Home

THE HOUS OF FAME. - The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, vol. 3 (House of Fame, Legend of Good Women, Treatise on Astrolabe, Sources of Canterbury Tales)

Return to Title Page for The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, vol. 3 (House of Fame, Legend of Good Women, Treatise on Astrolabe, Sources of Canterbury Tales)

The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Literature

Subject Area: Science

THE HOUS OF FAME. - Geoffrey Chaucer, The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, vol. 3 (House of Fame, Legend of Good Women, Treatise on Astrolabe, Sources of Canterbury Tales) [1899]

Edition used:

The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, edited from numerous manuscripts by the Rev. Walter W. Skeat (2nd ed.) (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1899). 7 vols.

Author: Geoffrey Chaucer
Editor: Walter W. Skeat

Part of: The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer, 7 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.

Copyright information:

The text is in the public domain.

Fair use statement:

This material is put online to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. Unless otherwise stated in the Copyright Information section above, this material may be used freely for educational and academic purposes. It may not be used in any way for profit.

THE HOUS OF FAME.

BOOK I.

The authorities are F. (Fairfax 16); B. (Bodley 638); P. (Pepys 2006); Cx. (Caxton’s ed.); Th. (Thynne’s ed. 1532). I follow F. mainly, correcting the spelling.

GOD turne us every dreem to gode[ ] !
For hit is wonder, by the rode[ ] ,
To my wit, what causeth swevenes
Either on morwes, or on evenes;
And why the effect folweth of somme,5
And of somme hit shal never come;
Why that is an avisioun[ ] ,
And this a revelacioun;
Why this a dreem, why that a sweven ,
And nat to every man liche even ;10
Why this a fantom , these oracles,
I noot ; but who-so of these miracles
The causes knoweth bet than I,
Devyne he; for I certeinly
Ne can hem noght, ne never thinke15
To besily my wit to swinke,
To knowe of hir signifiaunce
The gendres , neither the distaunce
Of tymes of hem, ne the causes
For-why this more than that cause is[ ] ;20
As if folkes complexiouns[ ]
Make hem dreme of reflexiouns ;
Or elles thus, as other sayn,
For to greet feblenesse of brayn,
By abstinence, or by seeknesse,25
Prison, stewe , or greet distresse;
Or elles by disordinaunce
Of naturel acustomaunce,
That som man is to curious
In studie, or melancolious,30
Or thus, so inly ful of drede,
That no man may him bote bede;
Or elles, that devocioun
Of somme, and contemplacioun
Causeth swiche dremes ofte;35
Or that the cruel lyf unsofte
Which these ilke lovers leden
That hopen over muche or dreden,
That purely hir impressiouns
Causeth hem avisiouns;40
Or if that spirits have the might
To make folk to dreme a-night
Or if the soule, of propre kinde ,
Be so parfit, as men finde,
That hit forwot that is to come,45
And that hit warneth alle and somme
Of everiche of hir aventures
By avisiouns, or by figures,
But that our flesh ne hath no might
To understonden hit aright,50
For hit is warned to derkly;—
But why the cause is, noght wot I.
Wel worthe, of this thing, grete clerkes[ ] ,
That trete of this and other werkes;
For I of noon opinioun55
Nil as now make mencioun,
But only that the holy rode
Turne us every dreem to gode[ ] !
For never, sith that I was born,
Ne no man elles, me biforn,60
Mette, I trowe stedfastly,
So wonderful a dreem as I
The tenthe day [dide] of Decembre[ ] ,[ ]
The which, as I can now remembre[ ] ,
I wol yow tellen every del.65

The Invocation.
But at my ginning, trusteth wel,
I wol make invocacioun,
With special devocioun[ ] ,
Unto the god of slepe anoon[ ] ,
That dwelleth in a cave of stoon70
Upon a streem that comth fro Lete,
That is a flood of helle unswete;
Besyde a folk men clepe Cimerie ,
Ther slepeth ay this god unmerie
With his slepy thousand sones[ ]75
That alway for to slepe hir wone is—
And to this god, that I of rede,
Preye I, that he wol me spede
My sweven for to telle aright,
If every dreem stonde in his might.80
And he, that mover is of al
That is and was, and ever shal,
So yive hem Ioye that hit here
Of alle that they dreme to-yere,
And for to stonden alle in grace85
Of hir loves, or in what place
That hem wer levest for to stonde,
And shelde hem fro povert and shonde[ ] ,
And fro unhappe and ech disese,
And sende hem al that may hem plese,90
That take hit wel, and scorne hit noght,
Ne hit misdemen in her thoght
Through malicious entencioun.
And who-so, through presumpcioun,
Or hate or scorne, or through envye,95
Dispyt, or Iape, or vilanye,
Misdeme hit, preye I Iesus god
That (dreme he barfoot, dreme he shod),
That every harm that any man
Hath had, sith [that] the world began,100
Befalle him therof, or he sterve,
And graunte he mote hit ful deserve,
Lo! with swich a conclusioun
As had of his avisioun
Cresus , that was king of Lyde,105
That high upon a gebet dyde!
This prayer shal he have of me;
I am no bet in charite!
Now herkneth, as I have you seyd [ ] ,
What that I mette, or I abreyd .110

The Dream.
- Of Decembre the tenthe day[ ] ,
- Whan hit was night, to slepe I lay
- Right ther as I was wont to done,
- And fil on slepe wonder sone,
- As he that wery was for-go115
- On pilgrimage myles two
- To the corseynt Leonard ,
- To make lythe of that was hard .
- But as I sleep , me mette I was[ ]
- Within a temple y-mad of glas[ ] ;120
- In whiche ther were mo images
- Of gold , stondinge in sondry stages,
- And mo riche tabernacles,
- And with perre mo pinacles,
- And mo curious portreytures,125
- And queynte maner of figures
- Of olde werke, then I saw ever.
- For certeynly, I niste never
- Wher that I was, but wel wiste I,
- Hit was of Venus redely,130
- The temple; for, in portreyture,
- I saw anoon-right hir figure
- Naked fletinge in a see.
- And also on hir heed , parde,
- Hir rose-garlond whyt and reed,135
- And hir comb to kembe hir heed,
- Hir dowves , and daun Cupido,
- Hir blinde sone, and Vulcano ,
- That in his face was ful broun .
- But as I romed up and doun ,140
- I fond that on a wal ther was[ ]
- Thus writen, on a table of bras:
- ‘I wol now singe , if that I can[ ] ,
- The armes, and al-so the man,
- That first cam, through his destinee,145
- Fugitif of Troye contree,
- In Itaile, with ful moche pyne,
- Unto the strondes of Lavyne .’
- And tho began the story anoon,
- As I shal telle yow echoon.150
- First saw I the destruccioun
- Of Troye , through the Greek Sinoun ,
- [That ] with his false forsweringe,[ ]
- And his chere and his lesinge
- Made the hors broght into Troye,155
- Thorgh which Troyens loste al hir Ioye.
- And after this was grave, allas!
- How Ilioun assailed was
- And wonne, and king Priam y-slayn ,
- And Polites his sone, certayn,160[ ]
- Dispitously, of dan Pirrus.
- And next that saw I how Venus,
- Whan that she saw the castel brende ,
- Doun fro the hevene gan descende,[ ]
- And bad hir sone Eneas flee;165
- And how he fledde, and how that he
- Escaped was from al the pres,
- And took his fader, Anchises,
- And bar him on his bakke away,
- Cryinge, ‘Allas, and welaway!’170
- The whiche Anchises in his honde
- Bar the goddes of the londe,
- Thilke that unbrende were.
- And I saw next, in alle this fere,[ ]
- How Creusa, daun Eneas wyf,175
- Which that he lovede as his lyf,
- And hir yonge sone Iulo ,
- And eek Ascanius also,
- Fledden eek with drery chere,
- That hit was pitee for to here;180
- And in a forest, as they wente,
- At a turninge of a wente ,
- How Creusa was y-lost, allas!
- That deed, [but] noot I how, she was;[ ]
- How he hir soughte, and how hir gost185
- Bad him to flee the Grekes ost,
- And seyde, he moste unto Itaile,
- As was his destinee , sauns faille;
- That hit was pitee for to here,[ ]
- Whan hir spirit gan appere,190
- The wordes that she to him seyde,
- And for to kepe hir sone him preyde.
- Ther saw I graven eek how he,
- His fader eek, and his meynee,
- With his shippes gan to sayle195
- Toward the contree of Itaile,
- As streight as that they mighte go.
- Ther saw I thee, cruel Iuno,[ ]
- That art daun Iupiteres wyf,
- That hast y-hated, al thy lyf,200
- Al the Troyanisshe blood,
- Renne and crye, as thou were wood,
- On Eolus, the god of windes,
- To blowen out, of alle kindes,
- So loude, that he shulde drenche205
- Lord and lady, grome and wenche
- Of al the Troyan nacioun,
- Withoute any savacioun.
- Ther saw I swich tempeste aryse,
- That every herte mighte agryse,210
- To see hit peynted on the walle.
- Ther saw I graven eek withalle,
- Venus, how ye, my lady dere,
- Wepinge with ful woful chere,
- Prayen Iupiter an hye215
- To save and kepe that navye
- Of the Troyan Eneas,
- Sith that he hir sone was.
- Ther saw I Ioves Venus kisse,[ ]
- And graunted of the tempest lisse .220
- Ther saw I how the tempest stente ,
- And how with alle pyne he wente ,
- And prevely took arrivage
- In the contree of Cartage;
- And on the morwe, how that he225
- And a knight, hight Achatee ,
- Metten with Venus that day,
- Goinge in a queynt array,
- As she had ben an hunteresse,
- With wind blowinge upon hir tresse;230
- How Eneas gan him to pleyne,
- Whan that he knew hir, of his peyne;
- And how his shippes dreynte were,
- Or elles lost, he niste where;
- How she gan him comforte tho,235
- And bad him to Cartage go,
- And ther he shuldë his folk finde,
- That in the see were left behinde.
- And, shortly of this thing to pace,[ ]
- She made Eneas so in grace240
- Of Dido, quene of that contree,
- That, shortly for to tellen , she
- Becam his love, and leet him do
- That that wedding longeth to.
- What shulde I speke more queynte,245
- Or peyne me my wordes peynte,
- To speke of love? hit wol not be;
- I can not of that facultee.
- And eek to telle the manere
- How they aqueynteden in-fere,250
- Hit were a long proces to telle,
- And over long for yow to dwelle.
- Ther saw I grave, how Eneas
- Tolde Dido every cas,
- That him was tid upon the see.255
- And after grave was, how she
- Made of him, shortly, at oo word ,
- Hir lyf, hir love, hir lust, hir lord ;
- And dide him al the reverence,
- And leyde on him al the dispence,260
- That any woman mighte do,
- Weninge hit had al be so,
- As he hir swoor; and her-by demed
- That he was good, for he swich semed.
- Allas! what harm doth apparence,265[ ]
- Whan hit is fals in existence!
- For he to hir a traitour was;
- Wherfor she slow hir-self, allas!
- Lo, how a woman doth amis,
- To love him that unknowen is!270
- For, by Crist, lo! thus hit fareth;
- ‘Hit is not al gold , that glareth.’
- For , al-so brouke I wel myn heed,
- Ther may be under goodliheed
- Kevered many a shrewed vyce;275
- Therfor be no wight so nyce,
- To take a love only for chere,
- For speche , or for frendly manere;
- For this shal every woman finde
- That som man, of his pure kinde,280[ ]
- Wol shewen outward the faireste,
- Til he have caught that what him leste;
- And thanne wol he causes finde,
- And swere how that she is unkinde,
- Or fals, or prevy, or double was.285
- Al this seye I by Eneas[ ]
- And Dido, and hir nyce lest,
- That lovede al to sone a gest ;
- Therfor I wol seye a proverbe,
- That ‘he that fully knoweth therbe[ ]290
- May saufly leye hit to his yë’;
- Withoute dreed, this is no lye.
- But let us speke of Eneas,
- How he betrayed hir, allas!
- And lefte hir ful unkindely.295
- So whan she saw al-utterly,
- That he wolde hir of trouthe faile,
- And wende fro hir to Itaile,
- She gan to wringe hir hondes two.
- ‘Allas!’ quod she, ‘what me is wo!300
- Allas! is every man thus trewe,
- That every yere wolde have a newe,
- If hit so longe tyme dure,
- Or elles three, peraventure?
- As thus: of oon he wolde have fame305[ ]
- In magnifying of his name;
- Another for frendship, seith he;
- And yet ther shal the thridde be,
- That shal be taken for delyt ,
- Lo, or for singular profyt .’310
- In swiche wordes gan to pleyne
- Dido of hir grete peyne,
- As me mette redely;
- Non other auctour alegge I.
- ‘Allas!’ quod she , ‘my swete herte,315[ ]
- Have pitee on my sorwes smerte,
- And slee me not! go noght away!
- O woful Dido, wel away!’
- Quod she to hir-selve tho.
- ‘O Eneas! what wil ye do?320
- O, that your love, ne your bonde,
- That ye han sworn with your right honde,
- Ne my cruel deeth,’ quod she,
- ‘May holde yow still heer with me!
- O, haveth of my deeth pitee!325
- Y-wis, my dere herte, ye
- Knowen ful wel that never yit,
- As fer-forth as I hadde wit,
- Agilte [I ] yow in thoght ne deed.
- O, have ye men swich goodliheed330
- In speche, and never a deel of trouthe?
- Allas, that ever hadde routhe
- Any woman on any man!
- Now see I wel, and telle can,
- We wrecched wimmen conne non art;335
- For certeyn, for the more part,
- Thus we be served everichone.
- How sore that ye men conne grone,
- Anoon as we have yow receyved!
- Certeinly we ben deceyved;[ ]340
- For, though your love laste a sesoun,
- Wayte upon the conclusioun,
- And eek how that ye determynen,[ ]
- And for the more part diffynen.
- ‘O, welawey that I was born!345
- For through yow is my name lorn,[ ]
- And alle myn actes red and songe
- Over al this lond, on every tonge.
- O wikke Fame! for ther nis
- Nothing so swift, lo, as she is!350[ ]
- O, sooth is, every thing is wist,[ ]
- Though hit be kevered with the mist.
- Eek, thogh I mighte duren ever,
- That I have doon, rekever I never,
- That I ne shal be seyd , allas,355
- Y-shamed be through Eneas,
- And that I shal thus Iuged be—
- “Lo, right as she hath doon , now she
- Wol do eftsones , hardily;”
- Thus seyth the peple prevely.’—360
- But that is doon, nis not to done ;
- Al hir compleynt ne al hir mone,
- Certeyn , availeth hir not a stre.
- And whan she wiste sothly he
- Was forth unto his shippes goon,[ ]365
- She in hir chambre wente anoon,[ ]
- And called on hir suster Anne,[ ]
- And gan hir to compleyne thanne;
- And seyde, that she cause was
- That she first lovede [Eneas ],370
- And thus counseilled hir therto.
- But what! when this was seyd and do,
- She roof hir-selve to the herte,
- And deyde through the wounde smerte.
- But al the maner how she deyde,375
- And al the wordes that she seyde,
- Who-so to knowe hit hath purpos,
- Reed Virgile in Eneidos
- Or the Epistle of Ovyde,
- What that she wroot or that she dyde;380
- And nere hit to long to endyte ,[ ]
- By god, I woldë hit here wryte.
- But, welaway! the harm, the routhe,
- That hath betid for swich untrouthe,
- As men may ofte in bokes rede,385
- And al day seen hit yet in dede,
- That for to thenken hit, a tene is.
- Lo, Demophon, duk of Athenis,[ ]
- How he forswor him ful falsly,
- And trayed Phillis wikkedly,390
- That kinges doghter was of Trace,
- And falsly gan his terme pace ;
- And when she wiste that he was fals,
- She heng hir-self right by the hals,
- For he had do hir swich untrouthe;395
- Lo! was not this a wo and routhe?
- Eek lo! how fals and reccheles[ ]
- Was to Briseida Achilles,
- And Paris to Enone;
- And Iason to Isiphile;400
- And eft Iason to Medea;[ ]
- And Ercules to Dyanira;[ ]
- For he lefte hir for Iöle,
- That made him cacche his deeth, parde.
- How fals eek was he, Theseus;405[ ]
- That, as the story telleth us,
- How he betrayed Adriane;[ ]
- The devel be his soules bane!
- For had he laughed, had he loured,
- He mostë have be al devoured,410
- If Adriane ne had y-be!
- And, for she had of him pitee,
- She made him fro the dethe escape,
- And he made hir a ful fals Iape;
- For after this, within a whyle415
- He lefte hir slepinge in an yle ,
- Deserte alone, right in the see,
- And stal away, and leet hir be;
- And took hir suster Phedra tho
- With him, and gan to shippe go.420
- And yet he had y-sworn to here,
- On al that ever he mighte swere,
- That, so she saved him his lyf,
- He wolde have take hir to his wyf;
- For she desired nothing elles,425
- In certein, as the book us telles .
- But to excusen Eneas
- Fulliche of al his greet trespas,
- The book seyth, Mercurie , sauns faile,
- Bad him go into Itaile,430
- And leve Auffrykes regioun,
- And Dido and hir faire toun.
- Tho saw I grave, how to Itaile
- Daun Eneas is go to saile ;
- And how the tempest al began,435
- And how he loste his steresman,
- Which that the stere, or he took keep,
- Smot over-bord, lo! as he sleep.
- And also saw I how Sibyle[ ]
- And Eneas, besyde an yle,440
- To helle wente, for to see
- His fader, Anchises the free.
- How he ther fond Palinurus,
- And Dido, and eek Deiphebus;
- And every tourment eek in helle445
- Saw he, which is long to telle.
- Which who-so willeth for to knowe,
- He moste rede many a rowe
- On Virgile or on Claudian ,
- Or Daunte, that hit telle can.450
- Tho saw I grave al tharivaile [ ]
- That Eneas had in Itaile;
- And with king Latine his tretee,
- And alle the batailles that he
- Was at him-self, and eek his knightes,455
- Or he had al y-wonne his rightes;
- And how he Turnus refte his lyf,
- And wan Lavyna to his wyf;[ ]
- And al the mervelous signals
- Of the goddes celestials;460
- How, maugre Iuno, Eneas,
- For al hir sleighte and hir compas,
- Acheved al his aventure;
- For Iupiter took of him cure
- At the prayere of Venus;465
- The whiche I preye alway save us,
- And us ay of our sorwes lighte!
- Whan I had seyen al this sighte[ ]
- In this noble temple thus,
- ‘A, Lord!’ thoughte I, ‘that madest us,470
- Yet saw I never swich noblesse
- Of images, ne swich richesse,
- As I saw graven in this chirche;
- But not woot I who dide hem wirche,
- Ne wher I am, ne in what contree.475
- But now wol I go out and see,
- Right at the wiket, if I can
- See o-wher stering any man,
- That may me telle wher I am.’
- When I out at the dores cam,480
- I faste aboute me beheld.
- Then saw I but a large feld,[ ]
- As fer as that I mighte see,
- Withouten toun, or hous, or tree,
- Or bush, or gras, or ered lond;485
- For al the feld nas but of sond
- As smal as man may see yet lye
- In the desert of Libye;
- Ne I no maner creature,
- That is y-formed by nature,490
- Ne saw , me [for] to rede or wisse.
- ‘O Crist,’ thoughte I, ‘that art in blisse,
- Fro fantom and illusioun
- Me save!’ and with devocioun
- Myn yën to the heven I caste.495
- Tho was I war, lo ! at the laste,
- That faste by the sonne, as hyë
- As kenne mighte I with myn yë,
- Me thoughte I saw an egle sore,
- But that hit semed moche more500
- Then I had any egle seyn.
- But this as sooth as deeth, certeyn,
- Hit was of golde, and shoon so bright,
- That never saw men such a sighte,[ ][ ]
- But-if the heven hadde y-wonne505
- Al newe of golde another sonne;
- So shoon the egles fethres brighte,
- And somwhat dounward gan hit lighte.

Explicit liber primus.

BOOK II.

Incipit liber secundus.

Colophon and Title.So in Cx.; the rest omit them.

Proem.
- Now herkneth, every maner man
- That English understonde can,510
- And listeth of my dreem to lere;[ ]
- For now at erste shul ye here
- So selly an avisioun,
- That Isaye , ne Scipioun ,
- Ne king Nabugodonosor ,515
- Pharo , Turnus, ne Elcanor ,
- Ne mette swich a dreem as this!
- Now faire blisful, O Cipris ,(10)
- So be my favour at this tyme!
- And ye, me to endyte and ryme520
- Helpeth, that on Parnaso dwelle
- By Elicon the clere welle.
- O Thought, that wroot al that I mette,
- And in the tresorie hit shette
- Of my brayn! now shal men see525
- If any vertu in thee be,
- To tellen al my dreem aright;
- Now kythe thyn engyn and might!(20)

