1561. The author introduces it as an additional Canterbury tale. After a fevere fickness, having a defign to visit the shrine of Thomas a Beckett at Canterbury, he arrives in that city while Chaucer's pilgrims were affembled there for the fame purpose; and by mere accident, not fufpecting to find fo numerous and refpectable a company, goes to their inn. There is some humour in our monk's travelling figure".

In a cope of black, and not of grene,
On a palfray, flender, long, and lene,
With rufty bridle, made not for the sale,
My man toforne with a void male ‘.

He fees, standing in the hall of the inn, the convivial host of the tabard, full of his own importance; who without the least introduction or hesitation thus addreffes our author, quite unprepared for fuch an abrupt falutation.

Dan Dominike, Dan Godfray, or Clement,

Ye be welcome newly into Kent;

Though your bridle have neither boss, ne bell,
Befeching you that you will tell,

Firft of your name, &c.

That looke so pale, all devoid of blood,

Upon your head a wonder thredbare hood'.

Our hoft then invites him to fupper, and promises that he shall have, made according to his own directions, a large pudding, a round bagis, a French moile, or a phrase of eggs: adding, that he looked extremely lean for a monk, and must certainly have been sick, or else belong to a poor monastery:

Edit. 1687. fol. ad CALC. CHAUCER'S WORKS. pag. 623. col. 1. Prol.

• Portmanteau.

d See fupr. vol. i. p. 164. notes, h.
• Ibid.

that

that fome nut-brown ale after fupper will be of fervice, and that a quantity of the feed of annis, cummin, or coriander, taken before going to bed, will remove flatulencies. But above all, fays the hoft, chearful company will be your best physician. You fhall not only fup with me and my companions this evening, but return with us to-morrow to London; yet on condition, that you will fubmit to one of the indispensable rules of our fociety, which is to tell an entertaining story while we are travelling.

What, looke up, Monke! For by 'cockes blood,
Thou shall be mery, whofo that say nay;

For to-morrowe, anone as it is day,

And that it ginne in the east to dawe*,

Thou shall be bound to a newe lawe,
At going out of Canterbury toun,

And lien afide thy profeffioun ;

Thou shall not chefe ", nor thyfelf withdrawe,
If any mirth be found in thy mawe,
Like the custom of this company;

For none fo proude that dare me deny,
Knight, nor knave, chanon, priest, ne nonne,
To telle a tale plainely as they conne',
When I affigne, and fee time oportune;
And, for that we our purpose woll contune*,
We will homeward the fame cuftome ufe1.

Our monk, unable to withstand this profusion of kindness and festivity, accepts the hoft's invitation, and fups with the pilgrims. The next morning, as they are all riding from Canterbury to Ofpringe, the hoft reminds his friend DAN JOHN of what he had mentioned in the evening, and without farther ceremony calls for a story. Lydgate obeys

f God's. Dawn. h Chufe. i Can, or Know. Continue. Pag. 622. col. 2. feq. Vol. II. his

L

his commands, and recites the tragical deftruction of the city of Thebes". As the story is very long, a paufe is made in descending a very steep hill near the Thrope" of Broughton on the Blee; when our author, who was not furnished with that accommodation for knowing the time of the day, which modern improvements in fcience have given to the traveller, discovers by an accurate examination of his calendar, I fuppofe fome fort of graduated scale, in which the fun's horary progrefs along the equator was marked, that it is nine in the morning.

It has been faid, but without any authority or probability, that Chaucer firft wrote this story in a Latin narrative, which Lydgate afterwards translated into English verse. Our author's originals are Guido Colonna, Statius, and Seneca the tragedian". Nicholas Trevet, an Englishman, a Dominican friar of London, who flourished about the year 1330, has left a commentary on Seneca's tragedies: and he was so favorite a poet as to have been illustrated by Thomas Aquinas'. He was printed at Venice fo early as the year 1482. Lydgate in this poem often refers to myne auctor, who, I fuppofe, is either Statius, or Colonna'. He fometimes cites Boccacio's Latin tracts: particularly the GENEALOGIÆ DEORUM, a work which at the restoration of learning greatly contributed to familiarife the claffical ftories, De CASIBUS VIRORUM ILLUSTRIUM, the ground-work of the FALL OF PRINCES juft mentioned, and DE CLARIS MULIERIBUS,-in which pope Joan is one of the heroines'. From the first, he has taken the ftory of Amphion building the

