Chaucer's Works, Volume 5 — Notes to the Canterbury Tales (part 2)

2129. This is the 're Licurgo' of the Teseide, vi. 14; and the Lycurgus of the Thebaid, iv. 386, and of Homer, Il. vi. 130. But the description of him is partly taken from that of another warrior, Tes. vi. 21, 22. It is worth notice that, in Lydgate's Story of Thebes, pt. iii., king Ligurgus or Licurgus (the name is spelt both ways) is introduced, and Lydgate has the following remark concerning him:—

'And the kingdom, but-if bokes lye,

Of Ligurgus, called was Trace;

And, as I rede in another place,

He was the same mighty champion

To Athenes that cam with Palamon

Ayenst his brother (!) that called was Arcite,

Y-led in his chare with foure boles whyte,

Upon his bed a wreth of gold ful fyn.'

The term brother must refer to l. 1147 above. See further, as to Lycurgus, in the note to Leg. Good Women, 2423, in vol. iii. p. 344.

2134. 'kempe heres, shaggy, rough hairs. Tyrwhitt and subsequent editors have taken for granted that kempe = kemped, combed (an impossible equation); but kempe is rather the reverse of this, and instead of smoothly combed, means bristly, rough, or shaggy. In an Early English poem it is said of Nebuchadnezzar that

"Holghe (hollow) were his yghen anunder (under) campe hores."

Early Eng. Alliterative Poems, p. 85, l. 1695.

Campe hores = shaggy hairs (about the eyebrows), and corresponds exactly in form and meaning to kempe heres,'—M. See Glossary.

2141. I. e. the nails of the bear were yellow. In Cutts, Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages, p. 345, the bad guess is hazarded that these 'nails' were metal studs. But Chaucer was doubtless thinking of the tiger's skin described in the Thebaid, vi. 722:—

'Tunc genitus Talao uictori tigrin inanem

Ire iubet, fuluo quae circumfusa nitebat

Margine, et extremes auro mansueuerat ungues.'

Lewis translates the last line by:—'The sharpness of the claws was dulled with gold.'

2142. for-old, very old. See next note.

2144. for-blak is generally explained as for blackness; it means very black. Cf. fordrye, very dry, in F. 409.

2148. alaunts, mastiffs or wolf-hounds. Florio has: 'Alano, a mastiue dog.' Cotgrave: 'Allan, a kind of big, strong, thickheaded, and short-snowted dog; the brood where-of came first out of Albania (old Epirus).' Pineda's Span. Dict. gives: 'Alano, a mastiff dog, particularly a bull dog; also, an Alan, one of that nation.' This refers to the tribe of Alani, a nation of warlike horsemen, first found in Albania. They afterwards became allies, first of the Huns, and afterwards of the Visi-Goths. It is thus highly probable that Alaunt (in which the t is obviously a later addition) signifies 'an Alanian dog,' which agrees with Cotgrave's explanation. Smith's Classical Dict. derives Alanus, said to mean 'mountaineer,' from a Sarmatian word ala.

The alaunt is described in the Maister of the Game, c. 16. We there learn they were of all colours, and frequently white with a black spot about the ears.

2152. Colers of, having collars of. Some MSS. read Colerd of, which I now believe to be right. Collared was an heraldic term, used of greyhounds, &c.; see the New Eng. Dict. This leaves an awkward construction, as torets seems to be governed by with. See Launfal, 965, in Ritson, Met. Rom. i. 212. Cf. 'as they (the Jews) were tied up with girdles ... so were they collared about the neck.'—Fuller's Pisgah Sight of Palestine, p. 524, ed. 1869.

torets, probably eyes in which rings will turn round, because each eye is a little larger than the thickness of the ring. This appears from Chaucer's Astrolabe, i. 2. 1—'This ring renneth in a maner turet,' i. e. in a kind of eye (vol. iii. p. 178). Warton, in his Hist. E. Poet. ed. 1871, ii. 314, gives several instances. It also meant a small loose ring. Cotgrave gives: 'Touret, the annulet, or little ring whereby a hawk's lune is fastened unto the jesses.' 'My lityll bagge of blakke ledyr with a cheyne and toret of siluyr'; Bury Wills, ed. Tymms, p. 16. Cf. E. swivel-ring.

2156. Emetrius is not mentioned either by Statius or by Boccaccio; cf. Tes. vi. 29, 17, 16, 41.

2158. diapred, variegated with flowery or arabesque patterns. See diaspre and diaspré in Godefroy's O. F. Dict.; diasprus and diasperatus in Ducange. In Le Rom. de la Rose, 21205, we find mention of samis diaprés, diapered samites.

2160. cloth of Tars, 'a kind of silk, said to be the same as in other places is called Tartarine (tartarinum), the exact derivation of which appears to be somewhat uncertain.'—Wright. Cf. Piers the Plowman, B. xv. 224, and my note to the same, C. xvii. 299; also Tartarium in Fairholt.

2187. alle and some, 'all and singular,' 'one and all.'

2205. See the Teseide, vi. 8; also Our Eng. Home, 22.

2217. And in hir houre. 'I cannot better illustrate Chaucer's astrology than by a quotation from the old Kalendrier de Bergiers, edit. 1500, Sign. K. ii. b:—"Qui veult savoir comme bergiers scevent quel planete regne chascune heure du jour et de la nuit, doit savoir la planete du jour qui veult s'enquerir; et la premiere heure temporelle du soleil levant ce jour est pour celluy planete, la seconde heure est pour la planete ensuivant, et la tierce pour l'autre," &c., in the following order: viz. Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sol, Venus, Mercury, Luna. To apply this doctrine to the present case, the first hour of the Sunday, reckoning from sunrise, belonged to the Sun, the planet of the day; the second to Venus, the third to Mercury, &c.; and continuing this method of allotment, we shall find that the twenty-second hour also belonged to the Sun, and the twenty-third to Venus; so that the hour of Venus really was, as Chaucer says, two hours before the sunrise of the following day. Accordingly, we are told in l. 2271, that the third hour after Palamon set out for the temple of Venus, the Sun rose, and Emily began to go to the temple of Diane. It is not said that this was the hour of Diane, or the Moon, but it really was; for, as we have just seen, the twenty-third hour of Sunday belonging to Venus, the twenty-fourth must be given to Mercury, and the first hour of Monday falls in course to the Moon, the presiding planet of that day. After this, Arcite is described as walking to the temple of Mars, l. 2367, in the nexte houre of Mars, that is, the fourth hour of the day. It is necessary to take these words together, for the nexte houre, singly, would signify the second hour of the day; but that, according to the rule of rotation mentioned above, belonged to Saturn, as the third did to Jupiter. The fourth was the nexte houre of Mars that occurred after the hour last named.'—Tyrwhitt. Thus Emily is two hours later than Palamon, and Arcite is three hours later than Emily.

2221-64. To be compared with the Teseide, vii. 43-49, and vii. 68.

2224. Adoun, Adonis. See Ovid, Met. x. 503.

2233-6. Imitated from Le Rom. de la Rose, 21355-65, q. v.

2238. 'I care not to boast of arms (success in arms).'

2239. Ne I ne axe, &c., are to be pronounced as ni naxe, &c. So in l. 2630 of this tale, Ne in must be pronounced as nin.

2252. wher I ryde or go, whether I ride or walk.

2253. fyres bete, kindle or light fires. Bete also signifies to mend or make up the fire; see l. 2292.

2271. The thridde hour inequal. 'In the astrological system, the day, from sunrise to sunset, and the night, from sunset to sunrise, being each divided into twelve hours, it is plain that the hours of the day and night were never equal except just at the equinoxes. The hours attributed to the planets were of this unequal sort. See Kalendrier de Berg. loc. cit., and our author's treatise on the Astrolabe.'—Tyrwhitt.

2275-360. Cf. the Teseide, vii. 71-92.

2286. a game, a pleasure.

2288. at his large, at liberty (to speak or to be silent).

2290. 'E coronò di quercia cereale'; Tes. vii. 74. Cerial should be cerrial, as spelt by Dryden, who speaks of 'chaplets green of cerrial oak'; Flower and Leaf, 230. It is from cerreus, adj. of cerrus, also ill-spelt cerris, as in the botanical name Quercus cerris, the Turkey oak. The cup of the acorn is prickly; see Pliny, bk. xvi. c. 6.

2294. In Stace of Thebes, in the Thebaid of Statius, where the reader will not find it. Cf. the Teseide, vii. 72.

2303. aboughte, atoned for. Attheon, Actaeon; Ovid, Met. iii. 230.

2313. thre formes. Diana is called Diva Triformis;—in heaven, Luna; on earth, Diana and Lucina, and in hell, Proserpina. See note to l. 2041.

2336. Cf. Statius, Theb. viii. 632:—'Omina cernebam, subitusque intercidit ignis.'

2365. the nexte waye, the nearest way. Cf. the Teseide, vii. 93.

2368. walked is, has walked. See note to l. 2217.

2371-434. Cf. the Teseide, vii. 23-28, 39-41.

2388. For the story, see Ovid, Met. iv. 171-189; and, in particular, cf. Rom. de la Rose, 14064, where Venus is said to be 'prise et lacie.'

2395. lyves creature, creature alive, living creature.

2397. See Compl. of Anelida, 182; cf. Compl. to his Lady, 52.

2405. do, bring it about, cause it to come to pass.

2422-34. From Tes. vii. 39, 40; there are several verbal resemblances here.—Kölbing.

2437. 'As joyful as the bird is of the bright sun.' So in Piers Pl., B. x. 153. It was a common proverb.

2438-41. Cf. the Teseide, vii. 67.

2443. Cf. 'the olde colde Saturnus'; tr. of Boethius, bk. iv. met. 1.

2447-8. From Le Rom. de la Rose, 13022, q. v.

2449. 'Men may outrun old age, but not outwit (surpass its counsel).' Cf. 'Men may the wyse at-renne, but not at-rede.'—Troilus, iv. 1456.

'For of him (the old man) þu migt leren

Listes and fele þewes,

Þe baldure þu migt ben:

Ne for-lere þu his redes,

For þe elder mon me mai of-riden

Betere þenne of-reden.'

'For of him thou mayest learn

Arts and many good habits,

The bolder thou mayest be.

Despise not thou his counsels,

For one may out-ride the old man

Better than out-wit.'

The Proverbs of Alfred, ed. Morris, in an Old Eng. Miscellany, p. 136. And see Solomon and Saturn, ed. Kemble, p. 253.

2451. agayn his kynde. According to the Compost of Ptolemeus, Saturn was influential in producing strife: 'And the children of the sayd Saturne shall be great jangeleres and chyders ... and they will never forgyve tyll they be revenged of theyr quarell.'—Wright.

2454. My cours. The course of the planet Saturn. This refers to the orbit of Saturn, supposed to be the largest of all, until Uranus and Neptune were discovered.

2455. more power. The Compost of Ptolemeus says of Saturn, 'He is mighty of hymself.... It is more than xxx yere or he may ronne his course.... Whan he doth reygne, there is moche debate.'—Wright.

2460. groyning, murmuring, discontent; from F. grogner. See Rom. Rose, 7049; Troil. i. 349.

2462. 'Terribilia mala operatur Leo cum malis; auget enim eorum malitiam.'—Hermetis Aphorismorum Liber, § 66.

2469.

'Er fyue ȝer ben folfult, such famyn schal aryse,

þorw flodes and foul weder, fruites schul fayle,

And so seiþ Saturne, and sent vs to warne.'

P. Plowman, A. vii. 309 (B. vi. 325; C. ix. 347).

2491-525. Cf. the Teseide, vii. 95-99.

2504. Gigginge, fitting or providing (the shield) with straps. Godefroy gives O. F. guige, guigue, a strap for hanging a buckler over the shoulder, a handle of a shield. Cotgrave gives the fem. pl. guiges, 'the handles of a target or shield.' In Mrs. Palliser's Historic Devices, p. 277, she describes a monument in St. Edmund's chapel, in Westminster Abbey, on which are three shields, each with 'the guige or belt of Bourchier knots formed of straps.' In the M. E. word gigginge, both the g's are hard, as in gig (in the sense of a two-wheeled vehicle).

Layneres lacinge, lacing of thongs; see Prompt. Parv., s. v. Lanere.

In Sir Bevis, ed. Kölbing, p. 134, we find—

'Sir Beues was ful glad, iwis,

Hese laynerys [printed layuerys] he took anon,

And fastenyd hys hawberk hym upon.'

2507. Shakespeare seems to have observed this passage; cf. Hen. V. Act 4. prol. 12.

2511. Cf. House of Fame, 1239, 1240:—

'Of hem that maken blody soun

In trumpe, beme, and clarioun.'

Also Tes. viii. 5:—'D'armi, di corni, nacchere e trombette.'

'The Nakkárah or Naqárah was a great kettle-drum, formed like a brazen cauldron, tapering to the bottom, and covered with buffalo-hide, often 3½ or 4 feet in diameter.... The crusades naturalised the word in some form or other in most European languages, but in our own apparently with a transfer of meaning. Wright defines naker as "a cornet or horn of brass," and Chaucer's use seems to countenance this.'—Marco Polo, ed. Yule, i. 303-4; where more is added. But Wright's explanation is a mere guess, and should be rejected. There is no reason for assigning to the word naker any other sense than 'kettle-drum.' Minot (Songs, iv. 80) is explicit:—

'The princes, that war riche on raw,

Gert nakers strike, and trumpes blaw.'

Hence a naker had to be struck, not blown. See also Naker in Halliwell's Dictionary. Boccaccio has the pl. nacchere; see above.

2520. Sparth, battle-axe; Icel. sparða. See Rom. Rose, 5978; Wars of Alexander, ed. Skeat, 1403, 2458; Gawain and Grene Knight, 209; Prompt. Parv. In Trevisa's tr. of Higden, bk. i. ch. 33, we are told that the Norwegians first brought sparths into Ireland. Higden has 'usum securium, qui Anglicè sparth dicitur.'

2537. As to the regulations for tournaments, see Strutt's Sports and Pastimes, bk. iii. c. 1. §§ 16-24; the passages are far too long for quotation. We may, however, compare the following extract, given by Strutt, from MS. Harl. 326. 'All these things donne, thei were embatailed eche ageynste the othir, and the corde drawen before eche partie; and whan the tyme was, the cordes were cutt, and the trumpettes blew up for every man to do his devoir [duty]. And for to assertayne the more of the tourney, there was on eche side a stake; and at eche stake two kyngs of armes, with penne, and inke, and paper, to write the names of all them that were yolden, for they shold no more tournay.' And, from MS. Harl. 69, he quotes that—'no one shall bear a sword, pointed knife, mace, or other weapon, except the sword for the tournament.'

2543-93. Cf. the Teseide, vii. 12, 131-2, 12, 14, 100-2, 113-4, 118, 19. In 2544, shot means arrow or crossbow-bolt.

2546. 'Nor short sword having a biting (sharp) point to stab with.'

2565. Cf. Legend of Good Women, 635:—'Up goth the trompe.'

2568. Cf. King Alisaunder, 189, where we are told that a town was similarly decked to receive queen Olimpias with honour. See Weber's note.

2600-24. Cf. the Teseide, viii. 5, 7, 14, 12, &c.

2602. 'In go the spears full firmly into the rest,'—i. e. the spears were couched ready for the attack.

'Thai layden here speres in areeste,

Togeder thai ronnen as fire of thondere,

That both here launces to-braste;

That they seten, it was grete wonder,

So harde it was that they gan threste;

Tho drowen thai oute here swordes kene,

And smyten togeder by one assente.'

The Sowdone of Babyloyne, l. 1166.

'With spere in thyne arest'; Rom. of the Rose, 7561.

2614. he ... he = one ... another. See Historical Outlines of English Accidence, p. 282. Cf. the parallel passage in the Legend of Good Women, 642-8.

2615. feet. Some MSS. read foot. Tyrwhitt proposed to read foo, foe, enemy; but see l. 2550.

2624. wroght ... wo, done harm to his opponent.

2626. Galgopheye. 'This word is variously written Colaphey, Galgaphey, Galapey. There was a town called Galapha in Mauritania Tingitana, upon the river Malva (Cellar. Geog. Ant. v. ii. p. 935), which perhaps may have given name to the vale here meant.'—Tyrwhitt. But doubtless Chaucer was thinking of the Vale of Gargaphie, where Actæon was turned into a stag:—

'Vallis erat, piceis et acutâ densa cupressu,

Nomine Gargaphie, succinctae sacra Dianae.'

Ovid, Met. iii. 155, 156.

2627. Cf. the Teseide, viii. 26.

2634. Byte, cleave, cut; cf. the cognate Lat. verb findere. See ll. 2546, 2640.

2646. swerdes lengthe. Cf.

'And then he bar me sone bi strenkith

Out of my sadel my speres lenkith.'

Ywaine and Gawin, ll. 421, 2.

2675. Which a, what a, how great a.

2676-80. Cf. the Teseide, viii. 131, 124-6.

2683. al his chere may mean 'all his delight, as regarded his heart.' The Harl. MS. does not insert in before his chere, as Wright would have us believe.

2684. Elles. reads furie, as noted; so in the Teseide, ix. 4. This incident is borrowed from Statius, Theb. vi. 495, where Phœbus sends a hellish monster to frighten some horses in a chariot-race. And see Vergil, Æn. xii. 845.

2686-706. Cf. the Teseide, ix. 7, 8, 47, 13, 48, 38, 26.

2689. The following is a very remarkable account of a contemporary occurrence, which took place at the time when a parliament was held at Cambridge, A. D. 1388, as told by Walsingham, ed. Riley, ii. 177:—

'Tempore Parliamenti, cum Dominus Thomas Tryvet cum Rege sublimis equitaret ad Regis hospitium, quod fuit apud Bernewelle [Barnwell], dum nimis urget equum calcaribus, equus cadit, et omnia pene interiora sessoris dirumpit [cf. l. 2691]; protelavit tamen vitam in crastinum.' The saddle-bow or arsoun was the 'name given to two curved pieces of wood or metal, one of which was fixed to the front of the saddle, and another behind, to give the rider greater security in his seat'; New Eng. Dict. s. v. Arson. Violent collision against the front saddle-bow produced very serious results. Cf. the Teseide, ix. 8—'E 'l forte arcione gli premette il petto.'

2696. 'Then was he cut out of his armour.' I. e. the laces were cut, to spare the patient trouble. Cf. Statius, Theb. viii. 637-641.

2698. in memorie, conscious.

2710. That ... his, i. e. whose. So which ... his, in Troil. ii. 318.

2711. 'As a remedy for other wounds,' &c.

2712, 3. charmes ... save. 'It may be observed that the salves, charms, and pharmacies of herbs were the principal remedies of the physician in the age of Chaucer. Save (salvia, the herb sage) was considered one of the most universally efficiently medieval remedies.'—Wright. Hence the proverb of the school of Salerno, 'Cur moriatur homo, dum salvia crescit in horto?'

2722. nis nat but = is only. aventure, accident.

2725. O persone, one person.

2733. Gree, preëminence, superiority; lit. rank, or a step; answering to Lat. gradus (not gratus). The phrases to win the gree, i. e. to get the first place, and to bear the gree, i. e. to keep the first place, are still in common use in Scotland. See note to the Allit. Destruction of Troy, ed. Panton and Donaldson, l. 1353, and Jamieson's Dictionary.

2736. dayes three. Wright says the period of three days was the usual duration of a feast among our early forefathers. As far back as the seventh century, when Wilfred consecrated his church at Ripon, he held 'magnum convivium trium dierum et noctium, reges cum omni populo laetificantes.'—Eddius, Vit. S. Wilf. c. 17.

2743. This fine passage is certainly imitated from the account of the death of Atys in Statius, Theb. viii. 637-651. I quote ll. 642-651, in which Atys fixes his last gaze upon his bride Ismene; as to ll. 637-641, see note to l. 2696 above.

'Prima uidet, caramque tremens Iocasta uocabat

Ismenen: namque hoc solum moribunda precatur

Uox generi, solum hoc gelidis iam nomen inerrat

Faucibus: exclamant famulae: tollebat in ora

Uirgo manus; tenuit saeuus pudor; attamen ire

Cogitur (indulget summum hoc Iocasta iacenti),

Ostenditque offertque: quater iam morte sub ipsa

Ad nomen uisus, deiectaque fortiter ora

Sustulit: illam unam neglecto lumine coeli

Adspicit, et uultu non exsatiatur amato.'

2745. 'Also when bloude rotteth in anye member, but it be taken out by skill or kinde, it tourneth into venime'; Batman upon Bartholomè, lib. iv. c. 7. bouk, paunch; A. S. būc.

2749. 'The vertue Expulsiue is, which expelleth and putteth away that that is vnconuenient and hurtfull to kinde' [nature]; Batman upon Bartholomè, lib. iii. c. 8.

'This vertue [given by the soul to the body] hath three parts; one is called naturall, and is in the lyuer: the other is called vitall, or spiritall, and hath place in the heart; the third is called Animal, and hath place in the brayn'; id. c. 14.

'The vertue that is called Naturalis moueth the humours in the body of a beast by the vaines, and hath a principal place in the liuer'; id. c. 12.

2761. This al and som, i. e. this (is) the al and som, this is the short and long of it. A common expression; cf. F. 1606; Troil. iv. 1193, 1274. With ll. 2761-2808 compare the Teseide, x. 12, 37, 51, 54, 55, 64, 102-3, 60-3, 111-2.

2800. overcome. Tyrwhitt reads overnome, overtaken, the pp. of overnimen; but none of the seven best MSS. have this reading.

2810. The real reason why Chaucer could not here describe the passage of Arcite's soul to heaven is because he had already copied Boccaccio's description, and had used it with respect to the death of Troilus; see Troil. v. 1807-27 (stanzas 7, 8, 9 from the end).

2815. ther Mars, &c., where I hope that Mars will, &c.; may Mars, &c.

2822. swich sorwe, so great sorrow. The line is defective in the third foot, which consists of a single (accented) syllable.

2827-46. Cf. the Teseide, xi. 8, 7, 9-11, xii. 6.

2853-962. Cf. the Teseide, xi. 13-16, 30, 31, 35, 38, 40, 37, 18, 26-7, 22-5, 21, 27-9, 30, 40-67.

2863-962. The whole of this description should be compared with the funeral rites at the burial of Archemorus, as described in Statius, Thebaid, bk. vi; which Chaucer probably consulted, as well as the imitation of the same in Boccaccio's Teseide. For example, the 'tree-list' in ll. 2921-3 is not a little remarkable. The first list is in Ovid, Met. x. 90-105; with which cf. Vergil, Æn. vi. 180; Lucan, Pharsalia, iii. 440-445. Then we find it in Statius, vi. 98-106. After which, it reappears in Boccaccio, Teseide, xi. 22; in Chaucer, Parl. of Foules, 176; in the present passage; in Tasso, Gier. Lib. iii. 75; and in Spenser, F.Q. i. 1. 8. There is also a list in Le Roman de la Rose, 1338-1368. Again, we may just compare ll. 2951-2955 with the following lines in Lewis's translation of Statius:—

'Around the pile an hundred horsemen ride,

With arms reversed, and compass every side;

They faced the left (for so the rites require);

Bent with the dust, the flames no more aspire.

Thrice, thus disposed, they wheel in circles round

The hallow'd corse: their clashing weapons sound.

Four times their arms a crash tremendous yield,

And female shrieks re-echo through the field.'

Moreover, Statius imitates the whole from Vergil, Æn. xi. 185-196. And Lydgate copies it all from Chaucer in his Sege of Thebes, part 3 (near the end).

2864. Funeral he myghte al accomplice (Elles.); Funeral he mighte hem all complise (Corp., Pet.). The line is defective in the first foot. Funeral is an adjective. Tyrwhitt and Wright insert Of before it, without authority of any kind; see l. 2942.

2874. White gloves were used as mourning at the funeral of an unmarried person; see Brand, Pop. Antiq. ed. Ellis, ii. 283.

2885. 'And surpassing others in weeping came Emily.'

2891. See the description of old English funerals in Rock, Church of our Fathers, ii. 488: 'If the deceased was a knight, his helmet, shield, sword, and coat-armour were each carried by some near kinsman, or by a herald clad in his blazoned tabard'; &c.

2895. Cf. 'deux ars Turquois,' i. e. two Turkish bows; Rom. de la Rose, 913; see vol. i. p. 132.

2903. Compare the mention of 'blake clothes' in l. 2884. When 'master Machyll, altherman, was bered, all the chyrche [was] hangyd with blake and armes [coats-of-arms], and the strett [street] with blake and armes, and the place'; &c.—Machyn's Diary (Camden Soc.) p. 171.

2923. whippeltree (better wippeltree) is the cornel-tree or dogwood (Cornus sanguinea); the same as the Mid. Low G. wipel-bom, the cornel. Cf. 'wepe, or weype, the dog-tree'; Hexham. See N. and Q. 7 S. vi. 434.

2928. Amadrides; i. e. Hamadryades; see Ovid, Met. i. 192, 193, 690. The idea is taken from Statius, Theb. vi. 110-113.

2943. men made the fyr (Hn., Cm.); maad was the fire (Corp., Pet.).

2953. loud (Elles.); heih (Harl.); bowe (Corp.).

2958. 'Chaucer seems to have confounded the wake-plays of his own time with the funeral games of the antients.'—Tyrwhitt. Cf. Troil. v. 304; and see 'Funeral Entertainments' in Brand's Popular Antiquities.

2962. in no disioynt, with no disadvantage. Cf. Verg. Æn. iii. 281.

2967-86. Cf. the Teseide, xii. 3-5.

2968. Lounsbury (Studies in Chaucer, i. 345) proposes to put a full stop at the end of this line, after teres; and to put no stop at the end of l. 2969.

2991-3. that faire cheyne of love. This sentiment is taken from Boethius, lib. ii. met. 8: 'þat þe world with stable feith / varieth acordable chaungynges // þat the contraryos qualite of elementz holden amonge hem self aliaunce perdurable / þat phebus the sonne with his goldene chariet / bryngeth forth the rosene day / þat the mone hath commaundement ouer the nyhtes // whiche nyhtes hesperus the euesterre hat[h] browt // þat þe se gredy to flowen constreyneth with a certeyn ende hise floodes / so þat it is nat lẽueful to strechche hise brode termes or bowndes vpon the erthes // þat is to seyn to couere alle the erthe // Al this a-cordaunce of thinges is bownden with looue / þat gouerneth erthe and see and hath also commaundementz to the heuenes / and yif this looue slakede the brydelis / alle thinges þat now louen hem togederes / wolden maken a batayle contynuely and stryuen to fordoon the fasoun of this worlde / the which they now leden in acordable feith by fayre moeuynges // this looue halt to-gideres peoples ioygned with an hooly bond / and knytteth sacrement of maryages of chaste looues // And love enditeth lawes to trewe felawes // O weleful weere mankynde / yif thilke loue þat gouerneth heuene gouernedẽ yowre corages.'—Chaucer's Boethius, ed. Morris, p. 62; cf. also pp. 87, 143. (See the same passage in vol. ii. p. 50; cf. pp. 73, 122.) And cf. the Teseide, ix. 51; Homer, II. viii. 19. Also Rom. de la Rose, 16988:—

'La bele chaéne dorée

Qui les quatre elemens enlace.'

2994. What follows is taken from Boethius, lib. iv. pr. 6: 'þe engendrynge of alle þinges, quod she, and alle þe progressiouns of muuable nature, and alle þat moeueþ in any manere, takiþ hys causes, hys ordre, and hys formes, of þe stablenesse of þe deuyne þouȝt; [and thilke deuyne thowht] þat is yset and put in þe toure, þat is to seyne in þe heyȝt of þe simplicite of god, stablisiþ many manere gyses to þinges þat ben to don.'—Chaucer's Boethius, ed. Morris, p. 134. (See the same passage in vol. ii. p. 115).

3005. Chaucer again is indebted to Boethius, lib. iii. pr. 10, for what follows: 'For al þing þat is cleped inperfit, is proued inperfit by þe amenusynge of perfeccioun, or of þing þat is perfit; and her-of comeþ it, þat in euery þing general, yif þat þat men seen any þing þat is inperfit, certys in þilke general þer mot ben somme þing þat is perfit. For yif so be þat perfeccioun is don awey, men may nat þinke nor seye fro whennes þilke þing is þat is cleped inperfit. For þe nature of þinges ne token nat her bygynnyng of þinges amenused and inperfit; but it procediþ of þingus þat ben al hool and absolut, and descendeþ so doune into outerest þinges and into þingus empty and wiþoute fruyt; but, as I haue shewed a litel her-byforne, þat yif þer be a blisfulnesse þat be frele and vein and inperfit, þer may no man doute þat þer nys som blisfulnesse þat is sad, stedfast, and perfit.'—Chaucer (as above), p. 89. (See the same passage in vol. ii. pp. 74, 75.)

3013. 'And thilke same ordre neweth ayein alle thinges growyng and fallyng adoune by semblables progressiouns of seedes and of sexes.'—Chaucer's Boethius, ed. Morris, p. 137. (See the same passage in vol. ii. p. 117; i. e. in bk. iv. pr. 6. l. 103).

3016. seen at ye, see at a glance. Gower, ed. Pauli, i. 33, has:—'The thing so open is at theye,' i. e. is so open at the eye, is so obvious. 'Now is the tyme sen at eye,' i. e. clearly seen; Coventry Myst. p. 122.

3017-68. Cf. the Teseide, xii. 7-10, 6, 11, 13, 9, 12-17, 19.

3042. So in Troilus, iv. 1586: 'Thus maketh vertu of necessite'; and in Squire's Tale, pt. ii. l. 247 (Group F, l. 593): 'That I made vertu of necessite.' It is from Le Roman de la Rose, 14217:—

'S'il ne fait de necessité

Vertu.'

So in Matt. Paris, ed. Luard, i. 20. Cf. Horace, Carm. i. 24:—

'Durum! sed leuius fit patientia

Quidquid corrigere est nefas.'

3068. Cf.

'The time renneth toward right fast,

Joy cometh after whan the sorrow is past.'

Hawes' Pastime of Pleasure, ed. Wright, p. 148.

3089. oghte to passen right, should surpass mere equity or justice.

3094-102. Cf. the Teseide, xii. 69, 72, 83.

3105. Cf. Book of the Duchesse, 1287-97.

The Miller's Prologue.

The Miller's name is Robin (l. 3129).

3110. The reading companye (as in old editions and Tyrwhitt) in place of route makes the line too long.

3115. I. e. the bag is unbuckled, the budget is opened; as when a packman displays his wares. See Group I, l. 26.

3119. To quyte with, to requite the Knight with, for his excellent Tale. This position of with, next its verb, is the almost invariable M. E. idiom. Cf. F. 471, 641, C. 345; Notes to P. Pl., C. i. 133, &c.

3120. 'Very drunk, and all pale'; cf. A. 4150, H. 30.

3124. I. e. in a loud, commanding voice, such as that of Pilate in the Mystery Plays. In the Chester Plays, Pilate is of rather a meek disposition; but in the York Plays, pp. 270, 307, 320, he is represented as boastful and tyrannical, as is evidently here intended. The expression seems to have been proverbial. Palsgrave has: 'In a pylates voyce, a haulte voyx'; p. 837. Udall, tr. of Erasmus' Apophthegms (repr. 1877), last page, has—'speaking out of measure loude and high, and altogether in Pilates voice.'

3125. by armes, i. e. by the arms of Christ; see note to C. 651.

3129. 'My dear brother'; a common form; cf. 3848, below, and 1136, above.

3131. thriftily, i. e. profitably, to a useful purpose; cf. B. 1165.

3134. a devel wey, in the devil's name; see Skelton, ed. Dyce, ii. 287; originally, in the way to the devil, with all ill luck. Compare—

'Hundred, chapitle, court, and shire,

Al hit goth a devel way' [to the bad].

Polit. Songs, ed. Wright, Camd. Soc. p. 254.

See note to l. 3713 below.

3140. Wyte it, lay the blame for it upon. of Southwerk, i. e. of the Tabard inn.

3143. 'Made a fool of the wright,' i. e. of the carpenter; cf. A. 586, 614; also A. 3911, and the note.

3145. The Reeve interferes, because he was a carpenter himself (A. 614). 'Let alone your ignorant drunken ribaldry.'

3152. A reference to a proverbial expression which is given in Rob. of Brunne's Handlyng Synne, 1892:—

'Men sey, ther a man ys gelous,

That "ther ys a kokewolde at hous."'

Compare also Le Roman de la Rose, 9167-9171, which expresses a similar opinion.

3155-6. Tyrwhitt omits these two lines in his text, but admits, in his Notes, that they should have been inserted. The former of the two lines is repeated from l. 277 of the original (but rejected) Prologue to the Legend of Good Women. but-if thou madde, unless thou art going mad.

3161. oon, one, i. e. a cuckold; or, possibly, an ox (l. 3159). As an ox was a 'horned' animal, it comes to the same thing, according to the miserable jest so common in our dramatists.

3165. goddes foyson, sufficient abundance, i. e. all he wants, all the affection he expects. there, in his wife.

3166. A defective line; read—Of | the rém' | nant, &c.

The Milleres Tale.

On the Miller's Tale, see Anglia, i. 38, ii. 135, vii (appendix), 81; and see the remarks in vol. iii. p. 395.

