Sia vi per gastigamento Questa figura di morte, E pensa vie di fare forte Tu via di salvamento.

Opposite to the figure of Death is that of a man dressed like a tradesman or merchant, who throws a bag of money on a table, and speaks thus:

Tutti ti volio dare Se mi lasci scampare.

To which Death answers:

Se mi potesti dare Quanto si pote dimandare Non te pote scampare la morte Se te viene la sorte.[77]

It can hardly be supposed that this subject was not known in Spain, though nothing relating to it seems to have been recorded, if we except the poem that has been mentioned in p. 25, but no Spanish painting has been specified that can be called a regular Macaber Dance. There are grounds, however, for believing that there was such a painting in the cathedral of Burgos, as a gentleman known to the author saw there the remains of a skeleton figure on a whitewashed wall.

CHAPTER IV.

_Macaber Dance in England.--St. Paul's.--Salisbury.--Wortley Hall.--Hexham.--Croydon.--Tower of London.--Lines in Pierce Plowman's Vision supposed to refer to it._

We are next to examine this subject in relation to its existence in our own country. On the authority of the work ascribed to Walter de Mapes, already noticed in p. 24, it is not unreasonable to infer that paintings of the Macaber Dance were coeval with that writer, though no specimens of it that now remain will warrant the conclusion. We know that it existed at Old Saint Paul's. Stowe informs us that there was a great cloister on the north side of the church, environing a plot of ground, of old time called Pardon church-yard. He then states, that "about this _cloyster_ was artificially and richly painted the Dance of Machabray, or Dance of Death, commonly called the Dance of Paul's: the like whereof was painted about St. Innocent's cloyster at Paris: the meters or poesie of this dance were translated out of French into English, by John Lidgate, Monke of Bury, the picture of Death leading all estates; at the dispence of Jenken Carpenter in the reigne of Henry the Sixt."[78] Lydgate's verses were first printed at the end of Tottell's edition of the translation of his Fall of Princes, from Boccaccio, 1554, folio, and afterwards, in Sir W. Dugdale's History of St. Paul's cathedral.[79] In another place Stowe records that "on the 10th April, 1549, the cloister of St. Paul's church, called Pardon church-yard, with the Dance of Death, commonly called the Dance of Paul's, about the same cloister, costly and cunningly wrought, and the chappel in the midst of the same church-yard, were all begun to be pulled down."[80]

This spoliation was made by the Protector Somerset, in order to obtain materials for building his palace in the Strand.[81]

The single figure that remained in the Hungerford chapel at Salisbury cathedral, previously to its demolition, was formerly known by the title of "Death and the Young Man," and was, undoubtedly, a portion of the Macaber Dance, as there was close to it another compartment belonging to the same subject. In 1748, a print of these figures was published, accompanied with the following inscription, which differs from that in Lydgate. The young man says:

Alasse Dethe alasse a blesful thyng thou were Yf thou woldyst spare us yn ouwre lustynesse.

And cum to wretches that bethe of hevy chere Whene thay ye clepe to slake their dystresse But owte alasse thyne own sely selfwyldnesse Crewelly werneth me that seygh wayle and wepe To close there then that after ye doth clepe.

Death answers:

Grosless galante in all thy luste and pryde Remembyr that thou schalle onys dye Deth schall fro thy body thy sowle devyde Thou mayst him not escape certaynly To the dede bodyes cast down thyne ye Beholde thayme well consydere and see For such as thay ar such shalt thou be.

This painting was made about the year 1460, and from the remaining specimen its destruction is extremely to be regretted, as, judging from that of the young gallant, the dresses of the time would be correctly exhibited.

In the chapel at Wortley Hall, in Gloucestershire, there was inscribed, and most likely painted, "an history and Daunce of Deathe of all estatts and degrees." This inscribed history was the same as Lydgate's, with some additional characters.[82] From a manuscript note by John Stowe, in his copy of Leland's Itinerary, it appears that there was a Dance of Death in the church of Stratford upon Avon: and the conjecture that Shakespeare, in a passage in Measure for Measure, might have remembered it, will not, perhaps, be deemed very extravagant. He there alludes to Death and the fool, a subject always introduced into the paintings in question.[83]

On the upper part of the great screen which closes the entrance to the choir of the church at Hexham, in Northumberland, are the painted remains of a Dance of Death.[84] These consist of the figures of a pope, a cardinal, and a king, which were copied by the ingenious John Carter, of well-deserved antiquarian memory.

