The Troubadours Author:John Rutherford Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: 146 THE CAVALlfiR SERVENTE; OR, LOVE IN PRACTICE. AMONG the troubadours there could be no recognised and sustained gallantry between a pair when the lad... more »y was much the inferior in point of birth. The Cavaliers Serventes, then, were of two classes : they were either the social equals of their ladies, or selected from a condition much beneath them. In the first instance there were certain duties imposed on the gentleman, and certain rights accorded to him. He could not refuse to perform the one, nor his lady to grant the other, without incurring disgrace. The rights we shall allow to disclose themselves as we proceed. The duties were multifarious. The cavalier was to escort his mistress abroad and to wait on her at home. He was to show her particular attention in society, to secure her a duly honoured place in all companies, and to eat off the same plate at meals. " There were eight hundred cavaliers seated at table," says an old romance, " and there was not one.among them that had not a dame or a damsel at his trencher." In another romance—that of " Lancelot of the Lake"—a lady plagued with a jealous husband is made to lament that, for many a day, no gentleman has eaten off her plate. In church the cavalier was to take care that no lady of inferiorrank was censed before his mistress. This was one of his most onerous tasks, since there was nothing more disputed in the olden time than the honour of premier censing. Even so late as the seventeenth century, it was not uncommon for rivals on this item to come to blows, even in the church. In earlier times such disputes led to many deadly feuds, and in later days to numerous duels and an infinity of endless law-suits. In addition to the duties already mentioned, the cavalier was expected to keep his mistress well supplied with fl...« less