3188. gnof, churl, lit. a thief; a slang word, of Hebrew origin; Heb. ganāv, a thief, Exod. xxii. 1. The same as the mod. E. gonoph, the epithet applied to Jo in Dickens, Bleak House, ch. xix. Halliwell's Dict. quotes from The Norfolke Furies, 1623—'The country gnoffes, Hob, Dick, and Hick, With clubbes and clouted shoon,' &c. Drant, in his tr. of Horace, Satires, fol. A i, back (1566), has:—'The chubbyshe gnof that toyles and moyles.' Todd, in his Illustration of Chaucer, p. 260, says—'See A Comment upon the Miller's Tale and the Wife of Bath, 12mo. Lond. 1665, p. 8, [where we find] "A rich gnofe; a rich grub, or miserable caitiff, as I render it; which interpretation, to be proper and significant, I gather by the sence of that antient metre:

The caitiff gnof sed to his crue,

My meney is many, my incomes but few.

This, as I conceive, explains the author's meaning; which seems no less seconded by that antient English bard:

That gnof, that grub, of pesants blude,

Had store of goud, yet did no gude."'

The note in Bell's Chaucer, connecting it with oaf, is wrong. The carpenter's name was John (l. 3501).

3190. This shews that students used often to live in lodgings, as is so common at Cambridge, where the number of students far exceeds the number of college-rooms.

3192, 3. Chaucer himself knew something of astrology, as shewn by his numerous references to it. The word conclusions in l. 3193 is the technical name for 'propositions' or problems. In his Treatise on the Astrolabe, prologue (l. 9), he says to his son Lowis—'I purpose to teche thee a certein nombre of conclusions apertening to the same instrument.' We here learn that one object of astrology was to answer questions relating to coming weather, as well as with reference to almost every other future event.

3195. in certein houres. In astrology, much depended on times; certain times were supposed to be more favourable than others for obtaining solutions of problems. The great book for prognostications of weather was the Calendrier des Bergiers, an English version of which was frequently reprinted as The Shepheards Kalendar. The old almanacks also predicted the weather; see Ben Jonson's Every Man Out of his Humour, A. i. sc. 1—'Enter Sordido, with an almanack in his hand.'

3199. hende, gracious, mild; hence, gentle, courteous; orig. near at hand, hence, useful, serviceable; A. S. gehende. Ill spelt hendy in Tyrwhitt. Several passages from this Tale are quoted and illustrated by Warton, Hist. E. Poetry, sect. xvi; which see.

3203. hostelrye, lodging. Nicholas had his room to himself; whereas it was usual for two or more students to have a room in common, even in college.

3207. cetewale, zedoary; but commonly, though improperly, applied to valerian (Valeriana pyrenaica); also spelt setwall. Gerarde, in his Herball (ed. 1597, p. 919), says that 'it hath beene had (and is to this day among the poore people of our northerne parts) in such veneration amongst them, that no brothes, pottages, or phisicall meates are woorthe anything, if setwall were not at one end'; &c. See Britten's Plant-Names (E. D. S.). See note to B. 1950.

3208. Almageste; Arab. almajistī; from al, the, and majistī, for Gk. μεγίστη;, short for μεγίστη σύνταξις, 'greatest composition,' a name given to the great astronomical treatise of Ptolemy; hence extended to signify, as here, a text-book on astrology. See Hallam, Middle Ages, c. i. 77. Ptolemy's work 'was in thirteen books. He also wrote four books of judicial astrology. He was an Egyptian astrologist, and flourished under Marcus Antoninus.'—Warton. See D. 182, 325, 2289. And see my note to Chaucer's Astrolabe, i. 17; vol. iii. p. 354.

3209. See Chaucer's own treatise on The Astrolabe, which he describes. It was an instrument consisting of several flat circular brass plates, with two revolving pointers, used for taking altitudes, and other astronomical purposes.

longinge for, suitable for, belonging to.

3210. augrim-stones, counters for calculation. Augrim is algorism (see New Eng. Dict.), or the Arabic system of arithmetic, performed with the Arabic numerals, which became known in Europe from translations of a work on algebra by the Arab mathematician Abu Ja'far Mohammed Ben Musa, surnamed al-Khowārazmī, or the native of Khwārazm (Khiva). Chaucer speaks of 'nombres in augrim'; Astrolabe, i. 9. 3.

3212. falding, a kind of coarse cloth; see note on A. 391.

3216. Angelus ad virginem. This hymn occurs in MS. Arundel 248, leaf 154, written about 1260, both in Latin and English, and with musical notes. It is printed, with a facsimile of part of the MS., at p. 695 of the print of MS. Harl. 7334, issued by the Chaucer Society. The first verse of the Latin version runs thus:—

'Angelus ad uirginemsubintrans in conclaue,

Virginis formidinemdemulcens, inquit "Aue!

Aue! regina uirginumceli terreque dominum

concipies et paries intacta,

salutem hominumtu, porta celi facta,

medela criminum."'

Hence the subject of the anthem is the Annunciation.

3217. the kinges note, the name of some tune or song. There is nothing to identify it with a chant royal, described by Warton, Hist. E. Poet. ii. 221, note b. Warton says that 'Chaucer calls the chant royal ... a kingis note.' But Chaucer says 'THE kinges note,' which makes all the difference; it is merely a bad guess. A song entitled 'Kyng villyamis note,' or 'King William's note,' is mentioned in the Complaint of Scotland (1549), ed. Murray, p. 64.

3220. 'According to the money provided by his friends and his own income.'

3223. eight-e-ten-e has four syllables; cf. B. 5. Tyrwhitt read it as of two syllables, and inserted I gesse after she was. He duly notes that the words I gesse are 'not in the MSS.'

3226. 'And considered himself to be like.' Tyrwhitt has belike, which he probably took to be an adverb; but this is a gross anachronism. The adv. belike is unknown earlier than the year 1533.

3227. Catoun, Dionysius Cato; see note to G. 688. But Tyrwhitt notes, that 'the maxim here alluded to is not properly one of Cato's; but I find it (he says) in a kind of Supplement to the Moral Distichs entitled Facetus, int. Auctores octo morales, Lugd. 1538, cap. iii.

"Duc tibi prole parem sponsam moresque venustam,

Si cum pace velis vitam deducere justam."'

He refers to the catalogue of MSS. in Trin. Coll. Dublin, No. 275 (under Urbanus, another name for Facetus); and to Bale, Cent. iii. 17, and Fabricius, Bib. Med. Aetatis.

3230. Note is, in the singular. 'Crabbed age and youth cannot live together';—Passionate Pilgrim.

3235. ceynt, girdle; barred, adorned with cross stripes. Warton could not understand the word; but a bar is a transverse stripe on a girdle or belt, as in A. 329, which see.

3236-7. barm-clooth, lap-cloth, i. e. an apron 'over her loins.' gore, a triangular slip, used as an insertion to widen a garment in any particular place. The apron spread out towards the bottom, owing rather, it appears, to inserted 'gores' below than to pleats above. Or the pleats may be called gores here, from their triangular shape. Cf. A. S. gāra, an angular projection of land, as in Kensington Gore. 'Gheroni, the gores or gussets of a smocke or shirt'; Florio's Ital. Dict. See note to B. 1979, and the note to l. 3321 below.

3238. brouded, embroidered; cf. B. 3659, Leg. Good Women, 227. Of in l. 3240 means 'with.'

3241. voluper, lit. 'enveloper' or 'wrapper'; hence, kerchief, or cap. In l. 4303, it means a night-cap. In Wright's Vocabularies, it translates Lat. calamandrum (568, 28), inuolutarium (590, 28), and mafora (594, 19). In the Prompt. Parv. we find: 'volypere, kerche, teristrum'; and in the Catholicon, 'volyper, caliend[r]um.' In Baret's Alvearie, h. 596, we find: 'A woman's cap, hood, or bonet, Calyptra, Caliendrum.' The tapes of this cap were 'of the same suit' as the embroidery of her collar, i. e. were of black silk.

3245. smale y-pulled, i. e. partly plucked out, to make them narrow, even, and well-marked.

3247. Tyrwhitt at first had 'for to see,' but corrected it to 'on to see,' i. e. to look upon. Cf. Leg. Good Women, 2425.

3248. pere-ionette, early-ripe pear. Tyrwhitt refers us to a F. poire jeunette, or an Ital. pero giovanetto, i. e. very young pear-tree; but I believe the explanation is as imaginary as are these terms, which I seek for in vain. I take it that he has been misled by a false etymology from F. jeune, Ital. giovane, young, whereas the reference is to the early-ripe pear called in O. F. poire de hastivel (F. hâtiveau); see hastivel in Godefroy. The corresponding E. term is gennitings, applied to apples, but applicable to pears also; and I take the etymology to be from F. Jean, John, because such apples and pears ripen about St. John's day (June 24), which is very early. Cotgrave has: 'Hastivel, a soon-ripe apple, called the St. John's apple.' Littré, s. v. poire, has: 'La poire appellée à Paris de messire Jean est celle qu'en Dauphiné et Languedoc l'on nomme de coulis.' Lacroix (Manners, &c. during the Middle Ages, p. 116) says that, in the thirteenth century, one of the best esteemed pears was the hastiveau, which was 'an early sort, and no doubt the golden pear now called St. Jean.' Finally, we learn from Piers Plowman, C. xiii. 221, that 'pere-Ionettes' were very sweet and very early ripe, and therefore very soon rotten; see my note to that line. The text, accordingly, compares this young and forward beauty to the newe (i. e. fresh-leaved) early-ripe pear-tree; and there is much propriety in the simile. Of course, this explanation is somewhat of a guess; and perhaps I may add another possible etymology, viz. from jaune, yellow, with reference to the golden colour of the pear. Cf. jaulnette, in Cotgrave, as a name for St. John's wort, and the form floure-jonettis in the King's Quair, st. 47.

3251. 'With silk tassels, and pearls (or pearl-shaped knobs or buttons) made of the metal called latoun.' Such is Tyrwhitt's simple explanation. In Riley's Memorials of London, p. 398, we find that a man was accused of having 'silvered 240 buttons of latone ... for purses.' The notes in Warton are doubly misleading, first confusing latoun with cheklatoun (which are unconnected words), and then quoting the expression 'perled cloth of gold,' which is another thing again. As to latoun, see note to C. 350, and cf. A. 699, B. 2067, &c.

3254. popelote, darling, poppet. Not connected with papillon, but with F. poupée and E. puppet. Halliwell gives: 'Poplet, a term of endearment, generally applied to a young girl: poppet is still in common use.' Cotgrave has: 'Popelin, masc. a little finicall darling.' Godefroy gives: 'poupelet, m. petit poupon.'

3256. Wright says: 'The gold noble of this period was a very beautiful coin; specimens are engraved in Ruding's Annals of the Coinage. It was coined in the Tower of London [as here said], the place of the principal London mint.' It was worth 6s. 8d., and first coined about 1339. See C. 907, and note.

3258. 'Sitting on a barn.' Repeated in C. 397.

3261. bragot, a sweet drink, made of ale and honey fermented together; afterwards, the honey was replaced by sugar and spice. See Bragget in New E. Dict. The full receipt for 'Braket' is given in Strutt, Manners and Customs, iii. 74; it contained 4 gallons of ale to a pint of honey. In 1783, it was made of ale, sugar, and spices, and drunk at Easter; Brand, Pop. Antiq. i. 112. Spelt bragot, Palladius on Husbandry, p. 90, l. 812; &c. Of British origin; Welsh bragawd; cf. O. Irish brac, later braich, malt. See also the note on Bragott in the Catholicon, ed. Herrtage.

3262. Cf. 'An appyll-hurde, pomarium'; Catholicon Anglicum.

3263-4. These two lines are cited by Dryden with approval, in the Preface to his Fables, as being 'not much behind our present English.' We are amazed to find that Dryden condemns Chaucer's lines as unequal; and coolly remarks that 'equality of numbers ... was either not known, or not always practised in Chaucer's age.' The black-letter editions which Dryden read were, in fact, full of misspelt words; but even in them, he might have found plenty of good lines, if he had not been so prejudiced and (to say the truth) conceited.

3268. prymerole, primrose; as in Gower, C. A. iii. 130. pigges-nye, pig's eye, a term of endearment; pig's eyes being (as Tyrwhitt notes) remarkably small. Cf. 'Waked with a wench, pretty peat, pretty love, and my sweet pretty pigsnie'; Peele, Old Wives' Tale, ed. Dyce (1883), p. 455, col. 1. And see Skelton, ed. Dyce, i. 28, ii. 97, 104. In fact, it is common. Brand, quoting Douce (Illust. of Shak. ii. 151), says that 'Shadwell not only uses the word pigsney in this sense, but also birdsney [bird's eye]; see his Plays, i. 357, iii. 385.' See also pigsney in Todd's Johnson, where one quotation has the form pigs eie. An ye became a nye; hence the pl. nyes, and even nynon (= eyne), as in Halliwell. See note to P. Plowman, C. xx. 306, where bler-eyed, i. e. blear-eyed, appears as bler-nyed in the B-text.

3269. leggen, to lay. Tyrwhitt has liggen, to lie, which is but poor grammar.

3274. Oseneye, Oseney, in the suburbs of Oxford, where there was an Abbey of St. Austin's Canons; cf. l. 3666.

3286. harrow (Pt. harowe), a cry for help, a cry of distress; O. F. haro, harou, the same; see Godefroy. Cf. ll. 3825, 4307.

'Primus Demon. Oute, haro, out, out! harkyn to this horne'—&c. Towneley Mysteries, Surtees Society, p. 307 (in the Mystery of "Judicium.") So in the Coventry Mysteries, we have:—

'Omnes demones clamant. Harrow and out! what xal we say?

harrow! we crye, owt! And Alas!

Alas, harrow! is þis þat day?...

Alas, harrow! and owt! we crye.'

(Play of Judgment.)

'My mother was afrayde there had ben theves in her house, and she kryed out haroll alarome (F. elle sescria harol alarme)'; Palsgrave, s. v. crye, p. 501. See Haro in Littré, hara in Schade. Cf. l. 3825; and the note in Dyce's Skelton, ii. 274.

3291. I. e. St. Thomas of Canterbury.

3299. 'A clerk would have employed his time ill.'

3308. Defective in the first foot; scan: Crist | es, &c. Tyrwhitt inserts Of before Cristes, and coolly observes, in his Notes, that it is 'added from conjecture only.' He might have said, that it makes bad grammar. And it is from such manipulated lines as this that the public forms its judgement of Chaucer's verse! Is it nothing that all the authorities begin the line alike?

3316. shode, not 'hair,' as in Tyrwhitt, but 'parting of the hair.'

3318. 'It was the fashion to wear shoes with the upper leather cut into a variety of beautiful designs, resembling the tracery of window-heads, through which the bright colour of the green, blue, or scarlet stocking beneath was shewn to great advantage';—Rock, Church of our Fathers, ii. 239, with illustrations at p. 240. Poules windowes, windows like those in St. Paul's Cathedral; hence, designs resembling them. Wright conjectures that there may even be a reference to the rose-window of old St. Paul's; and he says that examples of such shoes still exist, in the museum of Mr. C. Roach Smith. Good illustrations of these beautifully cut shoes are given in Fairholt's Costume, pp. 64, 65, who also notes that 'in Dugdale's view of old St. Paul's ... the rose-window in the transept is strictly analogous in design.' The Latin name for such shoes was calcei fenestrati, which see in Ducange. Rock also quotes the phrase corium fenestratum from Pope Innocent III. Observe the mention of his scarlet hose in the next line. Cf. note to Rom. of the Rose, 843, in vol. i. p. 423.

3321. wachet, a shade of blue. Tyrwhitt wrongly connects it with the town of Watchet, in Somersetshire. But it is French. Littré, s. v. vaciet, gives: 'Couleur d'hyacinthe ou vaciet,' colour of the hyacinth, or bilberry (Lat. uaccinium). Roquefort defines vaciet as a shrub which bears a dark fruit fit for dyeing violet; it is applied, he says, both to the fruit and the dye; and he calls it Vaccinium hysginum. Phillips says watchet is 'a kind of blew colour.' Todd's Johnson cites from Milton's Hist. of Muscovia, c. 5, 'watchet or sky-coloured cloth'; and the line, 'Who stares, in Germany, at watchet eyes,' tr. of Juvenal, Sat. xiii, wrongly attributed to Dryden. See examples in Nares from Browne, Lyly, Drayton, and Taylor: and, in Richardson, from Beaumont and Fletcher, Hackluyt, Spenser, and Ben Jonson. Cotgrave explains F. pers as 'watchet, blunket, skie-coloured,' and couleur perse as 'skie-colour, azure-colour, a blunket, or light blue.' See Blunket in the New E. Dict., and my article in Philolog. Soc. Trans. Nov. 6, 1885, p. 329. Webster has 'watchet stockings,' The Malcontent, A. iii. sc. 1. Lydgate has 'watchet blewe'; see Warton, Hist. Eng. Poet. (1840), ii. 280.

3322. poyntes, tagged laces, as in Shakespeare. MS. Hl. has here a totally different line, involving the word gores (cf. l. 3237 above), viz. 'Schapen with goores in the newe get,' i. e. in the new fashion.

3329. Tyrwhitt says:—'The school of Oxford seems to have been in much the same estimation for its dancing, as that of Stratford for its French'; see l. 125. He probably meant this satirically; but it may mean the very opposite, or something nearly so. The Stratford-at-Bow French was excellent of its kind, but unlike that of France (see note to l. 125); and probably the Oxford dancing was, likewise, of no mean quality after its kind, having twenty 'maneres.'

3331. rubible; also ribible (4396). Cf. 'where was his fedylle [fiddle] or hys ribible'; Knight de la Tour, cap. 117. See Ribibe, Ribible in Halliwell; The Squire of Low Degree (in Ritson), l. 1071; Warton, Hist. Eng. Poetry, ii. 194. Also called a rebeck, as in Milton. A two-stringed musical instrument, played with a bow, of Moorish origin; Arab. rabāb. 'Hec vitula, a rybybe'; Wright's Gloss. 738. 19.

3332. quinible. Not a musical instrument, as Tyrwhitt supposed, but a kind of voice. It is not singing consecutive fifths upon a plain song, as Mr. Chappell once thought (Pop. Music of the Olden Time, i. 34); but, as afterwards explained by him in Notes and Queries, 4 S. vi. 117, it refers to a very high voice. The quinible was an octave higher than the treble; the quatreble was an octave higher than the mean. The mean was intermediate between the plain-song or tenor (so called from its holding on the notes) and the treble. It means 'at the extreme pitch of the voice.' Skelton miswrites it quibyble.

3333. giterne, a kind of guitar. 'The gittern and the kit the wand'ring fiddlers like'; Drayton, Polyolbion, song 4. See note to P. Pl. C. xvi. 208; Prompt. Parv. p. 196.

3337. squaymous, squeamish, particular. Tyrwhitt says—'I know not how to make this sense agree with what follows' (l. 3807). But it is easy to understand that he was, ordinarily, squeamish, retentive; exceptionally, far otherwise. In the Knight de la Tour, cap. cxiv, p. 155, there is a story of a lady who waited on her old husband, and nursed him under most trying conditions; 'and unnethe there might haue be founde a woman but atte sum tyme she wolde haue lothed her, or ellys to haue be right scoymous ta haue do the seruice as thes good lady serued her husbonde contynuelly.' In a version of the Te Deum, composed about 1400, we read—'Thou were not skoymus of the maidens wombe'; Maskell, Monumenta Ritualia, ii. 14. Cf. 'squaymose, verecundus,' Catholicon; 'skeymowse, or sweymows or queymows, abhominativus'; Prompt. Parv. Spelt squmous (badly), Court of Love, l. 332; and sqymouse in Morris's reprint of it. See Desdaigneux in Cotgrave. 'To be squamish, or nice, delicias facere'; Baret's Alvearie. 'They that be subiect to Saturne ... be not skoymous of foule and stinking clothing'; Batman on Bartholomè, lib. 8. c. 23. In Weber's Metrical Romances, i. 359, we find:

'Than was the leuedi of the hous

A proude dame and an envieous,

Hokerfulliche missegging,

Squeymous and eke scorning.'

Lay le Freine, ll. 59-62.

These examples quite establish the sense. The derivation is from the rare A. F. escoymous, which occurs in P. Meyer's ed. of Nicole Bozon (Soc. des Anc. Textes Français), p. 158:—'si il poy mange e beyt poy, lors est gageous ou escoymous,' if he eats and drinks little, then is he delicate or nice. Robert of Brunne has the spelling esquaymous; Handlyng Synne, l. 7249.

3338. dangerous, sparing; see the Glossary.

3340. Cutts (Scenes and Characters of the Middle Ages, p. 219) seems to think that the clerk went about the parish with his censer, as he sometimes certainly went about with holy water. Warton, on the other hand, says that 'on holidays it was his business to carry the censer about the church, and he takes this opportunity of casting unlawful glances on the handsomest ladies of the parish.' Warton is clearly right here, for there is an allusion to the ladies coming forward with the usual offering (l. 3350); cf. note to A. 450. And see Persones Tale, l. 407.

3354. for paramours, for love's sake: a redundant expression, since par means 'for.' Cf. n. to l. 1155, at p. 67.

3358. shot-windowe. Brockett's Northern Glossary gives: 'Shot-window, a projecting window, common in old houses'; but this may have been copied from Horne Tooke, who seems to have guessed at, and misunderstood, the passage, below, in Gawain Douglas. In the new edition of Jamieson, Mr. Donaldson defines Schot as 'a window set on hinges and opening like a shutter,' and explains that, 'in the West of Scotland, a projecting window is called an out-shot window, whereas a shot-window or shot is one that can be opened or shut like a door or shutter by turning on its hinges.' It is material to the story that the window here mentioned should be readily opened and shut. The passage in G. Douglas's tr. of Virgil, prol. to bk. vii, evidently refers to a window of this character, as the poet first says:—

'Ane schot-wyndo vnschet a lytill on char,'

i. e. I unshut the shot-window, and left it a little ajar; and he goes on to say that the weather was so cold that he soon shut it again—

'The schot I clossit, and drew inwart in hy.'

See also ll. 3695, 6 below. In the next line, upon merely means 'in' or 'formed in.'

It is curious that, in Bell's Chaucer, a quotation is given from the Ballad of Clerk Saunders (Border Minstrelsy, vol. ii.) to shew that shot-window cannot mean 'shut window.' But it does not prove that it cannot mean 'hinge-shutting window,' as I have shewn the right sense to be.

'Then she has ta'en a crystal wand,

And she has stroken her troth thereon;

She has given it him out at the shot-window,

With mony a sad sigh and heavy groan.'

3361. Tyrwhitt absurdly says that ll. 3361, 3362 should be broken into four short verses, and that ladý (sic) rimes with be! In Bell's edition, they are printed in small type! They are just ordinary lines; and be (pronounced nearly as modern bay) certainly never rimed with lády—nor yet with la-dý—in Chaucer's time, when the final y was sounded like the modern ee in meet, and would rather have rimed with a word like my. It is a mere whim.

3375. menes, intermediate people, go-betweens; see Mene, sb., in Gloss. to P. Plowman, with numerous references. Brocage is the employment of a 'broker' or agent, and so means much the same. See Brokage in New E. Dict., and Brocage in Gloss. to P. Plowman.

3377. brokkinge, with quick regular interruptions, quavering, in a 'broken' manner. See Brock in New E. Dict.

3379. wafres, wafers. 'They (F. gaufres) are usually sold at fairs, and are made of a kind of batter poured into an iron instrument, which shuts up like a pair of snuffers. It is then thrust into the fire, and when it is with-drawn and opened, the gaufre, or wafer, is taken out and eaten "piping hote out of the glede," as here described.'—Note in Bell's Chaucer.

3380. mede, reward, money; distinct from meeth, mead, in l. 3378. The sense of mede is very amply illustrated in P. Plowman. L. 3380 intimates that, as she lived in a town, she could spend money at any time.

3382. A side-note, in several MSS., says: 'Unde Ouidius: Ictibus agrestis.' But the quotation is not from Ovid.

3384. The parish-clerks often took part in the Mystery Plays. The part of Herod was an important one; cf. Hamlet, iii. 2. 15.

3387. 'I presume this was a service that generally went unrewarded.'—Wright. It was like 'piping in an ivy-leaf'; see A. 1838.

3389. ape, dupe; as in A. 706.

3392. Gower has the like, ed. Pauli, i. 343:—

'An olde sawe is: who that is sligh,

In place w[h]ere he may be nigh,

He maketh the ferre leve loth

Of love; and thus ful ofte it goth.'

Hending, among his Proverbs, has—'Fer from eye, fer from herte,' answering to the mod. E. 'out of sight, out of mind.' Kemble cites: 'Quod raro cernit oculi lux, cor cito spernit,' from MS. Trin. Coll., fol. 365. Also 'Qui procul est oculis, procul est a lumine cordis,' from Gartner, Dict. 8 b.

3427. deyde, should die; subjunctive mood.

3430. that ... him is equivalent to whom. Cf. A. 2710.

3445. kyked, stared, gazed; see l. 3841. Cf. Scotch keek, to peep, pry; Burns has it in his Twa Dogs, l. 58.

3449. The carpenter naturally invokes St. Frideswide, as there was a priory of St. Frideswide at Oxford, the church of which has become the present cathedral. The shrine of St. Frideswide is still to be seen, though in a fragmentary state, at the east end of the cathedral, on its former site near the original chancel-arches and wall of her early stone church. In this line, seint-e has the fem. suffix.

3451. astromye is obviously intentional, as it fills up the line, and is repeated six lines below. The carpenter was not strong in technical terms. In like manner, he talks of 'Nowelis flood'; see note to l. 3818. The reading astronomy just spoils both lines, and loses the jest.

3456. 'That knows nothing at all except his Creed.'

3457. This story is told of Thales by Plato, in his Theaetetus; it also occurs, says Tyrwhitt, in the Cento Novelle Antiche, no. 36. It has often been repeated, and may now be found in James's edition of Æsop, 1852, Fable 170.

3469. Nearly repeated from A. 545.

3479. 'I defend thee with the sign of the cross from elves and living creatures.' At the same time, the carpenter would make the sign over him. Wightes does not mean 'witches,' as Tyrwhitt thought, but 'creatures.' Cf. l. 3484.

3480. night-spel, night-spell, a charm said at night to keep off evil spirits. The carpenter says it five times, viz. towards the four corners of the house and on the threshold. The charm is contained in lines 3483-6, and is partly intentional nonsense, as such charms often were. See several unintelligible examples in Cockayne's Leechdoms, iii. 286. The object of saying it four times towards the four corners of the house was to invoke the four evangelists, just as in the child's hymn still current, which is, in fact, a charm:—

'Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,

Bless the bed that I lie on;

Four angels round my bed,' &c.

Lines 3483-4 are clear, viz. 'May Jesus Christ and St. Benedict bless this house from every wicked creature.' As this is a reproduction of a popular saying, it is not necessary that the lines should scan; still, they run correctly, if we pronounce seynt as se-ynt, as elsewhere (note to A. 509), and if we take both to be defective at the beginning. The last two lines are mere scraps of older charms. It is just possible that for nightes verye represents an A. S. for nihte werigum, 'against the evil spirits of night'; against whom 'the white Paternoster' is to be said. The reading white is perfectly correct. There really was a prayer so called. See Notes and Queries, 1 Ser. xi. 206, 313; whence we learn that the charm above quoted, beginning 'Matthew, Mark,' &c., resembles one in the Patenôtre Blanche, to be found in the (apocryphal) Enchiridion Leonis Papae (Romae, MDCLX), where occurs:—'Petite Patenôtre Blanche, que Dieu fit, que Dieu dit, que Dieu mit en Paradis. Au soir m'allant coucher, je trouvis trois anges à mon lit, couchès, un aux pieds, deux au chevet'; &c. Here is a charm that mentions it, quoted in Notes and Queries, 1 Ser. viii. 613:—

'White Paternoster, Saint Peter's brother,

What hast thou i' th' t'one hand? White Booke leaves.

What hast i' th' t'other hand? Heven-Yate Keyes.

Open Heaven-Yates, and steike [shut] Hell-Yates.

And let every crysome-child creepe to its owne mother.

White Paternoster! Amen.'

The mention of St. Peter's brother is remarkable. It is a substitution for the older 'Saint Peter's sister' here mentioned. Again, St. Peter's sister is a substitution for St. Peter's daughter, who is a well-known saint, usually called St. Petronilla, or, in English, Saint Parnell, once a very common female name, and subsequently a surname. Her day is May 31, and she was said to cure the quartan ague; see Brand, Pop. Antiq., ed. Ellis, i. 363. A curious passage in the Ancren Riwle, p. 47, gives directions for crossing oneself at night, and particularly mentions the use of four crosses on 'four halves,' or in the original, 'vour creoices a uour halue'; with the remark 'Crux fugat omne malum,' &c. For 'Rural Charms,' see the chapter in Brand's Popular Antiquities, vol. iii.; and see the charm against rats in Political and Love Poems, ed. Furnivall, p. 23. I may add that, in Kemble's Solomon and Saturn, p. 136, is an A. S. poem, in which the Paternoster is personified, and destroys evil spirits. In Longfellow's Golden Legend, § II., Lucifer is made to say a Black Paternoster.

3507. 'That, if you betray me, you shall go mad (as a punishment).'

3509. labbe, chatterbox, talkative person. In P. Plowm. C. xiii. 39, we find the phrase 'ne labbe it out,' i. e. do not chatter about it, do not utter it foolishly. In the Romans of Partenay, ed. Skeat, 3751, we find: 'a labbyng tonge'; and Chaucer has elsewhere: 'a labbing shrewe,' E. 2428. Sewel's Du. Dict. (1754) gives: 'labben, or labbekakken, to blab, chat'; also 'labbekak, a tattling gossip, a common blab'; and 'labbery, chat, idle talk.'

3512. him, i. e. Christ. The story of the Harrowing (or despoiling) of Hell by Christ is derived from the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, and is a favourite and common subject in our older authors. It describes the descent of Christ into hell, after His crucifixion, in order to release the souls of the patriarchs, whom He takes with Him to paradise. It is given at length in P. Plowman, Text C. Pass. xxi; and was usually introduced into the mystery plays; see the Coventry Mysteries, the York Plays, &c. See also Cursor Mundi, 17,863; Ayenbite of Inwyt, p. 12; &c.

3516. 'On Monday next, at the end of the first quarter of the night,' i. e. about 9 P.M. Cf. ll. 3554, 3645.

3530. See Ecclesiasticus, xxxii. 24 [Eng. version, 19]; this was not said by 'Solomon,' but by Jesus, son of Sirach. It is quoted again in the Tale of Melibeus; B. 2193.

3539. 'The trouble endured by Noah and his company.' Noë is the form in the Latin Vulgate version. The allusion is to the intentionally comic scene introduced into the mystery plays, as, e. g. in the Chester Plays, the Towneley Plays, and the York Plays, in which Noah and his sons (felawshipe) have much ado to induce Noah's wife to enter the ark; and, in the course of the scene, she gives Noah a sound box on the ear.

3548. kimelin, a large shallow tub; especially one used for brewing; see Prompt. Parv. p. 274; and Kimnell in Miss Jackson's Shropshire Glossary.

3554. pryme, i. e. about 9 A.M. See note to F. 73.

3565. This shows that the hall was open to the roof, with cross-beams, and that the stable was attached to it, between it and the garden.

3590. sinne, i. e. venial sin; see I. 859, 904, 920.

3598. Evidently a common proverb.

3616. It is obvious that the first foot is defective.

3624. His owne hand, with his own hand. Tyrwhitt points out the same idiom in Gower, ed. Pauli, ii. 83:—

'The craft Minerve of wolle fond

And made cloth her owne hond.'

And again, id. ii. 310:—

'Thing which he said his owne mouth.'

3625. ronges, rungs, rounds, steps; stalkes, upright pieces. To climb by the rungs and the stalks means to employ the hands as well as the feet. A rung was also called a stayre (stair); and stalke is the diminutive of stele, a handle, which was another name for the upright part of a ladder. In Allit. Poems, ed. Morris, C. 513, the author complains that some people cannot tell the difference between a stele and a stayre; and, in fact, the Glossary does not point it out. In the Ancren Riwle, p. 354, we find mention of the two ladder-stales that are upright to the heaven, between which stales the tinds (or rungs) are fastened. This makes the sense perfectly clear.

3637. a furlong-way, a few minutes; exactly, two minutes and a half, at the rate of three miles an hour.

3638. 'Now say a Paternoster, and keep silence.' Accordingly, the carpenter 'says his devotion.' 'Clom!' is a word imposing silence, like 'mum!' So in the Ayenbite of Inwyt, p. 266, we find: 'Yef ye me wylleth y-here, habbeth amang you clom and reste'; i. e. if you wish to hear me, keep among you silence and rest.

3645. corfew-tyme, probably 8 P.M. The original time for ringing the curfew-bell, as a signal for putting out fires and lights, was eight o'clock. The custom has been kept up in some places till the present day; the hour for it is sometimes 8 P.M., and sometimes 9 P.M. In olden times, mention is usually made of the former of these hours; see Brand, Pop. Antiq. ii. 220; Prompt. Parv. p. 110. People invariably went to bed very early; see l. 3633.

