geons who fucceed in rotation abuse and reve se the practice of their colleagues without juft occafion. As a fpecimen. of the furgical department, the following may suffice, "I have been prefent," fays Dr. D. " at the furgical visit after two o'clock in the afternoon in fummer, when the furgeon was obliged to drefs the patients by candle-light. He faw the only window of the end of the ward open, and ordered it to be immediately fhut, adding, that he was no friend to fresh air for furgical patients. This philofopher is a native of Sicily." P. 113. The perufal of this unaffuming publication has afforded us fome ainufement. The author, we prefume, is a foreigner, and on this account we refrain from offering any animadverfion on his ftyle, which is diffuse, and in fome places confufed and incorrect. ART. VIII. Illuftrations of the Lives and Writings of Gower and Chaucer. Collected from Authentick Documents. By the Rev. Henry J. Todd, M. A. F. §. A. 8vo. 441 PP: 15s. Rivingtons, &c. 1810. TH HAT the fuccefsful editor of Milton and Spenfer, fhould extend his researches to the most famous of our ftill earlier poets, will be regarded by all perfons capable of judging, as a circumftance highly propitious to our national literature. The diligence of Mr. Todd, accompanied as it is with tafte, judgement and accuracy, and embellished by a modefty, which does not for fake him, even when he makes difcoveries, qualifies him in an eminent degree for critical researches; and the honourable circumstances that give him ready accefs to fome of the most remarkable collections, enable him at once to gratify his own literary propenfities, and to enlighten as well as amufe the public. The prefent volume of "Illuftrations" confifts of the following particulars. 1. The very interefting and valuable animadverfions of Mr. Francis Thynne, (an eminent Herald and Antiquary *) on the work of Chaucer; addreffed to his editor, Speght. This article is taken from a MS. preferved * Author of feveral learned difcourfes among thofe collected by Thomas Hearne. In Mr. Evans's Edition, 1773, are alfo No. 76, On Epitaphs; and Vol. II. No. 5, On the Office of High Steward. No. 23, On that of Earl Marshall, besides thofe mentioned by Mr. Todd. in in the Afhridge Collection, and now in the poffeffion of the Marquis of Stafford. In this curious document it appears clearly that Thynne attributed the Pilgrim's Tale to Chaucer *, which Mr. Tyrwhitt argued against receiving as his; and gave fufficient reafons for its omiffion. But it may fomething weaken the teftimony of Thynne, that he seems to confider the Plowman's Tale the genuine work of Chaucer, which modern critics have determined not to belong to him. He pofitively denies that it was the work of Sir Thomas Wyat, the elder, as fome had fuppofed. Thynne's paper confifts. alfo of Animadverfions on the Life of Chaucer, as given by Speght; and of explanations of difficult words, very different from thofe which had been offered by that editor. This paper is altogether extremely valuable. Of its curious contents, an idea will be formed from one or two fpeci mens. "IN THE TITLE OF CHAUCERS MARIAGE you faye, you cannot fynde the name of the Gentlewomanne whom he maryed. Trulye, yf I did followe the conceyte of others, I fhoulde fuppofe her name was Elizabethe, a way tinge womanne of Quene Philippe, wyfe to Edwarde the thirde and daughter to Willia erle of Henalte. But I favor not their opynyone. For, although I fynde a recorde of the pellis exitus, in the tyme of Edwarde the thirde, of a yerely ftypende to Elizabethe Chawcere, domicelle regine Philippe, whiche domicella dothe fignyfye one of her waytinge gentlewomen; yet I cannott for this tyme thinke this was his wyfe, but rather his fifter or kinf-womanne, who after the deathe of her myftreffe Quene Philippe did forfake the worlde, and became a nonne at Seinte Helens in London, accordinge as you have touched one of that profefsōne primo of kinge Richarde the feconde." P. 26. The following note of Mr. Thynne ftands in oppofition to an obfervation of Mr. Tyrwhitt on the fame paffage, but it by no means clears up the difficulty, for there is no reason to believe that Sir William Windfore was well enough known in France to be noticed by Guil, de Lorris. Mr. Tyrwhitt's note ftands at the end of his third volume in the 8vo. edition, p. 314. Thynne's is as follows. "Fo: 122. pa: 2. The lordes fonne of Windefore. Vppon these wordes you faye, this maye feme ftrange bothe in respecte that yt is not in the Frenche, as alfo for that there was no lorde of *It had been printed by W. Thynne the father of Francis, in an edition inferted for him in 1542, in one column. R$ 4 Windfore Windfore at thofe dayes. But yt femeth to me more ftrange that thefe wordes fhoulde feme ftrange to you, not to be in the Frenche, where you fhall fynde them. For thus hathe the Frenche written Romante, as maye appere in the old Frenche vfed at the tyme when the Romante was compofed, in this forte : Pris a Franchise lez alez Ne fai coment eft appelles, Fuiz au feigneur de Guindefores : Whiche is thus englished: Next to Franchife went a young bache ler, I knowe not howe he was called, he was fayre and gentle as yf be had byn fonne to the lorde of Windfore. Where in olde Frenche this word 'fuiz (vfed here as in manye places of that booke) is placed for that whiche we wryte and pronounce at this daye for filz or fitz, in Englishe fonne. And that it is here fo mente, you fhall fee in the Romante of the Rofe turned into profe, moralized by the French Molinet, and printed at Paris in the yere 1521, who hathe the fame verses in these wordes in profe: A Franchife s'eftoit prins un ieune bacheler de qui ne fcay le nome, fort bell, en fon temps filz du feigneure de Guindefore. Whiche you mighte have well feene, had you but remembered their orthographie, and that the Latyne, Italiane, Frenche, and Spanyfhe have no doble w as the Dutche, the Englifhe, and fuche as haue affyny tye with the Dutche; fince they vfe for doble (a letter comone to vs) these two letters gu, as in Gulielmus, which we wryte