In a passage of these compilations the Emperor Charlemagne is asked whether in his judgment King Meliadus or his son Tristan were the better man?  The Emperor’s answer is:  “I should say that the King Meliadus was the better man, and I will tell you why I say so.  As far as I can see, everything that Tristan did was done for Love, and his great feats would never have been done but under the constraint of Love, which was his spur and goad.  Now that never can be said of King Meliadus!  For what deeds he did, he did them not by dint of Love, but by dint of his strong right arm.  Purely out of his own goodness he did good, and not by constraint of Love.”  “It will be seen,” remarks on this Paulin Paris, “that we are here a long way removed from the ordinary principles of Round Table Romances.  And one thing besides will be manifest, viz., that Rusticien de Pise was no Frenchman!"[10]

The same discretion is shown even more prominently in a passage of one of his compilations, which contains the romances of Arthur, Gyron, and Meliadus (No. 6975—­see last note but one):—­

“No doubt,” Rustician says, “other books tell the story of the Queen Ginevra and Lancelot differently from this; and there were certain passages between them of which the Master, in his concern for the honour of both those personages, will say not a word.”  Alas, says the French Bibliographer, that the copy of Lancelot, which fell into the hands of poor Francesca of Rimini, was not one of those expurgated by our worthy friend Rustician![11]

[Sidenote:  Identity of the Romance Compiler with Polo’s fellow-prisoner.]

41.  A question may still occur to an attentive reader as to the identity of this Romance-compiler Rusticien de Pise with the Messire Rustacians de Pise, of a solitary MS. of Polo’s work (though the oldest and most authentic), a name which appears in other copies as Rusta Pisan, Rasta Pysan, Rustichelus Civis Pisanus, Rustico, Restazio da Pisa, Stazio da Pisa, and who is stated in the preamble to have acted as the Traveller’s scribe at Genoa.

M. Pauthier indeed[12] asserts that the French of the MS. Romances of Rusticien de Pise is of the same barbarous character as that of the early French MS. of Polo’s Book to which we have just alluded, and which we shall show to be the nearest presentation of the work as originally dictated by the Traveller.  The language of the latter MS. is so peculiar that this would be almost perfect evidence of the identity of the writers, if it were really the fact.  A cursory inspection which I have made of two of those MSS. in Paris, and the extracts which I have given and am about to give, do not, however, by any means support M. Pauthier’s view.  Nor would that view be consistent with the judgment of so competent an authority as Paulin Paris, implied in his calling Rustician a nom recommandable in old French literature, and his speaking of him as “versed in the secrets of the French Romance Tongue."[13] In fact the difference of language in the two cases would really be a difficulty in the way of identification, if there were room for doubt.  This, however, Paulin Paris seems to have excluded finally, by calling attention to the peculiar formula of preamble which is common to the Book of Marco Polo and to one of the Romance compilations of Rusticien de Pise.