Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist Part 4

Jasmin did not at first write in Gascon. In fact, he had not yet mastered a perfect knowledge of this dialect. Though familiarly used in ancient times, it did not exist in any written form. It was the speech of the common people; and though the Gascons spoke the idiom, it had lost much of its originality. It had become mixed, more or less, with the ordinary French language, and the old Gascon words were becoming gradually forgotten.

Yet the common people, after all, remain the depositories of old idioms and old traditions, as well as of the inheritances of the past. They are the most conservative element in society. They love their old speech, their old dress, their old manners and customs, and have an instinctive worship of ancient memories.

Their old idioms are long preserved. Their old dialect continues the language of the fireside, of daily toil, of daily needs, and of domestic joys and sorrows. It hovers in the air about them, and has been sucked in with their mothers' milk. Yet, when a primitive race such as the Gascons mix much with the people of the adjoining departments, the local dialect gradually dies out, and they learn to speak the language of their neighbours.

The Gascon was disappearing as a speech, and very few of its written elements survived. Was it possible for Jasmin to revive the dialect, and embody it in a written language? He knew much of the patois, from hearing it spoken at home. But now, desiring to know it more thoroughly, he set to work and studied it. He was almost as a.s.siduous as Sir Walter Scott in learning obscure Lowland words, while writing the Waverley Novels. Jasmin went into the market-places, where the peasants from the country sold their produce; and there he picked up many new words and expressions. He made excursions into the country round Agen, where many of the old farmers and labourers spoke nothing but Gascon. He conversed with illiterate people, and especially with old women at their spinning-wheels, and eagerly listened to their ancient tales and legends.

He thus gathered together many a golden relic, which he afterwards made use of in his poetical works. He studied Gascon like a pioneer. He made his own lexicon, and eventually formed a written dialect, which he wove into poems, to the delight of the people in the South of France. For the Gascon dialect--such is its richness and beauty--expresses many shades of meaning which are entirely lost in the modern French.

When Jasmin first read his poems in Gascon to his townspeople at Agen, he usually introduced his readings by describing the difficulties he had encountered in prosecuting his enquiries. His hearers, who knew more French than Gascon, detected in his poems many comparatively unknown words,--not indeed of his own creation, but merely the result of his patient and long-continued investigation of the Gascon dialect. Yet they found the language, as written and spoken by him, full of harmony--rich, mellifluous, and sonorous. Gascon resembles the Spanish, to which it is strongly allied, more than the Provencal, the language of the Troubadours, which is more allied to the Latin or Italian.

Hallam, in his 'History of the Middle Ages,' regards the sudden outburst of Troubadour poetry as one symptom of the rapid impulse which the human mind received in the twelfth century, contemporaneous with the improved studies that began at the Universities. It was also encouraged by the prosperity of Southern France, which was comparatively undisturbed by internal warfare, and it continued until the tremendous storm that fell upon Languedoc during the crusade against the Albigenses, which shook off the flowers of Provencal literature.{1}

The language of the South-West of France, including the Gascon, was then called Langue d'Oc; while that of the south-east of France, including the Provencal, was called Langue d'Oil. M. Littre, in the Preface to his Dictionary of the French language, says that he was induced to begin the study of the subject by his desire to know something more of the Langue d'Oil--the old French language.{2}

In speaking of the languages of Western Europe, M. Littre says that the German is the oldest, beginning in the fourth century; that the French is the next, beginning in the ninth century; and that the English is the last, beginning in the fourteenth century. It must be remembered, however, that Plat Deutsch preceded the German, and was spoken by the Frisians, Angles, and Saxons, who lived by the sh.o.r.es of the North Sea.

The Gaelic or Celtic, and Kymriac languages, were spoken in the middle and north-west of France; but these, except in Brittany, have been superseded by the modern French language, which is founded mainly on Latin, German, and Celtic, but mostly on Latin. The English language consists mostly of Saxon, Norse, and Norman-French with a mixture of Welsh or Ancient British. That language is, however, no test of the genealogy of a people, is ill.u.s.trated by the history of France itself.

In the fourth and fifth centuries, the Franks, a powerful German race, from the banks of the Rhine, invaded and conquered the people north of the Somme, and eventually gave the name of France to the entire country.

The Burgundians and Visigoths, also a German race, invaded France, and settled themselves in the south-east. In the year 464, Childeric the Frank took Paris.

