Chapter IX: Part 9

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

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

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

35. _been submitted_, have agreed. This illustrates the common usage of expressing a perfect by the verb _to be_ and the past part. of an _intransitive_ verb. Cf. _is went_, in B. 1730.--M.

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

37. _Acquiteth yow_, acquit yourself, viz. by redeeming your promise. _holdeth your biheste_, keep your promise. _Acquit_ means to absolve or free oneself from a debt, obligation, charge, &c.; or to free oneself from the claims of duty, by fulfilling it.

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

_atte leste_, at the least. _Atte_ or _atten_ is common in Old English for _at the_ or _at then_; the latter is a later form of A. S. _æt þ[=a]m_, where _then_ (= _þ[=a]m_) is the dative case of the article. But for the explanation of peculiar forms and words, the Glossarial Index should be consulted.

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

'Quod Troilus, "_depardieux I assente_";'--

and again--

'"_Depardieux_," quod she, "god leve al be wel";'
Troilus and Cres. ii. 1058 and 1212;

and in the Freres Tale, D. 1395--

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

[136]

It is much more to the point to observe that the Man of Lawe talks about _law_ in l. 43. Cotgrave, in his French Dictionary, under _par_, gives--'_De par Dieu soit_, a [i. e. in] God's name be it. _De par moy_, by my means. _De par le roy_, by the king's appointment.' _De par_ is a corruption of O.Fr. _de part_, on the part or side of; so that _de par le roy_ means literally, 'as for the king,' i. e. 'in the king's name.' Similarly, _de par Dieu_ is 'in God's name.' See Burguy, Grammaire de la Langue D'oil, ii. 359. The form _dieux_ is a _nominative_, from the Latin _deus_; thus exhibiting an exception to the almost universal law in French, that the modern F. substantives answer to the _accusative_ cases of Latin substantives, as _fleur_ to _florem_, &c. Other exceptions may be found in some proper names, as _Charles_, _Jacques_, from _Carolus_, _Jacobus_, and in _fils_, from _filius_.

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

_holde fayn_, &c.; gladly perform all my promise.

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

'In commune iubes si quid censesue tenendum,
Primus iussa subi; tunc obseruantior aequi
Fit populus, nec ferre negat cum uiderit ipsum
Auctorem parere sibi.'

45. _text_, quotation from an author, precept, saying. _Thus wol our text_, i. e. such is what the expression implies.

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

'And nevertheles hast set thy wit,
Although that in thy hede ful lyte is,
To make bokes, songes, dytees,
In ryme, or elles in cadence,
As thou best canst, in reverence
Of Love, and of his servants eke'; &c.

[137]

_can but lewedly on metres_, is but slightly skilled in metre. _Can_ = _knows_ here; in the line above it is the ordinary auxiliary verb.

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

_made of mencioun_; we should now say--'made mention of.'

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

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

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

59. _Thise_ is a monosyllable; the final _e_ probably denotes that _s_ was 'voiced,' and perhaps the _i_ was long, pronounced (dhiiz).

59, 60. For _eek_, _seek_, read _eke_, _seke_. Here _sek-e_ is in the infinitive mood. The form _ek-e_ is not etymological, as the A.S. _[=e]ac_ was a monosyllable; but, as _-e_ frequently denoted an _adverbial_ suffix, it was easily added. Hence, in M.E., both _eek_ and _ek-e_ occur; and Chaucer uses either form at pleasure, _ek-e_ being more usual. For examples of _eek_, see E. 1349, G. 794.

61. _the seintes legende of Cupyde_; better known now as The Legend of Good Women. Tyrwhitt says--'According to Lydgate (Prologue to Boccace), the number [of good women] was to have been _nineteen_; and perhaps the Legend itself affords some ground for this notion; see l. 283, and Court of Love, l. 108. But this number was never completed, and the last story, of Hypermnestra, is seemingly unfinished.... In this passage the Man of Lawe omits two ladies, viz. Cleopatra and Philomela, whose histories are in the Legend; and he enumerates eight others, of whom there are no histories in the Legend as we have it at present. Are we to suppose, that they have been lost?' The Legend contains the nine stories following: 1. Cleopatra; 2. Thisbe; 3. Dido; 4. Hypsipyle and Medea; 5. Lucretia; 6. Ariadne; 7. Philomela; 8. Phyllis; 9. Hypermnestra. Of these, Chaucer here mentions, as Tyrwhitt points out, all but two, Cleopatra and Philomela. Before discussing the matter further, let me note that in medieval times, proper names took strange shapes, and the reader must not suppose that the writing of _Adriane_ for _Ariadne_, for example, is peculiar to Chaucer. The meaning of the other names is as follows:--_Lucresse_, Lucretia; _Babilan Tisbee_, Thisbe of Babylon; _Enee_, Æneas; _Dianire_, Deianira; _Hermion_, Hermione; _Adriane_, Ariadne; _Isiphilee_, Hypsipyle; _Leander_, _Erro_, Leander and Hero; _Eleyne_, Helena; _Brixseyde_, [138] Briseis (acc. Briseïda); _Ladomea_, Laodamia; _Ypermistra_, Hypermnestra; _Alceste_, Alcestis.

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

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

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

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

1. Penelope Ulixi.*+
2. _Phyllis Demophoonti._*+
3. Briseis Achilli.*
4. Phaedra Hippolyto.
5. Oenone Paridi.
6. _Hypsipyle Iasoni_;*+ 12. _Medea Iasoni_.*
7. _Dido Aeneae._*+
8. Hermione Orestae.*
9. Deianira Herculi.*
10. _Ariadne Theseo._*+
11. Canace Macareo*+ (_expressly rejected_).
13. Laodamia Protesilao.*+
14. _Hypermnestra Lynceo._*+
15. Sappho Phaoni.
[139]
16. Paris Helenae; 17. Helena Paridi.*+
18. Leander Heroni; 19. Hero Leandro.*+
20. Acontius Cydippae; 21. Cydippe Acontio.

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

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

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

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

_Babilan_, Babylonian; elsewhere Chaucer has _Babiloine_ = Babylon, riming with _Macedoine_; Book of the Duchesse, l. 1061.

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

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

'She was her owne deeth right _with a corde_.'

The word may also be taken literally, since Phyllis was metamorphosed after her death into a tree; Gower says she became a nut-tree, and [140] derives _filbert_ from Phyllis; Conf. Amant. bk. iv. Lydgate writes _filbert_ instead of Phyllis; Complaint of Black Knight, l. 68.

66. _The pleinte of Dianire_, the complaint of Deianira, referring to Ovid's letter 'Deianira Herculi'; so also that of _Hermion_ refers to the letter entitled 'Hermione Orestae'; that of _Adriane_, to the 'Ariadne Theseo'; and that of _Isiphilee_, to the 'Hypsipyle Iasoni.'

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

'Omne latus terrae cingit mare; nauita nusquam,
Nulla per ambiguas puppis itura uias.'

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

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

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

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

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

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

90. _of_, as to, with regard to. _doon_, accomplish it.

92. _Pierides_; Tyrwhitt rightly says--'He rather means, I think, the [141] daughters of Pierus, that contended with the Muses, and were changed into pies; Ovid, Metam. bk. v.' Yet the expression is not wrong; it signifies--'I do not wish to be likened to those _would-be_ Muses, the Pierides'; in other words, I do not set myself up as worthy to be considered a poet.

93. _Metamorphoseos._ It was common to cite books thus, by a title in the _genitive case_, since the word _Liber_ was understood. There is, however, a slight error in this substitution of the singular for the plural; the true title being P. Ovidii Nasonis Metamorphoseon Libri Quindecim. See the use of _Eneydos_ in the Nonne Prestes Tale, B. 4549; and of _Judicum_ in Monk. Ta. B. 3236.

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

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

_Baken_ was a strong verb in M. E., with the pp. _baken_ or _bake_ (A. S. _bacen_). Dr. Stratmann, apparently by mistake, enters this phrase under _hawe_, adj. dark grey! But he refrains from explaining _bake_.

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

98. _after_, afterwards, immediately hereafter. Cf. _other_ for _otherwise_ in Old English.--M.

PROLOGUE TO THE MAN OF LAWES TALE.

99-121. It is important to observe that more than three stanzas of this Prologue are little else than a translation from the treatise by Pope Innocent III. entitled De Contemptu Mundi, sive de Miseria Conditionis Humanae. This was first pointed out by Prof. Lounsbury, of Yale, Newhaven, U.S.A., in the _Nation_, July 4, 1889. He shewed that the lost work by Chaucer (viz. his translation of 'the Wreched Engendring of Mankinde As man may in Pope Innocent y-finde,' mentioned in the Legend of Good Women, Prologue A, l. 414) is not lost altogether, [142] since we find traces of it in the first four stanzas of the present Prologue; in the stanzas of the Man of Lawes Tale which begin, respectively, with lines 421, 771, 925, and 1135; and in some passages in the Pardoner's Prologue; as will be pointed out.

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

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

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

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

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

101. _Thee_ is a dative, like _me_ in l. 91.--M. See Gen. ii. 15 (A. S. version), where _him þæs ne sceamode_ = they were not ashamed of it; lit. it shamed them not of it.

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

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

105. _Or ... or_ = either ... or; an early example of this construction.--M.

108. _neighebour_ is a trisyllable; observe that _e_ in the middle of a word is frequently sounded; cf. l. 115. _wytest_, blamest.

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

114. 'It is better (for thee) to die than be in need.' Tyrwhitt says--'This saying of Solomon is quoted in the Romaunt of the Rose, [143] l. 8573--Mieux vault mourir que pauvres estre'; [l. 8216, ed. Méon.] The quotation is not from Solomon, but from Jesus, son of Sirach; see Ecclus. xl. 28, where the Vulgate has--'Melius est enim mori quam indigere.' Cf. B. 2761.

115. _Thy selve neighebor_, thy very neighbour, even thy next neighbour. See note to l. 108.

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

119. The reading _to_ makes the line harsh, as the final _e_ in _come_ should be sounded, and therefore needs elision. _in that prikke_, into that point, into that condition; cf. l. 1028.

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

'Donec eris felix, multos numerabis amicos,
Tempora si fuerint nubila, solus eris.'

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

123. _as in this cas_, as relates to this condition or lot in life. In Chaucer, _cas_ often means _chance_, _hap_.

124. _ambes as_, double aces, two aces, in throwing dice. _Ambes_ is Old French for _both_, from Lat. _ambo_. The line in the Monkes Tale--'Thy _sys_ fortune hath turned into _as_' (B. 3851)--helps us out here in some measure, as it proves that a six was reckoned as a good throw, but an ace as a bad one. So in Shakespeare, Mids. Nt. Dream, v. 1. 314, we find _less than an ace_ explained as equivalent to _nothing_. In the next line, _sis cink_ means _a six and a five_, which was often a winning throw. The allusion is probably, however, not to the mere attempt as to which of two players could throw the highest, but to the particular game called _hazard_, in which the word _chance_ (here used) has a special sense. There is a good description of it in the Supplemental volume to the English Cyclopaedia, div. Arts and Sciences. The whole description has to be read, but it may suffice to say here that, when the caster is going to throw, he _calls a main_, or names one of the numbers five, six, seven, eight, or nine; most often, he calls seven. If he then throws either seven or eleven (Chaucer's _sis cink_), he wins; if he throws aces (Chaucer's _ambes as_) or deuce-ace (two and one), or double sixes, he loses. If he throws some other number, that number is called the caster's _chance_, and he goes on playing till either the main or the chance turns up. In the first case he loses, in the second, he wins. If he calls some other number, the winning and losing throws are somewhat varied; but in all cases, the double ace is a losing throw. [144]

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

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

'Whos chaunce gothe nether yn _synke or syse_;
With _ambes ase_ encressithe hys dispence.'

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

'So wel fortuned is their chaunce
The dice to turne[n] vppe-so-doune,
With _sise and sincke_ they can auaunce.'

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

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

'Muche myrthe is in may · amonge wilde bestes,
And so forth whil somer lasteþ · heore solace dureþ;
And muche myrthe amonge riche men is · þat han meoble [_property_]
ynow and heele [_health_].
Ac beggers aboute myd-somere · bredlees þei soupe,
And [gh]ut is wynter for hem wors · for wet-shood þei gangen,
A-furst and a-fyngred [_Athirst and ahungered_] · and foule rebuked
Of þese worlde-riche men · þat reuthe hit is to huyre [_hear of it_].'
Piers Plowman, C. xvii. 10; B. xiv. 158.

