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two. The former is the association of these two works in Chaucer's lines to Adam

'Adam scriveyn, if ever it thee befalle

Boece or Troilus to wryten newe.

Ch. Minor Poems, ed. Skeat, p. 117.

And the latter is the fact that Chaucer inserts in Troilus (book iv. stanzas 134-148, ed. Morris) a long passage on predestination and free-will, taken from Boethius, book v. proses 2, 3; which he would appear to have still fresh in his mind. It is probable that his Boethius preceded Troilus almost immediately; indeed, it is conceivable that, for a short season, both may have been in hand at the same time.

There is also a close connection between Troilus and the House of Fame, the latter of which shows the influence of Dante so strongly, that it is reasonable to suppose that it is the very poem to which Lydgate gave the name of 'Dante in English '; see Introd. to Minor Poems, p. xii. This connection will appear from comparing Troil. v. stt. 52-55 with Ho. Fame, 2–54; and Troil. i. st. 74 with Ho. Fame, 639, 640. See Ten Brink, Studien, p. 121. It would seem that the House of Fame followed Troilus almost immediately. At the same time, we cannot put the date of the House of Fame later than 1384, because of Chaucer's complaint in it of the hardship of his official duties, from much of which he was released (as we shall see) early in 1385. Further, the 10th of December is especially mentioned as being the date on which the House of Fame was commenced (1. 111), the year being probably 1383 (see note to that line).

It would appear, further, that the Legend was begun soon after the House of Fame was suddenly abandoned, in the very middle of a sentence. That it was written later than Troilus and the House of Fame is obvious, from the mention of these poems in the Prologue; ll. 332, 417, 441 (pp. 26, 33, 34). That it was written at no great interval after Troilus appears from the fact that, even while writing Troilus, Chaucer had already been meditating upon the goodness of Alcestis, of which the Prologue to the Legend says so much. Observe the following passages

(cited by Ten Brink, Studien, p. 120) from Troilus, bk. v. stt. 220, 255

'As wel thou mightest lyen on Alceste
That was of creatures-but men lye-
That ever were, the kyndest and the beste;
For whan her husband was in Iupartye

To dye himself, but-if she wolde dye,
She chees for him to dye and go to helle,
And starf anon, as us the bokes telle.

Beseching every lady bright of hewe
And every gentil womman, what she be,
That, al be that Criseyde was untrewe,

That for that gilt she be not wroth with me.

Ye may her gilt in otheres bokes see,

And gladlier I wol wryten, if yow leste,

[Of] Pénelópes trouthe, and good Alceste.'

There is also a striking similarity between the argument in Troilus, bk. iv. st. 3 [bk. iii. st. 256, ed. Morris], and II. 369-372 (B-text) of the Prologue to the Legend. The stanza runs thus :— 'For how Criseyde Troilus forsook

Or, at the leste, how that she was unkynde,
Mot hennes-forth be matere of my book,
As wryten folk thorugh whiche it is in mynde.
Allas! that they shulde ever cause fynde

To speke her harm; and, if they on her lye,
Y-wis, hem-self shulde han the vilanye.'

I will here also note the fact that the first line of the above stanza is quoted, almost unaltered, in the earlier version of the Prologue, viz. at 1. 265 of the A-text, on p. 26.

From the above considerations we may already infer that the House of Fame was begun, probably, in December, 1383, and continued in 1384; and that the Legend of Good Women, which almost immediately succeeded it, may be dated about 1384 or 1385; certainly after 1382, when King Richard was first married. But now that we have come so near to the date, it is possible to come still nearer; for it can hardly be doubted

1 Or bk. v. stt. 219, 254 in Dr. Furnivall's print of the MSS., from which my quotation is taken.

that the extremely grateful way in which Chaucer speaks of the queen may fairly be connected with the stroke of good fortune which happened to him just at this very period. In the House of Fame we find him groaning about the troublesomeness of his official duties, and the one object of his life, just then, was to obtain greater leisure, especially if it could be had without serious loss of income. Now we know that, on the 17th of February, 1385, he obtained the indulgence of being allowed to nominate a permanent deputy for his Controllership of the Customs and Subsidies; see Life of Chaucer (Aldine edition, i. 33), and Furnivall's Trial Forewords to the Minor Poems, p. 25. If with our knowledge of this fact we combine these considerations, viz. that Chaucer expresses himself gratefully to the queen, that he says nothing more of his troublesome duties, and that Richard II. is known to have been a patron of letters (as we learn from Gower), we may well conclude that the poet's release from his burden was brought about by the queen's intercession with the king on his behalf. We may here notice Lydgate's remarks in the following stanza, which occurs in the prologue to the Fall of Princes 1:

This poete wrote, at the request of the quene,

A Legende, of perfite holynesse,

Of Good Women, to fynd out nynetene
That did excell in bounte and fayrenes;
But for his labour and besinesse
Was importable, his wittes to encombre,

In all this world to fynd so gret a nombre2'

Lydgate can hardly be correct in his statement that Chaucer wrote 'at the request' of the queen; for, had the latter done so, he would have let us know it. Still, he has seized the right idea, viz. that the queen was, so to speak, the moving cause which effected the production of the poem.