The Dream.
- This egle , of which I have yow told,
- That shoon with fethres as of gold,530
- Which that so hyë gan to sore,
- I gan beholde more and more,
- To see hir beautee and the wonder;
- But never was ther dint of thonder,[ ]
- Ne that thing that men calle foudre,535
- That smoot somtyme a tour to poudre,
- And in his swifte coming brende ,[ ]
- That so swythe gan descende,(30)
- As this foul, whan hit behelde
- That I a-roume was in the felde;540
- And with his grimme pawes stronge,
- Within his sharpe nayles longe,
- Me, fleinge, at a swappe he hente ,
- And with his sours agayn up wente,
- Me caryinge in his clawes starke545
- As lightly as I were a larke,
- How high, I can not telle yow,
- For I cam up, I niste how.(40)
- For so astonied and a-sweved
- Was every vertu in my heved,550
- What with his sours and with my drede,
- That al my feling gan to dede;
- For-why hit was to greet affray.
- Thus I longe in his clawes lay,
- Til at the laste he to me spak555
- In mannes vois, and seyde, ‘Awak!
- And be not so a-gast , for shame!’[ ]
- And called me tho by my name.(50)
- And, for I sholde the bet abreyde—
- Me mette—‘Awak,’ to me he seyde,560
- Right in the same vois and stevene
- That useth oon I coude nevene;
- And with that vois, soth for to sayn,
- My minde cam to me agayn;
- For hit was goodly seyd to me,565
- So nas hit never wont to be.
- And herwithal I gan to stere,
- And he me in his feet to bere,(60)
- Til that he felte that I had hete,
- And felte eek tho myn herte bete.570
- And tho gan he me to disporte,
- And with wordes to comforte,
- And sayde twyës, ‘Seynte Marie![ ]
- Thou art noyous for to carie,
- And nothing nedeth hit , parde!575
- For al-so wis god helpe me
- As thou non harm shalt have of this;
- And this cas, that betid thee is,(70)
- Is for thy lore and for thy prow;—
- Let see! darst thou yet loke now?580
- Be ful assured, boldely,
- I am thy frend.’ And therwith I
- Gan for to wondren in my minde.
- ‘O god,’ thoughte I, ‘that madest kinde,
- Shal I non other weyes dye?585
- Wher Ioves wol me stellifye,
- Or what thing may this signifye?
- I neither am Enok, ne Elye,(80)[ ]
- Ne Romulus, ne Ganymede
- That was y-bore up, as men rede,590
- To hevene with dan Iupiter,
- And maad the goddes boteler .’
- Lo! this was tho my fantasye!
- But he that bar me gan espye
- That I so thoghte, and seyde this:—595
- ‘Thou demest of thy-self amis;
- For Ioves is not ther-aboute —
- I dar wel putte thee out of doute—(90)
- To make of thee as yet a sterre.
- But er I bere thee moche ferre,600[ ]
- I wol thee telle what I am,
- And whider thou shalt, and why I cam
- To done this, so that thou take
- Good herte, and not for fere quake.’
- ‘Gladly,’ quod I. ‘Now wel,’ quod he:—605
- ‘First I, that in my feet have thee,
- Of which thou hast a feer and wonder,
- Am dwelling with the god of thonder,(100)[ ]
- Which that men callen Iupiter,
- That dooth me flee ful ofte fer610
- To do al his comaundement.
- And for this cause he hath me sent
- To thee: now herke, by thy trouthe!
- Certeyn, he hath of thee routhe,[ ]
- That thou so longe trewely615
- Hast served so ententifly
- His blinde nevew Cupido,
- And fair Venus [goddesse ] also,(110)[ ]
- Withoute guerdoun ever yit,
- And nevertheles hast set thy wit—620
- 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,625
- That have his servise soght, and seke;
- And peynest thee to preyse his art,
- Althogh thou haddest never part;(120)
- Wherfor, al-so god me blesse,
- Ioves halt hit greet humblesse630
- And vertu eek, that thou wolt make
- A-night ful ofte thyn heed to ake,
- In thy studie so thou wrytest,
- And ever-mo of love endytest,
- In honour of him and preysinges,635
- And in his folkes furtheringes,
- And in hir matere al devysest,
- And noght him nor his folk despysest,(130)
- Although thou mayst go in the daunce
- Of hem that him list not avaunce.640
- ‘Wherfor, as I seyde, y-wis,
- Iupiter considereth this,
- And also, beau sir, other thinges;
- That is, that thou hast no tydinges
- Of Loves folk, if they be glade,645
- Ne of noght elles that god made;
- And noght only fro fer contree
- That ther no tyding comth to thee,(140)
- But of thy verray neyghebores,
- That dwellen almost at thy dores,650
- Thou herest neither that ne this;
- For whan thy labour doon al is,[ ]
- And hast y-maad thy rekeninges,
- In stede of reste and newe thinges,
- Thou gost hoom to thy hous anoon;655
- And, also domb as any stoon,
- Thou sittest at another boke,
- Til fully daswed is thy loke,(150)
- And livest thus as an hermyte,
- Although thyn abstinence is lyte.660
- ‘And therfor Ioves, through his grace,
- Wol that I bere thee to a place,[ ]
- Which that hight the Hous of Fame,
- To do thee som disport and game,
- In som recompensacioun665
- Of labour and devocioun
- That thou hast had, lo! causeles,
- To Cupido, the reccheles!(160)
- And thus this god, thorgh his meryte,
- Wol with som maner thing thee quyte,670
- So that thou wolt be of good chere.
- For truste wel, that thou shalt here,
- When we be comen ther I seye,
- Mo wonder thinges, dar I leye,
- Of Loves folke mo tydinges,675
- Bothe soth-sawes and lesinges;
- And mo loves newe begonne,
- And longe y-served loves wonne,(170)
- And mo loves casuelly
- That been betid, no man wot why,680
- But as a blind man stert an hare;[ ]
- And more Iolytee and fare ,
- Whyl that they finde love of stele,
- As thinketh hem, and over-al wele;
- Mo discords, and mo Ielousyes,685
- Mo murmurs, and mo novelryes,
- And mo dissimulaciouns,
- And feyned reparaciouns;(180)
- And mo berdes in two houres
- Withoute rasour or sisoures690
- Y-maad, then greynes be of sondes;
- And eke mo holdinge in hondes ,
- And also mo renovelaunces
- Of olde forleten aqueyntaunces;
- Mo love-dayes and acordes695
- Then on instruments ben cordes ;[ ]
- And eke of loves mo eschaunges
- Than ever cornes were in graunges;(190)
- Unethe maistow trowen this?’—
- Quod he . ‘No, helpe me god so wis !’—700
- Quod I. ‘No? why?’ quod he. ‘For hit
- Were impossible , to my wit,
- Though that Fame hadde al the pyes
- In al a realme, and al the spyes,
- How that yet she shulde here al this,705
- Or they espye hit.’ ‘O yis, yis!’
- Quod he to me, ‘that can I preve
- By resoun, worthy for to love ,(200)
- So that thou yeve thyn advertence
- To understonde my sentence.710
- ‘First shalt thou heren wher she dwelleth,
- And so thyn owne book hit telleth;
- Hir paleys stant, as I shal seye,
- Right even in middes of the weye
- Betwixen hevene, erthe, and see;715
- That, what-so-ever in al these three
- Is spoken, in privee or aperte,
- The wey therto is so overte,(210)
- And stant eek in so Iuste a place,
- That every soun mot to hit pace,720
- Or what so comth fro any tonge,
- Be hit rouned, red, or songe,
- Or spoke in seurtee or drede,
- Certein, hit moste thider nede.
- ‘Now herkne wel; for-why I wille725
- Tellen thee a propre skile,
- And worthy demonstracioun
- In myn imagynacioun.(220)
- ‘Geffrey, thou wost right wel this,
- That every kindly thing that is,730[ ]
- Hath a kindly stede ther he
- May best in hit conserved be;
- Unto which place every thing,
- Through his kindly enclyning,
- Moveth for to come to,735
- Whan that hit is awey therfro;
- As thus; lo, thou mayst al day see
- That any thing that hevy be,(230)
- As stoon or leed, or thing of wighte ,
- And ber hit never so hye on highte ,740
- Lat go thyn hand, hit falleth doun.
- ‘Right so seye I by fyre or soun,
- Or smoke, or other thinges lighte,
- Alwey they seke upward on highte ;
- Whyl ech of hem is at his large ,745
- Light thing up, and dounward charge .[ ]
- ‘And for this cause mayst thou see,
- That every river to the see(240)
- Enclyned is to go, by kinde.
- And by these skilles , as I finde,750
- Hath fish dwellinge in floode and see,
- And treës eek in erthe be.[ ]
- Thus every thing, by this resoun,
- Hath his propre mansioun ,
- To which hit seketh to repaire,[ ]755
- As ther hit shulde not apaire.
- Lo, this sentence is knowen couthe
- Of every philosophres mouthe,(250)
- As Aristotle and dan Platon,[ ]
- And other clerkes many oon;760
- And to confirme my resoun,
- Thou wost wel this, that speche is soun,
- Or elles no man mighte hit here;
- Now herkne what I wol thee lere.
- ‘Soun is noght but air y-broken,765[ ]
- And every speche that is spoken ,
- Loud or privee, foul or fair,
- In his substaunce is but air;(260)
- For as flaumbe is but lighted smoke,
- Right so soun is air y-broke.770
- But this may be in many wyse,
- Of which I will thee two devyse,
- As soun that comth of pype or harpe.
- For whan a pype is blowen sharpe,
- The air is twist with violence,775
- And rent; lo, this is my sentence;
- Eek, whan men harpe-stringes smyte,
- Whether hit be moche or lyte,(270)
- Lo, with the strook the air to-breketh;
- Right so hit breketh whan men speketh.780
- Thus wost thou wel what thing is speche.
- ‘Now hennesforth I wol thee teche,
- How every speche, or noise, or soun,
- Through his multiplicacioun,
- Thogh hit were pyped of a mouse,785
- Moot nede come to Fames House.
- I preve hit thus—tak hede now—
- By experience ; for if that thou(280)
- Throwe on water now a stoon,
- Wel wost thou, hit wol make anoon790
- A litel roundel as a cercle,
- Paraventure brood as a covercle ;
- And right anoon thou shalt see weel,
- That wheel wol cause another wheel ,
- And that the thridde, and so forth, brother,795
- Every cercle causing other,
- Wyder than himselve was;
- And thus , fro roundel to compas,(290)
- Ech aboute other goinge,
- Caused of othres steringe,800
- And multiplying ever-mo,
- Til that hit be so fer y-go
- That hit at bothe brinkes be.
- Al-thogh thou mowe hit not y-see
- Above, hit goth yet alway under,805[ ]
- Although thou thenke hit a gret wonder.
- And who-so seith of trouthe I varie,
- Bid him proven the contrarie.(300)[ ]
- And right thus every word, y-wis,
- That loude or privee spoken is,810
- Moveth first an air aboute ,
- And of this moving, out of doute,
- Another air anoon is meved,
- As I have of the water preved,
- That every cercle causeth other.815
- Right so of air, my leve brother;
- Everich air in other stereth
- More and more, and speche up bereth,(310)
- Or vois, or noise, or word, or soun,
- Ay through multiplicacioun,820
- Til hit be atte House of Fame;—
- Tak hit in ernest or in game.[ ]
- ‘Now have I told, if thou have minde,
- How speche or soun, of pure kinde,
- Enclyned is upward to meve;825
- This, mayst thou fele , wel I preve.
- And that [the mansioun] , y-wis,[ ]
- That every thing enclyned to is,(320)
- Hath his kindeliche stede:
- That sheweth hit, withouten drede,830
- That kindely the mansioun
- Of every speche, of every soun,
- Be hit either foul or fair,
- Hath his kinde place in air.
- And sin that every thing, that is835
- Out of his kinde place, y-wis,
- Moveth thider for to go
- If hit a-weye be therfro,(330)
- As I before have preved thee,
- Hit seweth, every soun, pardee,840
- Moveth kindely to pace
- Al up into his kindely place.
- And this place of which I telle,
- Ther as Fame list to dwelle,
- Is set amiddes of these three,845
- Heven, erthe, and eek the see,[ ]
- As most conservatif the soun.
- Than is this the conclusioun,(340)
- That every speche of every man,
- As I thee telle first began,850
- Moveth up on high to pace
- Kindely to Fames place.
- ‘Telle me this feithfully,
- Have I not preved thus simply,
- Withouten any subtiltee855
- Of speche, or gret prolixitee
- Of termes of philosophye,
- Of figures of poetrye,(350)
- Or colours of rethoryke?
- Pardee, hit oghte thee to lyke;860
- For hard langage and hard matere[ ]
- Is encombrous for to here
- At ones; wost thou not wel this?’
- And I answerde, and seyde , ‘Yis.’
- ‘A ha!’ quod he, ‘lo, so I can,865
- Lewedly to a lewed man
- Speke, and shewe him swiche skiles,
- That he may shake hem by the biles,(360)[ ]
- So palpable they shulden be.
- But tel me this, now pray I thee,870
- How thinkth thee my conclusioun?’
- [Quod he] . ‘A good persuasioun,’
- Quod I, ‘hit is; and lyk to be [ ]
- Right so as thou hast preved me.’
- ‘By god,’ quod he, ‘and as I leve,875
- Thou shalt have yit, or hit be eve,
- Of every word of this sentence
- A preve, by experience;(370)
- And with thyn eres heren wel
- Top and tail, and everydel,880
- That every word that spoken is
- Comth into Fames Hous, y-wis,
- As I have seyd; what wilt thou more?’
- And with this word upper to sore
- He gan, and seyde, ‘By Seynt Iame!885
- Now wil we speken al of game.’—
- ‘How farest thou?’ quod he to me.
- ‘Wel,’ quod I. ‘Now see,’ quod he,(380)[ ]
- ‘By thy trouthe, yond adoun,
- Wher that thou knowest any toun,890
- Or hous, or any other thing.
- And whan thou hast of ought knowing,
- Loke that thou warne me,
- And I anoon shal telle thee
- How fer that thou art now therfro.’895
- And I adoun gan loken tho,
- And beheld feldes and plaines,
- And now hilles, and now mountaines,(390)
- Now valeys, and now forestes,
- And now, unethes , grete bestes;900
- Now riveres , now citees,
- Now tounes, and now grete trees,
- Now shippes sailinge in the see.
- But thus sone in a whyle he
- Was flowen fro the grounde so hyë,905
- That al the world, as to myn yë,
- No more semed than a prikke ;
- Or elles was the air so thikke(400)
- That I ne mighte not discerne.
- With that he spak to me as yerne,910
- And seyde: ‘Seestow any [toun]
- Or ought thou knowest yonder doun?’
- I seyde , ‘Nay.’ ‘No wonder nis,’
- Quod he, ‘for half so high as this
- Nas Alexander Macedo;915[ ]
- Ne the king , dan Scipio,
- That saw in dreme, at point devys ,
- Helle and erthe, and paradys;(410)
- Ne eek the wrecche Dedalus ,
- Ne his child, nyce Icarus,920
- That fleigh so highe that the hete
- His winges malt , and he fel wete
- In-mid the see, and ther he dreynte,
- For whom was maked moch compleynte.
- ‘Now turn upward,’ quod he, ‘thy face,925[ ]
- And behold this large place,
- This air; but loke thou ne be
- Adrad of hem that thou shalt see;(420)
- For in this regioun, certein,
- Dwelleth many a citezein,930[ ]
- Of which that speketh dan Plato.[ ]
- These ben the eyrish bestes , lo!’
- And so saw I al that meynee
- Bothe goon and also flee.
- ‘Now,’ quod he tho, ‘cast up thyn yë;935
- See yonder, lo, the Galaxy ë,
- Which men clepeth the Milky Wey,
- For hit is whyt: and somme, parfey,(430)
- Callen hit Watlinge Strete:
- That ones was y-brent with hete,940
- Whan the sonnes sone, the rede,
- That highte Pheton, wolde lede[ ]
- Algate his fader cart, and gye.
- The cart-hors gonne wel espye
- That he ne coude no governaunce,945
- And gonne for to lepe and launce,
- And beren him now up, now doun,
- Til that he saw the Scorpioun ,(440)
- Which that in heven a signe is yit.
- And he, for ferde, loste his wit,950
- Of that, and leet the reynes goon
- Of his hors; and they anoon
- Gonne up to mounte, and doun descende
- Til bothe the eyr and erthe brende;
- Til Iupiter , lo, atte laste,955
- Him slow, and fro the carte caste.
- Lo, is it not a greet mischaunce,
- To lete a fole han governaunce(450)
- Of thing that he can not demeine?’
- And with this word, soth for to seyne,960
- He gan alway upper to sore,
- And gladded me ay more and more,
- So feithfully to me spak he.
- Tho gan I loken under me,
- And beheld the eyrish bestes,965
- Cloudes, mistes, and tempestes,
- Snowes, hailes, reines, windes,
- And thengendring in hir kindes,(460)
- And al the wey through whiche I cam;
- ‘O god,’ quod I, ‘that made Adam,970
- Moche is thy might and thy noblesse!’
- And tho thoughte I upon Boëce ,
- That writ , ‘a thought may flee so hyë,
- With fetheres of Philosophye,
- To passen everich element;975
- And whan he hath so fer y-went,
- Than may be seen, behind his bak,
- Cloud, and al that I of spak.’(470)
- Tho gan I wexen in a were,
- And seyde, ‘I woot wel I am here;980
- But wher in body or in gost[ ]
- I noot, y-wis; but god, thou wost!’
- For more cleer entendement
- Nadde he me never yit y-sent.
- And than thoughte I on Marcian ,985
- And eek on Anteclaudian ,
- That sooth was hir descripcioun
- Of al the hevenes regioun,(480)
- As fer as that I saw the preve;
- Therfor I can hem now beleve.990
- With that this egle gan to crye:
- ‘Lat be,’ quod he, ‘thy fantasye;
- Wilt thou lere of sterres aught?’
- ‘Nay, certeinly,’ quod I, ‘right naught;
- And why? for I am now to old.’995
- ‘Elles I wolde thee have told,’
- Quod he, ‘the sterres names, lo,
- And al the hevenes signes to ,(490)
- And which they been.’ ‘No fors,’ quod I.
- ‘Yis, pardee,’ quod he; ‘wostow why?1000
- For whan thou redest poetrye,
- How goddes gonne stellifye
- Brid , fish, beste, or him or here ,
- As the Raven , or either Bere,
- Or Ariones harpe fyn,1005
- Castor, Pollux , or Delphyn,
- Or Atlantes doughtres sevene,[ ]
- How alle these arn set in hevene;(500)
- For though thou have hem ofte on honde,
- Yet nostow not wher that they stonde.’1010
- ‘No fors,’ quod I, ‘hit is no nede;
- I leve as wel, so god me spede,
- Hem that wryte of this matere,
- As though I knew hir places here;
- And eek they shynen here so brighte,1015
- Hit shulde shenden al my sighte,
- To loke on hem.’ ‘That may wel be,’
- Quod he. And so forth bar he me(510)
- A whyl, and than he gan to crye,
- That never herde I thing so hye,1020
- ‘Now up the heed ; for al is wel;
- Seynt Iulyan, lo, bon hostel![ ]
- See here the House of Fame, lo!
- Maistow not heren that I do?’[ ]
- ‘What?’ quod I. ‘The grete soun,’1025
- Quod he, ‘that rumbleth up and doun
- In Fames Hous, ful of tydinges,
- Bothe of fair speche and chydinges,(520)
- And of fals and soth compouned.
- Herkne wel ; hit is not rouned.1030
- Herestow not the grete swogh?’
- ‘Yis, pardee,’ quod I, ‘wel y-nogh.’
- ‘And what soun is it lyk?’ quod he.
- ‘Peter ! lyk beting of the see,’
- Quod I, ‘again the roches holowe,1035
- Whan tempest doth the shippes swalowe;
- And lat a man stonde, out of doute,
- A myle thens, and here hit route;(530)
- Or elles lyk the last humblinge
- After the clappe of a thundringe,1040
- When Ioves hath the air y-bete;
- But hit doth me for fere swete.’
- ‘Nay, dred thee not therof,’ quod he,
- ‘Hit is nothing wil byten thee;[ ]
- Thou shalt non harm have, trewely.’1045
- And with this word bothe he and I
- As nigh the place arryved were
- As men may casten with a spere.(540)[ ]
- I nistë how, but in a strete
- He sette me faire on my fete,1050
- And seyde, ‘Walke forth a pas,
- And tak thyn aventure or cas,
- That thou shalt finde in Fames place.’
- ‘Now,’ quod I, ‘whyl we han space
- To speke, or that I go fro thee,1055
- For the love of god, tel me,
- In sooth, that wil I of thee lere,
- If this noise that I here(550)
- Be, as I have herd thee tellen,
- Of folk that doun in erthe dwellen,1060
- And comth here in the same wyse
- As I thee herde or this devyse;
- And that ther lyves body nis
- In al that hous that yonder is,
- That maketh al this loude fare?’1065
- ‘No,’ quod he, ‘by Seynte Clare,
- And also wis god rede me!
- But o thinge I wil warne thee(560)
- Of the which thou wolt have wonder.
- Lo, to the House of Fame yonder1070
- Thou wost how cometh every speche,
- Hit nedeth noght thee eft to teche.
- But understond now right wel this;
- Whan any speche y-comen is
- Up to the paleys, anon-right1075
- Hit wexeth lyk the same wight,
- Which that the word in erthe spak,
- Be hit clothed reed or blak;(570)
- And hath so verray his lyknesse
- That spak the word, that thou wilt gesse1080
- That hit the same body be,
- Man or woman, he or she.
- And is not this a wonder thing?’
- ‘Yis,’ quod I tho, ‘by hevene king!’
- And with this worde, ‘Farwel,’ quod he,1085
- ‘And here I wol abyden thee;
- And god of hevene sende thee grace,
- Som good to lernen in this place.’(580)
- And I of him took leve anoon,
- And gan forth to the paleys goon.1090

Explicit liber secundus.

Colophon.—FromCx.Th.

BOOK III.

Incipit liber tercius.

Invocation.
O god of science and of light,[ ]
Apollo, through thy grete might,
This litel laste book thou gye!
Nat that I wilne, for maistrye,
Here art poetical be shewed;1095
But, for the rym is light and lewed,
Yit make hit sumwhat agreable,
Though som vers faile in a sillable;[ ]
And that I do no diligence
To shewe craft, but o sentence.(10) 1100
And if, divyne vertu, thou
Wilt helpe me to shewe now
That in myn hede y-marked is—
Lo, that is for to menen this,
The Hous of Fame to descryve—1105
Thou shalt see me go, as blyve,
Unto the nexte laure I see,
And kisse hit, for hit is thy tree;
Now entreth in my breste anoon!—

