xxxii. The story of the daughter of Paulus Emilius and her little dog

is told by Valerius Maximus, _Mem._ i. 5. 3. Finally, the details of the defeat of Perseus seem to be taken from the account of a catastrophe which about the same time befell the Basternae, a Thracian tribe allied with Perseus, who according to Orosius (iv. 20), when crossing the Danube in winter with large numbers of men and horses, were almost annihilated by the breaking of the ice. The same author mentions that after the defeat and capture of Perseus his son exercised the craft of a brass-worker at Rome.

It is possible of course that Gower had before him some single account in which these elements were already combined. In Vincent of Beauvais, _Speculum Hist._ v. 65 f., we find first the catastrophe of the Basternae, taken from Orosius, then the Macedonian war from Justin and Orosius, with the incident of the dog inserted from Valerius.

1631 (margin). _testibus que iudicibus_, ‘witnesses and judges,’ a common use of the conjunction in Gower’s Latin: cp. ‘Celsior est Aquila que Leone ferocior,’ _Latin Verses after_ i. 574.

1633. _dorst_, so here in the best MSS. for ‘dorste.’

1711. _apparant_, for ‘heir apparant,’ which was the original reading of the first recension: cp. _Mirour_, 5580,

‘Car d’autre bien n’est apparant.’

1723. _livende his father_: for this absolute use cp. 752.

1757. _upon depos_, that is, having his power given to him as a temporary charge. See the examples in the _New Engl. Dict._

1778. _And he._ ‘As he’ is an error which crept into the third recension. The interchange of ‘As’ with ‘And’ in Gower MSS. is very common.

1793 f. ‘For such an omen of an hound was most like to him,’ the words being transposed for the sake of the metre.

1799. _do slain._ This is apparently past participle by attraction for infinitive: cp. i. 3153, iv. 249, 816.

1817 ff. This incident is not related of the army of Perseus in any history, so far as I know: see note on 1613.

_Latin Verses._ iv. 7 f. As punctuated in F the couplet runs,

‘Quod patet esse fides in eo, fraus est que politi Principium pacti, finis habere negat.’

This does not seem to give any sense. The text may be translated thus: ‘What appears to be faith in him is in fact fraud, and the end of the smooth covenant disowns the beginning’ (_lit._ ‘denies that it has the beginning’).

1921. _it scheweth_, ‘there appeareth’: cp. iii. 809.

1943. _how it were_: subjunctive of indirect question; cp. 1243.

1950. _of love, and._ The punctuation is that of F.

2016. _byme_: see note on i. 232.

2018. _For this I weene_, ‘the other cause is because I ween,’ &c.

2025. _Forwhy and_, ‘provided that’: the same line occurs again in v. 2563. Compare the use of ‘for why that’ in _Le Morte Arth._ 389 (Roxb.), ‘Thou shalt haue yiftis good, For why þat thou wilte dwelle wyth me,’ quoted in the _New Engl. Dict._

2066. _of his oghne hed._ It may be questioned whether ‘hed’ is not here from an O. E. ‘*hǣd,’ a collateral form of ‘hád,’ like the termination ‘-hed’ for ‘-hod.’ See _New Engl. Dict._, ‘hede.’ In that case, ‘of his oghne hed’ would mean ‘about his own condition.’ The rhyme with ‘red’ is no guide to us.

2071. _Bot hield_, i.e. ‘But I held’; see note on i. 1895.

2098 ff. With this attack on the Lombards compare _Mirour de l’omme_, 25429 ff. It is the usual popular jealousy of foreign rivals in trade.

2122. _Fa crere_, ‘make-believe,’ the art by which they acquired credit in business. The form ‘crere’ is used in Gower’s French, e. g. _Mirour_, 4474.

2124. _hem stant no doute_, ‘they have no fear,’ ‘they are sure’: cp. iii. 1524, v. 7244. In v. 2118, ‘which stant of him no doute,’ we have a somewhat different form of the expression: cp. iii. 2536.

2157 ff. The story is mainly taken from Ovid, _Metam._ ix. 101 ff., but probably Gower was acquainted also with the epistle, _Deianira Herculi_, and he has (naturally enough) supposed that what is there said of Hercules and Omphale, the exchange of clothes &c., referred to the relations of Hercules and Iole: see 2268 ff. ‘The kinges dowhter of Eurice’ is no doubt derived from the expression ‘Eurytidosque Ioles’: cp. _Traitié_, vii. 2. Ovid’s account of the death of Hercules is very much shortened by our author, and not without good reason.

2160. That is, ‘it befell him to desire,’ &c.

2297. Ovid, _Met._ ix. 229 ff.

2299. _al of_: so the first and second recension copies generally, and also W. The sense seems to require it, rather than ‘of al,’ given by FH₃.

2341. _his slyh compas_: a clear case of the loss of inflexion in the adjective, notwithstanding that it is a native English stem. The same word occurs in the definite form in l. 2374 ‘with his slyhe cast.’

2346. _chalk for chese_: cp. Prol. 416.

2366. _axeth no felawe_, ‘requires none to share it.’

2392. The metre requires the form ‘bote,’ which is etymologically correct, and is given in the best MSS.

2403. _Me roghte noght_: pret. subjunctive, ‘I should not care.’

2423. _I wolde_: cp. iii. 78. We should expect the negative ‘I nolde,’ as in i. 2750 f.,

‘I wol noght say That I nam glad on other side.’

The conditional clause thrown in has broken the thread of the sentence.

2430. _tant ne quant_: so _Mirour de l’omme_, 3654, 23358.

2437. _A man to ben_, cp. vi. 57.

2447. _in a wayt_: so given by the best copies, cp. 2999, but ‘upon await’ iii. 955, 1016.

2451 ff. In the MSS. the paragraph is marked as beginning with the next line, ‘At Troie how that,’ the line before being insignificant. As to the first story referred to in the text, Gower may have known it from Hyginus (_Fab._ cvi), or from Ovid, _Her. Ep._ iii. The example of Diomede and Troilus had been popularized by Chaucer, who had the name ‘Criseide’ from Boccaccio’s ‘Griseida.’ In Benoît and Guido the name is ‘Briseida,’ but Boccaccio was aware that Briseis was a different person (_Gen. Deorum_, xii. 52).

2459 ff. The name Geta was taken by Gower from the Geta of Vitalis Blesensis, a dramatic piece in Latin elegiacs founded on Plautus, in which Geta takes the place of Sosia: see Wright’s Early Mysteries, &c., pp. 79-90. It may be suspected that our author himself modified the story in order to make it more suitable for his purpose by substituting a mortal friend for Jupiter. We may note that he has also reversed the part played by Amphitryon.

2501 ff. I cannot indicate the source of this tale.

2537. _As thei._ The sense seems to require this reading, which is found however in only two MSS., so far as I know, and those not the best. It appears as a correction in Berthelet’s second edition.

2550. _which that him beclipte._ Either this means ‘who was encompassing him,’ that is pressing upon his borders, referring to the Caliph of Egypt, or ‘which encircled his territory,’ referring to what follows, ‘in a Marche costeiant.’ In the latter case we should have a very bold inversion of clauses for the sake of rhyme, but hardly more so than in 709 ff.

2558. _unto Kaire._ It is evident that the author conceives this as the capital not of Egypt but of Persia: cp. 2648.

2578. _hair._ The form of the word is accommodated to the rhyme: so iv. 1252.

2642. _Upon hire oth_ &c., inverted order, ‘how it was a token that she should be his wife upon her oath,’ i.e. in accordance with her oath.

2670. The same line occurs also i. 2106, ii. 895.

2680. _tome_, i.e. ‘leisure,’ ‘opportunity,’ from the adjective ‘tom,’ empty. The reading ‘come’ is due probably to the misunderstanding of a rather unusual word, but the rhyme ‘Rome: come’ (past partic.) is not an admissible one (cp. K. Fahrenburg in _Archiv für neuere Sprachen_, vol. 89, p. 406, who of course is not aware of the corruption).

2803. The account of Boniface VIII which was most current in England is that which we find given in Rishanger’s Chronicle and repeated by Higden and Walsingham. It is as follows, under the year 1294:--

_Papa cedit._

‘Coelestinus Papa se minus sufficientem ad regendam Ecclesiam sentiens, de consilio Benedicti Gaietani cessit Papatui, edita prius constitutione super cessione Pontificum Romanorum.

_Supplantatio Papae._

‘In vigilia Natalis Domini apud Neapolim in Papam eligitur Benedictus Gaietanus.... De quo praedecessor eius Coelestinus, vir vitae anachoriticae, eo quod eum ad cedendum Papatui subdole induxisset, prophetavit in hunc modum, prout fertur: “Ascendisti ut vulpes, regnabis ut leo, morieris ut canis.” Et ita sane contigit; nam ipsum Papam ut Papatui cederet et ut Papa quilibet cedere posset, constitutionem edere fecit; quam quidem postmodum ipsemet Papa effectus revocavit. Deinde rigide regens generosos quosdam de Columpna Cardinales deposuit; Regi Francorum in multis non solum obstitit, sed eum totis viribus deponere insudavit. Igitur Senescallus Franciae, Willelmus de Longareto, vir quidem in agibilibus admodum circumspectus, et fratres de Columpna praedicti, foederatis viribus Bonifacium Papam comprehenderunt et in equum effrenem, versa facie ad caudam, sine freno posuerunt; quem sic discurrere ad novissimum halitum coegerunt, ac tandem fame necaverunt.’

It remains to be asked where Gower found the story of the speaking-trumpet by means of which Celestin was moved to his abdication, why he supposed that the capture of Boniface took place near Avignon, and whence came such additional details as we have in l. 3028.

As to the first, it was certainly a current story, because we find it repeated by later writers, as Paulus Langius, _Chron. Citiz._, ann. 1294, ‘Per fistulam etiam frequentius noctu in cubili per parietem missam, velut coelica vox esset, loquebatur ei: “Celestine, Celestine, renuncia papatui, quia aliter saluari non poteris, nam vires tuas excedit.”’

As to the death of Boniface, it was commonly reported that he had been starved in prison, the fact being that after the episode of his captivity he refused to take food, and the biting of his hands was observed as a symptom of extreme vexation, ‘saepe caput muro concussit et digitos momordit,’ ‘per plures dies ira feruidus manus sibi arrodere videbatur,’ &c. Ciacon. _Vita Pont._ p. 655.

2837 f. cp. Prol. 329.

2875. _of such prolacioun_,’with so prolonged a note.’

2889. _hedde_: cp. v. 1254.

2966. _Lowyz._ This of course is a mistake historically.

2985. _And seiden._ For omission of pronoun cp. i. 1895.

2995. _de Langharet._ We find this form of the name, or something equivalent, in the English Chronicles quoted, and also in Villani. The true name was apparently ‘de Nogaret.’

3001. _at Avinoun._ This is quite unhistorical, and the precise mention of ‘Pontsorge’ (or as our author first wrote it, ‘Poursorge’) seems to point to the use of some particular form of the story, which cannot at present be indicated.

3033 ff. This saying is sometimes given in the form of a prophecy, and attributed to the predecessor of Boniface, whose resignation he was said to have procured: see the passage quoted on l. 2803.

3037. _to the houndes like_, ‘after the likeness of the hound’: cp. i. 2791, ‘to his liche.’ The form ‘like’ would hardly be admissible here as an adjective for ‘lik.’

3056. This prophecy no doubt was current among the many attributed to the Abbot Joachim, but I do not find it exactly in the form here given. The quotation of it in the margin of F is in a different hand from that of the text and of the heading ‘Nota de prophecia’ &c. The omission of the Latin altogether in some manuscripts, as AdT, W, has no special significance for this passage.

3081 f. ‘He shall not be able to abstain from hindering him.’

3095. This saying, which is here attributed to Seneca, and which appears also in the _Mirour de l’omme_ in a slightly different form, 3831 ff., may be based really upon the well-known passage of Dante, _Inf._ xiii. 64.

_Latin Verses._ vi. 4. _Dumque_, for ‘Dum,’ as sometimes in the _Vox Clamantis_.

