The Legende of Goode Women.

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THE PROLOGUE.

THOUSANDE tymes I have herde telle,
That there ys joy in hevene, and peyne in helle,

And I acorde wel that it ys so;

But, natheles, yet wot I wel also,

That ther nis noon dwellyng in this countree,
That eyther hath in hevene or helle ybe,

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2. ys, is; e, i, and y, c and k, u and w, sh and sch, o and oo, are respectively convertible, and used indifferently, in Chaucer's orthography.

4. natheles, not the less, nevertheless ;-wot, pres. tense of witen, know.

5. nis, a contraction of ne is, is not;-nis noon: in early English, as in the Anglo-Saxon, two negatives do not annul each other, as in modern English, but strengthen the negation.

6. ybe, past part. of to be, been; the prepositive particle y, generally the sign of the past participle, is the remains of the Saxon ge, which is still preserved in the German language; e. g., loben, to praise, gelobt, praised. Though frequently used by Spenser, who was fond of old forms, it was quite obsolete in his time. It occurs but in five places in all Shakspeare. Milton uses ychain'd, in his Ode on the Nativity, v. 155, yclep'd (still sometimes used), in L'Allegro, v. 12, and star-ypointing, in his Epitaph on Shakspeare,

v. 4.

Ne may of hit noon other weyes witen,

But as he hath herd seyd, or founde it writen;
For by assay ther may no man it preve.
But God forbede but men shulde leve
Wel more thing than men han seen with eye!
Men shal not wenen every thing a lye
But yf himselfe yt seeth, or elles dooth;
For, God wot, thing is never the lasse sooth,
Thogh every wight ne may it not ysee.

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7. hit, it; the Anglo-Saxon personal pronoun was, in the nominative singular, he for the masculine, heó for the feminine, and hit for the neuter. He we still retain; for heó we have substituted she, apparently a modification of seó, the feminine of the demonstrative (se, seó, thaet); hit we have converted into it (though the aspirate is still often heard in the Scottish dialect). The genitive was hire for the feminine (whence our modern her), and his both for the masculine and the neuter; witen, know.

9. assay, trial, experience; preve, to try, prove by trial. 10. leve, believe.

11. wel more, considerably more, much more; wel is frequently joined to adverbs and adjectives in the same way as ful and right; han, 3d pers. pl. pres. tense of have.

12. wenen, think, suppose. The old Saxon infinitive ended in -an, which in the middle English was softened into -en. In the fading away of inflection, n was first dropt, and e continued for a while to be pronounced obscurely, in verse, when before a word beginning with a consonant; finally e was dropt, except where it was required to lengthen the root vowel of a word. From the unsettled, transition state of the language in Chaucer's time, the poet was at liberty to use both the earlier and later forms, as best suited the rhythm or the melody of the verse. The later form, however, is the more frequent. In v. 12 he uses the earlier form, wenen, for the reason, evidently, that the following word begins with a vowel, and the rhythm of the verse requires that the ending should eonstitute a light syllable; see also v. 27.

13. elles, else.

14. God wot, God knows ;-the lasse sooth, the less true.

15. thogh, though; wight, person; on this word, see Grimm's Deutsche Mythologie, pp. 408-410-ysee: here the particle y is

Bernarde, the monke, ne saugh nat al parde!
Than mote we to bokes that we fynde,

(Thurgh which that olde thinges ben in mynde)
And to the doctrine of these olde wyse,
Yeve credence, in every skylful wise,

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That tellen of these olde appreved stories,

Of holynes, of regnes, of victories,

Of love, of hate, and other sondry thynges,
Of whiche I may not maken rehersynges:
And yf that olde bokes were awey,

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used, as it sometimes is, with the infinitive form of the verb; see note on ybe, v. 6.

16. Bernarde, the monke, ne saugh nat ul parde: In the margin of Fairfax MS. 16, is written in red letters the following gloss :'Bernardus monachus non vidit omnia.' This appears to have been a proverbial expression of equivocal import, meaning either that however wise St. Bernard may have been, there were yet some things which had escaped him; or, with a sly innuendo, that St. Bernard asserted more than he ever saw, and that his statements are, therefore, to be taken cum grano salis.-Bell. The negative ne-nat corresponds with the French ne-pas; parde, a common oath, signifying, literally, By God (Fr. pardi), though its literal force must have been much worn away by frequent use; it was, perhaps, not even recognized; saugh, past tense of se, saw; this preterite has various other forms, e. g., sauh, sawh, say, segh, sey, seigh,seygh, sie, sihe, sigh; the latter form is invariably used, I believe, by Gower, in his Confessio Amantis.