The Dream.
- Whan I was fro this egle goon,(20) 1110
- I gan beholde upon this place.
- And certein, or I ferther pace,
- I wol yow al the shap devyse
- Of hous and site ; and al the wyse[ ]
- How I gan to this place aproche1115
- That stood upon so high a roche,[ ]
- Hyer stant ther noon in Spaine.
- But up I clomb with alle paine,
- And though to climbe hit greved me,[ ]
- Yit I ententif was to see,(30) 1120
- And for to pouren wonder lowe,
- If I coude any weyes knowe
- What maner stoon this roche was;
- For hit was lyk a thing of glas,
- But that hit shoon ful more clere;1125
- But of what congeled matere
- Hit was, I niste redely.
- But at the laste espyed I,
- And found that hit was, every deel,
- A roche of yse, and not of steel.(40) 1130
- Thoughte I, ‘By Seynt Thomas of Kent![ ]
- This were a feble foundement
- To bilden on a place hye;
- He oughte him litel glorifye
- That her-on bilt , god so me save!’1135
- Tho saw I al the half y-grave
- With famous folkes names fele,
- That had y-been in mochel wele,
- And hir fames wyde y-blowe.
- But wel unethes coude I knowe(50) 1140
- Any lettres for to rede
- Hir names by; for, out of drede,
- They were almost of-thowed so,
- That of the lettres oon or two
- Was molte away of every name,1145
- So unfamous was wexe hir fame;
- But men seyn, ‘What may ever laste?’
- Tho gan I in myn herte caste,
- That they were molte awey with hete,
- And not awey with stormes bete.(60) 1150
- For on that other syde I sey
- Of this hille, that northward lay,[ ]
- How hit was writen ful of names
- Of folk that hadden grete fames
- Of olde tyme , and yit they were1155
- As fresshe as men had writen hem there
- The selve day right, or that houre
- That I upon hem gan to poure.
- But wel I wiste what hit made ;
- Hit was conserved with the shade—(70) 1160
- Al this wrytinge that I sy—
- Of a castel, that stood on hy,
- And stood eek on so cold a place,
- That hete mighte hit not deface.
- Tho gan I up the hille to goon,1165
- And fond upon the coppe a woon,
- That alle the men that ben on lyve[ ]
- Ne han the cunning to descryve
- The beautee of that ilke place,
- Ne coude casten no compace(80) 1170
- Swich another for to make,
- That mighte of beautee be his make
- Ne [be] so wonderliche y-wrought;[ ]
- That hit astonieth yit my thought,
- And maketh al my wit to swinke1175
- On this castel to bethinke.
- So that the grete craft , beautee,[ ]
- The cast, the curiositee
- Ne can I not to yow devyse,
- My wit ne may me not suifyse.(90) 1180
- But natheles al the substance
- I have yit in my remembrance;
- For-why me thoughte, by Seynt Gyle !
- Al was of stone of beryle,
- Bothe castel and the tour,1185
- And eek the halle, and every bour,
- Withouten peces or Ioininges.
- But many subtil compassinges,
- Babewinnes and pinacles,[ ]
- Imageries and tabernacles,(100) 1190
- I saw; and ful eek of windowes,
- As flakes falle in grete snowes.
- And eek in ech of the pinacles
- Weren sondry habitacles ,
- In whiche stoden , al withoute—1195
- Ful the castel , al aboute—
- Of alle maner of minstrales,[ ]
- And gestiours, that tellen tales
- Bothe of weping and of game,
- Of al that longeth unto Fame.(110) 1200
- Ther herde I pleyen on an harpe
- That souned bothe wel and sharpe,
- Orpheus ful craftely,
- And on his syde, faste by,
- Sat the harper Orion ,1205
- And Eacides Chiron ,
- And other harpers many oon,
- And the Bret Glascurion;[ ]
- And smale harpers with her gleës
- Seten under hem in seës,(120) 1210
- And gonne on hem upward to gape ,
- And countrefete hem as an ape,
- Or as craft countrefeteth kinde.
- Tho saugh I stonden hem behinde,
- A-fer fro hem, al by hemselve,1215
- Many thousand tymes twelve,
- That maden loude menstralcyes
- In cornemuse and shalmyes,[ ]
- And many other maner pype,
- That craftely begunne pype(130) 1220
- Bothe in doucet and in rede ,
- That ben at festes with the brede ;[ ]
- And many floute and lilting-horne ,
- And pypes made of grene corne,[ ]
- As han thise litel herde-gromes,1225
- That kepen bestes in the bromes.
- Ther saugh I than Atiteris ,[ ]
- And of Athenes dan Pseustis ,
- And Marcia that lost her skin,
- Bothe in face, body, and chin,(140) 1230
- For that she wolde envyen , lo!
- To pypen bet then Apollo.
- Ther saugh I famous , olde and yonge,
- Pypers of the Duche tonge,
- To lerne love-daunces, springes,1235
- Reyes , and these straunge thinges.[ ]
- Tho saugh I in another place
- Stonden in a large space,
- Of hem that maken blody soun
- In trumpe, beme, and clarioun;(150) 1240
- For in fight and blood-shedinge
- Is used gladly clarioninge.
- Ther herde I trumpen Messenus ,
- Of whom that speketh Virgilius.
- Ther herde I Ioab trumpe also,1245
- Theodomas , and other mo;
- And alle that used clarion
- In Cataloigne and Aragon,
- That in hir tyme famous were
- To lerne, saugh I trumpe there.(160) 1250
- Ther saugh I sitte in other seës,
- Pleyinge upon sondry gleës,
- Whiche that I cannot nevene,
- Mo then sterres been in hevene,
- Of whiche I nil as now not ryme,1255
- For ese of yow, and losse of tyme:
- For tyme y-lost, this knowen ye,[ ]
- By no way may recovered be.
- Ther saugh I pleyen Iogelours ,
- Magiciens and tregetours ,(170) 1260
- And phitonesses , charmeresses,
- Olde wicches , sorceresses,
- That use exorsisaciouns,
- And eek thise fumigaciouns;
- And clerkes eek, which conne wel1265
- Al this magyke naturel,[ ]
- That craftely don hir ententes,
- To make, in certeyn ascendentes ,
- Images, lo, through which magyk
- To make a man ben hool or syk .(180) 1270
- Ther saugh I thee , queen Medea ,
- And Circes eke, and Calipsa;[ ]
- Ther saugh I Hermes Ballenus,[ ]
- Lymote , and eek Simon Magus.[ ]
- Ther saugh I , and knew hem by name,1275
- That by such art don men han fame.
- Ther saugh I Colle tregetour
- Upon a table of sicamour[ ]
- Pleye an uncouthe thing to telle;
- I saugh him carien a wind-melle(190) 1280
- Under a walsh-note shale.
- What shuld I make lenger tale
- Of al the peple that I say,
- Fro hennes in-to domesday?
- Whan I had al this folk beholde,1285
- And fond me lous, and noght y-holde ,
- And eft y-mused longe whyle
- Upon these walles of beryle,
- That shoon ful lighter than a glas,
- And made wel more than hit was(200) 1290
- To semen, every thing, y-wis,
- As kinde thing of fames is;
- I gan forth romen til I fond
- The castel-yate on my right hond,
- Which that so wel corven was1295
- That never swich another nas;
- And yit hit was by aventure
- Y-wrought, as often as by cure.
- Hit nedeth noght yow for to tellen,[ ]
- To make yow to longe dwellen,(210) 1300
- Of this yates florisshinges,
- Ne of compasses, ne of kervinges,
- Ne how they hatte in masoneries,
- As, corbets fulle of imageries.[ ]
- But, lord! so fair hit was to shewe,1305
- For hit was al with gold behewe.
- But in I wente, and that anoon;
- Ther mette I crying many oon,—
- ‘A larges, larges, hold up wel![ ]
- God save the lady of this pel,(220) 1310
- Our owne gentil lady Fame,[ ]
- And hem that wilnen to have name
- Of us!’ Thus herde I cryen alle,
- And faste comen out of halle,
- And shoken nobles and sterlinges.1315
- And somme crouned were as kinges ,
- With crounes wroght ful of losenges ;
- And many riban, and many frenges
- Were on hir clothes trewely.
- Tho atte laste aspyed I(230) 1320
- That pursevauntes and heraudes ,
- That cryen riche folkes laudes,
- Hit weren alle; and every man
- Of hem, as I yow tellen can,
- Had on him throwen a vesture,1325
- Which that men clepe a cote-armure ,
- Enbrowded wonderliche riche,
- Al-though they nere nought y-liche.
- But noght nil I, so mote I thryve,[ ]
- Been aboute to discryve.(240) 1330
- Al these armes that ther weren,
- That they thus on hir cotes beren,
- For hit to me were impossible;
- Men mighte make of hem a bible
- Twenty foot thikke, as I trowe.1335
- For certeyn, who-so coude y-knowe
- Mighte ther alle the armes seen
- Of famous folk that han y-been
- In Auffrike, Europe, and Asye,
- Sith first began the chevalrye.(250) 1340
- Lo! how shulde I now telle al this?
- Ne of the halle eek what nede is[ ]
- To tellen yow, that every wal
- Of hit, and floor, and roof and al
- Was plated half a fote thikke1345
- Of gold, and that nas no-thing wikke ,
- But, for to prove in alle wyse,
- As fyn as ducat in Venyse,
- Of whiche to lyte al in my pouche is?
- And they wer set as thikke of nouchis(260) 1350
- Fulle of the fynest stones faire,
- That men rede in the Lapidaire ,
- As greses growen in a mede;
- But hit were al to longe to rede
- The names; and therfore I pace.1355
- But in this riche lusty place,
- That Fames halle called was,
- Ful moche prees of folk ther nas,
- Ne crouding, for to mochil prees.
- But al on hye, above a dees ,(270) 1360
- Sitte in a see imperial,[ ]
- That maad was of a rubee al,
- Which that a carbuncle is y-called,
- I saugh, perpetually y-stalled,
- A feminyne creature;1365
- That never formed by nature
- Nas swich another thing y-seye.
- For altherfirst, soth for to seye,[ ]
- Me thoughte that she was so lyte,
- That the lengthe of a cubyte(280) 1370
- Was lenger than she semed be ;
- But thus sone, in a whyle, she
- Hir tho so wonderliche streighte,
- That with hir feet she therthe reighte,
- And with hir heed she touched hevene,1375
- Ther as shynen sterres sevene .
- And ther-to eek, as to my wit,
- I saugh a gretter wonder yit,
- Upon hir eyen to beholde;
- But certeyn I hem never tolde ;(290) 1380
- For as fele eyen hadde she
- As fetheres upon foules be,
- Or weren on the bestes foure ,
- That goddes trone gunne honoure,
- As Iohn writ in thapocalips.1385
- Hir heer, that oundy was and crips,
- As burned gold hit shoon to see.
- And sooth to tellen, also she
- Had also fele up-stonding eres
- And tonges , as on bestes heres;(300) 1390
- And on hir feet wexen saugh I
- Partriches winges redely.
- But, lord! the perrie and the richesse
- I saugh sitting on this goddesse!
- And, lord! the hevenish melodye1395
- Of songes, ful of armonye,
- I herde aboute her trone y-songe,
- That al the paleys-walles ronge!
- So song the mighty Muse, she
- That cleped is Caliopee ,(310) 1400
- And hir eighte sustren eke,
- That in hir face semen meke;
- And evermo, eternally,
- They songe of Fame, as tho herde I:—
- ‘Heried be thou and thy name,1405
- Goddesse of renoun and of fame!’
- Tho was I war, lo, atte laste,
- As I myn eyen gan up caste,
- That this ilke noble quene
- On hir shuldres gan sustene(320) 1410
- Bothe tharmes and the name[ ]
- Of tho that hadde large fame;
- Alexander , and Hercules
- That with a sherte his lyf lees!
- Thus fond I sitting this goddesse,1415
- In nobley , honour, and richesse;
- Of which I stinte a whyle now,
- Other thing to tellen yow.
- Tho saugh I stonde on either syde,
- Streight doun to the dores wyde,(330) 1420
- Fro the dees, many a pileer
- Of metal, that shoon not ful cleer;
- But though they nere of no richesse,
- Yet they were maad for greet noblesse,
- And in hem greet [and hy] sentence;1425
- And folk of digne reverence,
- Of whiche I wol yow telle fonde,
- Upon the piler saugh I stonde.
- Alderfirst, lo, ther I sigh,
- Upon a piler stonde on high,(340) 1430
- That was of lede and yren fyn ,
- Him of secte Saturnyn,
- The Ebrayk Iosephus, the olde,[ ]
- That of Iewes gestes tolde;
- And bar upon his shuldres hye1435
- The fame up of the Iewerye .
- And by him stoden other sevene,[ ]
- Wyse and worthy for to nevene,
- To helpen him bere up the charge,
- Hit was so hevy and so large.(350) 1440
- And for they writen of batailes,
- As wel as other olde mervailes ,
- Therfor was, lo, this pileer ,
- Of which that I yow telle heer ,
- Of lede and yren bothe, y-wis.1445
- For yren Martes metal is,
- Which that god is of bataile;
- And the leed, withouten faile,
- Is, lo, the metal of Saturne,
- That hath ful large wheel to turne.(360) 1450
- Tho stoden forth, on every rowe,
- Of hem which that I coude knowe,
- Thogh I hem noght by ordre telle,
- To make yow to long to dwelle.
- These, of whiche I ginne rede,1455
- Ther saugh I stonden , out of drede:
- Upon an yren piler strong,
- That peynted was, al endelong,
- With tygres blode in every place,[ ]
- The Tholosan that highte Stace ,(370) 1460
- That bar of Thebes up the fame
- Upon his shuldres, and the name
- Also of cruel Achilles .
- And by him stood, withouten lees,
- Ful wonder hye on a pileer1465
- Of yren, he, the gret Omeer ;
- And with him Dares and Tytus[ ]
- Before, and eek he, Lollius ,
- And Guido eek de Columpnis,
- And English Gaufride eek, y-wis;(380) 1470
- And ech of these, as have I Ioye,
- Was besy for to bere up Troye.
- So hevy ther-of was the fame,
- That for to bere hit was no game.
- But yit I gan ful wel espye,1475
- Betwix hem was a litel envye.
- Oon seyde, Omere made lyes,
- Feyninge in his poetryes,
- And was to Grekes favorable;
- Therfor held he hit but fable.(390) 1480
- Tho saugh I stonde on a pileer,
- That was of tinned yren cleer,[ ]
- That Latin poete, [dan] Virgyle,[ ]
- That bore hath up a longe whyle
- The fame of Pius Eneas.1485
- And next him on a piler was,
- Of coper, Venus clerk, Ovyde ,
- That hath y-sowen wonder wyde
- The grete god of Loves name.
- And ther he bar up wel his fame,(400) 1490
- Upon this piler, also hye
- As I might see hit with myn yë :
- For-why this halle, of whiche I rede
- Was woxe on highte , lengthe and brede,[ ]
- Wel more, by a thousand del,1495
- Than hit was erst, that saugh I wel.
- Tho saugh I, on a piler by,
- Of yren wroght ful sternely ,
- The grete poete, daun Lucan ,
- And on his shuldres bar up than,(410) 1500
- As highe as that I mighte see,
- The fame of Iulius and Pompee.
- And by him stoden alle these clerkes,
- That writen of Romes mighty werkes,
- That, if I wolde hir names telle,1505
- Al to longe moste I dwelle.
- And next him on a piler stood
- Of soulfre, lyk as he were wood,
- Dan Claudian , the soth to telle,
- That bar up al the fame of helle,(420) 1510
- Of Pluto, and of Proserpyne,
- That quene is of the derke pyne.[ ]
- What shulde I more telle of this?
- The halle was al ful, y-wis,
- Of hem that writen olde gestes,1515
- As ben on treës rokes nestes;
- But hit a ful confus matere
- Were al the gestes for to here,
- That they of write , and how they highte.
- But whyl that I beheld this sighte,(430) 1520
- I herde a noise aprochen blyve,[ ]
- That ferde as been don in an hyve,
- Agen her tyme of out-fleyinge;
- Right swiche a maner murmuringe,
- For al the world, hit semed me.1525
- Tho gan I loke aboute and see,
- That ther com entring in the halle[ ]
- A right gret company with-alle,
- And that of sondry regiouns,
- Of alleskinnes condiciouns,[ ](440) 1530
- That dwelle in erthe under the mone,
- Pore and ryche. And also sone
- As they were come into the halle,
- They gonne doun on kneës falle
- Before this ilke noble quene,1535
- And seyde, ‘Graunte us, lady shene,
- Ech of us, of thy grace, a bone!’
- And somme of hem she graunted sone,
- And somme she werned wel and faire;
- And somme she graunted the contraire(450) 1540
- Of hir axing utterly.
- But thus I seye yow trewely,
- What hir cause was, I niste.
- For this folk, ful wel I wiste,
- They hadde good fame ech deserved,1545
- Althogh they were diversly served;[ ]
- Right as hir suster, dame Fortune,
- Is wont to serven in comune.
- Now herkne how she gan to paye
- That gonne hir of hir grace praye;[ ](460) 1550
- And yit , lo, al this companye
- Seyden sooth, and noght a lye.
- ‘Madame,’ seyden they, ‘we be
- Folk that heer besechen thee,
- That thou graunte us now good fame,1555
- And lete our werkes han that name;
- In ful recompensacioun
- Of good werk, give us good renoun.’
- ‘I werne yow hit,’ quod she anoon,
- ‘Ye gete of me good fame noon,(470) 1560
- By god! and therfor go your wey.’
- ‘Alas,’ quod they, ‘and welaway!
- Telle us, what may your cause be?’
- ‘For me list hit noght,’ quod she;[ ]
- ‘No wight shal speke of yow, y-wis,1565
- Good ne harm, ne that ne this.’
- And with that word she gan to calle
- Hir messanger, that was in halle,
- And bad that he shulde faste goon,
- Up peyne to be blind anoon,[ ](480) 1570
- For Eolus, the god of winde;—[ ]
- ‘In Trace ther ye shul him finde,
- And bid him bringe his clarioun,
- That is ful dyvers of his soun,
- And hit is cleped Clere Laude,1575
- With which he wont is to heraude
- Hem that me list y-preised be:
- And also bid him how that he
- Bringe his other clarioun,
- That highte Sclaundre in every toun,(490) 1580
- With which he wont is to diffame
- Hem that me list, and do hem shame.’
- This messanger gan faste goon,
- And found wher, in a cave of stoon,
- In a contree that highte Trace,1585
- This Eolus, with harde grace,
- Held the windes in distresse,
- And gan hem under him to presse,
- That they gonne as beres rore,
- He bond and pressed hem so sore.(500) 1590
- This messanger gan faste crye,
- ‘Rys up,’ quod he, ‘and faste hye,
- Til that thou at my lady be;
- And tak thy clarions eek with thee,
- And speed thee forth.’ And he anon1595
- Took to a man, that hight Triton,
- His clariouns to bere tho,
- And leet a certeyn wind to go,[ ]
- That blew so hidously and hye,
- That hit ne lefte not a skye(510) 1600
- In al the welken longe and brood.
- This Eolus no-wher abood
- Til he was come at Fames feet,
- And eek the man that Triton heet;
- And ther he stood, as still as stoon.1605
- And her-withal ther com anoon
- Another huge companye
- Of gode folk, and gunne crye,
- ‘Lady, graunte us now good fame,
- And lat our werkes han that name(520) 1610
- Now, in honour of gentilesse,
- And also god your soule blesse!
- For we han wel deserved hit,
- Therfor is right that we ben quit.’[ ]
- ‘As thryve I,’ quod she, ‘ye shal faile,1615
- Good werkes shal yow noght availe
- To have of me good fame as now.
- But wite ye what? I graunte yow,[ ]
- That ye shal have a shrewed fame
- And wikked loos, and worse name,(530) 1620
- Though ye good loos have wel deserved.
- Now go your wey, for ye be served;
- And thou, dan Eolus, let see!
- Tak forth thy trumpe anon,’ quod she,
- ‘That is y-cleped Sclaunder light,1625
- And blow hir loos, that every wight
- Speke of hem harm and shrewednesse,
- In stede of good and worthinesse.
- For thou shalt trumpe al the contraire
- Of that they han don wel or faire.’(540) 1630
- ‘Alas,’ thoughte I, ‘what aventures
- Han these sory creatures!
- For they, amonges al the pres,
- Shul thus be shamed gilteles!
- But what! hit moste nedes be.’1635
- What did this Eolus, but he
- Tok out his blakke trumpe of bras,
- That fouler than the devil was,
- And gan this trumpe for to blowe,
- As al the world shulde overthrowe ;(550) 1640
- That through-out every regioun
- Wente this foule trumpes soun,
- As swift as pelet out of gonne,
- Whan fyr is in the poudre ronne.
- And swiche a smoke gan out-wende1645
- Out of his foule trumpes ende,
- Blak, blo, grenish, swartish reed,
- As doth wher that men melte leed,
- Lo, al on high fro the tuel!
- And therto oo thing saugh I wel,(560) 1650
- That, the ferther that hit ran,
- The gretter wexen hit began,
- As doth the river from a welle,
- And hit stank as the pit of helle.
- Alas, thus was hir shame y-ronge,1655
- And giltelees, on every tonge.
- Tho com the thridde companye,
- And gunne up to the dees to hye,
- And doun on knees they fille anon,
- And seyde, ‘We ben everichon(570) 1660
- Folk that han ful trewely
- Deserved fame rightfully,
- And praye yow, hit mot be knowe,
- Right as hit is, and forth y-blowe.’
- ‘I graunte,’ quod she, ‘for me list1665
- That now your gode werk be wist ;
- And yit ye shul han better loos,
- Right in dispyt of alle your foos,
- Than worthy is; and that anoon:
- Lat now,’ quod she, ‘thy trumpe goon,(580) 1670
- Thou Eolus, that is so blak;
- And out thyn other trumpe tak
- That highte Laude, and blow hit so
- That through the world hir fame go
- Al esely, and not to faste,1675
- That hit be knowen atte laste.’
- ‘Ful gladly, lady myn,’ he seyde;
- And out his trumpe of golde he brayde
- Anon, and sette hit to his mouthe,
- And blew hit est, and west, and southe,(590) 1680
- And north, as loude as any thunder,
- That every wight
  (Unfinished.)
  
  [1. ]P. drem; rest dreme.
  
  [8. ]All have And why; I omit why.
  
  [9, 10. ]F. swevene, evene; Cx. Th. sweuen, euen.
  
  [11. ]Th. B. a fantome; P. a fauntom; Cx. a fanton; F. affaintome; after which, all needlessly insert why.
  
  [12. ]F. Th. B. P. not; Cx. note (=noot). Elide o in so.
  
  [20. ]All wrongly insert is before more.
  
  [24. ]B. of the; rest of her; I omit the (her).
  
  [26. ]F. B. stewe; P. stoe; Cx. stryf; Th. stryfe.
  
  [35. ]P. sweche; rest suche, such.
  
  [45. ]F. B. forwote; rest wote.
  
  [50. ]F. vnderstonde, followed by a metrical mark, indicating a pause: I add n.
  
  [58, 62. ]MSS. dreme (=dreem).
  
  [63. ]See note.
  
  [64. ]B. P. now; F. yow; rest om.
  
  [71. ]P. strem; rest streme (=streem); so P. drem (rest dreme) in l. 80. MSS. cometh (=com’th).
  
  [73. ]Cx. Th. clepe; F. clepeth.
  
  [77. ]F. That; rest And.
  
  [78. ]Th. wol; P. wul; Cx. wyl; F. B. wolde.
  
  [85. ]F. B. stonde; Cx. Th. stande; P. stond. Cx. alle; F. Th. al (wrongly).
  
  [88. ]All pouerte.
  
  [89. ]B. ech; F. eche.
  
  [100. ]I supply that.
  
  [103. ]P. om. a.
  
  [109, 110. ]Cx. seyd, abreyd; the rest seyde (sayde), abreyde (abrayde). Grammar requires seyd, abreyd; (abreyde also occurs).
  
  [117, 118. ]Cx. P. leonard, hard; F. Th. B. leonarde, harde. P. om. of.
  
  [119. ]MSS. slept, slepte; read sleep, as in l. 438.
  
  [122. ]F. Th. golde; Cx. P. gold; B. goold.
  
  [126. ]All queynt.
  
  [127. ]F. B. olde; Th. golde; Cx. P. gold. F. sawgh.
  
  [131. ]Th. This; rest The
  
  [132. ]F. sawgh.
  
  [134. ]Th. heed; B. hed; F. Cx. hede. Cx. Th. P. parde; F. B. partee (!).
  
  [135. ]B. red; F. Th. rede; Cx. Rose garlondes smellynge as a mede.
  
  [136. ]MSS. combe. B. hed; rest hede.
  
  [139. ]Cx. P. brown; F. bronne.
  
  [140. ]Cx. down; F. dovne.
  
  [141. ]P. fond; F. Cx. B. fonde; Th. founde. Cx. Th. wal; B. wall; F. walle.
  
  [143. ]F. B. say; rest synge. F. B. P. om. that.
  
  [146. ]F. B. Troy.
  
  [148. ]Cx. Th. P. Lauyne; F. B. Labyne.
  
  [152. ]Cx. Th. P. Troye; F. B. Troy; see l. 155.
  
  [153. ]All om. That. F. B. P. fals; Cx. fals vntrewe; Th. false vntrewe.
  
  [159. ]Cx. Th. kyng; F. B. kynge. F. y-slayne; rest slayn.
  
  [160. ]Th. Polytes; F. B. Polite. From this point I make no further note of obvious corrections in spelling.
  
  [172. ]Cx. P. Th. goddes; F. B. goddesse (wrongly).
  
  [173. ]F. B. -brende; rest -brenned.
  
  [174. ]Cx. P. this; F. B. his.
  
  [184. ]F. P. That dede not I how she was; B. That ded not I how she was; Cx. That rede note I how it was; Th. That rede nat I howe that it was. Read deed, and insert but.
  
  [188. ]Cx. Th. destyne; F. destanye.
  
  [193. ]Cx. Th. grauen; P. graven; F. grave; B. grane.
  
  [196. ]F. B. Towardes.
  
  [199. ]P. Iubiter; rest Iupiters; read Iupiteres.
  
  [204. ]F. blowe; P. Cx. Th. blowen.
  
  [210. ]Th. herte; rest hert.
  
  [220. ]F. omits from lisse to tempest in next line; the rest art right.
  
  [221, 222. ]F. B. stent, went; Cx. Th. stente, wente.
  
  [227. ]P. Cx. Th. Metten; F. B. Mette.
  
  [235. ]F. P. comfort; rest comforte.
  
  [237. ]P. folk; rest folke; but shulde is here dissyllabic.
  
  [242. ]F. tel; B. telle; P. Cx. Th. tellen.
  
  [257, 8. ]All worde, lorde.
  
  [260. ]Th. the; rest omit.
  
  [270. ]F. vnknowe; rest vnknowen.
  
  [278. ]Th. Or speche; rest Or (F. Of!)for speche; read For speche. Lines 280-2 3 are in Th. only, which reads some; fayrest; lest; than.
  
  [285. ]Cx. Th. (3rd) or; F. B. P. om.
  
  [290. ]F. B. therbe (=the herbe); P. Cx. Th. the herbe.
  
  [305. ]Cx. Th. one; P. on; F. B. love.
  
  [309, 310. ]All delyte, profyte.
  
