CHAUCER'S INFLUENCE
Few poets have received more immediate and widespread recognition than
Chaucer. Fifteenth-century poetry almost wholly dominated by his
influence, and one united chorus of praise and admiration rises from the
lips of his successors. Shirley, who edited the _Knightes Tale_ (amongst
other works of Chaucer's) in the first half of the fifteenth century,
speaks of him as "the laureal and most famous poete that euer was to-fore
him as in th' embelisshing of oure rude modern englisshe tonge...."
Lydgate and Occleve, the most noted poets of the period, invariably refer
to him as their master. As has already been mentioned, a large number of
poems were written in close imitation of his style, and echoes of his
verse are to be heard on every side.
It is usual to divide his followers into two groups: English Chaucerians
and Scottish Chaucerians.
The English Chaucerians, with all their admiration for their master, show
but scant understanding of his real greatness. Having little ear for
rhythm themselves, they only mangle his verse when they try to imitate it;
and while they fully recognise the debt which English versification owes
him, it is but rarely that their own lines show any hint of his sweetness
and melody. Lydgate is by far the greatest of them, and of him Professor
Saintsbury justly remarks: "It is enough to say that, even in rime royal,
his lines wander from seven to fourteen syllables, without the possibility
of allowing monosyllabic or trisyllabic feet in any fashion that shall
restore the rhythm; and that his couplets, as in the _Story of Thebes_
itself, seem often to be unaware whether they are themselves octosyllabic
or decasyllabic--four-footed, or five-footed." Instead of the suppleness
and endless variety of Chaucer's verse, we have a treatment of metre which
at its best is apt to be dull and stiff, and at its worst is intolerably
slipshod. Only by some rare chance does a momentary gleam of beauty
flicker across these pages, and a flash of poetic feeling raise the trite
and conventional language to such a level as:--
O thoughtful herte, plonged in dystresse,
With slomber of slouthe this longe winter's night--
Out of the slepe of mortal hevinesse
Awake anon! and loke upon the light
Of thilke starr.
(Lydgate, _Life of Our Lady_.)
Nor is the matter much more inspiring than the form that clothes it. The
English Chaucerians are worthy men, who spend their time in bewailing the
errors of their youth and offering good advice to whoso will accept it. Of
Chaucer's humour and realism they have no conception, nor do they realise
the force of his digressions. The allegorical form of his earlier poems
appeals to them, and, disregarding the movement and life of the
_Canterbury Tales_, they ramble along the paths marked out in the _Hous of
Fame_ without attending to their master's excellent advice to flee
prolixity. Lydgate, it is true, does show some narrative power. His _Troy
Book_ is obviously inspired by _Troilus and Creseyde_, and his _Story of
Thebes_ by the _Knightes Tale_, but he has neither the conciseness of
Gower nor the dramatic insight of Chaucer. Among the 114 works attributed
to him, it is only natural that some variety should be shown, and
occasionally, as in the _London Lickpenny_, a skit on contemporary life
in the City, he shows some trace of humour. _The Temple of Glas_ is a
close imitation of the _Hous of Fame_, but it lacks the shrewd sense, the
original comments on life, the subtle humour of its model. Lydgate is most
poetical when his religious feeling is touched, as in his _Life of Our
Lady_; and most human when he becomes frankly autobiographical. The
stiffness of the _Temple of Glas_ is redeemed by such passages as that in
which the author (who entered a monastery at fifteen) describes the
lamentations of those
That were constrayned in hir tender youthe
And in childhode, as it is ofte couthe[208]
Yentered were into religion[209]
Or they hade yeares of discresioun;
That al her life cannot but complein
In wide copes perfeccion to feine.
Occleve, who has even less poetic genius than Lydgate, is remembered
chiefly because the manuscript of his _Gouvernail of Princes_ (a poem of
good advice, addressed to Prince Hal) contains the only authentic portrait
of Chaucer--a sketch drawn in the margin by the author himself. The lines
which accompany the portrait, sufficiently illustrate the estimation in
which Chaucer was held. Their modesty and simple affection disarm
criticism.
Symple is my goste, and scars my letterure[210]
Unto youre excellence for to write
My inward love, and yit in aventure
Wol I me put, thogh I can but lyte;
My dere maister--God his soule quyte,--[211]
And fader, Chaucer, fayne wold have me taught,
But I was dulle, and lerned lyte or naught.
Allas! my worthy maister honorable,
This londes verray tresour and richesse,
Dethe by thy dethe hath harm irreperable
Unto us done: hir vengeable duresse[212]
Dispoiled hath this londe of the swetnesse
Of rethoryk, for unto Tullius
Was never man so lyk amenges us.
* * * * *
She myght have taryed hir vengeaunce a whyle,
Tyl sum man hadde egal to thee be;
Nay, let be that; she wel knew that this yle[213]
May never man forth bringe like to thee,
And her office needes do must she;
God bad her soo, I truste as for the beste,
O maystir, maystir, God thy soule reste!
His consciousness of the superiority of his master did not, however,
prevent him from venturing to make use of the same material, and in the
_Chaste Spouse of the Emperor Gerelaus_ he re-tells the story of
Constance.
A number of minor poets make up the list. Benedict Burgh--the shadow of
Chaucer's shadow--completed _The Secrets of the Philosophers_, a
peculiarly dull poem which Lydgate left unfinished at his death. Side by
side with him worked George Ashby, clerk of the signet to Queen Margaret,
and a little later comes Henry Bradshaw, a monk of St. Werburgh's Abbey at
Chester. They are all worthy, honest men, who utter moral platitudes with
an air of conviction; painstaking but unskilful apprentices in the
workshop of poetry, who conscientiously blunt their tools and cut their
fingers in a vain effort to do the work of master craftsmen. One curious
little development is, however, worth noticing. In the latter half of the
fifteenth century two poets, Sir George Ripley and Thomas Norton, wrote
treatises on alchemy, in verse. Ripley's _The Compound of Alchemy, or the
Twelve Gates_, and Norton's _Ordinall of Alchemy_, owe their interest in
the first place to the proof they afford that verse at the time was a
natural means of instruction rather than an end in itself; and in the
second to their adventitious connection with the _Chanouns Yemannes
Tale_. Norton endeavours to copy the Chaucerian couplet, and Professor
Saintsbury suggests that he is probably the Th. Norton whom Ascham, in his
_Scholemaster_, classes with Chaucer, Surrey, Wyatt and Phaer, as having
vainly attempted to replace accent by rhyme.
