Chapter 15

Of his life we do not know much. In his youth he studied law and disliked it,--a circumstance common enough in the lives of men of letters, from his time to that of Shirley Brooks. How he lived, what he did when he was a student, we are unable to discover. Only for a moment is the curtain lifted, and we behold, in the old quaint peaked and gabled Fleet Street of that day, Chaucer thrashing a Franciscan friar (friar's offence unknown), for which amusement he was next morning fined two shillings. History has preserved this for us, but has forgotten all the rest of his early life, and the chronology of all his poems. What curious flies are sometimes found in the historic amber! On Chaucer's own authority, we know that he served under Edward III. in his French campaign, and that he for some time lay in a French prison. On his return from captivity he married; he was valet in the king's household, he was sent on an embassy to Genoa, and is supposed to have visited Petrarch, then resident at Padua, and to have heard from his lips the story of "Griselda,"--a tradition which one would like to believe. He had his share of the sweets and the bitters of life. He enjoyed offices and gifts of wine, and he felt the pangs of poverty and the sickness of hope deferred. He was comptroller of the customs for wools; from which post he was dismissed,--why, we know not; although one cannot help remembering that Edward made the writing out of the accounts in Chaucer's own hand the condition of his holding office, and having one's surmises. Foreign countries, strange manners, meetings with celebrated men, love of wife and children, and their deaths, freedom and captivity, the light of a king's smile and its withdrawal, furnished ample matter of meditation to his humane and thoughtful spirit. In his youth he wrote allegories full of ladies and knights dwelling in impossible forests and nursing impossible passions; but in his declining years, when fortune had done all it could for him and all it could against him, he discarded these dreams, and betook himself to the actual stuff of human nature. Instead of the "Romance of the Rose," we have the "Canterbury Tales" and the first great English poet. One likes to fancy Chaucer in his declining days living at Woodstock, with his books about him, and where he could watch the daisies opening themselves at sunrise, shutting themselves at sunset, and composing his wonderful stories, in which the fourteenth century lives,--riding to battle in iron gear, hawking in embroidered jerkin and waving plume, sitting in rich and solemn feast, the monarch on the dais.

Chaucer's early poems have music and fancy, they are full of a natural delight in sunshine and the greenness of foliage; but they have little human interest. They are allegories for the most part, more or less satisfactorily wrought out. The allegorical turn of thought, the delight in pageantry, the "clothing upon" of abstractions with human forms, flowered originally out of chivalry and the feudal times. Chaucer imported it from the French, and was proud of it in his early poems, as a young fellow of that day might be proud of his horse furniture, his attire, his waving plume. And the poetic fashion thus set retained its vitality for a long while,--indeed, it was only thoroughly made an end of by the French Revolution, which made an end of so much else. About the last trace of its influence is to be found in Burns' sentimental correspondence with Mrs. M'Lehose, in which the lady is addressed as Clarinda, and the poet signs himself Sylvander. It was at best a mere beautiful gauze screen drawn between the poet and nature; and passion put his foot through it at once. After Chaucer's youth was over, he discarded somewhat scornfully these abstractions and shows of things. The "Flower and the Leaf" is a beautiful-tinted dream; the "Canterbury Tales" are as real as anything in Shakspeare or Burns. The ladies in the earlier poems dwell in forests, and wear coronals on their heads; the people in the "Tales" are engaged in the actual concerns of life, and you can see the splashes of mire upon their clothes. The separate poems which make up the "Canterbury Tales" were probably written at different periods, after youth was gone, and when he had fallen out of love with florid imagery and allegorical conceits; and we can fancy him, perhaps fallen on evil days and in retirement, anxious to gather up these loose efforts into one consummate whole. If of his flowers he would make a bouquet for posterity, it was of course necessary to procure a string to tie them together. These necessities, which ruin other men, are the fortunate chances of great poets. Then it was that the idea arose of a meeting of pilgrims at the Tabard in Southwark, of their riding to Canterbury, and of the different personages relating stories to beguile the tedium of the journey. The notion was a happy one, and the execution is superb. In those days, as we know, pilgrimages were of frequent occurrence; and in the motley group that congregated on such occasions, the painter of character had full scope. All conditions of people are comprised in the noisy band issuing from the courtyard of the Southwark inn on that May morning in the fourteenth century. Let us go nearer, and have a look at them.

