And there dyed all my vallyant knights Alas! that woful day! Two and twenty yeere I ware the crown In honor and grete fame; And thus by deth[4] suddenlye Deprived of the same. Some distinguished English critics, like Warton and Dr. Warburton, maintain that the materials as well as the taste for romantic fiction were derived almost exclusively from the Arabians. They assume therefore that the traditions, fables and mode of thought in Northern Asia from whence the Scandinavians and Germans are supposed to have originated, were identical with those which the secluded people of Arabia afterwards incorporated into their literature. It is more natural to assume that there is always a similarity in the mythologies, as in the manners, religion, and armor of rude ages and races. Respect for woman was a characteristic of the northern nations of Europe, and not of the Mohammedans. This is an all pervading element in romantic and chivalric fiction. The Northmen believed in giants and dwarfs; in wizzards and fairies; in necromancy and enchantments; as well as the Oriental natives. It is reasonable, therefore, to assume that the immense tide of song which inundated Europe from the eleventh to the sixteenth century, under the form of metrical romances, ballads, and songs, was made up of confluent streams from classical, Oriental, and Gothic mythologies. The Troubadours of Province (from Provincia, by way of eminence), the legitimate successors of the Latin citharcedi, the British bards, the northern scalds, the Saxon gleemen, and English harpers, all contributed in turn to form English minstrelsy and French romance. The Latin tongue ceased to be spoken in France about the ninth century. The new language used in its stead was a mixture of bad Latin and the language of the Franks. As their speech was a medley, so was their poetry. As the songs of chivalry were the most popular compositions in the new or Romance language, they were called Romans, or Romants. They appeared about the eleventh century. The stories of Arthur and his round table are doubtless of British origin. It is evident that the Northmen had the elements of chivalry in them long before that institution became famous, as is shown by the story of Regner Lodbrog, the celebrated warrior and sea king, who landed in Denmark about the year 800. A Swedish Prince had intrusted his beautiful daughter to the care of one of his nobles who cruelly detained her in his castle under pretence of making her his wife. The King made proclamation that whoever would rescue her should have her in marriage. Regner alone achieved her rescue. The name of the traitorous man was Orme, which in the Islandic tongue means a serpent, hence the story that the maiden was guarded by a dragon, which her bold deliverer slew. The history of Richard I. is full of such romantic adventures. Shakespeare, in his play of King John, alludes to an exploit of Richard in slaying a lion, whence the epithet "Coeur de Lion,"