Stephen Hawes falls into a class somewhat apart. Writing at the close of
the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth century, he stands at the
parting of the ways, and while his poetry shows signs of the new
influences that were at work, his heart is evidently with the old
conventions which are beginning to pass away. His chief poem, _The Pastime
of Pleasure, or the Historye of Graunde Amoure and la Bell Pucell:
containing the Knowledge of the Seven Sciences and the Course of Man's
Life in this World_, is sufficiently described by its title. It stands, as
it were, half-way between Chaucer and Spenser, at one moment clearly
recalling the love scenes of _Troilus and Criseyde_, at another reminding
us equally forcibly of the elaborate and ingenious allegory of the _Faerie
Queene_. The combination of chivalry and allegory was something new, and
though Hawes himself proved incapable of making the most of its
possibilities, English literature owes him a real debt. He never rises to
any great height. Mr. Murison, in his chapter on Hawes in Vol. II of the
_Cambridge History of Literature_, draws attention to certain verbal
resemblances between the _Passetyme of Pleasure_ and the _Faerie Queene_,
but the passages quoted serve only to show how far removed the music of
Spenser is from the speech of ordinary men. At his worst Hawes sinks
beneath the lowest level of what can possibly be allowed to pass as verse.
The dialogue between Graunde Amour and Dame Grammar defies parody:--
"Madame," quod I, "for as much as there be
Eight partes of speche, I would knowe right faine,
What a noune substantive is in his degree;
And wherefore it is so called certaine?
To whom she answered right gentely againe
Saing alway that a noune substantive
Might stand without helpe of an adjective.
That the stanza of _Troilus and Criseyde_ should be used for such stuff as
this is unbearable.
The Scottish Chaucerians are of far more intrinsic importance. The
love-allegory of the _Kingis Quair_ shows the influence of Chaucer not
only in its use of the Chaucerian stanza--henceforth to be known as the
rhyme royal--but in the evidence it affords of its author's acquaintance
with the English version of the _Romance of the Rose_. Moreover, in it may
be noticed that sympathy with the freshness and joy of nature which forms
so strong a bond between Chaucer and his Scottish disciples, and is so
conspicuous by its absence in the work of the English Chaucerians. Emily
herself might well walk in the garden where
... on the smale grene twistis[214] sat
The little sweete nyghtingale, and song
So loud and clear, the hymnes consecrate
Of loves use, now softe now loud among,
That all the gard(e)nes and the walles rong
Ryght of their song, and on the copill[215] next
Of their sweet harmony, and lo the text:
"Worschippe, ye that loveres be(ne) this May,
For of your bliss the kalendes are begonne,
And sing with us, away winter, away,
Come sumer, come, the sweet season and sonne,
Awake, for schame! that have your heavenes wonne,
And amourously lift up your heades all,
Thank Love that list you to his merci call;"
and the picture of Joan Beaufort,
The fairest or the freschest yong(e) floure
That ever I sawe, me thoght, before that houre;
has something of Chaucer's daintiness and grace.
The Scottish poets have, also, far more sense of form than the English.
Henryson's _Testament of Cressid_, written to satisfy its author's thirst
for poetic justice and to show Cressida paying the penalty of her
misdeeds, with all its conventional morality, for sincerity of feeling and
felicity of style will bear comparison with its great original. His fables
show a quick sense of humour, a combination of tenderness and realism
which recall Chaucer again and again. The feast spread by the Burgis Mouse
for the Uplandis Mouse is delightful:--
After when they disposed were to dine,
Withouten grace they wash'd and went to meat,
With all the courses that cooks could define,
Mutton and beef laid out in slices greet;
And lordis fare thus could they counterfeit,
Except one thing, they drank the water clear
Instead of wine, but yet they made good cheer.
Gawain Douglas, Bishop of Dunkeld, was perhaps most nearly akin to the
English Chaucerians. A scholar and a man of distinguished position, he has
none of the lightness of Henryson. He takes poetry seriously, and inclines
to trace a moral purpose even in the Æneid. His _Palice of Honour_ well
illustrates the manner in which Chaucer's successors made free with the
framework of his poems, while at the same time it shows the growing
delight in picturesque effect which was one day to break into the
Elizabethan glow of colour. The poet finds himself wandering in a dreary
wilderness and breaks out in complaint against Fortune, who has led him
there. As he laments, he sees approaching him a rout "of ladyis fair and
gudlie men":--
Amiddes(t) whom borne in a golden chair
O'er-fret with pearl and stones most preclair[216]
That draw(e)n was by hackneys all milk-white
Was set a Queen, as lily sweet of swair[217]
In purple robe, hemmed with gems each gair[218]
Which gemmed claspes closed all perfite[219]
A diadem, most pleasantly polite,
Set on the tresses of her golden hair.
The original form, which illustrates the comparatively modernness of the
language used by Chaucer, is as follows:
Amiddes quhome, borne in ane goldin chair
Ourfret with perle and stanis maist preclair
That drawin was by haiknayis all milk quhite,
Was set a Quene, as lyllie sweit of swair
In purpor rob hemmit with gold ilk gair,
Quhilk gemmit claspis closit all perfite.
A diademe maist plesandlie polite.
Set on the tressis of her giltin hair.
And in her hand a scepter of delight.
This is Dame Sapyence, and with her come Diana, Jephtha's daughter,
Palamon, Arcite and Emily, Troilus and Cressida, David and Bathsheba,
Delilah, Cleopatra, Jacob and Rachel, Venus (whose "hair as gold or
topasis was hewit") and a number more famous lovers of antiquity. A
"ballet of inconstant love" follows. This offends Venus, and the poet is
brought before her to answer for his lack of respect. Poetry, the Muses,
and the Poets from Homer to Chaucer and Dunbar, form a Court. Calliope
pleads for him, and he is allowed to atone for his misdeed by composing "A
ballet for Venus' pleasour," which so delights the company that he is
invited to join the cavalcade. After travelling through Germany, France,
Italy, and other countries, they reach the Fountain of the Muses. Here
they alight:--
Our horses pastured in ain pleasand plane,
Low at the foot of ain fair grene montane,
Amid ain mead shaddowit with cedar trees,
where
... beriall stremis rinnand ouir stanerie greis[220]
Made sober noise, the shaw dinned agane
For birdis song and sounding of the beis.[221]
In the midst of the field Douglas finds a gorgeous pavilion in which
knights and ladies are feasting, while a poet relates the brave deeds of
those who in the past proved "maist worthie of thair handis." After
listening to these heroic tales the company once more sets out. Beyond
Damascus they reach their journey's end. The poet is guided by a nymph to
the foot of a steep mountain, at the summit of which stands the Palace of
Honour. As he climbs he sees before him a dreadful abyss out of which
proceed flames. His ears are filled with the sound of terrible cries; on
either side lie dead bodies. These beings in torment are they who set out
to pursue Honour, but "fell on sleuthfull sleip," and so were "drownit in
the loch of cair." (It has been suggested by critics bent on finding an
original for the _Pilgrim's Progress_, that Bunyan found in this the idea
of his "byway to Hell.") At last he reaches the Palace, where he is shown
many treasures, including Venus' mirror, which reflects "the deidis and
fatis of euerie eirdlie wicht." Prince Honour is attended by all the
virtues, and the poem ends by contrasting worldly and heavenly honour and
commending virtue.
