, who with more cunning than the tailor, strews hot ashes round his house, so that when the fairies come they scorch their feet; for which indignity, however, they take ample vengeance by breaking all his pans and ovens. A similar trick is played off upon the German fairies, in a tradition called 'The Fairies on the Rock.' In the Irish version of the legend, the poor fellow, who is suddenly surrounded in the moonlight by a troop of fairies, dancing and singing, "Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday," &c. finding the refrain rather monotonous, adds, "Saturday and Sunday," &c. whereupon the whole company vanish with a scream. There is also a French version to the same effect, only that instead of vanishing, the horrified fairies stamp with their feet, and utter such tremendous cries that the traveller is ready to die with fear. Had he only added, 'And thus the week is ended!' the penance of the poor fairies would have ended also. The moral of the tradition ought to be borne in mind by all persons who may hereafter contemplate thefts on the 'good people,'-namely, that their money is of no value. It is worthy of note, in connexion with this point, that the Welsh assign this story to the Coraniens, a race whom they accused of the practice of coining false money; and that in designating the false money, they usethe very same terms employed by the Breton poet-terms for which neither the Welsh nor the Breton dictionaries furnish any satisfactory explanation. It is a curious incident in fairy lore, this identification of the fairies with the false coiners. "Oh! neither blue nor red, my child, nor any colThe mode is changed, and you must go to church in black to day." Then passing through the churchyard ground amidst funeral trees, And cemetry monuments, her husband's tomb she sees. with such care?" "Now, which of our dear relatives is laid here The news has fallen upon her heart, and struck rises more. Oh! it was wondrous in the night which follow'd the sad day When they interr'd that lady bright where her dear husband lay, 'Twas wond'rous in the night to see, in the night-time dark and drear, Two oak-trees o'er that recent tomb, spring up into the air; And in their branches two white doves, all gaily through the night The Breton fairies seem to possess one distinctive characteristic their close relationship with Druidical reliques and traditions. This is easily accounted for in a country where the remains of the Celtic worship are so numerous. The grottos of the fairies are always amongst the monuments of the Druids, and one of the names by which the fairy is popularly knownKorrigan-is borrowed from them. The ballad called 'Lord Nann and the Korrigan' affords us a glimpse of the fairy in her grotto by the side of the fountain or well-both of which, the altar of stones and the spring of water, were anciently objects of the superstitious worship of the Druids. The Lord Nann goes into the green forest to hunt a roe for his young wife, and seeing a white hind, he follows it through the woods with such ardor, that he grows hot and exhausted. Evening is now setting in, and discovering a little stream running from a well, close at the foot of a fairy grotto, he descends to drink. The Korrigan is seated by the side of her fountain, combing her flaxen hair with a comb of gold. She is outraged at his audacity in troubling her waters, and gives him his choice, either to marry her on the instant, to linger pining away for seven years, or to die in three days. He tells her he cannot marry her, because he is already married; that as to the seven years, he must die when it shall please God; and the reader may probably remember an but that in any event he would rather die old Scotch ballad to which it bears a close at once than marry a Korrigan. The vin-resemblance. dictive Korrigan pronounces his doom, and Sing even till the dawn of day, then heavenwards plume their flight. This fanciful notion of trees springing up with doves singing in them, is of frequent occurrence in the old tragic ballads. Sometimes, as in our English ballad of 'Lord Lovel and the fair Ouncebell,' two briars or yews grow up to a brave height, and tie themselves at the top into a true lover's knot. This was a very common resource of the poets of the middle ages. This story of 'Lord Nann and the Korrigan' is familiar, in other shapes, to the poetry of Sweden, Denmark, Servia, and other countries, Although the Bretons supply their fairies |