  [313. ]For mette, Cx. Th. have mette dremyng (!).
  
  [314. ]F. auttour=anctour.
  
  [315. ]F. he; the rest she.
  
  [320. ]F. Th. wol; P. wille; Cx. wyl.
  
  [322. ]F. ha; P. B. haue rest om.
  
  [328. ]All had.
  
  [329. ]I insert I; which all omit.
  
  [332. ]P. hadde; rest had.
  
  [334. ]Cx. telle; P. tellen; F. tel.
  
  [340. ]F. omits this line; the rest have it.
  
  [347. ]F. B. al youre; Cx. Th. P. myn (om. al).
  
  [352. ]F. B. om. be.
  
  [353. ]Th. duren; F. B. dure.
  
  [358. ]Th. done; rest omit.
  
  [362. ]All insert But before Al.
  
  [363. ]Cx. Th. P. Certeyn; F. B. Certeynly.
  
  [365. ]Cx. goon; P. gon; F. agoon; B. agon.
  
  [366. ]in] All in to.
  
  [370. ]All Allas (alas); read Eneas.
  
  [371. ]F. B. As; rest And.
  
  [375. ]Cx. Th. P. But; F. B. And.
  
  [381. ]F. And nor hyt were to; Cx. And nere it were to; Th. And nere it to; B. P. And ner it were to. Th. B. to endyte; F. Cx. tendyte.
  
  [387. ]P. thenken; F. B. thynke; Cx. Th. thynken.
  
  [391. ]F. B. om. was.
  
  [402. ]Cx. Th. P. And; F. B. omit.
  
  [410. ]Th. al; Cx. all; P. alle; F. B. om.
  
  [426. ]F. B. om. as and us.
  
  [428. ]F. B. om. greet.
  
  [429. ]B. Mercure; F. Mercure; rest om.
  
  [433. ]F. B. how that; rest how.
  
  [434. ]Cx. P. to saylle; Th. for to sayle; F. B. for to assayle.
  
  [446. ]Th. longe is for; F. B. is longe. Cx. P. whyche no tonge can telle.
  
  [451. ]For tharivaile, F. B. Th. have the aryvayle; Cx. the arryuaylle; P. the arevaille.
  
  [458. ]F. labina; rest Lauyna.
  
  [468. ]Cx. P. seyn; rest seen (sene).
  
  [473. ]F. B. grave; rest grauen.
  
  [475. ]F. B. omit in.
  
  [478. ]Th. sterynge any; the rest any stiryng (sterynge).
  
  [486. ]Cx. Th. P. was but of sonde (sande); F. B. nas but sonde.
  
  [491. ]I insert for. Cx. Th. P. insert I after saw; but it is in l. 489.
  
  [496. ]F. B. omit lo.
  
  [504. ]F. B. omit lines 504-507.
  
  [511. ]P. listeth; Th. lysteth; F. Cx. listeneth; B. lystneth.
  
  [513. ]All sely; read selly (Willert).
  
  [514. ]Cx. Th. Scipion; F. P. Cipion; B. Cypyon.
  
  [516. ]Th. Alcanore.
  
  [533. ]Cx. Th. P. her; F. B. the.
  
  [535. ]F. B. kynge (by mistake for thing).
  
  [536. ]Cx. Th. P. smyte; F. B. smote. Cx. Th. P. to; F. B. of.
  
  [537. ]Cx. Th. P. brende; F. beende; B. bende.
  
  [543. ]Cx. Th. P. at; F. B. in.
  
  [545. ]F. cryinge (!).
  
  [548. ]Cx. P. cam; F. came.
  
  [552. ]P. Cx. Th. That; F. B. And. F. felynge.
  
  [557. ]Cx. Th. P. agast so (but read so agast); F. B. omit so.
  
  [558. ]Cx. Th. tho; which F. B. P. omit.
  
  [566. ]B. Th. nas; F. Cx. was.
  
  [570. ]F. that; the rest tho.
  
  [573. ]All seynt.
  
  [575. ]F. B. omit hit.
  
  [592. ]All made.
  
  [603. ]All do; read done (gerund).
  
  [618. ]goddesse is not in the MSS. The line is obviously too short.
  
  [621. ]F. Th. lytel; Cx. lytyl; B. litell; P. litil (all wrong); read lyte.
  
  [622. ]Cx. P. bookes songes or ditees; Th. bokes songes and ditees; F. B. songes dytees bookys.
  
  [635. ]F. B. and in; rest and.
  
  [647. ]F. frerre (by mistake).
  
  [650. ]Cx. Th. dwellen; P. dwelleth; F. B. dwelle.
  
  [651. ]F. ner; B. nor; Cx. Th. P. ne.
  
  [653. ]F. ymade; B. I-made; Cx. made alle thy; Th. made al thy; P. I-made alle thy.
  
  [658. ]Cx. P. daswed; F. B. dasewyd; Th. dased.
  
  [673. ]Cx. Th. comen; F. come.
  
  [676. ]F. sothe sawes; Cx. Th. P. sothsawes.
  
  [680. ]Cx. Th. ben; P. been; F. B. omit.
  
  [682. ]fare] Cx. Th. P. welfare.
  
  [685. ]Cx. Th. and; rest om.
  
  [696. ]F. B. acordes (!).
  
  [705. ]Cx. she; rest he.
  
  [711. ]P. heren; rest here.
  
  [715. ]F. and erthe; rest omit and.
  
  [717. ]Cx. Th. P. in; F. B. either.
  
  [718. ]F. B. aire; P. wey; Cx. Th. way.
  
  [723. ]or] F. B. or in.
  
  [727. ]Cx. Th. a worthy; P. a wurthy; F. worthe a; B. worth a; omit a.
  
  [739, 740. ]I add e in wighte, highte.
  
  [746. ]Cx. Th. vp; F. B. P. vpwarde. Cx. Th. P. transpose 745, 746.
  
  [755. ]B. it; F. om.; Cx. Th. P. he.
  
  [764. ]All herke; see l. 725.
  
  [766. ]Cx. Th. spoken; P. poken (!); F. B. yspoken.
  
  [773. ]Cx. Th. P. As; F. B. Of (copied from l. 772).
  
  [780. ]Cx. Th. P. And ryght so brekyth it; F. B. omit this line.
  
  [789. ]F. Thorwe; B. P. Throw; Cx. Th. Threwe
  
  [794. ]F. Th. B. whele sercle (for 1st wheel); Cx. P. omit the line. (Sercle is a gloss upon wheel).
  
  [798. ]F. B. this; rest thus. F. B. om. to.
  
  [800. ]Cx. Th. P. Causeth.
  
  [803. ]F. Tyl; rest That.
  
  [804. ]F. om. thogh.
  
  [805. ]F. B. om. alway.
  
  [810. ]F. B. yspoken.
  
  [817. ]F. B. om. in. Read another (Willert).
  
  [821. ]Cx. Th. P. at the.
  
  [823. ]Cx. Th. P. thou haue; F. B. ye haue in.
  
  [827. ]F. And that sum place stide; B. And that som styde; Th. And that some stede; Cx. P. omit ll. 827-864. read And that the mansioun (see ll. 754, 831).
  
  [830. ]For That read Than!
  
  [838. ]MSS. a wey, away.
  
  [839. ]F. Th. B. haue before; Cx. P. onsit the line.
  
  [853. ]Th. B. this; F. thus.
  
  [859. ]Th. of; F. B. or.
  
  [860. ]All ought.
  
  [866. ]P. to a lewde; Cx. Th. vnto a lewde; F. trealwed (!); B. talwyd (!).
  
  [872. ]All omit Quod he; cf. ll. 700, 701.
  
  [873. ]P. Cx. Th. I; F. B. he. F. B. me (for be).
  
  [886. ]P. Cx. speken; rest speke.
  
  [896. ]Cx. Th. gan to; rest to (!).
  
  [899. ]F. B. P. om. and.
  
  [911. ]F. B. omit this line; for Seestow, Cx. Th. P. have Seest thou. For toun, all have token; see l. 890.
  
  [912. ]From P.; F. B. omit this line. Cx. Or ought that in the world is of spoken; Th. Or aught that in this worlde is of spoken; see l. 889.
  
  [913. ]F. B. om. I seyde.
  
  [932. ]F. B. om. the.
  
  [951. ]Cx. P. lete (= leet); F. B. lat.
  
  [955. ]F. Cx. Iubiter.
  
  [956. ]F. B. fer fro; P. Cx. Th. om. fer.
  
  [957. ]Cx. P. grete; Th. great; E. mochil; B. mochill.
  
  [961. ]Cx. Th. P. alway vpper; F. B. vpper alway for. Cf. l. 884.
  
  [964. ]F. Th. B. ins. to bef. loken.
  
  [969. ]P. Cx. And; rest om.
  
  [973. ]Cx. Th. wryteth; F. writ. F. B. of (for a).
  
  [978. ]So P. Cx.; rest ins. and erthe bef. and.
  
  [984. ]F. B. Nas (om. he me); Th. Nas me; Cx. P. Nadde he me.
  
  [998. ]to] F. B. ther-to.
  
  [999. ]F. B. insert and before No.
  
  [1003. ]F. B. Briddes; P. Brid; Cx. Byrd; Th. Byrde.
  
  [1007. ]F. Cx. Th. B. Athalantes (-ys); P. athlauntres; see note.
  
  [1014. ]Cx. Th. P. As; F. Alle; B. Al.
  
  [1015. ]Cx. P. they shynen; F. Th. B. thy seluen (!).
  
  [1029. ]F. inserts that before soth.
  
  [1030. ]Cx. Herkne; P. Th. Herken; F. B. Herke.
  
  [1034. ]F. B. P. om. lyk.
  
  [1040. ]Cx. Th. P. the; F. P. a. Cx. Th. P. a; F. B. oo.
  
  [1044. ]F. P. beten; Th. B. byten; Cx. grene.
  
  [1056. ]Th. tel; P. tell; rest telle.
  
  [1057. ]Cx. Th. P. I wyl; F. B. wil I.
  
  [1063. ]F. B. om. And.
  
  [1071. ]F. B. ins. now bef. how.
  
  [1072. ]Th. the efte; Cx. the more; F. B. eft the; P. the.
  
  [1079. ]Cx. Th. hath so very; P. hath so verrey; F. B. so were (!).
  
  [1080. ]Cx. P. That; F. B. Th. And (!).
  
  [1088. ]F. Cx. Th. lerne; read lernen.
  
  [1101. ]Cx. Th. thou; P. thow; F. nowe; B. now.
  
  [1102. ]Cx. P. now; Th. nowe; F. yowe; B. yow.
  
  [1105. ]Cx. to; rest for to.
  
  [1106. ]F. B. men; rest me.
  
  [1107. ]Cx. lawier; Th. laurer.
  
  [1113. ]F. B. this; rest the.
  
  [1114. ]F. citee; P. cite (=site); rest cyte (=syte).
  
  [1115. ]F. hys (for this).
  
  [1119. ]Cx. P. it; B. yt; F. Th. om.
  
  [1127. ]Th. I nyste; Cx. I ne wyst; P. I nust; F. B. nyste I neuer.
  
  [1132. ]F. B. fundament; rest foundement.
  
  [1135. ]bilt = bildeth; Th. B. bylte.
  
  [1136. ]F. B. om. al; cf. l. 1151.
  
  [1145. ]Cx. Th. Were; rest Was.
  
  [1154. ]F. B. folkes; rest folk.
  
  [1155. ]F. tymes; rest tyme. F. there; rest they.
  
  [1156. ]Cx. Th. P. there; F. B. here.
  
  [1162. ]F. om. that.
  
  [1173. ]I supply be.
  
  [1177. ]Supply craft from l. 1178, where it occurs, after cast, in Cx. Th. P. (Willert).
  
  [1178. ]F. To; the rest The.
  
  [1185. ]Cx. Th. P. ins. the before castel.
  
  [1189. ]F. Rabewyures or Rabewynres; B. Rabewynnes; Cx. As babeuwryes; Th. As babeuries; P. Babeweuries.
  
  [1195. ]F. B. om. stoden.
  
  [1197. ]F. om. of.
  
  [1201. ]F. B. vpon; rest on.
  
  [1202. ]F. B. sowneth; rest sowned.
  
  [1204. ]P. Cx. his; Th. B. this; F. the.
  
  [1206. ]F. Eaycidis; P. Eaycides; Cx. Th. Gacides.
  
  [1208. ]B. bret; Th. Briton; Cx. Bryton; P. Bretur; F. gret.
  
  [1210. ]F. Saten; B. Sate; Cx. Th. Sat; P. Sett; read Seten.
  
  [1210, 1, 2, 4. ]F. hym (for hem); P. hym (in 1210 only); B. him (in 1211, 2, 4).
  
  [1211. ]Cx. Th. P. gape; F. iape; B. yape.
  
  [1220. ]F. Cx. Th. B. to pipe; P. om. to.
  
  [1221. ]F. B. riede; rest rede.
  
  [1222. ]Cx. Th. P. brede; B. Bryede; F. bride.
  
  [1227. ]F. Atiteris; B. Atyterys; Cx. Th. dan Cytherus; P. an Citherus. F. B. transpose lines 1227 and 1228.
  
  [1228. ]F. Pseustis; B. Pseustys; Cx. Th. proserus; P. presentus.
  
  [1233. ]F. B. fames; rest famous.
  
  [1234. ]F. B. of alle; Th. of al; P. Cx. of. F. om. the.
  
  [1236. ]Cx. Th. Reyes; P. Reyþs; F. B. Rens.
  
  [1241. ]F. seight (!); for fight.
  
  [1245. ]F. B. trumpe Ioab.
  
  [1255. ]Cx. Th. P. as now not; F. B. not now.
  
  [1259. ]Th. pleyeng; rest pley; read pleyen.
  
  [1262. ]F. wrecches (wrongly); for wicches.
  
  [1269. ]P. magyk; rest magyke.
  
  [1270. ]F. B. syke; rest seke.
  
  [1271. ]All the.
  
  [1272. ]Cx. Th. P. Circes; F. Artes; B. Artys.
  
  [1273.]So in all.
  
  [1274. ]Cx. Th. Lymote; F. Limete; B. Lumete; P. Llymote.
  
  [1275, 6. ]From B.; F. om. both lines. P. hem; Cx. hym; B. Th. om.
  
  [1278. ]Th. Sycamour; F. B. Sygamour; Cx. Sycomour; P. Cicomour.
  
  [1283. ]F. B. y ther; rest that I.
  
  [1285. ]F. B. folkys.
  
  [1286. ]B. I-holde; Cx. Th. P. holde; F. y-colde.
  
  [1287. ]Cx. P. eft; F. oft; B. all; Th. om. F. B. P. I mused.
  
  [1293. ]F. B. to; rest forth.
  
  [1299. ]Cx. P. for; rest more.
  
  [1301. ]B. this; rest these; see 1294.
  
  [1303. ]F. how they hat; B. how they hate; Cx. how the hackyng; P. Th. how the hackynge.
  
  [1304. ]Cx. Th. P. As corbettis(-es) and ymageries; B. As corbettz, full of ymageryes; F. As corbetz, followed by a blank space.
  
  [1309. ]F. hald; rest hold (holde).
  
  [1315. ]Cx. Th. P. shoke; F. shoon; B. shone.
  
  [1316. ]F. B. As (for And).
  
  [1317. ]P. Cx. lesynges; rest losynges; read losenges.
  
  [1318. ]F. frenges; B. Th. frynges.
  
  [1321. ]F. B. herauldes.
  
  [1326. ]F. crepen (!).
  
  [1327. ]P. wonderliche; the rest wonderly.
  
  [1328. ]Cx. P. Alle though; F. Th. B. As though.
  
  [1332. ]Cx. Th. P. cotes; F. B. cote.
  
  [1335. ]F. B. om. as.
  
  [1349. ]F. B. litel; rest lyte.
  
  [1350. ]B. thicke; Th. thyke; F. thik.
  
  [1351. ]P. Cx. Full; rest Fyne.
  
  [1353. ]P. As; Cx. Th. Or as; F. B. Of.
  
  [1356. ]P. Cx. riche lusty; rest lusty and riche.
  
  [1361. ]F. Sit; B. Syt; Cx. P. Sat; Th. Satte; read Sitte.
  
  [1369. ]F. B. om. that.
  
  [1371. ]F. B. omit semed be.
  
  [1372. ]So Cx. Th. P.; F. B. read—This was gret marvaylle to me.
  
  [1373. ]All wonderly; cf. l. 1327.
  
  [1374. ]F. B. erthe.
  
  [1377. ]F. B. om. to.
  
  [1404. ]F. synge; rest songe.
  
  [1406. ]F. B. or; rest and.
  
  [1411. ]Th. the armes; rest armes; read tharmes (i. e. th’ armes).
  
  [1415. ]All And thus.
  
  [1416. ]Cx. P. nobley; F. Th. B. noble (= noblee).
  
  [1421. ]F. peler; B. pylere.
  
  [1425. ]I supply and hy.
  
  [1431. ]All fyne.
  
  [1432. ]Cx. Hym that wrote thactes dyuyne; P. om.; F. B. Th. Saturnyne.
  
  [1435. ]Cx. P. bare vpon; F. Th. B. he bare on.
  
  [1436. ]F. B. om. up.
  
  [1437. ]F. stonden; rest stoden.
  
  [1442. ]P. Cx. Th. as of other merveilles.
  
  [1443. ]P. Cx. piler; F. B. pilere.
  
  [1444. ]All here.
  
  [1450. ]F. B. a ful; rest ful.
  
  [1456. ]F. B. stonde; Cx. Th. stande; P. stond.
  
  [1460. ]F. B. Tholausan; Th. Tholason; P. Tolofan; Cx. tholophan.
  
  [1477. ]So Cx. Th. P.; F. B. seyde Omere was.
  
  [1483. ]I supply dan; see l. 1499.
  
  [1484. ]F. B. omit a.
  
  [1492. ]F. And; rest As; B. As I hit myght se with myn ye; P. Cx. Th. As I myght see it wyth myn ye.
  
  [1494. ]F. high the (=highthe); Cx. Th heyght; see l. 744.
  
  [1498. ]F. sturmely.
  
  [1507. ]F. om. a
  
  [1510. ]F. B. om. al.
  
  [1515. ]F. inserts al of the before olde; B inserts of the.
  
  [1527. ]All in-to (for in).
  
  [1530. ]F. alle skynnes; Cx. alle kyns.
  
  [1543. ]Cx. Th. grace (for cause).
  
  [1546. ]F. B. om. this line.
  
  [1549. ]F. B. herke.
  
  [1551. ]Cx. Th. P. yet; F. B. right.
  
  [1553. ]Cx. Th. P. sayd; F. quod; B quoth.
  
  [1570. ]F. B. Vpon the peyn to be blynde, omitting l. 1572; Cx. Th. om. the. Read Vp, the usual idiom.
  
  [1572. ]In Cx. Th. only.
  
  [1585. ]F. B. om. that.
  
  [1594. ]F. B. clarioun; see l. 1597.
  
  [1599. ]F. B. And (for That).
  
  [1603. ]Cx. P. at; rest to.
  
  [1609. ]F. B. om. now.
  
  [1614. ]F. B. insert wel after be.
  
  [1618. ]F. B. wete; rest wote; read wite.
  
  [1621. ]F. B. om. wel.
  
  [1623. ]Cx. Th. P. And thou dan; F. B. Haue doon.
  
  [1637. ]P. blak; F. B. blake.
  
  [1647. ]Cx. Th. P. swartysh; F. B. swart, swarte.
  
  [1657. ]B. thridde; F. thirdde.
  
  [1661. ]F. ben; rest han.
  
  [1666. ]All werkes, pl.; see 1701. Th. That your good workes shal be wyst (perhaps better).
  
  [1668. ]F. B. om. Right.
  
  [1675. ]F. B. om. Al.
  
  [1682. ]F. B. Cx. Th. hath; P. have.
  
  [1686. ]All of bawme; omit of (Koch).
  
  [1.]For this method of commencing a poem with a dream, compare The Book of the Duchesse, Parl. of Foules, and The Romance of the Rose.
  
  For discourses on dreams, compare the Nonne Preestes Tale, and the remarks of Pandarus in Troilus, v. 358-385. Chaucer here propounds several problems; first, what causes dreams (a question answered at some length in the Nonne Preestes Tale, B 4116); why some come true and some do not (discussed in the same, B 4161); and what are the various sorts of dreams (see note to l. 7 below).
  
  There is another passage in Le Roman de la Rose, which bears some resemblance to the present passage. It begins at l. 18699:—
  - ‘Ne ne revoil dire des songes,
  - S’il sunt voirs, ou s’il sunt mençonges;
  - Se l’en les doit du tout eslire,
  - Ou s’il sunt du tout à despire:
  - Porquoi li uns sunt plus orribles,
  - Plus bel li autre et plus paisible,
  - Selonc lor apparicions
  - En diverses complexions,
  - Et selonc lors divers corages
  - Des meurs divers et des aages;
  - Ou se Diex par tex visions
  - Envoie revelacions,
  - Ou li malignes esperiz,
  - Por metre les gens en periz;
  - De tout ce ne m’entremetrai.’
  [2.]This long sentence ends at line 52.
  
  [7.]This opens up the question as to the divers sorts of dreams. Chaucer here evidently follows Macrobius, who, in his Commentary on the Somnium Scipionis, lib. i. c. 3, distinguishes five kinds of dreams, viz. somnium, visio, oraculum, insomnium, and visum. The fourth kind, insomnium, was also called fantasma; and this provided Chaucer with the word fantome in l. 11. In the same line, oracles answers to the Lat. oracula. Cf. Ten Brink, Studien, p. 101.
  
  [18.]The gendres, the (various) kinds. This again refers to Macrobius, who subdivides the kind of dream which he calls somnium into five species, viz. proprium, alienum, commune, publicum, and generale, according to the things to which they relate. Distaunce of tymes, i. e. whether the thing dreamt of will happen soon, or a long time afterwards.
  
  [20.]‘Why this is a greater (more efficient) cause than that.’
  
  [21.]This alludes to the four chief complexions of men; cf. Nonne Preestes Tale, B 4114. The four complexions were the sanguine, phlegmatic, melancholy, and choleric; and each complexion was likely to have certain sorts of dreams. Thus, in the Nonne Preestes Tale, B 4120, the choleric man is said to dream of arrows, fire, fierce carnivorous beasts, strife, and dogs; whilst the melancholy man will dream of bulls and bears and black devils.
  
  [22.]Reflexiouns, the reflections or thoughts to which each man is most addicted; see Parl. of Foules, 99-105.
  
  [24.]‘Because of too great feebleness of their brain (caused) by abstinence,’ &c.
  
  [43.]Of propre kynde, owing to its own nature.
  
  [48.]The y in By is run on to the a into avísióuns.
  
  [53.]‘As respects this matter, may good befall the great clerks that treat of it.’ Of these great clerks, Macrobius was one, and Jean de Meun another. Vincent of Beauvais has plenty to say about dreams in his Speculum Naturale, lib. xxvi.; and he refers us to Aristotle, Gregory (Moralia, lib. viii.), Johannes de Rupella, Priscianus (ad Cosdroe regem Persarum), Augustinus (in Libro de diuinatione dæmonum), Hieronimus (super Matheum, lib. ii.), Thomas de Aquino, Albertus, &c.
  
  [58.]Repeated (nearly) from l. 1.
  
  [63.]I here give the text as restored by Willert, who shows how the corruptions in ll. 62 and 63 arose. First of all dide was shifted into l. 62, giving as dide I; as in Caxton’s print. Next, an additional now was put in place of dide in l. 63; as in P., B., F., and Th., and dide was dropped alltogether. After this, F. turned the now of l. 64 into yow, and Cx. omitted it. See also note to l. 111.
  