3655. The service of lauds followed that of nocturns; the latter originally began at midnight, but usually somewhat later. The time indicated seems to have been just before daybreak. 'These nocturns should begin at such a time as to be ended just as morning's twilight broke, so that the next of her services, the lauds, or matutinae laudes, might come on immediately after.'—Rock, Church of our Fathers, iii. 2. 6. From l. 3731, we learn, however, that the night was still 'as dark as pitch.' Perhaps the time was between two and three o'clock, as Wright suggests.

3668. the grange, lit. granary; but the term was applied to a farm-house and granary on an estate belonging to a feudal manor or (as here) to a religious house. As the estate often lay at some distance from the abbey, it might be necessary for the carpenter, who went to cut down trees, to stay at the grange for the night. Cf. note to P. Pl. C. xx. 71; and Prompt. Parv. (s. v. grawnge).

3675. at cockkes crowe; cf. l. 3687. The expression in l. 3674 must refer to Monday: the 'cock-crow' refers to Tuesday morning, when it was still pitch-dark (l. 3731). The time denoted by the 'first cock-crow' is very vague; see the Chapter on Cock-crowing in Brand's Pop. Antiquities. The 'second cock-crow' seems to be about 3 A.M., as in Romeo and Juliet, iv. 4. 4; and the 'first cock-crow,' shortly after midnight, as in K. Lear, iii. 4. 121, 1 Hen. IV. ii. 1. 20. An early mention of the first cock occurs in Ypomedon, 783, in Weber's Met. Romances, ii. 309:—'And at the fryst cokke roos he.' The clearest statement is in Tusser's Husbandrie, sect. 74 (E. D. S. p. 165), where he says that cocks crow 'At midnight, at three, and an hower ere day,' which he afterwards explains by 'past five.'

3682. On 'itching omens,' see Miss Burne's Shropshire Folk-Lore, p. 269. 'If your right hand itches, you will receive money; ... if your nose itches, you will be kissed, cursed, or vexed.'

3684. Cf. 'If [in a dream] you see many loaves, it portends joy'; A. S. Leechdoms, iii. 215.

3689. at point-devys, with all exactness, precisely, very neatly; cf. As You Like It, iii. 2. 401. O. F. devis, 'ordre, beauté; a devis, par devis, en bel ordre, d'une manière bien ordonnée, à gré, à souhait'; Godefroy. See F. 560; Rom. of the Rose, 1215.

3690. greyn, evidently some sweet or aromatic seed or spice; apparently cardamoms, otherwise called grains of Paradise (New E. Dict.) 'Greynys, spyce, Granum Paradisi'; Prompt. Parv.; see Way's note. Cf. Rom. of the Rose, 1369, and the note (vol. i. p. 428).

3692. trewe-love, (probably) a leaf of herb-paris; in the efficacy of which he had some superstitious belief. True-love is sometimes used as an abbreviation of true-love knot, as in the last stanza of the Court of Love; and such is the case here. True-love knots were of various shapes; see pictures of four such in Ogilvie's Dictionary. Some had four loops, which gave rise to the name true-love as applied to herb-paris. Gerarde's Herball, 1597, p. 328, thus describes herb-paris (Paris quadrifolia):—At the top of the stalk 'come foorth fower leaves directly set one against another, in manner of a Burgonnion crosse or a true love knot; for which cause among the auncients it hath beene called herbe Truelove.' It is still called True Love's Knot in Cumberland.

3700. Note the rime of tó me with cinam-ó-me.

3708. Iakke, Jack, here an epithet of a fool, like Iankin (B. 1172); and see note to B. 4000. Cf. E. zany.

3709. 'It wilt not be (a case of) come-kiss-me.' Chaucer has ba, to kiss, D. 433; and come-ba-me, i. e. come kiss me, is here used as a phrase; so that the line simply means 'you certainly will not get a kiss!' Observe the rime with bla-me. Bas also meant to kiss, and Skelton uses the words together (ed. Dyce, i. 22):—

'With ba, ba, ba, and bas, bas, bas,

She cheryshed hym, both cheke and chyn';

i. e. with repeated kisses on cheek and chin. So again (i. 127) we find: 'bas me, buttyng, praty Cys!' And so again (ii. 6): 'bas me, swete Parrot, bas me, swete, swete!' Further illustration is afforded by Burton's Anat. of Melancholy, pt. 3. sec. 2. mem. 4. subsec. 1: 'Yea, many times, this love will make old men and women ... dance, come-kiss-me-now, mask, and mum.' This complete explanation of an old crux was first given by Mr. Ellis, in 1870, in his Early Eng. Pronunciation, p. 715, who notes that the reading com ba me is fairly well supported; see his Critical Note. Several MSS. turn it into compame, which is clearly due to the influence of the familiar word companye, which repeatedly ends a line in Chaucer. Mr. Ellis well remarks—'Com ba me! was probably the name of a song, like ... the modern "Kiss me quick, and go, my love." It is also probable that Absolon's speech contained allusions to it, and that it was very well known at the time.'

The curious part of the story is that, in 1889, I adopted the same reading independently, and for precisely similar reasons. But Mr. Ellis was before me, by nineteen years. See l. 3716 below.

The following MSS. (says Mr. Ellis) read combame; viz. Harl. 7335—Camb. Univ. Library, Ii. 3. 26—Trin. Coll. Camb. R. 3. 3—Rawl. MS. Poet. 141. Bodl. 414 has cum bame; whilst Rawl. Misc. 1133 and Laud 739 have come ba me.

3713. Lit. 'in the way to twenty devils'; hence, in the name of twenty devils. 'In the twenty deuyll way, Au nom du grant diable'; Palsgrave (1852), p. 838. See ll. 3134, 4257.

3721-2. These two lines are in E. only; Tyrwhitt omits them. But the old black-letter editions retain them.

3723. He knelt down, because the window was so low (3696).

3725. Cf. 'For who-so kissing may attayne'; Rom. Rose, 3677; and Ovid, Ars Amatoria, i. 669.

3726. thyn ore, thy favour, thy grace; the words 'grant me' being understood. It is not uncommon.

'Syr Lybeaus durstede [thirsted] sore,

And seyde, Maugys, thyn ore,

To drynke lette me go.'

Ritson, Met. Romances, ii. 57.

'I haue siked moni syk, lemmon, for thin ore';

Böddeker's Altengl. Dichtungen, p. 174.

See Specimens of E. Eng., Part I; Glossary to Havelok; &c.

3728. com of, i. e. be quick; like Have do, have done! We now say 'come on!' But strictly, come on means 'begin,' and come off means 'make an end.'

3751. 'If it be not so that, rather than possess all this town, I would like to be avenged.'

3770. viritoot must be accepted as the reading; the reading verytrot in MS. Hl. gives a false rime, as the oo in woot is long. The meaning is unknown; but the context requires the sense of 'upon the move,' or 'astir.' My guess is that viri- is from F. virer, to turn (cf. E. virelay), and that toot represents O. F. tot (L. totum, F. tout), all; so that viritoot may mean 'turn-all.' Cotgrave gives virevoulte, 'a veere, whirle a round gamball, friske, or turne,' like the Portuguese viravolta. The form verytrot (very trot) is clearly due to an attempt to make sense. MS. Cam. has merytot, possibly with reference to M. E. merytoter, a swing (Catholicon); which is derived from mery, merry, and toteren, to totter, oscillate. In the North of England, a swing is still called a merry-trotter (corruption of merry-totter), as noted by Halliwell, who remarks that 'the meritot is mentioned by Chaucer,' which is not the fact. Both these 'glosses' give the notion of movement, as this is obviously the general sense implied. Whatever the reading may be, we can see the sense, viz. 'some gay girl (euphemism for light woman) has brought you thus so early astir'; and Gervase accordingly goes on to say, 'you know what I mean.'

Ed. 1561 has berytote, a misprint for verytote.

3771. Here as elsewhere, së-ynt is dissyllabic; several MSS. have seinte, but this can hardly be right. For Note, MSS. Pt. Hl. have Noet, meaning St. Neot, whose day is Oct. 28, and whose name remains in St. Neot's, in Cornwall, and St. Neot's, in Huntingdonshire. He died about 877; see Wright's Biogr. Brit. Litt., A. S. Period, p. 381. The spelling Note is remarkable, as the mod. E. name (pronounced as Neet, riming with feet) suggests the A. S. form Nēot, and M. E. Neet.

3774. A proverbial phrase. Tyrwhitt quotes from Froissart, v. iv. p. 92, ed. 1574; 'Il aura en bref temps autres estoupes en sa quenoille.' To 'have tow on one's distaff' is to have a task in hand. 'Towe on my dystaf have I for to spynne'; Hoccleve, De Regimine Principum, p. 45.

3777. As lene, pray lend; see note to E. 7.

3782. MS. Hl. has fo, which is silently altered to fote by Bell and Wright. Tyrwhitt also has fote, which he found in the black-letter editions. The reading foo is probably quite right, and is an intentional substitution for foot. It is notorious that oaths were constantly made unmeaning, to avoid a too open profanity. In Chaucer, we have cokkes bones, H. 9, I. 29, and Corpus bones, C. 314. Another corruption of a like oath is 's foot, Shak. Troil. ii. 3. 6, which is docked at the other end. It is poor work altering MSS. so as to destroy evidence. Cristes foo might mean 'the devil'; but this is unlikely.

3785. stele, handle; i. e. by the cold end, which served as a handle. See note to D. 949. stēle, i. e. steel, would give a false rime.

3811. Tyrwhitt inserted al before aboute in his text, but withdrew it in his notes. The A. S. has hand-brǣd, but the M. E. hand-e-brede had at least three syllables, if not four. This is shewn by MS. spellings and by the metre, and still more clearly by Wyclif's Bible, which has: 'a spanne, that is, an handibreede,' Ezek. xl. 5 (later version). It may have been formed by analogy with M. E. handiwerk (A. S. hand-geweorc) and handewrit (A. S. hand-gewrit). But the form is handbrede in Palladius on Husbandry, p. 80, l. 536.

3818. Nowelis flood is the mistake of the illiterate carpenter for Noes flood; see it again in l. 3834, where he is laughed at for having used the expression in his previous talks with the clerk and his wife. It is on a par with his astromye (note to l. 3451). He was less familiar with the Noe of the Bible than with the Nowel of the carol-singers at Christmas; see F. 1255. The editors carefully 'correct' the poet. In l. 3834, Nowélis helps the scansion, whilst Noes spoils the line, which has to be 'amended.' The readings are: E. Hn. as in the text; Cm. Pt. Ln. the Nowels flood; Pt. the Noes flood; Hl. He was agast and feerd of Noes flood. Tyrwhitt actually reads; He was agast-e so of Noes flood; regardless of the fact that agast has no final -e. The carpenter's mistake is the more pardonable when we notice that Noë was sometimes used, instead of Noël, to mean 'Christmas.' For an example, see the Poètes de Champagne, Reims, 1851, p. 146.

3821. This singular expression is from the French. Tyrwhitt cites:—

'Ainc tant come il mist a descendre,

Ne trouva point de pain a vendre,'

i. e. he found no bread to sell in his descent. His reference is to the Fabliaux, t. ii. p. 282; Wright refers, for the same, to the fabliau of Aloul, in Barbazan, l. 591. I suppose the sense is, 'he never stopped, as if to transact business.'

3822. E. Hn. celle; rest selle. The word celle might mean 'chamber.' There was an approach to the roof, which they had reached by help of a ladder; and the three tubs were hung among the balks which formed the roof of the principal sitting-room below. But it is difficult to see how the word celle could be applied to the chief room in the house. Tyrwhitt explains selle as 'door-sill or threshold'; but we must bear in mind that the usual M. E. form of sill was either sille or sulle, from A. S. syll. The spelling with s proves nothing, since Chaucer undoubtedly means 'cell' in A. 1376, where Cm. Hl. have selle, and in B. 3162, where three MSS. (Cp. Pt. Ln.) all read selle again. Why the carpenter should have arrived at the door-sill, I do not know.

Nevertheless, upon further thoughts, I accept Tyrwhitt's view, with some modification. We find that Chaucer actually uses Kentish forms (with e for A. S. y) elsewhere, for the sake of a rime. A clear case is that of fulfelle, in Troil. iii. 510. This justifies the dat. form selle (A. S. sylle). But we must take selle to mean 'flooring' or 'boarding,' and floor to mean the ground beneath it; just as we find, in Widegren's Swedish Dictionary, that syll means 'the timber next the ground.' I would therefore read selle, with the sense of 'flooring'; and I explain floor by 'flat earth.' In the allit. Morte Arthure, 3249, flores signifies 'plains.' In Gawayn and the Grene Knyght, 55, sille means 'floor.'

3841. Observe the form cape, as a variant of gape, both here and in l. 3444 (see footnotes); and in Troil. v. 1133.

The Reve's Prologue.

3855. For laughen, Tyrwhitt has laughed, and in l. 3858 has the extraordinary form lought, but he corrects the former of these in his Notes. The verb was originally strong; see examples in Stratmann, s. v. hlahhen.

3857. Repeated, nearly, in F. 202; see note.

3864. so theek, for so thee ik, so may I thrive, as I hope to thrive. The Reve came from Norfolk, and Chaucer makes him use the Northern ik for I in this expression, and again in l. 3867 (in the phrase ik am), and in l. 3888 (in the phrase ik have), but not elsewhere; whence it would seem that ik for I was then dying out in Norfolk; it has now died out even in the North. Both the Host and the Canon's Yeoman use the Southern form so theech; see C. 947, G. 929. Cf. so the ik, P. Pl., B. v. 228.

3865. To blear (lit. to dim) one's eye was to delude, hoodwink, or cheat a man. So also blered is thyn yë, H. 252.

3868. gras-time, the time when a horse feeds himself in the fields. My fodder is now forage, my food is now such as is provided for me; I am like a horse in winter, whose food is hay in a stable. Thynne animadverts upon this passage (Animadversions, p. 39), and says that forage means 'such harde and olde prouisione as ys made for horses and cattle in winter.' He remarks, justly, that forage is but loosely used in Sir Thopas, B. 1973.

3869. I take this to mean—'my old years write (mark upon me) this white head,' i. e. turn me grey.

3870. 'My heart is as old (lit. mouldy) as my hairs are.' Mouled is the old pp. out of which we have made the mod. E. mould-y, adding -y by confusion with the adj. formed from mould, the ground. It is fully explained in the Addenda to my Etym. Dict. 2nd ed. p. 818; and the verb moulen, to grow mouldy, occurs in B. 32.

3871. 'Unless I grow like a medlar, which gets worse all the while, till it be quite rotten, when laid up in a heap of rubbish or straw.'

3876. hoppen, dance; alluding to Luke vii. 32, where Wyclif has: 'we han sungun to you with pipis, and ye han not daunsid.'

3877. nayl, a hindrance; like a nail that holds a box from being opened, or that catches a man's clothes, and holds him back.

3878. 'E quegli che contro alla mia età parlando vanno, mostra mal che conoscano che, perchè il porro abbia il capo blanco, che la coda sia verde'; and, as for those that go speaking about my age, it shews that they ill understand how, although the leek has a white head, its tail (or blade) is green; Boccaccio, Decamerone; introduction to the Fourth Day. So also in Northward Ho, by Dekker and Webster, Act iv. sc. 1: 'garlic has a white head and a green stalk'; where Dyce remarks that it occurs again in The Honest Lawyer, 1616, sig. G 2. Cf. P. Plowman, B. xiii. 352.

3878-82. Compare Alanus de Insulis, Parabolae, cap. I (in Leyser's collection, p. 1067):—

'Extincti cineres, si ponas sulphura, uiuent;

Sic uetus apposita mente calescit amor.'

3882. For olde, T. has cold, I cannot guess why: smouldering ashes are more likely to be hot. Old ashes mean ashes left after a fire has died down, in which, if raked together, fire can be long preserved. 'Still, in our old ashes, is fire collected.' See the parallel passage in Troilus, ii. 538.

In Soliman and Persida (Dodsley's Old Plays, ed. Hazlitt, v. 339) we find:—

'as the fire

That lay, with honour's hand raked up in ashes,

Revives again to flames.'

We are reminded of line 92 in Gray's Elegy:—'Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires'; but Gray himself tells us that he was thinking, not of Chaucer, but of Sonnet 169 (170) of Petrarch:—

'Ch'i veggio nel pensier, dolce mio fuoco,

Fredda una lingua e due begli occhi chiusi,

Rimaner doppo noi pien di faville'—

i. e. which (love-songs) I see in thought, O my sweet flame, when (my) one tongue is cold, and (your) two fine eyes are closed, remaining after us, full of sparkles.

y-reke, raked or heaped together, collected. Not explained by Wright or Morris; Tyrwhitt explains it by 'smoking,' and takes it to be a present participle, which is impossible. It is the pt. t. of the scarce strong verb reken, pt. t. rak, pp. y-reken, y-reke, of which the primary notion was to 'gather together.' It occurs, just once, in Gothic, in the translation of Romans, xii. 20: 'haurja funins rikis ana haubith is,' i. e. coals of fire shalt thou heap together on his head. It is the very verb from which the sb. rake is derived. See Rake in my Etym. Dict., and the G. Rechen in Kluge. The notion is taken from the heaping together of smouldering ashes to preserve the fire within. Lydgate copies this image in his Siege of Troye, ed. 1555, fol. B 4:—

'But inward brent of hate and of enuy

The hoote fyre, and yet there was no smeke [smoke],

So couertly the malyce was yreke.'

3895. chimbe. 'The prominency of the staves beyond the head of the barrel. The imagery is very exact and beautiful'; Tyrwhitt. 'Chime (pronounced choim), sb. a stave of a cask, barrel, &c.'; Leicestershire Glossary (E. D. S.) Urry gives 'Chimbe, the Rim of a Cooper's Vessel on the outside of the Head. The ends of the Staves from the Grooves outward are called the Chimes.' Hexham's Du. Dict. has: 'Kimen, Kimmen, the Brimmes of a tubb or a barrill.' Sewel's Du. Dict. has: 'Kim, the brim of a barrel.' The Bremen Kimm signifies not only the rim of a barrel, but the edge of the horizon; cf. Dan. Kiming, Kimming, the horizon. See further in New E. Dict.

3901-2. what amounteth, to what amounts. What shul, why must.

3904. Tyrwhitt refers us to Ex sutore medicus, Phædrus, lib. i. fab. 14; and to ex sutore nauclerus, alluded to by Pynson the printer, at the end of his edition of Littleton's Tenures, 1525 (Ames, p. 488).

3906. Depeford (lit. deep ford), Deptford; just beyond which is Grenewich, Greenwich. Thus the pilgrims had not advanced very far, considering that the Knight and Miller had both told a tale. They had made an early start, and it was now 'half-way prime.' 'Deptford,' says Dr. Furnivall, 'is 3 miles down the road [or a little more, it depends upon whence we reckon]; and, as only the Reeve's Tale and the incomplete Cook's Tale follow in Group A, we must suppose that Chaucer meant to insert here [at the end of Group A] the Tales of some, at least, of the Five City-Mechanics and the Ploughman ... in order to bring his party to their first night's resting-place, Dartford, 15 miles from London'; Temp. Preface, p. 19. 'The deep ford,' I may remark, must have been the one through the Ravensbourn. Deptford and Greenwich (where, probably, Chaucer was then residing) lay off the Old Kent Road, on the left; hence the host points them out.

half-way prime. That is, half-past seven o'clock; taking prime to mean the first quarter of the day, or the period from 6 to 9 A.M. It was also used to denote the end of that period, or 9 A.M., as in B. 4387, where the meaning is certain. In my Preface to Chaucer's Astrolabe, (E. E. T. S.), I said: 'What prime means in all cases, I do not pretend to say. It is a most difficult word, and I think was used loosely. It might mean the beginning or end of a period, and the period might be an hour, or a quarter of a day. I think it was to obviate ambiguity that the end of the period was sometimes expressed by high prime, or passed prime, or prime large; we also find such expressions as half prime, halfway prime, or not fully prime, which indicate a somewhat long period. For further remarks, see Mr. Brae's Essay on Chaucer's Prime, in his edition of the Astrolabe, p. 90. I add some references for the word prime, which may be useful. We find prime in Kn. Ta. 1331 (A. 2189); Mill. Ta. 368 (A. 3554); March. Ta. 613 (E. 1857); Pard. Ta. 200 (C. 662); Ship. Ta. 206 (B. 1396); Squi. Ta. 65 (F. 73); fully prime, Sir Topas, 114 (B. 2015); halfway prime, Reve's Prol. 52 (A. 3906); passed prime, Ship. Ta. 88 (B. 1278), Fre. Ta. 178 (D. 1476); prime large, Squi. Ta. ii. 14 (F. 360). See also prime in Troilus, ii. 992, v. 15; passed prime, ii. 1095 (in the same); an houre after the prime, ii. 1557.' Cf. notes to F. 73, &c.

3911. somdel, in some degree. sette his howve, the same as set his cappe, i. e. make him look foolish; see notes to A. 586, 3143. To come behind a man, and alter the look of his head-gear, was no doubt a common trick; now that caps are moveable, the perennial joy of the street-boy is to run off with another boy's cap.

3912. 'For it is allowable to repel (shove off) force by force.' The Ellesmere MS. has here the sidenote—'vim vi repellere.'

3919. stalke, (here) a bit of stick; Lat. festuca. balke, a beam; Lat. trabs. See the Vulgate version of Matt. vii. 3.

The Reves Tale.

The origin of this Tale was a French Fabliau, like one that was first pointed out by Mr. T. Wright, and printed in his Anecdota Literaria, p. 15. Another similar one is printed in Méon's edition of Barbazan's Fabliaux, iii. 239 (Paris, 1808). Both were reprinted for the Chaucer Society, in Originals and Analogues, &c., p. 87. See further in vol. iii. p. 397.

3921. Trumpington. The modern mill, beside the bridge over the Granta, between the villages of Trumpington and Grantchester, is familiar to all Cambridge men; but this mill and bridge are both comparatively modern, being placed upon an artificial channel. The old 'bridge' is that over the old river-bed, somewhat nearer Trumpington; the 'brook' is this old course of the Granta, which is hereabouts very narrow and circuitous; and the mill stood a quarter of a mile above the bridge, at the spot marked 'Old Mills' on the ordnance-map, though better known as 'Byron's pool,' which is the old mill-pool. The fen mentioned in l. 4065 is probably the field between the Old Mills and the road, which must formerly have been fen-land; though Lingay Fen may be meant, which covers the space between Bourne Brook (flowing into the Granta at the Old Mills) and the Cambridge and Bedford Railway. We like to think that Chaucer saw the spot himself; but he certainly seems to have thought that Trumpington was somewhat further from Cambridge than it really is, as he actually makes the clerks to have been benighted there; and he might easily have learnt some local particulars from his wife's friend, Lady Blaunche de Trumpington, or from Sir Roger himself. In any case, it is interesting to find him thus boldly assigning a known locality to a mill which he had found in a French fabliau.

3927. Pypen, play the bag-pipe; see A. 565. The Reeve is clearly trying to make his description suit the Miller in the company, whom it is his express object to tease. Hence he says he could wrestle well (cf. A. 548) and could play the bag-pipe.

nettes bete, mend nets; he knew how to net.

3928. turne coppes, turn cups, make wooden cups in a turning-lathe; not a very difficult operation. It is curious that Tyrwhitt gave up trying to explain this simple phrase. In Riley's Memorials of London, p. 666, we find that, in 1418, when the English were besieging Rouen, it was enacted that 'the turners should have 4s. for every hundred of 2,500 cups, in all 100s.': so that a wooden cup could be turned at the cost of a halfpenny.

3929. Printed pavade by Tyrwhitt, pauade by Thynne (ed. 1532), but panade in Wright. Levins' Manipulus Vocabulorum (1570) has: 'A pauade, pugio'; but this is probably copied from Thynne. The exact form is not found in O. F., but Godefroy's O. F. Dict. gives: 'Penart, pennart, penard, panart, pannart, coutelas, espèce de grand couteau à deux tranchants ou taillants, sorte de poignard'; with seven examples, one of which shows that it could be hung at the belt: 'Un grant pennart qu'il avoit pendu a sa sainture.' Ducange gives the Low Lat. form penardus, and wrongly connects it with F. poignard, from which it is clearly distinct; but he also gives the form pennatum with the sense of 'pruning-knife,' and Torriano gives an Ital. pennato with the same sense. Cf. Lat. bi-pennis. It was a two-edged cutlass, worn in addition to his sword; and see below. It is also printed pauade in Lydgate's Siege of Troy, ed. 1555, fol. N 5, back.

3931. popper, thruster, i. e. dagger; from the verb pop, to thrust in; cf. poke. Ioly probably means 'neat' or 'small.' This was the Miller's third weapon of offence, of which he had three sizes, viz. a sword, a cutlass, and a little dagger like a misericorde, used for piercing between the joints of armour. No wonder that no one durst touch him 'for peril.' The poppere answers to the boydekin of l. 3960, q.v. And besides these, he carried a knife. 'Poppe, to stryke'; Cathol. Angl. p. 286.

3933. thwitel, knife; from A.S. thwītan, to cut; now ill-spelt whittle. The portraits of Chaucer show a knife hanging from his breast; accordingly, in Greene's Description of Chaucer, we find this line: 'A whittle by his belt he bare'; see Greene's Works, ed. Dyce, 1883, p. 320. Note that Sheffield was already celebrated for its cutlery; so in the Witch of Edmonton, Act ii. sc. 2, Somerton speaks of 'the new pair of Sheffield knives.'

3934. camuse (Hl. camois), low and concave; cf. l. 3974 below. F. camus, 'flat-nosed'; Cotgrave. Ital. camuso, 'one with a flat nose'; Florio. See Camois in the New E. Dict., where it is thus explained: 'Of the nose: low and concave. Of persons: pug-nosed.' To the examples there given, add the following from Holland's tr. of Pliny, i. 229; 'As for the male goats, they are held for the best which are most camoise or snout-nosed.' Hexham's Du. Dict., s. v. Neuse, has the curious entry: 'een Camuys ende opwaerts gaende Neuse [lit. a camus and upwards-going Nose], Camell-nosed.'

3936. market-beter, a frequenter of markets, who swaggered about, and was apt to be quarrelsome and in the way of others. See Wyclif's Works, ed. Matthew, pp. 511, 520; and cf. F. battre le pavé, 'aller et venir sans but, sans occupation'; Littré. And cf. E. 'policeman's beat.' Cotgrave has: 'Bateur de pavez, a pavement-beater; ... one that walks much abroad, and riots it wheresoever he walks.' The following passage from the Complaint of the Ploughman (in Wright's Polit. Poems, i. 330) makes it clear—

'At the wrastling, and at the wake,

And chief chantours at the nale [ale];

Market-beaters, and medling make,

Hoppen and houten [hoot], with heve and hale.'

A synonymous term was market-dasher, spelt market-daschare in the Prompt. Parv.; see Way's note.

atte fulle, completely, entirely.

3941. Simkin, diminutive of Simond, which was his real name (ll. 4022, 4127). Altered to Sim-e-kin by Tyrwhitt, for the scansion; but cf. ll. 3945, 3947, 4034, &c. He makes the same alteration in l. 3959, for a like reason, but we may scan it: 'But if | he wold | e be | slayn,' &c. All the MSS. have Symkyn, except Hl., which has Symekyn here and in l. 3959. We must either make the form variable, or else treat the word de-y-nous as a trisyllable. Deynous was his regular epithet.

3943. This statement, that the parson of the town was her father, has caused surprise. In Bell's Chaucer, the theory is started that the priest had been a widower before he took orders, which no one can be expected to believe; it is too subtle. It is clear that she was an illegitimate daughter; this is why her father paid money to get her married to a miller, and why she thought ladies ought to spare her (and not avoid her), because it was an honour to have a priest for a father, and because she had learnt so much good-breeding in a nunnery. The case is only too clear; cf. note to l. 3963.

3953. tipet, not here a cape, but the long pendant from the hood at one time fashionable, which Simkin wound round his head, in order to get it out of the way. See Tippett in Fairholt's Costume in England; Glossary. Cf. notes to A. 233, 682.

3954. So also the Wife of Bath had 'gay scarlet gytes'; D. 559. Spelt gide in MS. Ln., and gyde in Blind Harry's Wallace, i. 214: 'In-till a gyde of gudly ganand greyne,' where it is used of a gay dress worn by Wallace. It occurs also twice in Golagros and Gawain, used of the gay dress of a woman; see Jamieson. Nares shews that gite is used once by Fairfax, and thrice by Gascoigne. The sense is usually dubious; it may mean 'robe,' or, in some places, 'head-dress.' The g was certainly hard, and the word is of F. origin. Godefroy gives 'guite, chapeau'; and Roquefort has 'wite, voile.' The F. Gloss. appended to Ducange gives the word witart as applied to a man, and witarde as applied to a woman. Cf. O. F. wiart, which Roquefort explains as a woman's veil, whilst Godefroy explains guiart as a dress or vestment. The form of the word suggests a Teutonic origin; perhaps from O. H. G. wît, wide, ample, which would explain its use to denote a veil or a robe indifferently. Ducange suggests a derivation from Lat. uitta, which is also possible.

3956. dame, lady; see A. 376.

3959. wold-e, wished, seems to be dissyllabic; see note to l. 3941.

3960. boydekin, dagger, as in B. 3892, q. v. Cf. note to l. 3931.

3962. 'At any rate, they would that their wives should think so.' Wenden, pt. pl. subj. of wenen.

3963. smoterlich, besmutched; cf. bismotered in A. 76. Tyrwhitt says: 'it means, I suppose, smutty, dirty; but the whole passage is obscure.' Rather, it is perfectly clear when the allusion is perceived. The allusion is to the smutch upon her reputation, on account of her illegitimacy. This explains also the use of somdel; 'because she was, in some measure, of indifferent reputation, she was always on her dignity, and ready to take offence'; which is true to human nature. Thus the whole context is illuminated at once.

3964. digne, full of dignity, and therefore (as Chaucer says, with exquisite satire) like (foul) water in a ditch, which keeps every one at a proper distance. However, the satire is not Chaucer's own, but due to a popular proverbial jest, which occurs again in The Ploughman's Crede, l. 375, where the Dominican friars are thus described:—

'Ther is more pryve pride in Prechours hertes

Than ther lefte [remained] in Lucyfer, er he were lowe fallen;

They ben digne as dich-water, that dogges in bayteth' [feed in].

And, again, in the same, l. 355:—

'For with the princes of pride the Prechours dwellen,

They bene as digne as the devel, that droppeth fro hevene.'

Hence digne is proud, repulsive.

3965. 'And full of scorn and reproachful taunting'; like the lady in Lay de Freine, l. 60 (in Weber's Met. Romances, i. 359):—

'A proud dame and an enuious,

Hokerfulliche missegging,

Squeymous and eke scorning;

To ich woman sche hadde envie.'

Hoker is the A. S. hōcor, scorn. Bismare is properly of two syllables only (A. S. bismor), but is here made into three; MS. Cp. has bisemare, and Hl. has bissemare, and the spelling bisemare also appears much earlier, in the Ancren Riwle, p. 132, and bisemære in Layamon, i. 140. Owing to a change in the accentuation, the etymology had been long forgotten. See Bismer in the New E. Dict., and see the Glossary.

3966. 'It seemed to her that ladies ought to treat her with consideration,' and not look down upon her; see note to l. 3943.

3977. The person, the parson, i. e. her grandfather.

3980. 'And raised difficulties about her marriage.'

3990. The Soler-halle has been guessed to be Clare Hall, merely because that college was of early foundation, and was called a 'hall.' But a happy find by Mr. Riley tells us better, and sets the question at rest. In the First Report of the Historical MSS. Commission, p. 84, Mr. Riley gives several extracts from the Bursar's Books of King's Hall, in which the word solarium repeatedly occurs, shewing that this Hall possessed numerous solaria, or sun-chambers, used as dwelling-rooms, apparently by the fellows. They were probably fitted with bay-windows. This leaves little doubt that Soler-Hall was another name for King's Hall, founded in 1337 by Edward III, and now merged in Trinity College. It stood on the ground now occupied by the Great Gate, the Chapel, Bowling-green, and Master's Lodge of that celebrated college. On the testimony of Chaucer, we learn that the King's Hall, even in his time, was 'a greet collegge.' Its successor is the largest in England.

In Wright's Hist. of Domestic Manners, pp. 83, 127, 128, it is explained that the early stone-built house usually had a hall on the ground-floor, and a soler above. The latter, being more protected, was better lighted, and was considered a place of greater security. 'In the thirteenth century a proverbial characteristic of an avaricious and inhospitable person, was to shut his hall-door and live in the soler.' It was also 'considered as the room of honour for rich lodgers or guests who paid well.' Udall speaks of 'the solares, or loftes of my hous'; tr. of Erasmus' Apophthegmes, Aug. Cæsar, § 27.

3999. made fare, made a to-do (as we now say).

