This graceful Balade is a happy specimen of Chaucer's skill in riming. The
metre is precisely that of 'Fortune,' resembling that of the Monkes Tale
with the addition of a refrain; only the same rimes are used throughout.
The formula is _a b a b b c b c_.
2. 'As far as the map of the world extends.' _Mappemounde_ is the F.
_mappemonde_, Lat. _mappa mundi_; it is used also by Gower, Conf. Amant.
iii. 102.
9. _tyne_, a large tub; O. F. _tine_. The whole phrase occurs in the
Chevalier au Cigne, as given in Bartsch, Chrest. Française, 350. 23:--'Le
jour i ot plore de larmes plaine tine.' Cotgrave has:--'_Tine_, a Stand,
open Tub, or Soe, most in use during the time of vintage, and holding
_about four or five pailfuls_, and commonly borne, by a Stang, between
two.' We picture to ourselves the brawny porters, staggering beneath the
'_stang_,' on which is slung the 'tine' containing the 'four or five
pailfuls' of the poet's tears.
10. The poet, in all his despair, is sustained and refreshed by regarding
the lady's beauty.
11. _seemly_, excellent, pleasing; this is evidently meant by the _semy_ of
the MS.
_smal_, fine in tone, delicate; perhaps treble. A good example occurs in
the Flower and the Leaf, 180:--
'With voices sweet entuned, and so _smalle_,
That it me thoughte the swetest melodye,' &c.
Cf. 'his vois gentil and _smal_'; Cant. Tales, A 3360. The reading _fynall_
(put for _finall_) is due to mistaking the long s for _f_, and _m_ for
_in_.
_out-twyne_, twist out, force out; an unusual word.
17. 'Never was pike so involved in galantine-sauce as I am completely
involved in love.' This is a humorous allusion to a manner of serving up
pikes which is well illustrated in the Fifteenth-Century Cookery-books, ed.
Austin, p. 101, where a recipe for 'pike in Galentyne' directs that the
cook should 'cast the sauce _under him and aboue him, that he be al y-hidde
in the sauce_.' At p. 108 of the same we are told that the way to make
'sauce galentyne' is to steep crusts of brown bread in vinegar, adding
powdered cinnamon till it is brown; after which the vinegar is to be
strained twice or thrice through a strainer, and some pepper and salt is to
be added. Thus 'sauce galentine' was a seasoned pickle. See further in the
note to 1. 16 of Sect. IX.
20. 'True Tristram the second.' For _Tristram_, see note to Sect. V. 1.
290. Tristram was a famous example of 'truth' or constancy, as his love was
inspired by having drunk a magical love-potion, from the effects of which
he never recovered. The MS. has _Tristam_.
21. _refreyd_, cooled down; lit. 'refrigerated.' This rare word occurs
twice in Troilus; see bk. ii. 1343, v. 507; cf. Pers. Ta. I 341. Dr. Murray
tells me that no writer but Chaucer is known to have used this form of the
word, though Caxton has _refroid_, from continental French, whereas
_refreid_ is from Anglo-French.
_afounde_, sink, be submerged. See O. F. _afonder_, to plunge under water,
also, to sink, in Godefroy; and _affonder_ in Cotgrave. Chaucer found this
rare word in Le Roman de la Rose, 19914. (I once thought it was the pp. of
_afinden_, and meant 'nor be explored'; but it is better to take it as
infin. after _may not_). See _Afounder_ in the New E. Dict.