Into the twelve Cantos of his poem Mistral wove many local customs and personal memories. The _mas_, or farmstead, was modeled from his own home and Ramoun, the wealthy _mas_-dweller, had many traits of his own father. Familiar to him from boyhood had been the festivals and daily tasks here portrayed--the wheat-threshing, the snail-gathering, the fireside meals, the dance of the farandole on the eve of harvest day. In outline it is a simple, somewhat conventional theme. Mireio, daughter of a “farmer-prince,” loved the son of a poor basket-weaver; their romance had days of joy and nights of deep sorrow; the epical climax of the death of Mireio at the Church of the Holy Maries is relieved of its grim tragedy by the words of hope on the lips of the dying heroine. There is a gayety of spirit, a zest of life in the opening lines of Invocation, the poet’s promise to tell the life story of this lovely girl of fifteen and her innocent, ardent passion: I sing the love of a Provençal maid; How through the wheat-fields of La Crau she strayed Following the fate that drew her to the sea. Unknown beyond remote La Crau was she; And I, who tell the rustic tale of her, Would fain be Homer’s humble follower. What though youth’s aureole was her only crown? And never gold she wore, nor damask gown? I’ll build her up a throne out of my song, And hail her queen in our despis’d tongue. Mine be the simple speech that ye all know, Shepherds and farmer-folk of lone La Crau. The romantic episodes are told in the cantos, “The Suitors,” “The Battle,” “The Witch,” “The Saints,” “Death.” Graphic pictures of local customs and setting are suggested by the subtitles “Lotus Farm,” “Leaf-Picking,” “The Cocooning,” and “the Camargue” (or salty marshes of the Rhône). Exquisite songs are interspersed like this in Canto III, “The Cocooning”: If thou the moon wilt be, Sailing in glory, I’ll be the halo white Hovering every night Around and o’er thee. If thou become a flower, Before thou thinkest, I’ll be a streamlet clear, And all the waters bear That thou, love, drinkest. _Mireio_ was made familiar to American readers of the last generation by the translation of Harriet Waters Preston (Boston, 1872). Several excerpts from her verse-interpretations of this and Mistral’s later poems are to be found in _Library of the World’s Best Literature_, edited by Charles Dudley Warner; an excellent sketch of the poet is found here. With unique, virile words George Meredith has rendered into verse some stanzas from Canto X, “The Mares of Camargue”:[17] A hundred mares, all white! their manes Like mace-reed of the marshy plains Thick-tufted, wavy, free o’ the shears: And when the fiery squadron rears Bursting at speed, each mane appears Even as the white scarf of a fay Floating upon their necks along the heavens away.