something of the high, and, as it was then thought, Divine inspiration of the scald, they added something of the mimetic power of the actor, and of the musical skill of the singer. The ancient bards, indeed, seem to have been singers and actors, too; but their artistic power was subordinate to their genius, and was regarded rather as a fit expression of their inspired utterance, than as possessing much distinct or distinguishable merit of its own. In the minstrels, genius and art were more thoroughly equalised, and served to support each other. The scalds in keeping with the earnest character of the iron North, with its gloomy forests, gloomier snows, and its midnight winter sky, heavy-laden with stars-were stern in their subjects and in their mode of song: they interwove such philosophy, morality, and theology as they had, with poetry; whereas the minstrels, though often tragical and pathetic, were, on the whole, more secular in their topics, more brilliant in their ideas, and gayer in their spirit. These differences sprang from differences in age, in climate, and in national character. The scald stood alone, as reflecting the intellect, the culture, the conscience, as well as the poetic gift, of his country; his spirit was partly soured and partly sublimed by the savage scenery, weather, manners, and religion of Scandinavia; whereas, ere the minstrel appeared, civilisation had produced division of labour-monks and doctors had become the spiritual teachers-Paganism had yielded to a certain form of Christianity-over his head there expanded a bluer and sunnier heaven; and his progress, as he walked, was surrounded, now by the lilies of France, now by the orange-groves of Spain, now by the purpling vineyards of Italy, and now by the glad green sward of England. Yet, different as the two classes ultimately became, there can be little doubt that the one was intimately related to the other; and it does not really matter much whether you say that the minstrel arose out of the scald, or that the scald sunk into the minstrel, since each term of the alternative only expresses a different taste on the part of the inquirer-one preferring the grace and gaiety of the southern, and the other the energy, the terrible sincerity, and the solemn grandeur of the northern genius.

The derivation of the term minstrel has been a matter of dispute. Some derive it from the word ministerialis, which, in the Latin of the middle ages, signified a workman—in Languedoc still the word ministral means a workman-and thus the word minstrel is just a translation of the ancient Greek term ποιητης, and answers to the Scotch "maker or makker." Others derive it from the French menestreux or menstriers, a word which describes the inferior ministers or servants in a noble family. Others, with Percy, think that, because the minstrels assisted at Divine service, the word minister was used to express the minstrel "ministellus joculator," and not the officiating clergyman. Junius supposes the word to be of English origin, and derived from the old Saxon word for a cathedral min gteɲe or minister. To this it has been objected, first, the word minstrel was not known in England before the conquest, but had long been used in France; and that, secondly, the old Saxon word first given is manifestly a corruption of monasterium, and properly not an old Saxon word at all. A recent writer (F. Burghley, author of two very promising books of poetry, namely "Sonnets" and "Sir Edwin Gilderoy," a ballad), ingeniously tries to shew that the three first of these derivations are resolvable into one. He says, "The Latin word from which they all derive is minister, which is formed from minus, as magister is from magis, correlatives standing for greater man and lesser man-master and helper. The workman is an helper, called ministral in Languedoc. The inferior servants are helpers in the hall, and perhaps they did as servants in a country-house do here, form a part of the Church choir, although this is doubtful. But it is immaterial; the choristers who became permanently attached to the Church were ministri or servants of the Church, and so semi-clerical. Now, the dress of the common. minstrels was clerical, and points almost without a chance of error to the true origin of the "minstrel." Supposing this theory to be entertained, there are, however, certain difficulties to be explained, as, first, how did these "helpers," in hall or choir, come to leave their calling, and to wander through the country, sometimes, it must be confessed, singing

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profane songs; secondly, how did they supplant or swallow up the gleemen or harpers, who, from the time of the Druids, had always followed this profession; and, thirdly, how were they, being half clerical, nevertheless, as Godwin and some others maintain, hated and proscribed by the clergy, who got up, it is said, "miracle plays or mysteries to rival them, and refused them the sacred communion and Christian burial."

