The Teaching and Cultivation of the French Language in England Part 25

METHODS OF TEACHING FRENCH--LATIN AND FRENCH--FRENCH AND ENGLISH DICTIONARIES--STUDY OF FRENCH LITERATURE

Eliote gives some information concerning the fees charged by French teachers in the later part of the sixteenth century. He a.s.serts that the usual charge was a s.h.i.+lling a week,[449] but we are left in doubt as to how many lessons this ent.i.tled the student to. He affirms, probably not seriously, that he would charge a gentleman 10 a year, and a lord from 20 to 30.

We are indebted to him also for an account, very prejudiced, no doubt, of the usual method employed by French teachers generally. This consisted, according to him, in reading a page of French and then translating it. Fortunately we are enabled, by means of the French text-books that have come down to us, to draw a fuller picture of the French lessons of the time. It has been seen that as a rule these books contained four parts--rules of p.r.o.nunciation, rules of grammar, reading exercises, and a vocabulary. They are generally written throughout in French and English (in parallel columns[450]), the reason of this being the importance attached to reading and to double translation, from French into English and English into French. In the English version the idiomatic phrase is sacrificed in order to give a more literal rendering of the French, and also, possibly, because these Frenchmen were incapable of writing any other. As is to be expected, translation from French into English was the more usual exercise. Translation from English into French, however, was by no means neglected, and appears to have been recommended princ.i.p.ally by English teachers of French, and more especially by Palsgrave and Eliote. Edward VI.'s French exercises, it will be remembered, are translations from English into French, or free composition in French.

In addition to reading and translating, much importance was attached to p.r.o.nunciation. It was generally considered best to learn the sounds of the language by repet.i.tion after a teacher with a good accent; but rules were thought necessary to confirm the knowledge thus acquired. As to rules of grammar, there was no question of learning the language by means of them. A grammar was treated as a book of reference, just as a dictionary. Thus the student usually learnt the p.r.o.nunciation by reading the French aloud with his tutor, referring to the rules of p.r.o.nunciation whenever necessary, and then translating and retranslating the dialogues, grammar being supplied as the need for it was felt. Although these early teachers strictly limited the place of grammar, they almost all agree in emphasizing its importance within the limits indicated.

Grammar rules were reduced to a minimum. Attention was called to what were considered important general rules, but those with numerous exceptions, it is argued, were better learnt by "use" and persistent reading, "so as not to weary with long discourses which would be necessary to explain things learnt better by practice than by rule."

The dialogue form in which almost all the reading material is given, and the proverbs and familiar phrases, show the importance attached to a practical and colloquial knowledge of the language. The teaching of French was of a decidedly business-like nature, and closely in touch with the concerns of life. One of the chief reasons for this, no doubt, was that it was learnt for social or other immediate requirements. The fact that French was not taught in the grammar schools undoubtedly a.s.sisted it to maintain its close connexion with practical life. It is only about a century and a half later, when French began to gain a foothold in these schools, that it was taught more and more on grammatical lines, and less and less as a living language.

Latin, although most of the school statutes of the time encourage the scholars to speak it, was taught chiefly on grammatical lines.[451] The memorizing of Latin grammar was a foremost subject even in the Middle Ages.[452] [Header: LATIN AND FRENCH] In the sixteenth century the Latin grammar usually known as Lily's was the prescribed national grammar, with rules of accidence in English and of syntax in Latin.[453] Familiar dialogues in the style of those for French were also used, the chief difference between the Latin and French dialogues being that the Latin are separate and complete works in themselves, and are not, as a rule, provided with an English translation. They were memorized as the grammar was. From the dialogues, or colloquies as they were called, dealing with typical occurrences of life, the Latin scholar pa.s.sed on to the reading of school authors--Cato, Cicero, Ovid, Virgil, Terence, etc.[454] Nor was vocabulary neglected, for in the schools of the Renaissance the practice of learning so many words a day, prevalent in the Middle Ages, was still in vogue.

