The Teaching and Cultivation of the French Language in England Part 45

[863] _Pet.i.tion to the High Court of Parliament, in behalf of auncient and authentique Authours, for the universall and perpetuall good of every man_, 1623.

[864] _Essais_, liv. i., ch. xxv.

[865] Cp. _The Brain Breaker's Breaker, or the Apologie of Th. Grantham for his Method of Teaching_, 1644.

[866] _The Examination of Academies, wherein is discussed ... the Matter, Method and Customes of Academick and Scholastick Learning, and the insufficiency thereof discovered and laid open_, 1653, p. 21.

[867] Thus Sir Wm. Petty, in his _Advice to S. Hartlib for the advancement of some particular parts of learning_ (1648), argues that languages should be taught by "incomparably more easy wayes then are now usuall." An anonymous "Lover of his Nation" proposed that children should learn Latin as they do English, by having no other language within their hearing for two years; and similarly with other languages (Watson, _Modern Subjects_, p. 482). Ch. Hoole, teacher at a private grammar school in London, also proposes that Latin should be learnt by speaking and hearing it spoken, and attributes the unsatisfactory knowledge of the language to the too frequent use of English in schools (_New Discoverie of the old art of Teaching Schooll_, 1660). The French teacher Miege suggests that Latin should be taught in special schools, on the same lines as French was taught in the French ones (_French Grammar_, 1678). In 1685 was published _The Way of Teaching the Latin Tongue by use to those that have already learn'd their Mother Tongue_; and in 1669 had appeared a work translated from the French, called _An Examen of the Way of Teaching the Latine Tongue to little children by use alone_. Among other publications of similar import are: _An Essay on Education, showing how Latin, Greek, and other Languages may be learn'd more easily, quickly and perfectly than they commonly are_, 1711; and _An Essay upon the education of youth in Grammar Schools in which the Vulgar Method of Teaching is examined, and a new one proposed for the more easy and speedy training up of Youth, to the knowledge of the Learned Languages ..._, by J. Clarke, Master of the Public Grammar School in Hull (London, 1720).

[868] _Right Teaching of Useful Knowledge to fit scholars for some honest Profession_, London, 1649, p. 186.

[869] Locke, _Some thoughts concerning Education_ (1693), ed. J. W.

Adamson, in _Educational Writings of Locke_, London, 1912, p. 125.

[870] _Op. cit._ p. 127.

[871] "Why does the Learning of Latin and Greek need the rod, when French and Italian need it not?" (_op. cit._ p. 69). And again, "Those who teach any of the modern languages with success never amuse their scholars to make speeches or verses either in French or Italian, their business being language barely and not invention" (_op. cit._ p. 71).

[872] J. Palairet, _New Royal French Grammar_, The Hague, 1738.

[873] Languages, he held, were best learnt by rules of a simple nature, comparison of the points of difference and resemblance between the known and unknown language, and exercises on familiar subjects.

[874] _A compendious way of teaching Ancient and Modern Languages ..._, 2nd edition, London, 1723, pp. 45 _et seq._

[875] He would then learn Italian and Spanish on the same plan.

[876] _An Essay to Revive the Antient Education of Gentlewomen ..._, 1673.

[877] _Essay on Education_, 1711. The case of Queen Elizabeth, who is said to have learnt only one or two Latin rules, is also quoted.

[878] _An Essay on the education of children in the first rudiments of learning, together with a narrative of what knowledge Wm. Wotton, a child of 6 years of age, had attained unto upon the Improvement of those Rudiments in the Latin, Greek and Hebrew Tongues._ Reprinted, London, 1753, p. 38.

[879] _Diary_, July 6, 1679.

[880] _Ibid._, Jan. 27, 1688.

[881] For this purpose he wrote _The True and readie way to learne the Latin Tongue, expressed in an answer to the Question whether the ordinary way of teaching Latin by Rules of Grammar be best_, 1654.

CHAPTER V

THE TOUR IN FRANCE

And now methinks I see a youth advance Ready prepared to make the tour of France.

_Satire against the French_, 1691.