The gracious figure of Sapience, her dress gleaming with jewels, her head
crowned with a diadem, is very different from any being of Lydgate's or
Occleve's creation; already the first rays of Renaissance light are
showing above the horizon, and the cold gray mists of fifteenth-century
poetry are dispersing before its warmth and brilliance; but the radiance
that heralds the new era is that of sunrise, flushing the world with a
wonder of colour, rather than of that light of common day in which Chaucer
is content to walk. In the great age to come, the Elizabethans are to show
how the rapture and intoxication of beauty may be combined with the
sternest realism, but in the early sixteenth century the children of the
new birth walk with uncertain steps towards the dawn.
The poet who most clearly shows the growing love of beauty, and at the
same time is most truly in sympathy with Chaucer, is William Dunbar. No
other poet of the period has such skill in versification, such freshness
and vigour, or such variety. His humour is as all-pervading as Chaucer's.
Now he addresses a daring poem to King James, slyly laughing at one of his
numerous love affairs; now he writes the story of the _Two Friars of
Berwick_, or the _Treatise of the Two Married Women and the Widow_,
broadly comic fabliaux which might well have found a place among the
_Canterbury Tales_. One of the wittiest of his poems is the _Visitation of
St. Francis_, in which the poet describes how his patron saint appeared to
him in a dream, bidding him wear the habit of a friar. Dunbar answers
slyly that he has noticed more bishops than friars are among the saints,
so perhaps it will be as well if St. Francis, to make all sure, provides
him with a bishop's robes instead, and then he is sure to go to heaven.
Whereupon his visitant reveals himself in his true character and vanishes
in a cloud of brimstone. Two little lyrics on James Dog, Keeper of the
Queen's wardrobe, are very characteristic. In the first, "whan that he had
offendit him," each verse ends with the refrain:--
Madame, ye have a dangerous Dog;
in the second, when the quarrel had been made up, the refrain runs:--
He is na Dog: he is a Lamb.
As Mr. Gregory Smith points out, "Dunbar is unlike Henryson in lacking the
gentler and more intimate fun of their master. He is a satirist in the
stronger sense; more boisterous in his fun, and showing, in his wildest
frolics, an imaginative range which has no counterpart in the southern
poet"; but his sincerity and virility, his boyish sense of fun, remind us
of Chaucer again and again. The Reve would thoroughly have enjoyed telling
the story of the flying friar of Tungland who courted disaster by using
hen's feathers. Chaucerian, too, in the truest sense, is Dunbar's power of
combining this keen sense of the ridiculous with a no less keen
appreciation of beauty. The charm of his verse is incontestible, and his
skill in making effective use of burdens and refrains shows an ear
sensitive to music. _The Thistle and the Rose_, written in honour of the
marriage of James IV and Margaret Tudor, borrows its idea from the
_Parlement of Foules_, and has something of Chaucer's tenderness and
charm. Dame Nature commands all birds, beasts, and flowers to appear
before her, and after some debate proceeds to crown the thistle with
rubies, while the birds unite in singing the praises of the "freshe Rose
of colour red and white."
The _Golden Targe_, an allegorical poem of the conventional type, in which
the shield of Reason proves no defence against the arrows of Beauty,
contains a description of spring which Chaucer himself never equalled:--
Full angel-like the birdes sang their houres
Within their curtains green, into their boweres
Apparelled white and red with blossoms sweet;
Enamelled was the field with all coloures
The pearly dropes shook in silver showeres
While all in balm did branch and leaves flete[222]
To part from Phoebus did Aurora weep;
Her crystal tears I saw hang on the floweres
Which he for love all drank up with his heat.
* * * * *
For mirth of May with skippes and with hoppes
The birdes sang upon the tender croppes[223]
With curious notes as Venus chapell clerkes;
The rose yong, new spreding of her knoppes[224]
War powdered bright with hevenly beriall[225] droppes
Through beames red, burning as ruby sparkes
The skyes rang for shouting of the larkes.
And in addition to all these, Dunbar writes serious religious poetry on
such subjects as _Love, Earthly and Divine_, draws a by no means
unimpressive picture of the _Dance of the Seven Deadly Sins_, and in his
_Lament for the Makaris_ (poets), with its haunting refrain:--
_Timor Mortis conturbat me_
shows a sense of the transitoriness of all earthly pleasure.
Enough has already been said to show that the influences that moulded
sixteenth-century literature in England were not such as to lead its poets
to model themselves on Chaucer. In the _Golden Targe_, Dunbar gives
expression to the popular view of Chaucer in his day:--
O reverend Chaucer, rose of rethoris[226] all,
As in our tongue a flower imperial,
That rose in Britain ever, who readeth right,
Thou bear'st, of makers[227] the triumph royal;
Thy fresh enamelled termes celestial
This matter could illumined have full bright,
Wert thou not of our English all the light,
Surmounting every tongue terrestrial
As far as Mayes morrow doth midnight?
And here again, as in Occleve, we see that it is for his language rather
than for his invention that the poet is praised. But the sixteenth
century saw the change from Middle English to Modern, a change which, for
the time being, lost men the key to Chaucer's verse. Old inflections had
gradually dropped off, the accented "e" which ends so many of Chaucer's
words had become mute, and the result was that the poets of the new age
found Chaucer's lines impossible to scan. A generation whose taste was
formed on Classical and Italian models, whose precisians urged the
necessity of discarding "bald and beggarly rhymning" in favour of the
classical system of accent, had not patience enough to rediscover the laws
that governed Chaucer's verse. It says much for the insight and genuine
poetic taste of Elizabethan critics that they one and all speak of Chaucer
with admiration and respect. Fresh editions of his works continued to
appear at frequent intervals throughout the century, and frequent
references to his name show that they were well known to the poets of the
period. To Spenser he is "The God of shepheards":--
Who taught me homely, as I can, to make.
He, whilst he lived, was the soueraigne head
Of shepheards all, that been with loue ytake;
and he goes on to protest that
... all hys passing skil with him is fledde,
The fame whereof doth dayly greater growe.
The famous reference in the _Faerie Queene_ to
Dan Chaucer, well of Englishe undefyled,
On Fames eternal beadroll worthie to be fyled,
has become part of the Chaucerian critic's stock in trade, and is as apt
and as well-known as Dryden's phrase which speaks of Chaucer as "a
perpetual fountain of good sense." Book III, canto xxv of the _Faerie
Queene_ contains a paraphrase of some of the lines on true love in the
_Frankleyns Tale_, and Book IV boldly promises to continue the story of
Couragious Cambell, and stout Triamond,
With Canacee and Cambine linckt in lovely bond.
