And faire, and riche, and yonge, and well begon." 8

"Yonge," what a word! Was human delusion ever more happily painted? How life-like is all, and how easy the tone. It is the satire of marriage. You will find it twenty times in Chaucer. Nothing more is wanted to exhaust the two subjects of French mockery than to unite with the satire of marriage the satire of religion.

We find it here; and Rabelais is not more bitter. The monk whom Chaucer paints is a hypocrite, a jolly fellow, who knows good inns and jovial hosts better than the poor and the hospitals:

"A Frere there was, a wanton and a mery
Ful wel beloved, and familier was he
With frankeleins over all in his contree,

And eke with worthy wimmen of the toun.
Full swetely herde he confession,
And pleasant was his absolution.

He was an esy man to give penance,

Ther as he wiste to han a good pitance:
For unto a poure ordre for to give

Is signe that a man is wel yshrive.

And knew wel the tavernes in every toun,
And every hosteler and gay tapstere,
Better than a lazar and a beggere.
It is not honest, it may not avance,
As for to delen with no swich pouraille,
But all with riche and sellers of vitaille.
For many a man so hard is of his herte,
He may not wepe, although him sore smerte.
Therfore in stede of weping and praieres,

Men mote give silver to the poure freres."9

This lively irony had an exponent before in Jean de Meung. But Chaucer pushes it further, and gives it life and motion. His monk begs from house to house, holding out his wallet:

"In every hous he gan to pore and prie,
And begged mele and chese, or elles corn.
'Yeve us a bushel whete, or malt, or reye,
A Goddes kichel, or a trippe of chese,

Or elles what you list, we may not chese;

"Canterbury Tales," ii., Wife of Bath's Prologue, p. 185, lines 6177-6188.

Ibid. prologue, ii. p. 7, line 208 et passim.

A Goddes halfpeny, or a masse peny;

Or yeve us of your braun, if ye have any,
A dagon of your blanket, leve dame,

Our suster dere (lo here I write your name).'
And whan that he was out at døre, anon,
He planed away the names everich on." 10

He has kept for the end of his circuit, Thomas, one of his most liberal clients. He finds him in bed, and ill; here is excellent fruit to suck and squeeze:

"God wot,' quod he, 'laboured have I ful sore,
And specially for thy salvation,

Have I sayd many a precious orison.

I have this day ben at your chirche at messe

And ther I saw our dame, a, wher is she?'" 11

The dame enters:

"This frere ariseth up ful curtisly,

And hire embraceth in his armes narwe,

And kisseth hire swete and chirketh as a sparwe.” 12

Then, in his sweetest and most caressing voice, he compliments her, and says:

"Thanked be God that you yaf soule and lif,
Yet saw I not this day so faire a wif

In all the chirche, God so save me.'” 13

Have we not here already Tartuffe and Elmire? But the monk is with a farmer, and can go to work more quickly and directly. When the compliments ended, he thinks of the substance, and asks the lady to let him talk alone with Thomas. He must inquire after the state of his soul:

"I wol with Thomas speke a litel throw:
Thise curates ben so negligent and slow

To gropen tendrely a conscience.

Now, dame,' quod he, 'jeo vous die sanz doute,

Have I nat of a capon but the liver,

And of your white bred nat but a shiver,
And after that a rosted pigges hed

"Canterbury Tales," The SompBoures Tale, ii. p. 220, lines 7319-7340. "Ibid. p. 221, line 7366.

12 Ibid. p. 221, line 7384.
1 Ibid. p. 222, line 7389.

(But I ne wolde for me no beest were ded),
Than had I with you homly suffisance.

I am a man of litel sustenance,

My spirit hath his fostring in the Bible.

My body is ay so redy and penible

To waken, that my stomak is destroied.' "' 14

Poor man, he raises his hands to heaven, and ends with a sigh.

The wife tells him her child died a fortnight before. Straightway he manufactures a miracle; how could he earn his money in any better way? He had a revelation of this death in the "dortour" of the convent; he saw the child carried to paradise; he rose with his brothers, with many a tere trilling on our cheke," and they sang a Te Deum:

66

"For, sire and dame, trusteth me right wel,

Our orisons ben more effectuel,

And more we seen of Cristes secree thinges
Than borel folk, although that they be kinges.
We live in poverte, and in abstinence,
And borel folk in richesse and dispence.
Lazer and Dives liveden diversely,
And divers guerdon hadden they therby.'

