ROMANCE. 



weapons of an enemy, procure victory, allay a tempeit, cure 

 bodily difeafes, or call the dead from their tombs, in uttering 

 a form of myfterious words, or infcribing Runic characters. 

 The magicians of romance are chiefly employed in forming 

 and conducting a train of deceptions. There is an air of 

 barbaric horror in the incantations of the fcaldic fablers : 

 the magicians of romance often prefent viiions of pleafure 

 and delight : and although, not without their alarming ter- 

 rors, fometimes lead us through flowery foreils, and raife 

 up palaces glittering with gold and precious ftones. The 

 Runic magic is more like that of Canidia in Horace, the 

 romantic refembles that of Armida in Taflb. The opera- 

 tions of the one are frequently but mere tricks, in compa- 

 rifon of that fublime folemnity of necromantic machinery 

 which the other fo awfully difplays. 



He adds, it is alfo remarkable, that in the earlier fcaldic 

 odes we find but few dragons, giants, and fairies. Thefe 

 were introduced afterwards, and are the progeny of Arabian 

 fancy. Nor, indeed, do thefe imaginary beings often occur 

 in any of the compofitions which preceded the introduction 

 of that fpecies of fabling. 



That the ideas of chivalry, the appendage and the fub- 

 ftance of romance, fubfifted among the Goths, our au- 

 thor readily allows, but not without certain limitations. 

 It was under the feudal etlablifhmcnts, which were foon 

 afterwards erected in Europe, that it received new vi- 

 gour, and was inverted with the formalities of a regular 

 inftitution. 



From the whole of his obfervations, the author deduces 

 the following general conclufion. 



Amid the gloom of fuperftition, in an age of the grofleft 

 ignorance and credulity, a tafte for the wonders of oriental 

 fiction was introduced by the Arabians into Europe, many 

 countries of which were already feafoned to a reception of its 

 extravagancies by means of the poetry of the Gothic fcalds, 

 who, perhaps, originally derived their ideas from the fame 

 fruitful region of invention. Thefe fictions, coinciding with 

 thereigningmanners, and perpetually kept up and improved in 

 the tales of troubadours and minftrels, feemed to have centered, 

 about the eleventh century, in the ideal hiltories of Turpin 

 and Geoffrey of Monmouth, which record the fuppoiititious 

 achievements of Charlemagne and king Arthur, where they 

 formed the ground-work of that fpecies of fabulous narrative 

 called romance. And from thefe beginnings, or caufes, 

 afterwards enlarged and enriched by kindred fancies, fetched 

 from the crufades, that lingular aud capricious mode of 

 imagination arofe, which at length compofed the marvellous 

 machineries of the more fublime Italian poets, and their 

 difciple Spenfer. 



Hearne imagines, that the old metrical romance, called 

 «' Richarde cuer de Lyon," was written by Robert de 

 Brunne. It is probable, however, that the leifure of mo- 

 nadic life produced many rhymers, nor is it at all unlikely, 

 but that the monks often wrote for the minftrels, and that 

 many of our ancient tales in verfe, containing fictitious ad- 

 ventures, were written, although not invented, in the reli- 

 gious houfes. The romantic hiftory of " Guy earl of 

 Warwick" is exprefsly faid, on good authority, to have 

 been written by Walter of Exeter, a Francifcan friar of 

 Carocus in Cornwall, about the year 1292. (Carew's Survey 

 of Cornwall, p. 59.) The libraries of the monafteries 

 were full of romances. Among the many French minftrels 

 invited into England by Richard I., it is natural to fuppofe 

 that fome of them made their magnificent and heroic patron 

 a principal fubject of their compofitions. We have a 

 romance now remaining in Engliih rhyme (which we have 

 juft mentioned) that celebrates the achievements of this il- 



luftrious monarch. It is called « Richard, &c." and was 

 probably tranflated from the French about this period. That 

 this romance, either in French or Engliih, exifted before the 

 year 1300, is evident from its being cited by Robert of 

 Gloucefter, in his relation of Richard's reign, and alfo by 

 Robert de Brunne, who wrote much about the fame time 

 with Robert of Gloucefter ; and hence we may infer that 

 Hearne mult be miftaken in fuppofing that he was the author 

 of it. 



The French, above all other nations, have applied them- 

 felves to this kind of writing ; whether it be owing to the 

 natural tafte and genius of the people, or to the freedom, 

 &c. with which they converfe with the women. They appear 

 to have written metrical romances before or about the year 

 1200. Some of thefe feem to have been formed from profe 

 hiftones, enlarged and improved with new adventures and em- 

 belhftiments from earlier and more iimple tales in verfe on 

 the fame fubjeft. They began chiefly with romances of 

 chivalry : hence their Amadis, in twentv-four volumes ■ 

 Palmerm d'Ohva ; and of England, king Arthur, &c. of 

 which we have an agreeable critique in Don Quixote. 



Chreftien of Troys wrote " Le Romans du Graal," or 

 the adventures of Sangrale, which included" the deeds of 

 king Arthur, fir Triftram, Lancelot du Lake, and the reft 

 of the knights of the round table, before 1191. Chreftien 

 alfo wrote the romance of " Sir Percival," and left unfinished 

 " La Charette," containing the adventures of Lanucelot 

 The firft French writers of romance were the Troubadours '■ 

 which fee. 



The later romances are much more polite ; the belt of 

 which are the Aftrea of d'Urfe ; the Cyrus and Clelie of 

 Mademoifelle de Scuderi ; the CafTandre and Cleopatre of 

 La Calprenede ; Ariane, Francion ; and the Adventures of 

 Telemachus, by the late archbiftiop of Cambray, worth all 

 the reft. 



The Germans, too, have their romances ; efpecially Her- 

 cules and Herculifcus, the Aramena, Octavia, Arminius 

 Otbert, &c. 



The Italians have their Eromena, by Biondi j the works 

 of Loredano, Marino, &c. The Spaniards, who, from 

 their temper and conftitution, were extravagantly fond of chi- 

 valrous exercifes, bad their Amadis of Gaul, their Diana, 

 and Don Quixote. Some critics have even fuppofed, that 

 Spam, having learned the art of romance-writing from their 

 naturalized guefts the Arabians, communicated it at an early 

 period to the reft of Europe. The Engliih, their Arcadia, 

 &c. And in modern times, the number has been fo great' 

 that our circulating libraries are full of them. 



The Argenis of Barclay is rather a fatire than a romance. 

 Although we owe to the Norman minftrels the greater 

 part of the romances now extant, which were avowedly tranf- 

 lated into Engliih, as foon as that language fuperfeded the 

 French ; yet fome few were moft probably originally com- 

 pofed in Enghlh for the ufe of the Scottifh court, where 

 French was never exclufively fpoken, and afterwards imitated 

 or tranflated by French minftrels. Hence it is curious to 

 obferve, that as the earlieft French romances were written 

 m England, fo the earlieft Engliih romances were compoied 

 in Scotland. 



Mr. Ellis makes an arrangement of romances into clafles, 

 introducing each with appropriate remarks. The firft clafs 

 comprehends romances relating to king Arthur ; which were 

 probably the earlieft in order, and were moft popular and 

 numerous. The next clafs included what ha has ventured 

 to call Saxon romances, that is, romances referring to Saxon 

 fubjefts, and claiming, perhaps, fome foundation in the 

 hiftory of that people. Guy of Warwick and Bevis 



of 



