sur le dos for couché sur le dos

11. couleur du temps is somewhat ambiguous; either “ weather stained ” or “ sky blue.”

14. Avignon, a Southern French city, situated on the left bank of the Rhône, was the official résidence of the popes during the greater part of the fourteenth century.

83, 4. chez nous, i. e., en Provence.

7. fifres et tambourins for les fifres et les tambourins. — sur le pont d’Avignon . . . Pon y dansait. This idea is borrowed from the popular song which French children sing while they turn in a ring:

Sur le pont d’Avignon L’on y danse, l’on y danse,

Sur le pont d’Avignon L’on y danse tout en rond.

Les beaux messieurs font comme ça

(Ail the children forming the ring bow in one direction)

Et puis encore comme ça

(They repeat the bow in the opposite direction).

And the children keep on repeating the same words except in the

NOTES

fifth line where the words “ les beaux messieurs ” are replaced by the name of any class or trade suggested by the leader. Of course the gestures they make after the 5th and 6th Unes dépend on the name of the person given in the 5th.

13. du Comtat. Le Comtat Venaissin, a district in Southern France, the capital oi which was Avignon, belonged to the popes from 1274 to 1791.

17. Boniface VIII was pope from 1294 to 1303; Boniface IX from 1389 to 1404, but neither lived in Avignon. — que de larmes = combien de larmes.

18. en Avignon. The préposition en is used hcre because it refers to the district around Avignon. If it referred to the city alone, the préposition would be à.

19. il vous riait for il vous souriait. Do not translate, “ he laughed at you,” but “ he smiled upon you.”