"15

Presently he spurts out a whole sermon, in a loathsome style, and with an interest which is plain enough. The sick man, wearied, replies that he has already given half his fortune to all kinds of monks, and yet he continually suffers. Listen to the grieved exclamation, the true indignation of the mendicant monk, who sees himself threatened by the competition of a brother of the cloth to share his client, his revenue, his booty, his food-supplies:

"The frere answered: 'O Thomas, dost thou so?

What nedeth you diverse freres to seche?

What nedeth him that hath a parfit leche,

To sechen other leches in the toun?

Your inconstance is your confusion.
Hold ye than me, or elles our covent,
To pray for you ben insufficient?
Thomas, that jape n' is not worth a mite,
Your maladie is for we han to lite.'" 16

14" Canterbury Tales," ii., The Somp. noures Tale, p. 222, lines 7397-7429.

15 Ibid. p. 223, lines 7450-7460.

10 Ibid. p. 226, lines 7536-7544

Recognize the great orator; he employs even the grand style to keep the supplies from being cut off:

“‘A, yeve that covent half a quarter otes;
And yeve that covent four and twenty grotes;
And yeve that frere a peny, and let him go:
Nay, nay, Thomas, it may no thing be so.
What is a ferthing worth parted on twelve?
Lo, eche thing that is oned in himself
Is more strong, than whan it is yscatered
Thou woldest han our labour al for nought.'

Then he begins again his sermon in a louder tone, shouting at each word, quoting examples from Seneca and the classics, a terrible fluency, a trick of his trade, which, diligently applied, must draw money from the patient. He asks for gold," to make our cloistre,"

And yet, God wot, uneth the fundament

Parfourmed is, ne of our pavement

N' is not a tile yet within our wones;

By God, we owen fourty pound for stones.

Now help Thomas, for him that harwed helle,
For elles mote we oure bokes selle,
And if ye lacke oure predication,

Than goth this world all to destruction.

For who so fro this world wold us bereve,

So God me save, Thomas, by your leve,
He wold bereve out of this world the sonne.'

99 18

In the end, Thomas in a rage promises him a gift, tells him to put his hand in the bed and take it, and sends him away duped, mocked, and covered with filth.

We have descended now to popular farce; when amusement must be had at any price, it is sought, as here, in broad jokes, even in filthiness. We can see how these two coarse and vigorous plants have blossomed in the dung of the Middle Ages. Planted by the sly fellows of Champagne and Ile-de-France, watered by the trouvères, they were destined fully to expand, speckled and ruddy, in the large hands of Rabelais. Meanwhile Chaucer plucks his nosegay from it. Deceived husbands, mishaps in inns, accidents in bed, cuffs, kicks, and robberies, these suffice to raise a loud laugh. Side by side with noble pictures

17"Canterbury Tales," ii., The Sompnoures Tale, p. 226, lines 7545-7553

18 Ibid. p. 230, lines 7685-7695.

of chivalry, he gives us a train of Flemish grotesque figures, carpenters, joiners, friars, summoners; blows abound, fists descend on fleshy backs; many nudities are shown; they swindle one another out of their corn, their wives; they pitch one another out of a window; they brawl and quarrel. A bruise, a piece of open filthiness, passes in such society for a sign of wit. The summoner, being rallied by the friar, gives him tit for tat:

"This Frere bosteth that he knoweth helle,
And, God it wot, that is but litel wonder,
Freres and fendes ben but litel asonder.
For parde, ye han often time herd telle
How that a Frere ravished was to helle
In spirit ones by a visoun,

And as an angel lad him up and doun,
To shewen him the peines that ther were,
And unto Sathanas he lad him doun.
(And now hath Sathanas,' saith he, ‘a tayl
Broder than of a Carrike is the sayl.)
Hold up thy tayl, thou Sathanas, quod he,
and let the Frere see

Wher is the nest of Freres in this place.
And er than half a furlong way of space,
Right so as bees out swarmen of an hive,
Out of the devils . . ther gonnen to drive.

A twenty thousand Freres on a route,

And thurghout hell they swarmed all aboute,
And com agen, as fast as they may gon.' "19

Such were the coarse buffooneries of the popular imagination.

Section V.-The Art of Chaucer

It is high time to return to Chaucer himself. Beyond the two notable characteristics which settle his place in his age and school of poetry, there are others which take him out of his age and school. If he was romantic and gay like the rest, it was after a fashion of his own. He observes characters, notes their differences, studies the coherence of their parts, endeavors to describe living individualities-a thing unheard of in his time, but which the renovators in the sixteenth century, and first among them Shakespeare, will do afterwards. Is it already the English positive common-sense and aptitude for seeing the inside of things

19 44 Canterbury Tales," ii., The Sompnoures Prologue, p. 217, lines 7254-7279.