“’It is well:  as I may choose, I choose the
  sword.

  “’But, first of all, take off your tunic; for
  the blood of a virgin gushes out so far, that it
  might reach you, and I should be sorry.’

  “But before he had divested himself of his
  tunic, his head rolled off and lay at his feet: 
  his lips still murmured these words: 

  “’Go down there into that corn-field, and blow
  the horn, so that my friends may hear it.’

  “’Into that corn-field I shall not go, neither
  shall I blow the horn.  I do not follow the counsel
  of a murderer.’

  “’Go, then, down under the gallows, and
  gather the balm which you shall find there,
  and spread it over my bloody throat.’

  “’Under the gallows I shall not go; on your
  bloody throat I shall spread no balm.  I do
  not follow the counsel of a murderer.’

  “She took up the head by the hair, and
  washed it at a clear fountain.

  “She mounted her charger proudly, and,
  laughing and singing, she rode through the
  forest.

  “When she reached the middle of the forest,
  she met the mother of Halewyn.  ’Beautiful
  virgin, have you not seen my son?’

  “’Your son, the Lord Halewyn, is gone
  hunting:  you will never see him again.

  “’Your son, the Lord Halewyn, is dead.  I
  have his head in my apron, which is red with
  his blood.’

  “And when she arrived at her father’s gate,
  she blew the horn like a man.

  “And when her father saw her, he rejoiced
  at her return.

  “He celebrated it by a feast, and the head
  of Halewyn was placed on the table.”

Flemish writers claim as entirely their own that epic of the people, “Reynard the Fox.”  Their right to it was long contested; nor has anything been done since the labors of Willems, who, in opposition to the opinion of William Grimm, settles the authorship of the “Reinaert de Vos” on Utenhove, a priest of Aerdenburg.  It seems natural to suppose that this most popular of Middle-Age productions should have originated in the very region which later gave to the world a school of painting that incarnated on canvas the phases of animal life, taking its delight and best inspirations in the burlesque side of human passions.

In its first period, Flemish literature found some encouragement from its princes.  John I. of Brabant fostered it, and even took, himself, the title of Flemish Troubadour.  Under Guy of Dampierre, who neither in heart nor mind was sympathetic with the people he ruled, we find Maerlant, still revered by his country; his name is ever coupled with the epithet of Father of Flemish Poets.  Didactic rather than poetical, his influence was great in breaking down the barriers which separated the people from the higher classes, by adapting to their own home-idiom the best