He speaks of them in a very different manner from those pictures that have come down to us of the Provencal Troubadours.

The latter were at once poets and musicians, who frequented the courts and castles of great lords, and sang their praises.

Their strains, too, were sometimes satirical.

They amused themselves with different subjects, and wedded their verses to the sound of the harp and other instruments.

They were called Troubadours from the word _trobar_, "to invent." They were original poets, of the true minstrel breed, similar to those whom Bishop Percy ascribes to England in the olden time, but about the reality of whom, as a professional body, Ritson has shown some cause to doubt.