Page:A History of Domestic Manners and Sentiments in England During the Middle Ages.djvu/217

 aiid Se?7timenfs. 1 97 chelT-board violently from him, and fcatters the chefl-men about the place — Tkicbatis Poi't, a pou 7i^ enrage I'is, Li efc/ies boutc, et le jcu cjpandit. — Garin le Loheraiii, ii. 77. So, in the fame romance, the emperor Pepin, arriving at his camp, had no fooner entered his tent than, having put on a loofe tunic {hliaut), and a mantle, he called for a cheff-board, and fat down to play — EJchh dcmandc,fi eji au jeu ajjis. — lb., ii. 127. Even Witikind, the king of the pagan Saxons, is reprefented as amufing himfelf with this game. When the meflenger, who carried him news that Charlemagne was on the way to make war upon him, arrived at "Tremoigne," the palace of the Saxon king, he found Witikind playing at chefs with Efcorfaus de Lutife, and the Saxon queen, Sebile, who was alfo well acquainted with the game, looking on — A lui joe as cfc/ias Ejcorfaus de Lutife ; Sebile les ejgardc, qi do jeu eji aprife. — Chanson des Saxons, i. 01. Witikind was fo angry at this intelligence, that his face "became as red as a cherry," and he broke the chefs-board to pieces — Wire et de mautalant riigifl conime cerifc ; Le mejfage regarde, le geu pe^oie et brije. In the " Chanfon de Gefte" of Guerin de Montglaive, the ftory turns upon an imprudent aft of Charlemagne, who flakes his whole kingdom upon a game of chefs, and lofing it to Guerin, is obliged to compound with him by furrendering to him his right to the city of Montglaive, then in the pofleflion of the Saracens. Thefe " Chanfons de Gefte," formed upon the traditions of the early Carlovingian period, can only of courfe be taken as a pi6ture of the manner of the age at which they were compofed, that is, of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and we know, from hiftorical evidence, that the pifture is ftriftly true. At that period chefs certainly was what has been termed the royal game. The celebrated Walter Mapes, writing in the latter half of the twelfth century, gives a curious anecdote relating to tniirical