"Before the king he set him down, And took his harp of merry soun, And, as he full well can, Many merry notes he began. The king beheld, and sat full still, To hear his harping he had good will. When he left off his harping, To him said that rich king, Minstrel, me liketh well thy glee, What thing that thou ask of me Largely I will thee pay; Therefore ask now and asay."[186] A minstrel's lay generally accompanied the wine and spices which concluded the entertainment.[187] Kings and queens had their trains of songsters, and partly from humour and partly from contempt, the head of the band was called king of the minstrels.[188] But men of the first quality, particularly the younger sons and brothers of great houses, followed the profession of minstrelsy, and no wonder, if it be true that they gained the guerdon without having encountered the dangers of war; for many a doughty knight complained that the smiles for which he had perilled himself in the battle field were bestowed upon some idle son of peace at home. The person of a minstrel was sacred, and base and barbarian the man would have been accounted, who did not venerate him that sang the heroic and the tender lay, the magic strains of chivalry, and could shed a romantic lustre over fierce wars and faithful loves. "In days of yore how fortunately fared The minstrel! wandering on from hall to hall, Baronial court or royal; cheered with gifts Munificent, and love, and ladies' praise: Now meeting on his road an armed knight, Now resting with a pilgrim by the side Of a clear brook: beneath an abbey's roof One evening sumptuously lodg'd; the next Humbly, in a religious hospital; Or with some merry outlaws of the wood; Or haply shrouded in a hermit's cell. Him, sleeping or awake, the robber spared; He walk'd--protected from the sword of war By virtue of that sacred instrument His harp, suspended at the traveller's side; His dear companion wheresoe'er he went, Opening from land to land an easy way By melody, and by the charm of verse."[189]