17. mote, must; an auxiliary to the verb yeve, give, in v. 20. 18. thurgh, through, by means of ;-ben, pres. tense pl., are. 20. yeve, give; the Anglo-Saxon g is frequently represented in English by y (the sound of which letter it seems to have had in certain positions); e. g., A. S. gear becomes year; daeg, day; tagl, tayl, and by a further change, tail; gea, gese, yea, yes; gif, yif, and then, if; gelew, middle English, yelwe, modern, yellow; geat, gat, gat, is, in middle English, frequently yate, but in modern English there has been a return to the g, gate, and this has happened in many other cases;-skylful wise, reasonable way. 22. regnes, kingdoms.

Ylorne were of remembraunce the key.
Well ought us, thanne, honouren and beleve
These bokes, ther we han noon other preve.

And as for me, though that I konne but lyte,
On bokes for to rede I me delyte,

And to hem yeve I feyth and ful credence,
And in myn herte have hem in reverence
So hertely, that ther is game noon,
That fro my bokes maketh me to goon,
But yt be seldome on the holy day,

Save, certeynly, whan that the monethe of May
Is comen, and that I here the foules synge,
And that the floures gynnen for to sprynge,
Farwel my boke, and my devocion!

26. ylorne, past part. of lese, lost.

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27. ought, past tense of owe; used here impersonally, like the Lat. oportet; wel ought us, well does it behoove us. This use of the word is common in Chaucer; though it is as frequently used in the modern way.

"Alla goth to his in, and as him ought

Arrayed for this fest in every wyse."-C. T. 5517.

i. e., as was becoming to him.

"And ther sche was honoured as hir ought."-C. T. 8996.

i. e., as was due to her.

See a valuable note on ought in Craik's English of Shakspeare. 28. ther, where; preve, proof.

29. I konne but lyte, I know but little.

30. for to rede: in early English, for is frequently thus prefixed

to the infinitive mood, as pour still is in French; it is now a vulgarism.

31. yeve, give; see note v. 20;-feyth, faith.

32. hem, them.

38. gynnen, begin.

39. Farwel my boke, and my devocion: How graceful the diction of the paragraph which this verse so beautifully concludes! The great poet shows here his keen relish, so characteristic of him, for all the cheering sights, and sounds, and odors of the springtime.

Now have I thanne suche a condicion,

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That of al the floures in the mede,

Thanne love I most these floures white and rede,
Suche as men callen daysyes in our toune.
To hem have I so grete affeccioun,
As I seyde erst, whanne comen is the May,
That, in my bed ther daweth me no day,
That I nam uppe and walkyng in the mede,
To seen this floure ayein the sunne sprede,
Whanne it up ryseth erly by the morwe;
That blisfull sight softeneth al my sorwe,
So glad am I, whan that I have presence
Of it, to doon it alle reverence,
As she that is of alle floures flour,
Fulfilled of al vertue and honour,
And evere ylike faire, and fressh of hewe.
And I love it, and ever ylike newe,
And ever shal, til that myn herte dye;

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40. thanne, then ;-condicion, constitution of mind, temperament, disposition. This sense of the word is frequent in Shakspeare; "if he have the condition of a saint, and the complexion of a devil, I had rather he should shrive me than wive me." M. of V. i. 2;-"Is't possible, that so short a time can alter the condition of a man?" Cor. v. 4;-"and then, of so gentle a condition!" Othello, iv. 1.

"Could it work so much upon your shape,

As it hath much prevailed on your condition,

I should not know you, Brutus."-Julius Cæsar, ii. 1.

43. daysyes, daisies; A. S. dæges-ege, i. e., day's eye.-"As he passed, the woods put forth their blossoms, the earth her primroses and day's-eyes to behold him."-Howell.

45. seyde, past tense of seye, said ;-erst, first, superlative of er, before.

46. daweth, dawneth.

47. nam, a contraction of ne am, am not.

48. ayein, against, toward.

55. ylike, alike, equally.