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Margaret, Queen of Navarre, 1492-1549

"The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. I. (of V.)"

The mark of modernity is on
them, and yet they are so little conscious of it, and so perfectly free
from even the slightest touch of at least its anti-religious influence.
Nobody, not even Hircan, the Grammont of the sixteenth century; not
even Nomerfide, the Miss Notable of her day and society; not even the
haughty lady Ennasuite, who wonders whether common folk can be supposed
to have like passions with us, feels the abundant religious services and
the periods of meditation unconscionable or tiresome.
And so we have here three notes constantly sounding together or in
immediate sequence. There is the passion of that exquisite _rondeau_
of Marot's, which some will have, perhaps not impossibly, to refer to
Margaret herself--
En la baisant m'a dit: "Amy sans blasme,
Ce seul baiser, qui deux bouches embasme,
Les arrhes sont du bien tant espere,"
Ce mot elle a doulcement profere,
Pensant du tout apaiser ma grand flamme.
Mais le mien cour adonc plus elle enflamme,
Car son alaine odorant plus que basme
Souffloit le feu qu'Amour m'a prepare,
En la baisant.


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