4014. Strother. There is now no town of this name in England, but the reference is probably to a place which gave its name to a Northumbrian family. Mr. Gollancz tells me:—'The Strother family, of Northumberland, famous in the fourteenth century, was a branch of the Strothers, of Castle Strother in Glendale, to the west of Wooler. The chief member of this Northumberland branch seems to have been Alan de Strother the younger, who died in 1381. (See Calendarium Inquis. post Mortem, 4 Ric. II, vol. iii. p. 32.) The records contain numerous references to him; e. g. "Aleyn de Struther, conestable de nostre chastel de Rokesburgh," A. D. 1366 (Rymer's Fœdera, iii. 784); "Alanum del Strother, vicecomitem de Rokesburgh et vicecomitem Northumbriæ" (id. iii. 919). It is a noteworthy point that this Alan de Strother had a son John.' This definite information does away with the old guess, that Strother is a mistake for Langstrothdale Chase almost at the N.W. extremity of the W. Riding of Yorkshire, joining the far end of Wharfdale to Ribblesdale, and even now not very accessible, though it can be reached from Ribblehead station, on the Skipton and Carlisle Railway, or from Horton-in-Ribblesdale.

I suppose that Castle Strother, mentioned above, must have been near Kirknewton, some 5 miles or so to the west of Wooler. The river Glen falls into the Till, which is a tributary of the Tweed. I find mention, in 1358-9, of 'Henry de Strother, of Kirknewton in Glendale'; Brand, Hist. of Newcastle, ii. 414, note. W. Hutchinson, in his View of Northumberland, 1778, i. 260, speaks of 'Kirknewton, one of the manors of the Barony of Wark, the ancient residence of the Strothers, now the property of John Strother Ker, Esq.'

We may here notice some of the characteristics of the speech which Chaucer assigns to these two students from Northumberland.

(a) They use a for A. S. ā, where Chaucer usually has ō (long and open). Ex. na (Ch. no), swa (so), ham (hoom), gas (gooth), fra (fro), banes (bones), anes (ones), waat (woot), raa (ro), bathe (bothe), ga (go), twa, (two), wha (who). Similarly we find saule for Ch. soule, soul, tald for told, halde for holde, awen for owen, own.

(b) They use a for A. S. short a before ng. Ex. wanges, but Ch. also has wang-tooth, B. 3234; sang for song (4170), lange for longe, wrang for wrong.

(c) They use (perhaps) ee for oo; as in geen for goon, gone, 4078; neen for noon, none, 4185. This is remarkable, and, in fact, the readings vary, as noted. Geen, neen are in MS. E. Note also pit for put, 4088.

(d) They use the indicative sing. and pl. in -es or -s. Ex. 3 pers. sing. far-es, bo-es, ga-s, wagg-es, fall-es, fynd-es, 4130, bring-es, tyd-es, 4175, say-s, 4180. Pl. werk-es, 4030. So also is I, I is, thou is, 4089. In l. 4045, we find are ye, E.; ar ye (better), Hn.; ere ye, Cp. Hl.; is ye, Cm. Pt.; es ye, Ln. Both ar (er) and is (es) are found in the present tense plural in Northern works; we is occurs in Barbour's Bruce, iii. 317. It is not 'ungrammatical,' as Tyrwhitt supposes.

(e) Other grammatical peculiarities are: sal for shal, shall, 4087; slyk for swiche, such, 4173; whilk for whiche, 4171; thair for hir, their, 4172 (which is now the standard use); hethen for hennes, hence, 4033; til for to (but Chaucer sometimes uses til himself, chiefly before a vowel); y-mel for amonges, 4171; gif for if, 4181.

(f) Besides the use of the peculiar forms mentioned in (e), we find certain words employed which do not occur elsewhere in Chaucer, viz. boes (see note to 4027), lathe, barn, fonne, fool, hething, contempt, taa, take. To these Tyrwhitt adds gar, reading Gar us have mete in l. 4132, but I can only find Get us som mete in my seven MSS. Capul, horse, occurs again in D. 1554, 2150.

I think Mr. Ellis a little underrates the 'marked northernism' of Chaucer's specimens. Certainly thou is is as marked as I is; and other certain marks are the pl. indic. in -es, as in werk-es, 4030, the use of sal for 'shall,' of boes for 'behoves,' of taa for 'take,' of hethen for 'hence,' of slyk for 'such,' the prepositions fra and y-mel, and even some of the peculiarities of pronunciation, as ā for ō, wrang for wrong.

It is worth enquiring whether Chaucer has made any mistakes, and it is clear that he has made several. Thus as clerkes sayn (4028) should be as clerkes says; and sayth should again be says in l. 4210. In l. 4171, hem (them) should be thaim. In l. 4180, y-greved should be greved; the Northern dialect knows nothing of the prefix y-. It also ignores the final -e in definite adjectives; hence thy fair-e (4023), this short-e (4265), and this lang-e (4175) all have a superfluous -e. Of course this is what we should expect; the poet merely gives a Northern colouring to his diction to amuse us; he is not trying to teach us Northern grammar. The general effect is excellent, and that is all he was concerned with.

4020. The mill lay a little way off the road on the left (coming from Trumpington); so it was necessary to 'know the way.'

4026. nede has na peer, necessity has no equal, or, is above all. More commonly, Nede ne hath no lawe, as in P. Plowman, B. xx. 10, or C. xxiii. 10; 'Necessitas non habet legem'; a common proverb.

4027. boës, contracted from behoves, a form peculiar to Chaucer. In northern poems, the word is invariably a monosyllable, spelt bos, or more commonly bus; and the pt. t. is likewise a monosyllable, viz. bud or bood, short for behoved. In Cursor Mundi, l. 9870, we have: 'Of a woman bos him be born; and in l. 10639: 'Than bus this may be clene and bright.' In M. E., it is always used impersonally; him boes or him bos means 'it behoves him,' or 'he must.' See Bus in the New E. Dictionary.

Chaucer here evidently alludes to some such proverb as 'He who has no servant must serve himself,' but I do not know the precise form of it. The expression 'as clerkes sayn' hints that it is a Latin one.

4029. hope, expect, fear. Cf. P. Plowman, C. x. 275, and see Hope in Nares, who cites the story of the tanner of Tamworth (from Puttenham's Arte of Poesie, bk. iii. c. 22) who said—'I hope I shall be hanged to-morrow.' Cf. also Thomas of Erceldoun, ed. Murray, l. 78:—

'But-if I speke with yone lady bryghte,

I hope myne herte will bryste in three!'

4030. 'So ache his molar teeth.' Wark, to ache, is common in Yorkshire: 'My back warks while I can hardly bide,' my back aches so that I can hardly endure; Mid. Yks. Gloss. (E. D. S.).

4032. ham, i. e. hām, haam, home.

4033. hethen, hence, is very characteristic of a Northern dialect; it occurs in Hampole, Havelok, Morris's Allit. Poems, Gawain, Robert of Brunne, the Ormulum, &c.; see examples in Mätzner.

4037. One clerk wants to watch above, and the other below, to prevent cheating. This incident is not in the French fabliaux. On the other hand, it occurs in the Jest of the Mylner of Abyngton, which is plainly copied from Chaucer.

4049. blere hir yë, blear their eyes, cheat them, as in l. 3865.

4055. 'The fable of the Wolf and the Mare is found in the Latin Esopean collections, and in the early French poem of Renard le Contrefait, from whence it appears to have been taken into the English Reynard the Fox'; Wright. Tyrwhitt observes that the same story is told of a mule in Cento Novelle Antiche, no. 91. See Caxton's Reynard, ch. 27, ed. Arber, p. 62, where the wolf wants to buy a mare's foal, who said that the price of the foal was written on her hinder foot; 'yf ye conne rede and be a clerk, ye may come see and rede it.' And when the wolf said, 'late me rede it,' the mare gave him so violent a kick that 'a man shold wel haue ryden a myle er he aroos.' The Fox, who had brought it all about, hypocritically condoles with the Wolf, and observes—'Now I here wel it is true that I long syth haue redde and herde, that the beste clerkes ben not the wysest men.'

For the story in Le Roman du Renard Contrefait, see Poètes de Champagne, Reims, 1851, p. 156. For further information, see Caxton's Fables of Æsop, ed. Jacobs, lib. v. fab. 10; vol. i. 254, 255; vol. ii. 157, 179. La Fontaine has a similar fable of the Fox, the Wolf, and the Horse. In Croxall's Æsop, it is told of the Horse, who tells the Lion, who is acting as physician, that he has a thorn in his foot. See further references in the Exempla of Jacques de Vitry, ed. Crane, pp. 147, 197.

4061. levesel, an arbour or shelter formed of branches or foliage. Lev-e is the stem of leef, A. S. lēaf, a leaf; and -sel is the same as the A. S. sæl, sele, a hall, dwelling, Swed. sal, Icel. salr, G. Saal. The A. S. sæl occurs also in composition, as burg-sæl, folc-sæl, horn-sæl, and sele is still commoner; Grein gives twenty-three compounds with the latter, as gæst-sele, guest-hall, hrōf-sele, roofed-hall, &c. In Icel. we have lauf-hús, leaf-house, but we find the very word we require in Swed. löfsal, 'a hut built of green boughs,' Widegren; Dan. lövsals-fest, feast of tabernacles. The word occurs again in the Persones Tale, l. 411, where it means a leafy arbour such as may still be seen to form the porch of a public-house. The word is scarce; but see the following:—

'Alle but Syr Gauan, graythest of alle,

Was left with Dame Graynour, vndur the greues [groves] grene.

By a lauryel ho [she] lay, vndur a lefe-sale

Of box and of barberè, byggyt ful bene.'

Anturs of Arthur, st. 6; in Three Met. Romances, ed. Robson, p. 3.

The editor prints it as lefe sale, and explains it by 'leafy hall,' but it is a compound word; the adjective would be lefy or leuy. In this case the arbour was 'built' of box and barberry.

'All his devocioun and holynesse

At the taverne is, as for the most dele,

To Bacus syne, and to the leef-sele

His youthe hym haleth,' &c.

Hoccleve, De Regim. Principum, p. 22.

Again, in Allit. Poems, ed. Morris, iii. 448, the arbour formed by Jonah's gourd is called a lefsel.

4066. Lydgate has 'through thinne and thikke'; Siege of Troy, fol. Cc. 6, back.

4078. geen, goon; so in MS. E., which again has neen, none, 4185. The usual Northern form is gan (= gaan), as in Hl.; Hn. Ln. have gane. But we also find gayn, as in Wallace, iv. 102; Bruce, ii. 80. The forms geen, neen, are so remarkable that they are likely to be the original ones.

4086. 'I am very swift of foot, God knows, (even) as is a roe; by God's heart, he shall not escape us both; why hadst thou not put the horse in the barn?' 'Light as a rae' [roe]; Tournament of Tottenham, st. 15.

4088. capul, a horse, occurs again, in D. 2150. lathe, a barn, is still in use in some parts of Yorkshire, but chiefly in local designations, being otherwise obsolescent; see the Cleveland and Whitby Glossaries. 'The northern man writing to his neighbour may say, "My lathe standeth neer the kirkegarth," for My barne standeth neere the churchyard:' Coote's Eng. Schoolemaster, 1632 (Nares). Ray gives: 'Lathe, a barn' in 1691; and we again find 'Leath, a barn' in 1781 (E. D. S. Gloss. B. 1); and 'Leath, Laith, a barn' in 1811 (E. D. S. Gloss. B. 7); in all cases as a Northern word.

4096. 'Trim his beard,' i. e. cheat him; and so again in D. 361. See Chaucer's Hous of Fame, 689, and my note upon it.

'Myght I thaym have spyde,

I had made thaym a berd.'

Towneley Mysteries, p. 144.

4101. Iossa, 'down here'; a cry of direction. Composed of O. F. jos, jus, down; and ça, here. Bartsch gives an example of jos in his Chrestomathie, 1875, col 8: 'tuit li felun cadegren jos,' all the felons fell down; and Cotgrave has: 'Jus, downe, or to the ground.' Godefroy gives: ça jus, here below, down here. It is clearly a direction given by one clerk to the other, and was probably a common cry in driving horses.

warderere, i. e. warde arere, 'look out behind!' Another similar cry. MS. Cm. has: ware the rere, mind the rear, which is a sort of gloss upon it.

4110. hething, contempt. See numerous examples in Mätzner, s. v. hæthing, ii. 396. Cf. 'Bothe in hething and in scorn'; Sir Amadace, l. 17, in Robson's Three Met. Romances, p. 27. 'Him thoght scorn and gret hething'; Seven Sages, ed. Weber, l. 91.

4112. The first foot is 'trochaic.'

4115. in his hond, in his possession, in his hold.

4126. 'Or enlarge it by argument'; prove by logic that it is the size you wish it to be.

4127. Cutberd, St. Cuthbert, bishop of Lindisfarne, died in 686. Being a Northumberland man, John swears by a Northumberland saint.

4130. Evidently a proverb: 'a man must take (one) of two things, either such as he finds or such as he brings'; i. e. must put up with what he can get.

4134. Another proverb. Repeated in D. 415, with lure for tulle. From the Policraticus of John of Salisbury, liv. v. c. 10: 'Veteri celebratur proverbio: Quia vacuae manus temeraria petitio est.' MS. Cm. has the rimes folle, tolle. For tulle, a commoner spelling is tille, to draw, hence to allure, entice. Hence E. till (for money), orig. meaning a 'drawer'; and the tiller of a rudder, by which it is drawn aside. See tullen in Stratmann, and tollen in Boeth. bk. ii. pr. 7. 11 (in vol. ii. p. 45).

4140. chalons, blankets. The same word as mod. E. shalloon, 'a slight woollen stuff'; Ogilvie's Dict. 'The blanket was sometimes made of a texture originally imported from Chalons in France, but afterwards extensively manufactured in England by the Chaloners'; Our Eng. Home, p. 108. 'Qwyltes ne chalouns'; Eng. Gilds, ed. Toulmin Smith, p. 350.

4152. quakke, asthma, or difficulty of breathing that causes a croaking noise. Halliwell gives: 'Quack, to be noisy, West. The term is applied to any croaking noise.' Also: 'Quackle, to choke, or suffocate, East.' Pose, a cold in the head; A. S. gepos.

4155. 'To wet one's whistle' is still in use for to drink deeply. 'I wete my whystell, as good drinkers do'; Palsgrave, p. 780. In Walton's Complete Angler, Part i. ch. 5, we find: 'Let's drink the other cup to wet our whistles.'

4172. wilde fyr, erysipelas (to torment them); see Halliwell. Cf. E. 2252. The entry—'Erysipela (sic), wilde fyr' occurs in Ælfric's Vocabulary. So in Le Rom. de la Rose:—'que Mal-Feu l'arde'; 7438, 8319.

4174. flour, choice, best of a thing; il ending, evil death, bad end. 'They shall have the best (i. e. here, the worst) of a bad end.' Rather a wish than a prophecy.

4181. Sidenote in MS. Hl.—'Qui in vno grauatur in alio debet releuari.' A Law Maxim.

4194. upright, upon her back. 'To slepe on the backe, vpryght, is vtterly to be abhorred'; Babees Book, ed. Furnivall, p. 245. Palsgrave, s. v. Throwe, has: 'I throwe a man on his backe or upright, so that his face is upwarde, Ie renuerse.' And see Nares. Cf. 'Now dounward groffe [on your belly], and now upright'; Rom. Rose, 2561. Bolt-upright occurs in l. 4266; where bolt is 'like a bolt,' hence 'straight,' or exactly. See Bolt, adv., in the New E. Dictionary. And compare B. 1506.

4208. daf, fool; from E. daf-t. cokenay, a milk-sop, poor creature. The orig. sense of coken-ay is 'cocks' egg,' from a singular piece of folk-lore which credited cocks with laying such eggs as happen to be imperfect. 'The small yolkless eggs which hens sometimes lay are called "cocks' eggs," generally in the firm persuasion that the name states a fact'; Shropshire Folklore, by C. S. Burne, p. 229. The idea is old, and may be found gravely stated as a fact in Bartolomæus De Proprietatibus Rerum (14th century). See Cockney in the New E. Dictionary.

4210. Unhardy is unsely, the cowardly man has no luck. 'Audentes fortuna iuuat'; Vergil, Aen. x. 284. So also our 'Nothing venture, nothing have,' and 'Faint heart never won fair lady'; which see in Hazlitt's Proverbs. For seel, luck, see l. 4239. See Troil. iv. 602, and the note.

4220. Pronounce ben'cite in three syllables; as usual.

4233. The thridde cok; apparently, between 5 and 6 A.M.; see note to line 3675 above. It was near dawn; see l. 4249.

4236. Malin, another form of Malkin, which is a pet-name for Matilda. See my note to P. Plowman, C. ii. 181, where my statement that Malkin occurs in the present passage refers to Tyrwhitt's edition, which substitutes Malkin for the Malin or Malyn of the MSS. and of ed. 1532. Cf. B. 30.

'Malyn, tersorium,' Cath. Anglicum; i. e. Malin, like Malkin, also meant a dishclout. Malin has now become Molly.

4244. cake. In Wright's Glossaries, ed. Wülker, col. 788, l. 36, we find, 'Hic panis subverucius, a meleres cake'; on which Wright remarks: 'Perhaps this name alludes to the common report that the miller always stole the flour from his customers to make his cakes, which were baked on the sly.'

4253. toty, in the seven MSS.; totty in ed. 1532. It means 'dizzy, reeling'; and Halliwell, s. v. Totty, quotes from MS. Rawl. C. 86: 'So toty was the brayn of his hede.' Cf. 'And some also so toty in theyr heade'; Lydgate, Siege of Troy, ed. 1555, fol. L 1, back. Spenser has the word twice, as tottie or totty, and evidently copied it from this very passage, which he read in a black-letter edition; see his Shep. Kal., February, 55, and F. Q. vii. 7. 39. Cf. E. totter.

4257. a twenty devel way, with extremely ill-luck. See note to l. 3713.

4264. Compare B. 1417.

4272. linage; her grandfather was a priest; see note to l. 3943.

4278. poke, bag; cf. the proverb, 'To buy a pig in a poke.'

'Than on the grounde together rounde

With many a sadde stroke

They roule and rumble, they turne and tumble,

As pygges do in a poke.'

Sir T. More, A Merrie Iest, &c. (1510).

This juvenile poem by Sir T. More is printed in Hazlitt's Popular Poetry, iii. 128, and in the Preface to Todd's Johnson.

4286. Bromeholm. A piece of what was supposed to be the true cross was brought from the East by an English priest to Norfolk in 1223, and immediately became famous as an object of pilgrimage. It is called the 'Rode [rood] of Bromeholme' in P. Plowman, B. v. 231; see my note to that line.

4287. The full form is quoted in the note to Scott's Marmion, can. ii. st. 13:—'In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum; a vinculis enim mortis redemisti me, Domine veritatis, Amen.' In Ratis Raving, &c., ed. Lumby, p. 8, l. 263, the form ends with 'spiritum meum, domine, deus veritatis.' In Reliquiae Antiquae, i. 235, the following translation of the Latin form is given:—

'Loverd Godd, in hondes thine I bequethe soule mine;

Thu me boctest with thi deadd, Loverd Godd of sothfastheedd.'

It here occurs in company with the Creed, the Paternoster, and the Ave Maria; so that it was one of the very common religious formulae which were familiar, even in the Latin form, to people of no education. They frequently knew the words of these forms, without knowing more than the general sense. In manus tuas, &c., was even recited by criminals before being hung; see Skelton's Works, ed. Dyce, i. 5, 292, ii. 268. The words are mostly taken from the Vulgate version of Luke, xxiii. 46.

4290. oon, one, some one; not common at this date.

4295. Cf. Roman de la Rose, 12720:—'Qui set bien de l'ostel les estres,' i. e. who knows well the inner parts of the hostel. See note to A. 1971 above.

4302. volupeer, nightcap; see note to A. 3241.

4307. harrow, a cry for help; see note to A. 3286.

4320. Him thar, lit. 'it needs him,' i. e. he need, he must. For thar, ed. 1532 has dare, which Tyrwhitt rightly corrects to thar, which occurs again in D. 329, 336, 1365, and H. 352. It is common enough in early authors; the full form is tharf, as in Owl and Nightingale, 803 (or 180), Moral Ode (Jesus MS.), 44; spelt tharrf, Ormulum, 12886; therf, Ancren Riwle, p. 192; darf, Floris and Blancheflur, 315; derf, O. Eng. Homilies, ed. Morris, i. 187, l. 31; dar, Octovian, 1337; &c. The pt. t. is thurfte, thurte, thorte; see tharf and thurfen in Stratmann, and cf. A. S. thearf, pt. t. thurfte. For wene, the correct reading, Tyrwhitt substitutes winne, against all authority, because he could make no sense of wene. It is odd that he should have missed the sense so completely. Wene is to imagine, think, also to expect; and the line means 'he must not expect good who does evil.' The very word is preserved by Ray, in his Proverbs, 3rd ed., 1737, p. 288:—'He that evil does, never good weines.' Hazlitt quotes a proverb to a like effect: 'He that does what he should not, shall feel what he would not.' Cf. 'Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap'; Gal. vi. 7.

4321. A common proverb; cf. Ps. vii. 16, ix. 15.

'For often he that will beguile

Is guiled with the same guile,

And thus the guiler is beguiled.'

Gower, Conf. Amant (bk. vi), iii. 47.

'Begyled is the gyler thanne'; Rom. Rose, 5759.

See further in my note to P. Plowman, C. xxxi. 166, and Kemble's Solomon and Saturn, p. 63. Le Rom. de la Rose, 7381, has:—'Qui les deceveors deçoivent.'

I can add another example from Caxton's Fables of Æsop, lib. ii. fab. 12 (The Fox and the Stork):—'And therfore he that begyleth other is oftyme begyled hymself.'

The Cook's Prologue.

4329. herbergage, lodging; alluding to l. 4123.

4331. Not from Solomon, but from Ecclesiasticus, xi. 31: 'Non omnem hominem inducas in domum tuum; multae enim sunt insidiae dolosi.' In the E. version, it is verse 29.

4336. Hogge, Hodge, for Roger (l. 4353). Ware, in Hertfordshire.

4346. laten blood, let blood, i. e. removed gravy from. It refers to a meat-pie, baked with gravy in it; as it was not sold the day it was made, the gravy was removed to make it keep longer; and so the pie was eaten at last, when far from being new.

4347. The meaning of 'a Jack of Dover' has been much disputed, but it probably meant a pie that had been cooked more than once. Some have thought it meant a sole (probably a fried sole), as 'Dover soles' are still celebrated; but this is only a guess, and seems to be wrong. Sir T. More, Works, p. 675 E, speaks of a 'Jak of Paris, an evil pye twyse baken'; which is probably the same thing. Roquefort's French Dict. has:—

'Jaquet, Jaket, impudent, menteur. C'est sans doute de ce mot que les pâtissiers ont pris leur mot d'argot jaques, pour signifier qu'une pièce de volaille, de viande ou de pâtisserie cuite au four, est vieille ou dure.'

See Hazlitt's Proverbs, p. 20; and Hazlitt's Shakespeare Jest-books, ii. 366. Hence, in a secondary sense, Jack of Dover meant an old story, or hashed up anecdote. Ray says:—'This he [T. Fuller] makes parallel to Crambe bis cocta, and applicable to such as grate the ears of their auditors with ungrateful tautologies of what is worthless in itself; tolerable as once uttered in the notion of novelty, but abominable if repeated.' This may explain the fact that an old jest-book was printed with the title A Jack of Dover in 1604, and again in 1615. The E. word jack has indeed numerous senses.

4350. The insinuation is that stray flies were mixed up with the parsley served up with the Cook's geese. Tyrwhitt quotes from MS. Harl. 279—'Take percely,' &c. in a receipt for stuffing a goose; so that parsley was sometimes used for this purpose. It was also used for stuffing chickens; see Liber Cure Cocorum, ed. Morris, p. 22.

4357. 'A true jest is an evil jest.' Hazlitt, in his Collection of Proverbs, gives, 'True jest is no jest,' and quotes 'Sooth bourd is no bourd' from Heywood, and from Harington's Brief Apologie of Poetrie, 1591. Kelly's Scotch Proverbs includes: 'A sooth bourd is nae bourd.' Tyrwhitt alters the second play to spel, as being a Flemish word, but he only found it in two MSS. (Askew 1 and 2), and nothing is gained by it. The fact is, that there is nothing Flemish about the proverb except the word quad, though there may have been an equivalent proverb in that language. We must take Chaucer's remark to mean that 'Sooth play is what a Fleming would call quaad play'; which is then quite correct. For just as Flemish does not use the English words sooth and play, so English seldom uses the Flemish form quaad, equivalent to the Dutch kwaad, evil, bad, spelt quade in Hexham's Du. Dict. (1658). Cf. also O. Friesic kwad, quad, East Friesic kwâd (still in common use). The Mid. Eng. form is not quad, but (properly) quēd or queed; see examples in Stratmann, s. v. cwêd. In P. Plowman, B. xiv. 189, the qued means the Evil One, the devil. Queed occurs as a sb. as late as in Skelton, ed. Dyce, i. 168. We find, however, the rare M. E. form quad in Gower, ed. Pauli, ii. 246, and in the Story of Genesis and Exodus, ed. Morris, 536; and in another passage of the Cant. Tales, viz. B. 1628. The oldest English examples seem to be those in the Blickling Glosses, viz. 'of cweade arærende, de stercore erigens'; and 'cwed uel meox, stercus.' There is no difficulty about the etymology; the corresponding O. H. G. word is quāt, whence G. Koth or Kot, excrement; and the root appears in the Skt. gu or gū, to void excrement; see Kot in Kluge.

4358. This is interesting, as giving us the Host's name. Herry is the mod. E. Harry, with the usual change from er to ar, as in M. E. derk, dark, &c. It is the same as the F. Herri (not uncommon in O. F.), made from F. Henri by assimilation of nr to rr.

The name seems to have been taken from that of a real person. In the Subsidy Rolls, 4 Rich. II. (1380-1), for Southwark, occurs the entry—'Henri' Bayliff, Ostyler, Xpian [Christian] ux[or] eius ... ij s.' In the parliament held at Westminster, in 50 Edw. III. (1376-7), Henry Bailly was one of the representatives for that borough; and again, in the parliament at Gloucester, 2 Rich. II., the name occurs. See Notes and Queries, 2 S. iii. 228.

The Cokes Tale.

4368. 'Brown as a berry.' So in A. 207.

4377. 'There were sometimes Justs in Cheapside; Hollingshead, vol. ii. p. 348. But perhaps any procession may be meant.'—Tyrwhitt. 'Cheapside was the grand scene of city festivals and processions.'—Wright.

4379. T. has And til, but his note says that And was inserted by himself. Wright reads, 'And tyl he hadde'; but And is not in the Harleian MS. Observe that Wright insists very much on the fact that he reproduces this MS. 'with literal accuracy,' though he allows himself, according to his own account, to make silent alterations due to collation with the Lansdowne MS. But the word And is not to be found in any of the seven MSS., and this is only one example of the numerous cases in which he has silently altered his text without any MS. authority at all. His text, in fact, is full of treacherous pitfalls; and Bell's edition is quite as bad, though that likewise pretends to be accurate.

The easiest way of scanning the line is to ignore the elision of the final e in had-de, which is preserved, as often, by the cæsural pause.

4383. sette steven, made an appointment; see A. 1524.

4394. 'Though he (the master) may have,' &c.

4396. 'Though he (the apprentice) may know how to play,' &c. Opposed to l. 4394. The sense is—'The master pays for the revelling of the apprentice, though he takes no part in such revel; and conversely, the apprentice may gain skill in minstrelsy, but takes no part in paying for it; for, in his case, his rioting is convertible with theft.' The master pays, but plays not; the other pays not, but plays.

4397. 'Revelling and honesty, in the case of one of low degree (who has no money), are continually wrath with (i. e. opposed to) each other.'

4402. 'And sometimes carried off to Newgate, with revel (such as he might be supposed to approve of).' The point of the allusion lies in the fact that, when disorderly persons were carried to prison, they were preceded by minstrels, in order to call public attention to their disgrace. This is clearly shewn in the Liber Albus, pp. 459, 460, (p. 396 of the E. translation). E. g. 'Item, if any person shall be impeached of adultery, and be thereof lawfully attainted, let him be taken unto Newgate, and from thence, with minstrelsy, through Chepe, to the Tun on Cornhulle [Cornhill], there to remain at the will of the mayor and alderman.'

4404. paper. The allusion is not clear; perhaps it means that he was referring to his account-book, and found it unsatisfactory.

4406. In Hazlitt's Proverbs we find; 'The rotten apple injures its neighbour.' Cf. G. 964.

In the Ayenbite of Inwyt, p. 205, we are bidden to avoid bad company, because a rotten apple rots the sound ones, if left among them.

In Ida von Düringsfeld's Sprichwörter, 1872-5, no. 354, is:—'Ein fauler Apfel steckt den andern an. Pomum compunctum cito corrumpit sibi iunctum.'

4413. his leve, his leave to go, his dismissal, his congé.

4414. or leve, or leave it, i. e. or desist from it.

4415. for, because, since. louke, an accomplice who entices the dupe into the thief's company, a decoyer of victims. Not 'a receiver to a thief,' as Tyrwhitt guessed, but his assistant in thieving, one who helped him (as Chaucer says) to suck others by stealing or borrowing. It answers to an A. S. *lūca (not found), formed with the agential suffix -a from lūcan, lit. to pull, pluck, root up weeds, hence (probably) to draw, entice. The corresponding E. Friesic lūkan or lukan means not only to pull, pluck, but also to milk or suck (see Koolman). The Low G. luken means not only to pull up weeds, but also to suck down, or to take a long pull in drinking; hence O. F. louchier, loukier, to swallow. From the A. S. lūcan, to pluck up, comes the common prov. E. louk, lowk, look, to pluck up weeds; see Ray, Whitby Glossary, &c.

4417. brybe, to purloin; not to bribe in the modern sense; see the New E. Dict.

4422. Here the Tale suddenly breaks off; so it was probably never finished.

* See Notes to Gamelin at the end of the Notes to the Tales.

NOTES TO GROUP B.

Introduction to the Man of Lawes Tale.

1. If, as Mr. Furnivall supposes, the time of the telling of the Canterbury Tales be taken to be longer than one day, we may suppose the Man of Lawes Tale to begin the stories told on the second morning of the journey, April 18. Otherwise, we must suppose all the stories in Group A to precede it, which is not impossible, if we suppose the pilgrims to have started early in the morning.

Hoste. This is one of the words which are sometimes dissyllabic, and sometimes monosyllabic; it is here a dissyllable, as in l. 39. See note to line 1883 below.

sey, i. e. saw. The forms of 'saw' vary in the MSS. In this line we find saugh, sauh, segh, sauhe, sawh, none of which are Chaucer's own, but due to the scribes. The true form is determined by the rime, as in the Clerkes Tale, E. 667, where most of the MSS. have say. A still better spelling is sey, which may be found in the House of Fame, 1151, where it rimes with lay. The A. S. form is sēah.

2. The ark, &c. In Chaucer's Treatise on the Astrolabe, pt. ii. ch. 7 (vol. iii. 194), is the proposition headed—'to knowe the arch of the day, that some folk callen the day artificial, from the sonne arysing til hit go to reste.' Thus, while the 'day natural' is twenty-four hours, the 'day artificial' is the time during which the sun is above the horizon. The 'arc' of this day merely means the extent or duration of it, as reckoned along the circular rim of an astrolabe; or, when measured along the horizon (as here), it means the arc extending from the point of sunrise to that of sunset. ronne, run, performed, completed.

3. The fourthe part. The true explanation of this passage, which Tyrwhitt failed to discover, is due to Mr. A. E. Brae, who first published it in May, 1851, and reprinted it at p. 68 of his edition of Chaucer's Treatise on the Astrolabe. His conclusions were based upon actual calculation, and will be mentioned in due order. In re-editing the 'Astrolabe,' I took the opportunity of roughly checking his calculations by other methods, and am satisfied that he is quite correct, and that the day meant is not the 28th of April, as in the Ellesmere MS., nor the 13th of April, as in the Harleian MS., but the 18th, as in the Hengwrt MS. and most others. It is easily seen that xviii may be corrupted into xxviii by prefixing x, or into xiii by the omission of v; this may account for the variations.

The key to the whole matter is given by a passage in Chaucer's 'Astrolabe,' pt. ii. ch. 29, where it is clear that Chaucer (who, however, merely translates from Messahala) actually confuses the hour-angle with the azimuthal arc; that is, he considered it correct to find the hour of the day by noting the point of the horizon over which the sun appears to stand, and supposing this point to advance, with a uniform, not a variable, motion. The host's method of proceeding was this. Wanting to know the hour, he observed how far the sun had moved southward along the horizon since it rose, and saw that it had gone more than half-way from the point of sunrise to the exact southern point. Now the 18th of April in Chaucer's time answers to the 26th of April at present. On April 26, 1874, the sun rose at 4h. 43m., and set at 7h. 12m., giving a day of about 14h. 30m., the fourth part of which is at 8h. 20m., or, with sufficient exactness, at half-past eight. This would leave a whole hour and a half to signify Chaucer's 'half an houre and more,' shewing that further explanation is still necessary. The fact is, however, that the host reckoned, as has been said, in another way, viz. by observing the sun's position with reference to the horizon. On April 18 the sun was in the 6th degree of Taurus at that date, as we again learn from Chaucer's treatise. Set this 6th degree of Taurus on the East horizon on a globe, and it is found to be 22 degrees to the North of the East point, or 112 degrees from the South. The half of this is at 56 degrees from the South; and the sun would seem to stand above this 56th degree, as may be seen even upon a globe, at about a quarter past nine; but Mr. Brae has made the calculation, and shews that it was at twenty minutes past nine. This makes Chaucer's 'half an houre and more' to stand for half an hour and ten minutes; an extremely neat result. But this we can check again by help of the host's other observation. He also took note, that the lengths of a shadow and its object were equal, whence the sun's altitude must have been 45 degrees. Even a globe will shew that the sun's altitude, when in the 6th degree of Taurus, and at 10 o'clock in the morning, is somewhere about 45 or 46 degrees. But Mr. Brae has calculated it exactly, and his result is, that the sun attained its altitude of 45 degrees at two minutes to ten exactly. This is even a closer approximation than we might expect, and leaves no doubt about the right date being the eighteenth of April. For fuller particulars, see Chaucer on the Astrolabe, ed. Brae, p. 69; and ed. Skeat (E.E.T.S.), preface, p. 1.

