תמונות בעמוד
PDF
ePub

and purple tunic. Whoever steals any of these ornaments, is to be punished with an ignominious death.

This story is copied by Gower, in the CONFESSIO AMANTIS: but he has altered some of the circumstances. He supposes

a statue of Apollo.

Of plate of golde a berde he hadde,
The wiche his brest all ovir spradde:
Of golde also, without fayle,

His mantell was, of large entayle,
Besette with perrey all aboute:

Forth ryght he straught his fynger oute,
Upon the whiche he had a rynge,
To seen it was a ryche thynge,
A fyne carbuncle for the nones

Moste precious of all stones".

In the sequel, Gower follows the substance of our author.

[ocr errors]

CHAP. X. Vespasian marries a wife in a distant country, who refuses to return home with him, and yet declares she will kill herself if he goes. The emperor ordered two rings to be made, of a wonderous efficacy; one of which, in the stone, has the image of Oblivion, the other the image of Memory: the ring of Oblivion he gave to the empress, and returned home with the ring of Memory.

CHAP. XI. The queen of the south sends her daughter to king Alexander, to be his concubine. She was exceedingly beautiful, but had been nourished with poison from her birth. Alexander's master, Aristotle, whose sagacity nothing could escape, knowing this, entreated, that before she was admitted to the king's bed, a malefactor condemned to death might be sent for, who should give her a kiss, in the presence of the king. The malefactor, on kissing her, instantly dropped down dead. Aristotle, having explained his reasons for what he had done, was loaded with honours by the king, and the princess was dismissed to her mother.

[merged small][ocr errors]

This story is founded on the twenty-eighth chapter of Aristotle's SECRETUM SECRETORUM: in which, a queen of India is said to have treacherously sent to Alexander, among other costly presents, the pretended testimonies of her friendship, a girl of exquisite beauty, who having been fed with serpents from her infancy, partook of their nature'. If I recollect right, in Pliny there are accounts of nations whose natural food was poison. Mithridates, king of Pontus, the land of venomous herbs, and the country of the sorceress Medea, was supposed to eat poison. Sir John Maundeville's Travels, I believe, will afford other instances.

CHAP. xii. A profligate priest, in the reign of the emperor Otto, or Otho, walking in the fields, and neglecting to say mass, is reformed by a vision of a comely old man.

CHAP. xiii. An empress having lost her husband, becomes so dotingly fond of her only son, then three years of age, as not to bear his absence for a moment. They sleep together every night, and when he was eighteen years of age, she proves with child by him. She murthers the infant, and her left hand is immediately marked with four circles of blood. Her repentance is related, in consequence of a vision of the holy virgin. This story is in the SPECULUM HISTORIALE of Vincent of Beauvais, who wrote about the year 12502.

CHAP. XIV. Under the reign of the emperor Dorotheus, a remarkable example of the filial piety of a young man, who redeems his father, a knight, from captivity.

CHAP. XV. Eufemian, a nobleman in the court of the emperor of Rome, is attended by three thousand servants girt with golden belts, and clothed in silken vestments. His house

scarce, he translated it into Latin.

This printed copy does not exactly correspond with MS. BODL. 495. membr. 4to. In the last, Alexander's miraculous horn is mentioned at fol. 45. b. In the former, in ch. lxxii. The dedication is the same in both.

Y [See p. 136.] This I now cite from a Latin translation, without date, but evidently printed before 1500. It is dedicated to Guido Vere de Valencia, bishop of Tripoly, by his most humble Clerk, Philippus: who says, that he found this treatise in Arabic at Antioch, quo carebant Latini, and that therefore, and because the Arabic copies were Ven.

Lib. vii. cap. 93. seq. f. 86. b. edit.

was crouded with pilgrims, orphans, and widows, for whom three tables were kept every day. He has a son, Allexius; who quits his father's palace, and lives unknown seventeen years in a monastery in Syria. He then returns, and lives seventeen years undiscovered as a pilgrim in his father's family, where he suffers many indignities from the servants.