  [64.]‘Which, as I can (best) now remember.’
  
  [68.]Pronounced fully:—With spé-ci-ál de-vó-ci-óun.
  
  [69.]Morpheus; see Book of Duch. 137. From Ovid, Met. xi. 592-612; esp. ll. 602, 3:—
  - ‘Saxo tamen exit ab imo
  - Riuus aquae Lethes.’
  [73.]‘Est prope Cimmerios,’ &c.; Met. xi. 592.
  
  [75.]See Ovid, Met. xi. 613-5; 633.
  
  [76.]That . . hir is equivalent to whose; cf. Kn. Tale, 1852.
  
  [81.]Cf. ‘Colui, che tutto move,’ i. e. He who moves all; Parad. i. 1
  
  [88.]Read povért; cf. Clerkes Tale, E 816.
  
  [92.]MSS. misdeme; I read misdemen, to avoid an hiatus.
  
  [93.]Read málicióus.
  
  [98.]‘That, whether he dream when bare-footed or when shod’; whether in bed by night or in a chair by day; i. e. in every case. The that is idiomatically repeated in l. 99.
  
  [105.]The dream of Crœsus, king of Lydia, and his death vpon a gallows, form the subject of the last story in the Monkes Tale. Chaucer got it from the Rom. de la Rose, which accounts for the form Lyde. The passage occurs at l. 6513:—
  - ‘Cresus . . .
  - Qui refu roi de toute Lyde, . . .
  - Qu’el vous vuet faire au gibet pendre.’
  [109, 10.]The rime is correct, because abreyd is a strong verb. Chaucer does not rime a pp. with a weak pt. tense, which should have a final e. According to Mr. Cromie’s Rime-Index, there is just one exception, viz. in the Kn. Tale, A 1383, where the pt. t. seyde is rimed with the ‘pp. leyde.’ But Mr. Cromie happens to have overlooked the fact that leyde is here not the pp., but the past tense! Nevertheless, abreyd-e also appears in a weak form, by confusion with leyd-e, seyd-e, &c.; see C. T., B 4198, E 1061. Cf. Book of the Duchess, 192. In l. 109, he refers to l. 65.
  
  [111.]Here again, as in l. 63, is a mention of Dec. 10. Ten Brink (Studien, p. 151) suggests that it may have been a Thursday; cf. the mention of Jupiter in ll. 608, 642, 661. If so, the year was 1383.
  
  [115.]‘Like one that was weary with having overwalked himself by going two miles on pilgrimage.’ The difficulty was not in the walking two miles, but in doing so under difficulties, such as going barefoot for penance.
  
  [117.]Corseynt; O.F. cors seint, lit. holy body; hence a saint or sainted person, or the shrine where a saint was laid. See Robert of Brunne, Handlyng Synne, 8739:—
  - ‘And hys ymage ful feyre depeynte,
  - RyȜt as he were a cors seynt.’
  See also P. Plowman, B. v. 539; Morte Arthure, 1164; and (the spurious) Chaucer’s Dream, 942.
  
  [118.]‘To make that soft (or easy) which was formerly hard.’ The allusion is humorous enough; viz. to the bonds of matrimony. Here again Chaucer follows Jean de Meun, Rom. de la Rose, 8871:—
  - ‘Mariages est maus liens,
  - Ainsinc m’aïst saint Juliens
  - Qui pelerins errans herberge,
  - Et saint Lienart qui defferge
  - Les prisonniers bien repentans,
  - Quant les voit à soi démentans’;
  i. e. ‘Marriage is an evil bond—so may St. Julian aid me, who harbours wandering pilgrims; and St. Leonard, who frees from their fetters (lit. un-irons) such prisoners as are very repentant, when he sees them giving themselves the lie (or recalling their word).’ The ‘prisoners’ are married people, who have repented, and would recall their plighted vow.
  
  St. Leonard was the patron-saint of captives, and it was charitably hoped that he would extend his protection to the wretched people who had unadvisedly entered into wedlock, and soon prayed to get out of it again. They would thus exchange the hard bond for the soft condition of freedom. ‘St. Julian is the patron of pilgrims; St. Leonard and St. Barbara protect captives’; Brand, Pop. Antiquities, i. 359. And, at p. 363 of the same, Brand quotes from Barnabee Googe:—
  - ‘But Leonard of the prisoners doth the bandes asunder pull,
  - And breaks the prison-doores and chaines, wherewith his church is full.’
  St. Leonard’s day is Nov. 6.
  
  [119.]The MSS. have slept-e, which is dissyllabic. Read sleep, as in C. T. Prol. 397.
  
  [120.]Hence the title of one of Lydgate’s poems, The Temple of Glass, which is an imitation of the present poem.
  
  [130.]Cf. the description of Venus’ temple (Cant. Tales, A 1918), which is imitated from that in Boccaccio’s Teseide.
  
  [133.]Cf. ‘naked fleting in the large see . . . And on hir heed, ful semely for to see, A rose garland, fresh and wel smellinge’; Cant. Tales, A 1956.
  
  [137.]‘Hir dowves’; C. T., A 1962. ‘Cupido’; id. 1963.
  
  [138.]Vulcano, Vulcan; note the Italian forms of these names. Boccaccio’s Teseide has Cupido (vii. 54), and Vulcano (vii. 43). His face was brown with working at the forge.
  
  [141, 2.]Cf. Dante, Inf. iii. 10, 11.
  
  [143.]A large portion of the rest of this First Book is taken up with a summary of the earlier part of Vergil’s Aeneid. We have here a translation of the well-known opening lines:—
  - ‘Arma uirumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris
  - Italiam, fato profugus, Lauinia uenit
  - Littora.’
  [147.]In, into, unto; see note to l. 366.
  
  [152.]Synoun, Sinon; Aen. ii. 195.
  
  [153.]I supply That, both for sense and metre.
  
  [155.]Made the hors broght, caused the horse to be brought. On this idiom, see the note to Man of Lawes Tale, B 171.
  
  [158.]Ilioun, Ilium. Ilium is only a poetical name for Troy; but the medieval writers often use it in the restricted sense of the citadel of Troy, where was the temple of Apollc and the palace of Priam. Thus, in the alliterative Troy-book, 11958, ylion certainly has this sense; and Caxton speaks of ‘the palays of ylyon’; see Spec. of English, ed. Skeat, p. 94. See also the parallel passage in the Nonne Preestes Tale, B 4546. Still more clearly, in the Leg. Good Women (Dido, 13), Chaucer says, of ‘the tour of Ilioun,’ that it ‘of the citee was the cheef dungeoun.’ In l. 163 below, it is called castel.
  
  [160.]Polites, Polites; Aen. ii. 526. Also spelt Polite in Troil. iv. 53.
  
  [163.]Brende, was on fire; used intransitively, as in l. 537.
  
  [164-73.]See Aen. ii. 589-733.
  
  [174.]Read this, rather than his. Cf. Aen. ii. 736.
  
  [177.]Iulus and Ascanius were one and the same person; see Æn. i. 267. Perhaps Ch. was misled by the wording of Æn. iv. 274. (On the other hand, Brutus was not the same person as Cassius; see Monkes Tale, B 3887). Hence, Koch proposes to read That hight instead of And eek; but we have no authority for this. However, Chaucer has it right in his Legend of Good Women, 941; and in l. 192 below, we find sone, not sones; hence l. 178 may be merely parenthetical.
  
  [182.]Wente, foot-path; Aen. ii. 737. Cf. Book Duch. 398.
  
  [184.]‘So that she was dead, but I know not how.’ Vergil does not say how she died.
  
  [185.]Gost, ghost; see Aen. ii. 772.
  
  [189.]Repeated from l. 180.
  
  [198.]Here Chaucer returns to the first book of the Æneid, which he follows down to l. 255.
  
  [204.]‘To blow forth, (with winds) of all kinds’; cf. Æn. i. 85.
  
  [219.]Ioves, Jove, Jupiter. This curious form occurs again, ll. 586, 597, 630; see note to l. 586. Boccaccio has Giove.
  
  [226.]Achatee (trisyllabic), Achates, Æn. i. 312; where the abl. form Achate occurs.
  
  [239.]The story of Dido is told at length in Le Rom. de la Rose, 13378; in The Legend of Good Women; and in Gower, Conf. Amantis, bk. iv., ed. Pauli, ii. 4. Chaucer now passes on to the fourth book of the Æneid, till he comes to l. 268 below.
  
  [265.]‘Mès ja ne verrés d’aparence Conclurre bonne consequence’; Rom. Rose, 12343.
  
  [272.]‘It is not all gold that glistens.’ A proverb which Chaucer took from Alanus de Insulis; see note to Can. Yem. Tale, G 962.
  
  [273.]‘For, as sure as I hope to have good use of my head.’ Brouke is, practically, in the optative mood. Cf. ‘So mote I brouke wel myn eyen tweye’; Cant. Ta., B 4490; so also E 2308. The phrase occurs several times in the Tale of Gamelyn; see note to l. 334 of that poem.
  
  [280-3.]These four lines occur in Thynne’s edition only, but are probably quite genuine. It is easy to see why they dropped out; viz. owing to the repetition of the word finde at the end of ll. 279 and 283. This is a very common cause of such omissions. See note to l. 504.
  
  [286.]By, with reference to.
  
  [288.]Gest, guest; Lat. aduena, Æn. iv. 591.
  
  [290.]‘He that fully knows the herb may safely lay it to his eye.’ So in Cotgrave’s Dict., s. v. Herbe, we find; ‘L’herbe qu’on cognoist, on la doit lier à son doigt; Prov. Those, or that, which a man knowes best, he must use most.’
  
  [305.]In the margin of MSS. F. and B. is here written:—‘Caute uos, innocentes mulieres.’
  
  [315.]Swete herte; hence E. sweetheart; cf. l. 326.
  
  [321.]Understand ne (i. e. neither) before your love. Cf. Æn. iv. 307, 8.
  
  [329.]I have no hesitation in inserting I after Agilte, as it is absolutely required to complete the sense. Read—Agílt’ I yów, &c.
  
  [343.]Pronounce déterminen (i as ee in beet).
  
  [346.]Cf. Æn. iv. 321-3.
  
  [350.]‘Fama, malum quo non aliud uelocius ullum,’ Æn. iv. 174; quoted in the margin of MSS. F. and B.
  
  [351.]‘Nichil occultum quod non reueletur’; Matt. x. 26: quoted in the margin of MSS. F. and B.
  
  [355.]Seyd y-shamed be, said to be put to shame.
  
  [359.]Eft-sones, hereafter again. In the margin of MSS. F. and B. we here find:—‘Cras poterunt turpia fieri sicut heri.’ By reading fieri turpia, this becomes a pentameter; but it is not in Ovid, nor (I suppose) in classical Latin.
  
  [361.]Doon, already done. To done, yet to be done. Cf. Book Duch. 708.
  
  [366.]I read in for into (as in the MSS.). For similar instances, where the scribes write into for in, see Einenkel, Streifzüge durch die Mittelengl. Syntax, p. 145. Cf. l. 147.
  
  [367.]In the margin of MSS. F. and B. is an incorrect quotation of Æn. iv. 548-9:—‘tu prima furentem His, germana, malis oneras.’
  
  [378.]Eneidos; because the books are headed Æneidos liber primus, &c.
  
  [379.]See Ovid, Heroides, Epist. vii—Dido Æneæ.
  
  [380.]Or that, ere that, before.
  
  [381.]Only Th. has the right reading, viz. And nere it to longe to endyte (where longe is an error for long). The expressions And nor hyt were and And nere it were are both ungrammatical. Nere=ne were, were it not.
  
  [388.]In the margin of F. and B. we find:—‘Nota: of many vntrewe louers. Hospita, Demaphoon, tua te R[h]odopeia Phyllis Vltra promissum tempus abesse queror.’ These are the first two lines of Epistola ii. in Ovid’s Heroides, addressed by Phyllis to Demophoon. All the examples here given are taken from the same work. Epist. iii. is headed Briseis Achilli; Epist. v., Oenone Paridi; Epist. vi., Hypsipyle Iasoni; Epist. xii., Medea Iasoni; Epist. ix., Deianira Herculi; Epist. x., Ariadne Theseo. These names were evidently suggested by the reference above to the same work, l. 379. See the long note to Group B, l. 61, in vol. v.
  
  Demophoon, son of Theseus; was the lover of Phyllis, daughter of king Sithon in Thrace; she was changed into an almond-tree.
  
  [392.]His terme pace, pass beyond or stay behind his appointed time. He said he would return in a month, but did not do so. See the story in The Legend of Good Women. Gower (ed. Pauli, iii. 361) alludes to her story, in a passage much like the present one; and in Le Rom. de la Rose, 13417, we have the very phrase—‘Por le terme qu’il trespassa.’
  
  [397.]In the margin of F. and B.:—‘Ouidius. Quam legis a rapta Briseide litera venit’; Heroid. Ep. iii. 1.
  
  [401.]In the same:—‘Ut [miswritten Vbi] tibi Colc[h]orum memini regina uacaui’; Heroid. Ep. xii. 1. For the accentuation of Medea, cf. Leg. of Good Women, 1629, 1663.
  
  [402.]In the margin of F. and B.:—‘Gratulor Oechaliam’; Heroid. Ep. ix. 1; but Oechaliam is miswritten yotholia.
  
  [405.]Gower also tells this story; ed. Pauli, ii. 306.
  
  [407.]In F. and B. is quoted the first line of Ovid, Heroid. x. 1. Adriane, Ariadne; just as in Leg. Good Wom. 2171, &c., and in C. T., Group B, l. 67. Gower has Adriagne.
  
  [409.]‘For, whether he had laughed, or whether he had frowned’; i. e. in any case. Cf. l. 98.
  
  [411.]‘If it had not been for Ariadne.’ We have altered the form of this idiom.
  
  [416.]Yle, isle of Naxos; see notes to Leg. Good Wom. 2163, and C. T., Group B, l. 68 (in vol. v.).
  
  [426.]Telles is a Northern and West-Midland form, as in Book Duch. 73. Cf. falles, id. 257. A similar admixture of forms occurs in Havelok, Will. of Palerne, and other M. E. poems.
  
  [429.]The book, i. e. Vergil; Æn. iv. 252.
  
  [434.]Go, gone, set out; correctly used. Chaucer passes on to Æneid, bk. v. The tempest is that mentioned in Æn. v. 10; the steersman is Palinurus, who fell overboard; Æn. v. 860.
  
  [439.]See Æn. bk. vi. The isle intended is Crete, Æn. vi. 14, 23; which was not at all near (or ‘besyde’) Cumæ, but a long way from it. Æneas then descends to hell, where he sees Anchises (vi. 679); Palinurus (337); Dido (450); Deiphobus, son of Priam (495); and the tormented souls (580).
  
  [447.]Which refers to the various sights in hell.
  
  [449.]Claudian, Claudius Claudianus, who wrote De raptu Proserpinae about ad 400. Daunte is Dante, with reference to his Inferno, ii. 13-27, and Paradiso, xv. 25-27.
  
  [451.]Chaucer goes on to Æn. vii-xii, of which he says but little.
  
  [458.]Lavyna is Lavinia; the form Lavina occurs in Dante, Purg. xvii. 37.
  
  [468.]I put seyën for seyn, to improve the metre; cf. P. Pl. C. iv. 104.
  
  [474.]‘But I do not know who caused them to be made.’
  
  [475.]Read ne in as nin; as in Squi. Tale, F 35.
  
  [482.]This waste space corresponds to Dante’s ‘gran diserto,’ Inf. i. 64; or, still better, to his ‘landa’ (Inf. xiv. 8), which was too sterile to support plants. So again, l. 486 corresponds to Dante’s ‘arena arida e spessa,’ which has reference to the desert of Libya; Inf. xiv. 13.
  
  [487.]‘As fine [said of the sand] as one may see still lying.’ Jephson says yet must be a mistake, and would read yt. But it makes perfect sense. Cx. Th. read at eye (put for at yë) instead of yet lye, which is perhaps better. At yë means ‘as presented to the sight’; see Kn. Ta., A 3016.
  
  [498.]Kenne, discern. The offing at sea has been called the kenning; and see Kenning in Halliwell.
  
  [500.]More, greater. Imitated from Dante, Purgat. ix. 19, which Cary translates thus:—
  - ‘Then, in a vision, did I seem to view
  - A golden-feather’d eagle in the sky,
  - With open wings, and hovering for descent.’
  Cf. also the descent of the angel in Purg. ii. 17-24.
  
  [504-7.]The omission of these lines in F. and B. is simply due to the scribe slipping from bright in l. 503 to brighte in l. 507. Cf. note to l. 280.
  
  [511.]Listeth, pleases, is pleased; the alteration (in MS. F.) to listeneth is clearly wrong, and due to confusion with herkneth above. (I do not think listeth is the imp. pl. here.)
  
  [514.]Isaye, Isaiah; actually altered, in various editions, to I saye, as if it meant ‘I say.’ The reference is to ‘the vision of Isaiah’; Isa. i. 1; vi. 1. Scipioun, Scipio; see note to Parl. Foules, 31, and cf. Book of the Duch. 284.
  
  [515.]Nabugodonosor, Nebuchadnezzar. The same spelling occurs in the Monkes Tale (Group B, 3335), and is a mere variant of the form Nabuchodonosor in the Vulgate version, Dan. i-iv. Gower has the same spelling; Conf. Amant. bk. i., near the end.
  
  [516.]Pharo; spelt Pharao in the Vulgate, Gen. xli. 1-7. See Book of the Duchesse, 280-3.
  
  Turnus; alluding to his vision of Iris, the messenger of Juno; Æneid ix. 6. Elcanor; this name somewhat resembles Elkanah (in the Vulgate, Elcana), 1 Sam. i. 1; but I do not know where to find any account of his vision, nor do I at all understand who is meant. The name Alcanor occurs in Vergil, but does not help us.
  
  [518.]Cipris, Venus, goddess of Cyprus; called Cipryde in Parl. Foules, 277. Dante has Ciprigna; Par. viii. 2.
  
  [519.]Favour, favourer, helper, aid; not used in the ordinary sense of Lat. fauor, but as if it were formed from O. F. faver, Lat. fauere, to be favourable to. Godefroy gives an example of the O. F. verb faver in this sense.
  
  [521.]Parnaso; the spelling is imitated from the Ital. Parnaso, i. e. Parnassus, in Dante, Par. i. 16. So also Elicon is Dante’s Elicona, i. e. Helicon, Purg. xxix. 40. But the passage in Dante which Chaucer here especially imitates is that in Inf. ii. 7-9:—
  - ‘O Muse, o alto ingegno, or m’ aiutate;
  - O mente, che scrivesti ciò ch’ io vidi,
  - Qui si parrà la tua nobilitate.’
  This Cary thus translates:—
  - ‘O Muses! O high genius, now vouchsafe
  - Your aid. O mind, that all I saw hast kept
  - Safe in a written record, here thy worth
  - And eminent endowments come to proof.’
  Hence ye in l. 520 answers to Dante’s Muse, the Muses; and Thought in l. 523 answers to Dante’s mente. Cf. also Parad. xviii. 82-87. And see the parallel passage in Anelida, 15-19.
  
  The reason why Chaucer took Helicon to be a well rather than a mountain is because Dante’s allusion to it is dubiously worded; see Purg. xxix. 40.
  
  [528.]Engyn is accented on the latter syllable, as in Troil. ii. 565, iii. 274.
  
  [529.]Egle, the eagle in l. 499; cf. ll. 503-7.
  
  [534.]Partly imitated from Dante, Purg. ix. 28-30:—
  - ‘Poi mi parea che, più rotata un poco,
  - Terribil come fulgor discendesse,
  - E me rapisse suso infino al foco.’
  Cary’s translation is:—
  - ‘A little wheeling in his aëry tour,
  - Terrible as the lightning, rushed he down,
  - And snatch’d me upward even to the fire.’
  But Chaucer follows still more closely, and verbally, a passage in Machault’s Jugement du Roi de Navarre, ed. Tarbé, 1849, p. 72, which has the words—
  - ‘Ia foudre
  - Que mainte ville mist en poudre’;
  i. e. literally, ‘the foudre (thunder-bolt) which reduces many a town to powder.’ Machault nearly repeats this; ed. Tarbé, p. 97.
  
  Curiously enough, almost the same words occur in Boethius, bk. i. met. 4, where Chaucer’s translation has:—‘ne þe wey of thonderleyt, that is wont to smyten heye toures.’ It hence appears that Chaucer copies Machault, and Machault translates Boethius. There are some curious M. E. verses on the effects of thunder in Popular Treatises on Science, ed. Wright, p. 136.
  
  Foudre represents the Lat. fulgur. One of the queer etymologies of medieval times is, that fulgur is derived a feriendo; Vincent of Beauvais, Spec. Nat. iv. 59. It was held to be quite sufficient that both fulgur and ferire begin with f.
  
  [537.]Brende, was set on fire; cf. l. 163. The idea is that of a falling thunderbolt, which seems to have been conceived of as being a material mass, set on fire by the rapidity of its passage through the air; thus confusing the flash of lightning with the fall of a meteoric stone. See Mr. Aldis Wright’s note on thunder-stone, Jul. Cæs. i. 3. 49.
  
  [543.]Hente, caught. We find a similar use of the word in an old translation of Map’s Apocalypsis Goliæ, printed in Morley’s Shorter Eng. Poems, p. 13:—
  - ‘And by and by I fell into a sudden trance,
  - And all along the air was marvellously hent.’
  [544.]Sours, sudden ascent, a springing aloft. It is well illustrated by a passage in the Somp. Tale (D 1938):—
  - ‘Therfor, right as an hauk up, at a sours,
  - Up springeth into their, right so prayeres
  - Of charitable and chaste bisy freres
  - Maken hir sours to Goddes eres two.’
  It is precisely the same word as M. E. sours, mod. E. source, i. e. rise, spring (of a river). Etymologically, it is the feminine of O. F. sors, pp. of sordre, to rise (Lat. surgere). At a later period, the r was dropped, and the word was strangely confused in sound with the verb souse, to pickle. Moreover, the original sense of ‘sudden ascent’ was confused with that of ‘sudden descent,’ for which the correct term was (I suppose) swoop. Hence the old verb to souse, in the sense ‘to swoop down,’ or ‘to pounce upon,’ or ‘to strike,’ as in Shak. K. John, v. 2. 150; Spenser, F. Q. i. 5. 8; iii. 4. 16; iv. 3. 19, 25; iv. 4. 30; iv. 5. 36; iv. 7. 9. The sense of ‘downward swoop’ is particularly clear in Spenser, F. Q. ii. 11. 36:—
  - ‘Eft fierce retourning, as a faulcon fayre,
  - That once hath failed of her souse full neare,
  - Remounts againe into the open ayre,
  - And unto better fortune doth her-selfe prepayre.’
  Such is the simple solution of the etymology of Mod. E. souse, as used by Pope (Epilogue to Satires, Dial. ii. 15)—‘Spread thy broad wing, and souse on all the kind.’
  
  [557.]Cf. Dante, Inf. ii. 122:—‘Perchè tanta viltà nel core allette?’ Also Purg. ix. 46:—‘Non aver tema.’
  
  [562.]‘One that I could name.’ This personal allusion can hardly refer to any one but Chaucer’s wife. The familiar tone recalls him to himself; yet the eagle’s voice sounded kindly, whereas the poet sadly tells us that his wife’s voice sounded far otherwise: ‘So was it never wont to be.’ See Ward’s Chaucer, pp. 84, 85; and cf. l. 2015 below. Perhaps Chaucer disliked to hear the word ‘Awak!’
  
  [573.]It would appear that, in Chaucer, sëynt is sometimes dissyllabic; but it may be better here to use the feminine form seynt-e, as in l. 1066. Observe the rime of Márie with cárie.
  
