BRUNETTO LATINI 33 



his eyes, and their immense delights are present, hanging and 

 growing before him, so that he may say, not without reason : 

 I sat under the shade of that tree, which I had longed for, and its 

 fruit was sweet to my throat. 1 The concert of the coloured birds 

 soothes his ears with their soft melody ; and for the cure of our 

 illness, the Divine tenderness provides many consolations, while 

 the air smiles with bright serenity, the earth breathes with fruitful- 

 ness, and he himself drinks in with eyes, ears, and nostrils, the 

 delights of colours, songs and odours. 



Where the orchard terminates, the garden begins, distributed 

 into separate plots, or rather, divided by intersecting rivulets ; for 

 although the water appears stagnant, it flows nevertheless with a 

 slow gliding. Here also a beautiful spectacle is exhibited to the 

 infirm brethren : while they sit upon the green margin of the huge 

 basin, they see the little fishes playing under the water, and repre- 

 senting a military encounter, by swimming to meet each other. 

 This water serves the double duty of supporting the fish and water- 

 ing the vegetables, to which water, Alba, a river of famous name, 

 supplies nourishment by its unwearied wandering. Description of 

 Clairvaux by a Contemporary of St Bernard. 



Ayf AIS les Fra^ais ont maisons granz, et plenieres et peintes, et BRUNETTO 

 ***- belles chambres pour avoir joie et delit sans guerre et LATINI 

 sans noise et pour ce savent ils mieux faire preaux et vergiers ^ I23 " 

 et pommiers entre la manoir car ce est une chose qui molt 

 vaut a delit d'ome. Libre I., pt. iv., chap. cxxx. Li Livres 

 dou Tresor. P. Chabaille. 



Maundeville was an early and imaginative traveller in Palestine, Egypt SIR JOHN 

 and China, and resided three years at Pekin. His work is a pot-pourri of/act^ MAUNDEVILLE 

 fiction^ chronicle ) legend and romance. ' 3 ~ I 37 2 )' 



NEAR the isle of Peutexoire, which is the land of Prester 

 John, is a great isle, long and broad, called Milsterak, 

 which is in the lordship of Prester John. That isle is very 

 1 See extract from Burton's ' Anatomy of Melancholy.' 



c 