When, in the middle of the seventeenth century, England was torn in twain by civil war and party quarrels, even the Puritans willingly sent their children to be brought up in France. It was at this period that Thomas Grantham, a severe critic of the usual method of teaching Latin in Grammar Schools,[882] wrote this significant pa.s.sage: "Let a boy of seven or eight years of age be sent out of England into France: he shall learn in a twelvemonth or less to write and speak the French tongue readily, although he keep much company with English, read many English books, and write many English letters home, and all this with pleasure and delight." The number of English children in France at this period was considerable.[883] At St. Malo, for instance, when proceedings were taken against the English in the town, the chief victims were the "English boys sent to learn French."[884]

The memoirs of the Verney family afford a detailed picture of one of the numerous families of royalist sympathies, cut off from English public school and university life, and brought up in France. Sir Ralph Verney had taken the side of Parliament in the long struggle, but in 1643 went into voluntary exile in France rather than sign the Covenant. He settled at Blois with his family, and procured French tutors for his boys. Apparently he had some trouble at first, one of the tutors being dismissed "for drinking, lying and seeking to proselytise." Finally the education of the boys was entrusted to the Protestant pastor, M.

Testard, who received foreign pupils. The young students worked hard at Latin and French under the minister's supervision. Testard reported of Edmund, the elder, "Il fait merveille... . Je luy raconte une histoire en francais, il me la rend extempore en Latin."[885] And one day Mme.

Testard found the young John hard at work in bed in the early morning with two books in French and Latin. The children wrote in French to their mother when she was absent in England making valiant and finally successful attempts to get the sequestration taken off Sir Ralph's estate. And when, after her death, Sir Ralph sought to divert his mind by travelling in Italy, Edmund,[886] then aged thirteen, wrote this letter--which shows clearly the dangers of a purely oral method:

Pl.u.s.t a Dieu qu'il vous donnast la pensee de retourner a Blois. Les jours me semblent des annees tant il m'ennuye d'ettre icy comme dans un desert de solitude; car quoy est cequi me peut desormais plaire dans cette ville, comment est ceque cette lumiere de la vie, et cette respiration de l'air me peuvent-elle estre agreeables, puisqu'y ayant perdu cequi m'estoit le plus au Monde et qu'il m'interesse plus q'une seule personne dont je suis prive de l'honneur de sa presence, au reste, graces a Dieu, nous nous porte fort bien et pourcequi et de moy je vous a.s.seure que je ne manqueray jamais a mon devoir, c'espourquoy finissant je demeure et demeureray aternellement,

Votre tres humble et fidel fils,

EDMOND VERNEY.

Sir Ralph had also in his charge two girls, his young cousins, whom their mother had entrusted to him: "Sweet nephew, I have after A long debate with my selfe sent my tow gurles where I shall desier youre care of them, that they may be tought what is fite for them as the reding of the french tong, and to singe, and to dance and to right and to playe of the gittar."[887]

Sir Ralph regarded France as "the fittest place to breed up youth."

[Header: SIR RALPH VERNEY'S VIEWS] "I wish peace in France for my children's sake," he wrote to M. Du Val, a French tutor. After bringing up his own family there, he would have liked to send his grandchildren to France with a sober and discreet governor, rather than to any school in England; but his son Edmund thought the advantage of learning to speak French fluently did not compensate for the loss of English public school life, which he himself had never enjoyed. Sir Ralph soon became a versatile source of information to parents desiring details of the cost of living and education in France. He considered 200 a year a proper allowance for an English youth to be boarded in a good French family, and that homes in which there were children were best, on account of the continual prattle of the young inmates. The families of French pastors were naturally preferred; and as the pastors were in the habit of taking French pupils also,[888] no doubt the young English boys found suitable companions.

The Protestant schools,[889] established wherever possible by the French reformers in the vicinity of their churches, were also in favour with English parents. These schools, in which the subjects usually taught were reading, writing, arithmetic, and the catechism, were for obvious reasons looked on with suspicion by the Government; one by one they were dispersed, especially when the feeling against the Protestants became more acute towards the middle of the seventeenth century. Thus the schools of Rouen were closed in 1640; and shortly afterwards Sir Ralph Verney wrote, in reply to an inquiry about a school, that Rouen is a very unfit place, as no Protestant masters are allowed to keep school there; moreover, living is dear in the town, and the accent of the inhabitants bad. In some cases, when the schools had been closed or converted into Jesuit establishments, the ejected schoolmasters gave private lessons, or received a few _pensionnaires_ in their homes. Even this was forbidden in 1683. And two years later the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes dealt the severest blow of all.