  [576.]‘For so certainly may God help me, as thou shalt have no harm.’
  
  [586.]Ioves, Jove, Jupiter; cf. l. 597. This remarkable form occurs again in Troil. ii. 1607, where we find the expression ‘Ioves lat him never thryve’; and again in Troil. iii. 3—‘O Ioves doughter dere’; and in Troil. iii. 15, where Ioves is in the accusative case. The form is that of an O. F. nominative; cf. Charles, Jacques, Jules.
  
  Stellifye, make into a constellation; ‘whether will Jupiter turn me into a constellation.’ This alludes, of course, to the numerous cases in which it was supposed that such heroes as Hercules and Perseus, or such heroines as Andromeda and Callisto were changed into constellations: see Kn. Tale, A 2058. Cf. ‘No wonder is thogh Iove hir stellifye’; Leg. Good Women, prol. 525. Skelton uses the word (Garland of Laurell, 963); and it is given in Palsgrave.
  
  [588.]Perhaps imitated from Dante, Inf. ii. 32, where Dante says that he is neither Æneas nor Paul. Chaucer here refers to various men who were borne up to heaven, viz. Enoch (Gen. v. 24), Elijah (2 Kings ii. 11), Romulus, and Ganymede. Romulus was carried up to heaven by Mars; Ovid, Metam. xiv. 824; Fasti, ii. 475-512. Ganymede was carried up to heaven by Jupiter in the form of an eagle; cf. Vergil, Æn. i. 28, and see Ovid, Metam. x. 160, where Ovid adds:
  - ‘qui nunc quoque pocula miscet,
  - Invitaque Iovi nectar Iunone ministrat.’
  In the passage in Dante (Purg. ix. 19-30), already alluded to above (note to l. 534), there is a reference to Ganymede (l. 23).
  
  [592.]Boteler, butler. No burlesque is here intended. ‘The idea of Ganymede being butler to the gods appears ludicrous to us, who are accustomed to see the office performed by menial servants. But it was not so in the middle ages. Young gentlemen of high rank carved the dishes and poured out the wine at the tables of the nobility, and grace in the performance of these duties was highly prized. One of the oldest of our noble families derives its surname from the fact that its founder was butler to the king’; Bell. So also, the royal name of Stuart is merely steward.
  
  [597.]Therabout, busy about, having it in intention.
  
  [600-4.]Cf. Vergil’s words of reassurance to Dante; Inf. ii. 49.
  
  [608.]The eagle says he is Jupiter’s eagle; ‘Iouis ales,’ Æn. i. 394.
  
  [614-40.]A long sentence of 27 lines.
  
  [618.]I supply goddesse, to complete the line. Cf. ‘In worship of Venús, goddésse of love’; Kn. Tale, A 1904; and again, ‘goddésse,’ id. A 1101, 2.
  
  [621.]The necessity for correcting lytel to lyte is obvious from the rime, since lyte is rimes with dytees. Chaucer seems to make lyte dissyllabic; it rimes with Arcite, Kn. Ta., A 1334, 2627; and with hermyte in l. 659 below. In the present case, the e is elided—lyt’is. For similar rimes, cf. nones, noon is, C. T. Prol. 523; beryis, mery is, Non. Pr. Ta., B 4155; swevenis, swevene is, id. B 4111.
  
  [623.]In a note to Cant. Ta. 17354 (I 43), Tyrwhitt says that perhaps cadence means ‘a species of poetical composition distinct from riming verses.’ But it is difficult to shew that Chaucer ever composed anything of the kind, unless it can be said that his translation of Boethius or his Tale of Melibeus is in a sort of rhythmical prose. It seems to me just possible that by rime may here be meant the ordinary riming of two lines together, as in the Book of the Duchess and the House of Fame, whilst by cadence may be meant lines disposed in stanzas, as in the Parliament of Foules. There is nothing to shew that Chaucer had, at this period, employed the ‘heroic verse’ of the Legend of Good Women. However, we find the following quotation from Jullien in Littré’s Dictionary, s. v. Cadence:—‘Dans la prose, dans les vers, la cadence n’est pas autre chose que le rhythme ou le nombre: seulement on y joint ordinairement l’idée d’une certaine douceur dans le style, d’un certain art dans l’arrangement des phrases ou dans le choix des mots que le rhythme proprement dit ne suppose pas du tout.’ This is somewhat oracular, as it is difficult to see why rhythm should not mean much the same thing.
  
  [637.]‘And describest everything that relates to them.’ (Here hir=their), with reference to lovers.
  
  [639-40.]‘Although thou mayst accompany those whom he is not pleased to assist.’ Nearly repeated in Troilus, i. 517, 518.
  
  [652.]In a note upon the concluding passage of the Cant. Tales, Tyrwhitt says of the House of Fame:—‘Chaucer mentions this among his works in the Leg. Good Women, verse 417. He wrote it while he was Comptroller of the Custom of Wools, &c. (see Bk. ii. l. 144-8 [the present passage]), and consequently after the year 1374.’ See Ward’s Chaucer, pp. 76, 77, with its happy reference to Charles Lamb and his ‘works’; and compare a similar passage in the Prol. to Legend of Good Women, 30-6.
  
  [662.]Cf. Dante, Inf. i. 113, which Cary thus translates:—
  - —‘and I, thy guide,
  - Will lead thee hence through an eternal space.’
  [678.]Long y-served, faithfully served for a long time, i. e. after a long period of devotion; alluding to the word servant in the sense of lover.
  
  [681.]Alluding to sudden fallings in love, especially ‘at first sight.’ Such take place at haphazard; as if a blind man should accidentally frighten a hare. without in the least intending it. We find in Hazlitt’s collection of Proverbs—‘The hare starts when a man least expects it’; p. 373.
  
  [682.]Iolytee and fare, happiness and good speed. The very same words are employed, but ironically, by Theseus in the Knight’s Tale, A 1807, 1809. The hare also accompanies them; id. A 1810.
  
  [683.]‘As long as they find love to be as true as steel.’ Cf. Troilus, iv. 325:—‘God leve that ye finde ay love of steel.’
  
  [689.]‘And more beards made in two hours,’ &c. ‘Yet can a miller make a clerkes berd’; (Reves Tale), C. T., A 4096. ‘Yet coude I make his berd’; C. T., D 361. Tyrwhitt’s note on the former passage is: ‘make a clerkes berd,’ i. e. cheat him. Faire la barbe is to shave, or trim the beard; but Chaucer translates the phrase literally, at least when he uses it in its metaphorical sense. Boccace has the same metaphor, Decamerone, viii. 10. Speaking of some exorbitant cheats, he says that they applied themselves ‘non a radere, ma a scorticare huomini’ [not to shave men, but to scarify them]; and a little lower—‘si a soavemente la barbiera saputo menare il rasoio’ [so agreeably did the she-barber know how to handle the razor]. Barbiera has a second and a bad sense; see Florio’s Dictionary.
  - ‘Myght I thaym have spyde,
  - I had made thaym a berd.’
  - Towneley Mysteries, p. 144.
  [692.]Holding in hond means keeping in hand, attaching to oneself by feigned favours; just as to bear in hand used to mean to make one believe a thing; see my note to Man of Lawes Tale, B 620.
  
  [695.]Lovedayes, appointed days of reconciliation; see note in vol. v. to Chaucer’s Prol. 258, and my note to P. Plowman, B. iii. 157. ‘What, quod she, maked I not a louedaie bitwene God and mankind, and chese a maide to be nompere [umpire], to put the quarell at ende?’ Test. of Love, bk. i. ed. 1561, fol. 287.
  
  [696.]Cordes, chords. Apparently short for acordes, i. e. musical chords, as Willert suggests. It is rather a forced simile, like cornes in l. 698.
  
  [698.]Cornes, grains of corn; see note to Monkes Tale (Group B, 3225).
  
  [700.]Wis, certainly; cf. y-wis. The i is short.
  
  [702.]Impossible, (accent on i); cf. Clerkes Tale, E 713.
  
  [703.]Pyes, mag-pies, chattering birds; Squi. Ta., F 650.
  
  [708.]Worthy for to leve, worthy to believe, worthy of belief.
  
  [712.]Thyn owne book, i. e. the book you are so fond of, viz. Ovid’s Metamorphoses, which Chaucer quotes so continually. Libraries in those days were very small (Cant. Ta. Prol. 294); but we may be almost certain that Chaucer had a copy of the Metamorphoses of his own. The reference here is to Ovid’s description of the House of Fame, Metam. xii. 39-63. See Golding’s translation of this passage in the Introduction.
  
  [730.]This passage is founded on one in Boethius; cf. Chaucer’s translation, bk. iii. pr. 11, ll. 98-110. Imitated also in Le Rom. de la Rose, 16963-9. Cf. Dante, Par. i. 109, which Cary thus translates:—
  - ‘All natures lean,
  - In this their order, diversely,’ &c.
  [738.]That practically goes with hit falleth doun, in l. 741. The sentence is ill-constructed, and not consistent with grammar, but we see what is meant.
  
  [742.]By, with reference to (as usual in M. E). Cf. Dante, Purg. xviii. 28, which Cary thus translates:—
  - ‘Then, as the fire points up, and mounting seeks
  - His birth-place and his lasting seat,’ &c.
  [745.]At his large, unrestrained, free to move. Cf. at thy large, Cant. Ta., A 1283, 1292.
  
  [746.]Charge, a heavy weight, opposed to light thing. The verb seke is understood from l. 744. ‘A light thing (seeks to go) up, and a weight (tends) downwards.’ In Tyrwhitt’s glossary, the word charge, in this passage, is described as being a verb, with the sense ‘to weigh, to incline on account of weight.’ How this can be made to suit the context, I cannot understand. Charge occurs as a sb. several times in Chaucer, but chiefly with the secondary sense of ‘importance’; see Kn. Tale, A 1284, 2287; Can. Yem. Ta., G 749. In the Clerkes Tale, E 163, it means ‘weight,’ nearly as here.
  
  [750.]Skilles, reasons. The above ‘reasons’ prove nothing whatever as regards the fish in the sea, or the trees in the earth; but the eagle’s mode of reasoning must not be too closely enquired into. The fault is not Chaucer’s, but arises from the extremely imperfect state of science in the middle ages. Chaucer had to accept the usual account of the four elements, disposed, according to their weight, in four layers; earth being at the bottom, then water, then air, and lastly fire above the air. See the whole scheme in Gower, Conf. Amant. bk. vii.; ed. Pauli, ii. 104: or Popular Treatises on Science, ed. Wright, p. 134.
  
  [752.]See Chaucer’s tr. of Boethius, bk. iii. pr. 11, l. 72. Hence Boethius is one of the ‘clerkes’ referred to in l. 760.
  
  [759.]Dante mentions these two; Inf. iv. 131-4.
  
  [765.]So also in Cant. Tales, D. 2233:—
  - ‘every soun
  - Nis but of eir reverberacioun,
  - And ever it wasteth lyte and lyte awey.’
  The theory of sound is treated of in Vincent of Beauvais, Speculum Naturale, lib. iv. c. 14. The ancients seem to have understood that sound is due to the vibration of the air; see ll. 775, 779. Thus, in the treatise by Boethius, De Musica (to which Chaucer expressly refers in Non. Preest. Tale, B 4484), lib. i. c. 3, I find:—‘Sonus vero præter quendam pulsum percussionemque non redditur . . . Idcirco definitur sonus, aeris percussio indissoluta usque ad auditum.’
  
  [788.]Experience, i. e. experiment. The illustration is a good one; I have no doubt that it is obtained, directly or at secondhand, from Boethius. Vincent of Beauvais, Spec. Nat. lib. xxv. c. 58, says:—‘Ad quod demonstrandum inducit idem Boetius tale exemplum: Lapis proiectus in medio stagni facit breuissimum circulum, et ille alium, et hoc fit donec vel ad ripas peruenerit vel impetus defecerit.’ This merely gives the substance of what he says; it will be of interest to quote the original passage, from the treatise De Musica, lib. i. c. 14, which chapter I quote in full:—
  
  ‘Nunc quis modus sit audiendi disseramus. Tale enim quiddam fieri consuevit in uocibus, quale cum paludibus uel quietis aquis iactum eminus mergitur saxum. Prius enim in paruissimum orbem undam colligit, deinde maioribus orbibus, undarum globos spargit, atque eo usque dum fatigatus motus ab eliciendis fluctibus conquiescat. Semperque posterior et maior undula pulsu debiliori diffunditur. Quod si quid sit, quod crescentes undulas possit offendere, statim motus ille reuertitur, et quasi ad centrum, unde profectus fuerat, eisdem undulis rotundatur. Ita igitur cum aer pulsus fecerit sonum, pellit alium proximum, et quodammodo rotundum fluctum aeris ciet. Itaque diffunditur et omnium circunstantium (sic) simul ferit auditum, atque illi est obscurior uox, qui longius steterit, quoniam ad eum debilior pulsi aeris unda peruenit.’
  
  [792.]Covercle, a pot-lid. Cotgrave cites the proverb—‘Tel pot tel couvercle, Such pot, such potlid, like master, like man.’
  
  [794.]Wheel must have been glossed by cercle (circle) in an early copy; hence MSS. F. and B. have the reading—‘That whele sercle wol cause another whele,’ where the gloss has crept into the text.
  
  [798.]Roundel, a very small circle; compas, a very large circle. Roundel is still a general term for a small circular charge in heraldry; if or (golden), it is called a bezant; if argent (white), it is called a plate; and so on. In the Sec. Non. Tale, G 45, compas includes the whole world.
  
  [801.]Multiplying, increasing in size.
  
  [805.]‘Where you do not observe the motion above, it is still going on underneath.’ This seems to allude to some false notion as to a transmission of motion below the surface.
  
  [808.]This is an easy way of getting over a difficulty. It is no easy task to prove the contrary of every false theory!
  
  [811.]An air aboute, i. e. a surrounding layer, or hollow sphere, of air.
  
  [822.]I would rather ‘take it in game’; and so I accept it.
  
  [826.]Fele, experience, understand by experiment.
  
  [827.]I here take the considerable liberty of reading the mansioun, by comparison with l. 831. Those who prefer to read sum place stide, or som styde, or some stede, can do so! The sense intended is obviously—‘And that the dwelling-place, to which each thing is inclined to resort, has its own natural stead,’ i. e. position. Fishes, for example, naturally exist in water; the trees, upon the earth; and sounds, in the air; water, earth, air, and fire being the four ‘elements.’ Cf. the phrase—‘to be in his element.’
  
  [836.]Out of, i. e. not in; answering to l. 838.
  
  [846.]Referring to Ovid’s description, Met. xii. 39, 40.
  - ‘Orbe locus medio est inter terrasque fretumque
  - Coelestesque plagas, triplicis confinia mundi.’
  I suspect that Ovid’s triplicis confinia mundi is the origin of Chaucer’s phrase tryne compas, in Sec. Non. Tale, G 45.
  
  [857.]The ‘terms of philosophy’ are all fully and remorselessly given by Gower, Conf. Amant. bk. vii.
  
  [861.]It is remarkable that Chaucer, some years later, repeated almost the same thing in the Prologue to his Treatise on the Astrolabe, in somewhat different words, viz. ‘curious endyting and hard sentence is full hevy atones for swich a child to lerne’; l. 32.
  
  [866.]Lewedly, in unlearned fashion; in his Astrolabe, l. 43, Chaucer says he is ‘but a lewd compilatour of the labour of olde Astrologiens.’
  
  [868.]The eagle characteristically says that his reasons are so ‘palpable,’ that they can be shaken by the bills, as men shake others by the hand. It is perhaps worth adding that the word bill was too vulgar and familiar to be applied to a hawk, which had only a beak (the French term, whereas bill is the A. S. bile). ‘Ye shall say, this hauke has a large beke, or a shortt beke; and call it not bille; Book of St. Alban’s, fol. a 6, back. The eagle purposely employs the more familiar term.
  
  [873.]Chaucer meekly allows that the eagle’s explanation is a likely one. He was not in a comfortable position for contradiction in argument, and so took a wiser course. The eagle resents this mild admission, and says he will soon find out the truth, ‘top, and tail, and every bit.’ He then eases his mind by soaring ‘upper,’ resumes his good temper, and proposes to speak ‘all of game.’
  
  [888.]Cf. Dante, Par. xxii. 128, which Cary thus translates:
  - ‘Look downward, and contemplate, what a world
  - Already stretch’d under our feet there lies.’
  [900.]Unethes, with difficulty; because large animals could only just be discerned. The graphic touches here are excellent.
  
  [901.]Rivér-es, with accent on the former e (pronounced as a in bare). Cf. Ital. riviera.
  
  [907.]Prikke, a point. ‘Al the environinge of the erthe aboute ne halt nat but the resoun of a prikke at regard of the greetnesse of hevene’; tr. of Boethius, bk. ii. pr. 7. 17.
  - ‘And doun fro thennes faste he gan avyse
  - This litel spot of erthe, that with the see
  - Enbraced is’;
  - Troilus, bk. v. ll. 1814-6.
  - ‘Vidi questo globo
  - Tal, ch’ io sorriso del suo vil sembiante.’
  - Dante, Parad. xxii. 134.
  See also Parl. Foules, 57, 58; and note that the above passage from Troilus is copied from the Teseide (xi. 2).
  
  [915.]The note in Gilman’s Chaucer as to Alexander’s dreams is entirely beside the mark. The word dreme (l. 917) refers to Scipio only. The reference is to the wonderful mode in which Alexander contrived to soar in the air in a car upborne by four gigantic griffins.
  - ‘Now is he won þurȜe þar wingis vp to the wale cloudis;
  - So hiȜe to heuen þai him hale in a hand-quile,
  - Midil-erth bot as a mylnestane, na mare, to him semed.’
  - Wars of Alexander, ed. Skeat (E. E. T. S.), 5523.
  Macedo, the Macedonian.
  
  [916.]King, kingly hero; not king in the strict sense. Dan Scipio, lord Scipio. See notes to Parl. Foules, 29; Book of the Duch. 284; Ho. Fame, 514.
  
  [917.]At point devys, with great exactness; see Rom. Rose, 830, 1215.
  
  [919.]Dedalus (i. e. Dædalus) and Ycarus (Icarus) are mentioned in the Rom. de la Rose, 5242; and cf. Gower, Conf. Amant. bk. iv., ed. Pauli, ii. 36; and Dante, Inf. xvii. 109. All take the story from Ovid, Metam. viii. 183. Dædalus constructed wings for himself and his son Icarus, and flew away from Crete. The latter flew too high, and the sun melted the wax with which some of the feathers were fastened, so that he fell into the sea and was drowned. Hence Dædalus is here called wrecche, i. e. miserable, because he lost his son; and Icarus nyce, i. e. foolish, because he disobeyed his father’s advice, not to fly too high.
  
  [922.]Malt, melted. Gower has the same word in the same story; ed. Pauli, ii. 37.
  
  [925.]Cf. Dante, Par. xxii. 19, which Cary thus translates: ‘But elsewhere now I bid thee turn thy view.’
  
  [930.]See note to l. 986 below, where the original passage is given.
  
  [931.]This line seems to refer solely to the word citizein in l. 930. The note in Bell’s Chaucer says: ‘This appears to be an allusion to Plato’s Republic.’ But it was probably suggested by the word respublica in Alanus (see note to l. 986).
  
  [932.]Eyrish bestes, aerial animals; alluding to the signs of the zodiac, such as the Ram, Bull, Lion, Goat, Crab, Scorpion, &c.; and to other constellations, such as the Great Bear, Eagle, Swan, Pegasus, &c. Chaucer himself explains that the ‘zodiak is cleped the cercle of the signes, or the cercle of the bestes; for zodia in langage of Greek sowneth bestes in Latin tonge’; Astrolabe, Part I, § 21, l. 37. Cf. ‘beasts’ in Rev. iv. 6. The phrase recurs in l. 965 below; see also ll. 1003-7.
  
  [934.]Goon, march along, walk on, like the Ram or Bull; flee, fly like the Eagle or Swan. He alludes to the apparent revolution of the heavens round the earth.
  
  [936.]Galaxye, galaxy, or milky way, formed by streaks of closely crowded stars; already mentioned in the Parl. of Foules, 56; see note to the same, l. 50. Cary, in a note to Dante, Parad. xxv. 18, says that Dante, in the Convito, p. 74, speaks of la galassia—‘the galaxy, that is, the white circle which the common people call the way of St. James’; on which Biscioni remarks:—‘The common people formerly considered the milky way as a sign by night to pilgrims, who were going to St. James of Galicia; and this perhaps arose from the resemblance of the word galaxy to Galicia; [which may be doubted]. I have often,’ he adds, ‘heard women and peasants call it the Roman road, la strada di Roma.’
  
  The fact is simply, that the Milky Way looks like a sort of road or street; hence the Lat. name uia lactea, as in Ovid, Metam. i. 168. Hence also the Roman peasants called it strada di Roma; the pilgrims to Spain called it the road to Santiago (Quarterly Review, Oct. 1873, p. 464); and the English called it the Walsingham way, owing to this being a route much frequented by pilgrims, or else Watling-street, which was a famous old road, and probably ran (not as usually said, from Kent to Cardigan Bay, but) from Kent to the Frith of Forth; see Annals of England, p. 6. The name of Vatlant Streit (Watling Street) is given to the milky way in the Complaint of Scotland, ed. Murray, p. 58; and G. Douglas calls it Watling Streit in his translation of Vergil, Æn. iii. 516, though there is no mention of it in the original; see Small’s edition of the Works of G. Douglas, vol. ii. p. 151. And again, it is called Wadlyng Strete in Henrysoun’s Traite of Orpheus; see Jamieson’s Scottish Dictionary. So also: ‘Galaxia, that is Watling-Strete’; Batman on Bartholome, lib. viii. c. 33. See my note to P. Plowman, C. i. 52; Florence of Worcester, sub anno 1013; Laws of Edward the Confessor, cap. 12; Towneley Myst., p. 308; Cutts, Scenes, &c. of the Middle Ages, p. 178; Grimm’s Mythology, tr. by Stallybras, i. 357.
  
  [942.]Gower also relates this story (Conf. Amant. ii. 34), calling the sun Phebus, and his son Pheton, and using carte in the sense of ‘chariot,’ as Chaucer does. Both copy from Ovid, Metam. ii. 32-328.
  
  [944.]Cart-hors, chariot-horses (plural). There were four horses, named Pyroeïs, Eous, Aethon, and Phlegon; Met. ii. 153. Hence gonne and beren are in the plural form; cf. l. 952.
  
  [948.]Scorpioun, the well-known zodiacal constellation and sign; called Scorpius in Ovid, Met. ii. 196.
  
  [972.]Boece, Boethius. He refers to the passage which he himself thus translates: ‘I have, forsothe, swifte fetheres that surmounten the heighte of the hevene. Whan the swifte thought hath clothed it-self in tho fetheres, it dispyseth the hateful erthes, and surmounteth the roundnesse of the greet ayr; and it seeth the cloudes behinde his bak’; bk. iv. met. 1. Hence, in l. 973, Ten Brink (Studien, p. 186) proposes to read—‘That wryteth, Thought may flee so hye.’
  
  [981, 2.]Imitated from 2 Cor. xii. 2.
  
  [985.]Marcian. Cf. C. T., E 1732 (March. Tale):—
  - ‘Hold thou thy pees, thou poete Marcian,
  - That wrytest us that ilke wedding murie
  - Of hir, Philologye, and him, Mercurie.’
  Martianus Minneus Felix Capella was a satirist of the fifth century, and wrote the Nuptials of Mercury and Philology, De Nuptiis inter Mercurium et Philologiam, above referred to. It consists of two books, followed by seven books on the Seven Sciences; see Warton’s Hist. E. Poetry, ed. 1871, iii. 77. ‘Book viii (l. 857) gives a hint of the true system of astronomy. It is quoted by Copernicus’; Gilman.
  
