And
it is his patriotism not to despair of it; he sees it already perfect in
all elegance and beauty of words--parfait en toute elegance et venuste
de paroles.
Du Bellay was born in the disastrous year 1525, the year of the battle
of Pavia, and the captivity of Francis the First. . His parents died
early, and to him, as the younger son, his mother's little estate, ce
petit Lire, the beloved place of his birth, descended. He was brought up
by a brother only a little older than himself; and left to themselves,
the two boys passed their lives in day-dreams of military glory. Their
education was neglected; "The time of my youth," says Du Bellay, "was
lost, like the flower which no shower waters, and no hand cultivates."
He was just twenty years old when the elder brother died, leaving
Joachim to be the guardian of his child. It was with regret, with a
shrinking feeling of incapacity, that he took upon him the burden of
this responsibility. Hitherto he had looked forward to the profession of
a soldier, hereditary in his family.
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