1. Among the evidences that Chaucer’s great work was left
incomplete, is the absence of any link of connexion between the
Wife of Bath’s Prologue and Tale, and what goes before. This
deficiency has in some editions caused the Squire’s and the
Merchant’s Tales to be interposed between those of the Man of
Law and the Wife of Bath; but in the Merchant’s Tale there is
internal proof that it was told after the jolly Dame’s. Several
manuscripts contain verses designed to serve as a connexion;
but they are evidently not Chaucer’s, and it is unnecessary to
give them here. Of this Prologue, which may fairly be regarded
as a distinct autobiographical tale, Tyrwhitt says: “The
extraordinary length of it, as well as the vein of pleasantry that
runs through it, is very suitable to the character of the speaker.
The greatest part must have been of Chaucer’s own invention,
though one may plainly see that he had been reading the popular
invectives against marriage and women in general; such as the
‘Roman de la Rose,’ ‘Valerius ad Rufinum, De non Ducenda
Uxore,’ (‘Valerius to Rufinus, on not being ruled by one’s wife’)
and particularly ‘Hieronymus contra Jovinianum.’ (‘Jerome
against Jovinianus’) St Jerome, among other things designed to
discourage marriage, has inserted in his treatise a long passage
from ‘Liber Aureolus Theophrasti de Nuptiis.’ (‘Theophrastus’s
Golden Book of Marriage’).”
2. A great part of the marriage service used to be performed in
the church-porch.