  [986.]Anteclaudian. The Anticlaudianus is a Latin poem by Alanus de Insulis, who also wrote the De Planctu Naturæ, alluded to in the Parl. of Foules, 316 (see note). This poem is printed in Anglo-Latin Satirical Poets, ed. Wright, pp. 268-428; see, in particular, Distinctio Quarta, capp. 5-8, and Distinctio Quinta, cap. 1; pp. 338-347. It is from this poem that Chaucer probably borrowed the curious word citizein (l. 930) as applied to the eyrish bestes (l. 932). Thus, at pp. 338, 360 of Wright’s edition, we find—
  - ‘Vestigans, videt intuitu meliore vagantes
  - Aerios cives.’
  - ‘Hic cives habitant supremi regis in urbe;
  - Civibus his servanda datur respublica coeli.’
  So again, ll. 966-969 above may well have been suggested by these lines (on p. 340), and other similar lines:—
  - ‘Aeris excurso spatio, quo nubila coeli
  - Nocte sua texunt tenebras, quo pendula nubes
  - In se cogit aquas, quo grandinis ingruit imber,
  - Quo certant venti, quo fulminis ira tumescit,
  - Æthera transgreditur Phronesis.’
  [1003.]Or him or here, or him or her, hero or heroine; e. g. Hercules, Perseus, Cepheus, Orion; Andromeda, Callisto (the Great Bear), Cassiopeia. Cf. Man of Lawes Tale, B 460.
  
  [1004.]Raven, the constellation Corvus; see Ovid, Fasti, ii. 243-266. Either bere; Ursa Maior and Ursa Minor.
  
  [1005.]Ariones harpe, Arion’s harp, the constellation Lyra; Ovid’s Fasti, i. 316; ii. 76.
  
  [1006.]Castor, Pollux; Castor and Pollux; the constellation Gemini. Delphyn, Lat. Delphin; the constellation Delphin (Ovid, Fasti, i. 457) or Delphinus, the Dolphin.
  - ‘Astris Delphina recepit
  - Iupiter, et stellas iussit habere nouem.’
  - Ovid’s Fasti, ii. 117.
  [1007.]Atlante does not mean Atalanta, but represents Atlante, the ablative case of Atlas. Chaucer has mistaken the form, having taken the story of the Pleiades (the seven daughters of Atlas and Pleione) from Ovid’s Fasti, v. 83:—
  - ‘Hinc sata Pleïone cum coelifero Atlante
  - iungitur, ut fama est; Pleïadasque parit.’
  [1021.]Up the heed, up with your head; look about you.
  
  [1022.]‘St. Julian (to our speed); lo! (here is) a good hostelry.’ The eagle invokes or praises St. Julian, because they have come to their journey’s end, and the poet may hope for a good reception in the House of Fame. St. Julian was the patron saint of hospitality; see Chaucer’s Prologue, 340. In Le Roman de la Rose, 8872, I find (cf. note to l. 118 above):—
  - ‘Ainsinc m’aïst saint Juliens,
  - Qui pelerins errans herberge.’
  In Bell’s Chaucer, i. 92, is the following: ‘ “Ce fut celluy Julien qui est requis de ceux qui cheminent pour avoir bon hostel”; Legende Dorée. Having by mischance slain his father and mother, as a penance he established a hospital near a dangerous ford, where he lodged and fed travellers gratuitously.’
  
  See Tale xviii. in the Gesta Romanorum, in Swan’s Translation; Caxton’s Golden Legende; and the Metrical Lives of Saints in MS. Bodley 1596, fol. 4. ‘I pray God and St. Julian to send me a good lodging at night’; translation of Boccaccio, Decam. Second Day, nov. 2; quoted in Swan’s tr. of Gesta Romanorum, p. 372. See Warton, Hist. Eng. Poet., ed. Hazlitt, i. 247; ii. 58.
  
  [1024.]‘Canst thou not hear that which I hear?’
  
  [1034.]Peter! By St. Peter; a common exclamation, which Warton amazingly misunderstood, asserting that Chaucer is here addressed by the name of Peter (Hist. E. P., ed. Hazlitt, ii. 331, note 6); whereas it is Chaucer himself who uses the exclamation. The Wyf of Bathe uses it also, C. T., D 446; so does the Sumpnour, C. T., D 1332; and the wife in the Shipman’s Tale, C. T., B 1404; and see l. 2000 below. See also my note to l. 665 of the Canon’s Yeoman’s Tale. But Warton well compares the present passage with Ovid, Met. xii. 49-52:—
  - ‘Nec tamen est clamor, sed paruae murmura uocis;
  - qualia de pelagi, si quis procul audiat, undis
  - esse solent: qualemve sonum, quum Iupiter atras
  - increpuit nubes, extrema tonitrua reddunt.’
  [1044.]Beten, beat, occurs in MSS. F. and B. But the other reading byten (bite) seems better. Cf. Troil. iii. 737, and the common saying ‘It won’t bite you.’
  
  [1048.]Cf. Dante, Purg. iii. 67-69. So also Inf. xxxi. 83.
  
  [1063.]Lyves body, a person alive; lyves is properly an adverb.
  
  [1066.]Seynte; see note to l. 573. Seynte Clare, Saint Clara, usually Saint Clare, whose day is Aug. 12. She was an abbess, a disciple of St. Francis, and died ad 1253.
  
  [1091-1109.]Imitated from Dante, Parad. i. 13-27. Compare ll. 1106, 1107, with Cary’s translation—
  - ‘If thou to me of thine impart so much, . . .
  - Thou shalt behold me of thy favour’d tree
  - Come to the foot, and crown myself with leaves.’
  And compare l. 1109 with—‘Entra nel petto mio.’
  
  [1098.]This shews that Chaucer occasionally, and intentionally, gives a syllable too little to the verse. In fact, he does so just below, in l. 1106; where Thou forms the first foot of the verse, instead of So thou, or And thou. This failure of the first syllable is common throughout the poem.
  
  [1099.]And that, i. e. And though that; see l. 1098.
  
  [1109.]Entreth is the imperative plural; see note to A. B. C. 17.
  
  [1114.]MSS. cite, cyte (F. citee!); but site in Astrol. pt. ii. 17. 25 (p. 201).
  
  [1116.]‘Fama tenet, summaque domum sibi legit in arce’; Ovid, Met. xii. 43. Cf. Dante, Purg. iii. 46-48; also Ovid, Met. ii. 1-5.
  
  [1131.]‘And swoor hir ooth by Seint Thomas of Kent’; C. T., A 3291. It alludes to the celebrated shrine of Beket at Canterbury.
  
  [1136.]Half, side; al the half, all the side of the hill which he was ascending, which we find was the south side (l. 1152).
  
  [1152.]This suggests that Chaucer, in his travels, had observed a snow-clad mountain; the snow lies much lower on the north side than on the south side; see ll. 1160 (which means that it, i. e. the writing, was preserved by the shade of a castle), 1163, 1164.
  
  [1159.]What hit made, what caused it, what was the cause of it.
  
  [1167-80.]This passage somewhat resembles one in Dante, Par. i. 4-12.
  
  [1177.]Craft, art; cast, plan. Craft, in the MSS., has slipt into l. 1178.
  
  [1183.]Gyle, Giles; St. Ægidius. His day is Sept. 1; see note to Can. Yem. Tale, G 1185, where the phrase by seint Gyle recurs.
  
  [1189.]Babewinnes is certainly meant; it is the pl. of babewin (O. Fr. babuin, Low Lat. babewynus, F. babouin), now spelt baboon. It was particularly used of a grotesque figure employed in architectural decoration, as in Early Eng. Allit. Poems, ed. Morris, B. 1411, where the pl. form is spelt baboynes, and in Lydgate, Chron. Troy, II. xi; both passages are given in Murray’s Dict., s. v. Baboon. ‘Babewyn, or babewen, detippus, ipos, figmentum, chimera’; Prompt. Parv. ‘Babwyne, beest, baboyn’; Palsgrave. In Shak. Macb. iv. 1. 37—‘Coole it with a báboones blood’—the accent on the a is preserved. The other spellings are inferior or false.
  
  [1192.]Falle, pres. pl., fall; (or perhaps fallen, the past participle).
  
  [1194.]Habitacles, niches; such as those which hold images of saints on the buttresses and pinnacles of our cathedrals. They are described as being al withoute, all on the outside.
  
  [1196.]Ful the castel, the castle (being) full, on all sides. This line is parenthetical.
  
  [1197.]Understand Somme, some, as nom. to stoden. ‘In which stood . . . (some) of every kind of minstrels.’ So in l. 1239. As to minstrels, &c., see note to Sir Topas (B 2035).
  
  [1203.]Orpheus, the celebrated minstrel, whose story is in Ovid, Met. x. 1-85; xi. 1-66. Chaucer again mentions him in C. T., E 1716; and in Troil. iv. 791.
  
  [1205.]Orion; so in all the copies; put for Arion. His story is in Ovid, Fasti, ii. 79-118.
  
  Spelt Arione in Gower, Conf. Amant. (end of prologue), ed. Pauli, i. 39. We might read Arion here; see l. 1005.
  
  [1206.]Chiron; called Chiro in Gower, C. A. ii. 67 (bk. iv). Chiron, the centaur, was the tutor of Achilles; and Achilles, being the grandson of Æacus, was called Æacides; Ovid, Met. xii. 82; Fasti, v. 390. Hence Eacides is here in the genitive case; and Eacides Chiron means ‘Achilles’ Chiron,’ i. e. Chiron, tutor of Achilles. In fact, the phrase is copied from Ovid’s Æacidæ Chiron, Art of Love, i. 17. Another name for Chiron is Phillyrides; Ovid, Art of Love, i. 11; or Philyrides; Verg. Georg. iii. 550; cf. Ovid, Fasti, v. 391. In a similar way, Chaucer calls the paladin Oliver, friend of Charles the Great, by the name of Charles Olyuer; Monkes Tale, B 3577.
  
  [1208.]Bret, Briton, one of the British. This form is quite correct, being the A. S. Bret, a Briton (see A. S. Chronicle, an. 491), commonly used in the pl. Brettas. This correct spelling occurs in MS. B. only; MS. P. turns it into Bretur, Th. and Cx. read Briton, whilst MS. F. turns Bret into gret, by altering the first letter. The forms gret and Bretur are clearly corruptions, whilst Briton spoils the scansion.
  
  Glascurion; the same as Glasgerion, concerning whom see the Ballad in the Percy Folio MS., ed. Hales and Furnivall, i. 246. Of this ‘a traditional version, under the name of Glenkindie, a various form of Glasgerion, is given in Jamieson’s Popular Songs and Ballads, and in Alex. Laing’s Thistle of Scotland (1823).’ G. Douglas associates ‘Glaskeriane’ with Orpheus in his Palice of Honour, bk. i. (ed. Small, i. 21); this poem is a palpable imitation of Chaucer’s House of Fame. The name is Celtic, as the epithet Bret implies. Cf. Irish and Welsh glas, pale.
  
  [1213.]‘Or as art imitates nature.’ Imitated from Le Rom. de la Rose, where Art asks Nature to teach her; l. 16233 is— ‘E la contrefait comme singes.’
  
  [1218.]There is a similar list of musical instruments in Le Rom. de la Rose, 21285-21308:—
  - ‘Puis chalemiaus, et chalemele
  - Et tabor, et fléute, et timbre . . .
  - Puis prent sa muse, et se travaille
  - As estives de Cornoaille.’
  And in Le Remède de Fortune, by G. de Machault, 1849, p. 87, is a similar long list:—
  - ‘Cornemuses, flaios, chevrettes,
  - Dousainnes, cimbales, clochettes,
  - Timbre, la flahute brehaigne,
  - Et le grant cornet d’Alemaigne,
  - Flaiot de saus, fistule, pipe’; &c.
  And a few lines below there is mention of the muse de blez (see note to l. 1224). Warton, Hist. E. Poet., ed. Hazlitt, iii. 177, quotes a similar passage from Lydgate’s poem entitled Reason and Sensualite, ending with—
  - ‘There were trumpes, and trumpettes,
  - Lowde shallys [shalmys?] and doucettes.’
  Cf. also Spenser, F. Q. vi. 9, 5; Shep. Kal. Feb. 35-40. In the latter passage, the imitation of ll. 1224-6 is obvious. Cornemuse is a bagpipe; shalmye is a shawm, which was a wind-instrument, being derived from Lat. calamus, a reed; Chaucer classes both instruments under pipe. Willert (on the House of Fame, p. 36) suggests (and, I think, correctly) that doucet and rede are both adjectival. Thus doucet would refer to pipe; cf. ‘Doucet, dulcet, pretty and sweet, or, a little sweet’; Cotgrave. Rede would also refer to pipe, and would mean ‘made with a reed.’ A reed-instrument is one ‘in which the sound was produced by the vibration of a reed, as in the clarionet or hautboys’; note in Bell’s Chaucer. There is no instrument properly called a doucet in Old French, but only dousainne (see above) and doucine (Godefroy).
  
  [1222.]Brede, roast meat; A. S. brǽde, glossed by ‘assura, vel assatura’ in Ælfric’s Glossary, ed. Wülcker, col. 127, l. 17. Cf. G. Braten. Not elsewhere in Chaucer, but found in other authors.
  - ‘To meit was greithed beef and motoun,
  - Bredes, briddes, and venysoun.’
  - Kyng Alisaunder, ed. Weber, 5248.
  In the allit. Morte Arthure, it occurs no less than five times. Also in Havelok, l. 98, where the interpretation ‘bread’ is wrong. Also in Altenglische Dichtungen, ed. Böddeker, p. 146, l. 47—‘Cud as Cradoc in court that carf the brede,’ i. e. carved the roast meat; but the glossary does not explain it. The scribe of MS. F. turns brede into bride, regardless of the rime. I cannot agree with the wholly groundless conjecture of Willert, who reads rude in l. 1221, in order to force brude into the text. For minstrelsy at feasts, see C. T., A 2197.
  
  [1223.]Cf. G. Douglas, tr. of Vergil, Æn. vii. 513, 4:—‘And in ane bowand horne, at hir awyne will, A feindlych hellis voce scho lyltis schyll.’
  
  [1224.]Alluding to the simple pipes fashioned by rustics. The glossary to Machault’s Works (1849) has: ‘Muse de blez, chalumeau fait avec des brins de paille.’ The O. F. estive, in the quotation in the note to l. 1218, has a like sense. Godefroy has: ‘estive, espèce de flûte, de flageolet ou pipeau rustique, qui venait, ce semble, de Cornouaille.’ Cf. the term corne-pipe, in the Complaint of Scotland, ed. Murray, p. 65, l. 22; also my note to R. Rose, 4250 (vol. i. p. 436).
  
  [1227-8.]Nothing is known as to Atiteris (or Cytherus); nor as to Pseustis (or Proserus). The forms are doubtless corrupt; famous musicians or poets seem to have been intended. I shall venture, however, to record my guess, that Atiteris represents Tyrtaeus, and that Pseustis is meant for Thespis. Both are mentioned by Horace (Ars Poet. 276, 402); and Thespis was a native of Attica, whose plays were acted at Athens. Another guess is that Atiteris means Vergil’s Tityrus; Athenæum, Apr. 13, 1889. Willert suggests that there is here an allusion to the so-called Ecloga Theoduli, a Latin poem of the seventh or eighth century, wherein the shepherd Pseustis and the shepherdess Alithia [who represent Falsehood and Truth] contend about heathendom and Christianity; and Pseustis adduces various myths and tales, from Ovid, Vergil, and Statius. He refers us to H. Dunger, Die Sage v. troj. Kriege in den Bearbeitungen des Mittelalters: Dresden, 1869, p. 76; cf. Leyser, Hist. Poet. Medii Aevi, p. 295. This only accounts for Pseustis; Atiteris can hardly be Alithia.
  
  [1229.]This is a curious example of how names are corrupted. Marcia is Dante’s Marsia, mentioned in the very passage which Chaucer partly imitates in ll. 1091-1109 above. Dante addresses Apollo in the words—
  - ‘Entra nel petto mio, e spira tue
  - Si come quando Marsia traesti
  - Della vagina delle membra sue.’
  As Chaucer had here nothing to guide him to the gender of Marsia, he guessed the name to be feminine, from its termination; and Dante actually has Marzia (Inf. iv. 128), with reference to Marcia, wife of Cato. But Dante’s Marsia represents the accus. case of Marsyas, or else the Lat. nom. Marsya, which also occurs. Ovid, Met. vi. 400, has ‘Marsya nomen habet,’ and tells the story. Apollo defeated the satyr Marsyas in a trial of musical skill, and afterwards flayed him alive; so that he ‘lost his skin.’
  
  [1231.]Envyën (accent on y), vie with, challenge (at a sport). So strong is the accent on the y, that the word has been reduced in E. to the clipped form ’vie; see Vie in my Etym. Dict. It represents Lat. inuitare, to challenge; and has nothing to do with E. envy. Florio’s Ital. Dict. has: ‘Inuito, a vie at play, a vie at any game; also an inuiting.’
  
  [1234.]‘Pipers of every Dutch (German) tongue.’
  
  [1236.]Reyes, round dances, dances in a ring. The term is Dutch. Hexham’s Du. Dict. (1658), has: een Rey, or een Reye, a Daunce, or a round Daunce’; and ‘reyen, to Daunce, or to lead a Daunce.’ Cf. G. Reihen, a dance, Reihentanz, a circular dance; M. H. G. reie, reige; which does not seem to be connected, as might be thought, with G. Reihe, a row; see Kluge and Weigand. Perhaps the Du. word was borrowed from O. F. rei, roi, order, whence also the syllable -ray in E. ar-ray; and the G. word may have been borrowed from the Dutch; but this is a guess. ‘I can daunce the raye’; Barclay’s First Egloge, sig. A ii. ed. 1570; quoted in Dyce’s Skelton, ii. 194.
  
  [1239.]Understand Somme, some; see note to l. 1197. The expression blody soun recurs in Kn. Tale, A 2512, in connection with trumpe and clarioun. Our author explains his meaning here; ll. 1241-2.
  
  [1243.]Missenus, Misenus, son of Æolus, trumpeter to Hector, and subsequently to Æneas; Verg. Æn. iii. 239; vi. 162-170.
  
  [1245.]Joab and Theodomas are again mentioned together in a like passage in the Merch. Tale (C. T., E 1719). ‘Joab blew a trumpet’; 2 Sam. ii. 28; xviii. 16; xx. 22. Theodomas is said by Chaucer (Merch. Tale) to have blown a trumpet ‘At Thebes, when the citee was in doute.’ He was therefore a trumpeter mentioned in some legendary history of Thebes. With this hint, it is easy to identify him with Thiodamas, mentioned in books viii. and x. of the Thebaid of Statius. He succeeded Amphiaraus as augur, and furiously excited the besiegers to attack Thebes. His invocation was succeeded by a great sound of trumpets (Theb. viii. 343), to which Chaucer here refers. But Statius does not expressly say that Thiodamas blew a trumpet himself.
  
  [1248.]Cataloigne and Aragon, Catalonia and Arragon, in Spain, immediately to the S. of the Pyrenees. Warton remarks: ‘The martial musicians of English tournaments, so celebrated in story, were a more natural and obvious allusion for an English poet’; Hist. E. P. ii. 331. The remark is, I think, entirely out of place. Chaucer is purposely taking a wide range; and, after mentioning even the pipers of the Dutch tongue, as well as Joab of Judæa and Thiodamas of Thebes, is quite consistent in mentioning the musicians of Spain.
  
  [1257.]Repeated, at greater length, in C. T., Group B, ll. 19-28; see note to that passage.
  
  [1259.]Iogelours, jugglers. See Squi. Tale, F 219.
  
  [1260.]Tregetours; see C. T., F 1141, on which Tyrwhitt has a long note. A jogelour was one who amused people, either by playing, singing, dancing, or tricks requiring sleight of hand; a tregetour was one who brought about elaborate illusions, by the help of machinery or mechanical contrivance. Thus Chaucer tells us (in the Frank. Tale, as above) that tregetoures even caused to appear, in a dining-hall, a barge floating in water, or what seemed like a lion, or a vine with grapes upon it, or a castle built of lime and stone; which vanished at their pleasure. Sir John Maundeville, in his Travels, ch. 22, declares that the ‘enchanters’ of the Grand Khan could turn day into night, or cause visions of damsels dancing or carrying cups of gold, or of knights justing; ‘and many other thinges thei don, be craft of hire Enchauntementes; that it is marveyle for to see.’ See note to l. 1277 below. Gawain Douglas imitates this passage in his Palice of Honour; see his Works, ed. Small, i. 65.
  
  [1261.]Phitonesses, pythonesses. The witch of Endor is called a phitonesse in the Freres Tale, C. T., D 1510; and in Gower, Conf. Amant. bk. iv, ed. Pauli, ii. 66; in Barbour’s Bruce, ed. Skeat, iv. 753; and in Skelton’s Phyllyp Sparowe, 1345. The Vulgate version has mulier pythonem habens, 1 Sam. xxviii. 7 (cf. Acts xvi. 16); but also the very word pythonissam in 1 Chron. x. 13, where the witch of Endor is again referred to. Ducange notices phitonissa as another spelling of pythonissa.
  
  [1266.]Cf. Chaucer’s Prologue, 417-420. There is a parallel passage in Dante, Inf. xx. 116-123, where the word imago occurs in the sense of ‘waxen image.’ This of course refers to the practice of sticking needles into a waxen image, with the supposed effect of injuring the person represented. See Ovid, Heroid. vi. 91, and Ben Jonson’s Masque of Queens (3rd Charm). But this is only a particular case of a much more general principle. Images of men or animals (or even of the things representing the zodiacal signs) could be made of various substances, according to the effect intended; and by proper treatment were supposed to cause good or evil to the patient, as required. Much could be done, it was supposed, by choosing the right time for making them, or for subjecting them to celestial influences. To know the right time, it was necessary to observe the ascendent (see note to l. 1268). See much jargon on this subject in Cornelius Agrippa, De Occulta Philosophia, lib. ii. capp. 35-47.
  
  [1268.]The ascendent is that point of the zodiacal circle which is seen to be just ascending above the horizon at a given moment. Chaucer defines it in his Treatise on the Astrolabe, and adds that astrologers, in calculating horoscopes, were in the habit of giving it a wider meaning; they further reckoned in 5 degrees of the zodiac above the horizon, and 25 degrees below the ascending point, so as to make the whole ascendent occupy 30 degrees, which was the length of a ‘sign.’ In calculating nativities, great importance was attached to this ascendent, the astrological concomitants of which determined the horoscope. The phrase to be ‘in the ascendant’ is still in use. Thus in certeyn ascendentes is equivalent to ‘in certain positions of the heavens, at a given time,’ such as the time of one’s birth, or the time for making an image (see last note). See p. 191 (above).
  
  [1271.]Medea, the famous wife of Jason, who restored her father Æson to youth by her magical art; Ovid, Met. vii. 162. Gower tells the whole story, C. A. bk. v. ed. Pauli, ii. 259.
  
  [1272.]Circes, Circe, the enchantress; Homer’s Odyssey, bk. x; Ovid, Met. xiv. Ovid frequently has the form Circes, in the gen. case; Met. xiv. 10, 69, 71, 247, 294. Cf. Chaucer’s Boethius, b. iv. met. 3. 24.
  
  Calipsa, Calypso, the nymph who detained Ulysses in an island; Odyssey, bk. i; Ovid, ex Ponto, iv. 10. 13.
  
