says a monkish author, " with empty purses, and hearts full of sorrow."l But to go on.

The rewards given to the minstrels did not always consist in money, but frequently in rich mantles and embroidered vestments: they received, says Fauchet, great presents from the nobility, who would sometimes give them even the robes with which they were clothed. It was a common custom in the middle ages to give vestments of different kinds to the minstrels. In an ancient poem, cited by Fauchet, called La RobeVermeille, or, The Red Robe, the wife of a vavaser, that is, one who, holding of a superior lord, has tenants under him, reproaches her husband for accepting a robe; " Such gifts," says she, " belong to jugglers, and other singing men, who receive garments from the nobility, because it is their trade:

S'appartient a ces jorgleours,
Et a ces autres chanteours,
Quits ayent de ces chevaliers,
Les robes car c'est lor mestier." *

These garments the jugglers failed not to take with them to other courts, in order to excite a similar liberality. Another artifice they often used, which was, to make the heroes of their poems exceedingly bountiful to the minstrels, who appear to have been introduced for that purpose: thus, in the metrical romance of Ipomedon, where the poet speaks of the knight's marriage, he says—

Ipomydon gaff, in that stound,

To mynstrelles five hundred pound.3

The author of Pierce the Ploughman, who lived in the reign of Edward HI., gives the following general description of the different performances of the minstrels, and of their rewards, at that period:

I am mynstrell, quoth that man; my name is Activa Vita;
All Idle iche hate,4 for All Active is my name;
A wafirer5 well ye wyt; and serve many lordes.
And few robes I get, or faire furred gownes.
Could I lye, to do" men laugh; then lachen7 I should
Nother mantill, nor money, amonges lords minstrels:
And, for 8 I can neither taber, ne trumpe, ne tell no gestes,
Fartin ne fislen, at feastes, ne harpen;

1 "Infinitum histrionum et joculatorum multitudinem, sine cibo ct moneribus, va cuamet mcerentum abire permisit." Chron. Virtziburg. 3 Origine de la Langue et Poesie Francoise, lib. i. cap. 4.

* Harl. MS. 2252. 'All idleness I hate. • A confectioner.

'That is, if he could tell falsehoods to make men laugh. 7 Lack, or want. • Because.

O

Jape, ne juggle, ne gentilly pype,

Na neither saylen ne saute,1 ne singe to the gytteme ,

I have no good giftes to please the great lordes.

And, if we refer to history, we shall find that the poets are not incorrect in their statement. Gaston earl of Foix, whose munificence is much commended by Froissart, lived in a style of splendour little inferior to that of royalty. The historian, speaking of a grand entertainment given by this nobleman, which he had an opportunity of seeing, says, " Ther wer many mynstrells, as well of his own, as of straungers; and each of them dyd their devoyre, in their faculties.8 The same day the earl of Foix gave to the heraulds and minstrelles the som of five hundred frankes; and gave to the duke of Tourayn's minstrelles gownes of cloth of gold, furred with ermyne, valued at two hundred frankes."3

Respecting the pecuniary rewards of the minstrels, we have, among others, the following accounts. At the marriage of Elizabeth, daughter of Edward I. to John earl of Holland, every king's minstrel received forty shillings.4 In the fourth of Edward II. Perrot de la Laund, minstrel to lord Hugh de Nevill, received twenty shillings for performing his minstrelsy before the king.5 In the same year, Janino la Che.veretter, who is called Le Tregettour,6 was paid at one time forty shillings, and at another twenty, for the same service; and John le Mendlesham, the boy7 of Robert le Foil, twenty shillings;6 the same sum was also given to John le Boteller, the boy of Perrot Duzedeys, for his performances; and, again, Perrot Duzedeys, Roger the Trumpeter, and Janino le Nakerer, all of them king's minstrels, received from the king sixty shillings for the like service.

XXII.—PAYMENTS TO MINSTRELS.