_ethnica flamma_: see note on l. 20.

3122 ff. Cp. _Mirour_, 3819 ff.

3160. See note on i. 232.

3187. The Latin books referred to are the current lives of Saint Silvester, the substance of which is reproduced in the _Legenda Aurea_. Gower tells the story in considerably better style than we have it there, with amplifications of his own, especially as regards the reflections of Constantine, 3243 ff., and the preaching of Silvester to the Emperor, 3383 ff. There are some variations in detail from the current account which may or may not point to a special source. For example, in the Life of Silvester we are told that the Emperor met the lamenting mothers as he was riding up to the Capitol to take his bath of blood, and in all forms of the legend that I have seen the mountain where Silvester lay in hiding was Soracte (or Saraptis) and not Celion. The name may however have been altered by Gower for metrical reasons, as was sometimes his habit; see note on i. 1407 (end).

3210. _of Accidence._ ‘Accidentia’ in its medical sense is explained as ‘affectus praeter naturam’: cp. v. 763.

3243 ff. These reflections, continued to l. 3300, are an expanded and improved form of the rather tasteless string of maxims given in the legend, the most pointed of which is that with which our author concludes, ‘Omnium se esse dominum comprobat, qui servum se monstraverit pietatis.’

3260. _his oghne wone._ This appears to mean ‘according to his own habits,’ like ‘his oghne hondes’ (i. 1427), ‘his oghne mouth’ (v. 5455), for ‘with his own hands,’ &c.

3507. _vertu sovereine_: a clear case of the French feminine inflexion, which must have been a very natural variation in such expressions as this; cp. i. 2677. In French as in English our author would feel at liberty to adapt the form to the rhyme or metre: so we have ‘sa joye soverein’ _Mir._ 4810, but ‘ma sovereine joie’ _Bal._ ix. 7.

3517. _betwen ous tweie_, i.e. ‘together’; cp. l. 653.

LIB. III.

4. _ther nis on._ Note the repetition of the negative from the clause above.

71. _the leng the ferre_, i.e. ‘the lengere the ferre.’

78. _mihte I_, for ‘ne mihte I’: cp. ii. 2423.

83. _redy to wraththe_: cp. ii. 3444, ‘redi to the feith.’

143 ff. The story is from Ovid, _Her. Ep._ xi. It is that which is referred to by Chaucer, _Cant. Tales_, B 77,

‘But certeinly no word ne writeth he Of thilke wikke ensample of Canacee, That loved hir owene brother synfully.’

(Note that the name ‘Canace’ is used by Gower so as to rhyme with ‘place.’)

In spite of the character of the subject, it must be allowed that Gower tells the story in a very touching manner, and he shows good taste in omitting some of Ovid’s details, as for example those in _Ep._ 39-44. The appeal of Canace to her father as given by Gower is original, and so for the most part is the letter to her brother and the picturesque and pathetic scene of her death. On the whole this must be regarded as a case in which our author has greatly improved upon his authority. Lydgate obviously has Gower’s story before him when he introduces the tale (quite needlessly) into his _Fall of Princes_. It may be noted that in Ovid also the catastrophe is given as a consequence of ungoverned anger:

‘Imperat, heu! ventis, tumidae non imperat irae.’

172. _lawe positif_: see note on Prol. 247. Gower’s view is that there is nothing naturally immoral about an incestuous marriage, but that it is made wrong by the ‘lex positiva’ of the Church. This position he makes clear at the beginning of the eighth book, by showing that in the first ages of the world such marriages must have been sanctioned by divine authority, and that the idea of kinship as a bar to marriage had grown up gradually, cousins being allowed to marry among the Jews, though brother and sister might not, and that finally the Church had ordered,

‘That non schal wedden of his ken Ne the seconde ne the thridde.’ viii. 147 f.

If attacked by Chaucer with regard to the subject of this story, he would no doubt defend himself by arguing that the vice with which it dealt was not against nature, and that the erring brother and sister were in truth far more deserving of sympathy than the father who took such cruel vengeance. Notwithstanding his general strictness in matters of morality, Gower was something of a fatalist, cp. the recurring phrases of 1222, 1348, 1677, iv. 1524, &c., and he repeatedly emphasizes the irresistible character of the impulses of nature in love; cp. i. 17 ff., 1051 ff., 2621, vi. 1261 ff., and here l. 161 (margin), ‘intollerabilem iuuentutis concupiscenciam.’

219. ‘the child which was,’ cp. i. 10.

253 f. Ovid, _Her. Ep._ xi. 96,

‘Et iubet ex merito scire quid iste velit.’

279 ff. This letter is for the most part original. That which we have in Ovid is mainly narrative.

292. _If that_ &c. The point of this as it occurs in Ovid depends upon the fact that her child has already been exposed and, as she conceives, torn by wild beasts, and she entreats her brother if possible to collect his remains and lay them by her,--a very natural and pathetic request. Gower has chosen for the sake of picturesque effect in this scene to make the exposure of the child come after the death of the mother, and he should therefore perhaps have omitted the reference to the child’s burial.

300 f. Ovid, _Her. Ep._ xi. 3, 4,

‘Dextra tenet calamum, strictum tenet altera ferrum, Et iacet in gremio charta soluta meo.’

315. The word ‘baskleth’ is perhaps a genuine alternative reading.

331. ‘Of such a thing done as that was.’ We must not be tempted by the correction ‘tho’ for ‘that.’

352. A fatalistic maxim which is often repeated, e.g. i. 1714, ‘nede he mot that nede schal.’

355. The revision of this line for the third recension may indicate a preference for throwing back the accent of ‘nature’ in the English fashion: so ii. 1376, but ‘natúre’ ll. 175, 350.

361 ff. This is from Ovid, _Met._ iii. 324 ff. Gower has chosen to omit the sequel of the story, which was that after seven years Tiresias saw the same snakes again, and by striking them a second time recovered his former sex. This being so, he is obliged to make a separate story (736 ff.) of the dispute between Jupiter and Juno, which gave Ovid occasion for mentioning the incident of the snakes.

382. _Wherof_,’ In regard to which.’

390. _menable_, ‘apt to be led’; see note on i. 1067. For the variations of reading cp. ii. 1599, and below, 519.

417. ‘Cheste’ is that form of contention which expresses itself in angry words. Gower seems to have taken it to be connected with the verb ‘chide,’ see 443, 492, 534, 552 ff.

431. Cp. _Mirour_, 4146 ff.,

‘ly sage auci Ce dist, que deinz le cuer de luy Folie buylle tresparmy, Comme du fontaine la liquour.’

The reference is to Proverbs xv. 2, ‘os fatuorum ebullit stultitiam.’

436. _oppose_, ‘inquire.’

463 ff. See note on the Latin verses at the beginning of the Prologue, 5 f.

479. That is, rather than sing such a creed, I would choose to be unlearned and know no creed at all.

487. _Upon hirself_, i.e. upon her authority.

515. _balketh._ A ‘balk’ is a ridge left unploughed, and ‘to balk’ in ploughing is to leave a ridge either between two furrows or in the furrow itself, the plough being permitted to pass over a piece of ground without breaking it. Here it is referred to as an accident arising either from not ploughing straight or not keeping the ploughshare regularly at the proper depth. From this idea of leaving out something come most of the other meanings of the verb: see _New Engl. Dict._

544. _Hire oghte noght be._ For this impersonal use with the simple infinitive cp. 704.

545. _For I_, i.e. ‘For that I’: cp. 820, &c.

585. This expression, which Pauli for some reason calls an ‘obscene proverb,’ seems to be nearly equivalent to the saying about the bird that fouls his own nest (cp. _Mirour_, 23413), and refers apparently to recriminations between the owl and the stock upon which he sits, on the matter of cleanliness. The application is to the case of the man who quarrels with his own performances, and naturally has the worst of it himself.

626. ‘World’ seems to be the true reading here, though ‘word’ stood in the earlier form of text. The meaning is ‘that state of things shall never be permitted by me.’ The use of ‘world’ is like that which we have in i. 178, where ‘mi world’ means ‘my condition’: cp. Prol. 383, 1081. The verb ‘asterte’ is used in the sense of escaping notice and so being allowed to pass or to happen: cp. i. 1934,

‘Bot that ne schal me noght asterte, To wene forto be worthi,’ &c.

Cp. i. 722.

The expression ‘that word schal me nevere asterte’ is a more ordinary one (and therefore more likely to have been introduced by a copyist), but it gives no satisfactory sense here.

641 ff. The story was a hackneyed one, and occurs in many places. It is shortly told by Jerome, _Adv. Jovin._ i. 48.

665. _what labour that sche toke._ The verb is subjunctive, either because the form of speech is indirect, cp. 708, or because the expression is indefinite.

699. Cp. _Mirour_, 4185 ff., where after telling the same story the author roundly declares that he shall not follow the example.

704. _Him oghte ... bere_: cp. 544, 1666.

708. _how that it stode_: subjunctive of indirect speech, under rhyme influence: cp. ii. 1243 and l. 771 below, and see note on Prol. 41.

736. _Met._ iii. 316 ff. We have here the rest of the story which was referred to above, 361 ff. The point of the incident as told by Ovid is (perhaps purposely) missed by Gower, who does not mention the reason why Tiresias was selected as judge.

737. That is, according to the religious belief which then prevailed.

762. ‘And yet the other state would have pleased him better, to have had’ &c.

771. _what he mene_: for the subjunctive cp. 708.

782. _of olde ensample_: for ‘olde’ in this expression cp. 1683; but ‘of old time,’ i. 1072, ‘an old ensample,’ iv. 75.

783. This is from Ovid, _Met._ ii. 542 ff. The Cornide of Gower’s story is Coronis. The story is told at greater length by Chaucer as the _Manciple’s Tale_.

818 ff. From Ovid, _Fasti_, ii. 585 ff.

889. _fals_: see note on Prol. 221.

918. F alone gives ‘overmor,’ but it is probably what the author intended, though his first editions had the common variation ‘evermor.’ S is here defective.

957. _sleth_, ‘strikes.’

971. _who so rede_: subjunctive because indefinite; cp. 2508 and note on Prol. 460.

973 ff. This story may be found in Benoît’s _Roman de Troie_, 27551 ff. and in Guido, lib. 32 (n 3 v^o, ed. Argent.). We must note however that for the classical Nauplius we find in Gower ‘Namplus,’ whereas in Benoît and Guido both it is ‘Naulus’: therefore it would seem that our author had before him also some other form of the story, where he found the name ‘Nauplius’ or ‘Nauplus,’ which he read ‘Nanplus’ or ‘Namplus.’ Perhaps this may have been Hyginus, _Fab._ cxvi. Elsewhere Gower usually follows Benoît rather than Guido, but here several expressions occur which seem to be suggested by Guido’s form of the story: see notes on 1030 and 1063. Also Gower says nothing of the incident of rocks being hurled down on the Greeks (_Rom. de Troie_, 27795 ff.), which is also omitted by Guido.

1002. The name which appears here and in the Latin margin as ‘Namplus,’ with no important variation of reading, is quite clearly ‘Nauplus’ in iv. 1816 ff.

1021. _Homward_, i.e. going towards home: cp. 2451.

1030 f. _Hist. Troiana_, n 4, ‘qui necesse habebant per confinia regni sui transire.’

1036. _it sihe_, ‘might see it.’

1049. _ten or twelve._ Guido says two hundred. Benoît does not specify the number of ships, but says that ten thousand men were lost. Gower has judiciously reduced the number.

1063. Cp. _Hist. Troiana_, n 4 v^o, ‘fugiunt et se immittunt in pelagus spaciosum.’

1065. ‘what’ for ‘war,’ which appears in the unrevised form of the first recension, must be an error of the original scribe: on the other hand, ‘tyme’ for ‘dai’ proceeded no doubt originally from the author and was altered in order to make the verse run more smoothly.