It thus appears that the books generally used in teaching Latin were not without some influence in determining the types of manuals employed for teaching French. The practice of including religious formulae, which we find in some books, was sanctioned by their place in the national Latin grammar, while it is clear that the Latin colloquia of the time had considerable influence on the French dialogues. In the early sixteenth century the dialogues of the scholar Vives,[455] who received honours at both Oxford and Cambridge during his short stay in England, were much in vogue. Like the French dialogues of the time, they kept closely in touch with the interests of the pupils and dealt with such topics as rising in the morning, going to school, returning home, and children's play and meals, and students' chatter. Similar works were the _Sententiae pueriles_,[456] a book for beginners, first published at Leipzig in 1544, and containing a collection of familiar phrases rather than dialogues, and the _Pueriles Confabulatiunculae_ by Evaldus Gallus. In the second half of the sixteenth century two other manuals of conversation were added to those already in use in England: the _Colloquia_ of Mathurin Cordier, first published in Latin in 1564, and Castellion's _Sacred Dialogues_ based on the Scriptures, printed in Latin at Basle, in 1555.[457]

With the text-books, however, all close resemblance between the teaching of Latin in grammar schools and the teaching of French ends. As we have seen, reading, p.r.o.nunciation, and conversation were the main concerns of the French student; translation held a large place and grammar rules a subsidiary one. The grammar-school boy, on the contrary, would first gain an elementary knowledge from rules written in English, and memorize the vocabulary and phrases; learn his Latin grammar, and then pa.r.s.e and construe[458] the usual school authors.[459] The sons of the aristocracy and well-to-do cla.s.ses probably learnt by a more practical method, as they were able to have private tutors, who devoted all their time to providing the necessary atmosphere. As late as 1607, when Latin was less used colloquially, the writer Cleland, a great advocate of the teaching of French, condemns the practice of those parents who have their children brought up to speak Latin only; they neglect their mother tongue and the language of elegance, French, and soon forget their Latin when once removed from their tutor's care.[460] That such cases were the exception rather than the rule, even in the early sixteenth century, may be gathered from the two great educational writers of the time, Sir Thomas Elyot and Roger Ascham. Both the _Governour_ (1531) and the _Scholemaster_ are protests against the common school usage of placing grammar in the first place, and a summons to base the study of the language on the reading of authors. They believed with Quintilian that "Longum et difficile iter est per praecepta, breve et efficax per exempla." Colet in his _Aeditio_ had laid down the same principle, to the effect that the "reading of good books, dyligent information of taught masters, studious advertence and taking heed of learners, hearing eloquent men speak, and finally busy imitation with the tongue and pen, more availeth shortly to get the true eloquent speech than all the tradition of rule and precepts of masters"; [Header: GRAMMAR AND TRANSLATION] and he adds, "men spoke not Latin because such rules were made, but contrariwise because men spoke such Latin, upon that followed the rules and so were made."[461] Yet it seems that the force of tradition prevailed, and that these precepts were only put into practice in exceptional cases.

It is striking to notice how close was the resemblance between the actual methods used by French teachers and those advocated by would-be reformers of the teaching of Latin. Colet's words express almost exactly the sentiments and practice of Holyband, De la Mothe, and other French teachers; and the same is true of Elyot and Ascham. "Nothing can be more convenient," writes Elyot in referring to students of Latin, "than by little and little to train and exercise them in the speaking of Latin, informing them to know first the names in Latin of all the things that come in sight, and to name all the parts of their bodies, and giving them somewhat that they covert or desire in most gentle manner to teach them to ask it again in Latin." He even goes so far as to say that the pupil may "as sone speake good latin" on this method "as he may do pure frenche,"[462] thereby showing that he probably derived suggestions from the prevalent methods of teaching French. Elyot, however, realized that the use of Latin as a familiar tongue was not as practicable in schools as in many n.o.ble families, where it might well happen that the pupil would have "none other persons to serve him or keep hym company but suche as can speake Latine elegantly." How successful the sole use of Latin could be in such circ.u.mstances is exemplified in the well-known case of Montaigne. Ascham, like Elyot, recognized the exceptional conditions required for such a method. He believed the "dailie use of speaking" would be the best way of learning the language if the child could only hear it spoken perfectly, but failing this he considered the practice dangerous.[463] It is probable, however, that in the best French schools, and certainly in that of Holyband, this ideal was realized in the case of French.

