Et femme et mère, en lieu d'une pucelle.'

His melody, likewise, is genuine melody; it is irrepressible. It led him
to belie his own professed seriousness. He could not stop his sonnets
from rippling even when he pretended to passionate argument. Life came
easily to him; he was never weary of it, at the most he acknowledged
that he was 'saoûl de la vie.' It is not surprising, therefore, that his
remonstrances as the tortured lover have a trick of opening to a
delightful tune:--

'Rens-moi mon coeur, rens-moi mon coeur pillarde....'

In another form this melody more closely recalls Thomas Campion:--

'Seule je l'ai veue, aussi je meurs pour elle....'

But to compare Ronsard's sonnet with 'Follow your saint' is to see how
infinitely more subtle a master of lyrical music was the Elizabethan
than the great French lyrist of the Renaissance. From first to last
Ronsard was an amateur.

[SEPTEMBER, 1919.




_Samuel Butler_


The appearance of a new impression of _The Way of all Flesh_[10] in Mr