5. eightetethe, eighteenth. Mr. Wright prints eightetene, with the remark that 'this is the reading in which the MSS. seem mostly to agree.' This is right in substance, but not critically exact. No such word as eightetene appears here in the MSS., which denote the number by an abbreviation, as stated in the footnote. The Hengwrt MS. has xviijthe, and the Old English for eighteenth must have have been eightetethe, the ordinal, not the cardinal number. This form is easily inferred from the numerous examples in which -teenth is represented by -tethe; see feowertethe, fiftethe, &c. in Stratmann's Old English Dictionary; we find the very form eightetethe in Rob. of Glouc., ed. Wright, 6490; and eighteteothe in St. Swithin, l. 5, as printed in Poems and Lives of Saints, ed. Furnivall, 1858, p. 43. Eighte is of two syllables, from A. S. eahta, cognate with Lat. octo. Eightetethe has four syllables; see A. 3223, and the note.

8. as in lengthe, with respect to its length.

13. The astrolabe which Chaucer gave to his little son Lewis was adapted for the latitude of Oxford. If, as is likely, the poet-astronomer checked his statements in this passage by a reference to it, he would neglect the difference in latitude between Oxford and the Canterbury road. In fact, it is less than a quarter of a degree, and not worth considering in the present case.

14. gan conclude, did conclude, concluded. Gan is often used thus as an auxiliary verb.

15. plighte, plucked; cf. shrighte, shrieked, in Kn. A. 2817.—M.

16. Lordinges, sirs. This form of address is exceedingly common in Early English poetry. Cf. the first line in the Tale of Sir Thopas.

18. seint Iohn. See the Squire's Tale, F. 596.

19. Leseth, lose ye; note the form of the imperative plural in -eth; cf. l. 37. As ferforth as ye may, as far as lies in your power.

20. wasteth, consumeth; cf. wastour, a wasteful person, in P. Plowm. B. vi. 154.—M. Hl. has passeth, i. e. passes away; several MSS. insert it before wasteth, but it is not required by the metre, since the e in time is here fully sounded; cf. A. S. tīma. Compare—

'The tyme, that passeth night and day,

And restẽlees travayleth ay,

And steleth from us so prively,

As water that doun runneth ay,

But never drope returne may,' &c.

Romaunt of the Rose, l. 369.

See also Clerkes Tale, E. 118.

21. what. We now say—what with. It means, 'partly owing to.'

22. wakinge; strictly, it means watching; but here, in our wakinge = whilst we are awake.

23. Cf. Ovid, Art. Amat. iii. 62-65:—

'Ludite; eunt anni more fluentis aquae.

Nec quae praeteriit, cursu reuocabitur unda;

Nec, quae praeteriit, hora redire potest.

Utendum est aetate; cito pede labitur aetas.'

25. Seneca wrote a treatise De Breuitate Temporis, but this does not contain any passage very much resembling the text. I have no doubt that Chaucer was thinking of a passage which may easily have caught his eye, as being very near the beginning of the first of Seneca's epistles. 'Quaedam tempora eripiuntur nobis, quaedam subducuntur, quaedam effluunt. Turpissima tamen est iactura, quae per negligentiam fit. Quem mihi dabis, qui aliquod pretium tempori ponat? qui diem aestimet?... In huius rei unius fugacis ac lubricae possessionem natura nos misit, ex qua expellit quicumque uult; et tanta stultitia mortalium est, ut, quae minima et uilissima sint, certe reparabilia, imputari sibi, quum impetrauere, patiantur; nemo se iudicet quidquam debere, qui tempus accepit, quum interim hoc unum est, quod ne gratus quidem potest reddere'; Epist. I.; Seneca Lucilio suo.

30. Malkin; a proverbial name for a wanton woman; see P. Plowman, C. ii. 181 (B. i. 182), and my note. 'There are more maids than Malkin'; Heywood's Proverbs.

32. moulen, lit. 'become mouldy'; hence, be idle, stagnate, remain sluggish, rot. See Mouldy in the Appendix to my Etym. Dict. 2nd ed. 1884; and cf. note to A. 3870.

33. Man of Lawe. This is the 'sergeant of the lawe' described in the Prologue, ll. 309-330. So have ye blis, so may you obtain bliss; as you hope to reach heaven.

34. as forward is, as is the agreement. See Prologue, A. 33, 829.

35. been submitted, have agreed. This illustrates the common usage of expressing a perfect by the verb to be and the past part. of an intransitive verb. Cf. is went, in B. 1730.—M.

36. at my Iugement, at my decree; ready to do as I bid you. See Prologue, A. 818 and 833.

37. Acquiteth yow, acquit yourself, viz. by redeeming your promise. holdeth your biheste, keep your promise. Acquit means to absolve or free oneself from a debt, obligation, charge, &c.; or to free oneself from the claims of duty, by fulfilling it.

38. devoir, duty; see Knightes Tale, A. 2598.

atte leste, at the least. Atte or atten is common in Old English for at the or at then; the latter is a later form of A. S. æt þām, where then (= þām) is the dative case of the article. But for the explanation of peculiar forms and words, the Glossarial Index should be consulted.

39. For ich, Tyrwhitt reads jeo = je, though found in none of our seven MSS. This makes the whole phrase French—de par dieux jeo assente. Mr. Jephson suggests that this is a clever hit of Chaucer's, because he makes the Man of Lawe talk in French, with which, as a lawyer, he was very familiar. However, we find elsewhere—

'Quod Troilus, "depardieux I assente";'—

and again—

'"Depardieux," quod she, "god leve al be wel";'

Troilus and Cres. ii. 1058 and 1212;

and in the Freres Tale, D. 1395—

'"Depardieux," quod this yeman, "dere brother."'

It is much more to the point to observe that the Man of Lawe talks about law in l. 43. Cotgrave, in his French Dictionary, under par, gives—'De par Dieu soit, a [i. e. in] God's name be it. De par moy, by my means. De par le roy, by the king's appointment.' De par is a corruption of O.Fr. de part, on the part or side of; so that de par le roy means literally, 'as for the king,' i. e. 'in the king's name.' Similarly, de par Dieu is 'in God's name.' See Burguy, Grammaire de la Langue D'oil, ii. 359. The form dieux is a nominative, from the Latin deus; thus exhibiting an exception to the almost universal law in French, that the modern F. substantives answer to the accusative cases of Latin substantives, as fleur to florem, &c. Other exceptions may be found in some proper names, as Charles, Jacques, from Carolus, Jacobus, and in fils, from filius.

41. In the Morality entitled Everyman, in Hazlitt's Old Eng. Plays, i. 137, is the proverb—'Yet promise is debt.' Mr. Hazlitt wrongly considers that as the earliest instance of the phrase.—M. Cf. Hoccleve, De Regim. Principum, p. 64:—'And of a trewe man beheest is dette.'

holde fayn, &c.; gladly perform all my promise.

43. man ... another = one ... another. The Cambridge MS. is right.—M. 'For whatever law a man imposes on others, he should in justice consider as binding on himself.' This is obviously a quotation, as appears from l. 45. The expression referred to was probably proverbial. An English proverb says—'They that make the laws must not break them'; a Spanish one—'El que ley establece, guardarla debe,' he who makes a law ought to keep it; and a Latin one—'Patere legem quam ipse tulisti,' abide by the law which you made yourself. The idea is expanded in the following passage from Claudian's Panegyric on the 4th consulship of Honorius, carm. viii., l. 296.—

'In commune iubes si quid censesue tenendum,

Primus iussa subi; tunc obseruantior aequi

Fit populus, nec ferre negat cum uiderit ipsum

Auctorem parere sibi.'

45. text, quotation from an author, precept, saying. Thus wol our text, i. e. such is what the expression implies.

47. But. This reading is given by Tyrwhitt, from MS. Dd. 4. 24 in the Cambridge University Library and two other MSS. All our seven MSS. read That; but this would require the word Nath (hath not) instead of Hath, in l. 49. Chaucer talks about his writings in a similar strain in A. 746, 1460; and at a still earlier period, in his House of Fame, 620, where Jupiter's eagle says to him:—

'And nevertheles hast set thy wit,

Although that in thy hede ful lyte is,

To make bokes, songes, dytees,

In ryme, or elles in cadence,

As thou best canst, in reverence

Of Love, and of his servants eke'; &c.

can but lewedly on metres, is but slightly skilled in metre. Can = knows here; in the line above it is the ordinary auxiliary verb.

54. Ovid is mentioned for two reasons; because he has so many love-stories, and because Chaucer himself borrowed several of his own from Ovid.

made of mencioun; we should now say—'made mention of.'

55. Epistelles, Epistles. (T. prints Epistolis, the Lat. form, without authority. The word has here four syllables.) The book referred to is Ovid's Heroides, which contains twenty-one love-letters. See note to l. 61.

56. What, why, on what account? cf. Prologue, A. 184.

57. 'The story of Ceyx and Alcyone is related in the introduction to the poem which was for some time called "The Dreme of Chaucer," but which, in the MSS. Fairfax 16 and Bodl. 638, is more properly entitled, "The Boke of the Duchesse."'—Tyrwhitt. Chaucer took it from Ovid's Metamorphoses, bk. xi. 'Ceyx and Alcyone' was once, probably, an independent poem; see vol. i. p. 63.

59. Thise is a monosyllable; the final e probably denotes that s was 'voiced,' and perhaps the i was long, pronounced (dhiiz).

59, 60. For eek, seek, read eke, seke. Here sek-e is in the infinitive mood. The form ek-e is not etymological, as the A.S. ēac was a monosyllable; but, as -e frequently denoted an adverbial suffix, it was easily added. Hence, in M.E., both eek and ek-e occur; and Chaucer uses either form at pleasure, ek-e being more usual. For examples of eek, see E. 1349, G. 794.

61. the seintes legende of Cupyde; better known now as The Legend of Good Women. Tyrwhitt says—'According to Lydgate (Prologue to Boccace), the number [of good women] was to have been nineteen; and perhaps the Legend itself affords some ground for this notion; see l. 283, and Court of Love, l. 108. But this number was never completed, and the last story, of Hypermnestra, is seemingly unfinished.... In this passage the Man of Lawe omits two ladies, viz. Cleopatra and Philomela, whose histories are in the Legend; and he enumerates eight others, of whom there are no histories in the Legend as we have it at present. Are we to suppose, that they have been lost?' The Legend contains the nine stories following: 1. Cleopatra; 2. Thisbe; 3. Dido; 4. Hypsipyle and Medea; 5. Lucretia; 6. Ariadne; 7. Philomela; 8. Phyllis; 9. Hypermnestra. Of these, Chaucer here mentions, as Tyrwhitt points out, all but two, Cleopatra and Philomela. Before discussing the matter further, let me note that in medieval times, proper names took strange shapes, and the reader must not suppose that the writing of Adriane for Ariadne, for example, is peculiar to Chaucer. The meaning of the other names is as follows:—Lucresse, Lucretia; Babilan Tisbee, Thisbe of Babylon; Enee, Æneas; Dianire, Deianira; Hermion, Hermione; Adriane, Ariadne; Isiphilee, Hypsipyle; Leander, Erro, Leander and Hero; Eleyne, Helena; Brixseyde, Briseis (acc. Briseïda); Ladomea, Laodamia; Ypermistra, Hypermnestra; Alceste, Alcestis.

Returning to the question of Chaucer's plan for his Legend of Good Women, we may easily conclude what his intention was, though it was never carried out. He intended to write stories concerning nineteen women who were celebrated for being martyrs of love, and to conclude the series by an additional story concerning queen Alcestis, whom he regarded as the best of all the good women. Now, though he does not expressly say who these women were, he has left us two lists, both incomplete, in which he mentions some of them; and by combining these, and taking into consideration the stories which he actually wrote, we can make out the whole intended series very nearly. One of the lists is the one given here; the other is in a Ballad which is introduced into the Prologue to the Legend. The key to the incompleteness of the present list, certainly the later written of the two, is that the poet chiefly mentions here such names as are also to be found in Ovid's Heroides; cf. l. 55. Putting all the information together, it is sufficiently clear that Chaucer's intended scheme must have been very nearly as follows, the number of women (if we include Alcestis) being twenty.

1. Cleopatra. 2. Thisbe. 3. Dido. 4. and 5. Hypsipyle and Medea. 6. Lucretia. 7. Ariadne. 8. Philomela. 9. Phyllis. 10. Hypermnestra (unfinished). After which, 11. Penelope. 12. Briseis. 13. Hermione. 14. Deianira. 15. Laodamia. 16. Helen. 17. Hero. 18. Polyxena (see the Ballad). 19. either Lavinia (see the Ballad), or Oenone (mentioned in Ovid, and in the House of Fame). 20. Alcestis.

Since the list of stories in Ovid's Heroides is the best guide to the whole passage, it is here subjoined.

In this list, the numbers refer to the letters as numbered in Ovid; the italics shew the stories which Chaucer actually wrote; the asterisk points out such of the remaining stories as he happens to mention in the present enumeration; and the dagger points out the ladies mentioned in his Prologue to the Legend of Good Women.

01. Penelope Ulixi.*†

02. Phyllis Demophoonti.*†

03. Briseis Achilli.*

04. Phaedra Hippolyto.

05. Oenone Paridi.

06. Hypsipyle Iasoni;*† 12. Medea Iasoni.*

07. Dido Aeneae.*†

08. Hermione Orestae.*

09. Deianira Herculi.*

10. Ariadne Theseo.*†

11. Canace Macareo*† (expressly rejected).

13. Laodamia Protesilao.*†

14. Hypermnestra Lynceo.*†

15. Sappho Phaoni.

16. Paris Helenae; 17. Helena Paridi.*†

18. Leander Heroni; 19. Hero Leandro.*†

20. Acontius Cydippae; 21. Cydippe Acontio.

Chaucer's method, I fear, was to plan more than he cared to finish. He did so with his Canterbury Tales, and again with his Treatise on the Astrolabe; and he left the Squire's Tale half-told. According to his own account (Prologue to Legend of Good Women, l. 481) he never intended to write his Legend all at once, but only 'yeer by yere.' Such proposals are dangerous, and commonly end in incompleteness. To Tyrwhitt's question—'are we to suppose that they [i. e. the legends of Penelope and others] have been lost?' the obvious answer is, that they were never written.

Chaucer alludes to Ovid's Epistles again in his House of Fame, bk. i., where he mentions the stories of Phyllis, Briseis, Oenone (not mentioned here), Hypsipyle, Medea, Deianira, Ariadne, and Dido; the last being told at some length. Again, in the Book of the Duchesse, he alludes to Medea, Phyllis, and Dido (ll. 726-734); to Penelope and Lucretia (l. 1081); and to Helen (l. 331). As for the stories in the Legend which are not in Ovid's Heroides, we find that of Thisbe in Ovid's Metamorphoses, bk. iv; that of Philomela in the same, bk. vi; whilst those of Cleopatra and Lucretia are in Boccaccio's book De Claris Mulieribus, from which he imitated the title 'Legend of Good Women,' and derived also the story of Zenobia, as told in the Monkes Tale. However, Chaucer also consulted other sources, such as Ovid's Fasti (ii. 721) and Livy for Lucretia, &c. See my Introduction to the Legend in vol. iii. pp. xxv., xxxvii.

With regard to the title 'seintes legend of Cupide,' which in modern English would be 'Cupid's Saints' Legend,' or 'the Legend of Cupid's Saints,' Mr. Jephson remarks—'This name is one example of the way in which Chaucer entered into the spirit of the heathen pantheism, as a real form of religion. He considers these persons, who suffered for love, to have been saints and martyrs for Cupid, just as Peter and Paul and Cyprian were martyrs for Christ.'

63. Gower also tells the story of Tarquin and Lucrece, which he took, says Professor Morley (English Writers, iv. 230), from the Gesta Romanorum, which again had it from Augustine's De Civitate Dei.

Babilan, Babylonian; elsewhere Chaucer has Babiloine = Babylon, riming with Macedoine; Book of the Duchesse, l. 1061.

64. swerd, sword; put here for death by the sword. See Virgil's Aeneid, iv. 646; and Chaucer's Legend of Good Women, 1351.

65. tree, put here, most likely, for death by hanging; cf. last line. In Chaucer's Legend, 2485, we find—

'She was her owne deeth right with a corde.'

The word may also be taken literally, since Phyllis was metamorphosed after her death into a tree; Gower says she became a nut-tree, and derives filbert from Phyllis; Conf. Amant. bk. iv. Lydgate writes filbert instead of Phyllis; Complaint of Black Knight, l. 68.

66. The pleinte of Dianire, the complaint of Deianira, referring to Ovid's letter 'Deianira Herculi'; so also that of Hermion refers to the letter entitled 'Hermione Orestae'; that of Adriane, to the 'Ariadne Theseo'; and that of Isiphilee, to the 'Hypsipyle Iasoni.'

68. bareyne yle, barren island; of which I can find no correct explanation by a previous editor. It refers to Ariadne, mentioned in the previous line. The expression is taken from Ariadne's letter to Theseus, in Ovid's Heroides, Ep. x. 59, where we find 'uacat insula cultu'; and just below—

'Omne latus terrae cingit mare; nauita nusquam,

Nulla per ambiguas puppis itura uias.'

Or, without referring to Ovid at all, the allusion might easily have been explained by observing Chaucer's Legend of Ariadne, l. 2163, where the island is described as solitary and desolate. It is said to have been the isle of Naxos.

69. Scan—The dreynt | e Lé | andér |. Here the pp. dreynt is used adjectivally, and takes the final e in the definite form. So in the Book of the Duchesse, 195, it is best to read the dreynte; and in the House of Fame, 1783, we must read the sweynte.

75. Alceste. The story of Alcestis—'that turned was into a dayesie'—is sketched by Chaucer in his Prologue to the Legend, l. 511, &c. No doubt he intended to include her amongst the Good Women, as the very queen of them all.

78. Canacee; not the Canace of the Squieres Tale, whom Chaucer describes as so kind and good as well as beautiful, but Ovid's Canace. The story is told by Gower, Confess. Amantis, book iii. It is difficult to resist the conclusion that Chaucer is here making a direct attack upon Gower, his former friend; probably because Gower had, in some places, imitated the earlier edition of Chaucer's Man of Lawes Tale. This difficult question is fully discussed in vol. iii. pp. 413-7.

81. 'Or else the story of Apollonius of Tyre.' The form Tyro represents the Lat. ablative in 'Apollonius de Tyro.' This story, like that of Canacee (note to l. 78), is told by Gower, Conf. Amant. bk. viii., ed. Pauli, iii. 284; and here again Chaucer seems to reflect upon Gower. The story occurs in the Gesta Romanorum, in which it appears as Tale cliii., being the longest story in the whole collection. It is remarkable as being the only really romantic story extant in an Anglo-Saxon version; see Thorpe's edition of it, London, 1834. It is therefore much older than 1190, the earliest date assigned by Warton. Compare the play of Pericles, Prince of Tyre.

89. if that I may, as far as lies in my power (to do as I please); a common expletive phrase, of no great force.

90. of, as to, with regard to. doon, accomplish it.

92. Pierides; Tyrwhitt rightly says—'He rather means, I think, the daughters of Pierus, that contended with the Muses, and were changed into pies; Ovid, Metam. bk. v.' Yet the expression is not wrong; it signifies—'I do not wish to be likened to those would-be Muses, the Pierides'; in other words, I do not set myself up as worthy to be considered a poet.

93. Metamorphoseos. It was common to cite books thus, by a title in the genitive case, since the word Liber was understood. There is, however, a slight error in this substitution of the singular for the plural; the true title being P. Ovidii Nasonis Metamorphoseon Libri Quindecim. See the use of Eneydos in the Nonne Prestes Tale, B. 4549; and of Judicum in Monk. Ta. B. 3236.

94. 'But, nevertheless, I care not a bean.' Cf. l. 4004 below.

95. with hawe bake, with plain fare, as Dr. Morris explains it; it obviously means something of a humble character, unsuited for a refined taste. This was left unexplained by Tyrwhitt, but we may fairly translate it literally by 'with a baked haw,' i. e. something that could just be eaten by a very hungry person. The expression I sette nat an hawe (= I care not a haw) occurs in the Wyf of Bathes Prologue, D. 659. Haws are mentioned as given to feed hogs in the Vision of Piers Plowman, B. x. 10; but in The Romance of William of Palerne, l. 1811, a lady actually tells her lover that they can live in the woods on haws, hips, acorns, and hazel-nuts. There is a somewhat similar passage in the Legend of Good Women, Prol. ll. 73-77. I see no difficulty in this explanation. That proposed by Mr. Jephson—'hark back'—is out of the question; we cannot rime bak with makë, nor does it make sense.

Baken was a strong verb in M. E., with the pp. baken or bake (A. S. bacen). Dr. Stratmann, apparently by mistake, enters this phrase under hawe, adj. dark grey! But he refrains from explaining bake.

96. I speke in prose, I generally have to speak in prose in the law courts; so that if my tale is prosy as compared with Chaucer's, it is only what you would expect. Dr. Furnivall suggests that perhaps the prose tale of Melibeus was originally meant to be assigned to the Man of Lawe. See further in vol. iii. p. 406.

98. after, afterwards, immediately hereafter. Cf. other for otherwise in Old English.—M.

Prologue to the Man of Lawes Tale.

99-121. It is important to observe that more than three stanzas of this Prologue are little else than a translation from the treatise by Pope Innocent III. entitled De Contemptu Mundi, sive de Miseria Conditionis Humanae. This was first pointed out by Prof. Lounsbury, of Yale, Newhaven, U.S.A., in the Nation, July 4, 1889. He shewed that the lost work by Chaucer (viz. his translation of 'the Wreched Engendring of Mankinde As man may in Pope Innocent y-finde,' mentioned in the Legend of Good Women, Prologue A, l. 414) is not lost altogether, since we find traces of it in the first four stanzas of the present Prologue; in the stanzas of the Man of Lawes Tale which begin, respectively, with lines 421, 771, 925, and 1135; and in some passages in the Pardoner's Prologue; as will be pointed out.

It will be observed that if Chaucer, as is probable, has preserved extracts from this juvenile work of his without much alteration, it must have been originally composed in seven-line stanzas, like his Second Nonnes Tale and Man of Lawes Tale.

I here transcribe the original of the present passage from Innocent's above-named treatise, lib. i. c. 16, marking the places where the stanzas begin.

De miseria divitis et pauperis. (99) Pauperes enim premuntur inedia, cruciantur aerumna, fame, siti, frigore, nuditate; vilescunt, tabescunt, spernuntur, et confunduntur. O miserabilis mendicantis conditio; et si petit, pudore confunditur, et si non petit, egestate consumitur, sed ut mendicet, necessitate compellitur. (106) Deum causatur iniquum, quod non recte dividat; proximum criminatur malignum, quod non plene subveniat. Indignatur, murmurat, imprecatur. (113) Adverte super hoc sententiam Sapientis, 'Melius est,' inquit, 'mori quam indigere': 'Etiam proximo suo pauper odiosus erit.' 'Omnes dies pauperis mali'; (120) 'fratres hominis pauperis oderunt eum; insuper et amici procul recesserunt ab eo.'

For further references to the quotations occurring in the above passage, see the notes below, to ll. 114, 118, 120.

99. poverte = povértë, with the accent on the second syllable, as it rimes with herte; in the Wyf of Bathes Tale, it rimes with sherte. Poverty is here personified, and addressed by the Man of Lawe. The whole passage is illustrated by a similar long passage near the end of the Wyf of Bathes Tale, in which the opposite side of the question is considered, and the poet shews what can be said in Poverty's praise. See D. 1177-1206.

101. Thee is a dative, like me in l. 91.—M. See Gen. ii. 15 (A. S. version), where him þæs ne sceamode = they were not ashamed of it; lit. it shamed them not of it.

102. artow, art thou; the words being run together: so also seistow = sayest thou, in l. 110.

104. Maugree thyn heed, in spite of all you can do; lit. despite thy head; see Knightes Tale, A. 1169, 2618, D. 887.

105. Or ... or = either ... or; an early example of this construction.—M.

108. neighebour is a trisyllable; observe that e in the middle of a word is frequently sounded; cf. l. 115. wytest, blamest.

110. 'By my faith, sayest thou, he will have to account for it hereafter, when his tail shall burn in the fire (lit. glowing coal), because he helps not the needy in their necessity.'

114. 'It is better (for thee) to die than be in need.' Tyrwhitt says—'This saying of Solomon is quoted in the Romaunt of the Rose, l. 8573—Mieux vault mourir que pauvres estre'; [l. 8216, ed. Méon.] The quotation is not from Solomon, but from Jesus, son of Sirach; see Ecclus. xl. 28, where the Vulgate has—'Melius est enim mori quam indigere.' Cf. B. 2761.

115. Thy selve neighebor, thy very neighbour, even thy next neighbour. See note to l. 108.

118. In Prov. xv. 15, the Vulgate version has—'Omnes dies pauperis mali'; where the A. V. has 'the afflicted.'

119. The reading to makes the line harsh, as the final e in come should be sounded, and therefore needs elision. in that prikke, into that point, into that condition; cf. l. 1028.

120. Cf. Prov. xiv. 20—'the poor is hated even of his neighbour'; or, in the Vulgate, 'Etiam proximo suo pauper odiosus erit.' Also Prov. xix. 7—'all the brethren of the poor do hate him; how much more do his friends go far from him'; or, in the Vulgate, 'Fratres hominis pauperis oderunt eum; insuper et amici procul recesserunt ab eo.' So too Ovid, Trist. i. 9. 5:—

'Donec eris felix, multos numerabis amicos,

Tempora si fuerint nubila, solus eris.'

Chaucer has the same thought again in his Tale of Melibeus (p. 227, B. 2749)—'and if thy fortune change, that thou wexe povre, farewel freendshipe and felaweshipe!' See also note to B. 3436.

123. as in this cas, as relates to this condition or lot in life. In Chaucer, cas often means chance, hap.

124. ambes as, double aces, two aces, in throwing dice. Ambes is Old French for both, from Lat. ambo. The line in the Monkes Tale—'Thy sys fortune hath turned into as' (B. 3851)—helps us out here in some measure, as it proves that a six was reckoned as a good throw, but an ace as a bad one. So in Shakespeare, Mids. Nt. Dream, v. 1. 314, we find less than an ace explained as equivalent to nothing. In the next line, sis cink means a six and a five, which was often a winning throw. The allusion is probably, however, not to the mere attempt as to which of two players could throw the highest, but to the particular game called hazard, in which the word chance (here used) has a special sense. There is a good description of it in the Supplemental volume to the English Cyclopaedia, div. Arts and Sciences. The whole description has to be read, but it may suffice to say here that, when the caster is going to throw, he calls a main, or names one of the numbers five, six, seven, eight, or nine; most often, he calls seven. If he then throws either seven or eleven (Chaucer's sis cink), he wins; if he throws aces (Chaucer's ambes as) or deuce-ace (two and one), or double sixes, he loses. If he throws some other number, that number is called the caster's chance, and he goes on playing till either the main or the chance turns up. In the first case he loses, in the second, he wins. If he calls some other number, the winning and losing throws are somewhat varied; but in all cases, the double ace is a losing throw.

Similarly, in The Pardoneres Tale, where hazard is mentioned by name (C. 591), we find, at l. 653—'Seven is my chaunce, and thyn is cinq and treye,' i. e. eight.

In Lydgate's Order of Fools, printed in Queen Elizabeth's Academy, ed. Furnivall, p. 81, one fool is described—

'Whos chaunce gothe nether yn synke or syse;

With ambes ase encressithe hys dispence.'

And in a ballad printed in Chaucer's Works, ed. 1561, folio 340, back, we have—

'So wel fortuned is their chaunce

The dice to turne[n] vppe-so-doune,

With sise and sincke they can auaunce.'

The phrase was already used proverbially before Chaucer's time. In the metrical Life of St. Brandan, ed. T. Wright, p. 23, we find, 'hi caste an ambes as,' they cast double aces, i. e. they wholly failed. See Ambs-ace in the New E. Dict. Dr. Morris notes that the phrase 'aums ace' occurs in Hazlitt's O. E. Plays, ii. 35, with the editorial remark—'not mentioned elsewhere' (!).

126. At Cristemasse, even at Christmas, when the severest weather comes. In olden times, severe cold must have tried the poor even more than it does now.

'Muche myrthe is in may · amonge wilde bestes,

And so forth whil somer lasteþ · heore solace dureþ;

And muche myrthe amonge riche men is · þat han meoble [property]

ynow and heele [health].

Ac beggers aboute myd-somere · bredlees þei soupe,

And ȝut is wynter for hem wors · for wet-shood þei gangen,

A-furst and a-fyngred [Athirst and ahungered] · and foule rebuked

Of þese worlde-riche men · þat reuthe hit is to huyre [hear of it].'

Piers Plowman, C. xvii. 10; B. xiv. 158.

127. seken, search through; much like the word compass in the phrase 'ye compass sea and land' in Matth. xxiii. 15.

128. thestaat, for the estaat, i. e. the estate. This coalescence of the article and substantive is common in Chaucer, when the substantive begins with a vowel; cf. thoccident, B. 3864; thorient, B. 3871.

129. fadres, fathers, originators; by bringing tidings from afar.

130. debat, strife. Merchants, being great travellers, were expected to pick up good stories.

131. were, should be. desolat, destitute. 'The E. E. word is westi; 'westi of alle gode theawes,' destitute of all good virtues; O. Eng. Homilies, i. 285.'—M.

132. Nere, for ne were, were it not. goon is, &c., many a year ago, long since.

The Tale of the Man of Lawe.

A story, agreeing closely with The Man of Lawes Tale, is found in Book II. of Gower's Confessio Amantis, from which Tyrwhitt supposed that Chaucer borrowed it. But Gower's version seems to be later than Chaucer's, whilst Chaucer and Gower were both alike indebted to the version of the story in French prose (by Nicholas Trivet) in MS. Arundel 56, printed for the Chaucer Society in 1872. In some places Chaucer agrees with this French version rather closely, but he makes variations and additions at pleasure. Cf. vol. iii. p. 409.

The first ninety-eight lines of the preceding Prologue are written in couplets, in order to link the Tale to the others of the series; but there is nothing to show which of the other tales it was intended to follow. Next follows a more special Prologue of thirty-five lines, in five stanzas of seven lines each; so that the first line in the Tale is l. 134 of Group B, the second of the fragments into which the Canterbury Tales are broken up, owing to the incomplete state in which Chaucer left them.

134. Surrie, Syria; called Sarazine (Saracen-land) by N. Trivet.

136. spycerye, grocery, &c., lit. spicery. The old name for a grocer was a spicer; and spicery was a wide term. 'It should be noted that the Ital. spezerie included a vast deal more than ginger and other "things hot i' the mouth." In one of Pegoletti's lists of spezerie we find drugs, dye-stuffs, metals, wax, cotton,' &c.—Note by Col. Yule in his ed. of Marco Polo; on bk. i. c. 1.

143. Were it, whether it were.

144. message, messenger, not message; see l. 333, and the note.

145. The final e in Rome is pronounced, as in l. 142; but the words the ende are to be run together, forming but one syllable, thende, according to Chaucer's usual practice; cf. note to l. 255. Indeed in ll. 423, 965, it is actually so spelt; just as, in l. 150, we have thexcellent, and in l. 151, themperoures.

151. themperoures, the emperor's. Gower calls him Tiberius Constantine, who was Emperor (not of Rome, but) of the East, A. D. 578, and was succeeded, as in the story, by Maurice, A. D. 582. His capital was Constantinople, whither merchants from Syria could easily repair; but the greater fame of Rome caused the substitution of the Western for the Eastern capital.

156. God him see, God protect him. See note to C. 715.

161. al Europe. In the margin of MSS. E. Hn. Cp. Pt. Ln. is written the note 'Europa est tercia pars mundi.'

166. mirour, mirror. Such French words are frequently accented on the last syllable. Cf. minístr' in l. 168.

171. han doon fraught, have caused to be freighted. All the MSS. have fraught, not fraughte. In the Glossary to Specimens of English, I marked fraught as being the infinitive mood, as Dr. Stratmann supposes, though he notes the lack of the final e. I have now no doubt that fraught is nothing but the past participle, as in William of Palerne, l. 2732—

'And feithliche fraught ful of fine wines,'

which is said of a ship. The use of this past participle after a perfect tense is a most remarkable idiom, but there is no doubt about its occurrence in the Clerkes Tale, Group E. 1098, where we find 'Hath doon yow kept,' where Tyrwhitt has altered kept to kepe. On the other hand, Tyrwhitt actually notes the occurrence of 'Hath don wroght' in Kn. Tale, 1055, (A. 1913), which he calls an irregularity. A better name for it is idiom. I find similar instances of it in another author of the same period,

'Thai strak his hed of, and syne it

Thai haf gert saltit in-til a kyt.'

