Page:The history of Fulk Fitz-Warine - tr. Kemp-Welch - 1904.djvu/20

 ably owing to the same chanson that Fulk, like Renaud, releases his sovereign when he has him completely at his mercy."

Its Relation to Renaud de Montauban.— These observations are just, but they do not go far enough. It seems possible to go much further, and that one must admit that the text itself of Renaud de Montauban was quite familiar to our author. He certainly knew of the use of the chess-board made by Landri and Charlot. But is there not a singular resemblance between the scene in which Renaud de Montauban, struck by the wrathful Bertolais, goes to make complaint to Charlemagne, and that in which Prince John, struck by Fulk, goes to make complaint to his father, King Henry II.? And does not the reply of Henry II. to his son recall in a forcible manner, and in a way to suggest a direct imitation, or a remarkably exact reminiscence, Charlemagne's reply to Renaud? "Tes téy, mauvais," says our author.

In the same way, when Fulk arrives at Alberbury, he relates to his mother, Dame Hawyse, the wanderings of himself and his brothers, and Dame Hawyse