_The Arke of Artificial Day_.
Before proceeding, to point out the indelible marks by which Chaucer has,
as it were, stereotyped the true date of the journey to Canterbury, I shall
clear away another stumbling-block, still more insurmountable to Tyrwhitt
than his first difficulty of the "halfe cours" in Aries, viz. the seeming
inconsistency in statements (1.) and (2.) in the following lines of the
prologue to the Man of Lawe's tale:--
{ "Oure hoste saw wel that the bright sonne,
(1.) { The arke of his artificial day, had ironne
{ The fourthe part and halfe an houre and more,
* * * *
{ And saw wel that the shadow of every tree
{ Was as in length of the same quantitie,
{ That was the body erecte that caused it,
{ And therefore by the shadow he toke his wit
(2.) { That Phebus, which that shone so clere and bright,
{ Degrees was five and fourty clombe on hight,
{ And for that day, as in that latitude
{ It was ten of the clok, he gan conclude."