cient to refer you to a learned and very elaborate memoir of a French writer, who has put together all that is requifite to be known on this fubject. Materials are firft laid in, before the architect goes to work; and if the ftructure, I am here raifing out of them, be to your mind, you will not think the worfe of it becaufe I pretend not, myfelf, to have worked in the quarry. In a word, and to drop this magnificent allufion, if I account to you for the rife and genius of Chivalry, it is all you are to expect: for an idea of what Chivalry was in itfelf, you may have recourfe to tom. xx. of the Memoirs of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres.

AND with this explanation I return, at length to my proper bufinefs.

SUPPOSING my idea of Chivalry to be fairly given, the conjecture I advance on the origin and nature of it, you incline to

think, may deserve to be admitted. But you will, perhaps, admit it the more readily, if you reflect, "That there is a re"markable correspondency between the "manners of the old heroic times, as painted by their great romancer, Ho' MER, and those which are represented "to us in books of modern knight"errantry. A fact, of which no good

account, I believe, can be given but by the affistance of another, not lefs certain, "That the political state of Greece, in "the earlier periods of its ftory," was fimi"lar in many respects to that of Europe, "as broken by the feudal fyftem into an "infinite number of petty independent "governments.",

It is not my defign to encroach on the province of the learned perfon [b], to whom I owe this hint, and who hath undertaken, at his leifure, to enlarge upon it. But fome few circumstances of agree [6] See the Memoir, just quoted.

ment

ment between the Heroic and Gothic manhers, fuch as are most obvious and occur to my memory, while I am writing, may be worth putting down, by way of fpecimen only of what may be expected from a profeffed inquiry into this curious fubject.

AND, FIRST, "the military enthusi"afm of the Barons is but of a piece "with the. fanaticifm of the Heroes." Hence the fame particularity of defcription, in the account of battles, wounds, deaths, in the Greek poet, as in the Gothic romancers: hence that perpetual fucceffion of combats and deeds of arms, even to fatiety, in the Iliad: and hence that minute curiofity, in the display of the dreffes, arms, accoutrements of the combatants, which we find fo ftrange, in that poem. The minds of all men being occupied and in a manner poffeffed with warlike images and ideas, were much gratified by the poet's dwelling, on the very slightest VOL. III.

e

circum

circumstances of these things; which now, for want of their prejudices, appear cold and unaffecting to modern readers.

BUT the correfpondency holds in more particular confiderations. For,

2. "WE hear much of Knights-errant "encountering Giants, and quelling Savages, in books of Chivalry.”

THESE Giants were oppreffive feudal Lords; and every Lord was to be met with, like the Giant, in his ftrong hold, or caftle. Their dependants of a lower form, who imitated the violence of their fuperiors, and had not their castles, but their lurking-places, were the Savages of Romance. The greater Lord was called a Giant, for his power; the lefs, a Savage, for his brutality.

ALL this is fhadowed out in the Gothic tales, and fometimes expreffed in plain words.

words. The objects of the Knight's vengeance go indeed by the various names of Giants, Paynims, Saracens, and Savages. But of what family they all are, is clearly feen from the poet's defcription:

What Mifter wight, quoth he, and how far

hence

Is he, that doth to travellers fuch harms? He is, faid he, a man of great defence, Expert in battle, and in deeds of arms;

And more embolden'd by the wicked charms With which his daughter doth him still support; Having great Lordships got and goodly farms Thro' firong oppreffion of his power extort; By which he ftill them holds and keeps with ftrong effort.

And daily he his wrong encreaseth more:
For never wight he lets to pass that way
Over his bridge, albee he rich or poor,

But he him makes his paffage-penny pay. Elfe he doth hold him back or beat away. Thereto he hath a Groom of evil guife,

Whose scalp is bare, that bondage doth bewray, Q2

Which