Whether the Spenserian stanza is a modification of the rhyme royal or of
the stanza used by Boccaccio and Ariosto it is impossible to say--all
three are obviously related to each other--but in view of Spenser's
admiration for Chaucer, and his deliberate attempt to use "Chaucerisms,"
it is at least probable that in this respect the _Faerie Queene_ owes a
debt to _Troilus and Criseyde_. In _Mother Hubbard's Tale_ and _Colin
Clouts come home again_, Spenser is frankly, though unsuccessfully,
imitating Chaucer's style. William Browne, the poet of Tavistock, also
showed his admiration for Chaucer by an attempt to imitate him in his
_Shepheard's Pipe_, a series of eclogues modelled partly on the
_Shepherd's Calendar_ and partly on the _Canterbury Tales_. In the
concluding lines of the first eclogue, which contains the story of
Jonathas, Browne confesses his indebtedness to Occleve:--
Scholler unto Tityrus
Tityrus the bravest swaine
Ever lived on plaine ...
thus using for Chaucer the name bestowed on him by Spenser.
During the seventeenth century Chaucer's fame seems to have suffered a
temporary eclipse. Between 1602 and 1687 not a single edition of his works
appeared, and the edition of 1687 is in reality no more than a re-issue of
Speght's. The poets hardly mention his name. Milton does indeed make a
reference to the _Squieres Tale_, but his works show no trace of Chaucer's
influence. Towards the end of the century, however, there was a revival of
interest. Dryden tells us that Mr. Cowley declared he had no taste of him,
but my lord of Leicester, on the other hand, was so warm an admirer of
the _Canterbury Tales_ that he thought it "little less than profanation
and sacrilege" to modernise their language, and not until his death did
Dryden venture to turn into modern English the tales of the Knight, the
Nun's Priest, and the Wife of Bath, and the character of the poor Parson
in the _Prologue_. The wigs and ruffles of the seventeenth century,
however, suit but ill the sturdy figure of the fourteenth-century poet. We
stand aghast before Dryden's Arcite, who, in the throes of death,
exclaims:--
No language can express the smallest part
Of what I feel, and suffer in my heart,
* * * * *
How I have loved; excuse my faltering tongue:
My spirit's feeble, and my pains are strong.
This I may say, I only grieve to die,
Because I lose my charming Emily.
It is an excellent specimen of the poetry of 1699, but it is not Chaucer.
Dryden is, indeed, far more eighteenth than seventeenth century in
feeling, and while the authors of the eighteenth century are too really
great not to appreciate true poetry wherever they see it, their own taste
leads them to the erection of "neat Modern buildings" rather than to the
admiration of "an ancient majestick piece of Gothick Architecture," and
all attempts to combine the two must necessarily be foredoomed to failure.
Pope paraphrases the _Hous of Fame_; Prior writes _Two Imitations of
Chaucer_, viz. _Susanah and the Two Elders_, and _Earl Robert's Mice_; Gay
writes a comedy on the Wife of Bath, with Chaucer himself for hero; the
Rev. Thomas Warton, who, as professor of poetry at Oxford, ought to have
known better, writes an elegy on the death of Pope in an extraordinary
jargon which he apparently considers Chaucerian English. (See Miss
Spurgeon's _Chaucer devant la Critique_, pp. 62-75.) But while these, and
numerous other works of the same kind, prove that Chaucer was widely read
at the time, they afford no evidence at all of his having any direct
influence upon the general development of eighteenth-century poetry. His
place as an English classic is firmly established, but centuries have
passed since he wrote, and the point of view of the men of the new age
differs too widely from that of their forefathers for any imitation to be
possible, except by way of a conscious experiment. The most amazing of all
modernisations was that of 1841. Richard Hengist Horne, inspired, if we
may believe his own words, by no less a person than Wordsworth, hit on the
most unfortunate idea of issuing Chaucer's poems in two volumes done into
modern English by a sort of joint-stock company of contemporary poets.
Wordsworth himself, Leigh Hunt, Miss Barrett, Robert Browning, Alfred
Tennyson, Bulwer-Lytton and the Cowden Clarkes, were to be among the
contributors. Landor showed his usual common-sense by refusing to take any
part in it, and his letter to Horne on the subject is worth quoting:
"Indeed I _do_ admire him (Chaucer), or rather, love him.... Pardon me if
I say that I would rather see Chaucer quite alone, in the dew of his sunny
morning, than with twenty clever gentlefolks about him, arranging his
shoestrings and buttoning his doublet. I like even his _language_. I will
have no hand in breaking his dun but rich-painted glass to put in (if
clearer) much thinner panes." It is comforting to reflect that the first
volume proved a failure, and the second never saw the light.
Fortunately the labours of such scholars as Professor Skeat and Dr.
Furnivall have saved us from all fear of being left in future to the
tender mercies of the moderniser. However great may be the changes that
are to pass over our language, however strange the tongue of
fourteenth-century England may sound in the ears of our descendants,
Chaucer's English has been preserved once for all, and never again can we
lose the key to his world of harmony and delight.
In Chaucer I am sped
His tales I have red;
His mater is delectable
Solacious and commendable;
His english wel alowed,
So as it enprowed,[228]
For as it is enployed
There is no englyshe voyd--
At those days moch commended,
And now men wold haue amended
His englishe where-at they barke,
And marre all they warke;
Chaucer, that famous Clarke
His tearmes were not darcke,
But pleasunt, easy, and playne;
No worde he wrote in vayne.
(Skelton, introductory lines to the _Book of Phillip sparow_, 1507?)
BIBLIOGRAPHY
SKEAT. _Chaucer_, text and notes, seven volumes (Clarendon Press, 1894).
W. P. KER. _English Literature: Medieval._ "Home University Library"
(Williams & Norgate, 1913).
TEN BRINK. _History of English Literature_, vol. ii, pp. 33-199.
Translated by W. Clarke Robinson, Ph.D. (George Bell & Sons, 1901).
TEN BRINK. _Language and Metre of Chaucer_, translated by M. Bentinck
Smith (Macmillan & Co., 1901).
LOUNSBURY. _Studies in Chaucer, his Life and Writings_ (James R. Osgood
McIlvaine & Co., 1892).
G. C. COULTON. _Chaucer and his England_ (Methuen, 2nd ed. 1909).
DRYDEN. Preface to the Fables. _Essays of John Dryden_, ed. W. P. Ker,
vol. ii, pp. 246-273 (Clarendon Press, 1900).
_Transactions of the Chaucer Society_ (Kegan Paul, Trench, & Co.).
A. W. WARD. _Chaucer._ "English Men of Letters."
_Cambridge History of Literature_, vol. ii (Cambridge University Press,
1908).
