_Horn_ (_King Horn_, _Horn-Child and Maiden Rimnilde_, &c.) is somewhat more courtly in its general outlines, and has less of the folk-tale about it; but it also has connections with Denmark, and it turns upon treachery, as indeed do nearly all the romances. Horn, son of a certain King Murray, is, in consequence of a raid of heathen in ships, orphaned and exiled in his childhood across the sea, where he finds an asylum in the house of King Aylmer of Westerness. His love for Aylmer's daughter Rimenhild and hers for him (he is the most beautiful of men), the faithfulness of his friend Athulf (who has to undergo the very trying experience of being made violent love to by Rimenhild under the impression that he is Horn), and the treachery of his friend Fikenild (who nearly succeeds in making the princess his own), defray the chief interest of the story, which is not very long. The good steward Athelbrus also plays a great part, which is noticeable, because the stewards of Romances are generally bad. The rhymed couplets of this poem are composed of shorter lines than those of _Havelok_. They allow themselves the syllabic licence of alliterative verse proper, though there is even less alliteration than in _Havelok_, and they vary from five to eight syllables, though five and six are the commonest. The poem, indeed, in this respect occupies a rather peculiar position. Yet it is all the more valuable as showing yet another phase of the change. The first really charming literature in English has, however, still to be mentioned: and this is to be found in the volume--little more than a pamphlet--edited fifty years ago for the Percy Society (March 1, 1842) by Thomas Wright, under the title of _Specimens of Lyric Poetry composed in England in the Reign of Edward the First_, from MS. 2253 Harl. in the British Museum. The first three poems are in French, of the well-known and by this time far from novel _trouvere_ character, of which those of Thibaut of Champagne are the best specimens. The fourth-- "Middel-erd for mon wes mad," is English, and is interesting as copying not the least intricate of the _trouvere_ measures--an eleven-line stanza of eight sevens or sixes, rhymed _ab, ab, ab, ab, c, b, c_; but moral-religious in tone and much alliterated. The fifth, also English, is anapaestic tetrameter heavily alliterated, and mono-rhymed for eight verses, with the stanza made up to ten by a couplet on another rhyme. It is not very interesting. But with VI. the chorus of sweet sounds begins, and therefore, small as is the room for extract here, it must be given in full:--