Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/78

62 BIOGRAPHICAL STUDIES fair virgins dwell, in order to carry out my projected work." Accordingly he returned to Paris, where we find him during the first troubles of the Fronde. As the loyal friend and follower of D'Harcourt, he made a satiric chanson on Conde. This great man, though equal, as we have seen, to an epigram on D'Harcourt, did not feel equal to a combat in satire with a pro- fessional like Saint-Amant, or else thought such a combat beneath his dignity. He therefore took the dignified course of having our brave poet cudgelled on the Pont Neuf by some of his retainers, a noble example which may have been in the mind of Buckingham in his similar quarrel with glorious John Dryden. This indignity may have disgusted Saint- Amant for a while with the region where dwell those fair virgins, the muses of the Seine ; at any rate he soon afterwards, in 1649, set out again for Poland, and this time got there ; and remained, well and honourably treated, for two years. It is even re- corded that he was not only gentleman of the chamber, but also Councillor of State. In some fine verses, semi-serious and grandiose, written in anti- cipation of this visit, he says that he has it in his mind to turn Pole ; to clothe himself as a noble and proud Sarmatian ; to adopt Polish fashions, even in their banquets, where they drink so much ; to learn the language, and polish it, and translate his poems into it, in a style lofty, magnificent, and various ; to become, in fine, the fat Saint-Amantsky instead of the fat Saint-Amant However, he re- turned to France in 165 1, calhng at Stockholm on the way, being sent there by his royal patroness to represent her at the coronation of Christina, the