SCHOFIELD. _English Literature from the Norman Conquest to Chaucer_
(Macmillan & Co., 1906).
G. E. & W. H. HADOW. _Oxford Treasury of English Literature_, vol. i
(Clarendon Press, 1905).
GERMAN AND FRENCH WORKS
TEN BRINK. _Chaucer Studien_ (Trübner, 1870).
LEGOUIS. _Geoffroy Chaucer_ (Bloud et Cie., 1910) (Eng. tr. Lailavoix.
Dent, 1912).
SPURGEON. _Chaucer devant la critique_ (Hachette et Cie., 1911).
INDEX
_A.B.C._, Chaucer's, 42, 48
_Against Women Unconstant_, 41
_Anelida and Arcite_, 4
_An Amorous Compleint_, 41, 46
Ashby George, 234
Boccaccio, 19, 20, 39, 49, 51, 63, 69, 73, 76, 77, 248
Boëthius's _Consolations of Philosophy_, 47, 50
_Book of the Duchesse_, the, 12, 16, 40, 43-6, 47, 49, 50, 62, 64, 106,
130-2, 171, 179, 183, 190, 194, 227
Bradshaw, Henry, 234
Browne, William, 249
Burgh, Benedict, 234
_Cambridge History of Literature_, the, 42, 237
_Canterbury Tales_, the, 46, 49, 62, 67, 83, 107, 117-29, 136-41, 150,
157, 185, 213, 214, 222-3, 231
_Chanouns Yemannes Tale_, 223-6
Chaucer, Agnes, 13
---- _Apocrypha_, 67-8
----, Elizabeth, 18
----, Geoffrey, birth, 7;
education, 9-14;
marriage, 15-18;
public life, 18-30;
death, 31
----, John, 8, 13, 23
----, Lewis, 17, 67
_Chaucer's Originals and Analogues_, 84, 99
Chaucer, Philippa, 15-17
----, Thomas, 17, 18
Clarence, Lionel, Duke of, 13
_Clerkes Tale_, 16, 19, 46, 125, 133, 134, 215
_Compleint of Mars_, 50, 156
_Compleint to his Lady_, 40
_Compleinte unto Pitè_, 40, 46
Coulton, G. C., _Chaucer and his England_, 18, 20
_Court of Love_, the, 10
Dante, 19, 20, 48, 50, 54, 101, 102, 103
Deguileville, Guillaume de, 42, 44
Douglas, Gawain, 12;
influence of Chaucer on, 238-42
Dunbar, 242-6
Dryden, John, 248, 249, 250
Fielding, 157
_Frankeleyns Tale_, 128, 129, 134, 192, 210, 248
_Freres Tale_, 197, 210
Furnivall, Dr., 99, 252
Gascoigne, 17
Gaunt, John of, 15, 18, 21, 25, 43, 50, 201, 206
Gower, John, 22, 37, 209
Hawes, Stephen, 235-6
Hendyng, Proverbs of, 35, 36
Henryson, 238-9, 244
_House of Fame_, the, 16, 21, 53-62, 128, 153, 155, 156, 188, 209, 232,
251
Jonson, Ben, 155
Ker, W. P., 32, 40
_Kingis Quair_, the, 236-7
_Knightes Tale_, 46, 73-6, 83, 128, 132, 180, 181, 182, 229
_Lak of Stedfastnesse_, 216
Landor, Walter Savage, 252
Layamon, 32, 36
_Legend of Good Women_, the, 11, 21, 25, 42, 62, 63-7, 106, 191, 206,
216
Leland, 10, 14
_Lenvoy a Scogan_, 24
_Lenvoy de Chaucer a Bukton_, 16, 125
Lounsbury, 10
Lydgate, Portrait of mediæval schoolboy, 9;
versification, 47, 54;
_Temple of Glas_, 62;
influence of Chaucer on, 229-32, 242
_Lyf of St. Cecyle_, 46, 48, 64
Machault, Guillaume de, 39, 67
_Man of Lawes Tale_, 47, 85-97, 136, 205, 210, 219, 226
_Marchantes Tale_, 15, 126
_Maunciples Tale_, 198, 210
_Merciles Beaute_, 40
_Milleres Tale_, 148, 149, 186-7
Milton, 249
_Monkes Tale_, 48, 100-2
_Nonne Preestes Tale_, 84, 94, 97-100, 140, 141, 153, 154, 170, 187-8,
208
Norton, Thomas, 234
Occleve, 229-34, 242, 249
_Of the Wretched Engendering of Mankind_, 46, 48, 93
_Palamon and Arcite_, 46, 49, 64
_Pardoners Tale_, 8, 9, 157-65
_Parlement of Foules_, the, 16, 17, 40, 49, 50-3, 62, 64, 69, 106, 165,
189, 193, 194, 195, 244
_Persones Tale_, 217
Petrarch, 19, 20, 49
_Phisiciens Tale_, 135
_Piers Plowman_, 33, 38, 211-12
Pope, Alexander, 251
_Prioresses Tale_, 202-4
Retters, 14
Ripley, Sir George, 234
Rolle, Richard, 33
_Romance of the Rose_, the, 41, 63, 70, 206, 237
Romances, English metrical, 34, 70-2, 148, 175
Saintsbury, 42, 230
_Seconde Nonnes Tale_, 46, 48, 135
Shakespeare, _Romeo and Juliet_, 78;
_Othello_, 104, 122, 127, 132, 146, 147, 148, 152
_Sir Thopas_, 82-3, 156
Skeat, introductory note, vi, 24, 30, 38, 48, 54, 83, 252
Skelton, quotation from, 253
Snell, _Age of Chaucer_, 8
_Somnours Tale_, 170, 210
Speght, 10, 249
Spenser, 181, 182, 188-9, 195, 235-6, 247, 248, 249
_Squieres Tale_, 79-82, 133, 165, 178, 191
Swift, 155
Ten Brink, _History of English Literature_, 30, 40, 43, 49, 201
_The Tale of the Wyf of Bathe_, 138-9, 182, 218
_To Rosemounde_, 41
_Treatise on the Astrolabe_, 67, 221-2
Trivet, Nicholas, 84 (note), 85, 96, 97
_Troilus and Criseyde_, 20, 41, 47, 49, 62, 65, 76-9, 82, 103, 106-17,
118, 136, 137, 165, 179, 184, 185, 196, 207, 208-9, 211, 231, 236
_Truth_, ballade of, 31
_Richard Clay & Sons, Limited, London and Bungay._
FOOTNOTES:
[1] So that I gained but little.
[2] chidden by.
[3] faults.
[4]
There are but three histories to which any man will listen,
Of France, and of Britain and of Rome the Great.
[5] And had the corpse (_i. e._ Antony's) embalmed.
[6] And forth she fetched this dead corpse, and shut it in the shrine.
