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JASMIN, THE BARBER POET.*

larger than nature; so when we look back into the past, things become magnified, and we involuntarily exaggerate their di

LAS PAPILLOTAS! Such is the title of the two volumes of poetry we have before us—a title which would be singular indeed, if it were not accounted for by the pro-mensions. It is thus in the present case; fession of the author. Jasmin is, indeed, but yet we think it may be said, that a coiffeur, and performs the menial offices among the ancients, as well as during the of his profession with all the accuracy of middle ages, poetry was more widely a Figaro; but when his work is done, he diffused, and had a more direct and does not, like so many of the brotherhood, powerful influence on the destinies of spend his time in laying in a stock of mankind, than it has in modern times. scandal and gossip, which he may retail The distance which separated the poet the next morning, when standing behind from those who listened to his verses, was the chair of some fair lady, whose chief then less great. Between them there delight it often is, to listen to such stories. seemed to be established an electric chain. No! Jasmin, when he has laid aside his He often borrowed from the people razors and his curling-tongs, devotes to images, which he returned, after having the Muses his hours of leisure. This con- given to them a new lustre, a new brilltrast between the vulgar occupation of iancy, as the glass refracts the rays of the poet of Agen, and the truly beauti- the sun with increased intensity. The ful poetry we find in his works, is par- earlier Greek bards went from place to ticularly striking, in an age when poetry place reciting their verses, until they beseems to have sought a refuge in the came indelibly engraved in the hearts of higher classes of society, and to have their hearers. In the middle ages, the become rather the passetems of the man minstrel, or the troubadour, was the favorof fortune than the conscientious expresite of all classes. In the castle of the sion of a popular feeling. The class of feudal baron, he would arouse the ardent poets to which Jasmin belongs is, at pres- and chivalrous spirit of the guests assement, very limited. He is essentially a bled around the festive board, by the recital popular poet. Sprung from the lower of the noble exploits of Arthur and his orders of society, an artisan himself, he barons, or the valor of those devoted has, in all his poetic effusions, addressed Christians, who crossed the seas to rescue himself to the multitude, not to the select the sepulchre of their Saviour from an infew. In former times it was not uncom- fidel foe; or else he would bewail, in strains mon to find a poet thus devoted to the so pathetic, the untimely fate of some fair entertainment and to the instruction of the maiden, that every eye would be moistencrowd. Judging of past ages, by means ed with tears of pity and compassion. But of that knowledge of general facts which it was not alone in the mansions of the history affords-for history deigns not to great, that the voice of the poet was heard. descend into the details of every private The peasant, too, would lend an ear to life-we almost fancy that there was a his songs, and himself repeat them, to time when poetry circulated in the world, beguile the weary hours of labor; and, as freely as the air we breathe,--when alas! how weary must those hours have every man was a poet, if not to create, at been, when he knew that it was not he least to understand and to feel. When who was to enjoy the fruits of this labor, the atmosphere is full of mists and va- but his tyrannical master. How different is pors, objects seen at a distance appear the occupation of the poet in our own times!

Las Papillotas de JASMIN COIFFEUR, Membre de la Societat de Sciencos et Arts d'Agen. Agen: 1835, 1842. 2 vols. 8vo.

Shut up in the narrow confines of a dense- | flowers; at the foot of the glaciers, she places verdant meadows and genial springs, as if to show that, even when she seems to have become extinct, she can, by the secret forces of which she is the mistress, arise with renovated vigor. Thus in ages of comparative barbarity, she often unexpectedly bursts forth with astonishing force and brilliancy; and in ages when civilization seems to have reached so high a pinnacle, as to leave nothing more for her to do, she still asserts her power, and shows that she is greater than civilization. She is not particular either about the garb in which genius is clothed. She often spurns the glare of pure and elegant form, and pours her richest gifts into a recipient of more homely shape and material. High intellectual culture is not always the necessary companion of genius. It is not alone by the contemplation and study of masterpieces, that the poet is enabled to produce works of which he may say, with the great Roman poet,