Regarding the Protestant Academies,[890] Sir Ralph sent the following report to his friends in England: "There are divers Universities at Sedan, Saumur, Geneva and other fine places, as I am told at noe unreasonable rate, and not only Protestant schoolmasters, but whole colleges of Protestants."[891] Many young Englishmen were sent to one or other of these towns, either to attend lectures at the Academies, or, more often, to study French and the "exercises" privately, in a Protestant atmosphere. Sir Orlando Bridgman, a friend of Sir Ralph Verney, after letting his son study with two other English boys under a M. Cordell at Blois, intended to send him either to Saumur or Poitiers, then to Paris, and so to the Inns of Court,[892] and Sir Thomas Cotton sent his sons to Saumur to perfect themselves in French.[893] In the middle of the seventeenth century, Sir Joseph Williamson, the future statesman and diplomat of the reign of Charles II., was living at Saumur with several young Englishmen in his care.[894] After graduating at Oxford, he had left England in the capacity of tutor to a young man of quality, possibly one of the sons of the Marquis of Ormonde. At Saumur, Williamson kept a book of notes relating to the studies of his pupils and containing the letters which he wrote to their parents in answer to inquiries concerning their progress. He and his pupils lived _en pension_ in a private house in the town, "with very civil company,"--"the best way to get the language which is much desired." On the whole Williamson's pupils do not seem to have made as rapid progress as either he himself or their parents desired. One anxious father writes to ask Williamson to let his son practise writing French daily; another exhorts his son to devote himself seriously to learning French by reading good authors and conversing. The Academies of Montauban and Sedan, though they never attained a popularity equal to that of Saumur, were not neglected, and attracted many foreign students. The Academy at Montauban was moved to Puy Laurens in 1659, where it remained until its suppression at the time of the Revocation. In 1678 Henry Savile, English amba.s.sador at Paris, informed his brother, Lord Halifax, that there are only two Protestant Universities in France, at Saumur and Puy Laurens, and that of these Saumur is beyond dispute the better.[895] [Header: TRAVELLERS AT FRENCH UNIVERSITIES] From this we see that these two Academies were then the best known;[896] no doubt the rest, which had never been quite so popular, were much enfeebled by the hostile edicts which preceded the Revocation. Lord Halifax at first intended to send his sons to the College at Chastillon. Savile, however, stopped them when they arrived at Paris, as he had heard that the only teaching given at the College was reading, writing, and the catechism--the curriculum of the Protestant schools. In the end the boys were sent with their governor to the Academy at Geneva. On their return to England in 1681, one of them went to complete his education at the University and the other to the academy which was opened that year by the Frenchman M.

Foubert, who had set up as a teacher of the "exercises" in London.

Other travellers spent some time at one of the French Universities. The University of Paris usually counted a considerable number of English among its students, and Clarendon tells us that those who have been there "mingle gracefully in all companies." The Universities of Bordeaux, Poitiers, and Montpellier were also favourite resorts.

Montpellier particularly, with its "gentle salutiferous air," attracted those suffering from the "national complaint."[897] When Will Allestry was there in 1668, he spent the greater part of his time learning French, and what leisure he had he employed in studying the Inst.i.tutions.[898] Orleans, famous for the study of law, was also much patronised. The custom of studying in French Universities, however, did not meet with general approval in England. Sir Balthazar Gerbier p.r.o.nounced it "no less than abusing the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge and the famous free schools of this realme to withdraw from them the sons of n.o.ble families and those that are lovers of vertue."

