Chivalry. Translated from the French of Lion Gautier by Henry
Frith. (Routledge and Sons.)—M. Gautier devotes his first four chapters to a discussion of the "Origin of Chivalry," and its "Code," which, for plainness' sake, he reduces to "Ten Commandments," of which "Thou shalt believe all that the Church teaches, and shalt observe all its directions," is the first, and "Thou shalt be everywhere and always the Champion of the Right and the Good against Injustice and Evil," is the tenth. In the last of these four chapters, he describes the decadence of the institution. He then in fifteen chapters traces the life of the Knight from birth to death. His "Infancy" and "Youth," his " Entrance into Chivalry," with the various rituals which accom- panied that step, lead us on to the subject of his "Espousals" and "Marriage," a curious subject, in which the "seamy" side of the chivalrous life is certainly exhibited. Five chapters are devoted to "The Domestic Life of the Baron," in which his life from morning to night is described with abundance of historical illustrations, Two chapters, similarly illustrated, are given to his "Military Life," and then we have a description of his "Death." The hook is full of matter, and has had justice done to it by the translator and the publisher. But we would gladly have exchanged the fancy pictures with which it is adorned for something more genuine. Spirited as they may be, they cannot be compared for real value to those that may be obtained from contemporary or approximately contemporary documents.
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