Allexius, or Alexis, was canonised. The story is taken from his Legend. In the metrical Lives of the Saints, his life is told in a sort of measure different from that of the rest, and not very common in the earlier stages of our poetry. It begins thus. Lesteneth alle and herkeneth me,

Zonge and olde, bonde and fre,
And ich zow telle sone,

How a zought man, gent and fre,
By gan this worldis wele to fle,
Y born he was in Rome.

In Rome was a dozty man
That was y cleped Eufemian,

Man of moche myzte;

Gold and seluer he hadde ynouz,

Hall and boures, oxse and plouz,

And swith wel it dyzte.

When Alexius returns home in disguise, and asks his father about his son, the father's feelings are thus described.

So sone so he spake of his sone,
The guode man, as was his wone,
Gan to sike soreb;

His herte fel so colde so ston,
The teres felle to his tond,

On her berd hore.

At his burial, many miracles are wrought on the sick.

With mochel sizte, and mochel song,

That holy cors, hem alle among,

Bischoppis to cherche bere.

b

See Caxton, GOLD. LEG. f. ccclxiii. b. sigh.

c felt.

d feet.

*sighs.

Amyddes rizt the heze strete,
So moche folke hym gone mete
That they resten a stonde,
All the sike that to him come,
I heled wer swithe sone

Of feth and eke of honde:

The blinde come to hare1 sizt,
The croked gonne sone rizt*,
The lame for to go:
That dombe wer fonge' speeche,
Thez heredem God the sothe leche",
And that halwe also.

The day zede and drouz to nyzt,
No lenger dweller they ne myzt,

To cherche they moste wende;
The bellen they gonne to rynge,
The clerkes heze to synge,
Everich in his ende".

Tho the corse to cherche com
Glad they wer everichon

That there ycure wer,

The pope and the emperour
By fore an auter of seynt Savour
Ther sette they the bere.

Aboute the bere was moche lizt
With proude palle was bedizt,
I beten al with goldes.

The history of saint Alexius is told entirely in the same words in the GESTA ROMANORUM, and in the LEGENDA Au

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

REA of Jacobus de Voragine', translated, through a French medium, by Caxton. This work of Jacobus does not consist solely of the legends of the saints, but is interspersed with multis aliis pulcherrimis et peregrinis historiis, with many other most beautiful and strange histories v.

CHAP. XVI. A Roman emperor in digging for the foundation of a new palace, finds a golden sarcophagus, or coffin, inscribed with mysterious words and sentences. Which being explained, prove to be so many moral lessons of instruction for the emperor's future conduct.

CHAP. Xvii. A poor man named Guido, engages to serve an emperor of Rome in six several capacities, or employments. One of these services is, to show the best way to the holy land. Acquitting himself in all with singular address and fidelity, he is made a knight, and loaded with riches.

CHAP. Xviii. A knight named Julian is hunting a stag, who turns and says, "You will kill your father and mother." On this he went into a distant country, where he married a rich lady of a castle. Julian's father and mother travelled into various lands to find their son, and at length accidentally came to this castle, in his absence; where telling their story to the lady, who had heard it from her husband, she discovered who they were, and gave them her own bed to sleep in. Early in the morning, while she was at mass in the chapel, her husband Julian unexpectedly returned; and entering his wife's chamber, perceived two persons in the bed, whom he immediately slew with his sword, hastily supposing them to be his wife and her adulterer. At leaving the chamber, he met his wife coming from the chapel; and with great astonishment asked her, who the persons were sleeping in her bed? She answered, "They are your parents, who have been seeking you so long, and whom I have honoured with a place in our own bed." After

HYSTOR. lxxxix. f. clviii. edit. 1479. fol. And in Vincent of Beauvais, who

quotes GESTA ALLEXII. SPECUL. HIST. Lib. xviii. cap. 43. seq. f. 241. b.

In the Colophon.

« הקודםהמשך »