_Latin Verses._ iv. 1. _et sit spiritus eius Naribus_: a reference to Isaiah ii. 22, ‘Quiescite ergo ab homine, cuius spiritus in naribus eius est.’ The same passage is quoted in _Mirour_, 4754, and it is evident there that the ‘breath in the nostrils’ was understood by our author to stand for fury of anger.

1113. _war hem wel_, ‘let them beware.’

1158. The contest in the heart between Wit and Reason on the one hand and Will and Hope on the other is quite in the style of the _Roman de la Rose_, where Reason and the Lover have an endless controversy (2983 ff.). Though the agencies are clearly personified here, the author has not assigned capital letters to their names.

1166. _out of retenue_, ‘out of my service.’

1173. _jeupartie_, ‘discord,’ one side being matched against the other. The first reading was ‘champartie,’ which may have proceeded from the author. It is clear that this word was used by Lydgate in the sense of ‘rivalry’ or ‘contest’ in the phrase ‘holde champartie,’ and this may either have come from the idea of partnership, implying division of power and so rivalry, as in Chaucer, _Cant. Tales_, A 1949, or from the legal sense, with which Gower and Lydgate would doubtless be acquainted, meaning partnership for a contentious purpose. There seems no sufficient reason for supposing (with the _New Engl. Dict._) that Lydgate’s use was founded on a misunderstanding of Chaucer.

1183. _and til._ Caxton and Berthelet both have ‘tyl that’ for ‘and til,’ and one is tempted to suggest that ‘and til’ was meant to stand for ‘until.’

1201 ff. The story of the visit of Alexander to Diogenes was a common one enough, and it is hardly worth while to investigate its source for Gower. He probably here combined various materials into one narrative, for the usual form of the story as given by Vincent of Beauvais, _Spec. Hist._ iii. 68 f., and in the _Gesta Romanorum_, does not include the conversation about the Reason and the Will. This may have been derived from Walter Burley, _De Vita Philosophorum_, cap. l., ‘Dum Alexander rex coram Diogene transiret, Diogenes tanquam illum spernens non respexit; cui dixit Alexander, “Quid est Diogenes quod me non respicis, quasi mei non indigeas?” Cui ille, “Ad quid necesse habeo servi servorum meorum?” Et Alexander, “Numquid servorum tuorum servus sum?” Ait, “Ego prevaleo cupiditatibus meis refrenans illas et subiciens mihi illas ut serviant: tibi autem cupiditates prevalent, et servus earum efficeris, earum obtemperans iussioni: servus igitur es servorum meorum.”’ Burley gives the other part of the conversation separately.

The incident of the messenger sent to inquire and of the answer which he brought back is no doubt due to Gower, as also the idea of the ‘tun’ being set on an axle and adapted for astronomical observations.

1212. The ‘dolium’ was of course popularly regarded as a wooden cask.

1222. ‘As fate would have it’: see note on 172 (end), and cp. 1442.

1224. _the Sonne ariste_, i.e. the rising of the sun: so iv. 1285, ‘and that was er the Sonne Ariste.’

1310. _to schifte_, ‘to dispose of.’ In Burley, ‘rogo ne auferas quod dare non potes.’

1331 ff. The tale of Pyramus and Thisbe is from Ovid, _Met._ iv. 55-166. Chaucer has taken it from the same source in the _Legend of Good Women_. When we compare the results, we find that in this instance it is Chaucer who has followed his authority closely, while Gower gives a paraphrase in his own language and with several variations of detail. He says, for example, that the lovers themselves made the hole in the wall through which they conversed; he omits Ninus’ tomb; he speaks of a lion, not a lioness; he says that Thisbe hid herself in a bush (not a cave), and that then the lion slew and devoured a beast before drinking at the spring; he cuts short the speech of Pyramus before killing himself; he represents that Pyramus was slain at once instead of living until Thisbe came; he invents an entirely new speech for Thisbe; and he judiciously omits, as Chaucer does also, the mention of the mulberry-tree and its transformation.

In short, Gower writes apparently from a general recollection of the story, while Chaucer evidently has his Ovid before him and endeavours to translate almost every phrase, showing thereby his good taste, for Ovid tells the story well.

The following points in Ovid (among others) are reproduced by Chaucer and not by Gower: l. 56, ‘quas Oriens habuit’; 58, ‘Coctilibus muris’; 59, ‘Notitiam primosque gradus vicinia fecit’ (which Chaucer misunderstands, however); 62, ‘Ex aequo captis ’ &c.; 64, ‘Quoque magis tegitur, tectus magis aestuat ignis’; 65, ‘Fissus erat tenui rima,’ &c.; 68, ‘Quid non sentit amor?’; 73-77, the speeches of the lovers to the wall; 81 f., ‘Postera nocturnos aurora’ &c.; 85, ‘Fallere custodes’; 87, ‘Neve sit errandum’ &c.; 94, ‘adopertaque vultum’; 97, ‘leaena’; 99, ‘ad lunae radios’; 100, ‘in antrum’; 105, ‘vestigia vidit in alto Pulvere’ &c.; 108, ‘Una duos nox, inquit, perdet amantes,’ and the rest of this speech; 117 f., ‘Utque dedit notae lacrimas,’ &c.; 122, ‘Non aliter quam cum vitiato fistula plumbo Scinditur’; 130, ‘Quantaque vitarit narrare pericula gestit’; 133, ‘tremebunda videt pulsare cruentum Membra solum’; 134 f., ‘oraque buxo’ &c.; 140, ‘Vulnera supplevit’ &c.; 145, ‘oculos iam morte gravatos’; 148 ff., the speech of Thisbe, except the reference to the mulberry-tree.

Gower’s rendering of the story is inferior to that of Chaucer, as might be expected, but nevertheless it is simple and pathetic. It has even some points of superiority, as 1386 f., the passage of Thisbe through the town at night; 1400, ‘with his blodi snoute’; 1411, the terror of Thisbe when concealed in the bush; and finally 1486 ff., where instead of deliberately resolving on death and inflicting it with calm resolution, she is more naturally represented as overcome by a sudden impulse in the midst of her mourning and killing herself almost without consciousness of what she did.

1348. _as it scholde be_: cp. 1222, ‘As thing which scholde so betyde.’

1356. All the best copies have ‘miht’ or ‘might’ here: cp. 1440. The distinction, however, between ‘miht’ (= mayest) and ‘mihte’ is usually well preserved by our author.

1394. _In haste and_: so ll. 1396, 1415. On the other hand, in 1430 we have a stop after ‘folhaste’ (in F), while 1447 remains doubtful.

1442. _as it schal betide_, cp. 1222.

1448. _For sche_, a reference to the ‘folhaste’ of the previous line. It was his haste that destroyed him, for if he had waited but a little he would have seen her come.

1466 f. ‘If it be only by this mishap which has befallen my love and me together.’ For the use of ‘betwen’ see note on ii. 653. The position of ‘Only’ is affected by metrical requirements: see note on ii. 709.

1473. _oure herte bothe_, ‘the hearts of us both.’ The singular ‘herte’ is given by the best copies of each recension.

1496. _Bewar_: thus written several times in F, e.g. 1738. Here A also has ‘Bewar.’

1524. _him stant of me no fere_: cp. ii. 2124.

1537. _Daunger_: see note on i. 2443.

1593 ff. The construction of the sentence is interrupted, but the sense is clear: ‘For if I, who have given all my will and wit to her service, should in reward thereof be suffered to die, it would be pity.’ For this kind of irregularity cp. i. 98, 2948, &c.

1605. The reading ‘in such,’ though given by both S and F, must be wrong.

1630. _overthrewe._ The verb no doubt is intransitive, as often, e.g. i. 1886, 1962, and below, l. 1638.

1666. _him oghte have be_: cp. 704.

1685 ff. Ovid, _Met._ i. 453-567. Gower cuts the story short.

1701. Ovid, _Met._ i. 470,

‘Quod facit auratum est et cuspide fulget acuta.’

(Merkel alters ‘auratum’ to ‘hamatum,’ but this is certainly wrong.)

1704. Note that the final syllable of ‘Daphne’ is subject to elision here and in 1716: so ‘Progne’ v. 5574, &c.

1718 ff. The suggestion is Gower’s own, as in other similar cases, e.g. i. 2355.

1743. ‘And it is to be desired that a man,’ &c.

1757 ff. This story is chiefly from Benoît, _Roman de Troie_, 28025 ff. Guido omits many details which are given by Gower. Note that in l. 28025, where Joly’s edition has ‘Samas,’ Guido and Gower both have ‘Athemas.’ Our author has treated his materials freely and tells the story at greater length. The speech which he assigns to Nestor is for the most part original.

1885 ff. The tale of Orestes is from Benoît de Sainte-More, _Rom. de Troie_, 27925-27990, 28155-28283, and 28339-28402. Guido omits the visit of Orestes to Athens to obtain help for his expedition, the portion of the oracle which bad him tear away his mother’s breasts, and the name of Menetius (or Menesteus), who defended Orestes, and Gower’s details are in general more in accordance with those of Benoît. A few exceptions may be found, however. For example, Gower says that Agamemnon was murdered as he lay in bed (1915), Guido, ‘dum suo soporatus dormiret in lecto,’ but Benoît only, ‘L’ont la premiere nuit ocis.’ Again, Guido calls Idomeneus ‘consanguineum eius,’ and Gower says, ‘So as he was of his lignage,’ of which Benoît says nothing. No doubt Gower was acquainted with both, and preferred the French because he perceived it to be better.

1911. ‘To set her love in place where it cannot be secure.’

2022 f. _Cropheon ... Phoieus._ The names are given as ‘Trofion’ and ‘Florentes’ by Benoît (Joly’s text), ‘Troiesem’ (‘Croeze’ MS.) and ‘Forensis’ by Guido. They are originally derived from a misunderstanding of a passage in Dictys, _Bell. Troi._ vi. 3, ‘armatus cum praedicta manu ad Strophium venit: is namque Phocensis, cuius filia,’ &c.

2055 ff. This speech is introduced by Gower.

2112 f.

‘Li un dient qu’il a fet dreit, Et li autre que non aveit.’

_Rom. de Troie_, 28275.

2145. _Menesteüs._ This is a more correct form of the name than the ‘Menetius,’ which we have in Joly’s text of Benoît.

2148. _of the goddes bede._ Here we perhaps have Guido rather than Benoît.

2173. _Egiona._ The name is properly Erigona, and so it is given by Benoît. The moralization on her fate, 2183 ff., is due to our author, and it is rather out of place, considering the circumstances of the story.

2346. _the trew man._ In F we have ‘trew,’ altered apparently from ‘trewe,’ which is the usual and the more correct form: ‘the trew man to the plowh’ means the labourer who truly serves the plough.

2358. This is simply a repetition of 2355, ‘thei stonde of on acord.’ ‘As of corage’ means as regards their feeling or inclination: for this use of ‘as’ cp. Prol. 492, i. 557, &c.

2363 ff. A very common story, found shortly in Augustine, _Civ. Dei_, iv. 4, and repeated in the _Gesta Romanorum_ and many other books. Gower has expanded it after his own fashion.

2424 f. ‘that men set their hearts to make gain by such wrong doing.’

2451. _homward_, i.e. ‘going homeward.’ The word included something of a verbal sense, as we see in i. 938, iii. 1021: so also ‘toward’ in l. 2643.

2458. _the world mistimed._ The verb ‘mistime’ means properly ‘to happen amiss,’ with the suggestion that it is by the fault of the person concerned. Gower uses it here transitively for ‘to manage amiss,’ while in vi. 4 ‘was mystymed’ means ‘came unhappily about.’

2508. _what man ... rede_: for the subjunctive see note on Prol. 460.

2536. ‘Hardly have any fear’: see note on ii. 2124.

2555. Acastus was king of Iolcos. He purified Peleus, as some say of the murder of Eurytion, but according to others of that of Phocus: cp. Bocc. _Gen. Deorum_, xii. 50, ‘ad Magnetas abiit, ubi ab Achasto fraterna caede purgatus est.’

2563 f. Alcmaeon, son of Amphiaraus, was purified by Achelous, whom our author here takes for a priest.

