Recompense, reward. ↩
Go. ↩
Doubt. ↩
Forbid. ↩
Mate. ↩
At all events. ↩
Raiment. ↩
Cheerfully. ↩
Naked. ↩
Dishonourable. ↩
That. ↩
Reward. ↩
Reward. ↩
Cover. ↩
With difficulty. ↩
Gone. ↩
Go. ↩
Dry. ↩
Formed, ordained. ↩
Had gratified his inclination. ↩
Disparagement. ↩
Dismiss, get rid of. ↩
To meet. ↩
Cause it to meet. ↩
Many; German, viel. ↩
To judge from. ↩
Spirit. ↩
Full. ↩
Particularly. ↩
Little. ↩
Unless it has lately come to pass. ↩
Arranged. ↩
Messenger. ↩
Innocent. ↩
Mind. ↩
Command. ↩
Greeted. ↩
What befits his condition. ↩
Pleasure. ↩
Poor to look on. ↩
In the quickest manner. ↩
Spirit. ↩
Cease. ↩
Arrange. ↩
Took all pains, used every exertion. ↩
Eventide, or afternoon; though by some undern is understood as dinnertime—9 a.m. ↩
So rich to behold. ↩
For the first time. ↩
Pleased. ↩
Think. ↩
Variable. ↩
A small coin of little value. ↩
Judgement. ↩
Proveth. ↩
Sedate. ↩
Ashamed. ↩
Torn. ↩
Cleverly, skilfully. ↩
Knew, understood how to do. ↩
Ceased. ↩
Thought. ↩
Faith. ↩
Me. “This is one of the most licentious corruptions of orthography,” says Tyrwhitt, “that I remember to have observed in Chaucer;” but such liberties were common among the European poets of his time, when there was an extreme lack of certainty in orthography. ↩
Although. ↩
Steadfast. ↩
Prepare, incline. ↩
Afraid nor displeased. ↩
Notice, heed. ↩
Awoke. ↩
Lost. ↩
Care. ↩
No matter for. ↩
Departs. ↩
Believed firmly. ↩
Caused you to be preserved. ↩
Instant. ↩
Fell. ↩
Firmly. ↩
Art. ↩
Pluck away, withdraw. ↩
Scarcely. ↩
Assuages. ↩
Astonished. ↩
Together. ↩
Saw. ↩
Firmament. ↩
Expense; sumptuousness. ↩
Although. ↩
Not to be denied. ↩
The fourteen lines that follow are translated almost literally from Petrarch’s Latin. ↩
Impossible; not to be borne. ↩
Goodwill. ↩
For it is most reasonable that He should prove or test that which he made. ↩
Doubt. ↩
Alloys. ↩
To view. ↩
Bend. ↩
Damage, pity. ↩
Chichevache, in old popular fable, was a monster that fed on good women, and was always very thin from scarcity of such food; a corresponding monster, Bycorne, fed only on obedient and kind husbands, and was always fat. The origin of the fable was French; but Lydgate has a ballad on the subject. Chichevache litterally means “niggardly” “greedy cow.” ↩
Counter-tally or counterfoil; something exactly corresponding. ↩
Befooled. ↩
Helm. ↩
Wives of rank. ↩
Camel. ↩
Forepart of a helmet, vizor. ↩
Advise. ↩
Submit, shrink. ↩
Linden, lime-tree. ↩
Though the manner in which the Merchant takes up the closing words of the Envoy to the “Clerk’s Tale,” and refers to the patience of Griselda, seems to prove beyond doubt that the order of the tales in the text is the right one, yet in some manuscripts of good authority the “Franklin’s Tale” follows the “Clerk’s,” and the “Envoy” is concluded by this stanza:—
“This worthy Clerk when ended was his tale,
Our Hoste said, and swore by cocke’s bones
‘Me lever were than a barrel of ale
My wife at home had heard this legend once;
This is a gentle tale for the nonce;
As, to my purpose, wiste ye my will.
But thing that will not be, let it be still.’ ”
In other manuscripts of less authority the Host proceeds, in two similar stanzas, to impose a “Tale” on the Franklin; but Tyrwhitt is probably right in setting them aside as spurious, and in admitting the genuineness of the first only, if it be supposed that Chaucer forgot to cancel it when he had decided on another mode of connecting the “Merchant’s” with the “Clerk’s Tale.” ↩
Believe. ↩
Thoroughly. ↩
So many I thrive! ↩
Again. ↩
Guard, forbid. ↩
Believe. ↩
Wickedness, shrewishness. ↩
If, as is
