Part 43 (2/2)

”I am without wealth or dignity; I am but a simple shepherd but there is none that can surpa.s.s me in affection.

”And methinks, according to my simple ideas, that I prefer my _berret_, old and worn as it is, to the finest ornamented hat that could be given me.

”The riches of the world only bring uneasiness with them, and the finest lord with all his possessions cannot compare to the shepherd who lives content.

”Adieu, tigress-heart! Shepherdess without affection; change, change, if you will, your adorers, never will you find any so true as I have been.”

I here give a metrical version of the same song:

DESPOURRINS.

”La Haut sas las Mountagnes.”

ABOVE, upon the mountains, A shepherd, full of thought, Beneath a beech sat musing On changes time had wrought: He told to ev'ry echo The story of his care, And made the rocks acquainted With love and its despair.

”Oh! light of heart,” he murmur'd, ”Oh! fickle and unkind!

Is this the cold return My tenderness should find?

Is this a fit reward For tenderness like mine?-- Since thou hast sought a sphere Where rank and riches s.h.i.+ne,

”Thou canst not cast a thought Upon my lowly cot; And all our former vows Are in thy pride forgot.

For thee to enter in, My roof is far too low, Thy very flocks disdain With mine to wander now.

”Alas! I have no wealth, No birth, no n.o.ble name, A simple shepherd youth Without a hope or claim; But none of all the train That now thy favours share Can bear, as I have borne, Or with my love compare.

”I'd rather keep my habits, Tho' humble and untaught, Than learn the ways of courts, With dang'rous falsehood fraught; I'd rather wear my bonnet, Tho' rustic, wild, and worn, Than flaunt in stately plumes Of courtiers highly born.

”The riches of the world Bring only care and pain, And n.o.bles great and grand With many a rich domain, Can scarcely half the pleasures, With all their art, secure, That wait upon the shepherd Who lives content and poor.

”Adieu, thou savage heart!

Thou fair one without love: I break the chain that bound us, And thou art free to rove.

But know, when in thy vanity, Thou wanderest alone, No heart like mine will ever Adore as I have done.”

The royal circle of Neuilly has been enlivened sometimes by the sound of the Bearnese minstrelsy; and, on one occasion, listened to a band of mountaineers from Luchon, who undertook, a few years since, a journey through Europe, singing their choruses in all the princ.i.p.al cities. On hearing the above song of Despourrins, the King exclaimed, with his usual ready kindness,--”Your songs alone would be sufficient to make one love your country.”

Several celebrated singers, favourites in the Italian world, were natives of Bearn: one of these, Garat, surnamed ”the musical Proteus,”

was born at Ustaritz. Nothing appeared impossible to this prodigious singer: his voice was splendid and his taste exquisite: his only defect was an inordinate vanity--by no means an uncommon fault in artists of this description. A person on one occasion, thinking to embarra.s.s him, inquired how high in the scale he could go; ”I can mount as high as it pleases me to go,” was his reply. He used frequently to surprise the Parisians by the introduction of Basque and Bearnese airs, whose peculiarity and originality never failed to cause the most lively admiration and enthusiasm; but he did not announce them as mountain songs till he had secured the praise he sought for them, having pa.s.sed them for Italian productions. A similar _ruse_ was practised by Mehul, when he brought out his ”Irato,” which the public was given to imagine was composed by an Italian _maestro_. Its success was very great, and Geoffrey, the editor of a popular paper, in noticing the opera, exclaimed,--”O, if Mehul could compose as well as this, we might be satisfied with him.” When the triumphant composer threw off his incognito, the unlucky critic was not a little mortified. The celebrated singer Jelyotte was from Bearn, and Louis the Fifteenth used to delight in hearing him sing his native melodies: in particular one beginning, ”De cap a tu soy Marion,” one of Despourrins' most spirited pastorals:--

”I am your own, my Marion, You charm me with each gentle art; Even from the first my love was won, Your pretty ways so pleased my heart; If you will not, or if you will, I am compell'd to love you still.

”No joy was ever like my joy, When I behold those smiling eyes, Those graceful airs so soft and coy, For which my heart with fondness dies: And when I seek the charm in vain, I dream the pleasure o'er again.

”Alas! I have no palace gay, My cottage is but small and plain; No gold, nor marble, nor display, No courtly friends nor glitt'ring train; But honest hearts and words of cheer Are there, and store of love sincere.

”Why should we not be quite as blest, Without the wealth the great may own?

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