As regards the respective importance of reading and grammar, the French teachers of the time appear to have put into practice the ideas of the reformers. All agree that grammar rules should be as few as possible, and be taught in connexion with reading. The general method of French teachers was to refer to the rule as the need for it arose in reading.

Ascham also pleads for the study of grammar, "so hardlie learned by the scholar in all common scholes," along with authors; and the educational reformer Mulcaster, in his _Elementarie_ of 1582, writes that grammar is best learnt by being applied to the matter, and that the child's mind should not be clogged with rules. Elyot differs slightly from them in detail but not in principle. He allows grammar to precede the study of authors, provided it is reduced to the smallest possible amount.

"Grammar," he says, "being but an introduction to the study of authors,"

care should be taken "not to detain the child too longe in that tedious labour, for a gentyll wytte is there with some fatigate," and "hit in a maner mortifieth his corage" before he "cometh to the most swete and pleasant readinge of olde authors."[464] Both these views as regards grammar--that of Ascham and Mulcaster, and that of Elyot--were prevalent among French teachers of the time. There are only small differences in detail; the general principles are identical.

In the matter of translation, "most common and most commendable of all other exercises of youth,"[465] there is a striking resemblance between the method of double translation common among French teachers, and the same method set out by Ascham, who marks the transition from oral to written methods of teaching Latin.[466] In the case of De la Mothe, the resemblance is so clear and close that we are led to believe he was acquainted with the work of Elizabeth's tutor,[467] published in 1570, over twenty years before the _French Alphabet_. Ascham's system consisted of the double translation of a model book, and it is interesting to compare it with the method of De la Mothe. The pupil has first to pa.r.s.e and translate the Latin into English; "after this the child must take a paper booke, and sitting in some place where no man shall prompe him, by him self, let him translate into Englisshe his former lesson. [Header: BOOKS IN FRENCH AND ENGLISH] Then showing it to his master, let the master take from him his Latin booke, and pausing an houre, at the least, than let the childe translate his owne Englishe into latin againe, in an other paper booke." And when this is done, the master should compare it with the original Latin, "and laie them both togither."[468]

There was thus much in common between the teaching of Latin and the teaching of French. The dialogues, which form so important a feature in the French text-books of the time, were certainly indebted to the Latin Colloquia, although they also continue the tradition of the mediaeval French conversation-books. The Latin Dialogues of Vives had much influence on the French, and Holyband based one of his books, the _Campo di Fior_, on the _Exercitatio_ translated in French, Italian, and English. Eliote also acknowledged his debt to the Spanish scholar. In other cases the debt was almost inevitable and probably unconscious; for the French teachers, who often taught Latin as well, would use such books daily, and had moreover probably acquired their own knowledge of Latin from them. Holyband, we have seen, read the _Sententiae pueriles_ with his pupils.

The importance attached to reading and double translation by teachers of French led to the appearance of a great number of books in French and English, on the lines of Bellot's _Jardin de Vertu_. For instance, part of the _Semaines_ of Du Bartas, the most popular French poet in England in the sixteenth century, was published in this form in 1596, and again in 1625, on the occasion of the marriage of Charles I. This translation is due to William L'Isle of Wilbraham,[469] the pioneer in the study of Anglo-Saxon, who dedicated it in the first place to Lord Howard of Effingham, Earl of Nottingham, Lord Admiral, and subsequently to Charles I. It is ent.i.tled _Part of Du Bartas, English and French, and in his own kinde of verse, so near the French Englished, as may teach Englishmen French, or a Frenchman English. Sequitur Victoria Junctos_,[470] and consists of the first two days of the _Second Week_, with the French and English arranged on opposite pages, followed by an English translation of the commentary of Simon Goulart de Senlis.

