306 THE GERMAN PASSION-PLA Y 



much doubt as to the direction in which they strove 

 to develop the religious drama. To win the popular 

 approval meant at least a good meal when the play 

 was over. 1 There is both direct and indirect evidence 

 connecting several early plays with the Golliards. Thus 

 in the thirteenth-century Benedictbeuern play we find 

 Mary Magdalen, before her conversion, singing a well- 

 known strolling-scholar drinking-song : 



Mundi delectatio 

 dulcis est et grata 

 cuius conversatio 

 suavis et ornata, 2 



and buying this time in the vernacular rouge of the 

 mercator in order to entice her lovers : 



Chramer, gip die varwe mir 



diu min wengel roete, 



da mit ich die jungen man 



an ir danch der minnenliebe noete. 



Seht mich an, 



jungen man ! 



Lat mich. eu gefallen ! 3 



must certainly credit them with the Ludus de decem Virginibus (see 0), we read : 

 " Ludus est factus apud Isinach in orto ferarum (Thiergarten) a clericis et a 

 scholaribus de decem Virginibus, cui ludo marchio intererat " (Chronicle of 1335, 

 cited O, pp. 3, 4). For evidence of the handiwork of the scholars in the 

 Bohemian plays, see U, pp. 47, 84. 



1 More than one of the later German passion-plays conclude with the 

 request that the scholars may receive a good meal (see I, p. 30 ; A, p. 144 ; B, i. 

 p. 264 footnote ; and F, p. 326). Something of the same kind seems to be the drift 

 of Gratemauvaiz's speech at the end of La Nativite de Jhfau-Christ (Jubinal, loc. 

 cit. vol. ii. p. 77). The meal to the actors was often kept up even in the case 

 of the great passion-plays. In Frankfurt three days after the play the Town 

 Council gave the performers a breakfast. In the expenses of the Coventry 

 Mysteries for 1490 we find entries for ale, gallons of beer, wine, ribs of beef, 

 and geese figure largely. See also Appendix II. 



2 J, p. 96. The very same song occurs 200 years later in a Ludus Mariae 

 Magdalene in gaudio (I, p. 105). 



3 " Pedlar, give me rouge to colour my cheeks that I may force the youths to 

 thought of love. Look, youth, at me, and let me delight you." 



