MEETING OF THE PILGRIMS. EXTRACTS FROM THE PROLOGUE TO THE CANTERBURY TALES. MEETING OF THE PILGRIMS. Whanné that April with his1 showers sote2 That them hath holpen when that they were sick. In Southwark, at the Tabard18 as I lay 1 April is masculine by classical analogy; feminine in modern poetry. 3 2 Sote or swote, sweet; o and e are very frequently interchangeable in English etymology, as break, broke; wear, wore; float, fleet. 3 Such moisture: swiche, swilk, analogous to which, whilk, etc. 4 A height covered with trees (Tooke); a grove. The eor i of the plural in old poetry is always sounded when the verse requires it, 7 Y is the old English prefix of the past participle; Saxon and German ge. 12 Pilgrims returned from the Holy Land, so called from bearing palm branches. 13 The old form of this and similar words is strond, hond, lond, etc. Spencer, in his imitation of the obsolete dialect, uses this form. 14 Far-off holies or shrines. 15 Known, celebrated; p. part. of cunnan (Sax.), to know, to be able; the cognate words are, can, could, cunning, con, ken, know. The ideas, knowledge, power, sight, are in languages often denoted by words of the same origin. 16 We retain the past tense went in the verb go. 18 Now the "Talbot;" tabard is a herald's coat. 17 St. Thomas à Becket. 19 Singular verbs were anciently often used with plural nominatives; "There is tears for his love."-Shaksp. Jul. Cæs. 20 Chance, Fr. those springs On chaliced flowers that lies.-Id. Cymbeline. 21 Met. That toward Canterbury wolden ride. THE KNIGHT AND THE SQUIRE. A knight there was, and that a worthy man, Truth, and honòur, freedom,3 and courtesy. At Alisandre" he was when it was won ; In Lettowe had he reyséd, and in Russe, When they were won; and in the Greaté Sea1 At mortal battles had he been fifteen, And foughten for our faith at Tramicene,15, 1 At the. 2 From, retained in to and fro, and in froward. A Fer, adv. (Sax.) far; comp. ferre, farther. 19 3 Liberality. 5 Alexandria was captured by Pierre de Lusignan, King of Cyprus, in 1365. Been set at the head of the table as the place of honour. 7 Service in Prussia with the Teutonic knights against the heathens of the Baltic countries formed a school of training for military men in these ages. 8 Lithuania. Travelled, (German, reise, a journey). 10 Grenada. 11 Algeciras, in Andalusia, west of Gibraltar, taken from the Moorish king of Grenada in 1344. 12 Supposed to be in Africa. 13 Layas in Armenia, and Satalia (ancient Attalia) in Caramania, were captured, the former in 1367, the latter 1352, by Pierre de Lusignan of Cyprus. 14 The Mediterranean. 15 Or Tlemecen, the western province of Algiers: its chief town of the same name was formerly a great city, the capital of an independent kingdom. It is said to contain many Roman remains. 16 The enclosure for tournaments and judicial combats. 17 Same; retained in the Scottish dialect. 18 In Anatolia among the ruins of Miletus. 19 Praise. 22 :0 As well as. 21 Of esteem in arms. 'Anything unbecoming a gentleman."-(Tyrwhitt.) Villain, a peasant, a Double negatives form a common idiom in old English. feudal serf. THE KNIGHT AND THE SQUIRE. In all his life, unto no manner wight. * * * * With him there was his son, a youngé Squire, With lockés crull, as they were laid in press. And wonderly deliver3 and great of strength; Embroidered was he, as it were a mead Short was his gown, with sleevés long and wide; He couldé songés well make, and indite,“ Joust, and eke dance, and well pourtray and write. He slept no more than doth the nightingale. THE FRANKLIN. A Frankélin1 was in this company. Well loved he by the morrow a sop in wine. For he was Epicurus' owén son,12 1 High born. 2 Curled. 5 3 Active, nimble. (Fr.) ↑ Military service; (Fr. cheval, a horse): chevauchée signifies in French judges' circuit. Elegantly: fair in its modern application implies mediocrity. Indite, to write ("what the muse or mind may dictate"); to dictate. The form indict seems now restricted to legal accusation. (Lat. indicium, accusation.) For the origin and application of indiction see Gibbon, Roman Empire, chap. xvii. To tilt in the tournament: some connect the term with the word justle; some with the Latin preposition juxta; others with justa, the Roman funeral rites, because combats formed a part of the ceremony. (Fr. jouster; Ital. giostrare.) Nightime: the termination tale seems to be the German word theil, a part, a deal. This was part of the duty of a squire, who fulfilled for his master many of the offices now reckoned menial, as well as equipping him for the field, and rendering him assistance there or in the tournament. "There is exquisite beauty in offices like these, not the growth of servitude, not rendered with unwillingness or constraint, but the spontaneous acts of reverence and affection, performed by a servant of mind not less noble and free than that of his honoured and illustrious master."