Barbour's Bruce, ed. Skeat, xviii. 167.

I. e. they have caused it (to be) salted. And again in the same, bk. viii. l. 13, we have the expression He gert held, as if 'he caused to be held'; but it may mean 'he caused to incline.' Compare also the following:—

'And thai sall let thame trumpit ill'; id. xix. 712.

I. e. and they shall consider themselves as evilly deceived.

In the Royal Wills, ed. Nichols, p. 278, we find:—'wher I have beforn ordeyned and do mad [caused to be made] my tombe.'

The infinitive appears to have been fraughten, though the earliest certain examples of this form seem to be those in Shakespeare, Cymb. i. 1. 126, Temp. i. 2. 13. The proper form of the pp. was fraughted (as in Marlowe, 2 Tamb. i. 2. 33), but the loss of final -ed in past participles of verbs of which the stem ends in t is common; cf. set, put, &c. Hence this form fraught as a pp. in the present instance. It is a Scandinavian word, from Swed. frakta, Dan. fragte. At a later period we find freight, the mod. E. form. The vowel-change is due to the fact that there was an intermediate form fret, borrowed from the French form fret of the Scandinavian word. This form fret disturbed the vowel-sound, without wholly destroying the recollection of the original guttural gh, due to the Swed. k. For an example of fret, we have only to consult the old black-letter editions of Chaucer printed in 1532 and 1561, which give us the present line in the form—'These marchantes han don fret her ships new.'

185. ceriously, 'seriously,' i. e. with great minuteness of detail. Used by Fabyan, who says that 'to reherce ceryously' all the conquests of Henry V would fill a volume; Chron., ed. Ellis, p. 589. Skelton, in his Garland of Laurell, l. 581, has: 'And seryously she shewyd me ther denominacyons'; on which Dyce remarks that it means seriatim, and gives a clear example. It answers to the Low Latin seriose, used in two senses; (1) seriously, gravely; (2) minutely, fully. In the latter case it is perhaps to be referred to the Lat. series, not serius. A similar word, cereatly (Lat. seriatim), is found three times in the Romance of Partenay, ed. Skeat, with the sense of in due order; cf. Ceriatly and Ceryows in the New E. Dict.

In N. and Q. 7 S. xii. 183, I shewed that Lydgate has at least ten examples of this use of the word in his Siege of Troye. In one instance it is spelt seryously (with s).

190. This refers to the old belief in astrology and the casting of nativities. Cf. Prol. A. 414-418. Observe that ll. 190-203 are not in the original, and were doubtless added in revision. This is why this sowdan in l. 186 is so far separated from the repetition of the same words in l. 204.

197. Tyrwhitt shews that this stanza is imitated closely from some Latin lines, some of which are quoted in the margin of many MSS. of Chaucer. He quotes them at length from the Megacosmos of Bernardus Silvestris, a poet of the twelfth century (extant in MS. Bodley 1265). The lines are as follows, it being premised that those printed in italics are cited in the margin of MSS. E. Hn. Cp. Pt. and Ln.:—

'Praeiacet in stellis series, quam longior aetas

Explicet et spatiis temporis ordo suis,

Sceptra Phoronei, fratrum discordia Thebis,

Flamma Phaethontis Deucalionis aque.

In stellis Codri paupertas, copia Croesi,

Incestus Paridis, Hippolytique pudor.

In stellis Priami species, audacia Turni,

Sensus Ulixeus, Herculeusque uigor.

In stellis pugil est Pollux et nauita Typhis,

Et Cicero rhetor et geometra Thales.

In stellis lepidum dictat Maro, Milo figurat,

Fulgurat in Latia nobilitate Nero.

Astra notat Persis, Ægyptus parturit artes,

Graecia docta legit, praelia Roma gerit.'

See Bernardi Sylvestris Megacosmos, ed. C.S. Barach and J. Wrobel, Innsbruck, 1876, p. 16. The names Ector (Hector), &c., are too well known to require comment. The death of Turnus is told at the end of Vergil's Æneid.

207, 208. Here have, forming part of the phrase mighte have grace, is unemphatic, whilst han (for haven) is emphatic, and signifies possession. See han again in l. 241.

211. Compare Squieres Tale, F. 202, 203, and the note thereon.

224. Mahoun, Mahomet. The French version does not mention Mahomet. This is an anachronism on Chaucer's part; the Emperor Tiberius II. died A. D. 582, when Mahomet was but twelve years old.

228. I prey yow holde, I pray you to hold. Here holde is the infinitive mood. The imperative plural would be holdeth; see saveth, next line.

236. Maumettrye, idolatry; from the Mid. E. maumet, an idol, corrupted from Mahomet. The confusion introduced by using the word Mahomet for an idol may partly account for the anachronism in l. 224. The Mahometans were falsely supposed by our forefathers to be idolaters.

242. noot, equivalent to ne woot, know not.

248. gret-è forms the fourth foot in the line. If we read gret, the line is left imperfect at the cæsura; and we should have to scan it with a medial pause, as thus:—

That thém | peróur || —óf | his grét | noblésse ||

Line 621 below may be read in a similar manner:—

But ná | thelées || —thér | was gréet | moorning ||

253. 'So, when Ethelbert married Bertha, daughter of the Christian King Charibert, she brought with her, to the court of her husband, a Gallican bishop named Leudhard, who was permitted to celebrate mass in the ancient British Church of St. Martin, at Canterbury.'—Note in Bell's Chaucer.

255. ynowe, being plural, takes a final e; we then read th'ende, as explained in note to l. 145. The pl. inoȝhe occurs in the Ormulum.

263. alle and some, collectively and individually; one and all. See Cler. Tale, E. 941, &c.

273-87. Not in the original; perhaps added in revision.

277. The word alle, being plural, is dissyllabic. Thing is often a plural form, being an A. S. neuter noun. The words over, ever, never are, in Chaucer, generally monosyllables, or nearly so; just as o'er, e'er, ne'er are treated as monosyllables by our poets in general. Hence the scansion is—'Ov'r al | lë thing |,' &c.

289. The word at is inserted from the Cambridge MS.; all the other six MSS. omit it, which makes the passage one of extreme difficulty. Tyrwhitt reads 'Or Ylion brent, or Thebes the citee.' Of course he means brende, past tense, not brent, the past participle; and his conjecture amounts to inserting or before Thebes. It is better to insert at, as in MS. Cm.; see Gilman's edition. The sense is—'When Pyrrhus broke the wall, before Ilium burnt, (nor) at the city of Thebes, nor at Rome,' &c. Nat (l. 290) = Ne at, as in Hl. Ylion, in medieval romance, meant 'the citadel' of Troy; see my note to l. 936 of the Legend of Good Women. Tyrwhitt well observes that 'Thebes the citee' is a French phrase. He quotes 'dedans Renes la cite,' Froissart, v. i. c. 225.

295-315. Not in the original, and clearly a later addition. They include an allusion to Boethius (see next note).

295. In the margin of the Ellesmere MS. is written—'Vnde Ptholomeus, libro i. cap. 8. Primi motus celi duo sunt, quorum vnus est qui mouet totum semper ab Oriente in Occidentem vno modo super orbes, &c. Item aliter vero motus est qui mouet orbem stellarum currencium contra motum primum, videlicet, ab Occidente in Orientem super alios duos polos.' The old astronomy imagined nine spheres revolving round the central stationary earth; of the seven innermost, each carried with it one of the seven planets, viz. the Moon, Venus, Mercury, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; the eighth sphere, that of the fixed stars, had a slow motion from west to east, round the axis of the zodiac (super alios duos polos), to account for the precession of the equinoxes; whilst the ninth or outermost sphere, called the primum mobile, or the sphere of first motion, had a diurnal revolution from east to west, carrying everything with it. This exactly corresponds with Chaucer's language. He addresses the outermost sphere or primum mobile (which is the ninth if reckoning from within, but the first from without), and accuses it of carrying with it everything in its irresistible westward motion; a motion contrary to that of the 'natural' motion, viz. that in which the sun advances along the signs of the zodiac. The result was that the evil influence of the planet Mars prevented the marriage. It is clear that Chaucer was thinking of certain passages in Boethius, as will appear from consulting his own translation of Boethius, ed. Morris, pp. 21, 22, 106, and 110. I quote a few lines to shew this:—

'O þou maker of þe whele þat bereþ þe sterres, whiche þat art fastned to þi perdurable chayere, and turnest þe heuene wiþ a rauyssyng sweighe, and constreinest þe sterres to suffren þi lawe'; pp. 21, 22.

'þe regioun of þe fire þat eschaufiþ by þe swifte moeuyng of þe firmament'; p. 110.

The original is—

'O stelliferi conditor orbis

Qui perpetuo nixus solio

Rapidum caelum turbine uersas,

Legemque pati sidera cogis';

Boeth. Cons. Phil. lib. i. met. 5.

'Quique agili motu calet aetheris'; id. lib. iv. met. 1.

(See the same passages in vol. ii. pp. 16, 94).

To the original nine spheres, as above, was afterwards added a tenth or crystalline sphere; see the description in the Complaint of Scotland, ed. Murray (E. E. T. S.), pp. 47, 48. For the figure, see fig. 10 on Plate V., in my edition of Chaucer's Astrolabe (in vol. iii.).

Compare also the following passage:—

'The earth, in roundness of a perfect ball,

Which as a point but of this mighty all

Wise Nature fixed, that permanent doth stay,

Wheras the spheres by a diurnal sway

Of the first Mover carried are about.'

Drayton: The Man in the Moon.

299. crowding, pushing. This is still a familiar word in East Anglia. Forby, in his Glossary of the East Anglian Dialect, says—'Crowd, v. to push, shove, or press close. To the word, in its common acceptation, number seems necessary. With us, one individual can crowd another.' To crowd a wheelbarrow means to push it. The expression 'crod in a barwe,' i. e. wheeled or pushed along in a wheelbarrow, occurs in the Paston Letters, A.D. 1477, ed. Gairdner, iii. 215.

302. A planet is said to ascend directly, when in a direct sign; but tortuously, when in a tortuous sign. The tortuous signs are those which ascend most obliquely to the horizon, viz. the signs from Capricornus to Gemini inclusive. Chaucer tells us this himself; see his Treatise on the Astrolabe, part ii. sect. 28, in vol. iii. The most 'tortuous' of these are the two middle ones, Pisces and Aries. Of these two, Aries is called the mansion of Mars, and we may therefore suppose the ascending sign to be Aries, the lord of which (Mars) is said to have fallen 'from his angle into the darkest house.' The words 'angle' and 'house' are used technically. The whole zodiacal circle was divided into twelve equal parts, or 'houses.' Of these, four (beginning from the cardinal points) were termed 'angles,' four others (next following them) 'succedents,' and the rest 'cadents.' It appears that Mars was not then situate in an 'angle,' but in his 'darkest (i. e. darker) house.' Mars had two houses, Aries and Scorpio. The latter is here meant; Aries being the ascendent sign, Scorpio was below the horizon, and beyond the western 'angle.'

Now Scorpio was 'called the house of death, and of trauaile, of harm, and of domage, of strife, of battaile, of guilefulnesse and falsnesse, and of wit'; Batman upon Bartholomè, lib. viii. c. 17. We may represent the position of Mars by the following table, where East represents the ascending sign, West the descending sign; and A., S., and C. stand for 'angle,' 'succedent,' and 'cadent house' respectively.

East.— Aries.
1. A. Taurus.
2. S. Gemini.
3. C. Cancer.
4. A. Leo.
5. S. Virgo.
6. C.

West.— Libra.
7. A. Scorpio.
8. S. Sagittarius.
9. C. Capricornus.
10. A. Aquarius.
11. S. Pisces.
12. C.

Again, the 'darkest house' was sometimes considered to be the eighth; though authorities varied. This again points to Scorpio.

'Nulla diuisio circuli tam pessima, tamque crudelis in omnibus, quam octaua est.'—Aphorismi Astrologi Ludovici de Rigiis; sect. 35. I may also note here, that in Lydgate's Siege of Troy, ed. 1555, fol. Y 4, there is a long passage on the evil effects of Mars in the 'house' of Scorpio.

305. The meaning of Atazir has long remained undiscovered. But by the kind help of Mr. Bensly, one of the sub-librarians of the Cambridge University Library, I am enabled to explain it. Atazir or atacir is the Spanish spelling of the Arabic al-tasir, influence, given at p. 351 of Richardson's Pers. Dict., ed. 1829. It is a noun derived from asara, a verb of the second conjugation, meaning to leave a mark on, from the substantive asar, a mark; the latter substantive is given at p. 20 of the same work. Its use in astrology is commented upon by Dozy, who gives it in the form atacir, in his Glossaire des Mots Espagnols dérivés de l'Arabique, p. 207. It signifies the influence of a star or planet upon other stars, or upon the fortunes of men. In the present case it is clearly used in a bad sense; we may therefore translate it by 'evil influence,' i. e. the influence of Mars in the house of Scorpio. On this common deterioration in the meaning of words, see Trench, Study of Words, p. 52. The word craft, for example, is a very similar instance; it originally meant skill, and hence, a trade, and we find star-craft used in particular to signify the science of astronomy.

307. 'Thou art in conjunction in an unfavourable position; from the position in which thou wast favourably placed thou art moved away.' This I take to mean that the Moon (as well as Mars) was in Scorpio; hence their conjunction. But Scorpio was called the Moon's depression, being the sign in which her influence was least favourable; she was therefore 'not well received,' i. e., not supported by a lucky planet, or by a planet in a lucky position. weyved, pushed aside.

312. 'Is there no choice as to when to fix the voyage?' The favourable moment for commencing a voyage was one of the points on which it was considered desirable to have an astrologer's opinion. Travelling, at that time, was a serious matter. Yet this was only one of the many undertakings which required, as was thought, to be begun at a favourable moment. Whole books were written on 'elections,' i. e. favourable times for commencing operations of all kinds. Chaucer was thinking, in particular, of the following passage, which is written in the margins of the Ellesmere and Hengwrt MSS.: 'Omnes concordati sunt quod elecciones sint debiles nisi in diuitibus: habent enim isti, licet debilitentur eorum elecciones, radicem, i. [id est] natiuitates eorum, que confortat omnem planetam debilem in itinere.' The sense of which is—'For all are agreed, that "elections" are weak, except in the case of the rich; for these, although their elections be weakened, have a "root" of their own, that is to say, their nativities (or horoscopes); which root strengthens every planet that is of weak influence with respect to a journey.' This is extracted, says Tyrwhitt, from a Liber Electionum by a certain Zael; see MS. Harl. 80; MS. Bodley 1648. This is a very fair example of the jargon to be found in old books on astrology. The old astrologers used to alter their predictions almost at pleasure, by stating that their results depended on several causes, which partly counteracted one another; an arrangement of which the convenience is obvious. Thus, if the aspect of the planets at the time inquired about appeared to be adverse to a journey, it might still be the case (they said) that such evil aspect might be overcome by the fortunate aspect of the inquirer's horoscope; or, conversely, an ill aspect in the horoscope could be counteracted by a fit election of a time for action. A rich man would probably be fitted with a fortunate horoscope, or else why should he buy one? Such horoscope depended on the aspect of the heavens at the time of birth or 'nativity,' and, in particular, upon the 'ascendent' at that time; i. e. upon the planets lying nearest to the point of the zodiac which happened, at that moment, to be ascending, i. e. just appearing above the horizon. So Chaucer, in his Treatise on the Astrolabe, pt. ii. § 4, (vol. iii. 191), explains the matter, saying—'The assendent sothly, as wel in alle nativitez as in questiouns and elecciouns of tymes, is a thing which that thise Astrologiens gretly observen'; &c. The curious reader may find much more to the same effect in the same Treatise, with directions to 'make roots' in pt. ii. § 44.

The curious may further consult the Epitome Astrologiae of Johannes Hispalensis. The whole of Book iv. of that work is 'De Electionibus,' and the title of cap. xv. is 'Pro Itinere.'

Lydgate, in his Siege of Thebes, just at the beginning, describes the astronomers as casting the horoscope of the infant Œdipus. They were expected

'to yeue a judgement,

The roote i-take at the ascendent,

Truly sought out, by minute and degre,

The selfe houre of his natiuite,

Not foryet the heauenly mansions

Clerely searched by smale fraccions,' &c.

To take a different example, Ashmole, in his Theatrum Chemicum, 1652, says in a note on p. 450—'Generally in all Elections the Efficacy of the Starrs are (sic) used, as it were by a certaine application made thereof to those unformed Natures that are to be wrought upon; whereby to further the working thereof, and make them more available to our purpose.... And by such Elections as good use may be made of the Celestiall influences, as a Physitian doth of the variety of herbes.... But Nativities are the Radices of Elections, and therefore we ought chiefly to looke backe upon them as the principal Root and Foundation of all Operations; and next to them the quality of the Thing we intend to fit must be respected, so that, by an apt position of Heaven, and fortifying the Planets and Houses in the Nativity of the Operator, and making them agree with the thing signified, the impression made by that influence will abundantly augment the Operation,' &c.; with much more to the same effect. Several passages in Norton's Ordinall, printed in the same volume (see pp. 60, 100), shew clearly what is meant by Chaucer in his Prologue, ll. 415-7. The Doctor could 'fortune the ascendent of his images,' by choosing a favourable moment for the making of charms in the form of images, when a suitable planet was in the ascendent. Cf. Troil. ii. 74.

314. rote is the astrological term for the epoch from which to reckon. The exact moment of a nativity being known, the astrologers were supposed to be able to calculate everything else. See the last note.

332. Alkaron, the Koran; al is the Arabic article.

333. Here Makomete is used instead of Mahoun (l. 224). See Washington Irving's Life of Mahomet.

message, messenger. This is a correct form, according to the usages of Middle English; cf. l. 144. In like manner, we find prison used to mean a prisoner, which is often puzzling at first sight.

340. 'Because we denied Mahomet, our (object of) belief.'

360. 'O serpent under the form of woman, like that Serpent that is bound in hell.' The allusion here is not a little curious. It clearly refers to the old belief that the serpent who tempted Eve appeared to her with a woman's head, and it is sometimes so represented. I observed it, for instance, in the chapter-house of Salisbury Cathedral; and see the woodcut at p. 73 of Wright's History of Caricature and Grotesque in Art. In Peter Comestor's Historia Libri Genesis, we read of Satan—'Elegit etiam quoddam genus serpentis (vt ait Beda) virgineum vultum habens.' In the alliterative Troy Book, ed. Panton and Donaldson, p. 144, the Tempter is called Lyuyaton (i. e. Leviathan), and it is said of him that he

'Hade a face vne fourmet as a fre maydon'; l. 4451.

And, again, in Piers the Plowman, B. xviii. 355, Satan is compared to a 'lusarde [lizard] with a lady visage.' In the Ancren Riwle, p. 207, we are gravely informed that a scorpion is a kind of serpent that has a face somewhat like that of a woman, and puts on a pleasant countenance. To remember this gives peculiar force to ll. 370, 371. See also note to l. 404.

367. knowestow is a trisyllable; and the olde is to be read tholdè. But in l. 371, the word Makestow, being differently placed in the line, is to be read with the e slurred over, as a dissyllable.

380. moste, might. It is not always used like the modern must.

401. See Lucan's Pharsalia, iii. 79—'Perdidit o qualem uincendo plura triumphum!' But Chaucer's reference, evidently made at random, is unlucky. Lucan laments that he had no triumph to record.

404. The line is deficient at the beginning, the word But standing by itself as a foot. So also in A. 294, G. 341, &c. See Ellis's Early English Pronunciation, pp. 333, 649. (This peculiarity was pointed out by me in 1866, in the Aldine edition of Chaucer, i. 174.) For the sense of scorpioun, see the reference to the Ancren Riwle, in note to l. 360, and compare the following extracts. 'Thes is the scorpioun, thet maketh uayr mid the heauede, and enuenymeth mid the tayle'; Ayenbite of Inwyt, ed. Morris, p. 62. 'The scorpion, the whiche enoynteth with his tongue, and prycketh sore with his taylle'; Caxton, Fables of Æsop; Lib. iv. fable 3. Chaucer repeats the idea, somewhat more fully, in the Marchaunts Tale, E. 2058-2060. So also this wikked gost means this Evil Spirit, this Tempter.

421. Pronounce ever rapidly, and accent súccessour on the first syllable. In the margin of MSS. E. Hn. Pt. and Cp. is the following note: 'Nota, de inopinato dolore. Semper mundane leticie tristicia repentina succedit. Mundana igitur felicitas multis amaritudinibus est respersa. Extrema gaudii luctus occupat. Audi ergo salubre consilium; in die bonorum ne immemor sis malorum.' This is one of the passages from Innocent's treatise de Contemptu Mundi, of which I have already spoken in the note to B. 99-121 above (p. 140). Lib. i. c. 23 has the heading—'De inopinato dolore.' It begins:—'Semper enim mundanae letitiae tristitia repentina succedit. Et quod incipit a gaudio, desinit in moerore. Mundana quippe felicitas multis amaritudinibus est respersa. Noverat hoc qui dixerat: "Risus dolore miscebitur, et extrema gaudii luctus occupat."... Attende salubrem consilium: "In die bonorum, non immemor sis malorum."'

This passage is mostly made up of scraps taken from different authors. I find in Boethius, De Consolatione Philosophiae, lib. ii. pr. 4—'Quam multis amaritudinibus humanae felicitatis dulcedo respersa est'; which Chaucer translates by—'The swetnesse of mannes welefulnesse is sprayned with many biternesses'; see vol. ii. p. 34; and the same expression is repeated here, in l. 422. Gower quotes the same passage from Boethius in the prologue to his Confessio Amantis. The next sentence is from Prov. xiv. 13—'Risus dolore miscebitur, et extrema gaudii luctus occupat.' The last clause (see ll. 426, 427) is from Ecclesiasticus, xi. 27 (in the Vulgate version). Cf. Troil. iv. 836.

438. Compare Trivet's French prose version:—'Dount ele fist estorier vne neef de vitaile, de payn quest apele bisquit, & de peis, & de feues, de sucre, & de meel, & de vyn, pur sustenaunce de la vie de la pucele pur treis aunx; e en cele neef fit mettre la richesse & le tresour que Iempire Tiberie auoit maunde oue la pucele Constaunce, sa fille; e en cele neef fist la soudane mettre la pucele saunz sigle, & sauntz neuiroun, & sauntz chescune maner de eide de homme.' I. e. 'Then she caused a ship to be stored with victuals, with bread that is called biscuit, with peas, beans, sugar, honey, and wine, to sustain the maiden's life for three years. And in this ship she caused to be placed the riches and treasure which the Emperor Tiberius had sent with the maid Constance his daughter; and in this ship the Sultaness caused the maiden to be put, without sail or oar, or any kind of human aid.'

foot-hot, hastily. It occurs in Gower, ed. Pauli, ii. 114; in The Romaunt of the Rose, l. 3827: Octovian, 1224, in Weber's Met. Rom. iii. 208; Sevyn Sages, 843, in the same, iii. 34; Richard Coer de Lion, 1798, 2185, in the same, ii. 71, 86; and in Barbour's Bruce, iii. 418, xiii. 454. Compare the term hot-trod, explained by Sir W. Scott to mean the pursuit of marauders with bloodhounds: see note 3 H to the Lay of the Last Minstrel. We also find hot fot, i. e. immediately, in the Debate of the Body and the Soul, l. 481. It is a translation of the O. F. phrase chalt pas, immediately, examples of which are given by Godefroy.

449-62. Not in the original; perhaps added in revision.

451-62. Compare these lines with verses 3 and 5 of the hymn 'Lustra sex qui iam peregit' in the office of Lauds from Passion Sunday to Wednesday in Holy Week inclusive, in the Roman breviary.

This hymn was written by Venantius Fortunatus; see Leyser's collection, p. 168.

'Crux fidelis, inter omnes

Arbor una nobilis:

Silua talem nulla profert

Fronde, flore, germine:

Dulce ferrum, dulce lignum,

Dulce pondus sustinent....

Sola digna tu fuisti

Ferre mundi uictimam;

Atque portum praeparare,

Arca mundo naufrago,

Quam sacer cruor perunxit,

Fusus Agni corpore.'

See the translation in Hymns Ancient and Modern, No. 97, part 2 (new edition), beginning—'Now the thirty years accomplished.'

We come still nearer to the original of Chaucer's lines when we consider the form of prayer quoted in the Ancren Riwle, p. 34, which is there given as follows:—'Salue crux sancta, arbor digna, quae sola fuisti digna portare Regem celorum et Dominum.... O crux gloriosa! o crux adoranda! o lignum preciosum, et admirabile signum, per quod et diabolus est victus, et mundus Christi sanguine redemptus.'

460. him and here, him and her, i. e. man and woman; as in Piers the Plowman, A. Pass. i. l. 100. The allusion is to the supposed power of the cross over evil spirits. See The Legends of the Holy Rood, ed. Morris; especially the story of the Invention of the Cross by St. Helen, p. 160—'And anone, as he had made the [sign of the] crosse, þe grete multitude of deuylles vanyshed awaye'; or, in the Latin original, 'statimque ut edidit signum crucis, omnis illa daemonum multitudo euanuit'; Aurea Legenda, ed. Grässe, 2nd ed. p. 311. Cf. Piers Plowman, B. xviii. 429-431.

461. The reading of this line is certain, and must not be altered. But it is impossible to parse the line without at once noticing that there is some difficulty in the construction. The best solution is obtained by taking which in the sense of whom. A familiar example of this use of which for who occurs in the Lord's Prayer. See also Abbott's Shakespearian Grammar, Sect. 265. The construction is as follows—'O victorious tree, protection of true people, that alone wast worthy to bear the King of Heaven with His new wounds—the White Lamb that was hurt with the spear—O expeller of fiends out of both man and woman, on whom (i. e. the men and women on whom) thine arms faithfully spread out,' &c. Limes means the arms of the cross, spread before a person to protect him.

464. see of Grece, here put for the Mediterranean Sea.

465. Marrok, Morocco; alluding to the Strait of Gibraltar; cf. l. 947. So also in Barbour's Bruce, iii. 688.

470-504. Not in the French text; perhaps added in revision.

474. Ther, where; as usual. knave, servant.

475. 'Was eaten by the lion ere he could escape.' Cf. l. 437.

480. The word clerkes refers to Boethius. This passage is due to Boeth. bk. iv. pr. 6. 114-117, and 152-4; see vol. ii. pp. 117, 118.

491. See Revelation vii. 1-3.

497. Here (if that be omitted) As seems to form a foot by itself, which gives but a poor line. See note to l. 404.

500. Alluding to St. Mary the Egyptian (Maria Egiptiaca), who according to the legend, after a youth spent in debauchery, lived entirely alone for the last forty-seven years of her life in the wilderness beyond the Jordan. She lived in the fifth century. Her day is April 9. See Mrs. Jameson's Sacred and Legendary Art; Rutebuef, ed. Jubinal, ii. 106-150; Maundeville's Travels, ed. Halliwell, p. 96; Aurea Legenda, ed. Grässe, cap. lvi. She was often confused with St. Mary Magdalen.

508. Northumberlond, the district, not the county. Yorkshire is, in fact, meant, as the French version expressly mentions the Humber.

510. of al a tyde, for the whole of an hour.

512. the constable; named Elda by Trivet and Gower.

519. Trivet says that she answered Elda in his own language, 'en sessoneys,' in Saxon, for she had learnt many languages in her youth.

525. The word deye seems to have had two pronunciations; in l. 644 it is dye, with a different rime. In fact, Mr. Cromie's 'Ryme-Index' to Chaucer proves the point. On the one hand, deye rimes to aweye, disobeye, dreye, preye, seye, tweye, weye; and on the other, dye rimes to avoutrye, bigamye, compaignye, Emelye, genterye, lye, maladye, &c. So also, high appears both as hey and hy.

527. forgat hir minde, lost her memory.

531. The final e in plese is preserved from elision by the cæsural pause. Or, we may read plesen; yet the MSS. have plese.

533. Hermengild; spelt Hermyngild in Trivet; answering to A. S. Eormengild (Lappenberg, Hist. England, i. 285). Note that St. Hermengild was martyred just at this very time, Apr. 13, 846.

543. plages, regions; we even find the word in Marlowe's Tamburlaine, pt. i. act iv. sc. 4, and pt. ii. act i. sc. 1. The latter passage is—'From Scythia to the oriental plage Of India.'

552. 'Eyes of his mind.' Jean de Meun has the expression les yex de cuer, the eyes of the heart; see his Testament, ll. 1412, 1683.

578. Alla, i. e. Ælla, king of Northumberland, A.D. 560-567; the same whose name Gregory (afterwards Pope) turned, by a pun, into Alleluia, according to the version of the celebrated story about Gregory and the English slaves, as given in Beda, Eccl. Hist. b. ii. c. 1.

584. quyte her whyle, repay her time; i. e. her pains, trouble; as when we say 'it is worth while.' Wile is not intended.

585. 'The plot of the knight against Constance, and also her subsequent adventure with the steward, are both to be found, with some variations, in a story in the Gesta Romanorum, ch. 101; MS. Harl. 2270. Occleve has versified the whole story'; Tyrwhitt. See vol. iii. p. 410, for further information. Compare the conduct of Iachimo, in Cymbeline.

609. See Troil. iv. 357.

620. Berth hir on hond, affirms falsely; lit. bears her in hand. Chaucer uses the phrase 'to bere in hond' with the sense of false affirmation, sometimes with the idea of accusing falsely, as here and in the Wyf of Bathes Prologue, D. 393; and sometimes with that of persuading falsely, D. 232, 380. In Shakespeare the sense is rather—'to keep in expectation, to amuse with false pretences'; Nares's Glossary. Barbour uses it in the more general sense of 'to affirm,' or 'to make a statement,' whether falsely or truly. In Dyce's Skelton, i. 237, occurs the line—'They bare me in hande that I was a spye'; which Dyce explains by 'they accused me, laid to my charge that,' &c. He refers us to Palsgrave, who has some curious examples of it. E.g., at p. 450:—'I beare in hande, I threp upon a man that he hath done a dede or make hym beleve so, Ie fais accroyre ... I beare hym in hande he was wode, Ie luy metz sus la raige, or ie luy metz sus quil estoyt enragé. What crime or yuell mayest thou beare me in hande of'; &c. So also: 'Many be borne an hande of a faute, and punysshed therfore, that were neuer gylty; Plerique facinoris insimulantur,' &c.; Hormanni Vulgaria, sig. m. ii. ed. 1530. In Skelton's Why Come Ye Nat to Courte, l. 449, bereth on hand simply means 'persuades.'

631-58. Not in the original. A later insertion, of much beauty.

634. 'And bound Satan; and he still lies where he (then) lay.' In the Apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, Christ descends into hell, and (according to some versions) binds him with chains; see Piers Plowman, B. xviii. 401.

639. Susanne; see the story of Susannah, in the Apocrypha.

641. The Virgin's mother is called Anna in the Apocryphal Gospel of James. Her day is July 26. See Aurea Legenda, ed. Grässe, cap. cxxxi; Cowper's Apocryphal Gospels, p. 4.

647. 'Where that he gat (could get) for himself no favour.'

660. 'For pitee renneth sone in gentil herte'; Knightes Tale, A. 1761. And see note to Sq. Tale, F. 479.

664. us avyse, deliberate with ourselves, consider the matter again. Compare the law-phrase Le roi s'avisera, by which the king refuses assent to a measure proposed. 'We will consider whom to appoint as judge.'

666. I. e. a copy of the Gospels in Welsh or British, called in the French prose version 'liure des Ewangeiles.' Agreements were sometimes written on the fly-leaves of copies of the Gospels, as may be seen in two copies of the A. S. version of them.

669. A very similar miracle is recorded in the old alliterative romance of Joseph of Arimathea, l. 362. The French version has:—'a peine auoit fini la parole, qe vne mayn close, com poyn de homme, apparut deuant Elda et quant questoient en presence, et ferri tiel coup en le haterel le feloun, que ambedeus lez eus lui enuolerent de la teste, & les dentz hors de la bouche; & le feloun chai abatu a la terre; et a ceo dist vne voiz en le oyance de touz: Aduersus filiam matris ecclesie ponebas scandalum; hec fecisti, et tacui.' I. e. 'Scarcely had he ended the word, when a closed hand, like a man's fist, appeared before Elda and all who were in the presence, and smote such a blow on the nape of the felon's neck that both his eyes flew out of his head, and the teeth out of his mouth; and the felon fell smitten down to the earth; and thereupon a voice said in the hearing of all, "Against the daughter of Mother Church thou wast laying a scandal; this hast thou done, and I held my peace."' The reading tacui suggests that, in l. 676, the word holde should rather be held; but the MSS. do not recognise this reading.

697. hir thoughte, it seemed to her; thoughte is here impersonal; so in l. 699. The French text adds that Domulde (Donegild) was, moreover, jealous of hearing the praises of Constance's beauty.