Willielmus; in guerra, which we call and write-warre; in Gualterus, which we write Walter; in guardeine, which we pronouce and write wardeyne; and fuche lyke; accordinge to whiche in the Frenche yt is GuindeJore for Windefore. For your other coniectures, why that Chaucer fhoulde inferte the lordes fon of Windefore, they are of no great momente; neque adhuc conftat that Chaucer tranflated the Ro mante, when Windfor Caftle was in buildinge. For then I fuppofe that Chaucer was but younge; whereon I will not ftande at this tyme, no more than I will that there was no lord Windfore in thofe dayes; although I fuppofe that Sir William Windfore, being then a worthye knighte and of great auctory tye in Englande and in partes beyond the feas vnder the kinge of Englande, mighte be lord Windfore, of whom the Frenche tooke notice, being in thofe partes, and by them called feigneure de Windefore, as euery gouernor was called feigneure emongst them. But whether he were a baron or no in Englande, I cannott yet faye; because Į haue not my booke of Somons of Barons to Parliament in my handes, at this inftante." P. 72. Chaucer certainly wrote, But faire he was, of gode height, The lord'is fonne of Windefore. Romaunt of the Rofe.” His His translation makes it probable, indeed, that in the old copies of the French the lines ftood as Thynne reprefents them, but in the prefent modern editions there is no trace of thefe words; nor are they noticed in the Variantes to Du Frefnoy's fupplement. At prefent the lines ftand thus, "Bel fut, gent, et de bel arroy, Il fembloit etre filz de Roy," If this filz de Roy is a fubftitute for the "Lordis fonne of Windefore," or as Thynne has it, "Fuiz au feigneur de Guindefores," it fhould imply the fon of one of our kings, and though Lorris died in 1260, which was before Edward the third was born, who built the prefent caftle, yet as there had been a royal caffle there from the time of the Conqueror, the Lord of Windfor might ftill mean the king of England. As there are fine MSS. of the French Romaunt de la Rofe in this country, and particularly in the British Museum*, it may be worth while to examine how the paffage is written there. It occurs at the 1225th line of the poem. 2. The fecond article of the Illuftrations contains only. the Will of Gower, and a deed to which a name which is thought to be his, ftands as a witnefs. But the former proves that Gower lived to the latter end of the year 1408; and the other makes it probable that he was of the family of the Gowers of Sitenham in Yorkshire, from which the Marquis of Stafford's family alfo defcends, Gower's Will had been, published before, in Gough's Sepulchral Monuments, which makes it extraordinary that the latest biographers had perfifted in making him die in 1402 or 3. But the enquirers into early poetry, and the examiners of fuch a work as the "Sepulchral Monuments," are often very different persons. It appears alfo, from the Will, that Gower was rich, according to the estimate of thofe times, 3. Mr. Todd next gives an account of fome of the most remarkable manufcripts of Gower and Chaucer. The firft of thefe is a moft curious MS. in the poffeffion of the Marquis of Stafford, defcribed alfo by Warton, containing. French Balades and fmaller Poems," by the Poet Gower. Mr. Todd, who has carefully re-examined the MS., gives material additions and corrections to Warton's account. The cinquante balades or French fonnets, in this manufcript, *See Harl. Cat. 4425, Vol. III. have not been found in any other. They were noticed alfo, and fome of them printed by Mr. Ellis, in his Specimens: but they are here given more correctly from a fresh collation of the original. Other valuable manufcripts of Gower and Chaucer are recorded as being in the collection of the Marquis of Stafford; particularly a beautiful one of the Canterbury Tales, defcribed at p. 128-132. The MS. of the Canterbury Tales, which is mentioned in p. 127, as being in the Cathedral Library at Lichfield, is handsome and valuable. It is written in a kind of Gothic hand, on 292 leaves of vellum, with only one chafm of a fingle leaf unfupplied, and two others of the fame extent fupplied in an old but later and bad hand. The initial letters. at the beginning of each tale are illuminated with a good deal of elegance, and other initials more or lefs, with colour and gilding. The th is expreffed throughout by the Saxon character þ, and you is written ou. It is certainly of the 15th century, and very well preferved. The Tales ftond much in the fame order as in the fine copy of the Stafford collection. 4. Contains fome extracts from the Confeffio Amantis of Gower; with fome curious evidences relating to the subject of the old romances, taken from the manufcript libraries of the Archbishop of Canterbury at Lambeth, and of the Marquis of Stafford. In the correfponding part of the introduction, the priority of Gower to Chaucer, in point of time is clearly eftablifhed by teftimony. 5. Confifts of extracts from Chaucer's poetry, with notes upon them, partly extracted from Warton, Tyrwhitt, and others, and partly fupplied by the editor himself. The specimens here given are the Prologue to the Canterbury Tales, and the poem of the Flower and the Leaf, exhibiting the talents of the old poet in two very different points of view. Here alfo the editor has defcribed the figure of each pilgrim, as represented in the illuminated MS. belonging to the Marquis of Stafford; from which alfo is taken the portrait of Chaucer, which is here engraved, and ftands oppofite to the title page."The Floure and the Leafe," fays Mr. Todd, "I have selected on account of its fubferviency to the illuftration of Gower as well as Chaucer, and because it exhibits the powers of the latter, in defcriptions of a very different kind from what we have been confidering: I mean rural objects and allegorical characters." The connection of the Floure and the Leafe with the poetry of Gower is this, that it has been certainly imitated by him, in the fourth book of his Confeffio Amantis. This difcovery was made by Warton, whose |