5 iz THE DRAMA. 



excellent poet, Pierre Gringore, herald-at-arms to the Duke of Lorraine, was 

 the principal author and the manager of the troupe named Enfants sans Souci, 

 the members of which, recruited amongst the wealthy bourgeois families, had 

 set up in opposition to the Brothers of the Passion. Gringore's theatre, 

 established close to what are now the Paris markets, was in great vogue 

 during the reign of Louis XII., and his representations generally took place 

 during the Carnival. The pieces in his repertory, though interlarded with 

 sharp hits at the higher clergy and the court of Rome, were for the most part 

 somewhat severe upon the score of morality, for he had taken as his motto, 

 "Raison partout, rien quo raison" (Reason everywhere, nothing but reason). 



The people had a keen liking for spectacles of every kind during the 

 Middle Ages, and always turned out in crowds to witness the cavalcades, 

 pomps, and processions which accompanied the tournaments, plenary courts, 

 and feudal ceremonies. In a history of the theatre it is necessary, there- 

 fore, to mention the plays in dumb-show, the allegories, and the pantomimes, 

 which were principally represented upon the occasion of a royal visit, or of 

 public rejoicings in celebration of some great local or political event. (See, in 

 the volume on " Manners, Customs, and Dress," chapter on Ceremonial.) Then, 

 again, there was the Dance of Death, known as the Dame Mucttbrr, which in 

 the fifteenth century was one of the spectacles which produced the greatest 

 effect upon the common people (Fig. 388). It is almost certain that at first 

 this Datise Macabre was a sort of pantomime, a compound of music and 

 singing ; and in 1424, the English, then masters of Paris, had it publicly 

 performed in the Cemetery of the Innocents, to celebrate their victory at 

 Verneuil. 



Another pantomime, but of a less lugubrious kind, was offered to the 

 people of Paris in 1313, by order of Philippe le Bel, in honour of the recep- 

 tion of his two sons into the Order of Chivalry. Godefroy de Paris, a 

 rhyming chronicler of the time, describes it as follows : 



" Vit-on Dieu, sa Mere rire . . . 

 Kostre Seigneur manger des pommes, . . . 

 Et Its Anges au paradis . . . 

 Et lea Ames dedans chanter . . . 

 Enfcr y fut noir et puant, 

 Diables y ot plus de cent." . . . 



In 1437, when Charles VII. entered Paris, a representation was given of 