—Godwin, Life of Chaucer. 10 From frank, free; a proprietor who held his lands free of feudal services or payments. 11 The daisy. Day's eye is the alleged etymology. 12 Comp. Horace, Epist. i. 4, 16. Who held opinion that plain delight An householder, and that a great was he: His bread, his ale, was always after one ;3 At sessions, there was he lord and sire, 1 Fr. parfait; this is always the form in Chaucer. 2 St. Julian is the patron saint of travellers. The Franklin is so hospitable he may be called the St. Julian of his country. 3 Alike in excellence and abundance. At one, in agreement: to atone, to set at one; to reconcile: hence to compensate for faults. 4 Furnished with wine. 5 This form is still used in Scottish poetry. With, from Anglo-Saxon withan, to join, signifies concomitancy; with, from wyrthen, to be, implies cause, instrumentality: within (be in), and without or withouten (be out), are formed from the latter. Were has the same origin; and worth, essence, hence value; worth is used in its original sense as an interjection: Wo worth the chace! wo worth the day! (Scott.) With, a willow twig, used for uniting or binding (Judges xvi. 8);-Withers, the joints of a horse's shoulders. According to. 7 A pike; from lupus (Lat.); the pike is the wolf of the waters. Horace, Sat. ii. 2, 31. Unless. It is alleged that there should be two words, but and bot; the former a preposition, from the Anglo-Saxon verb be-utan (to be out), implying exception or privation; the latter a conjunction from the verb botan (to add, to supply), denoting addition; in Scottish poetry but is still used for without Now thou'rt turned out for a' thy trouble But house or hald. (Burns.) In Wycliffe's version of the Scripture, but is used in many passages where the modern version uses and;-" But his disciples axiden him," etc., Luke viii. 9. But that, that fell among thorns," etc., Luke viii. 14. 9 "All sorts of instruments; of cookery, of war, of apparel."-(Tyrwhitt.) 10 Never moved, fixed. 11 Representative in parliament for the county. 12 A knife, usually worn at the girdle. 13 A purse. 14 Sometimes courtour. Warton takes this term to mean coroner; it is spelt also comptour (Fr. compteur), and may mean accountant or steward of the hundred to which he belonged. 15 Probably a middling landholder. THE PARSON. THE PARSON. A good man there was of religiön And such he was yproved often sithes.* Of his off'ring and eke of his substànce: This noble ensample to his sheep he yaf,— That first he wrought and afterward he taught ; And left his sheep accumbered in the mire, To seeken him a chanterie13 for souls, 7 1 "Skinner says from parischon, ecclesiastes; Barb. Lat. paræcianus, i. e., pastor of the parish. In low Latin it is persona, ecclesiæ rector, ruler or rector of the church. -persona, because by his person the church, which is an invisible body, is represented,' Blackstone." Richardson. 2 A scholar; the clergy being the only depositories of the arts of reading and writing in the dark ages. 3 Used adverbially. Times; German, seit, modern English, tide; also sith, sithence, since. Would he have been: analogous to methinks, meseems, "him listeth," etc The construction might perhaps be analysed into "he were to himself." Of the revenue received at the "offertory" in the service of the mass. 7 Sufficiency (French). 8 The farthest or most distant of his parishioners, great and small. 9 Gave. 1 Low, ignorant, unlearned; hence having the qualities that naturally spring from that condition. Acts xvii. 5. Hearne says, "the laity, laymen, the illiterate." 11 To become morally and religiously worse. 12 Exercise care in his office. 13 "An endowment for the payment of a priest to sing mass, agreeably to the appointment of the founder; there were 35 of these in St. Paul's." |