ly populated city, or at best, inhabiting
some country-seat, in which he is fortunate
indeed, if, at every hour of the day, the
shrill whistle of a railroad train does not
break in upon his meditations, the only
means he possesses of acting on his fel-
low-men, is the press-a powerful engine
indeed, but how inferior, when the heart
is to be touched, to the varied tones of
the poet's voice when he recites his own
verses. The poet, now, is the invisible be-
ing who sets the puppets on the stage in
motion; in former days he was himself the
actor. We may
indeed be touched by the
thoughts which he expresses, for there is
a secret harmony between different minds,
which enables them to communicate with-
out any material intermediary; but still,
we think that the poet, who addressed
himself directly to the public, could more
easily awaken deep emotions in the breast
of his hearers. Let us not, however, be
misapprehended. We would not be un-
derstood to express a regret for the past.
This is but a simple statement of facts.
We belong not to that class of worship-
pers of all that is gone by, who, in their
admiration for what no longer exists, for-
get the beauties and the blessings of the
present hour. The progress of civiliza-
tion modifies everything. Poetry, in an
age of material improvement, and of sci-
entific discovery, cannot be the same as in
an age when love and war seemed alone
to reign in the world. But it may still,
it does still exist, although modified in its
manifestation. At a period of high intel-
lectual culture, poetry must, of course,
partake in some degree of the philoso-
phical spirit of the times. Happy then,
when it does not take the form of the
stately and almost supernatural indiffer-
ence of a Goethe, or the impassioned
skepticism of a Byron! But even in these
ages of improved civilization, the simple
voice of pure and natural poetry is still
at times heard. In an age of political and
social reform, like our own, when all the
idols of the past are falling, one by one,
to the ground, there are still some poets,
whose poetry flows on in a calm and
tranquil stream, and fills the soul with
nought but pure and healthful instructions.
Nature delights in these contrasts. In a
barren soil, she, at times, brings forth

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Exegi monumentum aere perennius."

Imitation is useless. The poet may, it is true, borrow from others, but even that which he borrows must be newcreated within him, if it is to go forth in a poetic form. He must surround himself by that spiritual solitude, in which the voice of the world may yet be heard, but in which it only reaches him in a purer and more hallowed tone. Such a poet may well be found in the lower ranks of society. There is, indeed, a youthful force and vigor of intellect in those whose faculties have not been wasted on too vast a number of objects. Their thoughts are concentrated on some few great points. Unincumbered by the immense mass of knowledge which ages have accumulated, they can, when genius lends them wings, take the most bold and lofty flights. Such a child of nature is Jasmin, the barber poet.

Jaques Jasmin, or Jaqueon Jansemin, (as he is called in his native patois,) was born in the year 1787 or 1788 at Agen. His father was a tailor, who, although he did not know how to write, composed almost all the principal couplets which were sung in the popular festivities of the neighboring country. Jaques' father and mother were both poor, but he was as happy as a prince

when he was a child, for he had not yet learnt the meaning of those two wordsrich and poor. Until the age of ten, he spent almost all his time in the open air playing with his little companions or cutting wood. In the long winter evenings, he would sit at the family fireside on his grandfather's knee and listen to those wonderful stories which we all have heard as children, but which in the child of genius may be said to be the first cause which develops the poetic inspiration with which he is endowed. But these happy days could not last. One day, as he was playing in the street, he saw his grandfather taken to the hospital. "Why have you left us? Where are you going?" were the boy's questions at this melancholy sight." To the hospital," was the reply; "it is there that the Jansemins must die.' Five days afterwards the old man was no more. From that time Jasmin knew how poor he was. How bitter was this experience to him! He felt no longer any interest in his childish pastimes. As he has himself beautifully expressed it, if anything drew from him a smile, it was but like the pale rays of the sun on a rainy day. One morning, however, he saw his mother with a smiling countenance. What then had happened? She had succeeded in gaining admittance for him in a charity school. In six months afterwards he could read; in six months more, he could assist in the celebration of mass; in another six months, he could sing the Cantum ergo, and in two years from the time when he first went to school he was admitted into a seminary. Here, however, he remained but six months. He was expelled from thence on account of a rather suspicious adventure with a peasant girl, and perhaps still more because he had eaten some sweetmeats belonging to the director of the establishment. The despair of his family was great at this unexpected event, for they had been furnished with bread at least once a week from the seminary. They were now without money and without bread! But what will a mother not do for her children! His mother had a ring-her wedding ring: she sold it, and the children had bread once more, at least for a few days. He was now to learn a trade; he became the apprentice of a hair-dresser, and as soon as

he could, opened a shop. His skill as a coiffeur, and, we may add, the charming verses which he had already composed, soon brought him customers. He married, and his wife, who at first objected to his wasting his time in writing poetry, soon urged him to do so when she found that this employment was likely to be profitable. He has since then been able to buy the house in which he lives. The first, perhaps, of his family, he has experienced that feeling of inward satisfaction which the right of possession is so apt to confer, when it has been purchased by the meritorious labors of the hand and the head. He now enjoys that honest mediocrity which seems to be the height of his worldly ambition. Such are the only circumstances of Jasmin's life which we have been able to gather from the poetical autobiography entitled,, " Mons Soubenis." The life of a poet is not always interesting. Not unfrequently, its most striking features are the poetic flowers he has himself strewed on his path.

