134 ROMANCE BALLADS

They are the moulds and patterns of traditional narrative
lyrics in many lands. The fpastourellej opens with a glimpse
of the knight or squire riding along some particular stretch of
road:

Twixt Arras and Douay

outside Gravelle,
I, riding on my way,
found Perrennelle.

He makes his offers of love; the shepherdess pertly replies. He
presses his suit, and she yields or evades him, or, in songs which
may be supposed to appeal to the vulgar, calls in some villeins to
beat the gentleman off. Sometimes the damsel tricks him into
doing a services such as killing a wolf, and repays him with no more
than good words; at others she frightens him or holds him off until
it is too late, and then mocks him for not taking advantage of his
chances. The early songs were satisfied with these personages; but
in the fifteenth century and later it was licit to mark the lady's
lowly status by assigning to her a trade, as in La Belle BarUere.
In French verse and prose, as distinct from French life, courtship
and marriage are treated in a lightly sardonic vein, and infidelity
is accepted as the norm. Here enters the vast tribe of 'chansons de
la mal mariee3. Married to a rich, twisted old man who is impotent
in love, or to a boor who beats them, the young matrons are advised
by servants and friends to look for a young lover; they complain
to some sympathetic squire, give assignations, open their windows
or a side door at night, exult in infidelity and defy the consequences.
To be a nun is, from the standpoint of popular verse, to be un-
happily unwed; we have therefore the frequent pattern of the nun
who laments her solitude. The dawn-song or 'aubade' is yet
another form of the same convention. It is because the lady is
already ill-matched that dawn forces the lovers to separate. The
convention Is complete in all its details: the birds' songs announce
the dawn or the watchman blows his trumpet, the lovers com-
plain that the night has been short, and they abuse 'the jealous
one'—the unfortunate husband. In Spain the dawn breaks
and brings ingenuous lovers together; but that is not the
convention of the 'aubade' nor of the German 'Tageslied'.
Tannhauser, the Noble Moringer, and the Pyramus ballad are
notable instances of songs cast in a traditional mould formed
in France.