And here my remarks on the _canzo_ and on the general aspects of Provençal literature must end. Of the incompleteness of the sketch in more than one respect I am fully conscious. But I hope that the reader may be able to form some adequate view of the intellectual and moral conditions of which the poetry of the troubadours is the embodiment. To blur this outline with further detail would be contrary to the purpose of this book, which, I repeat it, is not a scientific treatise aiming at exhaustiveness, but rather a first attempt to attract the English reader towards a subject which deserves so much and has had so little of his attention. The safest, perhaps the only, method of gaining this end is the biographical. In the biographies of some of the principal troubadours I therefore have embodied what further information of the life and work of these poets I desired to give on the present occasion. Guillem de Cabestanh will be the representative of the love-song proper. Peire Vidal combines the satiric and the lyrical gifts. Bertran de Born represents the warlike or political _sirventes_; the Monk of Montaudon is the master of personal and literary satire, while Peire Cardinal’s pessimism and severe morality loom in cloudy distance above the gay throng. The crusade against the Albigeois heretics, with its baneful consequences for Provençal literature, is treated in continuous chapters, and a separate niche of fame is gallantly assigned to the lady troubadours. Other questions connected with the subject are incidentally treated. _PART II._ BIOGRAPHICAL CHAPTER XV. GUILLEM DE CABESTANH. Petrarch, in the fourth chapter of his ‘Trionfo d’Amore,’ in speaking of the love-poets of various nations, mentions the name of ‘William, who, by his song, shortened the flower of his days.’ Quel Guglielmo, Che per cantar ha’l fior dei suoi dì scemo! This William is Guillem de Cabestanh the troubadour, and it is his story that I propose to tell the reader, following as closely as possible the quaint old biography contained in a Provençal manuscript of the Laurentian Library in Florence. ‘Sir Raimon of Rossilho,’ the old manuscript begins, ‘was a mighty baron, as you are well aware, and had for his wife the Lady Margarida, the most beautiful lady, as you know, of that time, and the most prized for all that is praiseworthy, and noble, and courteous. It so happened that Guillem de Cabestanh, the son of a poor knight of Castle Cabestanh, came to the court of Sir Raimon de Rossilho, offering to remain with him as his servant (_vaslez de sa cort_). Sir Raimon, who found him to be of fair and good countenance, bade him welcome, and Guillem remained with him, and so gentle was his demeanour, that young and old loved him well. And so much did he advance in favour that Sir Raimon wished him to be page to Lady Margarida his wife; and so it was done.