2599 ff. This anecdote is told also in the _Mirour_, 5029-5040, and there also it is ascribed to Solinus. I do not find it, however, in his book.

2608 ff. For the irregularity of this sentence cp. 1593 ff.

2639 ff. The story is taken from Benoît _(Rom. de Troie_, 6497-6590), as we may see at once from the name ‘Theucer,’ which Guido gives rather more correctly as ‘Theutran.’ Also ll. 2674-2680, _Roman de Troie_, 6545-6553, have nothing corresponding to them in Guido. Guido here certainly referred to a copy of the so-called Dares, where the name occurs in its classical form ‘Teuthras.’ He is particularly interested in the story on local grounds, being concerned to show that the ‘Messe’ which he found in Benoît might be connected with the name of his place of residence, Messina, and that the events related occurred actually in Sicily. Accordingly he speaks of certain columns popularly called ‘columns of Hercules,’ which existed in his own time in Sicily, ‘ex parte Barbarorum,’ i.e. on the south coast, and takes them as evidence of the connexion of Hercules with the island, and hence of the probability that this story (which in the original has to do with Hercules, though Gower has excluded him from it) had its scene in Sicily. Dares, he admits, says nothing of this, and his reference to Dares is here in more precise form than usual, ‘in suo codice’ according to the Bodleian MS., though the printed editions give ‘in suo opere’ (MS. Add. A. 365, f. 50 v^o).

He says of the place where these columns are, ‘qui locus dicitur adhuc columpnarum,’ and adds that the emperor Frederic II has established a town there, and that the place is now called ‘terra nova.’ This is obviously identical with the modern Terranova, founded by Frederic II near the site of the ancient Gela. It seems probable that Guido may have been himself a native of this place or of its immediate neighbourhood, and that he chose to call himself after its former designation, ‘Columpna’ or ‘Columpnae,’ instead of by the new name which had come into use during his own lifetime[AN].

2643. _His Sone._ This is a mistake on the part of Gower. Both Benoît and Guido state quite clearly that Telephus was the son of Hercules, and that it was to Hercules that the obligation was due which is referred to in 2690 ff. Perhaps the copy of the _Roman de Troie_ which Gower used had ‘Thelefus fu filz Achilles’ for ‘Thelefus fu filz Hercules,’ in l. 6506.

2756. We should rather have expected ‘That I fro you wol nothing hele.’

LIB. IV.

9. Cp. _Mirour_, 5606,

‘Lachesce dist, Demein, Demein.’

38. _Thou schalt mowe_: cp. ii. 1670, where we have ‘mow’ for ‘mowe.’

60. _a fin._ This is a French expression, which appears repeatedly in the _Mirour_ as ‘au fin.’

77 ff. The only definite indication of sources here is the reference (such as it is) to Ovid, _Her. Ep._ vii., contained in ll. 104-115.

92. _as it be scholde_, cp. iii. 1348.

104 ff. This picture seems to be constructed partly from a misreading or misunderstanding of Ovid, _Her. Ep._ vii. 1 f.,

‘Sic ubi fata vocant, udis abiectus in herbis Ad vada Maeandri concinit albus olor.’

It is difficult to see how our author translated these lines, but the result, which must have been chiefly due to his imagination, is rather creditable to him. Chaucer gives the true sense in the _Legend of Good Women_, 1355 ff.,

‘Ryght so,’ quod she, ‘as that the white swan Ayenst his deth begynneth for to synge. Ryght so to yow I make my compleynynge.’

128. _such a lak of Slowthe_, ‘such a fault of Sloth.’

137. That is, to put all the slothful in mind (of their duty).

147 ff. The general idea of this is taken from the letter of Penelope to Ulysses, Ovid, _Her. Ep._ i, but this is not closely followed in details, and it will be noticed that Gower represents the letter as sent while the siege of Troy still continued, and apparently he knows nothing of the great length of the wandering afterwards: cp. 226 ff.

170. The reading ‘Had’ for ‘Hath’ is given by many MSS., including F. We find ‘Hath’ in the following, H₁C, SAdTΔ, W, and it must certainly be the true reading.

196 ff. Ovid, _Her. Ep._ i. 2, ‘Nil mihi rescribas, attamen ipse veni.’

234. Robert Grosteste’s reputation for learning in the sciences earned for him, as for his contemporary Roger Bacon, the character of a student of magic. In the metrical life of Grosteste by Robert of Bardney (Wharton, _Anglia Sacra_, i. 333) one chapter is ‘De aeneo capite quod Oxoniae fecit Grosthede ad dubia quaeque determinanda.’ This author says only that by some accident the head fell and was broken, and that its inventor thereupon abandoned the study of forbidden sciences.

Naudé in his _Apologie pour les grands hommes soupçonnez de Magie_ classes ‘Robert de Lincolne’ and Albertus Magnus together as supposed makers of speaking images, but the former only on the authority of Gower, with whom he had been made acquainted by Selden.

242 f. That is, he lost all that he had done from the time when he first began to work; an inversion of clauses for the sake of the rhyme: cp. ii. 709 ff.

249. _kept_: more properly ‘kepe,’ but the infinitive is attracted into the form of the participle ‘wold,’ much as the participle of the mood auxiliary in modern German takes the form of the infinitive: see note on ii. 1799.

305. _hadde I wist_, cp. i. 1888, ii. 473. It is the exclamation of those who fall into evil by neglect of proper precaution. The same sentiment is expressed more fully in l. 899,

‘Ha, wolde god I hadde knowe!’

345. _dar._ This form stands as plural here and l. 350.

371 ff. The story of Pygmalion is from Ovid, _Metam._ x. 243-297.

377. ‘Being destined to the labours of love’; cp. note on iii. 143 (end).

415. _how it were_, i.e. ‘how so ever it were’: cp. l. 1848.

448. _a solein tale_, ‘a strange tale.’ This word ‘solein’ (or ‘soulein’), which English etymologists in search for the origin of ‘sullen’ report as hardly to be found in French, occurs repeatedly in the _Mirour de l’omme_ in the sense of ‘alone,’ ‘lonely.’ For the meaning here assigned to it we may compare the modern use of the word ‘singular,’ which in Gower’s French meant ‘lonely.’ There is no authority for Pauli’s reading ‘solempne,’ and it gives neither sense nor metre.

451 ff. The tale of Iphis is from Ovid, _Metam._ ix. 666-797, abbreviated and altered with advantage.

453 ff. The authority of the MSS. is strongly in favour of ‘grete: lete’ in these lines, and this reading is certainly right. We must take ‘lete’ as the past participle of the strong verb ‘leten’ (from ‘lǣtan’), meaning ‘leave,’ ‘omit,’ and ‘grete’ as accommodated to the rhyme. The negative construction following rather suggests ‘let,’ meaning ‘hindered’ as ii. 128 ff., but the rhyme ‘let: gret’ would be an impossible one. See note on i. 3365 and cp. l. 1153.

585. _And stonde_, i.e. ‘And I stonde’: cp. i. 1895, &c., and below, l. 697.

624. _on miself along_, so below l. 952, ‘It is noght on mi will along,’ and Chaucer, _Troilus_, ii. 1001,

‘On me is nought along thyn yvel fare.’

The use of ‘on’ for ‘of’ in this phrase is still known in some dialects.

647 ff. For the Ring of Forgetfulness here spoken of see Petrus Comestor, _Exodus_ vi., where it is related that Moses in command of the Egyptians captured the chief city of the Ethiopians by the help of Tarbis, daughter of their king, and married her in recompense of her services. Then, wishing to return to Egypt and being detained by his wife, ‘tanquam vir peritus astrorum duas imagines sculpsit in gemmis huius efficaciae, ut altera memoriam, altera oblivionem conferret. Cumque paribus anulis eas inseruisset, alterum, scilicet oblivionis anulum, uxori praebuit, alterum ipse tulit; ut sic pari amore sic paribus anulis insignirentur. Coepit ergo mulier amoris viri oblivisci, et tandem libere in Aegyptum regressus est’ (Migne, _Patrol._ vol. 198, p. 1144). Cp. Godfr. Viterb., _Pantheon_, v. (p. 115).

731 ff. Partly from Ovid, _Her. Ep._ ii. and _Rem. Am._ 591-604; but there was probably some other source, for our author would not find anything in Ovid about the transformation into a tree. Many of the details seem to be of his own invention, and he is probably responsible for the variation which makes the visit of Demophon to Thrace take place on the way to Troy instead of on the return. Chaucer’s form of the story in the _Legend of Good Women_ is quite different.

733. F is here followed in punctuation.

776. _a Monthe day_: Ovid, _Her. Ep._ ii. 3 f.,

‘Cornua cum lunae pleno semel orbe coissent, Litoribus nostris ancora pacta tua est.’

782. Cp. Ovid, _Ars Am._ ii. 354,

‘Exarsit velis acrius illa datis.’

787 ff. Except the idea of a letter being sent, Gower takes little here from Ovid.

816 ff. This passage seems mostly of Gower’s invention, partly perhaps on the suggestion of the story of Hero and Leander in Ovid, _Her. Ep._ xix. 33 ff. See Bech in _Anglia_, v. 347.

_do set up._ Apparently ‘set’ is the participle, cp. ii. 1799.

833. _al hire one._ This idea is emphasized by Ovid, _Rem. Am._ 591 f.

869. This piece of etymology is perhaps due to our author, who usually adds something of his own to the stories of transformation which he relates; see note on i. 2355. Lydgate says that Phyllis hanged herself upon a filbert-tree, but he perhaps took the notion from Gower:

‘Upon the walles depeint men myght se Hou she was honged upon a filbert tre.’

_Temple of Glas_, 88.

See the note in Dr. Schick’s edition, E.E.T.S. 1891.

893. Cp. _Mirour_, 5436,

‘Lors est il sage apres la mein,’

of which this line is an exact reproduction.

904. _pleith an aftercast._ This looks like a metaphor from casting dice, but it is difficult to see the exact application. It means of course here that he is always too late in what he says and does.

914. _come at thin above_, i.e. attain to success: cp. _Mirour_, 25350,

‘Car lors est Triche a son dessus.’

964. See note on i. 2677.

979 ff. The story may probably enough be taken from Ovid, _Metam._ ii. 1-324, but if so it is much abbreviated.

_which is the Sonne hote_, ‘which is called the Sun’; cp. ii. 131 f. Possibly, however, ‘hote’ may be the adjective, with definite termination for the sake of the rhyme. There would be no objection to rhyming with it the adverb of the same form.

1030 ff. The moral drawn by Gower from the story of Phaeton is against going too low, that is abandoning the higher concerns of love owing to slothful negligence. The next story is against aiming too high and neglecting the due claims of service.

1035 ff. Ovid, _Metam._ viii. 183-235.

1090 f. Cp. _Mirour_, 5389 ff.

1096. _who as evere take_: so ‘what man’ is very commonly used with subjunctive, iii. 2508 &c., but the uncertainty of the construction is shown by ‘And thinkth’ in the next line. See notes on Prol. 13, 460.

1108 ff. Cp. _Mirour_, 5395 ff.

1131. A superfluous syllable, such as we have at the pause in this line, is very unusual in Gower’s verse; but cp. v. 447.

1153. _lete I ne mai_, ‘I may not neglect’: see note on i. 3365.

1180. Cp. i. 698, ‘And many a contenance he piketh.’ It means here perhaps ‘thus I keep up a pretence (for staying).’

1245 ff. A somewhat similar story to this is to be found in Andreas Capellanus, _De Amore_, to which my attention was first called by Mr. Archer. This book (written about 1220) gives imaginary colloquies between different kinds of persons, to illustrate the ways of courtship, ‘Plebeius loquitur plebeiae,’ ‘Plebeius nobili,’ ‘Nobilis plebeiae,’ ‘Nobilis nobili.’ In this last occurs the story of a squire who saw the god of love leading a great company of ladies in three bands, the first well mounted and well attended, the second well mounted but attended by so many that it was a hindrance rather than a help, and the third in wretched array with lame horses and no attendance. The meaning of the sight is explained to the squire by one of these last, and he is taken to see the appropriate rewards and punishments of each band. He relates what he has seen to his mistress in order to make her more ready to accept his suit (pp. 91-108, ed. Trojel, 1892).