Vestiges of a Macaber Dance were not long since to be traced on the walls of the hall of the Archiepiscopal palace at Croydon, but so much obscured by time and neglect that no particular compartment could be ascertained.

The tapestries that decorated the walls of palaces, and other dwelling places, were sometimes applied in extension of this moral subject. In the tower of London, the original and most ancient seat of our monarchs, there was some tapestry with the Macaber Dance.[85]

The following lines in that admirable satire, the Vision of Pierce Plowman, written about the year 1350, have evidently an allusion to the Dance, unless they might be thought to apply rather to the celebrated triumph of Death by Petrarch, of which some very early paintings, and many engravings, still exist; or they may even refer to some of the ancient representations of the infernal regions that follow Death on the Pale horse of the Revelations, and in which is seen a grotesque intermixture of all classes of people.[86]

Death came driving after, and all to dust pashed Kynges and Kaysers, Knightes and Popes, Learned and lewde: he ne let no man stande That he hitte even, he never stode after.

Many a lovely ladie and lemmans of knightes Swouned and swelted for sorrowe of Deathes dyntes.

It is probable that many cathedrals and other edifices, civil as well as ecclesiastical, in France, Germany, England, and probably other European countries, were ornamented with paintings and sculpture of this extremely popular subject.

CHAPTER V.

_List of editions of the Macaber Dance.--Printed Horae that contain it.--Manuscript Horae.--Other Manuscripts in which it occurs.--Various articles with letter-press, not being single prints, but connected with it._

It remains only, so far as regards the Macaber Dance, to present the reader with a list of the several printed editions of that celebrated work, and which, with many corrections and additions, has been chiefly extracted from M. Peignot's "Recherches historiques et litteraires sur les Danses des Morts," Paris et Dijon, 1826, 8vo.

The article that should stand at the head of this list, if any reliance could be had on a supposed date, is the German edition, intitled, "Der Dotendantz mit figuren. Clage und Antwort Schon von allen staten der welt," small folio. This is mentioned in Braun Notitia de libris in Bibliotheca Monasterii ad SS. Udalricum et Afram Augustae, vol. ii. 62. The learned librarian expresses his doubts as to the date, which he supposes may be between 1480 and 1500. He rejects a marginal note by the illuminator of the letters, indicating the date of 1459. Every page of this volume is divided into two columns, and accompanied with German verses, which may be either the original text, or a translation from the French verses in some early edition of the Macaber Dance in that language.

It consists of twenty-two leaves, with wood-cuts of the Pope, Cardinal, Bishop, Abbot, &c. &c. accompanied by figures of Death.

1. "La Danse Macabre imprimee par ung nomme Guy Marchand, &c. Paris, 1485," small folio. Mons. Champollion Figeac has given a very minute description of this extremely rare, and perhaps unique, volume, the only known copy of which is in the public library of Grenoble. This account is to be found in Millin's Magazin Encyclopedique, 1811, vol. vi. p. 355, and thence by M. Peignot, in his Recherches, &c.

2. "Ce present livre est appelle Miroer salutaire pour toutes gens, et de tous estatz, et est de grant utilite et recreation pour pleuseurs ensegnemens tant en Latin comme en Francoys lesquels il contient ainsi compose pour ceulx qui desirent acquerir leur salut: et qui le voudront avoir. La Danse Macabre nouvelle." At the end, "Cy finit la Danse Macabre hystoriee augmentee de pleuseurs nouveaux parsonnages (six) et beaux dis.

et les trois mors et trois vif ensemble. Nouvellement ainsi composee et imprimee par Guyot Marchant demorant a Paris au grant hostel du college de Navarre en champ Gaillart lan de grace, 1486, le septieme jour de juing."

A small folio of fifteen leaves, or thirty pages, twenty-four of which belong to the Danse Macabre, and six to the Trois morts et les trois vifs.

On the authority of the above expression, "composee," and also on that of La Croix du Maine, Marchant has been made the author as well as the printer of the work; but M. De la Monnoye is not of that opinion, nor indeed is there any other metrical composition by this printer known to exist.

3. "La Danse Macabre des femmes, &c. Paris, par Guyot Marchant, 1486, le septieme jour de Juillet," small folio, of fifteen leaves only. This is the first edition of the Macaber Dance of females; and though thirty-two of them are described, the Queen and Duchess only are engraved. See No. 6 for the rest. This and the preceding edition are also particularly described by Messrs. Champollion Figeac and Peignot.