Guy du Faur, Sieur de Pibrac, was another French writer widely read in England, and his _Quatrains_ were frequently commended by French teachers to their scholars. They were translated into English verse by Sylvester, the translator of Du Bartas, and published with the French original in 1605. Sylvester dedicated the quatrains to Prince Henry, and the copy in the British Museum contains an epigram in English in the handwriting of his brother, afterwards Charles I., and a ma.n.u.script dedication to the younger prince in that of the translator.[471] The quatrains appeared again with the subsequent editions of Sylvester's works. About this time Prince Henry made Sylvester a Groom of his Chamber, and gave him a small pension of 20 a year.[472] The story goes that the prince valued him so highly that he made him his first "poet pensioner," and it seems that Sylvester took advantage of his position to encourage his royal patron's French studies. Many other works of the kind appeared in French and in English.[473] The educational writer Charles Hoole tells us that masters frequently taught languages by using interlinearies, "not to speak of their construing the French and Spanish Bible by the help of an English one."[474] Lord Herbert of Cherbury, philosopher and gallant, amba.s.sador in France in the time of James I., learnt French, Italian, and Spanish, on this translation method, whilst living in the University or at home. He mastered them, he a.s.sures us, without the help of a tutor, solely by means of Latin or English books translated into those languages, and of dictionaries.[475]

[Header: FRENCH AND ENGLISH DICTIONARIES]

De la Mothe advised his advanced pupils to read difficult French books with the help of a dictionary, and there was some supply of works of this kind at the disposal of Lord Herbert and other students of the language. It is true that the widespread use of books in both languages diminished the demand for such manuals, which may not have been easy to acquire. Yet there was a considerable choice of such works. Holyband had produced two French-English dictionaries, in 1580 and 1593 respectively, in which he referred to "those which broke the ice before him." There had appeared in 1571 an anonymous _Dictionarie Frenche and English_,[476] printed by Henry Bynneman for Lucas Harrison. This work, which does not confine itself to words only, but includes phrases as well, was no doubt known to Holyband. Its author had probably drawn largely on an earlier dictionary, already mentioned, in which a place was given to French--the Latin, English, and French Dictionary of John Veron (1552). The inclusion of French in such a work is a striking testimony to the importance of French at that time. But when a second edition of Veron's dictionary was prepared by Ralph Waddington, in 1575, he "of purpose thought good to leave out the French, both because (he) saw it was not necessary for English students of Latin, as for that Maister Barret hath five years since set forth an alvearie sufficient to instruct those which are desirous to travel in th'understanding of the French Tongue."

This "alvearie" appeared in 1573, two years after the French-English dictionary printed for Harrison. It was ent.i.tled "_An alvearie or Triple Dictionarie in English, Latin and French, very profitable for all such as be desirous of any of those three languages ..._" and was dedicated to Wm. Cecil, Lord Burghley, then Chancellor of Cambridge University.

Baret had been teaching at Cambridge for eighteen years "pupils studious of the Latin tongue," and part of their daily task was to translate some piece of English into Latin "for the more speed and easie attayning of the same." At last, "perceiving what great trouble it was to come runnying to (him) for every word they missed,"[477] he made them collect each day a number of Latin words and phrases, together with their English equivalents. Within a year or two they had gathered together a great volume of work, to which, "for the apt similitude between the good scholers and diligent bees in gathering them wax and honey into their hive," Baret gave the t.i.tle of _Alvearie_. At first he had no intention of publis.h.i.+ng the work, but when he went to London he was finally persuaded to do so, and received help from many of his old pupils who were then at the Inns of Court, and from several of the best scholars in various English schools. How Baret first thought of adding French to his dictionary is not known. He owns that he did not trust his own skill in this matter, although he had formerly "travelled in divers countries beyond the seas both for languages and for learning"; but that he "used the help of M. Chaloner and M. Claudius." By 'M. Claudius,' Baret possibly meant Holyband, who was often called "Maistre Claude." M.

Chaloner may have been the author of the French-English dictionary published by Harrison in 1571.

According to the custom of the time, Baret's dictionary was preceded by a number of commendatory addresses, one of which was by the head-master of Merchant Taylors' School, Richard Mulcaster. In the dictionary itself, every English word is first explained, and then its equivalent in Latin and French given. At the end are tables of the Latin and French words "placed after the order of the alphabet, whatsoever are to be found in any other dictionarie. And so as to turn them backwards againe into Englishe when they reade any Latin or French authors and doubt of any harde worde therein."