There are some expressions which resemble those which Gower uses, as ‘quarum quaelibet in equo _pinguissimo_ et formoso et _suavissime ambulante_ sedebat’ (p. 92), cp. 1309 f.,

‘On faire amblende hors thei sete That were al whyte, fatte and grete.’

And again, ‘domina quaedam ... habens equum macerrimum et turpem et tribus pedibus claudicantem,’ cp. 1343 ff. The story, however, is different in many ways from that of Gower. For other similar stories see the article in _Romania_ for January 1900 on the ‘Purgatory of Cruel Beauties’ by W. A. Neilson.

The tale of Rosiphelee is well told by Gower, and in more than one passage it bears marks of having been carefully revised by the author. The alteration of 1321 f. is peculiarly happy, and gives us one of the best couplets in the _Confessio Amantis_.

1285. _the Sonne Ariste_: cp. iii. 1224. The capital letter was perhaps intended to mark ‘Ariste’ as a substantive.

1307. _comen ryde_: cp. i. 350.

1309. ‘hors’ is evidently plural here: so i. 2036 and often.

1320. _long and smal_, i.e. tall and slender. Adjectives used predicatively with a plural subject take the plural inflection or not according to convenience. Thus in Prol. 81 we have ‘Bot for my wittes ben to smale’ in rhyme with ‘tale.’

1323. _beere._ This is pret. plur., as 1376: the same form for pret. subj. 2749.

1330. _For pure abaissht_: cp. Chaucer, _Troilus_, ii. 656, ‘And with that thought for pure ashamed she Gan in hir hed to pulle.’ The parallel, to which my attention was called by Prof. M^cCormick, suggests the idea that ‘abaissht’ is a participle rather than a noun, and the use of the past participle with ‘for’ in this manner occurs several times in Lydgate, e.g. ‘for unknowe,’ ‘meaning from ignorance,’ _Temple of Glas_, 632, ‘for astonied,’ 934, 1366, and so with an adjective, ‘for pure wood’ in the English _Rom. of the Rose_, 276. See Dr. Schick’s note on Lydgate, _Temple of Glas_, 632.

1422. _That I ne hadde_, ‘I would that I had’: cp. v. 3747,

‘Ha lord, that he ne were alonde!’

‘to late war’ is in a kind of loose apposition to the subject.

1429. _swiche._ Rather perhaps ‘swich,’ as ii. 566 f., v. 377. Most MSS. have ‘such.’

1432 ff. _warneth ... bidd._ The singular of the imperative seems to be freely interchanged with the plural in this form of address.

1454 (margin). The author dissociates himself personally from the extreme doctrines enunciated in the text, as at first he took care to remind his readers that the character of a lover was for him only an assumed one (i. 63 ff. margin).

1490. _and longe er that sche changeth_ &c. This is a puzzling sentence, and we are not helped by the punctuation of the MSS., which for the most part have a stop after ‘herte.’ I can only suppose that it means ‘and is long before she changes her heart in her youth to marriage.’ We can hardly make ‘longe’ a verb, ‘and may be eager until she changes,’ because of the lines which follow.

1505 ff. Judges xi. Our author has expanded the story so far as regards the mourning for the virginity of Jephthah’s daughter, that being the point with which he was particularly concerned here.

1516. ‘Whether it be of man or woman.’

1537 ff. In the original this is different, ‘Heu me, filia mea, decepisti me et ipsa decepta es: aperui enim os meum ad Dominum, et aliud facere non potero.’ Gower deals freely here as elsewhere with the narrative, especially in the matter of speeches.

1563. _fourty daies_: in the original ‘duobus mensibus.’

1632 ff. Cp. _Mirour_, 11694.

1649. _as me thenketh ... That_, equivalent to ‘me thinketh ... That,’ either ‘as’ or ‘That’ being redundant.

1659. The best MSS. give ‘heþen’ here, not ‘heþene.’

1693 ff. _Roman de Troie_, 18385 ff. In the medieval Tale of Troy it is the love of Polyxena which serves as motive for the withdrawal of Achilles from the war.

1723. _which I travaile fore._ We have here rather a remarkable instance of emphasis thrown on the preposition, with a modification of form for the sake of the rhyme: cp. ii. 565.

1741. _On whether bord_, i.e. on which tack: technical terms of the sea occur several times in the _Confessio Amantis_, e.g. v. 3119, 7048, viii. 1983.

1810. _made_: cp. Prol. 300.

1815 ff. Gower seems to have dealt rather freely with this story. The usual form of it gives Palamedes, not Nauplius, as the person who came to fetch Ulysses, and makes Ulysses yoke a horse and an ox together in a plough as a sign of madness: see Hyginus, _Fab._ xcv. As to the name of Nauplus, see notes on iii. 973, 1002.

1833. That is, ‘feigning to be mad,’ not ‘like one who feigns to be mad’: see note on i. 695.

1847 ff. ‘He thought to try if he were mad or no, however it might please Ulysses,’ that is, whether it pleased him or not. ‘Hou’ seems to be for ‘How so evere’: cp. l. 415.

1875. _tothe_, written so when the emphasis falls on the preposition, see note on i. 232.

1901 ff. Ovid, _Her. Ep._ xiii.

1927. F has a stop after ‘londeth,’ thus throwing the clause, ‘and was the ferste there Which londeth,’ into a parenthesis.

1935 ff. 1 Sam. xxviii., where the witch is called ‘mulier pythonem habens.’

1968 ff. The story of the education of Achilles by Chiron, as we have it here, is apparently taken, directly or indirectly, from Statius, _Achill._ ii. 121 (407) ff.,

‘Nunquam ille imbelles Ossaea per avia damas Sectari, aut timidas passus me cuspide lyncas Sternere, sed tristes turbare cubilibus ursos Fulmineosque sues, et sicubi maxima tigris Aut seducta iugis fetae spelunca leaenae. Ipse sedens vasto facta exspectabat in antro, Si sparsus magno remearem sanguine; nec me Ante nisi inspectis admisit ad oscula telis.’

2014 ff. The argument is to the effect that Prowess, which is acknowledged to be the virtue opposed to Sloth, see _Mirour_, 10136 &c., must show itself partly in the spirit of warlike boldness, ‘the corage of hardiesce,’ leading to such undertakings as those of which the Lover had disputed the necessity.

2040. _And that_, i.e. ‘And as to that’: cp. Prol. 122.

2045 ff. The fight between Hercules and Achelous is related in detail by Ovid, _Metam._ ix. 31-88. Some parts of this seem to be reproduced by Gower, but the details are not very exactly copied. For the story generally he had some other authority, whence he got for example the names ‘Oënes’ and ‘Calidoyne.’

It is to be noted that Gower gives ‘Achelons’ instead of Achelous, as he does also in the _Traitié_, vii. 5, where the story is shortly told in the same way as here, and there we find ‘Achelontis’ in the margin as the genitive case. He ought to have been preserved from the mistake by the occurrence of the name in Ovid’s verse.

2054. For these two pillars cp. Chaucer, _Cant. Tales_, B 3307 f., but Gower supposes them to have been both set up in the ‘desert of India,’ ‘El grant desert d’Ynde superiour’ as he has it in _Traitié_, vii. 1, whereas according to Chaucer one was set up in the East and the other in the West, to mark the extreme bounds of the world.

2123 f. Such forms of spelling as ‘sleighte,’ ‘heighte’ are unusual with our author, but cp. vii. 1121, 1227 f.

2135. For the stories of ‘Pantasilee’ and Philemenis we may refer to the _Roman de Troie_, 23283 ff. and 25663-25704.

2200 ff. From this question arises the inevitable discussion of the nature of ‘gentilesse’ and how far it depends upon birth, riches or personal merit. Gower accepts only the last qualification, and argues for it after the fashion of John Ball, though he was neither a Lollard nor a social revolutionist: cp. _Mirour_, 23389 ff. For the general subject cp. Dante, _Convito_, iv. 10, _Roman de la Rose_, 18807 ff. (ed. Méon), Chaucer, _Cant. Tales_, D 1109, ff.

To Gower we must grant the merit of clearness and conciseness in handling the well-worn theme.

2208 f. Cp. Dante, _Convito_, iv. 3.

2305 ff. ‘And love is of profit also as regards women, so that they may be the better “affaited.”’

2314. _make it queinte_, ‘behave gently’: cp. ‘make it tough,’ Chaucer, _Troilus_, v. 101. For the meaning of ‘queinte’ see the quotations in Godefroy’s Dictionary under ‘cointe.’

2325. 1 John iii. 14.

2342. This is from Job v. 7.

2396 ff. Many of these names are unknown to me, and Warton’s conjectures on the subject are very wild, but some points may be illustrated from Godfrey of Viterbo. For example, as regards the first we find,

‘Septem quas legimus Cham primus scripserat artes.’

_Pantheon_, iii. (p. 88).

2401. Godf. Vit., _Pantheon_, vi. (p. 133), ‘Tunc Cadmus Graecas literas sedecim fecit.’

2410. _Termegis._ The word is a dissyllable for the metre. Probably this name stands for Termegistus (i.e. Trismegistus), and in that case we must throw the accent upon the final syllable and pass lightly over the preceding one.

2418 ff. I suspect that ‘Poulins’ means Apollo or Apollinis: cp. _Pantheon_, vi. (p. 133), ‘Apollo etiam citharam condidit et artem medicinalem invenit.’

2421. _Zenzis_, i.e. Zeuxis, who is referred to in the _Rom. de la Rose_ (for example) as the chief of painters, 16387 ff. (ed. Méon).

2422. Cp. Godf. Vit, _Panth._ v. (p. 121),

‘Tunc et Prometheus, qui filius est Atlantis Dat statuas hominis humano more meantes.’

2427. ‘Jadahel’ is the Jabal (or Jebal) of the Bible (Gen. iv. 20). Godfrey of Viterbo calls him by the same name and makes the same statement about his hunting and fishing:

‘In mundo Iadahel posuit tentoria primus, Venator prior ipse fuit feritate ferinus, Primus et invalidis retia mersit aquis.’

_Panth._ ii. (p. 77).

2439 ff. Godf. Vit., _Panth._ iv. (p. 98),

‘Saturnus statuit super aequora vela moueri, Denarios posuit commercia rite mereri. . . . . . . . . . . . Aedificans Sutrium dum vivit ibi dominatur, Triticeum semen primus in urbe serens.’

2462 ff. For the seven bodies and four spirits of Alchemy cp. Chaucer, _Cant. Tales_, G 818 ff. Mercury, it will be noticed, is reckoned both as a body and as a spirit, but some authorities called this a spirit only and reckoned six metallic bodies.

2476. _after the bok it calleth_, ‘according as the book calls it.’

2488 ff. Cp. 2565 ff.

2501. The seven forms are those enumerated in 2513 ff., viz. distillation, congelation, solution, descension, sublimation, calcination, fixation.

2522. Cp. Chaucer, _Cant. Tales_, G 862 f.

2533. _Thre Stones._ According to some authors, as Hortulanus (MS. Ashmole 1478, iv.), there was but one stone, the Elixir, which had vegetable, animal and mineral qualities or functions; but in Lydgate, _Secrees of the Philosophres_, l. 530 (E.E.T.S.), we have,

‘And of stones, specially of three, Oon mineral, another vegetatyff,’ &c.;

and the editor quotes from _Rosarium Philosophorum_, ‘Tres sunt lapides et tres sales sunt, ex quibus totum magisterium consistit, scilicet mineralis, plantalis et animalis.’ In the _Secreta Secretorum_, however, the stone seems to be one only, see the chapter ‘De lapide animali vegetabili.’

2597. _who that it knewe_: cp. ii. 88, and see note on Prol. 460.

2606. _Hermes_, i.e. Hermes Trismegistus, to whom the invention of the science was attributed.

