Marmion

Derby might be more completely armed.”-JOHNES’ Froissart, vol. iv. p.597.

‘The crest and motto of Marmion are borrowed from the following story:-

Sir David de Lindsay, first Earl of Cranford, was, among other gentlemen of quality, attended, during a visit to London in 1390, by Sir William Dalzell, who was, according to my authority, Bower, not only excelling in wisdom, but also of a lively wit. Chancing to be at the Court, he there saw Sir Piers Conrtenay, an English knight, famous for skill in tilting, and for the beauty of his person, parading the palace, arrayed in a new mantle, bearing for device an embroidered falcon, with this rhyme,-

     “I bear a falcon, fairest of night, 
      Whoso pinches at her, his death is dight1 
                                      In graith2.” 

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                  1prepared.        2armour.

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‘The Scottish knight, being a wag, appeared next day in a dress exactly similar to that of Courtenay, but bearing a magpie instead of the falcon, with a motto ingeniously contrived to rhyme to the vaunting inscription of Sir Piers:-

     “I bear a pie picking at a piece, 
      Whoso picks at her, I shall pick at his nese3, 
                                           In faith.”

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                                 3nose

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‘This affront could only be expiated by a just with sharp lances. In the course, Dalzell left his helmet unlaced, so that it gave way at the touch of his antagonist’s lance, and he thus avoided the shock of the encounter. This happened twice:-in the third encounter, the handsome Courtenay lost two of his front teeth. As the Englishman complained bitterly of Dalzell’s fraud in not fastening his helmet, the Scottishman agreed to run six courses more, each champion staking in the hand of the King two hundred pounds, to be forfeited, if, on entering the lists, any unequal advantage should be detected. This being agreed to, the wily Scot demanded that Sir Piers, in addition to the loss of his teeth, should consent to the extinction of one of his eyes, he himself having lost an eye in the fight of Otterburn. As Courtenay demurred to this equalisation of optical powers, Dalzell demanded the forfeit; which, after much altercation, the King appointed to be paid to him, saying, he surpassed the English both in wit and valour. This must appear to the reader a singular specimen of the humour of that time. I suspect the Jockey Club would have given a different decision from Henry IV.’

lines 85-6. ‘The arms of Marmion would be Vairee, a fesse gules-a simple bearing, testifying to the antiquity of the race. The badge was An ape passant argent, ringed and chained with gold. The Marmions were the hereditary champions of England.  The office passed to the Dymokes, through marriage, in the reign of Edward III.’-’Notes and Queries,’ 7th S. III. 37.

Stanza VII. line 95. ‘The principal distinction between the independent esquire (terming him such who was attached to no knight’s service) and the knight was the spurs, which the esquire might wear of silver, but by no means gilded.’-Scott’s ‘Essay on Chivalry,’ p.64.

With the squire’s ‘courteous precepts’ compare those of Chaucer’s squire in the Prologue,-

     ‘He cowde songes make and wel endite, 
      Juste and eek daunce, and wel purtreye and write. 
                     . . .

      Curteys he was, lowely, and servysable, 
      And carf byforn his fader at the table.’

Stanza VIII. line 108. Him listed is an Early English form. Cp. Chaucer’s Prologue, 583,-

     ‘Or lyve as scarsly as hym list desire.’

In Elizabethan English, which retains many impersonal forms, list is mainly used as a personal verb, as in Much Ado, iii. 4,-