701. Me list nat, it pleases me not, I do not wish to. He does not wish to give every detail. In this matter Chaucer is often very judicious; Gower and others often give the more unimportant matters as fully as the rest. Cf. l. 706; and see Squyeres Tale, F. 401.

703. What, why. Cf. Squyeres Tale, F. 283, 298.

716. Trivet says—'Puis a vn demy aan passe, vint nouele al Roy que les gentz de Albanie, qe sountz les Escotz, furent passes lour boundes et guerrirent les terres le Roy. Dount par comun counseil, le Roi assembla son ost de rebouter ses enemis. Et auant son departir vers Escoce, baila la Reine Constaunce sa femme en la garde Elda, le Conestable du chastel, et a Lucius, leuesqe de Bangor; si lour chargea que quant ele fut deliueres denlaunt, qui lui feisoient hastiuement sauoir la nouele'; i. e. 'Then, after half-a-year, news came to the king that the people of Albania, who are the Scots, had passed their bounds, and warred on the king's lands. Then by common counsel the king gathered his host to rebut his foes. And before his departure towards Scotland, he committed Queen Constance his wife to the keeping of Elda, the constable of the castle, and of Lucius, bishop of Bangor, and charged them that when she was delivered, they should hastily let him know the news.'

722. knave child, male child; as in Clerkes Tale, E. 444.

723. at the fontstoon, i. e. at his baptism; French text—'al baptisme fu nome Moris.'

729. to doon his avantage, to suit his convenience. He hoped, by going only a little out of his way, to tell Donegild the news also, and to receive a reward for doing so. Trivet says that the old Queen was then at Knaresborough, situated 'between England and Scotland, as in an intermediate place.' Its exact site is less than seventeen miles west of York. Donegild pretends to be very pleased at the news, and gives the man a rich present.

736. lettres; so in all seven MSS.; Tyrwhitt reads lettre. But it is right as it is. Lettres is sometimes used, like Lat. literae, in a singular sense, and the French text has 'les lettres.' Examples occur in Piers Plowman, B. ix. 38; Bruce, ii. 80. See l. 744, and note to l. 747.

738. If ye wol aught, if you wish (to say) anything.

740. Donegild is dissyllabic here, as in l. 695, but in l. 805 it appears to have three syllables. Chaucer constantly alters proper names so as to suit his metre.

743. sadly, steadily, with the idea of long continuance.

747. lettre; here the singular form is used, but it is a matter of indifference. Exactly the same variation occurs in Barbour's Bruce, ii. 80:—

'And, among othir, lettres ar gayn

To the byschop off Androwis towne,

That tauld how slayn wes that baroun.

The lettir tauld hym all the deid,' &c.

This circumstance, of exchanging the messenger's letters for forged ones, is found in Matthew Paris's account of the Life of Offa the first; ed. Wats, pp. 965-968.

748. direct, directed, addressed; French text 'maundez.'

751. Pronounce horrible as in French.

752. The last word in this line should rather be nas (= was not), as has kindly been pointed out to me; though the seven MSS. and the old editions all have was. By this alteration we should secure a true rime.

754. elf; French text—'ele fu malueise espirit en fourme de femme,' she was an evil spirit in form of woman. Elf is the A.S. ælf, Icel. álfr, G. alp and elfe; Shakespeare writes ouphes for elves. 'The Edda distinguishes between Ljósálfar, the elves of light, and Dökkálfar, elves of darkness; the latter are not elsewhere mentioned either in modern fairy tales or in old writers.... In the Alvismál, elves and dwarfs are clearly distinguished as different. The abode of the elves in the Edda is Álfheimar, fairy land, and their king the god Frey, the god of light. In the fairy tales the Elves haunt the hills; hence their name Huldufólk, hidden people; respecting their origin, life, and customs, see Íslenzkar þjóðsögur, i. 1. In old writers the Elves are rarely mentioned; but that the same tales were told as at present is clear'; note on the word álfr, in Cleasby and Vigfusson's Icelandic Dictionary. See also Keightley's Fairy Mythology, and Brand's Popular Antiquities. The word is here used in a bad sense, and is nearly equivalent to witch. In the Prompt. Parv. we find—'Elfe, spryte, Lamia'; and Mr. Way notes that these elves were often supposed to bewitch children, and to use them cruelly.

767. Pronounce ágreáble nearly as in French, and with an accent on the first and third syllables.

769. take, handed over, delivered. Take often means to give or hand over in Middle English: very seldom to convey or bring.

771. In the margin of MSS. E. Hn. Cp. and Pt. is written—'Quid turpius ebrioso, cui fetor in ore, tremor in corpore, qui promit stulta, prodit occulta, cuius mens alienatur, facies transformatur? Nullum enim latet secretum ubi regnat ebrietas.' This is obviously the original of the stanza, ll. 771-777; cf. note to B. 99 above. There is nothing answering to it in Trivet, but it is to be found in Pope Innocent's treatise De Contemptu Mundi, lib. ii. c. 19—De ebrietate. Migne's edition has 'promittit multa' for 'promit stulta.' The last clause is quoted from Prov. xxxi. 4 in the Vulgate version; our English versions omit it. See B. 2384.

778. 'O Donegild, I have no language fit to tell,' &c.

782. mannish, man-like, i. e. harsh and cruel, not mild and gentle like a woman. But Chaucer is not satisfied with the epithet, and says he ought rather to call her 'fiend-like.' Perhaps it is worth while to say that in Gower's Conf. Amant., lib. vi., where Pauli (iii. 52) has 'Most liche to mannes creature,' the older edition by Chalmers has the form mannish. Lines 778-84 are not in the original.

789. 'He stowed away plenty (of wine) under his girdle,' i. e. drank his fill.

794. Pronounce constábl' much as if it were French, with an accent on a. In l. 808 the accent is on o. Lastly, in l. 858, all three syllables are fully sounded.

798. 'Three days and a quarter of an hour'; i. e. she was to be allowed only three days, and after that to start off as soon as possible. Tide (like tíð in Icelandic) sometimes means an hour. The French text says 'deynz quatre iours,' within four days.

801. croude, push; see ll. 296, 299 above; and note to l. 299.

813-26. Lines 813-819 are not in the French, and ll. 820-826 are not at all close to the original. The former stanza, which is due to Boeth. bk. i. met. 5. 22-30, was doubtless added in the revision.

827-33. The French text only has—'en esperaunce qe dure comencement amenera dieu a bon fyn, et qil me purra en la mere sauuer, qi en mere et en terre est de toute puissaunce.'

835. The beautiful stanzas in ll. 834-868 are all Chaucer's own; and of the next stanza, ll. 869-875, the French text gives but the merest hint.

842. eggement, incitement. The same word is used in other descriptions of the Fall. Thus, in Piers Plowman, B. i. 65, it is said of Satan that 'Adam and Eue he egged to ille '; and in Allit. Poems, ed. Morris, B. 241, it is said of Adam that 'thurgh the eggyng of Eue he ete of an apple.'

852. refut, refuge; see G. 75, and A. B. C. 14.

859. As lat, pray, let. See note to Clerkes Prologue, E. 7.

873. purchace, provide, make provision. So in Troilus, bk. ii. 1125, the line 'And of som goodly answere you purchace' means—and provide yourself with some kind answer, i. e. be ready with a kind reply.

875-84. Much abridged from the French text.

885. tormented, tortured. However, the French text says the messenger acknowledged his drunkenness freely. Examination by torture was so common, that Chaucer seems to have regarded the mention of it as being the most simple way of telling the story.

893. out of drede, without doubt, certainly; cf. l. 869. The other equally common expression out of doute comes to much the same thing, because doute in Middle-English has in general the meaning of fear or dread, not of hesitation. See Group E. 634, 1155; and Prol. A. 487.

894. pleinly rede, fully read, read at length. In fact, Chaucer judiciously omits the details of the French text, where we read that King Ælla rushed into his mother's room with a drawn sword as she lay asleep, roused her by crying 'traitress!' in a loud voice, and, after hearing the full confession which she made in the extremity of her terror, slew her and cut her to pieces as she lay in bed.

901. fleteth, floats. French text—'le quinte an de cest exil, come ele flotaunt sur le mere,' &c. Cf. fleet in l. 463.

905. The name of the castle is certainly not given in the French text, which merely says it was 'vn chastel dun Admiral de paens,' i. e. a castle of an admiral of the Pagans.

912. gauren, gaze, stare. See note to Squ. Tale, F. 190.

913. shortly, briefly; because the poet considerably abridges this part of the narrative. The steward's name was Thelous.

925. The word Auctor, here written in the margin of E., signifies that this stanza and the two following ones are additions to the story by the author. At the same time, ll. 925-931 are really taken from Chaucer's own translation of Pope Innocent's treatise De Contemptu Mundi; see further in the note to B. 99 above. Accordingly, we also find here, in the margin of E., the following Latin note:—'O extrema libidinis turpitudo, que non solum mentem effeminat, set eciam corpus eneruat. Semper sequũntur dolor et penitentia post,' &c. This corresponds to the above treatise, lib. ii. c. 21, headed 'De luxuria.' The last clause is abbreviated; the original has:—'Semper illam procedunt ardor et petulantia; semper comitantur fetor et immunditia; sequuntur semper dolor et poenitentia.'

932-45. These two stanzas are wholly Chaucer's, plainly written as a parallel passage to that in ll. 470-504 above.

934. Golias, Goliath. See I Samuel xvii. 25.

940. See the story of Holofernes in the Monkes Tale, B. 3741; and the note. I select the spelling Olofernus here, because it is that of the majority of the MSS., and agrees with the title De Oloferno in the Monkes Tale.

947. In l. 465, Chaucer mentions the 'Strait of Marrok,' i. e. Morocco, though there is no mention of it in the French text; so here he alludes to it again, but by a different name, viz. 'the mouth of Jubalter and Septe.' Jubaltar (Gibraltar) is from the Arabic jabálu't tárik, i. e. the mountain of Tarik; who was the leader of a band of Saracens that made a descent upon Spain in the eighth century. Septe is Ceuta, on the opposite coast of Africa.

965. shortly, briefly; because Chaucer here again abridges the original, which relates how the Romans burnt the Sultaness, and slew more than 11,000 of the Saracens, without a single death or even wound on their own side.

967. senatour. His name was Arsemius of Cappadocia; his wife's name was Helen. Accent victorie on the o.

969. as seith the storie, as the history says. The French text relates this circumstance fully.

971. The French text says that, though Arsemius did not recognise Constance, she, on her part, recognised him at once, though she did not reveal it.

981. aunte. Helen, the wife of Arsemius, was daughter of Sallustius, brother of the Emperor Tiberius, and Constance's uncle. Thus Helen was really Constance's first cousin. Chaucer may have altered it purposely; but it looks as if he had glanced at the sentence—'Cest heleyne, la nece Constaunce, taunt tendrement ama sa nece,' &c., and had read it as—'This Helen ... loved her niece so tenderly.' In reality, the word nece means 'cousin' here, being applied to Helen as well as to Constance.

982. she, i. e. Helen; for Constance knew Helen.

991. to receyven, i. e. to submit himself to any penance which the Pope might see fit to impose upon him. Journeys to Rome were actually made by English kings; Ælfred was sent to Rome as a boy, and his father, Æthelwulf, also spent a year there, but (as the Chronicle tells us) he went 'mid micelre weorðnesse,' with much pomp.

994. wikked werkes; especially the murder of his mother, as Trivet says. See note to l. 894.

999. Rood him ageyn, rode towards him, rode to meet him; cf. l. 391. See Cler. Tale, E. 911, and the note.

1009. Som men wolde seyn, some relate the story by saying. The expression occurs again in l. 1086. On the strength of it, Tyrwhitt concluded that Chaucer here refers to Gower, who tells the story of Constance in Book ii. of his Confessio Amantis. He observes that Gower's version of the story includes both the circumstances which are introduced by this expression. But this is not conclusive, since we find that Nicholas Trivet also makes mention of the same circumstances. In the present instance the French text has—'A ceo temps de la venuz le Roi a Rome, comensca Moris son diseotisme aan. Cist estoit apris priuement de sa mere Constance, qe, quant il irreit a la feste ou son seignur le senatour,' &c.; i. e. At this time of the king's coming to Rome, Maurice began his eighteenth year. He was secretly instructed by his mother Constance, that, when he should go to the feast with his lord the senator, &c. See also the note to l. 1086 below. Besides, Gower may have followed Chaucer.

1014. metes space, time of eating. This circumstance strikingly resembles the story of young Roland, who, whilst still a child, was instructed by his mother Bertha to appear before his uncle Charlemagne, by way of introducing himself. The story is well told in Uhland's ballad entitled 'Klein Roland,' a translation of which is given at pp. 335-340 of my 'Ballads and Songs of Uhland.'

'They had but waited a little while,

When Roland returns more bold;

With hasty step to the king he comes,

And seizes his cup of gold.

"What ho, there! stop! you saucy imp!"

Are the words that loudly ring.

But Roland clutches the beaker still

With eyes fast fixed on the king.

The king at the first looked fierce and dark,

But soon perforce he smiled—

"Thou comest," he said, "into golden halls

As though they were woodlands wild,"' &c.

The result is also similar; Bertha is reconciled to Charlemagne, much as Constance is to Ælla.

1034. aught, in any way, at all; lit. 'a whit.'

1035. sighte, sighed. So also pighte, 'pitched'; plighte, 'plucked'; and shrighte, 'shrieked.' It occurs again in Troil. iii. 1080, iv. 714, 1217, v. 1633; and in the Romaunt of the Rose, l. 1746.

1036. that he mighte, as fast as he could.

1038. 'I ought to suppose, in accordance with reasonable opinion.' Chaucer tells the story quite in his own way. There is no trace of ll. 1038-1042 in the French, and scarcely any of ll. 1048-1071, which is all in his own excellent strain.

1056. shet, shut, closed. Compare the description of Griselda in the Clerkes Tale, E. 1058-1061.

1058. Both twyes and owne are dissyllabic.

1060. all his halwes, all His saints. Hence the term All-hallow-mas, i. e. All Saints' day.

1061. wisly, certainly. as have, I pray that he may have; see note to l. 859 above. 'I pray He may so surely have mercy on my soul, as that I am as innocent of your suffering as Maurice my son is like you in the face.'

1078. After this line, the French text tells us that King Ælla presented himself before Pope Pelagius, who absolved him for the death of his mother. Pelagius II. was pope in 578-90.

1086. Here again, Tyrwhitt supposes Chaucer to follow Gower. But, in fact, Chaucer and Gower both consulted Trivet, who says here—'Constaunce charga son fitz Morice del messager [or message].... Et puis, quant Morice estoit deuaunt lempereur venuz, oue la compaignie honurable, et auoit son message fest de part le Roi son pere,' &c.; i. e. 'Constance charged her son Maurice with the message ... and then, when Maurice was come before the emperor, with the honourable company, and had done his message on behalf of the king his father,' &c. Or, as before, Gower may have copied Chaucer.

1090. As he; used much as we should now use 'as one.' It refers to the Emperor, of course.

1091. Sente, elliptical for 'as that he would send.' Tyrwhitt reads send; but it is best to leave an expression like this as it stands in the MSS. It was probably a colloquial idiom; and, in the next line, we have wente. Observe that sente is in the subjunctive mood, and is equivalent to 'he would send.'

1107. Chaucer so frequently varies the length and accent of a proper name that there is no objection to the supposition that we are here to read Cústancë in three syllables, with an accent on the first syllable. In exactly the same way, we find Grísildis in three syllables (E. 948), though in most other passages it is Grisíld. We have had Cústance, accented on the first syllable, several times; see ll. 438, 556, 566, 576, &c.; also Custáncë, three syllables, ll. 184, 274, 319, 612, &c. Tyrwhitt inserts a second your before Custance, but without authority.

1109. It am I; it is I. It is the usual idiom. So in the A.S. version of St. John vi. 20, we find 'ic hyt eom,' i. e. I it am, and in a Dutch New Testament, A.D. 1700, I find 'Ick ben 't,' i. e. I am it. The Mœso-Gothic version omits it, having simply 'Ik im'; so does Wyclif's, which has 'I am.' Tyndale, A.D. 1526, has 'it ys I.'

1113. thonketh, pronounced thonk'th; so also eyl'th, B. 1171, Abyd'th, B. 1175. So also tak'th, l. 1142 below. of, for. So in Chaucer's Balade of Truth, l. 19, we have 'thank God of al,' i. e. for all things. See my notes to Chaucer's Minor Poems, vol. i. p. 552.

1123. The French text tells us that he was named Maurice of Cappadocia, and was also known, in Latin, as Mauritius Christianissimus Imperator. Trivet tells us no more about him, except that he accounts for the title 'of Cappadocia' by saying that Arsemius (the senator who found Constance and Maurice and took care of them) was a Cappadocian. Gibbon says—'The Emperor Maurice derived his origin from ancient Rome; but his immediate parents were settled at Arabissus in Cappadocia, and their singular felicity preserved them alive to behold and partake the fortune of their august son.... Maurice ascended the throne at the mature age of 43 years; and he reigned above 20 years over the east and over himself.'—Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, cap. xlv. He was murdered, with all his seven children, by his successor, Phocas the Usurper; Nov. 27, A.D. 600. His accession was in A.D. 582.

1127. The statement 'I bere it not in minde,' i. e. I do not remember it, may be taken to mean that Chaucer could find nothing about Maurice in his French text beyond the epithet Christianissimus, which he has skilfully expanded into l. 1123. He vaguely refers us to 'olde Romayn gestes,' that is, to lives of the Roman emperors, for he can hardly mean the Gesta Romanorum in this instance. Gibbon refers us to Evagrius, lib. v. and lib. vi.; Theophylact Simocatta; Theophanes, Zonaras, and Cedrenus.

1132. In the margin of MSS. E. Hn. Cp. Pt. is written—'A mane usque ad vesperam mutabitur tempus. Tenent tympanum et gaudent ad sonum organi,' &c. See the next note.

1135. In the margin of MSS. E. Hn. Cp. Pt. is written—'Quis vnquam vnicam diem totam duxit in sua dilectione [vel delectatione] iocundam? quem in aliqua parte diei reatus consciencie, vel impetus Ire, vel motus concupiscencie non turbauerit? quem liuor Inuidie, vel Ardor Auaricie, vel tumor superbie non vexauerit? quem aliqua iactura vel offensa, vel passio non commouerit,' &c. Cp. Pt. insert inde before non turbauerit. This corresponds to nothing in the French text, but it is quoted from Pope Innocent's treatise, De Contemptu Mundi, lib. i. c. 22; see note to B. 99 above. The extract in the note to l. 1132 occurs in the same chapter, but both clauses in it are borrowed; the former from Ecclus. xviii. 26, the latter from Job, xxi. 12.

1143. I gesse, I suppose. Chaucer somewhat alters the story. Trivet says that Ælla died at the end of nine months after this. Half-a-year after, Constance repairs to Rome. Thirteen days after her arrival, her father Tiberius dies. A year later, Constance herself dies, on St. Clement's day (Nov. 23), A.D. 584, and is buried at Rome, near her father, in St. Peter's Church. The date 584, here given by Trivet, should rather be 583; the death of Tiberius took place on Aug. 14, 582; see Gibbon.

The Shipman's Prologue.

1165. The host here refers to the Man of Lawes Tale, which had just been told, and uses the expression 'thrifty tale' with reference to the same expression above, B. 46. Most MSS. separate this end-link widely from the Tale, but MS. Hl. and MS. Arch. Seld. B. 14 have it in the right place. See vol. iii. pp. 417-9.

for the nones, for the nonce, for the occasion; see note to the Prologue, A. 379. The A.S. ānes (= once) is an adverb with a genitive case-ending; and, being an adverb, becomes indeclinable, and can accordingly be used as a dative case after the preposition for, which properly governs the dative.

1166. The Host here turns to the Parson (see Prol. A. 477), and adjures him to tell a tale, according to the agreement.

1167. yore, put for of yore, formerly, already.—M.

1169. Can moche good, know (or are acquainted with) much good; i. e. with many good things, Cf. B. 47.

1170. Benedicite, bless ye; i. e. bless ye the Lord; the first word of the Song of the Three Children, and a more suitable exclamation than most of those in common use at the time. In the Knightes Tale, A. 1785, where Theseus is pondering over the strange event he had just witnessed, the word is pronounced in full, as five syllables. But in A. 2115, it is pronounced, as here, as a mere trisyllable. The syllables to be dropped are the second and third, so that we must say ben'cite. This is verified by a passage in the Townley Mysteries, p. 85, where it is actually spelt benste, and reduced to two syllables only. Cf. notes to B. 1974, and Troil. i. 780.

1171. man; dat. case after eyleth. Swearing is alluded to as a prevalent vice amongst Englishmen in Robert of Brunne, in the Persones Tale of Chaucer, and elsewhere.—M.

1172. O Iankin, &c.; 'O Johnny, you are there, are you?' That is, 'so it is you whom I hear, is it, Mr. Johnny?' A derisive interruption. It was common to call a priest Sir John, by way of mild derision; see Monkes Prol. (B. 3119) and Nonne Prestes Prol. (B. 4000). The Host carries the derision a little further by using the diminutive form. See note to B. 4000.

1173. a loller, a term of reproach, equivalent to a canting fellow. Tyrwhitt aptly cites a passage from a treatise of the period, referring to the Harleian Catalogue, no. 1666:—'Now in Engelond it is a comun protectioun ayens persecutioun, if a man is customable to swere nedeles and fals and unavised, by the bones, nailes, and sides, and other membres of Christ. And to absteyne fro othes nedeles and unleful, and repreve sinne by way of charite, is mater and cause now, why Prelates and sum Lordes sclaundren men, and clepen hem Lollardes, Eretikes,' &c.

The reader will not clearly understand this word till he distinguishes between the Latin lollardus and the English loller, two words of different origin which were purposely confounded in the time of Wyclif. The Latin Lollardus had been in use before Wyclif. Ducange quotes from Johannes Hocsemius, who says, under the date 1309—-'Eodem anno quidam hypocritae gyrovagi, qui Lollardi, sive Deum laudantes, vocabantur, per Hannoniam et Brabantiam quasdam mulieres nobiles deceperunt.' He adds that Trithemius says in his Chronicle, under the year 1315—'ita appellatos a Gualtero Lolhard, Germano quodam.' Kilian, in his Dictionary of Mid. Dutch, says—'Lollaerd, mussitator, mussitabundus'; i. e. a mumbler of prayers. This gives two etymologies for Lollardus. Being thus already in use as a term of reproach, it was applied to the followers of Wyclif, as we learn from Thomas Walsingham, who says, under the year 1377—'Hi uocabantur a uulgo Lollardi, incedentes nudis pedibus'; and again—'Lollardi sequaces Joannis Wiclif.' But the Old English loller (from the verb to loll) meant simply a lounger, an idle vagabond, as is abundantly clear from a notable passage in Piers the Plowman, C-text (ed. Skeat), x. 188-218; where William tells us plainly—

'Now kyndeliche, by crist · beþ suche callyd lolleres,

As by englisch of oure eldres · of olde menne techynge.

He that lolleþ is lame · oþer his leg out of ioynte,' &c.

Here were already two (if not three) words confused, but this was not all. By a bad pun, the Latin lolium, tares, was connected with Lollard, so that we find in Political Poems, i. 232, the following—

'Lollardi sunt zizania,

Spinae, uepres, ac lollia,

Quae uastant hortum uineae.'

This obviously led to allusions to the Parable of the Tares, and fully accounts for the punning allusion to cockle, i. e. tares, in l. 1183. Mr. Jephson observes that lolium is used in the Vulgate Version, Matt. xii. 25; but this is a mistake, as the word there used is zizania. Gower, Prol. to Conf. Amant., ed. Pauli, i. 15, speaks of—

'This newe secte of lollardie,

And also many an heresie.'

Also in book v., id. ii. 187,—

'Be war that thou be nought oppressed

With anticristes lollardie,' &c.

See Mosheim, Eccl. Hist. iii. 355-358; Wordsworth's Eccl. Biography, i. 331, note.

1180. 'He shall not give us any commentary on a gospel.' To glose is to comment upon, with occasional free introduction of irrelevant matter. The gospel is the text, or portion of the Gospel commented upon.

1181. 'We all agree in the one fundamental article of faith'; by which he insinuates—'and let that suffice; we want no theological subtilties discussed here.'

1183. springen, scatter, sprink-le. The pt. t. is spreynde or spreynte; the pp. spreynd occurs in B. 422, 1830.—M. Gower, Conf. Amantis, bk. v., ed. Pauli, ii. 190, speaks of lollardie

'Which now is come for to dwelle,

To sowe cockel with the corne.'

1185. body, i. e. self. Cf. lyf = a person, in P. Plowman, B. iii. 292.—M.

1186. See B. 3984, which suggests that there is a play upon words here. The Shipman will make his horse's bells ring loudly enough to awake them all; or he will ring so merry a peal, as to rouse them like a church bell that awakes a sleeper.

1189. It is plain that the unmeaning words phislyas and phillyas, as in the MSS., must be corruptions of some difficult form. I think that form is certainly physices, with reference to the Physics of Aristotle, here conjoined with 'philosophy' and 'law' in order to include the chief forms of medieval learning. Aristotle was only known, in Chaucer's time, in Latin translations, and Physices Liber would be a possible title for such a translation. Lewis and Short's Lat. Dict. gives 'physica, gen. physicae, and physice, gen. physices, f., = φυσική, natural science, natural philosophy, physics, Cicero, Academ. 1. 7. 25; id. De Finibus, 3. 21. 72; 3. 22. 73.' Magister Artium et Physices was the name of a degree; see Longfellow's Golden Legend, § vi.

That Chaucer should use the gen. physices alone, is just in his usual manner; cf. Iudicum, B. 3236; Eneidos, B. 4549; Metamorphoseos, B. 93. Tyrwhitt's reading of physike gives the same sense.

The Shipmannes Tale.

This Tale agrees rather closely with one in Boccaccio's Decamerone, Day viii. nov. 1. See further in vol. iii. p. 420.

1191. Seint Denys, Saint Denis, in the environs of Paris. Cf. ll. 1247, 1249, and note to 1341.

1202. us, i. e. us women. This is clear proof that some of the opening lines of this Tale were not originally intended for the Shipman, but for the Wife of Bath, as she is the only lady in the company to whom they would be suitable. We may remember that Chaucer originally meant to make each pilgrim tell four Tales; so there is nothing surprising in the fact that he once thought of giving this to the Wife. This passage is parallel to D. 337-339.

1209. perilous. Cf. D. 339: 'it is peril of our chastitee.'

1228. Referring to the common proverb—'As fain as a fowl [bird] of a fair day'; cf. l. 1241 below, A. 2437, G. 1342.

1233. Daun, Dan, for Lat. Dominus, corresponding to E. sir, as in 'Sir John,' a common title for a priest. Cf. B. 3119.

1244. Shoop him, lit. shaped himself, set about, got ready. Cf. P. Plowman, C. i. 2, xiv. 247, and the notes.

1245. Brugges, Bruges; which, as Wright remarks, was 'the grand central mart of European commerce in the middle ages.' Cf. P. Plowman, C. vii. 278, and the note.

1256. graunges, granges; cf. notes to A. 3668, and A. 166.

1260. Malvesye, Malmsey; so named from Malvasia, now Napoli di Malvasia, a town on the E. coast of Lacedaemonia in the Morea. See note in the Babees Book, ed. Furnivall, p. 206, where Malvasia is explained as the Ital. corruption of Monemvasia, from Gk. μόνη ἐμβασία, single entrance; with reference to its position.

1261. Vernage. In the Babees Book, ed. Furnivall, p. 203, vernage is said to be a red wine, bright, sweet, and somewhat rough, from Tuscany and Genoa, and other parts of Italy. The Ital. name is vernaccia, lit. the name of a thick-skinned grape. The information in this note and the preceding one is drawn from Henderson's History of Ancient and Modern Wines, 1824: which see.

1262. volatyl, wild fowl, game; here used as a collective plural, to represent Lat. uolatilia. Littré quotes: 'Tant ot les volatiles chieres'; Roman de la Rose, 20365. Wyclif has al volatile to translate cunctum uolatile, Gen. vii. 14; also my volatilis in Matt. xxii. 4, where the Vulgate has altilia. Cf. F. volaille.

1278. passed pryme, past 9 A.M. See notes to A. 3906, F. 73; and cf. B. 1396.

1281. his thinges, the things he had to say; cf. F. 78. It 'means the divine office in the Breviary, i. e. the psalms and lessons from scripture which, being absent from the convent, he was bound to say privately'; Bell. curteisly, reverently. See note to l. 1321 below.

1287. under the yerde, still subject to the discipline of the rod. As girls were married at a very early age, this should mean 'still quite a child.' Cf. as hir list in l. 1286. And see E. 22. See Ælfric's Colloquy (Wright's Vocab. ed. Wülker, p. 102), where the boy says he is still sub uirga, on which the A.S. gloss is under gyrda. F. sous la verge (Littré).

1292. appalled, enfeebled, languid; see F. 365.

1293. dare, lie motionless. This is the original sense of the word, as in E. Friesic bedaren. So also Low G. bedaren, to be still and quiet; as in dat weer bedaart, the weather becomes settled; een bedaart mann, a man who has lost the fire of youth. Du. bedaren, to compose, to calm. The rather common M.E. phrase to droupe and dare means 'to sink down and lie quiet,' like a hunted animal in hiding; hence came the secondary sense 'to lurk' or 'lie close,' as in the Prompt. Parv. Cotgrave has F. blotir, 'to squat, skowke, or lie close to the ground, like a daring lark or affrighted foul.' Hence also a third sense, 'to peer round,' as a lurking creature that looks out for possible danger. The word is common in M.E., and in many passages the sense 'to lie still' suits better than 'lurk,' as it is usually explained.

1295. Were, 'which might be,' 'which should happen to be'; the relative is understood. forstraught, distracted. Such is evidently the sense; but the word occurs nowhere else, and is incorrect. As far as I can make it out, Chaucer has coined this word incorrectly. The right word is destrat (vol. ii. p. 67, l. 1), from O.F. destrait, pp. of destraire, to tear asunder (as by horses), to torment, fatigue (Godefroy). Next, he turned it (1) into forstrait, pp. of forstraire (fortraire in Cotgrave), to purloin; and (2) into forstraught, as if it were the pp. of an A.S. *for-streccan, to stretch exceedingly. Thus, he has made one change by altering the prefix, and another by misdividing the word and substituting English for French. A similar mistake is seen in the absurd form distraught, used for 'distracted,' though it is, formally, equivalent to dis-straught, as if made up of the prefix dis- and the pp. of strecchen, to stretch. An early instance occurs in Lydgate's Minor Poems, ed. Halliwell, p. 206, where we find 'Distrauhte in thouhte,' i. e. distracted in thought, mad. There is much confusion between the E. prefixes for-, fore-, and the F. fors-, for-. Chaucer has straughte (correctly), as the pt. t. of strecchen, in A. 2916.

1298. Accent labóured on the second syllable.

1303. 'God knows all'; implying, 'I can contradict you, if I choose to speak.'

1321. port-hors, for porte-hors, lit. 'carry-abroad,' the F. equivalent of Lat. portiforium, a breviary. Also spelt portous, portess, &c. 'The Portous, or Breviary, contained whatever was to be said by all beneficed clerks, and those in holy orders, either in choir, or privately by themselves, as they recited their daily canonical hours; no musical notation was put into these books.'—Rock, Church of our Fathers, v. iii. pt. 2, p. 212. Dan John had just been saying 'his things' out of it (l. 1281). The music was omitted to save space. See P. Plowman, B. xv. 122, and my note on the line.

1327. for to goon, i. e. even though going to hell were the penalty of my keeping secret what you tell me.

1329. 'This I do, not for kinship, but out of true love.'

1335. a legende, a story of martyrdom, like that of a saint's life.

1338. St. Martin of Tours, whose day is Nov. 11.

1341. St. Denis of France, St. Dionysius, bishop of Paris, martyred A.D. 272, whose day is Oct. 9. Near his place of martyrdom was built a chapel, which was first succeeded by a church, and then by the famous abbey of St. Denis, in which King Dagobert and his successors were interred. The French adopted St. Denis as their patron saint; see Chambers, Book of Days, ii. 427; Alban Butler, Lives of the Saints, Oct. 9.

1353. sit, is becoming, befits; see E. 460, 1277.

1384. Geniloun, Genilon or Ganelon, the traitor who betrayed Charlemagne's army at Roncesvalles. For this deed he was torn to death by wild horses, according to the romance-writers. See La Chanson de Roland, l. 3735. Cf. note to B. 3579, and Book of the Duchesse, 1121, and my note upon it.

1396. chilindre, a kind of portable sun-dial, lit. cylinder. A thirteenth-century Latin treatise on the use of the chilindre was edited by Mr. E. Brock for the Chaucer Society, and I here copy his clear description of the instrument. 'The Chilindre (cylindrus) or cylinder is one of the manifold forms of the sun-dial, very simple in its construction, but rude and inaccurate as a time-shower. According to the following treatise, it consists of a wooden cylinder, with a central bore from top to bottom, and with a hollow space in the top, into which a moveable rotary lid with a little knob at the top is fitted. This lid is also bored in the centre, and a string passed through the whole instrument. Upon this string the chilindre hangs [perpendicularly] when in use. The style or gnomon works on a pin fixed in the lid. When the instrument is in use, the style projects at a right angle to the surface of the cylindrical body, through a notch in the side of the lid, but can, at pleasure, be turned down and slipt into the central bore, which is made a little wider at the top to receive it. The body of the chilindre is marked with a table of the points of the shadow, a table of degrees for finding the sun's altitude, and spaces corresponding to the months of the year and the signs of the zodiac. Across these spaces are drawn six oblique hour-lines.