The whole history of the occupation of France is told by Augustin Thierry, in his 'Narratives of the Merovingian Times.' "There are Franks," he says in his Preface, "who remained pure Germans in Gaul; Gallo-Romans, irritated and disgusted by the barbarian rule; Franks more or less influenced by the manners and customs of civilised life; and 'Romans more or less barbarian in mind and manners.' The contrast may be followed in all its shades through the sixth century, and into the middle of the seventh; later, the Germanic and Gallo-Roman stamp seemed effaced and lost in a semi-barbarism clothed in theocratic forms."

The Franks, when they had completed the conquest of the entire country, gave it the name of Franken-ric--the Franks' kingdom. Eventually, Charles the Great, or Charlemagne, descended from Childeric the Frank, was in 800 crowned Emperor of the West. Towards the end of his reign, the Nors.e.m.e.n began to devastate the northern coast of Franken-ric.

Aix-la-Chapelle was Charlemagne's capital, and there he died and was buried. At his death, the Empire was divided among his sons. The Norse Vikingers continued their invasions; and to purchase repose, Charles the Simple ceded to Duke Rollo a large territory in the northwest of France, which in deference to their origin, was known by the name of Normandy.

There Norman-French was for a long time spoken. Though the Franks had supplanted the Romans, the Roman language continued to be spoken. In 996 Paris was made the capital of France; and from that time, the language of Paris became, with various modifications, the language of France; and not only of France, but the Roman or Latin tongue became the foundation of the languages of Italy, Spain, and Portugal.

Thus, Gaulish, Frankish, and Norman disappeared to give place to the Latin-French. The Kymriac language was preserved only in Brittany, where it still lingers. And in the south-west of France, where the population was furthest removed from the invasions of the Gauls, Ostrogoths, and Visigoths, the Basques continued to preserve their language,--the Basques, who are supposed by Canon Isaac Taylor to be the direct descendants of the Etruscans.

The descendants of the Gauls, however, const.i.tute the ma.s.s of the people in Central France. The Gauls, or Galatians, are supposed to have come from the central district of Asia Minor. They were always a warlike people. In their wanderings westward, they pa.s.sed through the north of Italy and entered France, where they settled in large numbers. Dr.

Smith, in his Dictionary of the Bible, says that "Galatai is the same word as Keltici," which indicates that the Gauls were Kelts. It is supposed that St. Paul wrote his Epistle to the Galatians soon after his visit to the country of their origin. "Its abruptness and severity, and the sadness of its tone, are caused by their sudden perversion from the doctrine which the Apostle had taught them, and which at first they had received so willingly. It is no fancy, if we see in this fickleness a specimen of that 'esprit impretueux, ouvert a toutes les impressions,'

and that 'mobilite extreme,' which Thierry marks as characteristic of the Gaulish race." At all events, the language of the Gauls disappeared in Central France to make way for the language or the Capital--the modern French, founded on the Latin. The Gaulish race, nevertheless, preserved their characteristics--quickness, lightness, mobility, and elasticity--qualities which enabled them quickly to conceive new ideas, and at the same time to quickly abandon them. The Franks had given the country the name it now bears--that of France. But they were long regarded as enemies by the Central and Southern Gauls. In Gascony, the foreigner was called Low Franciman, and was regarded with suspicion and dislike.

"This term of Franciman," says Miss Costello, who travelled through the country and studied the subject, "evidently belongs to a period of the English occupation of Aquitaine, when a Frenchman was another word for an enemy."{3} But the word has probably a more remote origin. When the Franks, of German origin, burst into Gaul, and settled in the country north of the Loire, and afterwards carried their conquests to the Pyrenees, the Franks were regarded as enemies in the south of France.

"Then all the countries," says Thierry, "united by force to the empire of the Franks, and over which in consequence of this union, the name of France had extended itself, made unheard-of efforts to reconquer their ancient names and places. Of all the Gallic provinces, none but the southern ones succeeded in this great enterprise; and after the wars of insurrection, which, under the sons of Charlemagne, succeeded the wars of conquest, Aquitaine and Provence became distinct states. Among the South Eastern provinces reappeared even the ancient name of Gaul, which had for ever perished north of the Loire. The chiefs of the new Kingdom of Aries, which extended from the Jura to the Alps, took the t.i.tle of Gaul in opposition to the Kings of France."{4}

It is probable that this was the cause of the name of "Franciman" being regarded as an hereditary term of reproach in the Gaulish country south of the Loire. Gascon and Provencal were the princ.i.p.al dialects which remained in the South, though Littre cla.s.ses them together as the language of the Troubadours.

