_Early Lyric Poetry._--Side by side with these two forms of literature, the epics and romances of the higher classes, and the fabliau, which, at least in its original, represented rather the feelings of the lower, there grew up a third kind, consisting of purely lyrical poetry. The song literature of medieval France is extremely abundant and beautiful. From the 12th to the 15th century it received constant accessions, some signed, some anonymous, some purely popular in their character, some the work of more learned writers, others again produced by members of the aristocracy. Of the latter class it may fairly be said that the catalogue of royal and noble authors boasts few if any names superior to those of Thibaut de Champagne, king of Navarre at the beginning of the 13th century, and Charles d'Orleans, the father of Louis XII., at the beginning of the 15th. Although much of this lyric poetry is anonymous, the more popular part of it almost entirely so, yet M. Paulin Paris was able to enumerate some hundreds of French chansonniers between the 11th and the 13th century. The earliest song literature, chiefly known in the delightful collection of Bartsch (_Altfranzosische Romanzen und Pastourellen_), is mainly sentimental in character. The collector divides it under the two heads of romances and pastourelles, the former being usually the celebration of the loves of a noble knight and maiden, and recounting how Belle Doette or Eglantine or Oriour sat at her windows or in the tourney gallery, or embroidering silk and samite in her chamber, with her thoughts on Gerard or Guy or Henry,--the latter somewhat monotonous but naive and often picturesque recitals, very often in the first person, of the meeting of an errant knight or minstrel with a shepherdess, and his cavalier but not always successful wooing. With these, some of which date from the 12th century, may be contrasted, at the other end of the medieval period, the more varied and popular collection dating in their present form from the 15th century, and published in 1875 by M. Gaston Paris. In both alike, making allowance for the difference of their age and the state of the language, may be noticed a charming lyrical faculty and great skill in the elaboration of light and suitable metres. Especially remarkable is the abundance of refrains of an admirably melodious kind. It is said that more than 500 of these exist. Among the lyric writers of these four centuries whose names are known may be mentioned Audefroi le Bastard (12th century), the author of the charming song of _Belle Idoine_, and others no way inferior, Quesnes de Bethune, the ancestor of Sully, whose song-writing inclines to a satirical cast in many instances, the Vidame de Chartres, Charles d'Anjou, King John of Brienne, the chatelain de Coucy, Gace Brusle, Colin Muset, while not a few writers mentioned elsewhere--Guyot de Provins, Adam de la Halle, Jean Bodel and others--were also lyrists.