We have already said that Jasmin was a popular poet. To be this, in the true sense of the word, it is necessary to speak the language of the people. This Jasmin has understood. With the exception of two or three pieces in the collection we have before us, all his poems are written in his native patois. But he not only makes use of this language, he defends it against all attacks as the last distinguishing mark between his countrymen and the inhabitants of the rest of France. Among his poems, there is a reply to the discourse of a Mr. Dumon, member of the Chamber of Deputies, in which that gentleman, after having paid, it is true, a just tribute to the genius of the Gascon poet, said that it was not even desirable that the patois should be maintained. The reply of Jasmin is full of an ardent patriotic spirit, and is a noble defence of his native language.

"The greatest misfortune," he says, "which can befall a man in this world, is to see an aged mother, sick and infirm, stretched out on her bed and given over by the doctors. At her pillow, which we do not leave for an instant, our eye fixed on hers and our hand in her hand, we may for a day revive her languishing spirits; but alas she lives to-day but to die to-morrow! This is not the case, however, with that

enchantress, that musical language, our second mother: learned Frenchmen have sentenced her to death for the last three hundred years, but she still lives; her words still resound. Seasons pass by her, and hundreds of thousands will yet pass.* This language is the language of labor; in the city and in the country, it may be found in every house. It takes man at the cradle and leads him on to the tomb. Oh, such a language is not easily destroyed. . . Relieve us from our sufferings, but leave us our language! We like to sing even in the midst of distress. It seems as if in singing the gall of grief became less bitter. But the honor of the country demands it; we will learn French: it is our language, too; we are Frenchmen. Let the people learn it. They will then have two languages, one for the sansfaçon, the other for making visits."

There is indeed no vestige of its ancient independence, to which a nation clings more eagerly than to its language. It has always been the endeavor of conquerors to destroy the national language of a conquered nation, as the only means of becoming entirely its master. And in truth, what can be more precious to a people, which has lost its independence, than to refer to its days of freedom in the language of its fathers? When once this tie, which binds it to the past, is destroyed, but little remains of its primitive character. The differences between languages are not arbitrary; they are the expression of the individual genius of the nation to whom they belong. And yet there are men, in this age of wild Utopian schemes, who, in order to carry out their ideas of social reform, would wish to leave but one common language to mankind. We say nothing of the practicability of such a projeci,-which

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L'on pu grand pèssomen que truque l'homme, aci,
Acò quand nostro may, bíeillo, feblo, desfèyto,
S'arremozo tonto, et s'allièyto,
Conndannado pel medici.

A soun triste cabès que jamay l'on non quitto,
L'èl sur son él et la ma dins sa ma,
Ponden-bè, per un jour rebiscoula sa bito;
Mais hélas! anèy bion per s'escanti donma.
N'es pas atal, Monssu, d'aquelo ensourcillayro
D'aquelo longo muzicayro

Nostro segundo may; de saben francimans,

La conndannon à mort dezunpèy tres cens ans ;
Tapla bion saquela; tapla sons mots brounzinon;
Ches elo, las sazons passon, sonen, tindinen;
Et cent-milo-milès enquèro y passaren,
Sounaran, et tindinaran.

could not even be executed by the means which the tyrannical government of a half civilized country employs to extirpate the language of the unfortunate Poles,-but the very idea is monstrous in itself. Those barbarians, who poured into Europe at the downfall of the Roman empire, have been accused of vandalism because they destroyed the monuments of art which they found on their road. But what was their vandalism, when compared with that of these modern innovators? To destroy all the different dialects of the world to make room for one common language, is not only to destroy all the master-pieces of the past, but to cut in the blossom all future literature. Instead of the beautiful and varied forms, which human thought now assumes according to the language in which it is expressed, we should have

but one stereotyped, monotonous and uniform literature, which would itself soon die for want of any impulse or stimulus from without. Fortunately, however, there is nothing to be feared on this ground. You may persecute a popular dialect and endeavor to stifle it in its growth, it will still come forth, even as the wild flower at times springs up in the cultivated soil. Wales has been for centuries subject to England, and Brittany to France, and yet they have maintained their original dialect. Even at this day the Welshman and the peasant of la Balle Bretagne understand each other better than they would understand those whom they call their countrymen. And the Gascon patois, against which innumerable regulations have been made, which is forbidden to be spoken in the schools of Gascony, can still make itself heard through the voice of Jasmin. We can say of his maternal dialect, notwithstanding the persecutions to which it has been subjected, what Galileo said of the earth: E pur si muove.