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

128. _thestaat_, for _the estaat_, i. e. the estate. This coalescence of the article and substantive is common in Chaucer, when the substantive begins with a vowel; cf. _thoccident_, B. 3864; _thorient_, B. 3871.

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

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

131. _were_, should be. _desolat_, destitute. 'The E. E. word is _westi_; 'westi of alle gode theawes,' destitute of all good virtues; O. Eng. Homilies, i. 285.'--M.

132. _Nere_, for _ne were_, were it not. _goon is, &c._, many a year ago, long since. [145]

THE TALE OF THE MAN OF LAWE.

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

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

134. _Surrie_, Syria; called _Sarazine_ (Saracen-land) by N. Trivet.

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

143. _Were_ it, whether it were.

144. _message_, messenger, _not_ message; see l. 333, and the note.

145. The final _e_ in _Rome_ is pronounced, as in l. 142; but the words _the ende_ are to be run together, forming but _one_ syllable, _thende_, according to Chaucer's usual practice; cf. note to l. 255. Indeed in ll. 423, 965, it is actually so spelt; just as, in l. 150, we have _thexcellent_, and in l. 151, _themperoures_.

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

156. _God him see_, God protect him. See note to C. 715.

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

166. _mirour_, mirror. Such French words are frequently accented on the _last_ syllable. Cf. _minístr'_ in l. 168.

171. _han doon fraught_, have caused to be freighted. All the MSS. have _fraught_, not _fraughte_. In the Glossary to Specimens of English, I marked _fraught_ as being the infinitive mood, as Dr. Stratmann [146] supposes, though he notes the lack of the final e. I have now no doubt that _fraught_ is nothing but the past participle, as in William of Palerne, l. 2732--

'And feithliche _fraught_ ful of fine wines,'

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

'Thai strak his hed of, and syne it
Thai _haf gert saltit_ in-til a kyt.'
Barbour's Bruce, ed. Skeat, xviii. 167.

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

'And thai sall _let thame trumpit_ ill'; id. xix. 712.

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

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

The infinitive appears to have been _fraughten_, though the earliest certain examples of this form seem to be those in Shakespeare, Cymb. i. 1. 126, Temp. i. 2. 13. The proper form of the pp. was _fraughted_ (as in Marlowe, 2 Tamb. i. 2. 33), but the loss of final _-ed_ in past participles of verbs of which the stem ends in _t_ is common; cf. _set_, _put_, &c. Hence this form _fraught_ as a pp. in the present instance. It is a Scandinavian word, from Swed. _frakta_, Dan. _fragte_. At a later period we find _freight_, the mod. E. form. The vowel-change is due to the fact that there was an intermediate form _fret_, borrowed from the French form _fret_ of the Scandinavian word. This form _fret_ disturbed the vowel-sound, without wholly destroying the recollection of the original guttural _gh_, due to the Swed. _k_. For an example of _fret_, we have only to consult the old black-letter editions of Chaucer printed in 1532 and 1561, which give us the present line in the form--'These marchantes han don _fret_ her ships new.'

185. _ceriously_, 'seriously,' i. e. with great minuteness of detail. Used by Fabyan, who says that 'to reherce _ceryously_' all the conquests of Henry V would fill a volume; Chron., ed. Ellis, p. 589. Skelton, in his Garland of Laurell, l. 581, has: 'And _seryously_ she shewyd me ther denominacyons'; on which Dyce remarks that it means _seriatim_, and gives a clear example. It answers to the Low Latin _seriose_, used in two senses; (1) seriously, gravely; (2) minutely, [147] fully. In the latter case it is perhaps to be referred to the Lat. _series_, not _serius_. A similar word, _cereatly_ (Lat. _seriatim_), is found three times in the Romance of Partenay, ed. Skeat, with the sense of _in due order_; cf. _Ceriatly_ and _Ceryows_ in the New E. Dict.

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

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

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

'Praeiacet in stellis series, quam longior aetas
Explicet et spatiis temporis ordo suis,
_Sceptra Phoronei, fratrum discordia Thebis,_
_Flamma Phaethontis Deucalionis aque_.
In stellis Codri paupertas, copia Croesi,
Incestus Paridis, Hippolytique pudor.
_In stellis Priami species, audacia Turni,_
_Sensus Ulixeus, Herculeusque uigor._
In stellis pugil est Pollux et nauita Typhis,
Et Cicero rhetor et geometra Thales.
In stellis lepidum dictat Maro, Milo figurat,
Fulgurat in Latia nobilitate Nero.
Astra notat Persis, Ægyptus parturit artes,
Graecia docta legit, praelia Roma gerit.'