The same opinion is voiced by Samuel Penton, Master of Exeter Hall, Oxford, who did not omit even the Protestant Academies from his condemnation. "The strangeness of New Faces, Language, Manners and Studies may prove perhaps uneasie, and then their great want of discipline to confine him to Prayers, Exercises and Meals is dangerous: all he will have to do is to keep in touch with a Lecturer, and what is learned from him, most young Gentlemen are so civil as to leave behind them when they return."[899]

The governors who usually accompanied young travellers, especially those of high birth, were not infrequently Frenchmen. We are told that it was a rare sight to see a young English n.o.bleman at a foreign court with a governor of his own nation,[900] though some preferred an English governor, and cautioned travellers against foreign tutors. Samuel Penton warns us that if the young traveller is committed, for cheapness or curiosity, to a foreigner instead of an English governor, "there are some in the world who without a fee will tell you what that is like to come to."[901] One of the English governors, J. Gailhard, who was tutor abroad to several of the n.o.bility and gentry, including the Earl of Huntingdon, Lord Hastings, and Sir Thomas Grosvenor, lays down "a method of travel" which is of special interest, as it is the one which he followed with his own pupils.[902] His view was that, if possible, the traveller should have some knowledge of French before setting out on his travels. The first thing he should do on arriving at Paris is to go to the famous Protestant temple at Charenton, and there give thanks for his safe journey so far--whether he understand French or not. He will do well to make but a short stay at Paris, where his progress will be hindered by the great number of his countrymen there. The best places to reside in are the towns along the valley of the Loire, where there are plenty of good masters to be had. Perhaps Angers is the best. The student is further urged to keep a diary, and talk as much as possible--"with speaking we learn to speak." The masters for the riding and fencing exercises, dancing and music, are to be looked upon as so many additional language teachers. Although "of ten words he could not speak two right, yet let him not be ashamed and discouraged at it: for it is not to be expected he should be a Master before he hath been a scholar." The language master should teach his pupil to read, write and spell correctly, and to speak properly. [Header: GUIDE-BOOKS FOR TRAVELLERS] The material for reading must be carefully chosen; romances, such as those of Scudery, are often dangerous; it is better to use books which give instruction in such subjects as history, morality, and politics. Every evening there should be a repet.i.tion of what has been learnt during the day. Gailhard also draws attention to the necessity of respecting and observing the customs of the places visited: "Here in England, the manner is for the master of the House to go in before a stranger, this would pa.s.s for a great incivility in France; so here the Lady or Mistress of the House uses to sit at the upper end of the Table, which in France is given to Strangers. So if we be many in a company we make no scruple to drink all out of a gla.s.s, or a Tankard, which they are not used to do, and if a servant would offer to give them a gla.s.s before it was washed every time they drink, they would be angry at it.

Here when a man is sneezing we say nothing to him, but there they would look upon't as a want of civility. Again, we in England upon a journey, use to ask one another how we do, but in France they do no such thing--amongst them that question would answer to this, 'what aileth you that you look so ill?'"

The att.i.tude of the French teachers in England towards the foreign tour gradually changed. They no longer saw in it a rival inst.i.tution, depriving them of many of their pupils, but, on the contrary, a means of giving the finis.h.i.+ng touch to the results of their own efforts in England. All strongly advise their pupils to go to France, and most of them add directions for travel in their text-books.[903] Mauger's dialogues include "most exact instructions for travel, very useful and necessary for all gentlemen that intend to travel into France," and Laine's grammar is "enriched with choice dialogues useful for persons of quality that intend to travel into France, leading them as by the hand to the most noted and princ.i.p.al places of the kingdom."

As the tour in France increased in popularity, the directions furnished by French teachers were supplemented by guide-books properly so called; towards the end of the seventeenth century books such as _The Present State of France_ and _The Description of Paris_ were to be had at every bookseller's in London.[904] As early as 1604 Sir Robert Dallington had written his _View of France_, in which he refers to a book called the _French Guide_, which "undertaketh to resemble eche countrie to some other thing, as Bretaigne to a horse-shoe, Picardy to a Neat's toung etc., which are but idle and disproportioned comparisons." Peter Heylyn, chaplain at the Courts of Charles I. and Charles II., was the author of two popular books of this type: _France painted to the Life by a learned and impartial Hand_,[905] and _A Full relation of two Journeys, the one in the mainland of France, the other in some of the adjacent Islands_.[906] Some of these guides are descriptions of the country, others are relations of journeys made there; to the first category belongs _A Description of France in its several governments by J. S.