They were both well understood in the South; and Jasmin's recitations were received with as much enthusiasm at Nimes, Aries, and Ma.r.s.eilles, as at Toulouse, Agen, and Bordeaux.

Mezzofanti, a very Tower of Babel in dialects and languages, said of the Provencal, that it was the only patois of the Middle Ages, with its numerous derivations from the Greek, the Arabic, and the Latin, which has survived the various revolutions of language. The others have been altered and modified. They have suffered from the caprices of victory or of fortune. Of all the dialects of the Roman tongue, this patois alone preserves its purity and life. It still remains the sonorous and harmonious language of the Troubadours. The patois has the suppleness of the Italian, the sombre majesty of the Spanish, the energy and preciseness of the Latin, with the "Molle atque facetum, le dolce de, l'Ionic;" which still lives among the Phoceens of Ma.r.s.eilles. The imagination and genius of Gascony have preserved the copious richness of the language.

M. de Lavergne, in his notice of Jasmin's works, frankly admits the local jealousy which existed between the Troubadours of Gascony and Provence. There seemed, he said, to be nothing disingenuous in the silence of the Provencals as to Jasmin's poems. They did not allow that he borrowed from them, any more than that they borrowed from him. These men of Southern France are born in the land of poetry. It breathes in their native air. It echoes round them in its varied measures. Nay, the rhymes which are its distinguishing features, pervade their daily talk.

The seeds lie dormant in their native soil, and when trodden under foot, they burst through the ground and evolve their odour in the open air.

Gascon and Provencal alike preserve the same relation to the cla.s.sic romance--that lovely but short-lived eldest daughter of the Latin--the language of the Troubadours.

We have said that the Gascon dialect was gradually expiring when Jasmin undertook its revival. His success in recovering and restoring it, and presenting it in a written form, was the result of laborious investigation. He did not at first realize the perfect comprehension of the idiom, but he eventually succeeded by patient perseverance, When we read his poems, we are enabled to follow, step by step, his lexicological progress.

At first, he clung to the measures most approved in French poetry, especially to Alexandrines and Iambic tetrameters, and to their irregular a.s.sociation in a sort of ballad metre, which in England has been best handled by Robert Browning in his fine ballad of 'Harve; Riel.'

Jasmin's first rhymes were written upon curl papers, and then used on the heads of his lady customers. When the spirit of original poetry within him awoke, his style changed. Genius brought sweet music from his heart and mind. Imagination spiritualised his nature, lifted his soul above the cares of ordinary life, and awakened the consciousness of his affinity with what is pure and n.o.ble. Jasmin sang as a bird sings; at first in weak notes, then in louder, until at length his voice filled the skies. Near the end of his life he was styled the Saint Vincent de Paul of poetry.

Jasmin might be cla.s.sed among the Uneducated Poets. But what poet is not uneducated at the beginning of his career? The essential education of the poet is not taught in the schools.

The lowly man, against whom the asperities of his lot have closed the doors of worldly academies, may nevertheless have some special vocation for the poetic life. Academies cannot shut him out from the odour of the violet or the song of the nightingale. He hears the lark's song filling the heavens, as the happy bird fans the milk-white cloud with its wings.

He listens to the purling of the brook, the bleating of the lamb, the song of the milkmaid, and the joyous cry of the reaper. Thus his mind is daily fed with the choicest influences of nature. He cannot but appreciate the joy, the glory, the unconscious delight of living. "The beautiful is master of a star." This feeling of beauty is the nurse of civilisation and true refinement. Have we not our Burns, who

"in glory and in joy Followed his plough along the mountain side;"

Clare, the peasant boy; Bloomfield, the farmer's lad; Tannahill, the weaver; Allan Ramsay, the peruke-maker; Cooper, the shoemaker; and Critchley Prince, the factory-worker; but greater than these was Shakespeare,--though all were of humble origin.