[7] _sterte_, sprang.
[8] God knows.
[9] contradicted.
[10] knows.
[11] or else something similar.
[12] fools.
[13] I had the thing I did not want.
[14] How he pays folk what he owes them.
[15]
No pike ever so wallowed in a galantine
As I wallow and am entangled in love.
[16]
Francis Petrarch, the laureat poet,
This clerk was called, whose rhetoric sweet
Illumined all Italy with poetry.
[17] Till fully dazed is thy look.
[18] The box in which dead bodies are put.
[19] Suitable for pipes.
[20] Evergreen oak.
[21] Tall fir.
[22] Cypress which mourns for death, _i. e._ is often found in
churchyards.
[23] Yew-tree, of which bows are made.
[24] Aspen, suitable for making arrows.
[25] With cheerfulness.
[26] Here is no home.
[27] Keep to the highway, and let thy spirit lead thee.
[28] And there is no fear but that truth shall deliver (thee).
[29] scarcely.
[30] thus.
[31] head.
[32] death.
The passage is taken from Richard Rolle of Hampole's _Pricke of
Conscience_ (Morris and Skeat, _Specimens of Early English_, Part II, p.
108).
[33] For a comparison of the French with the English romances see
Professor Ker's volume on _Medieval Literature_ in this series, pp. 66-74.
[34] like me.
[35] obtained aught.
[36]
He was pale as a stone ball, in a palsy he seemed,
And clothed in rough cloth, I do not know how to describe it;
In an under-jacket and short coat, and a knife by his side;
The sleeves were like those of a friar's habit.
_Piers Plowman_, V. 78-81.
[37] A pity.
[38] meadow.
[39] _i. e._ companion to another.
[40] of the most graceful shape.
[41] plowed.
[42] Thou art hard to carry.
[43] ignorant.
[44] tellers of tales or gestes.
[45] trumpet.
[46] journeys.
[47] delay.
[48] before he uttered a sound.
[49] many an hymn for your holy-days.
[50] will make fire dim.
[51] curled locks.
[52] embroidered.
[53] playing the flute.
[54] fine flour.
[55] complexion.
[56] worthless.
[57] The translations are taken from _Chaucer's Originals and Analogues_,
published by the Chaucer Society.
[58] This unusual list of the seven sciences is that given by Trivet.
[59] barbarous nation.
[60] died.
[61] commands.
[62] no matter if I am lost.
[63] grieve us but a little.
[64] sprinkled.
[65] All our joy ends in woe.
[66] maid.
[67] have pity on.
[68] rueful being.
[69] my love has gone away.
[70] eyes.
[71] Have the Greeks thus soon made you thin?
[72] Carving-tools.
[73] Slumberest thou as if in a lethargy.
[74] Friends cannot always be together.
[75] I am glad (lit. it is dear to me).
[76] And without doubt, to ease your heart.
[77] almost died for fear.
[78] the most timid person.
[79] pain.
[80] mine.
[81] be wroth with.
[82] cherish.
[83] sighed.
[84] _i. e._ I must act cautiously.
[85] jeopardy.
[86] No matter for the jangling of wicked tongues.
[87] blame.
[88] _i. e._ my name will be in everyone's mouth.
[89] penitent.
[90] lap.
[91] bless.
[92] do reverence, bow.
[93] wreak, avenge.
[94] chain.
[95] toil.
[96] desires.
[97] seems good to her.
[98] glitters.
[99] _i. e._ as my brains tell me.
[100] simply by nature.
[101] _i. e._ an unpropitious conjunction of planets.
[102] _i. e._ change of disposition.
[103] Wallacia.
[104] Possibly this refers to the sea of sand and pebbles mentioned by Sir
John Mandeville in his _Travels_. To go bareheaded was considered a great
hardship.
[105] Probably the dangerous gulf of Quarnaro in the Adriatic.
[106] hear tell.
[107] Where there was likely to be foolish behaviour.
[108]
Let them be bread of pure wheat-flour,
And let us wives be called barley-bread.
[109] burned.
[110]
With scrips cramful of lies
Intermixed with news.
[111] _bel ami_, fair friend.
[112] jests.
[113] ribaldry.
[114] learn.
[115] take trouble to speak loudly.
[116] _i. e._ I have all my sermon by heart.
[117] Wherewith to colour my sermon.
[118] If their souls go blackberrying, _i. e._ I do not care where they
go.
[119] _i. e._ curate of the parish.
[120] practised folly.
[121] kill.
[122] bees.
[123] And made guesses according to their fancy.
[124] The horse of Sinon the Greek.
[125] plot.
[126] whispered.
[127] ignorant.
[128] staff.
[129] ducks.
[130] kill.
[131] flew.
[132]
Groweth seed and bloweth mead
And springeth the wood now--
Sing cuckoo.
[133] goes.
[134] steady pace.
[135] maid.
[136] together.
[137] fall quickly from the linden tree.
[138] What need is there to tell of their array?
[139] _i. e._ Let us pay no attention to their greetings.
[140] fell to hunting.
[141] hot-foot.
[142] notes on the horn.
[143] roused itself.
[144] together.
[145] thrust.
[146] grave.
[147] size.
[148] Or looked well.
[149] Why should I be tedious.
[150] condition.
[151] bright.
[152] That steamed like a furnace of lead.
[153] condition.
[154] slim.
[155] girdle.
[156] apron.
[157] strings of her white cap.
[158] matched her collar.
[159] enticing eye.
[160] her eyebrows were fine.
[161] And they were arched, and black as any sloe.
[162] A kind of early pear.
[163] studded with brass.
[164] puppet.
[165] brisk.
[166] a sweet drink.
[167] mead.
[168] To have more flowers than the seven stars in the sky.
[169] This refers to the common practice of paying a poor and often
illiterate priest to take charge of a parish while the vicar went to
London and earned a handsome and easy livelihood by saying masses for the
repose of the souls of those who had left rich relatives.
[170] He was loth to excommunicate those whose tithe was in arrears.
[171] _i. e._ sow tares in our wheat.
[172] chorister.
[173] know.
[174] God grant that we may meet.
[175] Was eaten by the lion ere he could escape.
[176] slain.
[177] drowning.
[178] doctors.
[179] temperament.
[180] gluttony.
[181] dreamers.
[182] fiend.
[183] died and rose.
[184] wholly.
[185] servants.
[186] fairs.
[187] market.
[188] breaketh down my barn door.
[189] I scarcely dare look round, on account of him.
[190] tipped.
[191] guild-hall.
[192] daïs.
[193] suitable.
[194] Service held on the vigils of Saints' Days.
[195] The name Langland is used for convenience sake, to denote the
author, or authors of _Piers Plowman_.
[196] his own labour.
[197] unstable.
[198] chatter.
[199] dear at a Jane, _i. e._ a small Genoese coin.