There is a grave and gentle Knight, who has fought in many wars, and who has many a time hurled his adversary down in tournament before the eyes of all the ladies there, and who has taken the place of honour at many a mighty feast. There, riding beside him, is a blooming Squire, his son, fresh as the month of May, singing day and night from very gladness of heart,--an impetuous young fellow, who is looking forward to the time when he will flesh his maiden sword, and shout his first war-cry in a stricken field. There is an Abbot, mounted on a brown steed. He is middle-aged, his bald crown shines like glass, and his face looks as if it were anointed with oil. He has been a valiant trencher-man at many a well-furnished feast. Above all things, he loves hunting; and when he rides, men can hear his bridle ringing in the whistling wind loud and clear as a chapel bell. There is a thin, ill-conditioned Clerk, perched perilously on a steed as thin and ill-conditioned as himself. He will never be rich, I fear. He is a great student, and would rather have a few books bound in black and red hanging above his bed than be sheriff of the county. There is a Prioress, so gentle and tender-hearted that she weeps if she hears the whimper of a beaten hound, or sees a mouse caught in a trap. There rides the laughing Wife of Bath, bold-faced and fair. She is an adept in love-matters. Five husbands already "she has fried in their own grease" till they were glad to get into their graves to escape the scourge of her tongue. Heaven rest their souls, and swiftly send a sixth! She wears a hat large as a targe or buckler, brings the artillery of her eyes to bear on the young Squire, and jokes him about his sweetheart. Beside her is a worthy Parson, who delivers faithfully the message of his Master. Although he is poor, he gives away the half of his tithes in charity. His parish is waste and wide, yet if sickness or misfortune should befall one of his flock, he rides, in spite of wind, or rain, or thunder, to administer consolation. Among the crowd rides a rich Franklin, who sits in the Guildhall on the dais. He is profuse and hospitable as summer. All day his table stands in the hall covered with meats and drinks, and every one who enters is welcome. There is a Ship-man, whose beard has been shaken by many a tempest, whose cheek knows the kiss of the salt sea spray; a Merchant, with a grave look, clean and neat in his attire, and with plenty of gold in his purse. There is a Doctor of Physic, who has killed more men than the Knight, talking to a Clerk of Laws. There is a merry Friar, a lover of good cheer; and when seated in a tavern among his companions, singing songs it would be scarcely decorous to repeat, you may see his eyes twinkling in his head for joy, like stars on a frosty night. Beside him is a ruby-faced Sompnour, whose breath stinks of garlic and onions, who is ever roaring for wine,--strong wine, wine red as blood; and when drunk, he disdains English,--nothing but Latin will serve his turn. In front of all is a Miller, who has been drinking over-night, and is now but indifferently sober. There is not a door in the country that he cannot break by running at it with his head. The pilgrims are all ready, the host gives the word, and they defile through the arch. The Miller blows his bagpipes as they issue from the town; and away they ride to Canterbury, through the boon sunshine, and between the white hedges of the English May.

Had Chaucer spent his whole life in seeking, he could not have selected a better contemporary circumstance for securing variety of character than a pilgrimage to Canterbury. It comprises, as we see, all kinds and conditions of people. It is the fourteenth-century England in little. In our time, the only thing that could match it in this respect is Epsom down on the great race-day. But then Epsom down is too unwieldy; the crowd is too great, and it does not cohere, save for the few seconds when gay jackets are streaming towards the winning-post. The Prologue to the "Canterbury Tales," in which we make the acquaintance of the pilgrims, is the ripest, most genial and humourous, altogether the most masterly thing which Chaucer has left us. In its own way, and within its own limits, it is the most wonderful thing in the language. The people we read about are as real as the people we brush clothes with in the street,--nay, much _more_ real; for we not only see their faces, and the fashion and texture of their garments, we know also what they think, how they express themselves, and with what eyes they look out on the world. Chaucer's art in this Prologue is simple perfection. He indulges in no irrelevant description, he airs no fine sentiments, he takes no special pains as to style or poetic ornament; but every careless touch tells, every sly line reveals character; the description of each man's horse-furniture and array reads like a memoir. The Nun's pretty oath bewrays her. We see the bold, well-favoured countenance of the Wife of Bath beneath her hat, as "broad as a buckler or a targe"; and the horse of the Clerk, "as lean as is a rake," tells tales of his master's cheer. Our modern dress is worthless as an indication of the character, or even of the social rank, of the wearer; in the olden time it was significant of personal tastes and appetites, of profession, and condition of life generally. See how Chaucer brings out a character by touching merely on a few points of attire and personal appearance:--

