These men of Southern France are born in the land of poetry.

It breathes in their native air.

It echoes round them in its varied measures.

Nay, the rhymes which are its distinguishing features, pervade their daily talk.
The seeds lie dormant in their native soil, and when trodden under foot, they burst through the ground and evolve their odour in the open air.
Gascon and Provencal alike preserve the same relation to the classic romance--that lovely but short-lived eldest daughter of the Latin--the language of the Troubadours.
We have said that the Gascon dialect was gradually expiring when Jasmin undertook its revival.

His success in recovering and restoring it, and presenting it in a written form, was the result of laborious investigation.