1831.] Who jvrote Gil Bias ? 485 



allusion to it in Gil Bias is another strong proof of the early composition 

 of the work. 



Lastly, Gil Bias, when confined in the tower of Segovia, hears his 

 fellow-prisoner, Don Gaston de Cogollos, singing to a guitar-accompani- 

 ment the following simple and beautiful Spanish verses : — 



" Ay de me ! un ano felice 

 Parece un soplo ligero 

 Pero sin dicha un instante 

 Es un siglo de tormento." 



It appears almost impossible that these verses could have been written 

 by a foreigner ; for the use of the poetical licence of felice, instead of 

 fcliz, supposes well-trained habits of Spanish versification, which 

 a Frenchman could scarcely have possessed. 



2ndly. Of the Spanish phrases and idioms which abound in the work. 



Here, again, we have abundant proofs of the existence of an original 

 Spanish manuscript. 



One of the Hispanicisms of which Le Sage makes the most frequent 

 use, is " Seigneur," in addressing persons by their Christian names. 

 " Seigneur" is a French word of a very limited extent. Under the old 

 French regime, " Seigneur" was the style of address used to feudal 

 proprietors who held of the crown ; and this system of tenures being 

 now quite abolished, the word is hardly ever used. The coi-responding 

 term of address, " ^lonseigneur," was appropriated to princes of the 

 blood and other high dignitaries. To have spoken of a Seigneur cloth- 

 merchant, a Seigneur innkeeper, a Seigneur Gil Bias, or a Seigneur 

 Scipio, his lacquey, would have been viewed as an intentional burlesque. 

 In Spanish, on the contrary, the word " Seiior" corresponds with the 

 French " Monsieur," and is even more extensively used, being employed 

 as a term of address between persons of all ranks, from the monarch to 

 the servant. It is in this way that the French word " Seigneur" is used 

 in Gil Bias. Thus, in his first sally out from Oviedo, he encounters on 

 the road a beggar, who levels his firelock at him, soliciting at the 

 same time his charity with the polite address of " Seigneur, passant." 

 The natural French term would have been " Monsieur le vuyageur." 

 At Penaflor, in relating his adventure with the parasite, he describes him 

 thus : " Ce cavalier portait une longne epee et pouvait bien avoir trente 

 ans. II s'approcha de moi d'un air empresse — ' SeigneJtr ecolier,' nie 

 dit-il, ' je viens d'apprendre que vous etes le Seigneur Gil Bias de San- 

 tillane.' ' Je lui dis Seigneur cavalier,' " &c. Now the term " Seigneur 

 ecolier," apj)lied to a poor little student, was too gross even for the besot- 

 ted vanity of Gil Bias to have digested. The word "cavalier" also in 

 French means horseman, and is never used in the Spanish sense ; cabal- 

 IcYo, a distinguished manner of saluting a person of some consideration. 



Pedrillo, an old .servant of Don Annibal Chinchilla's, says to his 

 master, " You have only to inform me of the matter in hand, and I 

 promise you " de faire tirer pied ou aile du premier ministre." In French 

 this is an inelegant expression ; whereas in Spanish it is one of pro- 

 verbial expression, and in common use on occasions cited in the text — 

 " Yo prmncUo xacar del primer minislro pata 'o alan." 



It must be recollected that Le Sage flour islied during the Augustan 

 periofl of French literature — that he wrote for a people who possess an 

 ahnost Athenian delicacy of ear — a people with whom, in literary com- 

 pobilions, style is every thing. We tan only reconcile the examples we 



