Et vn keu le roi le retint,
Purceo qe fort le vist & grant,
Et mult le vist de bon semblant.
Merueillous fes poeit leuer,
Busche tailler, ewe porter.
The last line answers to l. 942 of the English version.
939. _He bar the turues, he bar the star._ The meaning of the latter
term will be best illustrated by a passage in Moor's _Suffolk Words_,
where, under the word _Bent_, he writes, "_Bent_ or _Starr_, on the N.W.
coast of England, and especially in Lancashire, is a coarse reedy
shrub--like ours perhaps--of some importance formerly, if not now, on
the sandy blowing lands of those counties. Its fibrous roots give some
cohesion to the silicious soil. By the 15 and 16 G. II. c. 33, plucking
up and carrying away _Starr_ or Bent, or having it in possession within
five miles of the sand hills, was punishable by fine, imprisonment, and
whipping." The use stated in the Act to which the _Starr_ was applied,
is, "making of Mats, Brushes, and Brooms or Besoms," therefore it might
very well be adapted to the purposes of a kitchen, and from its being
coupled with turves in the poem, was perhaps sometimes burnt for fuel.
The origin of the word is Danish, and still exists in the Dan. _Stær_,
Swed. _Starr_, Isl. _staer_, a species of sedge, or broom, called by
Lightfoot, p. 560, _carex cespitosa_. Perhaps it is this shrub alluded
to in the Romance of _Kyng Alisaunder_, and this circumstance will
induce us to assign its author to the district in which the Starr is
found.
The speris craketh swithe thikke,
So doth on hegge _sterre-stike_. --l. 4438.