Page:Archaeologia Volume 13.djvu/71

Rh author writes in France, and in the language of the country, he does not say that he is of France. Now this precaution on the part of Mary implies that she wrote in a foreign country, the greater part of whole inhabitants spoke her native language; and where shall we find the French tongue more used at that time than in England? In order, therefore, to avoid being confounded with the writers of that island, or to give a greater consequence to her work, she has stated herself a native of France. Guernes de Pont St. Maxence, who wrote at Canterbury in the 12th century, had been equally attentive to announce himself as a Frenchman, that his work might be regarded as written in a purer and correcter style.

II. Monsieur le Grand advances, without proof, that during the 13th century it was the uniform practice of the French poets to announce their works as translated from the English: an assertion so positive might, at least, have been accompanied with something like proof to support it; for I confess, that after all my researches upon this subject, I have not been able to discover more than two poets who profess to have translated from English works. The first is Geoffrey Gaimar, who in the 12th century composed the history of the Anglo-Saxon kings in French verse; but he not only contents himself with citing the English and Welsh MSS. that he used, but even names those persons who had lent him them. He relates also with extreme minuteness the difficulties he had found in procuring them. Now to call Such details as these by the name of quackery, is to deny even the existence of the works which he says he had borrowed, and which are certainly known to have existed at that time. In a word, it is throwing a scepticism upon the testimony of ancient writers, equally dangerous and unjust.

The second poet who has mentioned the circumstance of having translated from English works is Mary herself, who, in speaking of Æsop, informs us that a king of England, Rh