The Teaching and Cultivation of the French Language in England Part 13

_Gyles._ Certes, madame, elle estoit de la paix, laquelle (come on disoit) est proclamee par tout ce royaume... .

Then master and pupil are pictured discussing at length the subject of peace. Love, the nature of the soul, and the meaning of the celebration of Ma.s.s were other topics on which they had long conversations; and they would accompany their supper--for the princess begged her master to dine with her as often as possible, in order to talk French--by discourse on health and diet, in the course of which Duwes gave the princess much friendly advice. [Header: QUEEN MARY'S FRENCH STUDIES] His eloquence on the subject suggests that when he calls himself a "doctor" he means a doctor of medicine. Thus Mary's practice in the language was not by any means limited to regular lessons, and these lessons were always kept in close contact with her daily life. She is taught how to receive a messenger from the king, her father, or from any foreign potentate, in French, or how to accept presents from n.o.ble friends. Duwes sometimes used his lessons as a means of conveying to Mary messages from different members of her household. Lady Maltravers exhorts her to study French seriously that reports of her ability may not be belied, and that she may be able to speak French with the king her father, and her future husband, "whether king or emperor"; and her carver, John ap Morgan, writes to her when she is ill, to express his hopes for her speedy recovery. When Duwes's gout prevented him from waiting on the princess, he would send her a poem of his own composition, in French with an interlinear English version--Duwes wrote singularly crude and inharmonious verses--which the princess learnt by heart by way of lesson. Or he would excuse his absence in a letter, which, he a.s.sures her, "will not be of small profit" to her if she learns it.

Such were the relations of Duwes with his favourite pupil. Little else is known of his life beyond the fact that he taught French for nearly forty years in the highest ranks of English society. He himself tells us that he was a Frenchman, and in all probability he was a native of Picardy, for his name is of Picard origin, and there are a few traces of picardisms in his work. We also know that he was librarian to both Henry VII. and Henry VIII.,[247] and that in 1533 he was appointed a gentleman waiter in the Princess Mary's household, and his wife one of the ladies-in-waiting;[248] that, curiously enough, he was a student of alchemy and wrote a Latin dialogue, _Inter Naturam et Filium Philosophiae_, dated from the library at Richmond (1521), and dedicated to his friend "N. S. P. D.";[249] that he died in 1535, about two years after the publication of his _Introductorie_; and that he was buried in the Parish Church of St. Olave in Old Jury, where he was inscribed as "servant to Henry VII. and Henry VIII., clerke to their libraries, and schoolmaster of the French Tongue to Prince Arthur, and to the Ladie Mary"--a by no means complete list of his ill.u.s.trious pupils.

Among Duwes's earliest pupils had been Henry's sister Mary, afterwards Queen of France. This princess, however, was to continue her study of the language under John Palsgrave, and the first we hear of Palsgrave as a teacher of French is on the occasion of his appointment by Henry VIII.

as tutor to his sister, probably towards the end of 1512, when negotiations for the princess's marriage with the Prince of Castile, afterwards Charles V., were in progress.[250] And when at last it fell to the lot of the princess to marry, not the emperor, but the French king, Louis XII., in 1514, Palsgrave remained in her service, and accompanied her to France in the capacity of almoner. Like the majority of her English followers, he was soon dismissed from her service. Yet Mary did not forget her former tutor. From time to time she wrote to Wolsey, seeking to obtain preferment for him;[251] like many other men of his standing, Palsgrave was in Holy Orders, and became later chaplain to the king. In November 1514 the Queen of France wrote to Wolsey to beg his favour on behalf of Palsgrave that he may continue at "school."[252]

From this we may conclude that Palsgrave was continuing the studies he had begun at an earlier date at the University of Paris. He calls himself "gradue de Paris" in 1530, and no doubt also, his work on the French language was making headway.

How long he remained in France is uncertain, but we are told that on his return he was in great demand as a teacher of French and Latin to the young English n.o.bility and gentry.[253] Sir Thomas More, writing to Erasmus in 1617, mentions that Palsgrave is about to go to Louvain to study there. This second sojourn at a foreign university was not of long duration, for Erasmus, in a letter dated July the same year, informs Tunstall that Palsgrave had started for England.[254] Palsgrave was soon to receive from the king a second important appointment as tutor.

[Header: PALSGRAVE'S PUPILS] On the formation of the household of his natural son, Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond, in 1525, when his "worldly jewel," as Henry called the young duke, was made Lieutenant-General of the North, the king entrusted Palsgrave with the charge of bringing him up "in virtue & learning."[255] Palsgrave was allowed three servants and an annual stipend of 13:6:8. He took great pains with his young pupil's education, and the king seems to have approved of his method.[256] Such was not the case with Gregory Cromwell, who, it appears, shared the lessons of the duke. When Gregory went to Cambridge under John Cheking's care, the latter wrote to Cromwell that he had to unteach his charge all he had learnt, and that if such be Palsgrave's style of teaching, he does not think he will ever make a scholar.[257] Palsgrave declares that he suffered much, when in the North, from poverty and calumny.[258] His friend, Sir Thomas More, lent him money, and Palsgrave begged him to continue to help him to "tread underfoot" that horrible monster poverty.

He also pet.i.tions his constant patroness the Dowager Queen of France and her husband the Duke of Suffolk. All he has to live by and pay his debts and maintain his poor mother is little more than 50.[259]

Among Palsgrave's other pupils of note were Thomas Howard, brother to the Earl of Surrey; my Lord Gerald, probably the brother of the fair Geraldine, the object of Lord Surrey's pa.s.sionate sonnets; Charles Blount, son and heir of Lord Montjoie; Thomas Arundel, who later lost his head for conspiring with the Duke of Somerset against Northumberland, and Andrew Baynton, who has been mentioned already: all students of French, who were acquainted with his book before it was published, and knew his "hole intente and consyderation therein," and who called Palsgrave "our mayster" with a certain amount of pride.

The year after the publication of his grammar, Palsgrave went to Oxford, where he was incorporated M.A. and took the degree of B.D.[260] He was, however, back in London in the following year, taking pupils into his house and visiting others daily. He had, for instance, promised to serve Mr. Baynton and Mr. Dominico in the house of the latter till Candlemas.

Of the pupils who were "with him," the "best sped child for his age" was William St. Loe, afterwards Sir William and captain of Elizabeth's Guard. Palsgrave seems to have suffered much from interruptions in his pupils' studies caused by visits to their mothers, or by their leaving London on account of the unhealthiness of the city. He writes to William St. Loe's father that if he takes his son away for either of these reasons the child will not "recover this three years what he has lost in one," and moreover he will have "killed a schoolmaster," for Palsgrave vows he will never teach any more. He also writes that after spending a little time at Cambridge, where he could take the degree of D.D., he intends to keep school in Black Friars, and have with him Mr. St. Loe's son, Mr. Russell's son (who is a good example of what results from interruption of studies by a visit home), the younger brother of Mr.

Andrew Baynton, and Mr. Norice's son, of the Privy Chamber.[261] At Cambridge, also, he would be able to get an a.s.sistant, as at present the strenuous and continuous application to teaching is ruining his health.

Nothing else is known of Palsgrave's teaching career. He seems to have spent a good deal of time towards the end of his life at one or other of the rectories[262] to which he was collated by Archbishop Cranmer, and where, no doubt, he continued to receive pupils till the time of his death in 1554.

Palsgrave's great French Grammar was not his only professional work. He also published a text-book for the use of students of Latin. This was a Latin comedy, Acolastus,[263] which had made its way into English schools. Palsgrave added an English translation of his own, and the whole appeared in 1540, with a dedication to the king. He says it is a translation according to the method of teaching Latin in grammar schools, "first word for word, and then according to the sense."

[Header: EDWARD VI.'S FRENCH EXERCISES] Palsgrave had also announced his intention of publishing a book of French proverbs; he had written in his grammar: "There is no tongue more aboundante of adages or darke sentences comprehendyng great wysdome. But of them I differ at this time to speake any more, intendyng by G.o.ddes grace to make of thes adages a booke aparte." There is, however, nothing to show that he ever realized this intention, even partially.

Another French teacher in the royal family was Jean Bellemain, tutor to Edward VI. Edward refers to his French master in the pa.s.sage in his diary[264] in which he gives an account of his education. Speaking of himself in the third person, he writes: "He was brought up until he came to six years old among the women. At the sixth year of his age he was brought up in learning by master Dr. c.o.x, who was after his almoner, and John Chepe, M.A., two well-learned men, who sought to bring him up in learning of Tongues, of scripture, philosophy and all liberal sciences: also John Belmaine, French man, did teach him the French language." It appears from a letter of Dr. c.o.x to Secretary Paget, that the prince had his first lesson in French on October 1, 1546.[265] His teacher was a zealous Protestant, a friend and correspondent of Calvin, and he had probably some influence on the religious opinions of his pupil.

The three French exercises in the king's hand which are still in existence show that he made rapid progress in the language.[266] They all bear on religious subjects, showing how carefully Bellemain attracted the attention of his young pupil to this matter. All were written after his accession to the throne (1547), and were dedicated to his uncle, Protector Somerset. The first two are very similar in composition. Edward made a collection of texts out of the Bible in English, bearing on two subjects, Idolatry and Faith. He then proceeded to turn these from English into French as an exercise in translation.

After they had been corrected by his master, the king had them transcribed into a paper book--the first consisting of twenty pages, the second of thirty-five--and sent them to the Protector.[267] The first was written when Edward had been learning French for about a year (in 1547), and the second shortly afterwards.

The third exercise is much longer than the two earlier ones, and differs from them in being not a translation, but a composition of Edward's own in French. It is ent.i.tled, _A l'encontre des abus du Monde_, and was begun on December 13, 1548, and finished on March 14 of the following year, so that its composition occupied Edward for over three months. The ma.n.u.script is corrected throughout by Bellemain, who makes the interesting entry at the end, that the young king, who was then not yet twelve, had written the whole without the help of any living person.

Bellemain seems to have been very proud of his pupil's performance; he sent a copy of it to Calvin as "flowers whose fruit would be seen in due season."[268] Calvin in turn sent Bellemain observations on the composition for him to transmit to his pupil, and advised its publication, which Edward would not hear of.[269] Bellemain remarks that Edward took great delight in Calvin's works, and from time to time the French tutor acted as a medium of communication between the two, as in the case just mentioned. Calvin did not scruple to give the young monarch advice on religious subjects,[270] while Cranmer invited him to write to the young king. Bellemain himself made a translation of the English Liturgy of 1552, and sent it to Calvin to have his opinion on it.[271]

Besides these three exercises, two of Edward's French letters have also survived. One is addressed to Queen Katharine Parr and the other to the Princess Elizabeth. In the former he compliments the queen, whom he more usually addressed in Latin, on her beautiful handwriting.[272] [Header: JEAN BELLEMAIN] The other is to Elizabeth, who, it appears, had written to him in French, inviting him to reply in the same language. He takes her advice:

Puisque vous a pleu me rescrire, tres chere et bien aymee soeur, je vous mercie de bien bon cuer, et non seullement de vostre lettre, mais aussy de vostre bonne exhortation et example, laquelle, ainsy que j'espere, me servira d'esperon pour vous suivre en apprenant.

Priant Dieu vous avoir en sa garde. De t.i.tenhanger, 18 jour de decembre et l'an de nostre seigneur, 1548.--Vostre frere,

EDWARDUS. PRINCE.

a ma treschere et bien aymee soeur Elizabeth.[273]

We see from the date of this letter that Edward had been learning French nearly three months when it was written.

Bellemain's salary as French tutor to the king was 6:12:4 per quarter.

In 1546 he received an annuity of fifty marks for life; in 1550 a lease for twenty-one years of the parsonages of Minehead and Cotcombe, county Somerset; in 1553 a lease of the manor of Winchfield in Hampshire;[274]

and in 1551 a grant of letters of denization.[275] He stayed in England until the king's death in 1553, and was present at his funeral. No doubt, with his religious sympathies, he would find the England of Mary's time an uncongenial home, and leave it at as early a date as possible.

Bellemain did not compose any treatise on the French language. He says that he had long nourished the hope of writing some rules for French p.r.o.nunciation and orthography; but he changed his mind, thinking it mere folly to attempt to give rules for that which was not yet fixed and certain. In a translation into French of the Greek Epistle of Basil the Great to St. Gregory upon solitary life, which he dedicated to the Princess Elizabeth,[276] he expresses his opinion upon the new style of French orthography, then promoted by certain writers, with whom he did not agree on most points. These writers[277] wished to make the orthography tally with the p.r.o.nunciation and to discard the letters which are not p.r.o.nounced; they would thus change the spelling still used for the most part by scholars and courtiers, and which in Bellemain's opinion is preferable to that proposed by the so-called reformers. He argues that an alteration of the spelling of French would necessitate a corresponding change in Latin, where the letters have the same sound and meaning, a thing which appears ridiculous to the merest observer.

Besides, the derivative consonants are useful, as they serve to distinguish words of identical sound but different meaning and derivation, and to indicate the length of the preceding vowel. On the other hand, letters have been added by versifiers merely to suit their rimes, and these writers have done more than any others to corrupt French orthography. Of what avail is it, asks Bellemain, to compose rules on a subject so much in dispute? For these reasons he abstained from increasing the number of works on the French language produced in England.

In the dedication to Elizabeth of his translation of Basil the Great's Epistle to St. Gregory, Bellemain shows that he was familiar with the books which the princess read, and also expresses his desire that she will not let her French be corrupted by the so-called reformed orthography she may meet in some of these books.[278] Thus Bellemain took an interest in Elizabeth's French, and it is highly probable that he was her tutor in that language.[279] [Header: QUEEN ELIZABETH'S KNOWLEDGE OF FRENCH] In the year 1546, when he began to teach Edward French, the Princess Elizabeth shared for some time her brother's studies. It is said that they began with religious instruction in the morning, and the rest of the forenoon, breakfast alone excepted, was devoted to the languages, science, and moral learning. Edward then went to his outdoor exercises and Elizabeth to her lute or viol.[280] No doubt, then, she received lessons from the French tutor until she left her brother in December. Elizabeth, however, had made considerable progress in the language some years before this date, and before 1544, so that it is extremely likely that Bellemain had been teaching her for several years before he was appointed French tutor to Edward, perhaps owing to his success with Elizabeth. At any rate there does not seem to be any trace of any other French tutor to the princess, and the fact that he received an annuity of 50 for life suggests that he had already rendered some service in the royal family.

The scholar Leland praised Elizabeth's skill in French and Latin when he saw her at Ampthill with her brother, and already in 1544 she had completed the first composition in which she exerted her early activity in the French language. This was a translation of Margaret of Navarre's _Miroir de l'ame pecheresse_,[281] which she called _The Miroir or Gla.s.se of the Synneful Soul_, and dedicated to Queen Katharine Parr.[282] It was published in 1564 under the t.i.tle, _A G.o.dly meditacyon of the Christian soule concerning a love towards G.o.d and Hys Christe, compyled in Frenche by Lady Margarete, Quene of Naver, and aptly translated into Englysh by the right vertuous lady Elizabeth, daughter of our late Soverayne Kynge Henri the VIII._[283] The translation itself is not very good, and the style is awkward. But Elizabeth was only eleven years old when she undertook it, and observes apologetically that she "joyned the sentences together as well as the capacite of (her) symple witte and small lerning coulde expende themselves." In the following year (1545) she translated some prayers and meditations written in English by the queen, Katharine Parr, into Latin, French, and Italian, and dedicated them to her father.[284] Of greater interest is a little book the princess wrote in French, and also offered to the king--a translation into French of the _Dialogus Fidei_ of Erasmus, thus inscribed: "A Treshaut Trespuissant et Redoubte Prince Henry VIII de ce nom, Roy d'Angleterre, de France et d'Irlande, defenseur de la foy, Elizabeth sa Treshumble fille rend salut et obedience." This treatise, composed before the death of the king in 1547,[285] was preserved in the Library at Whitehall, and often attracted the attention of foreign visitors in London.[286]

Thus Elizabeth was well accomplished in French before the reign of Edward VI. It was while her brother was king that the great Hebrew scholar, Antony Rudolph Chevallier, commonly called Monsieur Antony, was for a short time her tutor in French. Chevallier was a Norman who had studied Hebrew under Vatable at Paris, and had been forced to take refuge in England on account of his religious opinions. He studied at Cambridge and lived for a year in the house of Archbishop Cranmer,[287]

who brought him to the notice of the young king (then famous for his patronage of foreign scholars of the Reform) and of Protector Somerset, who appointed him tutor to the Princess Elizabeth.[288]

On the death of Edward VI., Chevallier, like Bellemain, left England. He taught Hebrew at Strasburg and Geneva, where he came into contact with English student refugees under the reign of Mary I., and made the acquaintance of Calvin. He returned to England in the reign of Elizabeth (1568) to solicit the queen's help for the French Protestants. He received a good welcome, and in 1569 was made a lecturer in Hebrew at Cambridge, where "he was accounted second to none in the realme." He returned to France before the Ma.s.sacre of St. Bartholomew (1570), and died as a result of the hardships he suffered in making his escape.

[Header: RELIGIOUS OPINIONS OF FRENCH TUTORS]

It is a curious fact that the religious opinions of the French tutors in Henry VIII.'s family were reflected in the reigns of their pupils--the Protestant Edward VI., the Roman Catholic Mary, and the Protestant Elizabeth. Both Duwes and Bellemain allowed the subject of religion to make its way into their lessons, and they probably exercised some influence, differing in degree, on the religious convictions of their pupils.

FOOTNOTES:

[221] First edition. Printed at London, by Th. G.o.dfray, _c._ 1534. Sig.

A-Ea in fours.

[222] Both these grammars were reprinted by Genin, in the _Collection des doc.u.ments inedits sur l'Histoire de France_. II. _Histoire des lettres et sciences_. Paris, 1852.

[223] By Andrew Baynton, in a letter prefixed to Palsgrave's grammar.

[224] Palsgrave in his grammar.

[225] Both Palsgrave's and Duwes's observations on the p.r.o.nunciation of French are utilized by M. Thurot: _De la p.r.o.nonciation francaise depuis le commencement du_ 16e _siecle d'apres les temoignages des grammairiens_. 2 tom. Paris, 1881.

For further treatment of Palsgrave's grammar, see A. Benoist, _De la syntaxe francaise entre Palsgrave et Vaugelas_. Paris, 1877.

[226] The second book begins on folio x.x.xi. and ends on folio lix. In the third book the pagination begins anew: folio 1 to folio 473.

[227] Four hundred and seventy-three folios, while the first and second books together occupy only fifty-nine folios.

[228] The fulness, originality, and exhaustive character of the work may be ill.u.s.trated by the treatment of such a point as the agreement of the past participle with its subject, when used with the auxiliary _avoir_.

"... yet when the participle present followeth the tenses of _Je ay_, it is not ever generall that he shall remain unchaunged, but ... yf the tenses of _Je ay_ have a relatyve before them or governe an accusative case eyther of a p.r.o.noune or substantyve, the participle for the most part shall agree with the sayd accusatyve cases in gendre and nombre, and in such sentences not remayne unchaunged. Helas, I have loved her, _helas je l'ay aimee_ ..." etc.

[229] Duwes's plan is as comprehensive as Palsgrave's, as is seen by the following table:

"In the first part shal be treated of rules, that is to say, howe the fyve vowelles must be p.r.o.nounced in redynge frenche, and what letters shal be left unsounde, and the course thereof.

"The second part shal be of nounes, p.r.o.nounes, adverbes, participles, with verbes, propositions, and coniunctions.

"Also certayne rules for coniugation.

"Item fyve or syx maners of coniugations with one verbe.

"Item coniugations with two p.r.o.nounes and with thre and finally combining or ioinyng 2 verbes together."

[230] _The Boke of the Governour ..._ ed. H. H. S. Croft, 1883, vol. i.

p. 55.