_on the ferste_, ‘the very first,’ cp. vi. 1481. It may be questioned, however, whether the theory put forward by C. Stoffel in _Englische Studien_, xxvii. 253 ff., is the correct explanation of this expression, which survived to Elizabethan times (Shaksp., _Cymb._ i. 6. 165, ‘he is one the truest mannered’). He takes ‘on’ in the sense of the Latin ‘unus’ in ‘iustissimus unus,’ to mean ‘alone,’ ‘above all.’ It is perhaps more likely that the usual explanation, which regards it as an elliptical expression for ‘one who was the first,’ is correct, especially in view of such expressions as ‘two the first,’ ‘three the noblest,’ &c., which also occur in the fourteenth century. The use of ‘on’ (‘oon’) for ‘a person’ is common enough, as in the expressions ‘so good on,’ ‘so worthi on,’ ii. 1217, 1240, and ‘Oon Theloüs,’ ii. 1092. We find a similar expression in Gower’s French, e.g. _Mirour_, 2462.

2608. A work by Geber, ‘Super Artem Alkemie,’ in six books, translated from Arabic into Latin, may be found in MS. Ashmole 1384. It seems to treat in a practical and systematic manner of the method of transmutation of metals into gold.

2609. ‘Ortolan’ is the Englishman John Garland, called Hortulanus, for which name see the note in MS. Ashmole 1471 iv. prefixed to an English translation of his ‘Commentary on the Smaragdine Table of Hermes.’

Morien is said to have been a hermit in the mountains near Jerusalem. The two ‘books of Morien’ in the form of dialogues between him and Kalid the son of Gesid may be read in Latin (translated from Arabic) in MS. Digby 162.

2610. A short treatise of Avicen on Alchemy may be found in MS. Ashm. 1420.

2624. _the parfite medicine._ The inflexion is perhaps in imitation of the definite form of the English adjective, as in vii. 2168, 4994, while in l. 2522, where the accent is thrown back, we have ‘the parfit Elixir.’ It is possible, however, that this is a case of the French feminine form such as we have in i. 2677, ii. 3507, iv. 964, cp. i. 636. So perhaps ii. 3243, ‘O thou divine pourveance,’ and viii. 23, ‘O thou gentile Venus.’

2637. _Carmente_: cp. Godf. Vit., _Panth._ vi. (p. 135).

2641. Dindymus here means the grammarian Didymus, a follower of the school of Aristarchus and a very voluminous writer on Greek language and literature. Our author here classes Aristarchus and Didymus with Donatus, and supposes them all to be concerned with the Latin tongue.

2648. _Tullius with Cithero._ It is apparent from this passage, which has been differently given without any authority in the printed editions, that Gower supposed Tullius and Cicero to be two different persons. There would have been reason to suspect this from the passage in the seventh book where he refers to the debate on the death sentence of the Catiline conspirators, speaking of Tullius as his authority for the rules of rhetoric there illustrated, and ‘Cithero’ as the consul, without any hint that they are the same person (vii. 1588 ff.). In Gower’s French works Tullius (Tulles) is the only name used. The form Cithero (or Scithero) is used also by Chaucer, _Cant. Tales_, F 722.

2738 ff. Cp. _Mirour_, 5185 ff.

2749. _beere_, past tense subjunctive, cp. 1323.

2756 ff. Gower seems to be exceptionally well informed on the subject of the Fates and their separate functions.

2792. This casting with the dice would not be for ordinary gambling, but for divining characters and telling fortunes in matters of love. Each combination produced by the three dice thrown would have a certain meaning determined beforehand, as we see by the piece called _The Chaunces of the Dyse_ in the Bodleian MSS. Fairfax 16 and Bodl. 638. For example, the throw of six, four and ace is there explained by the following stanza:

‘O mekenesse of vertu principal, That may be founde in eny creature! In this persone of kunnynge ordinal Is ful assembled, I yow dar assure, The lorde of vertu and al vices cure, Perfit beaute grounded without envye, Assured trust withoute gelousye.’

And similarly there is a stanza, complimentary or otherwise, for each possible throw.

2813. _Hire daunger_: see note on i. 2443.

2855. _whi ne were it_, ‘would it were’: cp. the expression ‘that he ne were,’ vii. 3747, &c.

2895 f. Apparently he means that his dreams were of no such harmless things as sheep and their wool, or perhaps not of business matters, alluding to wool as the staple of English commerce.

2901 ff. Cp. _Roman de la Rose_, 2449-2479.

2905. _I ne bede nevere awake_: cp. _Romaunt of the Rose_, 791, ‘Ne bode I never thennes go.’ It means apparently ‘I should desire never to awake’ (‘I should not pray ever to awake’).

2924. _in my wrytinges._ The author forgets here that he is speaking in the person of the Confessor.

2927 ff. This is from Ovid, _Metam._ xi. 266-748, where the story is told at great length. Gower follows some parts of it, as the description of the House of Sleep and its surroundings, very closely.

Chaucer tells the story in the _Book of the Duchess_, but he has not been so successful in reproducing it as Gower. It is here introduced only as an illustration of the truth of dreams, but with its description of the House of Sleep it is very appropriate also in other respects to the subject of Somnolence, which is under discussion.

2928. _Trocinie_, from the adjective ‘Trachinia,’ in such expressions as ‘Trachinia tellus,’ _Metam._ xi. 269.

2973. The reading of all the best MSS. in this line is ‘he’: (S however is defective). We cannot doubt that the author meant to write ‘sche,’ for in what follows he regularly refers to Iris as female; but the mistake apparently escaped his notice, and we must regard the reading ‘she’ in the two copies in which I have found it as an unauthorized correction. Chaucer makes the messenger male, but does not name him.

2977-3055. This passage very happily follows Ovid, _Met._ xi. 589-645. Our author gives all the essential features, but rearranges them freely and adds details of his own.

2996. _Metam._ xi. 608,

‘Ianua, ne verso stridores cardine reddat, Nulla domo tota.’

3009 ff. _Metam._ xi. 602 ff.,

‘saxo tamen exit ab imo Rivus aquae Lethes, per quem cum murmure labens Invitat somnos crepitantibus unda lapillis.’

3015 ff. _Metam._ xi. 610 ff.,

‘At medio torus est ebeno sublimis in antro, Plumeus, unicolor, pullo velamine tectus, Quo cubat ipse deus membris languore solutis. Hunc circa passim varias imitantia formas Somnia vana iacent,’ &c.

3044. ‘Ithecus’ is a misreading of ‘Icelos,’ as ‘Panthasas’ in l. 3049 of ‘Phantasos.’

3061 ff. Here Gower has made a real improvement in the story by employing the two other ministers of Sleep, whose functions have been described, to represent the scene of the tempest and the wreck, while Morpheus plays the part of Ceyx in the same scene. Ovid introduces the characters of Icelos and Phantasos, but makes no use of them, sending Morpheus alone to relate what has taken place, instead of representing it in action, as it would more naturally appear in a dream.

3159. _mi herte_: more usually ‘min herte’ as 3139, and so generally before ‘h,’ whether aspirated or not, e.g. 3561; but ‘for mi housebondes were,’ vii. 4813, (with ‘myn housebonde’ below, 4829).

3187 ff. This seems to be for the most part original. A hint may have been given by the lines of Ovid in which it is suggested that Aurora might have used a somewhat similar prayer:

‘At si quem manibus Cephalum complexa teneres, Clamares, Lente currite, noctis equi.’

_Amor._ i. 13, 39.

3222. The sun enters Capricorn on Dec. 21.

3273. _that he arise_: so 3374, ‘Til it be dai that I arise,’ and v. 3422, ‘Til dai cam that sche moste arise.’

The verb seems here to be attracted into the subjunctive by the indefinite meaning of ‘Til.’ In the other passages the mood is uncertain.

3317 ff. Ovid, _Metam._ i. 588-723, much abbreviated. It was, however, Jupiter who turned Io into a cow.

3386. _for thou thee schalt avise_, ‘in order that thou mayest consider.’

3414. _that I nere of this lif_, ‘would that I were out of this life.’ For ‘that I nere’ cp. note on 1422. For ‘of this lif’ cp. vii. 2883, ‘whan he were of dawe.’

3438 f. ‘And yet he (Obstinacy) cannot support his own cause by any argument but by headstrong wilfulness.’

For the expression ‘of hed’ we may compare the Latin expression quoted by Du Cange ‘de testa esse,’ explained ‘esse obstinatum’ (Ital. ‘essere di testa’), and the French adjective ‘testu,’

‘Car fol estoient et testu,’ &c.

Froissart says of Pope Urban VI that after his election ‘il s’en outrecuida et enorguilli, et volt user de poissance et de teste,’ which is translated by Berners, ‘he waxed proude and worked all on heed.’ We find also the Latin adjective ‘capitosus’ used by Gower in the margin at the beginning of the _Cronica Tripertita_, and the adverb ‘capitose,’ meaning ‘in a headstrong manner,’ in Walsingham, _Hist. Anglica_, e.g. ‘Regem contra regni consuetudinem Cancellarium deposuisse capitose,’ vol. ii. p. 70 (Rolls Series).

The usual way of reading the sentence has been to punctuate after ‘skile’ and to take ‘bot of hed’ with the next line, ‘but he wastes away in his condition’ (‘hed’ from a supposed ‘hǣd’ akin to the suffix ‘-hed’ or ‘-hede’). This word perhaps occurs _Conf. Am._ ii. 2066, but it would give no very good sense here, and it is doubtful whether it would be rhymed with ‘ded.’ The suffix ‘-hed’ ‘-hede’ apparently has ‘ẹ’ in Gower’s rhymes. Again, if so marked a break in the middle of the line were intended, the Fairfax MS. would almost certainly have had a stop to indicate it, as in 3423, 3431, 3458, 3459, 3484, 3485, to quote instances only from the same page of the MS.

For the use of ‘avowe’ in this sense, cp. v. 124.

3515 ff. The story is based upon Ovid, _Metam._ xiv. 698-761. Our author, however, has reversed the position of the lover and his mistress. In Ovid Anaxarete is a high-born maid of the race of Teucer, while Iphis is ‘humili de stirpe creatus.’ Moreover, the story is considerably developed by Gower, to whom belong the speech of Iphis, the whole account of the grief and self-condemnation of Araxarathen, the details of the funeral and the tomb, and finally the very successful epitaph. Ovid says that she saw from a window the body of Iphis being carried by for burial, and was forthwith turned into stone, and that as witness of the truth of his tale a statue may still be seen at Salamis. There is nothing said about remorse on her part, rather the opposite is implied.

3516. Our author supposes this to be the same as the person mentioned in iii. 2645 ff. (who is really Teuthras king of Mysia). This is Teucer son of Telamon, founder of Salamis in Cyprus.

3520 f. These lines are transposed for the sake of the rhyme. It means ‘on a maid of low estate compared with his’: cp. ii. 709, and below, l. 3616.

3542. Punctuated in accordance with F.

3589. _Thi Daunger_, ‘thy unwillingness to love’: see note on i. 2443.

3658 f. Naturally the expression of Ovid,

‘Veneris quoque nomine templum Prospicientis habet,’

was not understood.

LIB. V.

18. _it cam to londe, wherof_, ‘the occasion arose, whence,’ &c.

22. _him supposeth_: the verb is used impersonally, like ‘him thenketh.’ Probably the confusion between ‘thinke’ and ‘thenke’ gave rise to this expression.

29 ff. So below, 348 ff.: cp. _Mirour_, 7585 ff.

47 f. This seems, as it stands at present, to be an application of the instances to the case of the avaricious man, ‘Thus he so possesses his wealth that he in truth possesses nothing,’ (‘that’ for ‘so that’). The original couplet however, as read by all the unrevised class of manuscripts, applies to the case of the sheep, and we may take it so also in its revised form (‘Thus’ being answered by ‘that’).

49 ff. Cp. _Mirour_, 7645 ff.,

‘L’en dist, mais c’est inproprement, Qe l’averous ad grant argent; Mais voir est que l’argent luy a: En servitude ensi le prent,’ &c.