"I saw his sleeves were purfiled at the hand With fur, and that the finest of the land; And for to fasten his hood under his chin He had of gold ywrought a curious pin. A love-knot in the greater end there was; His head was bald, and shone as any glass, And eke his face as if it was anoint."

What more would you have? You could not have known the monk better if you had lived all your life in the monastery with him. The sleeves daintly purfiled with fur give one side of him, the curious pin with the love-knot another, and the shining crown and face complete the character and the picture. The sun itself could not photograph more truly.

On their way the pilgrims tell tales, and these are as various as their relaters; in fact, the Prologue is the soil out of which they all grow. Dramatic propriety is everywhere instinctively preserved. "The Knight's Tale" is noble, splendid, and chivalric as his own nature; the tale told by the Wife of Bath is exactly what one would expect. With what good-humour the rosy sinner confesses her sins! how hilarious she is in her repentance! "The Miller's Tale" is coarse and full-flavoured,--just the kind of thing to be told by a rough, humourous fellow who is hardly yet sober. And here it may be said that although there is a good deal of coarseness in the "Canterbury Tales," there is not the slightest tinge of pruriency. There is such a single-heartedness and innocence in Chaucer's vulgarest and broadest stories, such a keen eye for humour, and such a hearty enjoyment of it, and at the same time such an absence of any delight in impurity for impurity's sake, that but little danger can arise from their perusal. He is so fond of fun that he will drink it out of a cup that is only indifferently clean. He writes often like Fielding, he never writes as Smollett sometimes does. These stories, ranging from the noble romance of Palamon and Arcite to the rude intrigues of Clerk Nicholas,--the one fitted to draw tears down the cheeks of noble ladies and gentlemen; the other to convulse with laughter the midriffs of illiterate clowns,--give one an idea of the astonishing range of Chaucer's powers. He can suit himself to every company, make himself at home in every circumstance of life; can mingle in tournaments where beauty is leaning from balconies, and the knights, with spear in rest, wait for the blast of the trumpet; and he can with equal ease sit with a couple of drunken friars in a tavern laughing over the confessions they hear, and singing questionable catches between whiles. Chaucer's range is wide as that of Shakspeare,--if we omit that side of Shakspeare's mind which confronts the other world, and out of which Hamlet sprang,--and his men and women are even more real, and more easily matched in the living and breathing world. For in Shakspeare's characters, as in his language, there is surplusage, superabundance; the measure is heaped and running over. From his sheer wealth, he is often the most _un_dramatic of writers. He is so frequently greater than his occasion, he has no small change to suit emergencies, and we have guineas in place of groats. Romeo is more than a mortal lover, and Mercutio more than a mortal wit; the kings in the Shakspearian world are more kingly than earthly sovereigns; Rosalind's laughter was never heard save in the Forest of Arden. His madmen seem to have eaten of some "strange root." No such boon companion as Falstaff ever heard chimes at midnight. His very clowns are transcendental, with scraps of wisdom springing out of their foolishest speech. Chaucer, lacking Shakspeare's excess and prodigality of genius, could not so gloriously err, and his creations have a harder, drier, more realistic look, are more like the people we hear uttering ordinary English speech, and see on ordinary country roads against an ordinary English sky. If need were, any one of them could drive pigs to market. Chaucer's characters are individual enough, their idiosyncrasies are sharply enough defined, but they are to some extent literal and prosaic; they are of the "earth, earthy;" out of his imagination no Ariel ever sprang, no half-human, half-brutish Caliban ever crept. He does not effloresce in illustrations and images, the flowers do not hide the grass; his pictures are masterpieces, but they are portraits, and the man is brought out by a multiplicity of short touches,--caustic, satirical, and matter of fact. His poetry may be said to resemble an English country road, on which passengers of different degrees of rank are continually passing,--now knight, now boor, now abbot: Spenser's, for instance, and all the more fanciful styles, to a tapestry on which a whole Olympus has been wrought. The figures on the tapestry are much the more noble-looking, it is true; but then they are dreams and phantoms, whereas the people on the country road actually exist.