Baret had "gone to G.o.d in Heavenlie seates" before the close of 1580, when there appeared a posthumous second edition of the _Alvearie_. In this final form Greek has a place by the side of the other languages, and the t.i.tle runs, _An Alvearie or quadruple Dictionarie containing four sundrie tongues, namely, English, Latine, Greeke, and Frenche, newlie enriched with varietie of wordes, phrases, proverbs, and divers lightsome observations of grammar_. But there is no table of the Greek words, as for the Latin and French. Such was the third dictionary of French words which appeared before Holyband's.[478]

[Header: FRENCH IN LATIN DICTIONARIES]

The place given to French in these early Latin dictionaries is worthy of notice. No doubt French first entered the schools in this indirect way.

Both Veron's and Baret's works were used in schools; and Baret's dictionary is included in the list of books mentioned by Charles Hoole as being specially useful to schoolboys.[479] There are at least two other school vocabularies in which French was introduced, both due to the poet and compiler John Higgins, who is said to have been "well read in cla.s.sick authors, and withall very well skilled in French."[480] The first of his lexicographical works was a new and revised edition of _Huloet's Dictionarie_,[481] which occupied him two years. It appeared in 1572,[482] a year before Baret's work. Higgins calls himself "late student in Oxforde," and dedicates the volume to Sir John Peckham. This edition by Higgins is so much altered that it is almost a new work. One of the chief changes was the addition of a French version to the Latin and English, "by whiche you may finde the Latin or French of anye Englishe woorde you will." For the French, Higgins seems to have drawn chiefly on the Latin-French dictionary of Robert Estienne, which had already been published in French, English, and Latin by Jean Veron, in 1552. Higgins also acknowledges his debt to Thierry, whose French-Latin dictionary appeared twelve years later in 1564. There was a close relations.h.i.+p between French-Latin and French-English dictionaries.

French is first found side by side with English, in one of these French-Latin dictionaries--that of Veron; and in subsequent years the French-English dictionaries are mostly based on one or other of the French-Latin lexicons. Those due to Robert estienne and to Thierry were probably the sources from which the author of the French-English dictionary of 1571 drew his material; while Holyband based his _Treasurie_ (1580), and his Dictionary (1593), respectively, on the augmented editions of Thierry's work due to Nicot, which appeared in 1573 and 1584.[483]

The second lexicographical work of Higgins, published in 1585, was a translation, ent.i.tled _Nomenclator or Remembrancer of Adria.n.u.s Junius, Physician, divided into two tomes_. It professed to supply the appropriate names and apt terms for all things under their convenient t.i.tles, in Latin, Greek, French, and English.[484] The English column was added by Higgins.

Thus by the end of the sixteenth century there had appeared in England three French-English dictionaries, and several others in which French found a place by the side of the cla.s.sical languages. And we may add to these the French-Latin dictionaries on which they were usually based, for it seems extremely likely that those students of French who knew Latin--and practically all of them would know this chief and first of school subjects--used the French-Latin lexicons as well, in their study of French, when other means were not available.

Early in the seventeenth century, in 1611, Holyband's French dictionary of 1593 was succeeded by the celebrated French-English dictionary of Randle Cotgrave,[485] which occupies in the seventeenth century the place that Palsgrave's _Esclarciss.e.m.e.nt_ does in the sixteenth among the works on the French language produced in England. Although Cotgrave's work is on a much larger scale than Holyband's, and much superior to it,[486] there is a close connexion between the two. In the _Stationers'

Register_ Cotgrave's is entered as a dictionary in French and English first collected by Holyband, and since augmented and altered by Cotgrave.[487] But the work which no doubt was of most help to Cotgrave was another French-Latin dictionary, Aimar de Ranconnet's _Tresor de la Langue Francoise_, revised by Nicot (1606).[488] He had, moreover, read all sorts of books, old and new, in all dialects, where he found words not heard of for hundreds of years, which he included in his book, to be used or left as the reader thought fit. J. L'Oiseau de Tourval,[489] a Parisian, and friend of Cotgrave, who wrote in French an epistle prefixed to the dictionary, thought it advisable to a.s.sure the reader that none of these words were of Cotgrave's invention, observing at the same time that it would be well to revive some of these obsolete and provincial terms. [Header: COTGRAVE'S DICTIONARY] He also adds that Cotgrave had sent to France in his eager search for words. M. Beaulieu, secretary to the British amba.s.sador at Paris, was no doubt Cotgrave's collaborator in this quest, as Cotgrave tells us elsewhere[490] that he had received valuable help from M. Beaulieu, as well as from a certain Mr. Limery.

Cotgrave dedicated his dictionary to Wm. Cecil, Lord Burghley, "his very good Lord and Maister," whose secretary he was. He declares that he would have produced a more substantial work to offer to his patron had not his eyes failed him and forced him "to spend much of their vigour on this bundle of words." He also offered a copy to the eldest son of James I., Prince Henry, and received from him a gift of 10.[491] The price of the dictionary seems to have been 11s. Cotgrave sent two copies to M.

Beaulieu at Paris, and wrote requesting payment of 22s., which they cost him; for, he says, "I have not been provident enough to reserve any of them and therefore am forced to be beholden for them to a base and mechanicall generation, that suffers no respect to weigh down a private gain."[492]

Cotgrave's dictionary was much superior to anything of the sort which had yet appeared. In addition to giving the meaning of each French word in English, with an indication of its gender in the case of nouns, and, in the case of adjectives, of the formation of the feminine form, Cotgrave supplied a collection of ill.u.s.trative phrases, idioms, and proverbs. At the end are found "briefe directions for such as desire to learne the French tongue," giving a succinct treatment of the p.r.o.nunciation of the letters, followed by a description of the various parts of speech.

This really remarkable work, which is still of considerable utility to the modern student, reigned supreme throughout the greater part of the seventeenth century. A second edition was issued in 1632, when Cotgrave was still alive. The only change in this issue is the addition of a "most copious Dictionarie of the English set before the French by R. S.

L." This R. S. L. was Robert Sherwood, Londoner, who taught French and English in London, and also had a French school for a time. He gave his dictionary the t.i.tle of _Dictionarie Anglois et Francois pour l'utilite de tous ceux qui sont desireux de deux langues_,[493] and addressed it to the "favorables lecteurs francois, alemans et autres." The English reader he advises to look for fuller information as to "the gender of all French nouns, and the conjugation of all French verbs" in Cotgrave's dictionary; the small s.p.a.ce to which he was limited did not allow him to provide such information. Like Cotgrave, Sherwood closes with rules of grammar, in the form of observations on English p.r.o.nunciation and on the English verbs. Sherwood's work is the earliest of the English-French dictionaries. Both Baret and Higgins had placed English before French, and no doubt Sherwood made use of their works, as well as of English-Latin dictionaries. Baret, however, gives an indication of the greater demand there was for French-English vocabularies, by supplying a table of French words at the end of his work. Moreover, the object of Sherwood's lexicon was less to facilitate translation from English to French than to teach English to foreigners.

In 1650 Cotgrave's dictionary was issued in a revised and augmented edition by James Howell, the famous letter-writer.[494] This edition is preceded by a lengthy essay on the French language, tracing its growth from the earliest times, and taken, without acknowledgement, from Pasquier's _Recherches_. Howell had already put much of the same matter in a series of letters addressed to the Earl of Clare in his _Epistolae Ho-Elianae_,[495] and repeated it in his glossary of English, French, Italian, and Spanish, the _Lexicon Tetraglotten_ (1660). He quotes several examples of old French in both prose and verse, and adds on his own account a praise of Richelieu and the Academy recently founded by the cardinal. [Header: JAMES HOWELL] He also discusses the question as to where the best French was spoken--at the Court, among scholars at the University, or lawyers at the Courts of Parliament--and is inclined to share the general opinion of the day, which made the Court the supreme arbiter in matters of language.