65. _nevere hier._ Note that there is no elision before ‘hier.’

81 f. ‘And yet, though I held her fast (as a miser his hoard), my life would be a perpetual feast, even on Fridays.’ If he possessed the treasure, his avarice would not allow him to let it go, and yet he would not keep it unused, as a miser does his gold. So later, 93, ‘Though I should hold it fast, I should so be doing that which I were bound to do.’

95. _pipe_, ‘be content’: perhaps from the idea of a bird-catcher piping or whistling for birds, but failing to snare them.

127-136. Note the repetition of the word ‘gold’ in an emphatic position.

141 ff. Ovid, _Metam._ xi. 85-147, freely treated as usual. The debate of Midas as to which of three things he should prefer (ll. 180-245) is all due to our author. In Ovid he chooses without hesitation.

143. _Cillenus_, i.e. Silenus.

154 f. Gower attributes the action of the king to pure courtesy, Ovid to the fact that Midas recognized in Silenus a fellow-mystic.

249 ff. Cp. _Mirour_, 7603 ff.

272 ff. Ovid, _Metam._ xi. 106,

‘Laetus abit gaudetque malo Berecyntius heros: Pollicitique fidem tangendo singula temptat. Ilice detraxit virgam, virga aurea facta est: Tollit humo saxum, saxum quoque palluit auro’: &c.

298. See note on i. 10.

315-332. This is an expansion of _Metam._ xi. 146 f.,

‘Ille perosus opes silvas et rura colebat, Panaque montanis habitantem semper in antris.’

363 ff. The punishment referred to is certainly more appropriate for avarice than for the offence committed by Tantalus: cp. Hor. _Sat._ i. 1. 68. The story of Tantalus is alluded to several times in Ovid, as _Metam._ iv. 458, and told by Hyginus, Fab. lxxxii. Perhaps our author rather followed Fulgentius, _Mythol._ ii. 18, who quotes from Petronius,

‘Divitis haec magni facies erit, omnia late Qui tenet, et sicco concoquit ore famem.’

Cp. _Mirour_, 7621 ff.,

‘Dame Avarice est dite auci Semblable au paine Tantali,’ &c.

370. This seems to mean that it serves for the punishment of the avaricious; but from what follows in 391 ff. we gather that the pains of avarice in this life also are to be compared with this particular pain of hell, and so the application is made in the _Mirour_, 7621-7632.

388. _which a wreche_, ‘what a punishment.’

418. _suie_: cp. Prol. 460.

447. For the superfluous syllable at the pause in the middle of this line cp. iv. 1131.

496. _berth an hond_: equivalent to ‘berth on hond,’ l. 546.

519. Count ‘evel’ as a monosyllable for the verse; so regularly, e. g. iii. 1272, vii. 2773.

526. _janglere._ The final ‘-e’ is not pronounced here.

558 f. _the gold ... The which was leid upon the bok._ The gold in question is that which is laid upon the service-book in payment of the marriage fees: ‘and the Man shall give unto the Woman a Ring, laying the same upon the book with the accustomed duty to the Priest and Clerk.’ _Marriage Service._

564. ‘though he will not praise it,’ i.e. he gives her no credit for it: cp. Prol. 154.

635 ff. Ovid, _Ars Am._ ii. 561-592, but the original is not very closely followed.

665. Cp. iii. 1362 ff.

729 ff. From this arises the very ill-advised digression of ll. 747-1970 about the various forms of Religion. There is no more reason why this should come in here than anywhere else, indeed if the question of false gods was to be raised at all, it ought to have come in as an explanation of the appearance of Venus and Cupid in the first book. Many stories have been told, for example those of Acteon, of the Gorgons, of Tiresias, of Phoebus and Daphne, of Phaeton, of Ceix, of Argus, and of Midas, which required the explanation quite as much as this one, and the awkwardness of putting it all info the mouth of the priest of Venus is inexcusable.

The main authority followed in this account of the religions of Chaldea, Egypt, and Greece is the _Vita Barlaam et Josaphat_, cap. xxvii. (Migne, _Patrol._ vol. 73, p. 548 ff.), but Gower adds much to it, especially as regards the gods and goddesses of Greece.

763. _of Accidence_: cp. ii. 3210.

774. _hevenly_: so Prol. 918, but ‘hevenely’ i. 834, 3136, the second syllable in that case being syncopated, as regularly in ‘hevene.’ So also in the case of ‘evermore’ and ‘everemore’ as compared with ‘evere.’

782. _les_, that is, ‘falsehood.’

798. _Isirus_, i.e. Osiris.

811. _thegipcienes._ This must be the true reading for the sake of the metre, both here and in l. 821, though the best copies fail to give it. A similar case occurs in l. 1119, but there the authority for ‘Jupiteres’ is made much stronger by the accession of S.

897. _Mynitor_, i.e. Numitor.

899 f. _that Remus and Romulus._ For the position of ‘that’ cp. 1166, 1249.

925. _To gete him with_: cp. i. 452.

1004. _wel the more lete by_, ‘much the more esteemed’: cp. _Piers Plowman_, A vi. 105, ‘to lete wel by thyselve,’ and xi. 29: also with ‘of,’ v. 5840; cp. _Piers Plowm._ iv. 160, ‘Love let of hire lighte and lewte yit lasse,’ _Orm._ 7523, ‘uss birrth ... lætenn wel off othre menn.’

1009. _Nonarcigne._ The name is taken no doubt from the adjective ‘Nonacrinus’ (from Nonacris), used as in Ovid, _Met._ i. 690, where it occurs in the story of Pan and Syrinx, told by Mercury to lull Argus to sleep: cp. _Conf. Am._ iv. 3345 ff.

1040. Cp. Prol. 118.

1043 ff. The sentence is interrupted and then begun again at l. 1051: see note on i. 98.

1063. _That he_, i.e. ‘In that he.’ Gower has here mistaken his authority, which says ‘post autem eum propter Tyndarei Lacedaemonii filium a Jove fulmine percussum interiisse narrant.’ _Vita Barl. et Jos._ xxvii.

1071. Delphi and Delos are very naturally confused in the medieval Tale of Troy and elsewhere; but Delos is mentioned correctly enough below, 1256.

1097. _no reason inne_: cp. i. 3209.

1163. _Philerem_, presumably Philyra, but there is no authority for making her the mother of Jupiter.

1249. _that_: cp. 899. Apparently it means, ‘that Diane of whom I am to speak.’ The necessities of rhyme are responsible for these forms of speech.

1276. ‘Which may not attain to reason.’

1323. The paragraph is made to begin here in the MSS. with what is, strictly speaking, its second line, because it is marked by a proper name which indicates its subject, the first line being a mere formal introduction. So also below, 1453: cp. ii. 2451.

1337. The name ‘Dorus’ seems to have been suggested by that of Doris, mother of the Nereids.

1389. _alle danger_, that is, all reluctance or coyness.

1397. _Armene_, i.e. Harmonia.

1398. _Andragene_ Androgynus or Hermaphroditus.

1428. _noght forsake To ben_, i.e. ‘not refuse to be.’

1449. ‘whether it was of weal or wo’; ‘wher’ for ‘whether.’

1453. See note on 1323.

As for the letters said to have been exchanged between Alexander and the king of the Bragmans (or Brahmins), we find them at length in the _Historia Alexandri Magni de Preliis_, which was the source of most of the current stories about Alexander. The passage referred to is as follows: ‘Tot deos colis quot in tuo corpore membra portas. Nam hominem dicis paruum mundum, et sicut corpus hominis habet multa membra, ita et in celo dicis multos deos existere. Iunonem credis esse deum cordis, eo quod iracundia nimia mouebatur. Martem vero deum pectoris esse dicis, eo quod princeps extitit preliorum. Mercurium deum lingue vocas, ex eo quod plurimum loquebatur. Herculem deum credis brachiorum, eo quod duodecim virtutes exercuit preliando. Bachum deum gutturis esse putas, eo quod ebrietatem primus inuenit. Cupidinem esse deam dicis, eo quod fornicatrix extitit; tenere dicis facem ardentem, cum qua libidinem excitat et accendit, et ipsam deam iecoris etiam existimas. Cererem deam ventris esse dicis, et Venerem, eo quod fuit mater luxurie, deam genitalium membrorum esse profers’ (e 2, ed. Argent. 1489).

Cp. the English alliterative _Wars of Alexander_, E.E.T.S., 1886, ll. 4494 ff. There is no mention of Minerva in either of these.

1520 ff. The usual account is to the effect that Ninus set up the first idol: see below, 1541. What we have here seems to be taken from Fulgentius, _Mythol._ ii. 9, where the authorities here cited, Nicagoras and Petronius, are quoted. The passage is apparently corrupt, and our author obviously did not quite understand it: ‘Et quamvis Nicagoras in Disthemithea libro quem scripsit, primum illum formasse idolum referat, et quod vulturi iecur praebeat livoris quasi pingat imaginem: unde et Petronius Arbiter ait,

“Qui vultur iecor intimum pererrat”’ &c.

From the same author, _Mythol._ i. 1, he got the story about Syrophanes, who set up an image of his dead son, to which offerings were made by those who wished to gain his favour.

1541. Cp. Godfr. Vit., _Panth._ iv. (p. 102), whose account agrees very nearly with what we have here, though he represents this image as the first example of an idol, under the heading, ‘Quare primum idolum in mundo et quo tempore fuit.’ Cp. Guido, _Hist. Troiana_, lib. x (e 5, ed. Argent. 1494).

1559. Godf. Vit, _Panth._ iv. (p. 112): ‘His temporibus apud Egyptios constructum est idolum magnum in honorem Apis, Regis Argivorum; quidam tamen dicunt in honorem Ioseph, qui liberavit eos a fame; quod idolum Serapis vocabatur, quasi idolum Apis.’

1571 ff. _Hist. Alexandri_, f 1 v^o, ed. Argent. 1489: ‘Exiens inde Alexander cum Candeolo profecti sunt iter diei vnius, et venerunt ad quandam speluncam magnam et hospitati sunt ibi. Dixitque Candeolus, “Omnes dii concilium in ista spelunca concelebrant.” Cum hoc audisset Alexander, statim fecit victimas diis suis, et ingressus in speluncam solus vidit ibi caligines maximasque nubes stellasque lucentes, et inter ipsas stellas quendam deum maximum,’ &c.

Cp. the English alliterative _Wars of Alexander_, ll. 5387 ff.

1624. _herd me seid_: see note on i. 3153.

1636. There is a stop after ‘Forbad’ in F. The meaning is that he gave a prohibition commanding them not to bow to an image.

1677. _Riht as who sette_: the verb apparently is subjunctive.

1746 ff. What purports to be the original passage is quoted in the margin of the second recension.

1747. For the form of expression cp. vi. 56 f.,

‘O which a sorwe It is a man be drinkeles!’

1756 ff. The substance of this is to be found in Gregory, _In_ i. _Reg._ viii. 7f. (Migne, _Patrol._ vol. 79. p. 222): ‘Et quidem, nisi Adam peccaret, Redemptorem nostrum carnem suscipere nostram non oporteret.... Si ergo pro peccatoribus venit, si peccata deessent, eum venire non oporteret.... Magna quippe sunt mala quae per primae culpae meritum patimur, sed quis electus nollet peiora perpeti, quam tantum Redemptorem non habere?’

1781 ff. Note that here twelve lines are replaced in the second recension by ten, one of the couplets (or the substance of it) having been inserted earlier, after l. 1742.

1826. ‘So that his word explained his deed’: ‘arawhte’ from ‘arechen’ (āreccan).

1831 ff. _Roman de Troie_, 25504-25559.

1848-1959. With this compare Prol. 193-498.

1865. ‘And they do every man what he pleases,’ the verb being plural.

1879. _Pseudo_: cp. _Mirour_, 21625 ff.,

‘Il estoit dit grant temps y a Q’un fals prophete a nous vendra, Q’ad noun Pseudo le decevant; Sicomme aignel se vestira, Et cuer du loup il portera. O comme les freres maintenant A Pseudo sont bien resemblant!’