In the eighth year of Edward III., licence was granted to Barbor the Bagpiper, to visit the schools for minstrels in parts beyond the seas,1 with thirty shillings to bear his expenses. Licence was also granted to Morlan the Bagpiper, to visit the minstrels' schools; and forty shillings for his expenses.2 A little lower we find a present of five shillings made by the king to a minstrel, for performing his minstrelsy before the image of the Blessed Virgin.3 In the eleventh year of the same reign, John de Hoglard, minstrel to John de Pulteney, was paid forty shillings for exhibiting before the king at Hatfield, and at London ;4 and to Roger the Trumpeter, and to the minstrels his associates, performing at the feast for the queen's delivery, held at Hatfield, ten pounds.5 In the ninth year of Henry VII. "Pudesay the piper in bagpipes," received six shillings and eight pence from the king, for his performance.6 In the fourteenth year of his reign, five pounds were paid to three stryng-mynstrels for wages, but the time is not specified; m a subsequent entry, however, we find that fifteen shillings were given to " a stryng-mynstrel, for one moneth's wages;" also to a " straunge taberer, in reward, sixty-six shillings and eight pence."r

XXIII.—WEALTH OF CERTAIN MINSTRELS.

In the middle ages, the professors of minstrelsy had the opportunity of amassing much wealth; and certainly some of them were men of property. In Domesday Book, it appears that Berdic, the king's joculator, had lands in Gloucestershire;8 Raher, or Royer, mimus rex, the mimic, or minstrel, belonging to Henry I., was the founder of the hospital and priory of Saint Bartholomew, in West Smithfield ;9 and the minstrels contributed towards building the church of Saint Mary, at Beverley in Yorkshire, as the inscription on one of the pillars plainly indicates;10 though, it must be owned, their general character does not bear the marks of prudence, as the reader must have observed in the perusal of this section.

'"Scolas ministrallis iu partibus trans mare." Liber de Computis Garderobae, MS. Cott. Lib. Nero, C. viii. p. 276. » Ibid. "Facienti ministralsiam suam coram imagine Beatee Maria e in Veltam, rege presente, 5 sol." Ibid. p. 277.

Ibid. p. 290. i Ibid.

* MS. in the Remembrancer's Office. See the extract in Dr. Henry's British History, vol. vi. Appendix, No. V.

'From another MS. in the same office. Ibid.

* See the next chapter, under the account of the joculators.

* Leland's Collectanea, pp. 61. 99. I0 See p. 189.

OS

XXIV.—MINSTRELS SOMETIMES DANCING MASTERS.

It has already been observed, that the name of minstrels was frequently applied to instrumental performers, who did not profess any other branch of the minstrelsy. In an old morality called Lusty Juventus, it is said,

Who knoweth where is ere a mynstrel!

By the Masse, I would fayne go daunce a fit.1

This passage calls to my memory a circumstance recorded by Fauchet, which proves that the minstrels were sometimes dancing masters. "I remember," says he, " to have seen Martin Baraton, an aged minstrel of Orleans, who was accustomed to play upon the tambourine at weddings, and on other occasions of festivity. His instrument was silver, decorated with small plates of the same metal,2 on which were engraved the arms of those he had taught to dance."

CHAPTER IV.

I. The Joculator.—II. His different Denominations and extraordinary Deceptions.— III. His Performances ascribed to Magic.—IV. Asiatic Jugglers.—V. Remarkable Story from Froissart.—VI. Tricks of the Jugglers ascribed to the Agency of the Devil; but more reasonably accounted for.—VII. John Rykell, a celebrated Tregetour.—VIII. Their various Performances.—IX. Privileges of the Joculators at Paris.—The King's Joculatoi an Officer of Rank.—X. The great Disrepute of modern Jugglers.

I.—THE JOCULATOR.

The joculator, or the jugglour of the Normans, was frequently included under the collective appellation of minstrel. His profession originally was very comprehensive, and included the practice of all the arts attributed to the minstrel; and some of the jugglers were excellent tumblers. Joinville, in the Life of St. Louis and Charpentier, quotes an old author, who speaks of a joculator, qui sciebat tombare.- He was called a gleeman in the Saxon era, and answers to the juggler of the more modern times. In the fourteenth century, he was also denominated a tregetour, or tragetour, at which time, he appears to have been separated from the musical poets, who exercised the first branches of the gleeman's art, and are more generally considered as minstrels. v

II.—DIFFERENT DENOMINATIONS OF THE JOCULATOR, AND HIS EXTRAORDINARY DECEPTIONS.

The name of tregetours was chiefly, if not entirely, appropriated to those artists who, by slight of hand, with the assistance of machinery of various kinds, deceived the eyes of the spectators, and produced such illusions as were usually supposed to be the effect of enchantment; for which reason they were frequently ranked with magicians, sorcerers, and witches; and, indeed, the feats they performed, according to the descriptions given of them, abundantly prove that they were no contemptible practitioners in the arts of deception. Chaucer, who, no doubt, had frequently an opportunity of seeing the tricks exhibited by the tregetours in his time, says, 'There