For him was lever have at his beddes heede Twenty bookes, clad in blak or reede, Of Aristotle and his philosophie, Then robes riche, or fithel,' or gay sawtrie. But al be that he was a philosophre, Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre; But al that he mighte of his frendes hente, On bookes and on lernyng he it spente, And busily gan for the soules preye Of hem that gaf him wherwith to scoleye,2 Of studie took he most cure and most heede. Not oo word spak he more than was neede, And that was seid in forme and reverence, And schort and quyk, and ful of high sentence. Sownynge in moral vertu was his speche, And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche. A Franklin, or freeholder was in the 'Epicurus' own son,' a great householder: company, His breed, his ale, was alway after oon ;3 This character is a fine picture of the wealthy rural Englishman, and it shews how much of enjoyment and hospitality was even then associated with this station of life. The Wife of Bath is another lively national portrait; she is shrewd and witty, has abundant means, and is always first with her offering at church. A good Wif was ther of byside Bathe, But sche was somdel deef, and that was skathe. Hire keverchefs ful fyne weren of grounde; 8 Ful streyte y-teyd, and schoos ful moyste and newe. Uppon an amblere esily sche sat, Ywymplid wel, and on hire heed an hat As brood as is a bocler or a targe; A foot-mantel aboute hire hipes large, A Sergeant of Law, 'discreet and of great reverence,' is portrayed : No where so besy a man as he ther nas,2 And yit he seemed besier than he was. Chaucer has many satires on the clergy, but he gives one redeeming sketch-that of a poor Parson: A good man was ther of religioun, But riche he was of holy thought and werk. And such he was i-proved ofte sithes.3 We have a pardoner from Rome, with some sacred relics-as part of the Virgin Mary's veil, and part of the sail of St Peter's ship-and who is also 'brimful of pardons come from Rome all hot.' Among the humbler characters are, a 'stout carl' of a miller, a reve or bailiff, and a sompnour or church apparitor, who summoned offenders before the archdeacon's court, but whose fire-red face and licentious habits contrast curiously with the nature of his duties. A shipman, cook, haberdasher, &c. make up the goodly company-the whole forming such a genuine Hogarthian picture, that we may exclaim, in the eloquent language of Campbell: What an intimate scene of English life in the fourteenth century do we enjoy in these tales, beyond what history displays by glimpses through the stormy atmosphere of her scenes, or the antiquary can discover by the cold light of his researches ! Chaucer's contemporaries and their successors were justly proud of this national work. Many copies existed in manuscript (a six-text edition is now in progress); and when the art of printing came to England, one of the primary duties of Caxton's press was to issue an impression of those inimitable creations. All the pilgrims in the Canterbury Tales do not relate stories. Chaucer had not, like Boccaccio, finished his design; for he intended, as we have said, to have given a second series on the return of the company from Canterbury, as well as an account of the transactions in the city when they reached the sacred shrine. The concluding supper at the Tabard, when the successful competitor was to be declared, would have afforded a rich display for the poet's peculiar humour. The parties who do not relate tales-as the poem has reached us-are the yeoman, the ploughman, and the five city mechanics. Like Shakspeare, Chaucer was content to borrow most of the outlines of his plots or stories. The Knight's Tale-the most chivalrous and romantic of the series-is founded on the Theseida of Boccaccio. The Clerk's Tale, so touching in its simplicity and pathos, has also an Italian origin. The Clerk says: her to quit his house to make room for a new wife! But even this Griselde could endure: 'And of your new wife God of his grace her father's house. But at length the marquis, Griselde, the 'flower of wifely patience,' goes to her husband, sends for her, declares that he has been merely playing an assumed part, that he will have no other wife, nor ever had, and she is introduced to her two children whom she believed dead : When she this heard, aswoone down she falleth O such a piteous thing it was to see Her swooning and her humble voice to hear! 'O tender, dear, young children mine! And in her swoon so sadly holdeth she The happy ending of the story, and the husband's declaration : The tale thus learned is the pathetic story of Patient Griselde, which was written by Boccaccio, and only translated into Latin by Petrarch. It appears that Petrarch did not translate this tale from Boccaccio's Decameron until the end of September 1373, and Chaucer was in England on the 22d of November following, as is proved by his having that day received his pension in person. I have done this deed But whether or not the two poets ever met, the For no malice, ne for no cruelty, Italian journey of Chaucer, and the fame and But for t' assay thee in thy womanhoodworks of Petrarch, must have fired the ambition of the accomplished Englishman, and greatly refined will not reconcile the reader to his marital experiand elevated his literary taste. As a model or ment; but such tales appear to have been more example of wifely obedience and implicit faith, suited to the ideas of the spinsters and knitters this story of Griselde long kept up its celebrity, in the sun' in the old age.' The Squire's Tale, both in prose and verse. The husband of Gris-'the story of Cambuscan bold,' by which Milton elde certainly carried his trial of his wife's sub-characterises Chaucer, has not been traced to any mission to the last extremity-worse even than the trial of the Nut-Brown Maid-when he ordered Much has been done to elucidate the works of the Father of English Poetry by Mr R. Morris, the Rev. Mr Skeat, Mr Ellis, Mr Furnival, and the Chaucer Society. They may be said to have given quite a revival to the old poet. other source. For two of his stories-the Man of Law's Tale, and the Wife of Bath's Tale, Chaucer was indebted to the Confessio Amantis of his contemporary Gower. Boccaccio was laid under contribution for other outlines, but the influence of * Scarcely. 