It is further much to the point to observe that Chaucer's state

1 It is the stanza next following the last quoted at p. xi of my Introduction to the Minor Poems. I quote it from the Aldine edition of Chaucer, ed. Morris, i. 80.

2 Of course Lydgate knew the work was unfinished; so he offers a humorous excuse for its incompleteness.

of delightful freedom did not last long. Perhaps he somewhat abused his privilege, for we know that on Dec. 4, 1386, he lost his Controllership of the Customs and Subsidies; and, only ten days later, also lost his Controllership of the Petty Customs. This looks very much as if something went wrong, though we do not certainly know that the fault was his own.

On the whole we may interpret ll. 496, 7 (p. 37), viz.—

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And whan this book is maad, yive hit the quene,

On my behalfe, at Eltham1 or at Shene,'

as giving us a date but little later than Feb. 17, 1385, and certainly before Dec. 4, 1386. The mention of the month of May in ll. 36, 45, 108, 176, is probably conventional; still, the other frequent references to spring-time, as in ll. 40-66, 130– 147, 171-174, 206, &c., may mean something; and in particular we may note the reference to St. Valentine's day as being past, in ll. 145, 146; seeing that chees (chose) occurs in the past tense. We can hardly resist the conviction that the right date of the Prologue is the spring of 1385, which satisfies every condition.

THE TWO FORMS OF THE PROLOGUE.

So far, I have kept out of view the important fact, that the Prologue exists in two distinct forms, viz. an earlier and a revised form. The lines in which 'the queen' is expressly mentioned occur in the later version only, so that some of the above arguments really relate to that alone. But it makes no great difference, as there is no reason to suppose that there was any appreciable lapse of time between the two versions.

In order to save words, I shall call the earlier version the A-text, and the later one the B-text. The manner of printing these texts is explained at p. 1. I print the B-text in full, in the lower half of the page. The A-text is given in the upper half of the same, but I have frequently left out unaltered passages in order to save space, giving due notice (as at p. 2), and keeping the right numbering of the lines throughout. Lines which

1 In December, 1384, Richard II. held his Christmas' at Eltham (Fabyan).

appear in one text only are marked with an asterisk (*); those which stand exactly the same in both texts are either omitted in A, or marked with a dagger (†); whilst the unmarked lines are such as occur in both texts, but with some slight alteration. By way of example, observe that lines B. 496, 497, mentioning the queen, are duly marked with an asterisk, as not being in A. Line 2, standing the same in both texts, is marked with a dagger. And thirdly, line I is unmarked, because it is slightly altered. A. has here the older expression 'A thousand sythes,' whilst B. has the more familiar 'A thousand tymes.'

The fact that A. is older than B. cannot perhaps be absolutely proved without a long investigation. But all the conditions point in that direction. In the first place, it occurs in only one MS., viz. MS. C., whilst all the others give the B-text; and it is more likely that a revised text should be multiplied than that a first draft should be. Next, this MS. C. is of high value and great importance, being quite the best MS., as regards age, of the whole set, and it is a fortunate thing that the A-text has been preserved at all. And lastly, the internal evidence tends, in my opinion, to show that B. can be more easily evolved from A. than conversely. Any one who reads the comparison of the two texts in Dr. Furnivall's Trial Forewords to the Minor Poems, at pp. 104-107, will observe how he unconsciously drops into calling the B-text 'the revised version' (p. 106, last line) without having given any formal proof that such is the case. This is doubtless due to the fact that, upon instituting the comparison, the suggestion naturally arises that A. preceded B. With such a supposition, the alterations seem natural; with the converse supposition, they are unmeaning and unintelligible. The proof, if indefinite, is sufficiently cogent. I have no doubt that a close and elaborate investigation would establish the order incontrovertibly; but it is needless to undertake it here; for we should, at the close of it, only prove that which, for practical purposes, is already sufficiently clear.

We may easily see that the A-text is, on the whole, more general and vague, whilst the B-text is more particular in its references. The impression left on my mind by the perusal of the two forms of the Prologue is that Chaucer made immediate use of the comparative liberty accorded to him on the 17th of

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