  [1273.]Hermes is mentioned in the Can. Yeom. Tale, C. T., Group G, 1434, where the reference is to Hermes Trismegistus, fabled to have been the founder of alchemy, though none of the works ascribed to him are really his. The name Balenus occurs, in company with the names of Medea and Circe, in the following passage of the Rom. de la Rose, l. 14599:—
  - ‘Que ja riens d’enchantement croie,
  - Ne sorcerie, ne charroie,
  - Ne Balenus, ne sa science,
  - Ne magique, ne nigromance, . . .
  - Onques ne pot tenir Medée
  - Jason por nul enchantement;
  - N’onc Circe ne tint ensement
  - Ulixes qu’il ne s’enfoïst,’ &c.
  (Charroie is the dance of witches on their sabbath.) Hermes Ballenus is really a compound name, the true significance of which was pointed out to me by Prof. Cowell, and explained in my letter to The Academy, Apr. 27, 1889, p. 287. Ballenus is ‘the sage Belinous,’ who discovered, beneath a statue of Hermes, a book containing all the secrets of the universe. Hence Hermes’ Ballenus (where Hermes is an epithet) means ‘Belinous, who adopted the philosophy of Hermes.’ For an explanation of the whole matter, see the fourth volume of the Notices et Mémoires des Manuscrits de la Bibliothèque du Roi, p. 107. In this there is an article by De Sacy, describing MS. Arabe de la Bibl. du Roi, no. 959, the title of which is ‘Le Livre du Secret de la Creature, par le sage Belinous.’ Belinous possessed the art of talismans, which he professed to have learnt from Hermes. There is some reason for identifying him with Apollonius of Tyana.
  
  [1274.]Lymote, according to Warton, is Limotheus; but he omits to tell us where he found such a name; and the suggestion seems no better than his mistake of supposing Calipsa (l. 1272) to mean the muse Calliope! Considering that he is mentioned in company with Simon Magus, or Simon the magician (Acts viii. 9), the suggestion of Prof. Hales seems probable, viz. that Lymote or Lymete (as in F.) means Elymas the sorcerer (Acts xiii. 8).
  
  [1275.]‘I saw, and knew by name, those that,’ &c.
  
  [1277.]Colle tregetour, Colle the juggler; see l. 1260. Colle is here a proper name, and distinct from the prefix col- in col-fox, Non. Pr. Tale, B 4405. Colle is the name of a dog; Non. Pr. Tale, B 4573. Colyn and Colle are names of grooms; Polit. Songs, p. 237. Tyrwhitt quotes a passage from The Testament of Love, bk. ii:—‘Buserus [Busiris] slew his gestes, and he was slayne of Hercules his gest. Hugest betraished many menne, and of Collo was he betraied’; ed. 1561, fol. 301, col. 2. With regard to tregetour, see the account of the performances of Eastern jugglers in Yule’s edition of Marco Polo; vol. i. p. 342, and note 9 to Bk. i. c. 61. Col. Yule cites the O. F. forms tregiteor and entregetour; also Ital. tragettatore, a juggler, and Prov. trasjitar, trajitar, to juggle. Bartsch, in his Chrestomathie Française, has examples of trasgeter, to mould, form, tresgeteïs, a work of mechanical art; and, in his Chrestomathie Provençale, col. 82, has the lines—
  - ‘Non saps balar ni tras-gitar
  - a guiza de juglar guascon’;
  i. e. thou know’st not how to dance, nor how to juggle, after the manner of a Gascon juggler. A comparison of the forms leaves no doubt as to the etymology. The Prov. trasgitar answers to a Low Lat. form trans-iectare=tra-iectare, frequentative of Lat. trans-icere, tra-icere, to throw across, transfer, cause to pass. Thus, the orig. sense of tregetour was one who causes rapid changes, by help of some mechanical contrivance. The F. trajecter, to ferry, transport, in Cotgrave, is the same word as the Prov. trasgitar, in a different (but allied) sense.
  
  [1292.]‘As is the usual way with reports.’
  
  [1295.]Accent Which and so.
  
  [1297.]‘And yet it was wrought by haphazard quite as often as by heed.’
  
  [1300.]To longe, too long; not ‘to dwell long.’ The barbarous practice of inserting an adverb between to and an infinitive, as in ‘to ungrammatically talk,’ is of later date, though less modern than we might perhaps imagine. Cf. l. 1354.
  
  [1302.]Elide the former Ne; read N’of.
  
  [1303.]Read—Ne hów they hátt’ in másonéries; i. e. nor how they are named in masonry, as, for example, corbets full of imageries. They hatte, i. e. they are called, was turned into hakking, and the sense lost.
  
  [1304.]Corbets, corbels. Florio’s Ital. Dict. has, ‘Corbella, Corbetta, a little basket’; shewing the equivalence of such forms. The E. corbel is the same word as O. F. corbel (F. corbeau), apparently from the Lat. coruus. The spelling with z (=ts) in MSS. F. and B. shews that the form is really corbetts or corbets, not corbelles. Spenser has the simple form corb; F. Q. iv. 10. 6:—
  - ‘It was a bridge ybuilt in goodly wise
  - With curious corbes and pendants graven faire.’
  ‘A Corbel, Corbet, or Corbill in masonrie, is a iutting out like a bragget [bracket] as carpenters call it, or shouldering-peece in timber-work’; Minsheu’s Dict. ed. 1627. Tyrwhitt explains corbets by ‘niches for statues’; but ‘imageries’ are not necessarily statues or images, but rather specimens of carved work.
  
  [1309.]‘A bounty! a bounty! hold up (your hands) well (to catch it).’ Sir W. Scott explains largesse as ‘the cry with which heralds and pursuivants were wont to acknowledge the bounty received from the knights’; note to Marmion, canto i. st. 11. The word is still in use amongst gleaners in East Anglia; see my note to P. Plowman, C. viii. 109.
  
  [1311.]In Anglia, xiv. 236, Dr. Köppell points out some resemblances between the present poem and Boccaccio’s Amorosa Visione. He compares this line with the A. V. vi. 75:—‘Io son la Gloria del popol mondano.’
  
  [1316, 7.]Kinges, i. e. kings-at-arms; losenges, lozenges (with g as j).
  
  [1326.]Cote-armure, surcoat; see Way’s note in Prompt. Parv.
  
  [1329-35.]Imitated from Rom. Rose, 6762-4.
  
  [1330.]Been aboute, used like the old phrase go about.
  
  [1342-6.]Cf. Boccaccio, Amorosa Visione, iv. 9:—‘Ed in una gran sala ci trovammo; Chiara era e bella e risplendente d’oro.’
  
  [1346.]Wikke, poor, much alloyed.
  
  [1352.]Lapidaire, ‘a treatise on precious stones, so entitled; probably a French translation of the Latin poem of Marbodus De Gemmis, which is frequently cited by the name of Lapidarius; Fabricius, Bibl. Med. Æt., in v. Marbodus’; Tyrwhitt’s Glossary. The Lapidarium of Abbot Marbodus (Marbœuf), composed about 1070-80, is chiefly taken from Pliny and Solinus. A translation in English verse is given in King’s Antique Gems. See note to l. 1363 below. There is some account of several precious stones in Philip de Thaun’s Bestiary, printed in Wright’s Popular Treatises on Science; at p. 127 he refers to the Lapidaire. Vincent of Beauvais refers to it repeatedly, in book viii. of his Speculum Naturale. There is a note about this in Warton, Hist. E. P. ed. 1871, ii. 324. And see note to l. 1363.
  
  [1360.]Dees, daïs; see the note to Prol. 370, in vol. v. Lines 1360-7 may be compared with various passages in Boccaccio’s Amorosa Visione, which describe a lady in a rich vesture, seated on a royal throne:—
  - ‘Tutti li soprastava veramente
  - Di ricche pietre coronata e d’oro’ . . .
  - ‘Il suo vestire a guisa imperiale
  - Era, e teneva nella man sinestra
  - Un pomo d’oro; e’n trono alla reale
  - Vidi sedeva’ . . .
  - ‘Odi: che mai natura con sua arte
  - Forma non diede a si bella figura’ . . .
  - ‘Donna pareva li leggiadra e pura’ . . .
  See Am. Vis. vi. 49, 58, 43, 48. See note to l. 1311 above.
  
  [1361.]The reading Sit would mean ‘sitteth’ or ‘sits’; the reading Sat would mean ‘sat.’ Both are wrong; the construction is sitte 1 saugh = I saugh sitte, I saw sit; so that sitte is the infin. mood.
  
  [1363.]Carbuncle. Vincent of Beauvais, Spec. Nat. bk. viii. c. 51, has: ‘Carbunculus, qui et Græcè anthrax dicitur, vulgariter rubith.’ An account of the Carbunculus is given in King’s Natural History of Precious Stones and Gems. He remarks that the ruby ‘must also be included among the numerous species of the carbunculus described by Pliny, although he gives the first rank to the Carbunculi amethystizontes, our Almandines or Garnets of Siam.’ See also his Antique Gems, where he translates sect. 23 of the Lapidarium of Marbodus thus:—
  - ‘The Carbuncle eclipses by its blaze
  - All shining gems, and casts its fiery rays
  - Like to the burning coal; whence comes its name,
  - Among the Greeks as Anthrax known to fame.
  - Not e’en by darkness quenched, its vigour tires;
  - Still at the gazer’s eye it darts its fires;
  - A numerous race; within the Lybian ground
  - Twelve kinds by mining Troglydytes are found.’
  [1368-76.]Cf. Boethius, in Chaucer’s translation; bk. i. pr. 1, ll. 8-13 (vol. ii. p. 2).
  
  [1376.]Sterres sevene, the seven planets.
  
  [1380.]Tolde, counted; observe this sense.
  
  [1383.]Bestes foure, four beasts; Rev. iv. 6. Cf. Dante, Purg. xxix. 92.
  
  [1386.]Thynne remarks that oundy, i. e. wavy, is a term in heraldry; cf. E. ab-ound, red-ound, surr-ound (for sur-ound); all from Lat. unda. Cf. Chaucer’s use of ounded in Troilus, iv. 736, and Le Roman de la Rose, 21399, 21400:—
  - ‘Et voit ses biaus crins blondoians
  - Comme undes ensemble ondoians.’
  [1390.]‘And tongues, as (there are) hairs on animals.’ ‘Her feet are furnished with partridge-wings to denote swiftness, as the partridge is remarkable for running with great swiftness with outstretched wings. This description is taken almost literally from the description of Fame in the Æneid [iv. 176-183], except the allusion to the Apocalypse and the partridge-wings’; note in Bell’s Chaucer. But it is to be feared that Chaucer simply blundered, and mistook Vergil’s pernicibus as having the sense of perdicibus; cf. ‘pedibus celerem et pernicibus alis’; Aen. iv. 180.
  
  [1400.]Caliope, Calliope the muse; her eight sisters are the other Muses. With ll. 1395-1405 cf. Dante, Par. xxiii. 97-111.
  
  [1411.]Read—Bóth-e th’ármes. Armes, i. e. coats of arms. Name, name engraved on a plate or written on a scroll.
  
  [1413.]Alexander; see Monkes Tale, in C. T., B 3821. Hercules; see the same; the story of the shirt is given in B 3309-3324. In Le Roman de la Rose, l. 9238, it is called ‘la venimeuse chemise.’ Cf. Dante, Inf. xii. 68.
  
  [1431.]Lede, lead, the metal of Saturn; yren, iron, the metal of Mars. See note to Can. Yeom. Tale, G 820, and ll. 827, 828 of the same; also ll. 1446, 1448 below.
  
  [1433.]Read—Th’Ebráyk Jósephús. In a note on Gower’s Conf. Amantis, Warton remarks—‘Josephus, on account of his subject, had long been placed almost on a level with the Bible. He is seated on the first pillar in Chaucer’s House of Fame. His Jewish History, translated into Latin by Rufinus in the fourth century, had given rise to many old poems and romances; and his Maccabaics, or History of the seven Maccabees, martyred with their father Eleazar under the persecution of Antiochus Epiphanes, a separate work translated also by Rufinus, produced the Judas Maccabee of Belleperche in the year 1240, and at length enrolled the Maccabees among the most illustrious heroes of romance.’—ed. Hazlitt, iii. 26.
  
  [1436.]Iewerye, kingdom of the Jews; cf. Prior. Tale, B 1679.
  
  [1437.]Who the other seven are, we can but guess; the reference seems to be to Jewish historians. Perhaps we may include Moses, Joshua, Samuel, Isaiah, Daniel, Nehemiah; and, in any case, Ezra. The number seven was probably taken at random. With l. 1447 cf. Troil. ii. 630.
  
  [1450.]Wheel, orbit. The orbit of Saturn is the largest of the (old) seven planets; see Kn. Tale, 1596 (A 2454). The reason why Josephus is placed upon Saturn’s metal, is because history records so many unhappy casualties, such as Saturn’s influence was supposed to cause. All this is fully explained in the Kn. Tale, 1597-1611 (A 2455-69).
  
  [1457.]Yren, the metal of Mars; see note to l. 1431.
  
  [1459.]This allusion to ‘tiger’s blood’ is curious; but is fully accounted for by the account of the two tigers in bk. vii. of the Thebaid. A peace had nearly been made up between the Thebans and the other Greeks, when two tigers, sacred to Bacchus, broke loose, and killed three men. They were soon wounded by Aconteus, whereupon ‘They fly, and flying, draw upon the plain A bloody line’; according to Lewis’s translation. They fall and die, but are avenged; and so the whole war was renewed. Lydgate reduces the two tigers to one; see his chapter ‘Of a tame Tigre dwelling in Thebes’; in part 3 of his Sege of Thebes.
  
  [1460.]Stace (as in Troil. bk. v, near the end, and Kn. Tale, A 2294) is Publius Papinius Statius, who died ad 96, author of the Thebais and Achilleis (see l. 1463), the latter being left incomplete. Tholosan means Toulousan, or inhabitant of Toulouse; and he is here so called because by some (including Dante, whom Chaucer follows) he was incorrectly supposed to have been a native of Toulouse. He was born at Naples, ad 61. Dante calls him Tolosano in Purg. xxi. 89, on which Cary remarks:—‘Dante, as many others have done, confounds Statius the poet, who was a Neapolitan, with a rhetorican of the same name, who was of Tolosa or Thoulouse. Thus Chaucer; and Boccaccio, as cited by Lombardi: “E Stazio di Tolosa ancora caro”; Amorosa Vis. cant. 5.’
  
  Dr. Köppell quotes the last passage, from Boccaccio, Am. Vis. v. 34, in Anglia, xiv. 237, and shews that other passages in the same resemble other lines in the Hous of Fame. See notes to ll. 1311, 1342, 1360, 1483, 1487, and 1499.
  
  [1463.]‘Cantai di Tebe, e poi del grande Achille’; Dante, Purg. xxi. 92.
  
  [1466.]Omeer, Homer; see ll. 1477-1480 below.
  
  [1467.]In Chaucer’s Troil. i. 146, is the line—‘In Omer, or in Dares, or in Dyte.’ Dares means Dares Phrygius; and Tytus is doubtless intended for the same person as Dyte, i. e. Dictys Cretensis. See the account in Warton, Hist. E. Poet., ed. Hazlitt, ii. 127, beginning:—‘But the Trojan story was still kept alive in two Latin pieces, which passed under the names of Dares Phrygius and Dictys Cretensis,’ &c.; and further in vol. iii. p. 81. The chief source of the romantic histories of Troy in the middle ages is the Roman de Troie by Benoit de Sainte-Maure, which appeared between 1175 and 1185, and has lately been edited by M. Joly. This was copied by Guido delle Colonne (see note to l. 1469 below), who pretended, nevertheless, to follow Dares and Dictys. Chaucer cites Dares and Dictys at second-hand, from Guido.
  
  [1468.]Lollius; evidently supposed by Chaucer to be a writer on the Trojan war. See Tyrwhitt’s note on the words the boke of Troilus, as occurring at the end of the Persones Tale. Chaucer twice quotes Lollius in Troilus, viz. in bk. i. 394 and bk. v. 1653. At the beginning of sect. xiv of his Hist. of Eng. Poetry, Warton shews that there was a Lollius Urbicus among the Historici Latini profani of the third century; ‘but this could not be Chaucer’s Lollius; . . . none of his works remain.’ The difficulty has never been wholly cleared up; we know, however, that the Troilus is chiefly taken from Boccaccio’s Filostrato, just as his Knight’s Tale is chiefly taken from Boccaccio’s Teseide. My idea of the matter is that, in the usual mode of appealing to old authorities, Chaucer refers us (not to Boccaccio, whom he does not mention, but) to the authorities whom he supposed Boccaccio must have followed. Accordingly, in his Troilus, he mentions Homer, Dares, Dictys, and Lollius, though he probably knew next to nothing of any one of these authors. On this account, the suggestion made by Dr. Latham (Athenæum, Oct. 3, 1868, p. 433) seems quite reasonable, viz. that he got the idea that Lollius wrote on the Trojan war by misunderstanding the lines of Horace, Epist. i. 2:—
  - ‘Troiani belli scriptorem, maxime Lolli,
  - Dum tu declamas Romæ, Præneste relegi.’
  See Ten Brink, Studien, p. 87. This supposition becomes almost a certainty when we observe how often medieval writers obtained their information from MSS. containing short extracts. Chaucer clearly never read Horace at all; he merely stumbled on a very few extracts from him in notebooks. In this way, he may easily have met with the first line above, apart from its context. Cf. vol. ii. pp. lii, liii.
  
  [1469.]Guido delle Colonne, or Guido de Columnis (not da Colonna), finished his translation or version of Benoit de Sainte-Maure’s Roman de Troie in the year 1287. His work is called Historia Troiana. The ‘Geste Hystoriale’ of the Destruction of Troy, edited by Panton and Donaldson for the Early English Text Society, is a translation of Guido’s Historia into Middle English alliterative verse. See Warton, Hist. E. P., ed. Hazlitt, iii. 81; and Introd. to vol. ii. pp. liv-lxv.
  
  [1470.]Gaufride, Geoffrey, viz. Geoffrey of Monmouth, who died ad 1154, and wrote a History of the Britons in Latin, full of extravagant but lively fictions, which was completed in 1147; see Morley’s Hist. E. Writers, i. 496. He is rightly mentioned among the writers who ‘bore up Troy,’ because he makes the Britons the descendants of Æneas. See note below.
  
  [1477.]Oon seyde, one (of them) said. Guido was one of those who said this; this appears from the Gest Hystoriale above mentioned, which was translated from Guido; see ll. 41-47, and 10312-10329 of Panton and Donaldson’s edition. Guido asserts, for example, that Achilles slew Hector by treachery, and not, as Homer says, in fair fight; and Chaucer asserts the same, Troil. v. 1560. The fact is, that the Latin races declined to accept an account which did not sufficiently praise the Trojans, whom they regarded as their ancestors. Geoffrey of Monmouth ingeniously followed up this notion, by making the Trojans also the ancestors of the ancient Britons. Hence English writers followed on the same side; Lydgate, as well as Chaucer, exclaims against Homer. See Warton, ed. Hazlitt, iii. 82. But Dante exalts Homer above Horace, Ovid, and Lucan: Inf. iv. 88.
  
  [1482.]‘Homer’s iron is admirably represented as having been by Virgil covered over with tin’; note in Bell’s Chaucer.
  
  [1483.]There is a similar mention of Vergil in Boccaccio, Amorosa Visione, v. 7. See note to l. 1460.
  
  [1487.]Ovide, Ovid; from whom perhaps Chaucer borrows more than from any other Latin writer. He stands on a pillar of copper, the metal sacred to Venus. See note to l. 820 of Can. Yeom. Tale. And cf. Boccaccio, Amorosa Visione, v. 25: ‘Eravi Ovidio, lo quale poetando Iscrisse tanti versi per amore.’
  
  [1494.]High the (as in F.) is an error for highthe, height; Cx. Th. have heyght. Read highte, as in l. 744.
  
  [1499.]Lucan; alluding to Lucan’s Pharsalia, which narrates the war between Cæsar and Pompey. See Man of Lawes Tale, B 401; Monkes Tale, De Caesare, B 3909 (and note), and a fourth mention of him in Troilus, v. 1792. There is an English translation by Rowe. Cf. Boccaccio, Amorosa Visione, v. 19: ‘A’ quai Lucan seguitava, ne’ cui Atti parea ch’ancora la battaglia Di Cesare narrasse, e di colui Magno Pompeo chiamato.’
  
  [1509.]Claudius Claudianus, in the fourth century, wrote a poem De Raptu Proserpinæ, alluded to here and in the Merchant’s Tale (C. T., E 2232), and several other pieces. See note to Parl. Foules, 99.
  
  [1512.]Imitated from Dante; Inf. ix. 44: ‘Della regina dell’ eterno pianto.’
  
  [1519.]Write, wrote; pt. t. pl. Highte, were named.
  
  [1521.]Perhaps from Dante, Inf. xvi. 1, which Cary translates:—
  - ‘Now came I where the water’s din was heard, . . .
  - Resounding like the hum of swarming bees,
  - When forth together issued from a troop,’ &c.
  [1527.]Cf. Ovid, Met. xii. 53: ‘Atria turba tenent; ueniunt leue uulgus, euntque.’
  
  [1530.]Alles-kinnes is in the gen. sing., and Of governs condiciouns; thus the line is equivalent to—‘Of conditions of every kind’; whereas modern English uses—‘Of every kind of condition.’ This peculiar idiom was formerly common; and precisely similar to it is the phrase noskinnes, for which see note to l. 1794. Observe that the phrase is oddly written alle skynnes in MS. F., by a misdivision of the words. So in Piers Plowman, A. ii. 175, we have the phrase for eny kunnes yiftus, for gifts of any kind, where one MS. has any skynes. In my note to P. Plowman, C. xi. 128, I give numerous examples, with references, of phrases such as none kynnes riche, many kynnes maneres, summes kunnes wise, what kyns schape, &c.
  
  [1550.]‘Those that did pray her for her favour.’
  
  [1564.]‘Because it does not please me.’
  
  [1570.]I here alter Vpon peyne to Vp peyne, as the former will not scan, and the latter is the usual idiom. See up peyne in Kn. Tale, A 1707, 2543; Man of Lawes Tale, B 795, 884. Cf. vp the toft, upon the toft, P. Plowman, B. i. 12; vp erthe, upon earth, id. B. ix. 99.
  
  [1571.]Cf. Rom. Rose, 18206—‘Car Eolus, li diex des vens.’ From Vergil, Æn. i. 52; cf. Ovid, Met. xiv. 223, where Æolus is said to reign over the Tuscan sea. The connection of Æolus with Thrace is not obvious; cf. l. 1585. Ovid, however, has ‘Threicio Borea’; Art. Am. ii. 431. And see Lounsbury, Studies in Chaucer, ii. 382.
  
  [1596.]Took to, delivered to. Triton, Triton; imitated from Ovid, Met. i. 333, where Neptune calls Triton, and bids him sound his ‘shell,’ the sound of which resounded everywhere.
  
  [1598.]We rarely find to used after leet; the usual formula is leet go. But cf. leet to glyde in Cant. Ta., F 1415. Or read to-go, to-glyde.
  
  [1618.]Wite is badly spelt wete or wote in the MS. copies; but the very phrase wite ye what occurs in C. T., E 2431. However, Ch. certainly uses the phrase ye woot instead of ye wite, more than once.
  
  [1640.]Overthrowe, be overthrown; as in the Tale of Gamelin, 512. Cf. Melibeus, B 2755.
  
  [1643.]A pelet was a stone ball, such as used to be fired from the earliest kind of cannon, of which this is a very early mention. See my glossary to P. Plowman (Clar. Press).
  
  [1670.]Lat goon, let go, lay aside.