1 Tear away by force. French literature was perhaps more predominant with the poet than that of Italy. The Prioress's Tale, the scene of which is laid in Asia, is supposed to be taken from some legend of the miracles of the Virgin, 'one of the oldest of the many stories, which have been propagated at different times, to excite or justify several merciless persecutions of the Jews upon the charge of murdering Christian children. The Nun's Priest's Tale (containing the fable of the cock and the fox) and the Merchant's Tale (modernised by Pope) have some minute painting of natural objects and scenery in Chaucer's clear and simple style. The tales of the Miller and Reve are coarse, but richly humorous. The following extracts are slightly modernised: The Poor Country Widow.-From the Nun's Priest's A poor widow, somedeal stoop'n in age, Ne apoplexy shente not her head; No wine ne drank she neither white nor red; For when degrees fifteen were ascended, Came riding like the god of arms, Mars. Of five and twenty year his age I cast. Emily. From the Knight's Tale. I n'ot which was the fairer of them two- The Death of Arcite.-From the same. Swelleth the breast of Arcite, and the sore Encreaseth at his hearte more and more. . . . All is to-bursten thilke region; Nature hath now no domination : And certainly where nature will not werche,? Farewell physic; go bear the man to church. This is all and some, that Arcite muste die ; For which he sendeth after Emily, And Palamon, that was his cousin dear; Then said he thus, as ye shall after hear: 'Nought may the woful spirit in mine heart Declare one point of all my sorrows' smart To you, my lady, that I love most. But I bequeath the service of my ghost To you aboven every creature, Since that my life ne may no longer dure. 'Alas the woe! alas the paines strong, That I for you have suffered, and so long! Alas mine hearte's queen! alas my wife! Mine hearte's lady, ender of my life! What is this world?-what asken men to have? That is to say, truth, honour, and knighthead, As in this world right now ne know I none And with that word his speeche fail began ; That dwelled in his hearte sick and sore, Departure of Custance.—From the Man of Law's Tale. Custance is banished from her husband, Alla, king of Northumberland, in consequence of the treachery of the king's mother. Her behaviour in embarking at sea, in a rudderless ship, is thus described: Weepen both young and old in all that place The fourthe day toward the ship she went ; 5 The will of Christ, and kneeling on the strond, She saide: 'Lord, aye welcome be thy sond." 'He that me kepte from the false blame, While I was in the land amonges you, He can me keep from harm and eke from shame Her little child lay weeping in her arm; 'Thou saw'st thy child yslain before thine eyen, And yet now liveth my little child, parfay:1 Now, lady bright! to whom all woful crien, Thou glory of womanhood, thou faire May! Thou haven of refute, bright star of day! Rue 3 on my child, that of thy gentleness Ruest on every rueful in distress. 'O little child, alas! what is thy guilt, That never wroughtest sin as yet, pardie? Why will thine harde father have thee spilt ?4 O mercy, deare Constable!' quod she, 'As let my little child dwell here with thee; And if thou dar'st not saven him from blame, So kiss him ones in his father's name.' Therewith she looketh backward to the land, For wind and weather, Almighty God purchase," Love.-From the Franklin's Tale. For one thing, sirs, safely dare I say, That friends ever each other must obey If they will longe holden company: Love will not be constrained by mastery. When mastery cometh, the god of Love anon Beateth his wings and, farewell! he is gone.* Love is a thing as any spirit free. Women of kind desiren liberty, And not to be constrained as a thrall; And so do men if soothly I say shall. Look who that is most patient in love He is at his advantage all above; Patience is a high virtue certain, For it vanquisheth, as these clerks say'n, Things that rigour never should attain ; For every word men should not chide or plain. Learneth to suffren or else, so might I gon Ye shall it learn whether ye will or non. The Fairies driven out by the Friars. In oldé dayés of the King Arthur I speak of many hundred years ago, That searchen every land and every stream, In undermeales and in morrowings, Good Counsel of Chaucer.