France too has had its uneducated poets. Though the ancient song-writers of France were n.o.ble; Henry IV., author of Charmante Gabrielle; Thibault, Count of Champagne; Lusignan, Count de la Marche; Raval, Blondel, and Ba.s.selin de la Vive, whose songs were as joyous as the juice of his grapes; yet some of the best French poets of modem times have been of humble origin--Marmontel, Moliere, Rousseau, and Beranger.

There were also Reboul, the baker; Hibley, the working-tailor; Gonzetta, the shoemaker; Durand, the joiner; Marchand, the lacemaker; Voileau, the sail-maker;

Magu, the weaver; Poucy, the mason; Germiny, the cooper;{5} and finally, Jasmin the barber and hair dresser, who was not the least of the Uneducated Poets.

The first poem which Jasmin composed in the Gascon dialect was written in 1822, when he was only twenty-four years old. It was ent.i.tled La fidelitat Agenoso, which he subsequently altered to Me cal Mouri (Il me fait mourir), or "Let me die." It is a languishing romantic poem, after the manner of Florian, Jasmin's first master in poetry. It was printed at Agen in a quarto form, and sold for a franc. Jasmin did not attach his name to the poem, but only his initials.

Sainte-Beuve, in his notice of the poem, says, "It is a pretty, sentimental romance, showing that Jasmin possessed the brightness and sensibility of the Troubadours. As one may say, he had not yet quitted the guitar for the flageolet; and Marot, who spoke of his flageolet, had not, in the midst of his playful spirit, those tender accents which contrasted so well with his previous compositions. And did not Henry IV., in the midst of his Gascon gaieties and sallies, compose his sweet song of Charmante Gabrielle? Jasmin indeed is the poet who is nearest the region of Henry IV."{6} Me cal Mouri was set to music by Fourgons, and obtained great popularity in the south. It was known by heart, and sung everywhere; in Agen, Toulouse, and throughout Provence. It was not until the publication of the first volume of his poems that it was known to be the work of Jasmin.

Miss Louisa Stuart Costello, when making her pilgrimage in the South of France, relates that, in the course of her journey," A friend repeated to me two charming ballads picked up in Languedoc, where there is a variety in the patois. I cannot resist giving them here, that my readers may compare the difference of dialect. I wrote them clown, however, merely by ear, and am not aware that they have ever been printed. The mixture of French, Spanish, and Italian is very curious."{7}

As the words of Jasmin's romance were written down by Miss Costello from memory, they are not quite accurate; but her translation into English sufficiently renders the poet's meaning. The following is the first verse of Jasmin's poem in Gascon--

"Deja la ney encrumis la naturo, Tout es tranquille et tout cargo lou dol; Dins lou clouche la brezago murmuro, Et lou tuquet succedo al rossignol: Del mal, helas! bebi jusq'a la ligo, Moun co gemis sans espouer de gari; Plus de bounhur, ey perdut moun amigo, Me cal mouri! me cal mouri!"

Which Miss Costello thus translates into English:

"Already sullen night comes sadly on, And nature's form is clothed with mournful weeds; Around the tower is heard the breeze's moan, And to the nightingale the bat succeeds.

Oh! I have drained the cup of misery, My fainting heart has now no hope in store.

Ah! wretched me! what have I but to die?

For I have lost my love for evermore!"

There are four verses in the poem, but the second verse may also be given

"Fair, tender Phoebe, hasten on thy course, My woes revive while I behold thee shine, For of my hope thou art no more the source, And of my happiness no more the sign.

Oh! I have drained the cup of misery, My fainting heart has now no bliss in store.

Ah! wretched me! what have I but to die?

Since I have lost my love for evermore!"

The whole of the poem was afterwards translated into modem French, and, though somewhat artificial, it became as popular in the north as in the south.

Jasmin's success in his native town, and his growing popularity, encouraged him to proceed with the making of verses. His poems were occasionally inserted in the local journals; but the editors did not approve of his use of the expiring Gascon dialect. They were of opinion that his works might be better appreciated if they appeared in modern French. Gascon was to a large extent a foreign language, and greatly interfered with Jasmin's national reputation as a poet.

Nevertheless he held on his way, and continued to write his verses in Gascon. They contained many personal lyrics, tributes, dedications, hymns for festivals, and impromptus, scarcely worthy of being collected and printed. Jasmin said of the last description of verse: "One can only pay a poetical debt by means of impromptus, and though they may be good money of the heart, they are almost always bad money of the head."