Cotgrave, it has been seen, included all sorts of words in his dictionary. Howell thought it necessary to distinguish obsolete and provincial words, and, accordingly, with the help of "a n.o.ble and knowing French gentleman," he marked such terms with a small cross. He also initiated another change by placing the grammar before the dictionary instead of after it, as Cotgrave did: "for a dictionary which contains the whole bulk of a language to go before the grammar is to make the building precede the basis. Therefore it was held more consentaneous to reason, and congruous to order that the grammar should be put here in the first place, for Art observes the method of Nature to make us creep before we go." He likewise made a few additions to Cotgrave's rules, and appended a dialogue in French and English, "consisting of some of the extraordinary and difficult criticall phrases which are meer Gallicismes, and pure idiomes of the French tongue"; and also a pa.s.sage of French prose, in the old spelling and also according to the reformed orthography introduced by the Academy.

In 1660 appeared another edition of Cotgrave, still further enlarged by Howell.[496] Some years previously copies of the edition of 1650, "with blank pages sown between the leaves," had been sent by the printer "to knowing persons, true lovers of the French," who were invited to enter on the blank pages any word they came across in their reading which was not in the dictionary; by means of this plan several hundred additional words were gathered together, many being "new invented terms, which the admired Mons. Scudery, and other late Romancers have so happily publisht in their printed volumes." After Howell's death there appeared yet another issue of his edition of Cotgrave, in 1673.[497] The printer employed the same means to increase the number of words as had been so successfully adopted in 1660.

The appearance of French dictionaries naturally facilitated the reading of French literature, which in its turn had much influence on the spread of the knowledge of the language. Lord Herbert of Cherbury, it has been seen, gained his first knowledge of French by reading it with the help of a dictionary. And, in spite of the fact that French literature was widely read in translations,[498] there were many who preferred to read it in the original. The number of French books in private libraries is enough to show this. One translator of the time felt it necessary to apologize for offering an English version (1627) "of the French Knight Lisander and his lady Calista," contrary to the fas.h.i.+on of the time, "which is all French."[499] Further testimony is found in the many French books which were printed in England,[500] in addition to the books in both French and English. And many English writers of the time introduced French freely into their own English compositions.[501]

Almost all Englishmen of education could read French, and many, no doubt, learnt it as Herbert did. [Header: STUDY OF FRENCH LITERATURE]

Milton, who differed from most of his countrymen in his decided preference for Italian, taught both languages to his two pupils and nephews, Edward and John Philips, on this method of reading. For Italian they read Giovanni Villani's _History_, and for French "a great part of Pierre Davity, the famous geographer of France in his time."[502] In fas.h.i.+onable circles the case was the same, and French romances and collections of _nouvelles_ were much in vogue. Lady Brilliana Harley, for instance, who later distinguished herself by defending her castle in Herefords.h.i.+re against the Royalists, spent much of her time reading French literature. She wrote asking her son, then at Magdalen College, Oxford (1638-9), to send her books in French, as she "had rather reade any thinge in that tounge than in Inglisch."[503] She would even while away days of sickness by translating pa.s.sages of Calvin, whom the English Protestants, yielding to the general prejudice in favour of all things French, followed in preference to Luther. Not infrequently, moreover, works in other languages were read in French versions, just as such versions were frequently the medium of translation; Drummond of Hawthornden read _Orlando Furioso_ and the _Azolani_ of Bembo in French, as well as the works of the Swiss theologian and follower of Zwingli, Thomas Erastus.[504]

Among the most eager advocates of the reading of French literature were naturally the French teachers of the time. One of the chief objections raised against Holyband's system of distinguis.h.i.+ng the unp.r.o.nounced letters was that the student would be at a loss when he came to read French books. Holyband, however, protested that such was not the case, and that "the cavillation of these ignorantes who measure other men's wit according to their owne" was in contradiction to his experience, which daily showed him the contrary. As to his reading, Holyband would first have the learner "reade halfe a score chapters of the New Testament, because it was both easie and profitable:[505] then let him take in hand any of the works of Monsieur de Launay, otherwise called Pierre Boaystuau, as the best and the most elegant writer of our tongue.

His workes be _le Theatre du monde_, the tragicall histories, the prodigious histories. Sleidan's commentaries in frenche be excellently translated. Philippe de Commins, when he is corrected is very profitable and wise." The _Nouveau Testament_ of de Beze, Boiasteau's _Theatre du monde_, and Sleidan's _Commentaries_[506] were all books well known in England, and Holyband himself prepared an edition of Boiasteau.[507] An additional reason, according to him, for retaining the unsounded consonants was to facilitate the reading of the older monuments of the French language. He also advised the perusal of Marot's works, of the _Amadis_ of Herberay des Essarts, of Francois de Belleforest's _Histoire Universelle du monde_, of the _Vies et Morales de Plutarque_, in Amyot's version, and of the collection of stories, on the plan of the _Decameron_, which its author, Jacques Yver, had ent.i.tled _Le Printemps_ (1572),[508] by way of contrast with his own name.

Evidently Holyband's choice of French literature was influenced to some extent by his religious sympathies. It is curious that he makes no mention of Ronsard, who was much read in England, and one of the favourite authors of the Queen. Bellot in his Grammar had similar if not identical ambitions. He sought to enable his pupils to read the _Amadis_ of Des Essarts, Marot, de Beze, du Bellay's lyrics, Froissart, Ronsard, Collet[509] and Jodelle "racontans l'un l'amour et l'autre la guerre cruelle." Pibrac and Du Bartas have already been mentioned as favourite authors. It was to encourage his pupils to take delight in the "profound learning and flowing sweetness of the French poets, especially the divine works of that matchlesse du Bartas," that a French teacher of the seventeenth century, Pierre Erondell, printed at the end of his book for teaching the language, the New Testament story of the Centurion, rendered by himself into French verse. "This poor work," he quaintly writes, will encourage learners to read better ones, "because everything is better known by his contrarye and the sweet sweeter, after that the mouth hath tasted of the sharpe sower."

Naturally writings of a religious character were much in favour with these teachers. [Header: AUTHORS USUALLY READ] Holyband advised the reading of de Beze's New Testament, and several times we hear of "the French Bible" being printed in England.[510] The Liturgy in French[511]

was also printed, and would be useful to English students of French attending the French Church.

French teachers were not the only zealous advocates of the reading of French literature. Most of the writers on polite education of the time give similar advice, although for different reasons. "For statesmen, French authors are the best," wrote Francis...o...b..rne in his _Advice to a son_,[512] "and most fruitful in negociations, and memoirs left by public ministers, and by their secretaries published after their deaths." Cleland names the works of the many learned historiographers of France he would have the future diplomat and aspirant to the services of the State read: "Engerrand of Munstrellet, Philip of Commines, the Lord of Haillant, who is both learned and profitable and pleasant in my conceit. The Commentaries of Bellay and the Inventorie of John Serres, newlie printed and worthie to be read, both for the good and compendious compiling of the storie and also for the French eloquence wherin he floweth. For militarie affairs, yee maie read the Lord of Noue, who is somwhat difficil for some men, and also the Commentaries of the L.

Monluc, which are good both for a young souldier, and an old captaine."[513]

Bodin was another of the authors specially recommended. Sir Philip Sidney counsels his brother Robert to read him with particular attention, and James Howell[514] includes him in a list of "good French writers," which varies slightly from that of Cleland: "For the general history of France, Serres is one of the best, and for the modern times, d'Aubigni, Pierre Mathieu, and du Pleix: for the politicall and martiall government du Haillan, De la Noue, Bodin, and the Cabinet: Touching Commines, who was contemporary with Machiavel, 'twas a witty speech of the last Queen mother of France that he made more Heretiques in policy than Luther ever did in religion. Therefore he requires a reader of riper years."

FOOTNOTES:

[449] This was the fee charged by Holyband in his French school.

[450] The interlinear arrangement used in the Middle Ages had been abandoned in all but a few exceptional cases. These teachers no doubt agreed with the pedagogue John Brinsley, the chief exponent of the method of translation, that interlinears were confusing because the eye catches the two languages simultaneously.

[451] F. Watson, _English Grammar Schools_, Cambridge, 1908, pp. 305 _sqq._ J. E. Sandys, "Education in Shakespeare's England," in _Shakespeare's England_, i. pp. 231 _sqq._