Part 3 (1/2)

Now and then a name emerges from the obscure crowd. That, for instance, of ”John Puncteus, a Frenchman, professing physick, with ten in his company,”

licensed ”to exercise the quality of playing, for a year, and to sell his drugs”;[97] or of Madame Le Croy (De La Croix), the notorious fortune-teller,

”Who draws from lines the calculations, Instead of squares for demonstrations,”

and

”Imposes on The credulous deluded town,”[98]

and no doubt carried on the dubious trade of her countrywoman ”la devineresse,” as recorded by Arnoult the engraver. We may fancy Madame La Croix slyly handing the billet-doux to the daughter, under the unsuspecting mother's very eyes.

Lower still we shall reach the criminal cla.s.ses: adventurers, gamblers, robbers, and murderers. If the notorious poisoner, the Marquise de Brinvilliers, stayed in England but a short time in her chequered career, Claude Du Val the highwayman became famous in his adopted country as well for his daring robberies as for his gallantry to ladies:

”So while the ladies viewed his brighter eyes, And smoother polished face, Their gentle hearts, alas! were taken by surprise.”[99]

The _State Trials_ have preserved the name of a French gambler, De La Rue, who in 1696 acted as informer at the trial for high treason of Charnock and his accomplices.

It is difficult to go lower than these infamous men: our inquiry is at end. We shall conclude that if it is an exaggeration to state that the French as a rule learned English in the seventeenth century, it is true that individual instances may be found of Frenchmen learning English, and even speaking and writing it.[100] Though they did not help to spread either English manners or literature in France, they contributed in a most marked manner to make the English familiar with the French language.

FOOTNOTES:

[35] Einstein, _Italian Renaissance in England_, p. 103.

[36] _Guide des Chemins d'Angleterre_, Preface.

[37] Jusserand, _Shakespeare en France_, p. 97.

[38] _Memoires et observations faites par un voyageur en Angleterre_, 1698.

[39] _Adv. and Ref. of Mod. Poetry_, Ep. dedic.

[40] _Bibliotheque choisie_, xxviii., Preface.

[41] ”Monsr Boyd ... has forgott, I believe, most of his English.”--_Original Letters of Locke_, etc., p. 229.

[42] _Description of Britain_, bk. i. (1577).

[43] Jusserand, _Histoire litteraire du peuple anglais_, i. p. 149 n.

[44] _Pantagruel_, iii. ch. xlvii.

[45] _L'honnete homme ou l'art de plaire a la cour._

[46] D'Estrades should be excepted. He knew English, so he was sent to the Hague.

[47] _French Amba.s.sador at the Court of Charles II._

[48] See Chap. III.

[49] Reyher, _Masques_, p. 81 sq.

[50] _Ibid._ p. 79.