walls of Thebes by the help of Mercury's harp, and the interpretation of that fable, together with the " fictions about Lycurgus king of Thrace". From the fecond, as I recollect, the accoutrements of Polymites and from the third, part of the tale of Ifophile'. He also characterises Boccacio for a talent, by which he is not now fo generally known, for his poetry; and ftyles him, among poetes in "Itaile ftalled"." But Boccacio's THESEID was yet in vogue. He fays, that when Oedipus was married, none of the Mufes were prefent, as they were at the wedding of SAPIENCE With ELOQUENCE, defcribed by that poet whilom fo fage, Matrician inamed de Capella. This is Marcianus Mineus Felix de Capella, who lived about the year 470, and whose Latin profaico-metrical work, de Nuptiis Philologiæ et Mercurii, in two books, an introduction to his feven books, or system, of the SEVEN SCIENCES, I have mentioned before: a writer highly extolled by Scotus Erigena, Peter of Blois, John of Salisbury, and other early authors in corrupt Latinity'; and of fuch eminent eftimation in the dark centuries, as to be taught in the feminaries of philological education as a claffic. Among the royal manufcripts in the British mufeum, a manufcript occurs written about the eleventh century, which is a commentary on these nine books of Capella,

Lydgate fays, that this was the fame Lycurgus who came as an ally with Palamon to Athens againft his brother Arcite, drawn by four white bulls, and crowned with a wreath of gold. Pag. 650. col. 2. See KN. TALE, Urry's Ch. p. 17. v. 2131. feq. col. 1. Our author exprefsly

refers to Chaucer's KNIGHT'S TALE about Thefeus, and with fome addrefs, "As ye have before heard it related in "paffing through Deptford, &c." pag. 568. col. 1.

W

Pag. 623. col. 2. 624. col. 1. 651. col. 1.

* Pag. 634. col. 2.

compiled by Duncant an Irish bishop', and given to his scholars in the monaftery of faint Remigius". They were early tranflated into Latin leonine rhymes, and are often imitated by Saxo Grammaticus". Gregory of Tours has the vanity. to hope, that no readers will think his Latinity barbarous : not even thofe, who have refined their tafte, and enriched their understanding with a complete knowledge of every fpecies of literature, by studying attentively this treatise of Marcianus'. Alexander Necham, a learned abbot of Cirencester, and a voluminous Latin writer about the year 1210, wrote annotations on Marcianus, which are yet preferved. He was firft printed in the year 1499, and other editions appeared foon afterwards. This piece of Marcianus, dictated by the ideal philofophy of Plato, is supposed to have led the way to Boethius's celebrated CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY".

The marriage of SAPIENCE and ELOQUENCE, or Mercury and Philology, as defcribed by Marcianus, at which Clio and Calliope with all their fifters affifted, and from which DISCORD and SEDITION, the great enemies of literature, were excluded, is artfully introduced, and beautifully contrafted with that of Oedipus and Jocafta, which was celebrated by an affemblage of the most hideous beings.

f Leland fays he faw this work in the library of Worcester abbey. Coll. iii. P. 268.

& MSS. Reg. 15 A. xxxiii. Liber olim ·S. Remig. Studio Gifardi fcriptus. Labb. Bibl. Nov. Manufcr. p. 66. In imitation of the first part of this work, a Frenchman, Jo. Boræus, wrote NUPTIA JURISCONSULTI ET PHILOLOGIA, Parif. 1651. 4to.

Stephan. in Prolegomen. c. xix. And in the Notes, paffim. He is adduced by Fulgentius.

Hift. Fr. lib. x. ad calc. A manufcript of Marcianus, more than seven hun