Syr Tergaunte, that nobyll knyzt,
He prefented the emperour ryzt,

And fette hym on hys kne*,
Wyth that cloth rychyly dyght;
Full of ftones thar hyt was pyght,
As thykke as hyt myght be :

Off topaze and of rubyes,
And other ftones of myche prys,
That femely wer to fe;

Of crapoutes and nakette,

As thykhe as they fette,

For fothe as y fay the '.
The cloth was dyfplayed fone:
The emperour loked thar upone
And myght hyt" not se;

For glyfterynge of the ryche ftone,
Redy fyght had he non,

be?

And fayde, how may this be

The emperour fayde on hygh,

Sertes", thys is a fayry °,

Or ellys a vanyte.

The kyng of Cyfyle answered than,
So ryche a jewell ys ther non

In all cryftyante.

The amerayles dowzter of hethenes
Made thys cloth, withouten lees',

Gloucefter. Hence, by corruption the word ADMIRAL, and in a restricted fenfe, for the commander of a fleet: which Milton, who knew the original, in that sense writes AMMIRAL. PARAD. L. i. 294. Dufrefne thinks, that our naval Amiral, i. e. Admiral, came from the crufades, where the Chriftians heard it used by the Saracens (in confequence of its general fignification) for the title of the leader of their fleets: and that from the Mediterranean states it was propagated over Europe.

Lying.

And

And wrozte hyt all wyth pryde;
And portreyed hyt wyth grete honour,
With ryche golde and afour',

And stones on ylka fyde.

And as the story telles yn honde,

The ftones that on this cloth ftonde
Sowzt" they wer full wyde:
Seven wynter hyt was yn makynge,
Or hyt was browght to endynge,
In hert ys not to hyde.

In that on korner made was

YDOYNE and AMADAS".

Wyth love that was so trewe;

For they loveden hem wyth honour,
Portreyed they wer wyth trewe love flour
Of stones bryght of hewe.

Wyth carbunkull, and fafere,
Kalfydonys, and onyx fo clere,
Sette in golde newe;
Deamondes and rubyes,

And othyr ftones of mychyll pryse,
And menftrellys wyth her gle".
In that othyr korner was dyght
TRYSTRAM and ISOWDE fo bryzt",
That femely wer to se;

And for they loved hem ryght,
As full of stones ar they dyght,
As thykke as they may be.-

On one corner, or fide, was embroidered the hiftory of Idonia and Amadas. For their Romance, fee fupr. vol. ii. p. 24.

In the thrydde korner wyth grete honour
Was FLORYS and BLAUNCHEFLOUR

As love was hem betwene,

For they loved wyth honour,

Portrayed they wer with trewe loveflour,
With ftones bryzht and shene..

In the fourth korner was oon

Of Babylone the fowdans fonn,

The amerayles dowzter hym by:
For hys fake the cloth was wrowght,
She loved hym in hert and thowght,
As teftymoyneth thys ftorye.
The fayr mayden her byforn,
Was portrayed an unikorn,
Wyth hys horn fo hye;
Flowres and bryddes on ylka syde,
Wyth ftones that wer fowght wyde,
Stuffed wyth ymagerye.

d

When the cloth to ende was wrowght,
To the Sowdan fone hyt was browzt,
That femely was of syzte;

My fadyr was a nobyll man,

Of the Sowdan he hyt wan

Wyth mayftrye and wyth myzte.

Chaucer fays in the ROMAUNT OF THE ROSE, that RICHESSE wore a robe of purple, which,

And purtraied in the ribaninges

Of DUKIS STORIES and of KINGES .

And, in the original,

Portraictes y furent d'orfroys

Hyftoryes d'empereurs et roys".

CHAP. clxxix. Cefarius, faint Bafil, the Gospel, Boethius, and Ovid, are quoted to fhew the deteftable guilt of gluttony and ebriety.

