A lady says to a falcon:
You happy falcon you! You fly whither you will!
And choose the tree you like in the wood.
I have done the same. I chose a husband For myself, whom my eyes chose.
So "tis fitting for beautiful women.
In winter he complains:
Alas for summer delight! The birds" song has disappeared with the leaves of the lime. Time has changed, the nightingales are dumb.
They have given up their sweet song and the wood has faded from above.
Uhland"s beautiful motive in _Spring Faith_, that light and hope will come back to the oppressed heart with the flowers and the green, is given, though stiffly and dimly, by Heinrich von Veldegge:
I have some delightful news; the flowers are sprouting on the heath, the birds singing in the wood. Where snow lay before, there is now green clover, bedewed in the morning. Who will may enjoy it. No one forces me to, I am not free from cares.
and elsewhere:
At the time when flowers and gra.s.s come to us, all that made my heart sad will be made good again.
The loss of the beauty of summer makes him sad:
Since the bright sunlight has changed to cold, and the little birds have left off singing their song, and cold nights have faded the foliage of the lime, my heart is sad.
Ulrich von Guotenberg makes a pretty comparison:
She is my summer joy, she sows flowers and clover In my heart"s meadow, whence I, whate"er befall, Must teem with richer bliss: the light of her eyes Makes me bloom, as the hot sun the dripping trees....
Her fair salute, her mild command Softly inclining, make May rain drop down into my heart.
Heinrich von Rugge laments winter:
The dear nightingale too has forgotten how beautifully she sang ... the birds are mourning everywhere.
and longs for summer:
I always craved blissful days.... I liked to hear the little birds" delightful songs. Winter cannot but be hard and immeasurably long. I should be glad if it would pa.s.s away.
Heinrich von Morungen:
How did you get into my heart?
It must ever be the same with me.
As the noon receives her light from the sun, So the glance of your bright eyes, when you leave me, Sinks into my heart.
He calls his love his light of May, his Easter Day:
She is my sweetheart, a sweet May Bringing delights, a sunshine without cloud.
and says, in promising fidelity: "My steady mind is not like the wind."
Reinmar says:
When winter is over I saw the heath with the red flowers, delightful there....
The long winter is past away; when I saw the green leaves I gave up much of my sorrow.
In a time of trouble he cried:
To me it must always be winter.
So we see that Troubadour references to Nature were drawn from a very limited area. Individual grasp of scenery was entirely lacking, it did not occur to them to seek Nature for her own sake. Their comparisons were monotonous, and their scenes bare, stereotyped arabesques, not woven into the tissue of lyric feeling. Their ruling motives were joy in spring and complaint of winter. Wood, flowers, clover, the bright sun, the moon (once), roses, lilies, and woodland birds, especially the nightingale, served them as elementary or landscape figures.
Wilhelm Grimm says:
The Minnesingers talk often enough of mild May, the nightingale"s song, the dew shining on the flowers of the heath, but always in relation only to their own feelings reflected in them. To indicate sad moods they used faded leaves, silent birds, seed buried in snow.
and Humboldt:
The question, whether contact with Southern Italy, or the Crusades in Asia Minor, Syria, and Palestine, have enriched the art of poetry in Germany with new natural pictures, can only generally be answered by the negative. It is not remarked that the acquaintance with the East gave any new direction to the songs of the minstrels. The Crusaders came little into actual contact with the Saracens; they even lived in a state of great restraint with other nations who fought in the same cause. One of the oldest lyric poets was Friedrich of Hausen. He perished in the army of Barbarossa. His songs contain many views of the Crusades; but they chiefly express religious sentiments on the pain of being separated from his dear friends. He found no occasion to say anything concerning the country or any of those who took part in the wars, as Reinmar the Elder, Rubin, Neidhart, and Ulrich of Lichtenstein. Reinmar came a pilgrim to Syria, as it appears, in the train of Leopold the 6th, Duke of Austria. He complains that the recollections of his country always haunted him, and drew away his thoughts from G.o.d. The date tree has here been mentioned sometimes, when they speak of the palm branches which pious pilgrims bore upon their shoulders. I do not remember that the splendid scenery in Italy has excited the fancy of the minstrels who crossed the Alps. Walther, who had wandered about, had only seen the river Po; but Friedank was at Rome. He merely remarked that gra.s.s grew in the palaces of those who formerly bore sway there.
As a fact, even the greatest Minnesinger, Walther, the master lyrist of the thirteenth century, was not ahead of his contemporaries in this matter. His _Spring Longing_ begins:
Winter has wrought us harm everywhere, Forest and field are dreary and bare Where the sweet voices of summer once were, Yet by the road where I see maiden fair Tossing the ball, the birds" song is there.
and _Spring and Women_:
When flowers through the gra.s.s begin to spring As though to greet with smiles the sun"s bright rays, On some May morning, and in joyous measure, Small songbirds make the dewy forest ring With a sweet chorus of sweet roundelays, Hath life in all its store a purer pleasure?
"Tis half a Paradise on earth.
Yet ask me what I hold of equal worth, And I will tell what better still Ofttimes before hath pleased mine eyes, And, while I see it, ever will.
When a n.o.ble maiden, fair and pure, With raiment rich and tresses deftly braided, Mingles, for pleasure"s sake, in company, High bred, with eyes that, laughingly demure, Glance round at times and make all else seem faded, As, when the sun shines, all the stars must die.
Let May bud forth in all its splendour; What sight so sweet can he engender As with this picture to compare?
Unheeded leave we buds and blooms, And gaze upon the lovely fair!
The grace in this rendering of a familiar motive, and the individuality in the following _Complaint of Winter_, were both unusual at the time:
Erewhile the world shone red and blue And green in wood and upland too, And birdlets sang on the bough.
But now it"s grown grey and lost its glow, And there"s only the croak of the winter crow, Whence--many a ruffled brow!
Elsewhere he says that his lady"s favour turns his winter to spring, and adds:
Cold winter "twas no more for me, Though others felt it bitterly; To me it was mid May.
He has many pictures of Nature and pretty comparisons, but the stereotyped style predominates--heath, flowers, gra.s.s, and nightingales. The pearl of the collection is the naive song which touches sensuous feeling, like the _Song of Solomon_, with the magic light of innocence:
Under the lime on the heath where I sat with my love, There you would find The gra.s.s and the flowers all crushed-- Sweetly the nightingale sang in the vale by the wood.
Tandaradei!
When I came up to the meadow my lover was waiting me there.
Ah! what a greeting I had! Gracious Mary, "tis bliss to me still!
Tandaradei! Did he kiss me, you ask? Look at the red of my lips!
Of sweet flowers of all sorts he made us a bed, I wager who pa.s.ses now smiles at the sight, The roses would still show just where my head lay.
Tandaradei!
But how he caressed me, that any but one Should know that, G.o.d forbid! I were shamed if they did; Only he and I know it, And one little birdie who never will tell.