Gent_ (1692), and to the second, _A Journey to Paris in the year 1698 by Dr. Martin Lister_. Some include advice as to the course of study to be followed. And as Italy was still frequently included in the tour, travellers were sometimes supplied with information regarding that country.[907]

So popular did the tour in France become in the seventeenth century that guide-books for travellers were produced on the spot. The earliest French books of this kind had not been specially designed for the use of foreign visitors; they were as a rule descriptions of the towns and their geographical positions, or notices on their history and antiquities.[908] In time, however, they a.s.sumed a character more particularly adapted to strangers.[909] [Header: ROUTES USUALLY FOLLOWED] One of the best known and most popular was _Le Voyage de France, dresse pour l'instruction et commodite tant des Francais que des etrangers_, first published in 1639. The author, C. de Varennes, gives directions for the study of French. He thinks Oudin's Grammar the most profitable, on account of the manner in which it deals with the chief difficulties of foreigners, and Paris and Orleans the best towns for study. For the rest, the help of a tutor should be enlisted, and the student should converse as much as possible with children, and with persons of learning and ability; he should also read widely, preferably dialogues in familiar style and the latest novels; and write French, for which exercise he will find much help in the _Secretaire de la Cour_ and the _Secretaire a la mode_,[910] collections of letters and "compliments," which, we may say incidentally, enjoyed a popularity greatly exceeding their merit.

The short tour in France grew in popularity as the seventeenth century advanced, and many were content to spend the whole of their sojourn abroad there, without undertaking the longer continental tour. Others went to France to prepare themselves for the longer tour. Naturally the tour in France alone engaged the attention of French teachers. We are told that the cost of a tour of three months need not be more than 50.

"If you take a friend with you 'twill make you miss a thousand opportunities of following your end: you go to get French, and it would be best if you could avoid making an acquaintance with any Englishman there. To converse with their learned men will be beside your purpose too, if you go for so short a time: they talk the worst for conversation and you had rather be with the ladies."[911]

The chief routes which French masters in England advised their pupils to take were those from Dover to Boulogne and from Rye to Dieppe, whence it was usual to proceed through Rouen to Paris.[912] Locke, for instance, landed at Boulogne when on his way to the South of France; thence he made his way to Paris, chiefly on foot.[913] "If Paris be heaven (for the French with their usual justice, extol it above all things on earth)," he writes after a night spent at Poy, "Poy certainly is purgatory on the way to it." His impressions of Tilliard were more favourable: "Good mutton, and a good supper, clean linen of the country, and a pretty girl to lay it (who was an angel compared with the fiends of Poy) made us some amends for the past night's suffering." It was on the same route to Paris that the Norman Claude du Val, afterwards notorious on the English highways, first came into contact with the English as he was journeying to Paris to try his fortune there. At Rouen he met a band of young Englishmen on their way to Paris with their governors, to learn the exercises and to "fit themselves to go a-wooing at their return home; who were infinitely ambitious of his company, not doubting but in those two days' travel (from Rouen to Paris) they should pump many considerable things out of him, both as to the language and customs of France: and upon that account they did willingly defray his charges." When the young Englishmen arrived at Paris and settled in the usual quarter, the Faubourg St. Germain, Du Val attached himself to their service, and betook himself to England on the Restoration, which drained Paris of many of its English inhabitants.[914]