In answer to these questions, it seems probable that poverty first drove some of the "ministrals," who felt themselves possessed of fine genius and of musical powers, to leave the convents and churches, and seek for a wider sphere to the exercise of their gifts. Some of them would keep true to their original profession, and avoid all profanity and licentiousness in their strains, while others would be tempted, by love of popularity and gain, to accommodate themselves to the taste of the mob. Wearing a clerical dress, and surrounded by a portion of the clerical prestige, as well as, perhaps, better educated and conducted, they would soon eclipse the gleemen, or even draw them into their ranks, an amalgamation which might increase the deterioration of their order. The clergy would feel a certain natural jealousy toward them, even as we know that the stationary monks felt jealousy toward the begging friars; and this would be deepened by the profligacy and profanity of a portion of their number, but would not extend to the more respectable members of the society. And hence, although Godwin adduces evidence to prove the aversion of the clergy to many of the minstrels, we know, on the other hand, that they were sometimes received gladly into convents to amuse the inmates, pensioned by abbeys, and invited by bishops on the promise of distinguished rewards, to leave France for England. In fact, there seem to have been two distinct classes of the minstrel-first, the man of genius who wrote as well as sung his ballads; and, secondly, the mere hawker of them, who was original only in the profane scurrility and the mountebank tricks by which he made them acceptable to the vulgar.

In proof that the character of the minstrel was on the whole an honourable one, we have the fact that it was assumed both

before and after the Norman conquest by the most distinguished men, by kings and nobles. Regner Lodbrog, king of Denmark, lived before what are properly called the minstrel days, but he was as eminent a scald as he was a conqueror. Every one remembers the story of Alfred finding his way into the Danish camp in the disguise of an harper. Richard, the first Duke of Normandy, was a minstrel, and the first writer of French verse. William, ninth Count of Poitou, was the earliest troubadour. Henry I. of England, surnamed Beauclerk, was a poet, although the romance poem, entitled "Urbanus" is falsely attributed to his pen. And Richard Coeur-de-Lion, besides being a munificent patron of minstrels, such as the famous Blondel de Nesle, was himself one of the royal poets of Provence, and Sir Walter Scott, in "Ivanhoe,” appropriately introduces him in this character in the cell of the immortal Friar Tuck, and makes him at once the composer and the singer of a spirited crusading ballad.

It seems probable from the mixture of Latin words in the minstrel dialect, that it sprang up in Provence, the district nearest in France to Rome, and possibly it was in Rome itself that a trained choir of musicians were first employed to lead the service of God. In Normandy, too, there was minstrelsy, but although it excelled the Provençal in power of imagination, it was inferior in tenderness, in grace, and in adaptation to music. "The case," remarks Burghley, "stands thus: the noblest strains of poetry were of northern growth! the Gothic temperament appears at all times to have been more fitted for the reception and development of sublime and elevated thought; but music is the child of the south, and was applied (first in an improved and scientific style about 366), by the Church to the sacred compositions that were ready to hand, so that there was no necessity for recourse to original composition at all. The rude Scandinavian, and the soft-voiced southern, the one a conqueror with the sword, the other a spiritual conqueror with the cross, commenced an invasion, one upon the other, and the midway point appears to have fallen in France." There the genius of the North and the splendid melody of Italy met and married, and produced between them the perfect form of mediæval

minstrelsy. Wherever the Church extended, a class of musicians arose, who by and by became dissatisfied with the stated services of the choir, and devoted themselves to the roving life of the scalds, adding to their fire and force the sweetness of southern harmony, and straightway all Europe resounded with song. For ages, indeed, the distinction between the "Provençal Troubadour" and the "Norman Rymour" continued, but by the time of Richard Coeur-de-Lion, and probably through the amalgamating influence of the Crusades, it was to all intents forgotten.

The language used by the minstrels was the romance tongue, a mixture of Latin and Norse, with the Latin element more abundantly infused in its southern, and the Norse in its northern dialect. This tongue, although the parent of the French, Italian, and Spanish, and although existing still in a corrupted form in Provence, can hardly be now called a living language. The southern dialect was termed in course of time the Provençal, although the best specimens of Provençal poetry are of Spanish origin, and are supposed to owe not a little to the Moors and Arabs (see Lockhart's Spanish Ballads). The first troubadour, however, was a Frenchman, and the Spanish influence did not create, it only finely and deeply coloured, the early French poetry. The fountain of the Norland minstrelsy was unquestionably Normandy, although some of the earliest pieces of poetry seem to have been written in England. By and by came a perfect chaos and seething of languages in Europe, of Latin, Saxon, Gothic, and Celtic, out of which gradually was formed the language of the earliest British ballads, which have come down to us. And time would fail us, to explain the differences from, or the resemblances to each other, of the varied species of singers, who flourished partly at the same, and partly at different periods, such as the bards, the scalds, the gleemen, the harpers, the rymours, the trouveres (or minstrels of the crusade), the conteurs, the jongleurs, the chanteurs, and finally the menestrals, coming to a climax in the English minstrel, whose ideal we described above, and who gave us the first rude versions of such strains as "Chevy Chase," which afterwards were by his followers re-touched, re-written,