Our sauyoure preserue ye all from synne!
And enable ye to receyue this blessed pardon,
Whiche is the greatest vndor the son,

Graunted by the pope in his bulles under lede,
Whiche pardon ye shall fynde whan ye are dede,
That offereth outher grotes er els pens,

To these holy relyques, whiche or I go hens
I shall here shewe, in open audyence,
Exortynge ye all to do to them reuerence.

But first ye shall know well, yt I com fro Rome, Lo here my bulles, all and some,

Our lyege lorde seale here on my patent

I bere with me, my body to warant;

That no man be so bolde, be he preest or clarke, Me to dysturbe of Chrystes holy warke;

Nor haue no dysdayne, nor yet scorne,

Of these holy reliques whiche sayntes haue worne.
Fyrst, here I shewe ye, of a holy Jewes shepe
A bone, I pray you take good kepe

To my wordes, and marke them well:-
Yf any of your bestes belyes do swell,

Dyppe this bone in the water that he dothe take
Into his body, and the swellynge shall slake.
And yf any worme haue your beestes stonge,
Take of this water, and wasshe his tonge,
And it wyll be hole anon; and furthermore
Of pockes, and scabbes, and every sore,

He shall be quyte hole that drynketh of the well

That this bone is dipped in; it is treuth that I tell!

And yf any man that any beste oweth

Ones in the weke, or that the cocke croweth,

Fastynge wyll drynke of this well a draughte,
As that holy Jew hath vs taught,

His beestes and his store shall multeply.

And maysters all, it helpeth well;
Thoughe a man be foule in ielous rage,
Let a man with this water make his potage,
And neuermore shall he his wyfe mystryst.

Here is a mytten eke, as ye may se;
He that his hande wyll put in this myttayn,
He shall haue encrease of his grayn,
That he hath sowne, be it w[h]ete or otys,
So that he offer pens, or els grotes.

And another holy relyke eke here se ye may;

The blessed arme of swete Saynt Sondaye!

And who so euer is blessyd with this ryght hande,
Can not spede amysse by se nor by lande;
And if he offereth eke with good deuocyon,
He shall not fayle to come to hyghe promocyon.
And another holy relyke here may ye see,
The great too of the Holy Trynyte.

And who so euer ones doth it in his mouthe take,
He shall neuer be dysseasyd with the tothe-ake!
Canker nor pockys shall there none brede!
This that I shewe ye is matter indede!

And here is of our Lady, a relyke full good,
Her bongrace which she ware with her French hode*
Whan she wente oute, al-wayes for sonne-bornynge;

And if this bongrace they do deuoutly kys,
And offer therto, as theyre deuocyon is.

Here is another relyke, eke a precyous one,
Of all helowes [All Saints] the blessyd jaw-bone,
Which relyke, without any fayle,

Agaynst poyson chefely dothe preuayle.

For whom so euer it toucheth, without dout,
All maner venym from hym shall issue out;
So that it shall hurt no maner wyghte;
Lo, of this relyke the great power and myght,
Which preseruyth from poyson euery man.
Lo of Saynt Myghell, eke the brayn-pan!
Which for the hed-ake is a preseruatyfe,
To every man or beste that beryth lyfe.
And further it shall stande hym in better stede,

For his hede shall neuer ake whan that he is dede.
Nor he shall fele no maner grefe nor payn,

Though with a sworde one cleue it than a-twayn!

But be as one that lay in a dede slepe,

Wherfore to these relykes now come crouche and crepe.
But loke that ye offerynge to them make
Or els can ye no maner profyte take.'

Cf. Pardoner's Prol. 336-340, 350-376; see CH. 3, PP. 40, 41.

*The French hood was the close coif, fashionable among ladies at this period; the bongrace was a frontlet attached to the hood, and standing up round the forehead; as may be particularly seen in the portraits of Queen Anne Bullen. See History of Costume in England, p. 243, and Glossary, p. 441 (vol. i. p. 232, vol. ii. p. 57, ed. 1885).

716. Thestat, tharray

=

the estate, the array: the coalescence of the article with the noun is very common in Old English writers. 726. 'That ye ascribe it not to my ill-breeding.'

727. pleynly speke (Elles. &c.); speke al pleyn (Harl.).

734. Al speke he, although he speak. See al have I, 1. 744.

741, 742. This saying of Plato is taken from Boethius, De Consolatione, lib. iii. pr. 12. 'Thou hast lerned by the sentence of Plato, that nedes the wordes moten ben cosynes to tho thinges of whiche thei speken ;' see Boeth., ed. Morris, p. 106, 11. 16, 17. In Le Roman de la Rose, 7131, Jean de Meun says that Plato tells us speech was given us to express our wishes and thoughts, and proceeds to argue that men, ought to use coarse language. Chaucer was thinking of this singular argument. We also find in Le Roman (1. 15372) the very words of the present passage :

'Li dis doit le fait resembler;

Car les vois as choses voisines
Doivent estre à lor faiz cosines.'

764. I saugh nat (Elles. &c.); I ne saugh (Harl.). To scan the line, read I n' saugh, dropping the e in ne.

770. 'May the blessed martyr reward you!'

772. talen

= to tell tales.

=

785. to make it wys, to make it a matter of wisdom or deliberation; so also made it straunge made it a matter of difficulty, C. T. 3978. 810. and our othes swore, and we our oaths swore; see next line. 817. In heigh and lowe. Lat. In, or de alto et basso, Fr. de haut en bas, were expressions of entire submission on one side, and sovereignty on the other.'-Tyrwhitt. It here means—' under all circumstances.'