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

207, 208. Here _have_, forming part of the phrase _mighte have grace_, is unemphatic, whilst _han_ (for _haven_) is emphatic, and signifies possession. See _han_ again in l. 241.

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

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

228. _I prey yow holde_, I pray you to hold. Here _holde_ is the infinitive mood. The imperative plural would be _holdeth_; see _saveth_, next line. [148]

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

242. _noot_, equivalent to _ne woot_, know not.

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

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

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

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

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

255. _ynowe_, being plural, takes a final _e_; we then read _th'ende_, as explained in note to l. 145. The pl. _ino[gh]he_ occurs in the Ormulum.

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

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

277. The word _alle_, being plural, is dissyllabic. _Thing_ is often a plural form, being an A. S. neuter noun. The words _over_, _ever_, _never_ are, in Chaucer, generally monosyllables, or nearly so; just as _o'er_, _e'er_, _ne'er_ are treated as monosyllables by our poets in general. Hence the scansion is--'Ov'r al | lë thing |,' &c.

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

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

295. In the margin of the Ellesmere MS. is written--'Vnde Ptholomeus, libro i. cap. 8. Primi motus celi duo sunt, quorum vnus est qui mouet totum semper ab Oriente in Occidentem vno modo super orbes, &c. Item aliter vero motus est qui mouet orbem stellarum currencium [149] contra motum primum, videlicet, ab Occidente in Orientem super alios duos polos.' The old astronomy imagined nine spheres revolving round the central stationary earth; of the seven innermost, each carried with it one of the seven planets, viz. the Moon, Venus, Mercury, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn; the eighth sphere, that of the fixed stars, had a slow motion from west to east, round the axis of the zodiac (_super alios duos polos_), to account for the precession of the equinoxes; whilst the ninth or outermost sphere, called the _primum mobile_, or the sphere of first motion, had a diurnal revolution from east to west, carrying everything with it. This exactly corresponds with Chaucer's language. He addresses the outermost sphere or _primum mobile_ (which is the _ninth_ if reckoning from within, but the _first_ from without), and accuses it of carrying with it everything in its irresistible westward motion; a motion contrary to that of the 'natural' motion, viz. that in which the sun advances along the signs of the zodiac. The result was that the evil influence of the planet Mars prevented the marriage. It is clear that Chaucer was thinking of certain passages in Boethius, as will appear from consulting his own translation of Boethius, ed. Morris, pp. 21, 22, 106, and 110. I quote a few lines to shew this:--

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

'þe regioun of þe fire þat eschaufiþ by þe swifte _moeuyng of þe firmament_'; p. 110.

The original is--

'O stelliferi conditor orbis
Qui perpetuo nixus solio
_Rapidum caelum turbine uersas_,
Legemque pati sidera cogis';
Boeth. Cons. Phil. lib. i. met. 5.

'Quique _agili motu_ calet _aetheris_'; id. lib. iv. met. 1.

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

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

Compare also the following passage:--

'The earth, in roundness of a perfect ball,
Which as a point but of this mighty all
Wise Nature fixed, that permanent doth stay,
Wheras the spheres by a _diurnal sway_
Of the first Mover carried are about.'
Drayton: The Man in the Moon.

299. _crowding_, pushing. This is still a familiar word in East [150] Anglia. Forby, in his Glossary of the East Anglian Dialect, says--'_Crowd_, v. to push, shove, or press close. To the word, in its _common_ acceptation, _number_ seems necessary. With us, _one_ individual can _crowd_ another.' To _crowd_ a wheelbarrow means to push it. The expression '_crod_ in a barwe,' i. e. wheeled or pushed along in a wheelbarrow, occurs in the Paston Letters, A.D. 1477, ed. Gairdner, iii. 215.

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

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

_East._--Aries. Taurus. Gemini. Cancer. Leo. Virgo.
1. A. 2. S. 3. C. 4. A. 5. S. 6. C.

_West._--Libra. Scorpio. Sagittarius. Capricornus. Aquarius. Pisces.
7. A. 8. S. 9. C. 10. A. 11. S. 12. C.

