But this serious and discontented spirit betrays itself also in compositions which are not parodies or travesties in form. One of the latest, if not absolutely the latest (for Cuvelier's still later _Chronique de Du Guesclin_ is only a most interesting _imitation_ of the _chanson_ form adapted to recent events), of the chansons de geste is _Baudouin de Sebourc_, one of the members of the great romance or cycle of romances dealing with the crusades, and entitled Le Chevalier au Cygne. _Baudouin de Sebourc_ dates from the early years of the 14th century. It is strictly a chanson de geste in form, and also in the general run of its incidents. The hero is dispossessed of his inheritance by the agency of traitors, fights his battle with the world and its injustice, and at last prevails over his enemy Gaufrois, who has succeeded in obtaining the kingdom of Friesland and almost that of France. Gaufrois has as his assistants two personages who were very popular in the poetry of the time,--viz., the Devil, and Money. These two sinister figures pervade the fabliaux, tales and fantastic literature generally of the time. M. Lenient, the historian of French satire, has well remarked that a romance as long as the _Renart_ might be spun out of the separate short poems of this period which have the Devil for hero, and many of which form a very interesting transition between the fabliau and the mystery. But the Devil is in one respect a far inferior hero to Renart. He has an adversary in the Virgin, who constantly upsets his best-laid schemes, and who does not always treat him quite fairly. The abuse of usury at the time, and the exactions of the Jews and Lombards, were severely felt, and Money itself, as personified, figures largely in the popular literature of the time. William of Lorris. Jean de Meung.