Cefarius, I fuppofe, is a Ciftercian monk of the thirteenth century; who, befide voluminous Lives, Chronicles, and Homilies, wrote twelve Books on the Miracles, Vifions, and Examples, of his own age. But there is another and an older monkish writer of the fame name. In the British Museum, there is a narrative taken from Cefarius, in old northern English, of a lady deceived by the fiends, or the devil, through the pride of rich clothing".

CHAP. clxxx. Paul, the hiftorian of the Longobards, is cited, for the fidelity of the knight Onulphus.

CHAP. clxxxi. The fagacity of a lion.

This is the last chapter in the edition of 1488.

Manufcript copies of the GESTA ROMANORUM are very numerous i. A proof of the popularity of the work. There are two in the British Museum; which, I think, contain, each one hundred and two chapters. But although the printed copies have one hundred and eighty-one ftories or chapters, there are many in the manufcripts which do not appear in the editions. The story of the CASKETTS, one of the principal incidents in Shakespeare's MERCHANT OF VENICE, is in one of the manuscripts of the Museum'. This story, however, is in

1 Viz. CHAP. xcix. fol. 78. b. MSS. HARL. 2270. In the CLERICALIS DISCIPLINA of Alphonfus, there is a narrative of a king who kept a FABULATOR, or ftory-teller, to lull him to fleep every

an old English translation printed by Wynkyn de Worde, without date; from which, or more probably from another edition printed in 1577, and entitled A RECORD OF ANCIENT HYSTORYES in Latin GESTA ROMANORUM, corrected and bettered, Shakespeare borrowed it. The story of the BOND in the fame play, which Shakespeare perhaps took from a translation of the PECORONE of Ser Florentino Giovanni ", makes the fortyeighth chapter of the last-mentioned manufcript". Giovanni flourished about the year 1378°. The tale of Gower's FLORENT, which refembles Chaucer's WIFE OF BATH, occurs in fome of the manufcripts of this work. The fame may be faid of a tale by Occleve, never printed; concerning the chafte confort of the emperor Gerelaus, who is abused by his steward, in his absence. This is the firft ftanza. A larger fpecimen fhall appear in its place.

In Roman Actis writen is thus,
Somtime an emperour in the citee
Of Rome regned, clept Gerelaus,
Wich his noble aftate and his dignite
Governed wifely, and weddiḍ had he
The douztir of the kyng of Vngrye,
A faire lady to every mannes ye.

At the end is the MORALISATION in profe1.

night. The king on fome occafion being feized with an unusual difquietude of mind, ordered his FABULATOR to tell him longer ftories, for that otherwise he could not fall asleep. The FABULATOR begins a longer ftory, but in the midft falls afleep himself, &c. I think I have feen this tale in fome manufcript of the GESTA ROMANORUM.

GIORN. iv. Nov. 5. In Vincent of Beauvais, there is a ftory of a bond between a Christian and a Jew; in which the former uses a deception which occafions the converfion of the latter. HIST. SPECUL. fol. 181. a. edit. ut fupr. Jews, yet under heavy reftrictions, were origi nally tolerated in the Christian kingdoms

of the dark ages, for the purpose of borrowing money, with which they supplied the exigencies of the ftate, and of merchants, or others, on the most lucrative ufurious contracts.

n Fol. 43. a. In this ftory MAGISTER VIRGILIUS, or Virgil the cunning man, is confulted.

• See Johnson's and Steevens's SHAKESPEARE, iii. p. 247. edit. ult. And Tyrwhitt's CHAUCER, iv. p. 332. 334.

P CONFESS. AMANT. Lib. i. f. xv. b. See fupr. vol. ii. p. 31.

9 MSS. SELD. Sup. 53. Bibl. Bodl. De quadam bona et nobili Imperatrice. It is introduced with "A Tale the which I in "the Roman dedis, &c." Viz. MSS. LAUD. 1 2 ibid.