242 POPULAR BELIEFS. 



declared from the pulpit that this festival was "welcome in the sight of 

 God," and when the clergy of Troyes met the remonstrances of King 

 Charles VII. by saying that their bishop, Jean Leguise, had ordered them 

 to celebrate the Feast of the Buffoons, which was also kept at Sens. 



This festival, which the Troyes clergy set great store by, was the same as 

 the famous Mass of the Ass which existed, in different forms, in various towns 

 of France, but the special ceremonial of which, drawn up expressly for the 

 Church of Sens, is still to be read in a manuscript of the thirteenth century 

 preserved in the library of that town. The rubrics, inserted in the text of 

 the order of service, enable us to follow the whole proceedings of this 

 mass, which was not celebrated, as has been alleged, in honour of Balaam's 

 ass, but of the ass which was in the stable in which our Lord was born, 

 or of that which He rode when He entered Jerusalem upon Palm Sunday. 

 This singular festival did not, it may be added, cause any greater 

 disorder than that of St. Hubert, when dogs and falcons were brought 

 into the church to receive the priest's benediction, to the sound of horn 

 and trumpet ; but there was no idea of profanity on the part of those who 

 did this. 



The festival of the Ass was conducted in this wise. A comely animal 

 having been selected, it was conducted in procession through the streets, 

 which were strewn with carpets, and was met by the clergy, chanting, who 

 accompanied it to the door of the church. Here they announced to the 

 people, in Latin verse, " This is the day of gladness. Let those who are of 

 doleful countenance get away from here. Away with envy and haughtiness ! 

 Those who celebrate the Feast of the Ass desire to be joyful." The ass was led 

 up to the altar, and then was sung that " Prose of the Ass " which, according 

 to the evidence of a contemporary, given in verse at the commencement of 

 the ritual, brought into relief the talents of the first chorister, and which, 

 far from being a sacrilegious mockery, as the philosophers of the eighteenth 

 century have insinuated, was a simple and pathetic manifestation of the faith 

 and piety of our forefathers. Two of the Latin strophes, with the French 

 chorus, run : 



" Orientibus parlibus, 

 Adventavit Asinus, 

 Pulcher et fortissimu.a, 

 Saioinie aptissimus, 

 He, sire Ane, he ! 



