sion of the same motif in art and in literature, and that strongly in favour of the former. The reader will remember the glorious castles which ornament the background of the miniatures of the brothers of Limburg; September with the vintage in progress and the castle of Saumur, rising like a vision behind it, the steeples of the towers with their high weather-vanes, the pinnacles and the graceful chimneys, all shooting up like tall white flowers against the deep blue of the sky; or December and the sombre towers of Vincennes looming threateningly behind the leafless woods. What means or methods had a poet like Eustache Deschamps at his disposal to rival scenes like these when he produced a sort of literary counterpart to them in a series of poems, in praise of seven castles of Northern France? The description of architectural forms at which he tried his hand in the lines devoted to the castle of Bièvre was by no means successful. So he limited himself to enumerating the delights which these castles provided; thus, speaking of Beauté, he says:
“Son filz ainsné, daulphin de Viennois,
Donna le nom à ce lieu de Beauté.
Et c’est bien drois, car moult est delectables:
L’en y oit bien le rossignol chanter;
Marne l’ensaint, les haulz bois profitables
Du noble parc puet l’en veoir branler….
Les prez sont pres, les jardins deduisables,
Les beaus preaulx, fontenis bel et cler,
Vignes aussi et les terres arables,
Moulins tournans, beaus plains à regarder.”[1]
What a difference between the effect of these lines and that of the miniature! And yet the method is the same: it is an enumeration of the things seen (or, in the case of the poet, things heard). But the view of the artist embraces a definite and limited space, in which he not merely has to collect a number of things, but also to harmonize and blend them into a single whole. In the miniature of February Paul
- ↑ His eldest son, the dauphin of Viennois, Gave this spot the name of Beauty. And justly, for it is very delectable: One hears the nightingale sing there; The river Marne surrounds it, the lofty pleasant woods Of the noble park may be seen waving on the wind. Meadows are near, pleasure-gardens, The fine lawns, beautiful and clear fountains, Also vineyards and arable lands, Turning mills, plains beautiful to view.