4. "Chorea ab eximio Macabro versibus Alemanicis edita, et a Petro Desrey emendata. Parisiis per magistrum Guidonem Mercatorem pro Godeffrido de Marnef. 1490," folio. Papillon thought the cuts were in the manner of the French artist Jollat, but without foundation, for they are much superior to any work by that artist, and of considerable merit.

5. "La nouvelle Danse Macabre des hommes dicte miroer salutaire de toutes gens et de touts etats, &c. Paris, Guyot Marchant. 1490." folio.

6. "La Danse Macabre des femmes, toute hystoriee et augmentee de nouveaulx personnages, &c. Paris, Guyot Marchant, le 2 Mai, 1491," folio. This edition, the second of the Dance of females, has all the cuts with other additions. The list of the figures is in Peignot, but with some doubts on the accuracy of his description.

7. An edition in the Low German dialect was printed at Lubeck, 1496, according to Vonder Hagen in his Deutschen Poesie, p. 459, who likewise mentions a Low German edition in prose, at the beginning of the 15th (he must mean 16th) century. He adds, that he has copied one page with cuts from _Kindeling's Remains_, but he does not say in what work.

8. "La grant Danse Macabre des hommes et des femmes hystorice et augmentee de beaulx dits en Latin, &c. &c. Le tout compose en ryme Francoise et accompagne de figures. Lyon, le xviii jour de Fevrier, l'an 1499," folio.

This is supposed to be the first edition that contains both the men and the women.

9. There is a very singular work, intitled "Icy est le compost et kalendrier des _Bergeres_, &c. Imprime a Paris en lostel de beauregart en la rue Cloppin a lenseigne du roy Prestre Jhan. ou quel lieu sont a vendre, ou au lyon dargent en la rue Sainct Jaques." At the end, "Imprime a Paris par Guy Marchant maistre es ars ou lieu susdit. Le xvii iour daoust mil cccciiiixxxix." This extremely rare volume is in the British Museum, and is mentioned by Dr. Dibdin, in vol. ii. p. 530 of his edition of Ames's typographical antiquities, and probably nowhere else. It is embellished with the same fine cuts that relate to the females in the edition of the Macaber Dance, Nos. 4 and 11. The work begins with the words "Deux jeunes Bergeres seulettes," and appears to have been composed for females only, differing very materially from the well-known "Kalendrier des Bergers," though including matter common to both.

10. "Chorea ab eximio Macabro versibus Alemanicis edita et a Petro Desrey Trecacio quodam oratore nuper emendata. Parisiis per Magistrum Guidonem Mercatorem pro Godeffrido Marnef. 15 Octob. 1499," folio, with cuts.

11. "La Danse Macabre, &c. Ant. Verard, no date, but about 1500," small folio. A vellum copy of this rare edition is described by M. Van Praet in his catalogue of vellum books in the royal library at Paris. A copy is in the Archb. Cant. library at Lambeth.

12. "La Danse Macabre, &c. Ant. Verard, no date, but about 1500," folio.

Some variations from No. 9 are pointed out by M. Van Praet. This magnificent volume on vellum, and bound in velvet, came from the library at Blois. It is a very large and thin folio, consisting of three or four leaves only, printed on pasteboard, with four pages or compartments on each leaf. The cuts are illuminated in the usual manner of Verard's books.

In the beginning it is marked "Marolles, No. 1601." It is probably imperfect, the fool not being among the figures, and all the females are wanting, though, perhaps, not originally in this edition. It is in the royal library at Paris, where there is another copy of the work printed by Verard, with coloured prints, but differing materially from the other in the press-work. It is a common-sized folio, and was purchased at the sale of the Count Macarthy's books.[87]

13. "La grant Danse Macabre des hommes et des femmes, &c. Imprimee a Troyes par Nicolas Le Rouge demourant en la grant rue a l'enseigne de Venise aupres la belle croix." No date, folio. With very clever wood-cuts, probably the same as in the edition of 1490; and if so, they differ much from the manner of Jollat, and have not his well-known mark.

14. "La grant Danse Macabre des hommes et des femmes, &c. Rouen, Guillaume de la Mare." No date, 4to. with cuts, and in the Roman letter.

15. "La grande Danse Macabre des hommes et des femmes, ou est demonstre tous humains de tous estats estre du bransle de la Mort. Lyon, Olivier Arnoulet." No date, 4to.

16. "La grant Danse Macabre des hommes et des femmes, &c. Lyon, Nourry, 1501," 4to. cuts.