Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
France: Vols. IX–X. 1876–79.

Vire

Vau de Vire

By Jean le Houx (1551–1616)

I SAW, where Vire through valleys flows,

The fulling-mills in ruins laid,

The mills from which our songs arose;

And, mourning the past time, I said:—

“Where are the mills, O valleys fair!

The source of many a drinking-air?”

The traffic of our sires of yore

Was in the cloth they made and sold.

Good Basselin (alas, no more!)

With them his joyous music trolled.

Where are the mills, O valleys fair!

The source of many a drinking-air?

In mills that fulled their drapery,

Where that bright river’s currents pass,

They deeply drank, in jollity,

Cider worth more than hypocras.

Where are the mills, O valleys fair!

The source of many a drinking-air?

Basselin framed their drinking-lays,

As Vaux-de-Vire so widely known;

And taught a thousand charming ways

Of singing their melodious tone.

Where are the mills, O valleys fair!

The source of many a drinking-air?

But to that good old time a close.

To all things human cometh rest!

Within me, wine! take thy repose:

May he who poured thee out be blest!

Where are the mills, O valleys fair!

The source of many a drinking-air?