222 CHAUCER. 



writers of French, by the greater pliancy of their dialect and 

 the simpler forms of their verse, had acquired an ease which 

 was impossible in the more stately and sharply-angled 

 vocabulary of the South. Their octosyllabics have not 

 seldom a careless facility not unworthy of Swift in his best 

 mood. They had attained the highest skill and grace in 

 narrative, as the lays of Marie de France and the Lai de 

 rOiselet bear witness.* Above all, they had learned how 

 to brighten the hitherto monotonous web of story with the 

 gayer hues of fancy. 



It is no improbable surmise that the sudden and sur 

 prising development of the more strictly epical poetry in 

 the North of France, and especially its growing partiality 

 for historical in preference to mythical subjects, were due 

 to the Normans. The poetry of the Danes was much of it 

 authentic history, or what was believed to be so ; the heroes 

 of their Sagas were real men, with wives and children, with 

 relations public and domestic, on the common levels of life, 

 and not mere creatures of imagination, who dwell apart 

 like stars from the vulgar cares and interests of men. If 

 we compare Havelok with the least idealised figures of 

 Carlovingian or Arthurian romance, we shall have a keen 

 sense of this difference. Manhood has taken the place of 

 caste, and homeliness of exaggeration. Havelok says, 



&quot; Godwot, I will with thee gang 

 For to learn some good to get ; 

 Swinken would I for my meat ; 

 It is no shame for to swinken.&quot; 



This Dane, we see, is of our own make and stature, a being 

 much nearer our kindly sympathies than his compatriot 

 Ogier, of whom we are told, 



&quot; Dix pies de lone avoit le chevalier.&quot; 



But however large or small share we may allow to the 

 Danes in changing the character of French poetry and 

 supplanting the Romance with the Fabliau, there can be 

 little doubt either of the kind or amount of influence which 



* If internal evidence may be trusted, the Lai de VEspine is not hers. 