The two finest poems of Jasmin are unquestionably, "L'Abuglo de CastelCueille," (The Blind Girl of Castel-Cueillé,) and Françonneto.* The first is the touching story of a poor blind orphan. The first canto opens with the description of the preparations for a country wedding. At the foot of that high mountain where

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The first of these two poems has been translated into English verse by Lady Georgina Fullerton.

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stands Castel-Cueillé, at the season when the fruit begins to ripen on the trees, this song was heard on a Wednesday the eve of St. Joseph's day. The paths should bear flowers, so lovely a bride is about to go forth; they should bear flowers, they should bear fruits, so lovely a bride is about to pass." The bride and Baptiste, her intended, are going, according to the custom of the country, to gather branches of laurel to scatter before the door of the church and before the houses of the guests. But the bridegroom is silent; he speaks not to Angèle; he caresses her not. On seeing them so cold, so indifferent, you would think they were great folks!" The sadness of Baptiste is not, however, without a cause. His affections are elsewhere engaged. At the foot of the hill lives the young and tender Margaret, the prettiest girl in the village. Baptiste was her lover, they were to have been married, but alas! Margaret has lost her sight after a severe illness, and Baptiste, who has just returned to the village, is, in order to fulfil the wishes of his father, about to marry Angèle, thinking all the while of Margaret. Meanwhile nothing but merriment and mirth are to be heard in the fields, until Jeanne the old fortune-teller appears. She examines the hand of the bride, and exclaims: God grant, giddy Angèle, that in marrying the unfaithful Baptiste thou mayest not cause a grave to be opened to-morrow." This sinister prediction interrupts for a moment the gaiety of the scene, but the clear voices of the young girls might soon be heard again singing their merry songs. In the young the memory of grief is but short. Baptiste, however, is still sad and silent. The second canto shows us Margaret in her solitary chamber. Baptiste has been three days in the village, and has not yet been to see her. "And yet he knows," she exclaims, "that he is the star, the sun of my night! He knows that I have counted every instant since first he left me! Oh, let him come again and fulfil his promise, that I may keep mine. Without him, what is this world to me? pleasure have I? The light of day shines What for others, but alas, for me it is always night! How dark it is without him! When heis by my side, I think no more of the light of day! The sky is blue, but his eyes are blue; they are a heaven of love for me!

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my head!.... Where is Baptiste! He a heaven full of happiness like that over the ivy which lies drooping on the ground, hears me no longer, when I call him! Like I need some support! But who knows? perhaps he has abandoned me! what a thought! They must bury me then! Alas, But I will banish it from me! Baptiste will return! Oh, he will return! I have nothing to fear! He swore it in the name of the Saviour! He could not come so soon! He is weary, sick perhaps. He intends perchance to surprise me. But I hear somebody! Now then is an end to all my sufferings! My heart does not deceive me! there he is!" The door opens-but BapIt is he! tiste does not appear; her little brother Paul enters, saying: "The bride has just passed! I have seen her. Say, sister, why were we not invited? alone of all her friends we are not there." There is in this scene a touch of nature which many poets would perhaps have scorned to delineate, cry of Margaret, on the ground that it was too trivial. The not," when she is all the while mistaken, My heart deceives me is admirable. Her heart is so full of hope and confidence that she naturally takes the first sound she hears to be that of the footsteps of her beloved. How true and how beautiful! In the heart of woman there are such treasures of constancy and devoest, the most unimportant circumstance tion, that she is feelingly alive to the smallwhich can still make her doubt the infidelity of the one she loves. Alas! what a fathomless depth of despair there must be in her heart when she no longer can doubt; when she must believe.

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and discovers that Baptiste is the brideMargaret, meanwhile questions the child groom. Jeanne, the sorceress, comes in and endeavors to console the young girl, as if there were any consolation for such him too well," she says; "pray God that sorrows but time, or death. 66 You love you may not love him so much." "The but it is no sin; may he not yet be mine?" more I pray God, the more I love him, this silence, but she affects to appear conJeanne replies not. Margaret understands tented, and the old woman leaves her, bethird and last canto opens on the followlieving that she is still undeceived. The ing morning-the morning of the day on which the wedding is to be celebrated.

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