QUESTIONS AND HELPS

1. Write or tell something of life in England at the time of Chaucer. 2. Write or tell what you can about Chaucer. When and where was he born, what sort of training had he, and what work did he do, besides writing, when he became a man? 3. Tell the general plan of the "Canterbury Tales." When, where, and by whom does Chaucer suppose they were told? Describe some of the Canterbury pilgrims. Which one is supposed to tell the tale of Chanticleer, or the Cock and the Fox?

4. Tell in your own words, and briefly, this story of Chanticleer. 5. What is meant by the widow's not needing any sauce but hunger? 6. What does "Chanticleer" mean? 7. What is meant by Chanticleer's having a beard? 8. Who was Cato? Sinon? 9. In the talk between Chanticleer and Dame Partlet, Chaucer is making fun of people who are afraid of dreams. What is he making fun of in the paragraph beginning "Poor Chanticleer," page 193, line 23?

10. Who was Priam, and who killed him? 11. Who was Nero, and what did he do? 12. What fable tells how a fox outwitted another creature by flattery? (See Book Four, page 26.) 13. Notice what a good description Chaucer gives of the fright in the barnyard. Read this again, and imagine you are in the midst of the hubbub. Try to see each person and animal and to make others see them in your reading.

14. How was the fox outwitted at last? What does that tell you about Chanticleer? 15. What moral did Chanticleer see in the adventure? 16. What moral did the fox see?

You will be interested in other stories by Chaucer told in the book "Canterbury Chimes." Another collection of Chaucer's stories are Darton's "Tales of the Canterbury Pilgrims."

Geoffrey Chaucer (Geoffrey Chau'- authority (au thor'ĭty): a right to

THE RED CROSS KNIGHT AND THE DRAGON

FROM "THE FAIRY QUEEN"

EDMUND SPENSER

[About a hundred and fifty years had passed since the death of Chaucer, the great story-teller of the "Canterbury Tales." During that time few great books had been written. Sir Thomas Malory had translated from the 5 French the stories of King Arthur-one of which you read in Book Five; the Bible had also been translated; and about the same time a man named Caxton had printed the first book in English. Before then books had been written by hand. Columbus, too, had sailed from 10 Spain and had discovered the new continent of America.

During all these years men were beginning to think less about their meat pies and strong drink and were growing anxious to learn. The world was waking up. The old Greek learning which had been so long forgotten 15 was revived, and because it was new to the people of that age they called it the "new learning." So the years had passed since Chaucer died.

In 1552 another great poet and story-teller was born in England. His name was Edmund Spenser, and like 20 Chaucer, he was born in London. It is supposed that his father was a tailor and that he was poor. If young Spenser had been like most boys in his position, he would

have been content to be a tailor like his father; but the lad had heard of the "new learning" and wanted some of it. He wanted to go to college. As his father could not afford to send him, he went as a sizar; that is, he earned his board and lodging by waiting on the 5 tables and doing other work. He also acted as a servant to wealthy students. He worked hard, and was often ill as a result of it; but he loved his college, and speaks of it in his poems with great tenderness.

At twenty-four he had finished his course, and still 10 being in ill health, he went to live for a time with some relatives in the north of England. There he began to write a poem called "The Shepherd's Calendar," telling of country life through all the months of the year.

Then one of his college friends wrote asking him to 15 come to London. He went; and there he met several famous courtiers and scholars. The great Sir Philip Sidney became his friend, and the Earl of Leicester took him into his house as secretary. He traveled to France and to Ireland in the service of the earl, and published 20 "The Shepherd's Calendar," which made him well-known. Queen Elizabeth was then upon the throne of England, and she was beginning to gather about her that famous group of poets and scholars who have made the England of her time so celebrated-Sidney and Sir Walter 25 Raleigh and Spenser and Lord Bacon and, greatest of all, Shakespeare.

Spenser soon received a position as secretary to the governor of Ireland. In Ireland he saw war and bloodshed. The Irish were in rebellion against the English rule, and were fighting savagely. But at last the rebellion 5 was put down, and Spenser was given for a home a fair old ivy-covered castle near the city of Cork. There he lived for many years, and there he wrote most of his great poem, "The Fairy Queen." Sir Walter Raleigh visited him there, and Spenser read to Raleigh the first 10 three parts of the poem. Raleigh was delighted with it, and made Spenser go back to London with him and publish all that was finished. Queen Elizabeth was also greatly pleased, and told her Lord Treasurer to give Spenser a generous pension; but the Lord Treasurer was 15 an economical person, and gave Spenser only half of what the queen had asked. That was not enough for Spenser to live upon in London, so he went back to Ireland to his castle.

Spenser employed the years that followed in working 20 busily at "The Fairy Queen." Meanwhile he married a beautiful Irish girl, writing in her honor a marriage hymn, which is one of his most famous poems. He went to London again, published three more parts of "The Fairy Queen," and spent some months at the court of 25 Elizabeth, meeting all the great men of that day. Here he must have talked with Shakespeare, who was already one of the celebrated writers and actors of the time.