[200] Your judgment is false, your constancy proves evil.
[201] _i. e._ one who farms taxes.
[202] pierced and cut into points.
[203] in secret and openly.
[204] birth.
[205] do not care a farthing.
[206] fetched.
[207] known.
[208] known.
[209] Entered were into religion, _i. e._ were placed in a monastery.
[210] Simple is my mind, and little my learning.
[211] repay.
[212] revengeful cruelty.
[213] isle.
[214] twigs.
[215] stanza.
[216] precious.
[217] neck.
[218] gore.
[219] perfect.
[220] grey stones.
[221] bees.
[222] float.
[223] tree-tops.
[224] buds.
[225] drops clear as beryl.
[226] flower of all rhetoricians.
[227] poets.
[228] proved.
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does not readily lend itself to untechnical explanation.... Upon every
page of it is stamped the impress of a creative imagination."--_Glasgow
Herald._
_46. MATTER AND ENERGY_
By F. SODDY, M.A., F.R.S. "Prof. Soddy has successfully accomplished the
very difficult task of making physics of absorbing interest on popular
lines."--_Nature._
_49. PSYCHOLOGY, THE STUDY OF BEHAVIOUR_
By Prof. W. MCDOUGALL, F.R.S., M.B. "A happy example of the non-technical
handling of an unwieldy science, suggesting rather than dogmatising. It
should whet appetites for deeper study."--_Christian World._
_53. THE MAKING OF THE EARTH_
By Prof. J. W. GREGORY, F.R.S. (With 38 Maps and Figures.) "A fascinating
little volume.... Among the many good things contained in the series this
takes a high place."--_The Athenæum._
_57. THE HUMAN BODY_
By A. KEITH, M.D., LL.D., Conservator of Museum and Hunterian Professor,
Royal College of Surgeons. (Illustrated.) "It literally makes the 'dry
bones' to live. It will certainly take a high place among the classics of
popular science."--_Manchester Guardian._
_58. ELECTRICITY_
By GISBERT KAPP, D.Eng., Professor of Electrical Engineering in the
University of Birmingham. (Illustrated.) "It will be appreciated greatly
by learners and by the great number of amateurs who are interested in what
is one of the most fascinating of scientific studies."--_Glasgow Herald._
_62. THE ORIGIN AND NATURE OF LIFE_
By Dr BENJAMIN MOORE, Professor of Bio-Chemistry, University College,
Liverpool. "Stimulating, learned, lucid."--_Liverpool Courier._
_67. CHEMISTRY_
By RAPHAEL MELDOLA, F.R.S., Professor of Chemistry in Finsbury Technical
College, London. Presents clearly, without the detail demanded by the
expert, the way in which chemical science has developed, and the stage it
has reached.
_72. PLANT LIFE_
By Prof. J. B. FARMER, D.Sc., F.R.S. (Illustrated.) "Professor Farmer has
contrived to convey all the most vital facts of plant physiology, and also
to present a good many of the chief problems which confront investigators
to-day in the realms of morphology and of heredity."--_Morning Post._
_78. THE OCEAN_
A General Account of the Science of the Sea. By Sir JOHN MURRAY, K.C.B.,
F.R.S. (Illus.) "A life's experience is crowded into this volume. A very
useful feature is the ten pages of illustrations and coloured maps at the
end."--_Gloucester Journal._
_79. NERVES_
By Prof. D. FRASER HARRIS, M.D., D.Sc. (Illustrated.) A description, in
non-technical language, of the nervous system, its intricate mechanism and
the strange phenomena of energy and fatigue, with some practical
reflections.
_Philosophy and Religion_
_15. MOHAMMEDANISM_
By Prof. D. S. MARGOLIOUTH, M.A., D.Litt. "This generous shilling's worth
of wisdom.... A delicate, humorous, and most responsible tractate by an
illuminative professor."--_Daily Mail._
_40. THE PROBLEMS OF PHILOSOPHY_
By the Hon. BERTRAND RUSSELL, F.R.S. "A book that the 'man in the street'
will recognise at once to be a boon.... Consistently lucid and
non-technical throughout."--_Christian World._
_47. BUDDHISM_
By Mrs RHYS DAVIDS, M.A. "The author presents very attractively as well as
very learnedly the philosophy of Buddhism as the greatest scholars of the
day interpret it."--_Daily News._
_50. NONCONFORMITY: Its ORIGIN and PROGRESS_
By Principal W. B. SELBIE, M.A. "The historical part is brilliant in its
insight, clarity, and proportion; and in the later chapters Dr Selbie
proves himself to be an ideal exponent of sound and moderate
views."--_Christian World._
_54. ETHICS_
By G. E. MOORE, M.A., Lecturer in Moral Science in Cambridge University.
"A very lucid though closely reasoned outline of the logic of good
conduct."--_Christian World._
_56. THE MAKING OF THE NEW TESTAMENT_
By Prof. B. W. BACON, LL.D., D.D. "Professor Bacon has boldly, and wisely,
taken his own line, and has produced, as a result, an extraordinarily
vivid, stimulating, and lucid book."--_Manchester Guardian._
_60. MISSIONS: THEIR RISE and DEVELOPMENT_
By Mrs CREIGHTON. "Very interestingly done.... Its style is simple,
direct, unhackneyed, and should find appreciation where a more fervently
pious style of writing repels."--_Methodist Recorder._
_68. COMPARATIVE RELIGION_
By Prof. J. ESTLIN CARPENTER, D.Litt., Principal of Manchester College,
Oxford. "Puts into the reader's hand a wealth of learning and independent
thought."--_Christian World._
_74. A HISTORY OF FREEDOM OF THOUGHT_
By J. B. BURY, Litt.D., LL.D., Regius Professor of Modern History at
Cambridge. "A little masterpiece, which every thinking man will
enjoy."--_The Observer._
_84. LITERATURE OF THE OLD TESTAMENT_
By Prof. GEORGE MOORE, D.D., LL.D., of Harvard. A detailed examination of
the books of the Old Testament in the light of the most recent research.
