x. 21,22:--'Cantabit uacuus coram latrone uiator; Et nocte ad lumen

trepidabit arundinis umbram.' The latter of these lines should come first, and the usual readings are _motae_ (not _nocte_), _lunam_, and _trepidabis_. However, it is only the other (and favourite) line that is here alluded to. The same line is quoted in Piers Plowman, B. xiv. 305; and is alluded to in Chaucer's tr. of Boethius, bk. ii. pr. 5. 129-130. In Wyclif's Works, ed. Arnold, ii. 364, is the remark:--'For _it is said comounli_, that a wey-goer, whan he is voide, singith sure bi the theef.'

1195. In the margin of E. is written:--'Secundus philosophus: Paupertas est odibile bonum, sanitatis mater, curarum remocio, sapientie reparatrix, possessio sine calumpnia.' This is the very passage quoted, even more fully, in Piers Plowman, B. xiv. 275 (C. xvii. 117). Tyrwhitt's note is--'In this commendation of Poverty, our author seems plainly to have had in view the following passage of a fabulous conference between the emperor Adrian and Secundus the philosopher, reported by Vincent of Beauvais, Speculum Historiale, lib. x. cap. 71. "Quid est paupertas? Odibile bonum, sanitatis mater, remotio curarum, sapientie repertrix, negotium sine damno, possessio absque calumnia, sine sollicitudine felicitas." What Vincent has there published seems to have been extracted from a larger collection of _Gnomae_ under the name of Secundus, which are still extant in Greek and Latin. See Fabricius, Bib. Gr., l. vi. c. x, and MS. Harl. 399.' Thus l. 1195 is a translation of _Paupertas est odibile bonum_, so that the proposal by Dr. Morris (Aldine edition of Chaucer, vol. i. p. vi) to adopt the reading _hatel_ from MSS. Cp. Pt. Ln. instead of _hateful_, is founded on a mistake. The expression is contradictory, but it is so intentionally. 'Poverty is a gift which its possessors hate' is, of course, the meaning. Dryden well explains it:--

'Want is a bitter and a hateful good, Because its virtues are not understood.'

1196. This translates 'remotio curarum.'

1197. This translates 'sapientie reparatrix,' not 'repertrix.'

1199. _elenge_, miserable, hard to bear. _Elenge_ is also spelt _alenge_, _alinge_, _alange_; see _Alange_ in the New English Dictionary, though the proper form is rather _alenge_. It is a derivative of the intensive A. S. prefix _[=æ]_ and _lenge_, a secondary form of _lang_, long; so that A. S. _[=æ]lenge_ meant protracted, tedious, wearisome, as in Alfred's tr. of Boethius, xxxix. 4. But it was confused with the M. E. _elend_, strange, foreign, and so acquired the sense of 'strange' as well as 'trying' or 'miserable.' See _Elynge_ in the Gl. to P. Plowman, and the note to P. Pl. C. i. 204; also Mätzner's note to the Land of Cokayne, l. 15.

1200. This line translates 'possessio absque calumnia.' The E. _challenge_ is, in fact, derived from _calumnia_, through Old French.

1202. Understand _him_: 'maketh (him) know his God and himself'; see Dryden's paraphrase. Against this line, in the margin of MS. E., [322] is written:--'Unde et Crates ille Thebanus, proiecto in mari non paruo auri pondere, Abite (inquit) pessime male cupiditates! Ego uos mergam, ne ipse mergar a uobis.' Probably Chaucer once intended to introduce this story into the text. It relates, apparently, to Crates of Thebes, the Cynic philosopher, who flourished about B. C. 320.

1203. _spectacle_, i. e. an optic glass, a kind of telescope. In the modern sense, the word was used in the plural, as at present. From Lydgate's London Lickpenny, st. 7, we learn that 'spectacles to reede' was, in his time, one of the cries of London. Cf. _prospectyves_, i. e. perspective glasses, in F. 234. Chaucer is here thinking of a passage in Le Roman de la Rose, where the E. version (l. 5551) has:--

'For infortune makith anoon To knowe thy freendis fro thy foon.'

This, again, is from Boethius, bk. ii. pr. 8. 22-33. Compare Chaucer's poem on Fortune, ll. 9, 32, 34, and my notes upon these lines; vol. i. pp. 383, 544.

1208. See note to l. 1276 below; and cf. D. 1.

1210. Compare C. 743, and the note.

1215. For _also_, Tyrwhitt reads _also so_, against all authority, as he admits. The text is right as it stands. _Eld-e_ is dissyllabic, the final _e_ being preserved by the cæsura; and _also_ means no more than 'so.' I suspect this is quoted from some French proverb. Dryden alters 'filth' to 'ugliness.'

1224. _repair_, great resort, viz. of visitors.

1234. 'I care not which of the two it shall be.' Cf. Gower, Conf. Amantis,