Many travellers, however, agreed with the French teachers that Paris was not a suitable place for serious study of French, both on account of the many distractions it offered and of the great number of English people resident there. It therefore became customary with the more serious-minded to retire for a time to some quiet provincial town where the accent was good. The French teacher Wodroeph tells us as much: "Mais, Monsieur, je vois bien que vous estes estranger et vous allez a la cour a Paris pour y apprendre nostre langue francoise. Mais mieux il vous vaut d'aller a Orleans pl.u.s.tost que d'y aller pour hanter la cour et baiser les Dames et Damoiselles... . Parquoy je vous conseille mieux vous en esloigner et d'aller a Orleans la ou vous apprendrez la vraye methode de la langue vulgaire."[915] The towns in the valley of the Loire were favourite resorts for purposes of study.[916] Orleans, Blois, and Saumur seem to have been the most popular. [Header: LOIRE TOWNS FAVOURED] For instance, James Howell, after spending some time in Paris, where he lodged near the Bastille--"the part furthest off from the quarters where the English resort," for he wished "to go on to get a little language"[917] as soon as he could--went to Orleans to study French; he describes it as "the most charming town on the Loire, and the best to learn the language in the purity." The town was never without a great abundance of strangers.[918] The fame of Blois and its teachers was widespread; and Bourges, Tours, Angers, and Caen were noted for the purity of their French. Saumur and other towns in which the Protestants were powerful were also much frequented. John Malpet, afterwards Princ.i.p.al of Gloucester Hall, Oxford, spent two years in France with his pupil, Lord Falkland, visiting Orleans, Blois, and Saumur.[919] John Evelyn visited Paris, Blois, Orleans, and Lyons, and finally settled at Tours, where he engaged a French master and studied the language diligently for nineteen weeks.

While studying in one or other of these towns, English travellers usually lodged in hotels, _auberges_, or _pensions_,[920] and sometimes with French families. One of their chief difficulties appears to have been to avoid their fellow-countrymen in such places. Gabriel Du Gres suggests that when English students are thus thrown together they should come to an agreement that any one who spoke his native tongue should pay a fine. A further though less serious impediment was the speaking of Latin, still considered necessary to the traveller by scholars such as John Brinsley.[921] For this reason travellers "for language" are advised to frequent the company of women and children, and "polite"

society, rather than that of scholars. It is a great inconvenience, observes Du Gres, if your landlord can speak Latin. The majority of travellers, however, do not appear to have experienced any embarra.s.sment in this respect; on the contrary, those with little previous knowledge of French found their Latin of use in their first French lessons if they studied the language "grammatically" with a master. French teachers in England usually recommended suitable _pensions_ to their students.

Gabriel Du Gres, for instance, gives a list of such lodgings at Saumur, his native town; Mauger, of those of Blois, Orleans, and other towns in the Loire valley.[922] In like manner they addressed their pupils to recommendable academies for instruction in the polite accomplishments and military exercises. However, for the most part they advised their pupils to go to private masters, who would attend to their French as well as the "exercises." The house of M. Doux, who had a riding school at Blois, was considered a particularly appropriate residence for those desiring to learn French, on account of his daughters, who spoke "wondrously well," as was also that of a certain M. Dechausse, who kept an academy for teaching young gentlemen to ride.

What is more, French teachers in England, no longer regarding their fellow-workers in France as rivals but rather as collaborators, as we have seen, not infrequently entertained friendly relations with them, and even went so far as to direct pupils to them. Claude Mauger, for instance, sent as many of his pupils as possible to M. Gaudrey at Paris, the author of verses in praise of Mauger's _Tableau du Jugement Universel_. This change of att.i.tude is probably explained by the fact that in the seventeenth century French was studied more seriously in England than in the sixteenth century; and students on their arrival in France had often had preliminary instruction under the care of a French tutor in England; Clarendon significantly states that in France "we quickly _renew_ the acquaintance we have had with the language by the practice and custom of speaking it." Students going abroad for purposes of study are therefore addressed to M. Nicolas, an excellent master at Paris, M. le Fevre, an _avocat en parlement_ at Orleans, and others. We are also informed that _abbes_ were fond of teaching their language to strangers, especially the English.[923] Moreover, several French teachers in England had previously exercised their profession in France.

The most popular of all, Claude Mauger, had spent seven years teaching French at Blois. [Header: FRENCH GRAMMARS FOR TRAVELLERS] Many years later, when he had made his reputation as a successful teacher of French in London, he went for a time to Paris, where he settled in the Faubourg St. Germain, and was busily occupied in teaching French to travellers, among others to the Earl of Salisbury. He also tells us that his books were very popular in France, and used by the great majority of English students there.