imaginary opponent of the preacher’s argument is made to say that after all it is ‘lesse yvels that thei have thyre recreaceon by pleyinge of myraclis than bi pleyinge of other japis’; and again that ‘to pley in rebaudye’ is worse than ‘to pley in myriclis[322].’ Now, there is of course no necessary dramatic connotation either in the word ‘pley’ or in the word ‘japis,’ which, like ‘bourde’ or ‘gab’ is frequently used of any kind of rowdy merriment, or of the lower types of minstrelsy in general[323]. But on the other hand the whole tone of the passage seems to draw a very close parallel between the ‘japis’ and the undeniably dramatic ‘myriclis,’ and to imply something in the former a little beyond the mere recitation, even with the help of impersonation, of a solitary mime. Such rude farces or ‘japis’ as we are considering, if they formed part of the travelling equipment of the humbler mimes, could only get into literature by an accident; in the event, that is to say, of some minstrel of a higher class taking it into his head to experiment in the form or to adapt it to the purposes of his own art. And this is precisely what appears to have happened. A very natural use of the farce would be in the _parade_ or preliminary patter, merely about himself and his proficiency, which at all times has served the itinerant entertainer as a means whereby to attract his audiences. And just as the very similar _boniment_ or patter of the mountebank charlatan at a fair became the model for Rutebeuf’s _Dit de l’Erberie_, so the _parade_ may be traced as the underlying motive of other _dits_ or _fabliaux_. The _Deus Bordeors Ribauz_ is itself little other than a glorified _parade_, and another, very slightly disguised, may be found in the discomfiture of the king by the characteristic repartees of the wandering minstrel in _Le Roi d’Angleterre et le Jougleur d’Ely_[324]. The _parade_, also, seems to be the origin of a certain familiar type of dramatic prologue in which the author or the presenters of a play appear in their own persons. The earliest example of this is perhaps that enigmatic _Terentius et Delusor_ piece which some have thought to point to a representation of Terence somewhere in the dark ages between the seventh and the eleventh century[325]. And there is a later one in the _Jeu du Pèlerin_ which was written about 1288 to precede Adan de la Hale’s _Jeu de Robin et Marion_.