* Flee from the press and dwell with soothfastness, Pain thee not each crooked to redress Strive not as doth a crock with a wall, clepeth Cassiodore, poverty the mother of ruin, that is to sayn, the mother of overthrowing or falling down; and therefore saith Piers Alphonse : One of the greatest adversities of the world is when a free man by kind, or of birth, is constrained by poverty to eaten the alms of his enemy. And the same saith Innocent in one of his books; he saith that sorrowful and mishappy is the condition of a poor beggar, for if he ax not his meat he dieth of hunger, and if he ax he dieth for shame; and algates necessity constraineth him to ax; and therefore saith Solomon: That better it is to die than for to have such poverty; and, as the same Solomon saith: Better it is to die of bitter death, than for to liven in such wise. By these reasons that I have said unto you, and by many other reasons that I could say, I grant you that riches ben good to 'em that well geten 'em, and to him that well usen tho' riches; and therefore wol I shew you how ye shulen behave you in gathering of your riches, and in what manner ye shulen usen 'em. First, ye shuln geten 'em withouten great desire, by good leisure, sokingly, and not over hastily, for a man that is too desiring to get riches abandoneth him first to theft and to all other evils; and therefore saith Solomon: He that hasteth him too busily to wax rich, he shall be non innocent: he saith also, that the riches that hastily cometh to a man soon and lightly goeth and passeth from a man, but that riches that cometh little and little waxeth alway and multiplieth. And, sir, ye shuln get riches by your wit and by your travail, unto your profit, and that withouten wrong or harm doing to any other person; for the law saith: There maketh no man himself rich, if he do harm to another wight; that is to say, that Nature defendeth and forbiddeth by right, that no man make himself rich unto the harm of another person. And Tullius that may fall unto a man, is so muckle agains nature as saith: That no sorrow, ne no dread of death, ne nothing That thee is sent receive in buxomness, The wrestling of this world asketh a fall; Here is no home, here is but wilderness, Forth, pilgrim, forth! best out of thy stall. Look up on high, and thank God of all; Waive thy lust, and let thy ghost thee lead, And truth shall thee deliver, 'tis no dread. Two of the Canterbury Tales are in prose-the Tale of Melibeus' and the 'Persone's (Parson's) Tale. A long allegorical and meditative work, the Testament of Love, an imitation of Boethius' De Consolatione Philosophie, has been ascribed to Chaucer, but its genuineness is doubted, if not disproved. The poet, however, wrote in prose a translation of Boethius, and a work On the Astro-wise flee idleness; for Solomon saith: That idleness labe, addressed to his son Lewis. On Gathering and Using Riches.-From the Tale of When Prudence had heard her husband avaunt himself of his riches and of his money, dispreising the power of his adversaries, she spake and said in this wise: Certes, dear sir, I grant you that ye ben rich and mighty, and that riches ben good to 'em that han well ygetten 'em, and that well can usen 'em; for, right as the body of a man may not liven withouten soul, no more may it liven withouten temporal goods, and by riches may a man get him great friends; and therefore saith Pamphilus: If a neatherd's daughter be rich, she may chese of a thousand men which she wol take to her husband; for of a thousand men one wol not forsaken her ne refusen her. And this Pamphilus saith also: If thou be right happy, that is to sayn, if thou be right rich, thou shalt find a great number of fellows and friends; and if thy fortune change, that thou wax poor, farewell friendship and fellowship, for thou shalt be all alone withouten any company, but if it be the company of poor folk. And yet saith this Pamphilus, moreover, that they that ben bond and thrall of linage shuln be made worthy and noble by riches. And right so as by riches there comen many goods, right so by poverty come there many harms and evils; and therefore 1 After the meal of dinner and in the mornings. The allusion to the zeal of the friars is evidently ironical. In one of the Cottonian MSS. (among those destroyed by fire), this poem was described as made by Chaucer upon his death-bed in his great anguish.' Tyrwhitt says, the verses are found without that statement in two other manuscripts. The copies differ considerably. * Except. a man to increase his own profit to harm of another man. And though the great men and the mighty men getten riches more lightly than thou, yet shalt thou not ben idle ne slow to do thy profit, for thou shalt in all teacheth a man to do many evils; and the same Solomon saith That he that travaileth and busieth himself to tillen his lond, shall eat bread, but he that is idle, and casteth him to no business ne occupation, shall fall into poverty, and die for hunger. And he that is idle and slow can never find convenable time for to do his profit; for there is a versifier saith, that the idle man excuseth him in winter because of the great cold, and in summer then by encheson of the heat. For these causes, saith Caton, waketh and inclineth you not over muckle to sleep, for over muckle saith St Jerome: Doeth some good deeds, that the rest nourisheth and causeth many vices; and therefore devil, which is our enemy, ne find you not unoccupied, for the devil he taketh not lightly unto his werking such as he findeth occupied in good werks. Then thus in getting riches ye musten flee idleness; and afterward ye shuln usen the riches which ye han geten by your wit and by your travail, in such manner, than men hold you not too scarce, ne too sparing, ne fool-large, that is to say, over large a spender; for right as men blamen an avaricious man because of his scarcity and chinchery, in the same wise he is to blame that spendeth over largely; and therefore saith Caton: Use (saith he) the riches that thou hast ygeten in such manner, that men have no matter ne cause to call thee to have a poor heart and a rich purse; he saith also: nother wretch ne chinch, for it is a great shame to a man The goods that thou hast ygeten, use 'em by measure, that is to sayn, spend measureably, for they that folily wasten and despenden the goods that they han, when they han no more proper of 'eir own, that they shapen 'em to take the goods of another man. I say, then, that ye shuln flee avarice, using your riches in such manner, that men sayen not that your riches ben yburied, but that ye have 'em in your might and in your wielding; |