The "Knight's Tale"--which is the first told on the way to Canterbury--is a chivalrous legend, full of hunting, battle, and tournament. Into it, although the scene is laid in Greece, Chaucer has, with a fine scorn of anachronism, poured all the splendour, colour, pomp, and circumstance of the fourteenth century. It is brilliant as a banner displayed to the sunlight. It is real cloth of gold. Compared with it, "Ivanhoe" is a spectacle at Astley's. The style is everywhere more adorned than is usual, although even here, and in the richest parts, the short, homely, caustic Chaucerian line is largely employed. The "Man of Law's Tale," again, is distinguished by quite a different merit. It relates the sorrows and patience of Constance, and is filled with the beauty of holiness. Constance might have been sister to Cordelia; she is one of the white lilies of womanhood. Her story is almost the tenderest in our literature. And Chaucer's art comes out in this, that although she would spread her hair, nay, put her very heart beneath the feet of those who wrong her, we do not cease for one moment to respect her. This is a feat which has but seldom been achieved. It has long been a matter of reproach to Mr. Thackeray, for instance, that the only faculty with which he gifts his good women is a supreme faculty of tears. To draw any very high degree of female patience is one of the most difficult of tasks. If you represent a woman bearing wrong with a continuous unmurmuring meekness, presenting to blows, come from what quarter they may, nothing but a bent neck, and eyelids humbly drooped, you are in nine cases out of ten painting elaborately the portrait of a fool; and if you miss making her a fool, you are certain to make her a bore. Your patient woman, in books and in life, does not draw on our gratitude. When her goodness is not stupidity,--which it frequently is,--it is insulting. She walks about an incarnate rebuke. Her silence is an incessant complaint. A teacup thrown at your head is not half so alarming as her meek, much-wronged, unretorting face. You begin to suspect that she consoles herself with the thought that there is another world, where brutal brothers and husbands are settled with for their behaviour to their angelic wives and sisters in this. Chaucer's Constance is neither fool nor bore, although in the hands of anybody else she would have been one or the other, or both. Like the holy religion which she symbolises, her sweet face draws blessing and love wherever it goes; it heals old wounds with its beauty, it carries peace into the heart of discord, it touches murder itself into soft and penitential tears. In reading the old tender-hearted poet, we feel that there is something in a woman's sweetness and forgiveness that the masculine mind cannot fathom; and we adore the hushed step and still countenance of Constance almost as if an angel passed.

Chaucer's orthography is unquestionably uncouth at first sight; but it is not difficult to read if you keep a good glossary beside you for occasional reference, and are willing to undergo a little trouble. The language is antique, but it is full of antique flavour. Wine of excellent vintage originally, it has improved through all the years it has been kept. A very little trouble on the reader's part, in the reign of Anne, would have made him as intelligible as Addison; a very little more, in the reign of Queen Victoria, will make him more intelligible than Mr. Browning. Yet somehow it has been a favourite idea with many poets that he required modernisation, and that they were the men to do it. Dryden, Pope, and Wordsworth have tried their hands on him. Wordsworth performed his work in a reverential enough spirit; but it may be doubted whether his efforts have brought the old poet a single new reader. Dryden and Pope did not translate or modernise Chaucer, they committed assault and battery upon him. They turned his exquisitely _naïve_ humour into their own coarseness, they put _doubles entendre_ into his mouth, they blurred his female faces,--as a picture is blurred when the hand of a Vandal is drawn over its yet wet colours,--and they turned his natural descriptions into the natural descriptions of "Windsor Forest" and the "Fables." The grand old writer does not need translation or modernisation; but perhaps, if it be done at all, it had better be reached in that way. For the benefit of younger readers, I subjoin short prose versions of two of the "Canterbury Tales,"--a story-book than which the world does not possess a better. Listen, then, to the tale the Knight told as the pilgrims rode to Canterbury:--