So also _Vox Clam._ iv. 787 f.,

‘Nomine sunt plures, pauci tamen ordine fratres; Vt dicunt aliqui, Pseudo prophetat ibi.’

It seems that the word ‘pseudopropheta,’ used Rev. xix. 20 and elsewhere, was read ‘Pseudo propheta,’ and ‘Pseudo’ was taken as a proper name. This was combined with the idea of the wolf in sheep’s clothing suggested by Matt. vii. 15, ‘Attendite a falsis prophetis,’ &c., and the application was made especially to the friars.

1888. ‘And this I am brought to believe by the argument that where those above neglect their duty, the people are ignorant of the truth, (as they now are).’

1900 ff. Cp. _Mirour_, 20065 ff., and _Vox Clamantis_, iii. 903. The reference is to Gregory, _Hom. in Evang._ xvii. (Migne, _Patrol._ vol. 76, p. 1148): ‘Ibi Petrus cum Iudaea conversa, quam post se traxit, apparebit: ibi Paulus conversum, ut ita dixerim, mundum ducens. Ibi Andreas post se Achaiam, ibi Iohannes Asiam, Thomas Indiam in conspectum sui regis conversam ducet.... Cum igitur tot pastores cum gregibus suis ante aeterni pastoris oculos venerint, nos miseri quid dicturi sumus, qui ad Dominum nostrum post negotium vacui redimus?’

1919. Cp. _Mirour_, 16662, ‘U q’il ert mesmes auditour.’ The metaphor from rendering accounts in the Exchequer is especially appropriate here for the prelates.

1930. _his lordes besant hedde_: Matt. xxv. 18.

1944. _every Prelat holde_, ‘let every Prelate hold.’

1952 ff. Coloss. iii. 5, ‘avaritiam, quae est simulacrorum servitus.’

END OF VOL. II

OXFORD PRINTED AT THE CLARENDON PRESS BY HORACE HART, M.A. PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY

FOOTNOTES:

[A] In some unpublished papers kindly communicated to me by Miss Bateson.

[B] Froissart, _Chron._, ed. K. de Lettenhove, vol. xv. p. 167.

[C] B. ten Brink, _Geschichte der Engl. Litt._ ii. 141.

[D] This date has hitherto been omitted from the text of the printed editions.

[E] The last two lines, which contain the mention of the earl of Derby, are omitted in some MSS. of the first recension, and this may be an indication that the author circulated some copies without them. A full account of the various recensions of the poem is given later, under the head of ‘Text.’

[F] The term ‘epilogue’ is used for convenience to designate the conclusion of the poem after viii. 2940, but no such designation is used by the author: similarly ‘preface’ means here the opening passage of the Prologue (ll. 1-92).

[G] ‘Minoris etatis causa inde excusabilem pronuncians.’

[H] Dr. Karl Meyer, in his dissertation _John Gower’s Beziehungen zu Chaucer und König Richard II_ (1889), takes account of these various notes of time, having made himself to some extent acquainted with the MSS., but his conclusions are in my opinion untenable.

[I] This has been equally the procedure of Prof. Hales on the one hand, who endeavours to throw back the composition of the first recension to an extravagantly early period, and of Dr. Karl Meyer on the other, who wishes to bring down the final form of the book to a time later than the deposition of Richard II. The theory of the latter, that the sixteenth year of King Richard is given as the date of the original completion of the poem, and not of the revised preface, is sufficiently refuted by the date ‘fourteenth year’ attached to the rewritten epilogue.

[J] For the connexion between this and the _Confessio Amantis_ see L. Bech in _Anglia_, v. 313 ff.

[K] Lydgate apparently did not take Chaucer’s censure very seriously, for he quite needlessly introduced the tale of Canace into his _Falls of Princes_, following Gower’s rendering of it.

[L] See for example the picture of Nebuchadnezzar transformed into an ox, ‘Tho thoghte him colde grases goode,’ &c. (i. 2976 ff.), the account of the jealous husband, who after charging his wife quite unreasonably with wishing she had another there in his stead, turns away from her in bed and leaves her to weep all the night, while he sleeps (v. 545 ff.), and the description of the man who entertains his wife so cheerfully on his return home with tales of the good sport that he has had, but carefully avoids all reference to the occurrence which would have interested her most (v. 6119 ff.).

[M] The reading in the Latin note at the beginning of ‘quarto ’ for ‘sexto decimo’ is probably due to a mistake, for we find ‘sextenthe’ in the text of l. 25. It may be noted that the MS. mentioned by Pauli as containing the rewritten preface and also the Chaucer verses (New Coll. 326) is a hybrid, copied from two different manuscripts.

[N] for King Richard’s sake, to whom my allegiance belongs and for whom I pray. It chanced that as I rowed in a boat on the flowing Thames under the town of New Troy, I met my liege lord, and he bad me come from my boat into his barge, and there he laid upon me a charge to write some new thing which he himself might read. Thus I am the more glad to write, and I have the less fear of envious blame. A gentle heart praises without malice, but the world is full of evil tongues and my king’s command shall nevertheless be fulfilled. Though I have long been sick, yet I will endeavour to write a book which may be wisdom to the wise and play to those who desire to play. But the proverb says that a good beginning makes a good end: therefore I will here begin the prologue of my book, speaking partly of the former state of the world and partly of the present.

[O] Adieu, for I must go from thee. And greet Chaucer well, as my disciple and my poet, who has filled the land with the songs which he made for my sake. And bid him in his later age make his testament of love, as thou hast made thy shrift.’

And so enveloped in a starry cloud, Venus was taken to her place above, and I turned homeward with my beads in hand. (2940*-2970*.)

To God, the Creator of all things, I pray for my worthy king Richard the Second, in whom has always been found Justice mingled with Pity. In his person it may be shown what a king should be, especially in that he sought no vengeance through cruelty. Though evil came upon the land, yet his estate was kept safe by the high God, as the sun is ever bright in himself, though the air be troubled. He sought love and peace and accord, not only here at home, but abroad also, following Christ’s way, and therefore are we bound to serve him, and his name shall be ever remembered. (2971*-3035*.)

I, his subject, helpless with old age and sickness, desire to do him some pleasure, and therefore I present to him this poor book, made both for profit and for sport, and I ask that I may be excused for lack of curious skill. I have written, as I best might, in rude plain words.

And now that I am feeble and old, my Muse bids me rest and write no more of love. He who has achieved what he desired may fitly do his service to love in songs and sayings; but if a man fail, it is otherwise: therefore I take now my final leave of love. But that love which stands confirmed by charity, which brings no repentance and charges not the conscience, this may God send us, that in heaven our joy may be without end. (3036*-3114*.)

[P] The difference in the MS. usually consists only in the line drawn over the final _on_. So also often in the case of the words discussed below, _chaunce_, _daunce_, _enchaunte_, &c.

[Q] Very seldom _sh_ in F, as Prol. 938, i. 2171, i. 1458.

[R] M. Konrath in _Archiv für die neueren Sprachen_, 89, p. 153 ff.

[S] In other cases, as with the group _broke_, _loke_, _spoke_, _wroke_ (past participles), and _ȝoke_ (subst.), there are no rhyme-words with _ǭ_ from _ā_ by which a distinction can be established.

[T] _Archiv für n. Sprachen_, 89, p. 392. As I sometimes have occasion to criticize statements in this paper, I take the opportunity here of acknowledging its merit, as the only careful study lately attempted of Gower’s language.

[U] According to ten Brink, _nede_ ought to be regarded as an uncertain rhyme because of the O. E. _nēades_ beside _nīedes_, but Gower never rhymes it with open _ē_.

[V] This latter rule explains Chaucer’s use of the inflected forms _faire_, _fresshe_, &c., in ‘fresshe Beaute,’ ‘gode, faire White,’ ‘fresshe May,’ &c.

[W] This is a regular use in Chaucer also, e.g. _Cant. Tales_, E 1749:

‘Fulfild of alle beautee and plesaunce,’

but it has not always been clearly recognized.

[X] In the _Praise of Peace_ however the MS. has _here_ for _hire_, ll. 108, 329, cp. 254. F has _hire_ for _here_ once accidentally, iii. 901.

[Y] In a few cases, as Prol. 543, i. 183, 1280, v. 3393, vi. 2062, the grammatically correct form has been printed in the text from less good MSS. and against the combined authority of F and S. On a review of the whole subject this does not now seem to me satisfactory.

[Z] Prof. Lounsbury’s criticism on the rhyme of vii. 5103 f., as given in Pauli’s edition, is quite sound, and Prof. Skeat’s defence of it will not do. Gower never rhymes a past participle in _-ed_ with a weak preterite, though he sometimes drops the _-e_ of the preterite before a vowel. The rhyme was good enough for Chaucer, however, as Prof. Lounsbury’s examples abundantly prove.

[AA] Except in the case of these imperative forms the 2nd pers. plur. is quite consistently used by the Lover in his shrift, and the 2nd pers. sing. by the Confessor in reply.

[AB] The copies which have this conclusion have also the preface in which Richard is mentioned as the occasion of the author’s undertaking, but this preface is found also in combination with the other conclusion.

[AC] Berthelette used a manuscript (not now existing) which in this respect, as in many others, resembled B.

[AD] It may be noted that the four second recension MSS. which contain the author’s Latin note about his books (‘Quia vnusquisque,’ &c.), viz. BTΛP₂, agree in a form of it which is different both from that which is given by first recension copies and that which we find in F, and is clearly intermediate between the other two, the first form fully excusing Richard II for the troubles of his reign and the third entirely condemning him, while this makes no mention of his merits or demerits, but simply prays for the state of the kingdom. It is noticeable that the second recension form definitely substitutes Henry for Richard as the patron of the _Confessio Amantis_, though in one at least of the copies to which it is attached this substitution has not been made in the text of the poem.

[AE] e.g. ii. 193, 365 ff., iii. 168, 1241, iv. 283, 1321, v. 1252, &c.

[AF] For the explanation of the use of letters to designate MSS. the reader is referred to the list of MSS. given later. It should be noted that AJM and FWH₃ represent in each case a group of about seven MSS., and H₁ ... B₂ one of nearly twenty. We observe in the examples given that B and A are sometimes found either separately or together on the side of the H₁ ... B₂ group, and that the same is true occasionally of W, while on the other hand some MSS. of the H₁ ... B₂ group are apt to pass over to the other side in a certain part of the text and support what we call the revised reading.

[AG] S is defective in one of these places and Ad in another, but a reckoning of the lines contained in the missing leaves proves that the facts were as stated.

[AH] They do not, however, contain the additions above mentioned, at Prol. 495, 579, i. 1403, 2267, &c.

[AI] It is doubtful, however, whether the special connexion between B and T extended over the whole book. It seems rather to begin about iii. 1500. The question about the relative position of these two MSS. would be easier of solution if it were not that T is defective up to ii. 2687, that is as regards the part where the connexion of B with the first recension is most apparent. The fact is that until about the middle of the third book B is found usually in accord with the ERCLB₂ group, and though it sometimes in these first books presents the characteristic second recension reading, as ii. 193, 365 ff., iii. 168, at other times it departs from it, as i. 1881, 2017.

[AJ] K belongs to the beginning and H₃ to the middle of the fifteenth century.

[AK] In the case of most of these passages the text proves them to be taken from Caxton’s edition. Thus in Prol. 497 both editions omit ‘to,’ Prol. 583 both omit ‘propre,’ i. 2248 both have ‘Vnder graue’ for ‘Vnder the grene,’ in 2354 ‘other’ for ‘thilke,’ and in 2372 ‘in me’ for ‘I me.’

[AL] These lines have never been printed in any edition before the present, though published separately by K. Meyer in his _John Gower’s Beziehungen_, &c., 1889, and by Prof. Easton of the University of Pennsylvania in his _Readings in Gower_, 1895. There are a large number of sound emendations from the Brit. Museum MSS. suggested in this latter book, but the author had no clear idea of the principles on which the text should be constructed.

[AM] The following will serve as examples of those omitted: