_Father_. Hard and coarse the food they eat, Beans and pottage-herbs their meat; After such a banquet, think, Water is their only drink! _Son_. What's the good of feasts, or bright Cups of Bacchus, when, in spite Of all comforts, at the last This poor flesh to worms is cast? _Father_. Well, then, let thy parent's moan Move thee in thy soul, my son! Mourning for thee made a monk, Dead-alive in darkness sunk. _Son_. They who father, mother love, And their God neglect, will prove That they are in error found When the judgment trump shall sound. _Father_. Logic! would thou ne'er hadst been Known on earth for mortal teen! Many a clerk thou mak'st to roam Wretched, exiled from his home.-- Never more thine eyes, my son, Shall behold thy darling one, Him, that little clerk so fair, N., thy friend beyond compare! _Son_. Oh, alas! unhappy me! What to do I cannot see; Wandering lost in exile so, Without guide or light I go!-- Dry your tears, my father dear, Haply there is better cheer; Now my mind on change is set, I'll not be a monk, not yet. XIX. The order adopted in this essay brings us now to drinking-songs. Next to spring and love, our students set their affections principally on the tavern and the winebowl. In the poems on the Order we have seen how large a space in their vagrant lives was occupied by the tavern and its jovial company of topers and gamesters. It was there that-- "Some are gaming, some are drinking, Some are living without thinking; And of those who make the racket, Some are stripped of coat and jacket; Some get clothes of finer feather, Some are cleaned out altogether; No one there dreads death's invasion, But all drink in emulation." The song from which I have extracted this stanza contains a parody of S. Thomas Aquinas' hymn on the Eucharist.[33] To translate it seemed to me impossible; but I will cite the following stanza, which may be compared with stanzas ix. and x. of _Lauda Sion_:-- "Bibit hera, bibit herus, Bibit miles, bibit clerus, Bibit ille, bibit illa, Bibit servus cum ancilla, Bibit velox, bibit piger, Bibit albus, bibit niger, Bibit constans, bibit vagus, Bibit rudis, bibit magus." Several of the best anacreontics of the period are even more distinctly parodies. The following panegyric of wine, for example, is modelled upon a hymn to the Virgin:-- FOOTNOTES: [Footnote 33: _In Taberna, Carm. Bur_., p. 235.] A SEQUENCE IN PRAISE OF WINE. No. 45. Wine the good and bland, thou blessing Of the good, the bad's distressing, Sweet of taste by all confessing, Hail, thou world's felicity! Hail thy hue, life's gloom dispelling; Hail thy taste, all tastes excelling; By thy power, in this thy dwelling Deign to make us drunk with thee!