822. day. It is the morning of the 17th of April. See CH. 2, p. xi. 826. St. Thomas a Waterings was a place for watering horses, at a brook beside the second mile-stone on the road to St. Thomas's shrine, i. e. to Canterbury. See Nares.

838. draweth cut, draw lots, lit. draw the short straw. In the Gloss. to Allan Ramsay's poems, ed. 1721, he explains-'cutts, lots. These cuts are usually made of straws unequally cut, which one hides between his finger and thumb, whilst another draws his fate.' See Brand, Pop. Antiq., iii. 337. The one who drew the shortest (or else the longest) straw was the one who drew the lot. Cf. 'Sors, a kut, or a lotte;' Reliquiæ Antiquæ, i. 7. 'Froissart calls it tirer à longue paille, to draw the long straw,' vol. i. c. 294.-T. 'After supper, we drew cuttes for a score of apricoks, the longest cut stil to draw an apricoke ;' Marston, Induction to The Malcontent.

847. as was resoun, as was reasonable or right.

THE KNIGHTES TALE.

It is only possible to give here a mere general idea of the way in which the Knightes Tale is related to the Teseide of Boccaccio. The following table gives a sketch of it, but includes very many lines wherein Chaucer is quite original. The reference to the Knightes Tale are to the lines; those to the Teseide are to the books and stanzas.

The MSS. quote a line and a half from Statius, Thebaid, xii. 519, 520, because Chaucer is referring to that passage in his introductory lines to this tale; see particularly ll. 9, II, 12.

Lines 1-24 and 106-123 should be compared with Chaucer's Anelida and Arcite, 11. 22-46. Lines 24 and 114 are borrowed from that poem, with but slight alteration.

3. governour. It should be observed that Chaucer continually accents words in the Anglo-French manner, on the last syllable. Thus we have here governóur; again in the next line, conqueróur; in 1. 7, chivalrýe; in 1. II, contrée ; in 1. 18, manére, &c. &c. The most remarkable examples are when the words end in -oun (11. 35, 77).

6. contree is here accented on the first syllable; in 1. 11, on the last. This is a good example of the unsettled state of the accents of such words in Chaucer's time, which afforded him an opportunity of licence, which he freely uses. In fact, cóntree shews the English, and contrée the

French accent.

7. chivalrye, knightly exploits. In 1. 20, chivalrye-knights; Eng. chivalry. So also in l. 124.

8. regne of Femenye. The kingdom (Lat. regnum) of the Amazons. Femenye is from Lat. fæmina, a woman. Cf. Statius, Theb. xii. 578.

9. Cithea, Scythia. Cf. Scythica in the quotation from Statius; p. 31. 10. Ipolita, Shakespeare's Hippolyta, in Mids. Night's Dream. The name is in Statius, Theb. xii. 534, spelt Hippolyte.

27. as now, at present, at this time. Cf. the M.E. adverbs as-swithe, as-sone, immediately.

31. I wol nat letten eek noon of this route, I desire not to hinder eke (also) none of all this company. Wol desire; cf. I will have mercy,' &c.

=3

43. creature is here a word of three syllables. In 1. 248 it has four syllables.

45. nolde, would not: ne wolde was no doubt pronounced nolde, would not; so ne hath, hath not, was pronounced nath.

stenten, stop. 'It stinted, and said aye.'-Romeo and Juliet, i. 3. 48. 50. that thus, i. e. ye that thus.

53. clothed thus (Elles.); clad thus al (Harl.).

54. alle is to be pronounced al-lè. Tyrwhitt inserts than, then, after alle, against the authority of the best MSS.

Statius (Theb. xii. 545) calls this lady Capaneia coniux; see l. 74, below. He says all the ladies were from Argos, and their husbands were kings. 55. a deedly chere, a deathly countenance.

60. we biseken, we beseech, ask for. For such double forms as beseken and besechen, cf. mod. Eng. dike and ditch, kirk and chirch, sack and satchel, stick and stitch. In the Early Eng. period the harder forms with k were very frequently employed by Northern writers, who preferred them to the palatalised Southern forms (perhaps influenced by Anglo-French) with ch. Cf. M. E. brig and rigg with bridge and ridge.

68. This line means 'that ensureth no estate to be (always) good.' 70. Clemence, Clemency, Pity. Suggested by 'il tempio . . . di Clemenza,' Tes. ii. 17; which again is from 'mitis posuit Clementia sedem,’ Theb. xii. 482.

74. Capaneus, one of the seven heroes who besieged Thebes: struck dead by lightning as he was scaling the walls of the city, because he had defied Zeus; Theb. x. 927. See note to 1. 54, above.

83. for despyt, out of vexation; mod. E. 'for spite.'

84. To do the dede bodyes vileinye, to treat the dead bodies shamefully. 90. withouten more respyt, without longer delay.

91. they fillen gruf, they fell flat with the face to the ground. In M. E. we find the phrase to fall grovelinges, or to fall groveling.

96. Him thoughte, it seemed to him; cf. methinks, it seemed to me. In M. E. the verbs like, list, seem, rue (pity), are used impersonally, and take the dative case of the pronoun. Cf. the modern expression 'if you please' if it be pleasing to you.

97. mat, dejected. 'Ententyfly, not feynt, wery ne mate.'-Hardyng,

p. 129.