_Social Science_
_1. PARLIAMENT_
Its History, Constitution, and Practice. By Sir COURTENAY P. ILBERT,
G.C.B., K.C.S.I., Clerk of the House of Commons. "The best book on the
history and practice of the House of Commons since Bagehot's
'Constitution.'"--_Yorkshire Post._
_5. THE STOCK EXCHANGE_
By F. W. HIRST, Editor of "The Economist." "To an unfinancial mind must be
a revelation.... The book is as clear, vigorous, and sane as Bagehot's
'Lombard Street,' than which there is no higher compliment."--_Morning
Leader._
_6. IRISH NATIONALITY_
By Mrs J. R. GREEN. "As glowing as it is learned. No book could be more
timely."--_Daily News._
_10. THE SOCIALIST MOVEMENT_
By J. RAMSAY MACDONALD, M.P. "Admirably adapted for the purpose of
exposition."--_The Times._
_11. CONSERVATISM_
By LORD HUGH CECIL, M.A., M.P. "One of those great little books which
seldom appear more than once in a generation."--_Morning Post._
_16. THE SCIENCE OF WEALTH_
By J. A. HOBSON, M.A. "Mr J. A. Hobson holds an unique position among
living economists.... Original, reasonable, and illuminating."--_The
Nation._
_21. LIBERALISM_
By L. T. HOBHOUSE, M.A., Professor of Sociology in the University of
London. "A book of rare quality.... We have nothing but praise for the
rapid and masterly summaries of the arguments from first principles which
form a large part of this book."--_Westminster Gazette._
_24. THE EVOLUTION OF INDUSTRY_
By D. H. MACGREGOR, M.A., Professor of Political Economy in the University
of Leeds. "A volume so dispassionate in terms may be read with profit by
all interested in the present state of unrest."--_Aberdeen Journal._
_26. AGRICULTURE_
By Prof. W. SOMERVILLE, F.L.S. "It makes the results of laboratory work
at the University accessible to the practical farmer."--_Athenæum._
_30. ELEMENTS OF ENGLISH LAW_
By W. M. GELDART, M.A., B.C.L., Vinerian Professor of English Law at
Oxford. "Contains a very clear account of the elementary principles
underlying the rules of English Law."--_Scots Law Times._
_38. THE SCHOOL: An Introduction to the Study of Education._
By J. J. FINDLAY, M.A., Ph.D., Professor of Education in Manchester
University. "An amazingly comprehensive volume.... It is a remarkable
performance, distinguished in its crisp, striking phraseology as well as
its inclusiveness of subject-matter."--_Morning Post._
_59. ELEMENTS OF POLITICAL ECONOMY_
By S. J. CHAPMAN, M.A., Professor of Political Economy in Manchester
University. "Its importance is not to be measured by its price. Probably
the best recent critical exposition of the analytical method in economic
science."--_Glasgow Herald._
_69. THE NEWSPAPER_
By G. BINNEY DIBBLEE, M.A. (Illustrated.) The best account extant of the
organisation of the newspaper press, at home and abroad.
_77. SHELLEY, GODWIN, AND THEIR CIRCLE_
By H. N. BRAILSFORD, M.A. "Mr Brailsford sketches vividly the influence of
the French Revolution on Shelley's and Godwin's England; and the charm and
strength of his style make his book an authentic contribution to
literature."--_The Bookman._
_80. CO-PARTNERSHIP AND PROFIT-SHARING_
By ANEURIN WILLIAMS, M.A.--"A judicious but enthusiastic history, with
much interesting speculation on the future of Co-partnership."--_Christian
World._
_81. PROBLEMS OF VILLAGE LIFE_
By E. N. BENNETT, M.A. Discusses the leading aspects of the British land
problem, including housing, small holdings, rural credit, and the minimum
wage.
_83. COMMON-SENSE IN LAW_
By Prof. P. VINOGRADOFF, D.C.L.
_85. UNEMPLOYMENT_ By Prof. A. C. PIGOU, M.A.
IN PREPARATION
_ANCIENT EGYPT._ By F. LL. GRIFFITH, M.A.
_THE ANCIENT EAST._ By D. G. HOGARTH, M.A., F.B.A.
_A SHORT HISTORY OF EUROPE._ By HERBERT FISHER, LL.D.
_THE BYZANTINE EMPIRE._ By NORMAN H. BAYNES.
_THE REFORMATION._ By President LINDSAY, LL.D.
_A SHORT HISTORY OF RUSSIA._ By Prof. MILYOUKOV.
_MODERN TURKEY._ By D. G. HOGARTH, M.A.
_FRANCE OF TO-DAY._ By ALBERT THOMAS.
_HISTORY OF SCOTLAND._ By Prof. R. S. RAIT, M.A.
_LATIN AMERICA._ By Prof. W. R. SHEPHERD.
_HISTORY AND LITERATURE OF SPAIN._ By J. FITZMAURICE-KELLY, F.B.A.,
Litt.D.
_LATIN LITERATURE._ By Prof. J. S. PHILLIMORE.
_THE RENAISSANCE._ By Miss EDITH SICHEL.
_ITALIAN ART OF THE RENAISSANCE._ By ROGER E. FRY.
_LITERARY TASTE._ By THOMAS SECCOMBE.
_CHAUCER AND HIS TIME._ By Miss G. E. HADOW.
_WILLIAM MORRIS AND HIS CIRCLE._ By A. CLUTTON BROCK.
_SCANDINAVIAN HISTORY & LITERATURE._ By T. C. SNOW.
_THE MINERAL WORLD._ By Sir T. H. HOLLAND, K.C.I.E., D.Sc.
_SEX._ By Prof. J. A. THOMSON and Prof. PATRICK GEDDES.
_THE GROWTH OF EUROPE._ By Prof. GRENVILLE COLE.
_BETWEEN THE OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS._ By Canon R. H. CHARLES, D.D.
_A HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY._ By CLEMENT WEBB, M.A.
_POLITICAL THOUGHT IN ENGLAND: From Bacon to Locke._ By G. P. GOOCH, M.A.
_POLITICAL THOUGHT IN ENGLAND: From Bentham to J. S. Mill._ By Prof.
W. L. DAVIDSON.
_POLITICAL THOUGHT IN ENGLAND: From Herbert Spencer to To-day._ By
ERNEST BARKER, M.A.
_THE CRIMINAL AND THE COMMUNITY._ By Viscount ST. CYRES.
_THE CIVIL SERVICE._ By GRAHAM WALLAS, M.A.
_THE SOCIAL SETTLEMENT._ By JANE ADDAMS and R. A. WOODS.
_GREAT INVENTIONS._ By Prof. J. L. MYRES, M.A., F.S.A.
_TOWN PLANNING._ By RAYMOND UNWIN.
London: WILLIAMS AND NORGATE
_And of all Bookshops and Bookstalls._
Transcriber's Notes:
Passages in italics are indicated by _italics_.
The notation [slur] represents an arc joining the end of one word to the
beginning of the next word.
Punctuation has been corrected without note.
The following misprints have been corrected:
"introduce" corrected to "introduced" (page 39)
"n" corrected to "in" (page 56)
"onw" corrected to "own" (page 81)
"ess" corrected to "less" (pag 133)
"booksihness" corrected to "bookishness" (page 139)
"Bulwer Lytton" corrected to "Bulwer-Lytton" (page 252)
"mong" corrected to "among" (page 252)
"Anclida" corrected to "Anelida" (index)
Other than the corrections listed above, inconsistencies in spelling and
hyphenation have been retained from the original.