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

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

305. The meaning of _Atazir_ has long remained undiscovered. But by the kind help of Mr. Bensly, one of the sub-librarians of the Cambridge University Library, I am enabled to explain it. _Atazir_ or _atacir_ is the Spanish spelling of the Arabic _al-tasir_, influence, given at p. 351 of Richardson's Pers. Dict., ed. 1829. It is a noun derived from _asara_, a verb of the second conjugation, meaning to leave a mark [151] on, from the substantive _asar_, a mark; the latter substantive is given at p. 20 of the same work. Its use in astrology is commented upon by Dozy, who gives it in the form _atacir_, in his Glossaire des Mots Espagnols dérivés de l'Arabique, p. 207. It signifies the _influence_ of a star or planet upon other stars, or upon the fortunes of men. In the present case it is clearly used in a bad sense; we may therefore translate it by 'evil influence,' i. e. the influence of Mars in the house of Scorpio. On this common deterioration in the meaning of words, see Trench, Study of Words, p. 52. The word _craft_, for example, is a very similar instance; it originally meant _skill_, and hence, a trade, and we find _star-craft_ used in particular to signify the science of astronomy.

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

312. 'Is there no choice as to when to fix the voyage?' The favourable moment for commencing a voyage was one of the points on which it was considered desirable to have an astrologer's opinion. Travelling, at that time, was a serious matter. Yet this was only one of the many undertakings which required, as was thought, to be begun at a favourable moment. Whole books were written on 'elections,' i. e. favourable times for commencing operations of all kinds. Chaucer was thinking, in particular, of the following passage, which is written in the margins of the Ellesmere and Hengwrt MSS.: 'Omnes concordati sunt quod elecciones sint debiles nisi in diuitibus: habent enim isti, licet debilitentur eorum elecciones, radicem, i. [_id est_] natiuitates eorum, que confortat omnem planetam debilem in itinere.' The sense of which is--'For all are agreed, that "elections" are weak, except in the case of the rich; for these, although their elections be weakened, have a "root" of their own, that is to say, their nativities (_or_ horoscopes); which root strengthens every planet that is of weak influence with respect to a journey.' This is extracted, says Tyrwhitt, from a Liber Electionum by a certain Zael; see MS. Harl. 80; MS. Bodley 1648. This is a very fair example of the jargon to be found in old books on astrology. The old astrologers used to alter their predictions almost at pleasure, by stating that their results depended on several causes, which partly counteracted one another; an arrangement of which the convenience is obvious. Thus, if the aspect of the planets at the time inquired about appeared to be adverse to a journey, it might still be the case (they said) that such evil aspect might be overcome by the fortunate aspect of the inquirer's horoscope; or, conversely, an ill aspect in the horoscope could be counteracted by a fit election of a time for action. A rich man would probably be fitted with a fortunate [152] horoscope, or else why should he buy one? Such horoscope depended on the aspect of the heavens at the time of birth or 'nativity,' and, in particular, upon the 'ascendent' at that time; i. e. upon the planets lying nearest to the point of the zodiac which happened, at that moment, to be _ascending_, i. e. just appearing above the horizon. So Chaucer, in his Treatise on the Astrolabe, pt. ii. § 4, (vol. iii. 191), explains the matter, saying--'The assendent sothly, as wel in alle nativitez as in questiouns and _elecciouns of tymes_, is a thing which that thise Astrologiens gretly observen'; &c. The curious reader may find much more to the same effect in the same Treatise, with directions to 'make roots' in pt. ii. § 44.

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

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

'to yeue a judgement,
The roote i-take at the ascendent,
Truly sought out, by minute and degre,
The selfe houre of his natiuite,
Not foryet the heauenly mansions
Clerely searched by smale fraccions,' &c.

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

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

332. _Alkaron_, the Koran; _al_ is the Arabic article. [153]

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

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

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

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

'Hade a face vne fourmet _as a fre maydon_'; l. 4451.

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

367. _knowestow_ is a trisyllable; and _the olde_ is to be read _tholdè_. But in l. 371, the word _Makestow_, being differently placed in the line, is to be read with the _e_ slurred over, as a dissyllable.

380. _moste_, might. It is not always used like the modern _must_.

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

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