'To ascertain the time of day by the chilindre, consider what month it is, and turn the lid round till the style stands directly over the corresponding part of the chilindre; then hold up the instrument by the string so that the style points towards the sun, or in other words, so that the shadow of the style falls perpendicularly, and the hour will be shewn by the lowest line reached by the shadow.'

Another treatise of the same character was subsequently edited by Mr. Brock for the same Society. It is entitled 'Practica Chilindri; or the Working of the Cylinder; by John Hoveden.'

There is a curious reference to the same instrument in the following passage from Horman's Vulgaria, leaf 338, back:—'There be iorneyringis [day-circles, dials] and instrumentis lyke an hangynge pyler with a tunge lyllyng [lolling] out, to knowe what tyme of the day.'

In Wright's Vocabularies, ed. Wülker, 572. 22, we find: 'Chilindrus, anglice a leuel; uel est instrumentum quo hore notantur, anglice a chylaundre.' It thus appears that the reading kalendar, in the old editions, is due to a mistake.

The most interesting comment on this passage is afforded by the opening lines of the Prologue to Part II. of Lydgate's Siege of Thebes, where Lydgate is clearly thinking of Chaucer's words. Here also the black-letter edition of 1561 has Kalendar, but the reading of MS. Arundel 119 (leaf 18) is more correct, as follows:—

'Passed the throp of Bowton on the Ble,

By my chilyndre I gan anon to se,

Thorgh the sonne, that ful cler gan shyne,

Of the clok[ke] that it drogh to nyne.'

pryme of day, 9 A.M., in the present passage; see above, and note the preparations for dinner in ll. 1399-1401; the dinner-hour being 10 A.M. See also note to A. 3906. 'Our forefathers dined at an hour at which we think it fashionable to breakfast; ten o 'clock was the time established by ancient usage for the principal meal'; Our Eng. Home, p. 33. In earlier times it was nine o'clock; see Wright, Hist. of Domestic Manners, p. 155.

1399. 'As cheery as a magpie.'

1404. Qui la? who's there. All the MSS. agree in thus cutting down the expression qui est la to two words; and this abbreviation is emphasised by the English gloss 'Who ther' in E. and Hn.; Cm. has Who there, without any French. It is clear, too, that the line is imperfect at the caesura, thus:—

Qui la? | quod he. | —Pe | ter it | am I ||

This medial pause is probably intentional, to mark the difference between the speakers. Ed. 1532 (which Tyrwhitt follows) has Qui est la, in order to fill out the line. Wright has the same; and (as usual) suppresses the fact that the word est is not in the MS. which he follows 'with literal accuracy.'

Peter! by Saint Peter! a too common exclamation, shewing that even women used to swear. It occurs again in D. 446, 1332, and Hous of Fame, 1034, 2000.

1412. elenge, pronounced (eelénggə), in a dreary, tedious, lonely manner; drearily. From A. S. ǣlenge, lengthy, protracted; a derivative from lang, long; see P. Plowman, C. i. 204, and the note. In Pegge's Kenticisms (E. D. S. Gloss. C. 3), we have: 'Ellinge [pronounced éllinj], adj. solitary, lonely, melancholy, farre from neighbours. See Ray.' It is also still in use in Sussex. The usual derivation from A. S. ellende, foreign, is incorrect; but it seems to have been confused with this word, whence the sense of 'strange, foreign,' was imported into it. See Alange in the New E. Dictionary.

1413. go we dyne, let us go and dine; as in P. Plowman, C. i. 227.

1417. Seint Yve. 'St. Ivia, or Ivo,' says Alban Butler, 'was a Persian bishop, who preached in England in the seventh century.' He died at St. Ive's in Huntingdonshire. A church was also built in his honour at St. Ive's in Cornwall. His day is April 25. This line is repeated in D. 1943. Cf. A. 4264.

1421. dryve forth, spend our time in; cf. P. Plowman, C. i. 225.

1423. pleye, 'take some relaxation by going on a pilgrimage'; clearly shewing the chief object of pilgrimages. Cf. D. 557. The line also indicates that it was a practice, when men could no longer make a show in the world, to go on a pilgrimage, or 'go out of the way' somewhere, to avoid creditors.

1436. houshold. So in E. Hn. Cm.; Cp. Pt. Ln. Hl. T. have housbonde, housbond, but the application of this word to a housewife is not happy.

1441. messe, mass; it seems to have been said, on this occasion, about 9.30 A.M. It did not take long; cf. l. 1413.

1445. At-after, soon after. This curious form is still in use; see the Cleveland Glossary. So in the Whitby Glossary:—'All things in order; ploughing first, sowing at-after.' Cf. 'at-after supper,' Rich. III. iv. 3. 31; and see At, § 40, in the New E. Dict. We find also at-under and at-before. It occurs again in F. 1219.

1466. a myle-wey, even by twenty minutes (the time taken to walk a mile).

1470. Graunt mercy of, many thanks for.

1476. 'God defend (forbid) that ye should spare.'

1484. took, handed over, delivered; see note to P. Plowman, C. iv. 47. And see l. 1594 below.

1496. let, leadeth, leads; note the various readings. Cf. 'Thet is the peth of pouerte huerby let the holy gost tho thet,' &c.; i. e. that is the path of poverty whereby the Holy Ghost leads those that, &c.—Ayenbite of Inwyt, p. 185; and so again in the same, p. 115, l. 9, and p. 51, l. 13. In P. Plowman, B. iii. 157, the Rawlinson MS. has let instead of ledeth.

1499. crowne; alluding to the priestly tonsure. See note to P. Plowman, C. i. 86.

1506. For bolt-upright, see note to A. 4194. This line is defective in the first foot; read—Hav' | hir in | his, &c. Tyrwhitt reads Haven, but admits, in the notes, that the final n came out of his own head.

1515. the faire, the fair at Bruges. On fairs, see the note to P. Plowman, C. vii. 211.

1519. chevisaunce, a contract for borrowing money on his credit; see A. 282, and note to P. Plowman, B. v. 249. For the purpose of making such a contract, a proportional sum had to be paid down in ready money; see note to l. 1524.

1524. 'A certain (number of) franks; and some (franks) he took with him.' The latter sum refers to the money he had to pay down in order to get the chevisance made. See note to Wyclif's Works, ed. Matthew, p. 528. And see l. 1558.

1542. Here sheeld is used as a plural, by analogy with pund, i. e. pounds. A sheeld was a French écu, or crown; see A. 278.

1557. Lumbardes, Lombards, the great money-lenders and bankers of the middle ages. Cf. 'Lumbardes of Lukes, that lyuen by lone as Iewes,' Lombards from Lucca, that live by lending, as Jews do; P. Plowman, C. v. 194. Owing to the accent, Lumbard's is dissyllabic.

1558. bond is misprinted hond in Wright's edition; MS. Hl. has bond, correctly, though the note in Bell says otherwise.

1592. Marie, by St. Mary; the familiar 'Marry!' as used by our dramatists.

1595. yvel thedom, ill success. Cf. 'Now, sere, evyl thedom com to thi snoute'; Coventry Mysteries, p. 139. This is printed by Halliwell in the form—'Now, sere evyl Thedom, com to thi snoute,' i. e. 'now, sir Ill Success, come to thy snout'; but how a man can come to his own nose, we are not told.

1599. bele chere, fair entertainment, hospitality. Bele = mod. F. belle.

1606. 'Score it upon my tally,' make a note of it. See A. 570, and note to P. Plowman, C. v. 61.

1613. to wedde, as a pledge (common). Cf. A. 1218.

1621. large, liberal; hence E. largesse, liberality.

The Prioress's Prologue.

1625. corpus dominus; of course for corpus domini, the Lord's body. But it is unnecessary to correct the Host's Latin.

1626. 'Now long mayest thou sail along the coast!'

1627. marineer, Fr. marinier; we now use the ending -er; but modern words of French origin shew their lateness by the accent on the last syllable, as engineer.—M. The Fr. pionnier is pioner in Shakespeare, but is now pioneer.

1628. 'God give this monk a thousand cart-loads of bad years!' He alludes to the deceitful monk described in the Shipman's Tale. A last is a very heavy load. In a Statute of 31 Edw. I. a weight is declared to be 14 stone; 2 weights of wool are to make a sack; and 12 sacks a last. This makes a last of wool to be 336 stone, or 42 cwt. But the dictionaries shew that the weight was very variable, according to the substance weighed. The word means simply a heavy burden, from A. S. hlæst, a burden, connected with hladan, to load; so that last and load are alike in sense. Laste, in the sense of heavy weight, occurs in Richard the Redeles, ed. Skeat, iv. 74. Quad is the Old English equivalent of the Dutch kwaad, bad, a word in very common use. In O.E., þe qued means the evil one, the devil; P. Pl. B. xiv. 189. Cf. note to A. 4357. The omission of the word of before quad may be illustrated by the expression 'four score years,' i. e. of years.

1630. 'The monk put an ape in the man's hood, and in his wife's too.' We should now say, he made him look like an ape. The contents of the hood would be, properly, the man's head and face; but neighbours seemed to see peeping from it an ape rather than a man. It is a way of saying that he made a dupe of him. In the Milleres Tale (A. 3389), a girl is said to have made her lover an ape, i. e. a dupe; an expression which recurs in the Chanones Yemannes Tale, G. 1313. Spenser probably borrowed the expression from this very passage; it occurs in his Faerie Queene, iii. 9. 31:—

'Thus was the ape,

By their faire handling, put into Malbeccoes cape.'

1632. 'Never entertain monks any more.'

1637. See the description of the Prioress in the Prologue, A. 118.

The Prioresses Tale.

For general remarks upon this Tale, see vol. iii. p. 421.

1643. Cf. Ps. viii. 1-2. The Vulgate version has—'Domine Dominus noster, quam admirabile est nomen tuum in uniuersa terra! Quoniam eleuata est magnificentia tua super caelos! Ex ore infantium et lactentium perfecisti laudem,' &c.

1650. can or may, know how to, or have ability to do.

1651. The 'white lily' was the token of Mary's perpetual virginity. See this explained at length in Rock, Church of our Fathers, iii. 245.

1655. 'For she herself is honour, and, next after her Son, the root of bounty, and the help (or profit) of souls.'

1658. Cf. Chaucer's A.B.C, or Hymn to the Virgin, (Minor Poems, vol. i. p. 266), where we find under the heading M—

'Moises, that saugh the bush with flaumes rede

Brenninge, of which ther never a stikke brende,

Was signe of thyn unwemmed maidenhede;

Thou art the bush, on which ther gan descende

The Holy Gost, the which that Moises wende

Had been a-fyr.'

So also in st. 2 of an Alliterative Hymn in Warton, Hist. Eng. Poetry, ed. Hazlitt, ii. 284.

1659. 'That, through thy humility, didst draw down from the Deity the Spirit that alighted in thee.'

1660. thalighte = thee alighte, the two words being run into one. Such agglutination is more common when the def. art. occurs, or with the word to; cf. Texpounden in B. 1716.

1661. lighte may mean either (1) cheered, lightened; or (2) illuminated. Tyrwhitt and Richardson both take the latter view; but the following passage, in which hertes occurs, makes the former the more probable:—

'But nathelees, it was so fair a sighte

That it made alle hir hertes for to lighte.'

Sq. Ta.; F. 395.

1664. Partly imitated from Dante, Paradiso, xxxiii. 16:—

'La tua benignità non pur soccorre

A chi dimanda, ma molte fiate

Liberamente al dimandar precorre.

In te misericordia, in te pietate,

In te magnificenza, in te s'aduna

Quantunque in creatura è di bontate.

1668. goost biforn, goest before, dost anticipate. of, by. The eighth stanza of the Seconde Nonnes Tale (G. 50-56) closely resembles ll. 1664-70; being imitated from the same passage in Dante.

1677. Gydeth, guide ye. The plural number is used, as a token of respect, in addressing superiors. By a careful analysis of the words thou and ye in the Romance of William of Palerne, I deduced the following results, which are generally true in Mid. English. 'Thou is the language of a lord to a servant, of an equal to an equal, and expresses also companionship, love, permission, defiance, scorn, threatening: whilst ye is the language of a servant to a lord, and of compliment, and further expresses honour, submission, or entreaty. Thou is used with singular verbs, and the possessive pronoun thine; but ye requires plural verbs, and the possessive your.'—Pref. to Will. of Palerne, ed. Skeat, p. xlii. Cf. Abbott's Shakespearian Grammar, sect. 231.

1678. Asie, Asia; probably used, as Tyrwhitt suggests, in the sense of Asia Minor, as in the Acts of the Apostles.

1679. a Iewerye, a Jewry, i. e. a Jews' quarter. In many towns there was formerly a Jews' quarter, distinguished by a special name. There is still an Old Jewry in London. In John vii. 1 the word is used as equivalent to Judea, as also in other passages in the Bible and in Shakesp. Rich. II, ii. 1. 55. Chaucer (House of Fame, 1435) says of Josephus—

'And bar upon his shuldres hye

The fame up of the Jewerye.'

Thackeray uses the word with an odd effect in his Ballad of 'The White Squall.' See also note to B. 1749.

1681. vilanye. So the six MSS.; Hl. has felonye, wrongly. In the margin of the Ellesmere MS. is written 'turpe lucrum,' i. e. vile gain, which is evidently the sense intended by lucre of vilanye, here put for villanous lucre or filthy lucre, by poetical freedom of diction. See Chaucer's use of vilanye in the Prologue, A. 70 and A. 726.

1684. free, unobstructed. People could ride and walk through, there being no barriers against horses, and no termination in a cul de sac. Cf. Troilus, ii. 616-8.

1687. Children an heep, a heap or great number of children. Of is omitted before children as it is before quad yere in B. 1628. For heep, see Prologue, A. 575.

1689. maner doctrine, kind of learning, i. e. reading and singing, as explained below. Here again of is omitted, as is usual in M.E. after the word maner; as—'In another maner name,' Rob. of Glouc. vol. i. p. 147; 'with somme manere crafte,' P. Plowman, B. v. 25: 'no maner wight,' Ch. Prol. A. 71; &c. See Mätzner, Englische Grammatik, ii. 2. 313. men used, people used; equivalent to was used. Note this use of men in the same sense as the French on, or German man. This is an excellent instance, as the poet does not refer to men at all, but to children. Moreover, men (spelt me in note to B. 1702) is an attenuated form of the sing. man, and not the usual plural.

1693. clergeon, not 'a young clerk' merely, as Tyrwhitt says, but a happily chosen word implying that he was a chorister as well. Ducange gives—'Clergonus, junior clericus, vel puer choralis; jeune clerc, petit clerc ou enfant de chœur'; see Migne's edition. And Cotgrave has—'Clergeon, a singing man, or Quirester in a Queer [choir].' It means therefore 'a chorister-boy.' Cf. Span. clerizon, a chorister, singing-boy; see New E. Dict.

1694. That, as for whom. A London street-boy would say—'which he was used to go to school.' That ... his = whose.

1695. wher-as, where that, where. So in Shakespeare, 2 Hen. VI. i. 2. 58; Spenser, F. Q. i. 4. 38. See Abbott's Shakesp. Grammar, sect. 135. thimage, the image; alluding to an image of the Virgin placed by the wayside, as is so commonly seen on the continent.

1698. Ave Marie; so in Spenser, F. Q. i. 1. 35. The words were—'Aue Maria, gratia plena; Dominus tecum; benedicta tu in mulieribus, et benedictus fructus uentris tui. Amen.' See the English version in Specimens of Early English, ed. Morris and Skeat, p. 106. It was made up from Luke i. 28 and i. 42. Sometimes the word Jesus was added after tui, and, at a later period, an additional clause—'Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc et in hora mortis nostrae. Amen.' See Rock, Church of our Fathers, iii. 315; and iii. pt. 2, 134.

1702. 'For a good child will always learn quickly.' This was a proverbial expression, and may be found in the Proverbs of Hending, st. 9:—

'Me may lere a sely fode [one may teach a good child]

That is euer toward gode

With a lutel lore;

Yef me nul [if one will not] him forther teche,

Thenne is [his] herte wol areche

Forte lerne more.

Sely chyld is sone ylered; Quoth Hendyng.'

1704. stant, stands, is. Tyrwhitt says—'we have an account of the very early piety of this Saint in his lesson; Breviarium Romanum, vi. Decemb.—Cuius uiri sanctitas quanta futura esset, iam ab incunabulis apparuit. Nam infans, cum reliquas dies lac nutricis frequens sugeret, quarta et sexta feria (i. e. on Wednesdays and Fridays) semel duntaxat, idque uesperi, sugebat.' Besides, St. Nicholas was the patron of schoolboys, and the festival of the 'boy-bishop' was often held on his day (Dec. 6); Rock, Church of our Fathers, iii. 2. 215.

1708. Alma redemptoris mater. There is more than one hymn with this beginning, but the one meant is perhaps one of five stanzas printed in Hymni Latini Medii Ævi, ed. F. J. Mone, vol. ii. p. 200, from a St. Gallen MS. no. 452, p. 141, of the thirteenth century. The first and last stanzas were sung in the Marian Antiphon, from the Saturday evening before the 1st Sunday in Advent to Candlemas day. In l. 4 we have the salutation which Chaucer mentions (l. 1723), and in the last stanza is the prayer (l. 1724). These two stanzas are as follows:—

'Alma redemptoris mater,

quam de caelis misit pater

propter salutem gentium;

tibi dicunt omnes "aue!"

quia mundum soluens a uae

mutasti uocem flentium....

Audi, mater pietatis,

nos gementes a peccatis

et a malis nos tuere;

ne damnemur cum impiis,

in aeternis suppliciis,

peccatorum miserere.'

There is another anthem that would suit almost equally well, but hardly comes so near to Chaucer's description. It occurs in the Roman Breviary, ed. 1583, p. 112, and was said at compline from Advent eve to Candlemas day, like the other; cf. l. 1730. The words are:—

'Alma redemptoris mater, quae peruia caeli

Porta manes, et stella maris, succurre cadenti,

Surgere qui curat, populo: Tu quae genuisti,

Natura mirante, tuum sanctum Genitorem,

Virgo priùs ac posteriùs, Gabrielis ab ore

Sumens illud "Aue!" peccatorum miserere.'

In the Myrour of Our Lady, ed. Blunt, p. 174, an English translation of the latter anthem is given, with the heading 'Alma redemptoris mater.'

1709. antiphoner, anthem-book. 'The Antiphoner, or Lyggar, was always a large codex, having in it not merely the words, but the music and the tones, for all the invitatories, the hymns, responses, versicles, collects, and little chapters, besides whatever else belonged to the solemn chanting of masses and lauds, as well as the smaller canonical hours'; Rock, Church of our Fathers, v. 3, pt. 2, p. 212.

1710. ner and ner, nearer and nearer. The phrase come neor and neor (= come nearer and nearer) occurs in King Alisaunder, in Weber's Metrical Romances, l. 599.

1713. was to seye, was to mean, meant. To seye is the gerundial or dative infinitive; see Morris, Hist. Outlines of English Accidence, sect. 290.

1716. Texpounden, to expound. So also tallege = to allege, Kn. Ta., A. 3000 (Harl. MS.); tespye = to espy, Nonne Pr. Ta., B. 4478. See note to l. 1733.

1726. can but smal, know but little. Cf. 'the compiler is smal learned'; Old Plays, ed. Hazlitt, i. 10.—M. Cf. coude = knew, in l. 1735.

1733. To honoure; this must be read tonóure, like texpounden in l. 1716.

1739. To scholeward; cf. From Bordeaux ward in the Prologue, A. 397.—M.

1749. The feeling against Jews seems to have been very bitter, and there are numerous illustrations of this. In Gower's Conf. Amant. bk. vii, ed. Pauli, iii. 194, a Jew is represented as saying—

'I am a Jewe, and by my lawe

I shal to no man be felawe

To kepe him trouth in word ne dede.'

In Piers the Plowman, B. xviii. 104, Faith reproves the Jews, and says to them—

'ȝe cherles, and ȝowre children · chieue [thrive] shal ȝe neure,

Ne haue lordship in londe · ne no londe tylye [till],

But al bareyne be · & vsurye vsen,

Which is lyf þat owre lorde · in alle lawes acurseth.'

See also P. Pl., C. v. 194. Usury was forbidden by the canon law, and those who practised it, chiefly Jews and Lombards, were held to be grievous sinners. Hence the character of Shylock, and of Marlowe's Jew of Malta. Cf. note on the Jews in England in the Annals of England, p. 162.

1751. honest, honourable; as in the Bible, Rom. xii. 17, &c.

1752. swich, such. The sense here bears out the formation of the word from so-like.—M.

1753. your, of you. Shakespeare has 'in your despite,' Cymb. i. 6. 135; 'in thy despite,' 1 Hen. VI, iv. 7. 22. Despite is used, like the Early and Middle English maugre, with a genitive; as maugre þin, in spite of thee, in Havelok, ll. 1128, 1789.—M.

1754. 'Which is against the respect due to your law.' Cf. 'spretaeque iniuria formae'; Æneid, i. 27.

1762. Wardrobe, privy. Godefroy's O. F. Dict. shews that garderobe meant not only a wardrobe, or place for keeping robes, &c., but also any small chamber; hence the sense. See Cotgrave.

1764. 'O accursed folk (composed) of Herods wholly new.'

1766. 'Murder will out'; a proverb; see B. 4242.

1769. Souded to, confirmed in. From O. F. souder, Lat. solidare, whence E. solder. Wyclif's later version has—'hise leggis and hise feet weren sowdid togidere'; Acts, iii. 7. The reference in ll. 1770-5 is to Rev. xiv. 3, 4.

1793. Iesu. This word is written 'Ihu' in E. Hn. Cm.; and 'ihc' in Cp. Pt. Ln.; in both cases there is a stroke through the h. This is frequently printed Ihesu, but the retention of h is unnecessary. It is not really an h at all, but the Greek Η, meaning long e (ē). So, also, in 'ihc,' the c is not the Latin c, but the Gk. C, meaning Σ or s; and ihc are the first three letters of the word ΙΗΣΟΥΣ = ιησους = iesus. Iesu, as well as Iesus, was used as a nominative, though really the genitive or vocative case. At a later period, ihs (still with a stroke through the h) was written for ihc as a contraction of iesus. By an odd error, a new meaning was invented for these letters, and common belief treated them as the initials of three Latin words, viz. Iesus Hominum Salvator. But as the stroke through the h or mark of contraction still remained unaccounted for, it was turned into a cross! Hence the common symbol I.H.S. with the small cross in the upper part of the middle letter. The wrong interpretation is still the favourite one, all errors being long-lived. Another common contraction is Xpc., where all the letters are Greek. The x is ch (χ), the p is r (ρ), and c is s, so that Xpc = chrs, the contraction for christus or Christ. This is less common in decoration, and no false interpretation has been found for it.

1794. inwith, within. This form occurs in E. Hn. Pt. Ln.; the rest have within. Again, in the Merchant's Tale (E. 1944), MSS. E. Hn. Cm. Hl. have the form inwith. It occurs in the legend of St. Katharine, ed. Morton, l. 172; in Sir Perceval (Thornton Romances), l. 611; in Alliterative Poems, ed. Morris, A. 970; and in Palladius on Husbandry, ed. Lodge, iii. 404. Dr. Morris says it was (like utwith = without) originally peculiar to the Northern dialect. See the Glossary, and the note to l. 2159 below (p. 202).

1805. coomen; so in E. Hn.; comen in Pt. Cp. But it is the past tense = came. The spelling comen for the past tense plural is very common in Early English, and we even find com in the singular. Thus, in l. 1807, the Petworth MS. has 'He come,' equivalent to 'coom,' the o being long. But herieth in l. 1808 is a present tense.

1814. nexte, nighest, as in Kn. Ta. A. 1413. So also hext = highest, as in the Old Eng. proverb—'When bale is hext, then bote is next,' i. e. 'when woe is highest, help is nighest.' Next is for neh-est, and hext is for heh-est.

1817. newe Rachel, second Rachel, as we should now say; referring to Matt. ii. 18.

1819. dooth for to sterve, causes to die. So also in l. 1823, dide hem drawe = caused them to be drawn.

1822. Evidently a proverb; compare Boeth. bk. iv. pr. 1. 37-40 (vol. ii. p. 93); and note to P. Plowman, C. v. 140.

1826. The body occupied the place of honour. 'The bier, if the deceased had been a clerk, went into the chancel; if a layman, and not of high degree, the bearers set it down in the nave, hard by the church-door'; Rock, Ch. of our Fathers, ii. 472. He cites the Sarum Manual, fol. c.

1827. the abbot; pronounced thabbòt. covent, convent; here used for the monks who composed the body over which the abbot presided. So in Shakespeare, Hen. VIII, iv. 2. 18—'where the reverend abbot, With all his covent, honourably received him.' The form covent is Old French, still preserved in Covent Garden.

1835. halse; two MSS. consulted by Tyrwhitt read conjure, a mere gloss, caught from the line above. Other examples of halse in the sense of conjure occur. 'Ich halsi þe o godes nome' = I conjure thee in God's name; St. Marherete, ed. Cockayne, p. 17. Again, in Joseph of Arimathie, ed. Skeat, l. 400—

'Vppon þe heiȝe trinite · I halse þe to telle'—

which closely resembles the present passage.

1838. to my seminge, i. e. as it appears to me.

1840. 'And, in the ordinary course of nature.'

1843. Wil, wills, desires. So in Matt. ix. 13, I will have mercy = I require mercy; Gk. ἔλεον θέλω; Vulgate, misericordiam uolo. Cf. B. 45.

1848. In the Ellesmere MS. (which has the metrical pauses marked) the pause in this line is marked after lyf. The word sholde is dissyllabic here, having more than the usual emphasis; it has the force of ought to. Cf. E. 1146.

1852. In the Cursor Mundi, 1373-6, Seth is told to place three pippins under the root of Adam's tongue.

1857. now is used in the sense of take notice that, without any reference to time. There is no necessity to alter the reading to than, as proposed by Tyrwhitt. See Mätzner, Engl. Gram. ii. 2. 346, who refers to Luke ii. 41, John i. 44, and quotes an apt passage from Maundeville's Travels, p. 63—'Now aftre that men han visited the holy places, thanne will they turnen toward Jerusalem.' In A. S. the word used in similar cases is sōþlīce = soothly, verily.

1873. Ther, where. leve, grant. No two words have been more confused by editors than lene and leue. Though sometimes written much alike in MSS., they are easily distinguished by a little care. The A. S. lȳfan or lēfan, spelt lefe in the Ormulum (vol. i. p. 308), answers to the Germ. erlauben, and means grant or permit, but it can only be used in certain cases. The verb lene, A. S. lǣnan, now spelt lend, often means to give or grant in Early English, but again only in certain cases. I quote from my article on these words in Notes and Queries, 4 Ser. ii. 127—'It really makes all the difference whether we are speaking of to grant a thing to a person, or to grant that a thing may happen. "God lene thee grace," means "God grant thee grace," where to grant is to impart; but "God leue we may do right" means "God grant we may do right," where to grant is to permit.... Briefly, lene requires an accusative case after it, leue is followed by a dependent clause.' Lene occurs in Chaucer, Prol. A. 611, Milleres Tale, A. 3777, and elsewhere. Examples of leue in Chaucer are (1) in the present passage, misprinted lene by Tyrwhitt, Morris, Wright, and Bell, though five of our MSS. have leue; (2) in the Freres Tale, D. 1644, printed lene by Tyrwhitt (l. 7226), leene by Morris, leeve by Wright and Bell; (3) (4) (5) in three passages in Troilus and Criseyde (ii. 1212, iii. 56, v. 1750), where Tyrwhitt prints leve, but unluckily recants his opinion in his Glossary, whilst Morris prints lene. For other examples see Stratmann, s. v. lænan and leven.

It may be remarked that leve in Old English has several other senses; such as (1) to believe; (2) to live; (3) to leave; (4) to remain; (5) leave, sb.; (6) dear, adj. I give an example in which the first, sixth, and third of these senses occur in one and the same line:—

'What! leuestow, leue lemman, that i the [thee] leue wold?'

Will. of Palerne, 2358.

1874. Hugh of Lincoln. The story of Hugh of Lincoln, a boy supposed to have been murdered at Lincoln by the Jews, is placed by Matthew Paris under the year 1255. Thynne, in his Animadversions upon Speght's editions of Chaucer (p. 45 of the reprint of the E.E.T.S.), addresses Speght as follows—'You saye, that in the 29 Henry iii. eightene Jewes were broughte from Lincolne, and hanged for crucyfyinge a childe of eight yeres olde. Whiche facte was in the 39 Hen. iii., so that you mighte verye well haue sayed, that the same childe of eighte yeres olde was the same hughe of Lincolne; of whiche name there were twoe, viz. thys younger Seinte Hughe, and Seinte Hughe bishoppe of Lincolne, which dyed in the yere 1200, long before this little seinte hughe. And to prove that this childe of eighte yeres olde and that yonge hughe of Lincolne were but one; I will sett downe two auctoryties out of Mathewe Paris and Walsinghame, wherof the fyrste wryteth, that in the yere of Christe 1255, being the 39 of Henry the 3, a childe called Hughe was sleyne by the Jewes at Lyncolne, whose lamentable historye he delyvereth at large; and further, in the yere 1256, being 40 Hen. 3, he sayeth, Dimissi sunt quieti 24 Judei á Turri London., qui ibidem infames tenebantur compediti pro crucifixione sancti Hugonis Lincolniae: All which Thomas Walsingham, in Hypodigma Neustriae, confirmeth: sayinge, Ao. 1255, Puer quidam Christianus, nomine Hugo, à Judeis captus, in opprobrium Christiani nominis crudeliter est crucifixus.' There are several ballads in French and English, on the subject of Hugh of Lincoln, which were collected by M. F. Michel, and published at Paris in 1834, with the title—'Hugues de Lincoln, Recueil de Ballades Anglo-Normandes et Ecossoises relatives au Meurtre de cet Enfant.' The day of St. Hugh, bishop of Lincoln, is Aug. 27; that of St. Hugh, boy and martyr, is June 29. See also Brand's Pop. Antiq. ed. Ellis, i. 431. And see vol. iii. p. 423.

1875. With, by. See numerous examples in Mätzner, Engl. Gram. ii. 1. 419, amongst which we may especially notice—'Stolne is he with Iues'; Towneley Mysteries, p. 290.

Prologue to Sir Thopas.

1881. miracle, pronounced míracl'. Tyrwhitt omits al, and turns the word into mirácle, unnecessarily.

1883. hoste is so often an evident dissyllable (see l. 1897), that there is no need to insert to after it, as in Tyrwhitt. In fact, bigan is seldom followed by to.

1885. what man artow, what sort of a man art thou?

1886. woldest finde, wouldst like to find. We learn from this passage, says Tyrwhitt, that Chaucer 'was used to look much upon the ground; that he was of a corpulent habit; and reserved in his behaviour.' We cannot be quite sure that the poet is serious; but these inferences are probably correct; cf. Lenvoy a Scogan, 31.

1889. war you, mind yourselves, i. e. make way.

1890. as wel as I; said ironically. Chaucer is as corpulent as the host himself. See note to l. 1886 above.

1891. were, would be. tenbrace, to embrace. In the Romaunt of the Rose, true lovers are said to be always lean; but deceivers are often fat enough:—

'For men that shape hem other wey

Falsly hir ladies to bitray,

It is no wonder though they be fat'; l. 2689.

1893. elvish, elf-like, akin to the fairies; alluding to his absent looks and reserved manner. See Elvish in the Glossary, and cf. 'this elvish nyce lore'; Can. Yeom. Tale, G. 842. Palsgrave has—'I waxe eluysshe, nat easye to be dealed with, Ie deuiens mal traictable.'

1900. Ye, yea. The difference in Old English between ye and yis (yes) is commonly well marked. Ye is the weaker form, and merely assents to what the last speaker says; but yis is an affirmative of great force, often followed by an oath, or else it answers a question containing a negative particle, as in the House of Fame, 864. Cf. B. 4006 below.

The Tale of Sir Thopas.

In the black-letter editions, this Tale is called 'The ryme of Sir Thopas,' a title copied by Tyrwhitt, but not found in the seven best MSS. This word is now almost universally misspelt rhyme, owing to confusion with the Greek rhythm; but this misspelling is never found in old MSS. or in early printed books, nor has any example yet been found earlier than the reign of Elizabeth. The old spelling rime is confirmed by the A. S. rīm, Icel. rím, Dan. rim, Swed. rim, Germ. reim, Dutch rijm, Old Fr. rime, &c. Confusion with rime, hoarfrost, is impossible, as the context always decides which is meant; but it is worth notice that it is the latter word which has the better title to an h, as the A. S. word for hoarfrost is hrīm. Tyrwhitt, in his edition of Chaucer, attempted two reforms in spelling, viz. rime for rhyme, and coud for could. Both are most rational, but probably unattainable.