least of all qualities be effectively exemplified in extract: its subtle life, dependent upon the thousand minutiae of place and connection, perishes under the process of excision; it is to attempt to exhibit, not the building by the brick, but the living man by a "pound of his fair flesh." We will venture, however, to give one or two short passages. Nothing is more admirable in the Canterbury Tales than the manner in which the character of the Host is sustained throughout. He is the moving spirit of the poem from first to last. Here is his first introduction to us presiding over the company at supper in his own gentle hostelry, That hightc the Tabard faste by the Bell, in Southwark, on the evening before they set out on their pilgrimage: Great cheere made our Host us everich one, And to the supper set he us anon, And served us with vitail of the best; Strong was the wine, and well to drink us lost.1 A fairer burgess is there none in Cheap; 4 Bold of his speech, and wise, and well ytaught, It pleased us. • Suchi. 2 Lacked. 5 Inn. 3 In addition, besides, also. They all gladly assent; upon which mine Host proposes further that each of them (they were twenty-nine in all, besides himself) should tell two stories in going, and two more in returning, and that, when they got back to the Tabard, the one who had told the "tales of best sentence and most solace" should have a supper at the charge of the rest. And, adds the eloquent, sagacious, and large-hearted projector of the scheme, -for to make you the more merry 5 Great as the extent of the poem is, therefore, what has been executed, or been preserved, is only a small part of the design; for this liberal plan would have afforded us no fewer than a hundred and twenty tales. Nothing can be better than the triumphant way in which mine Host of the Tabard is made to go through the duties of his self-assumed post;-his promptitude, his decision upon all emergencies, and at the same time his good feeling never at fault any more than his good sense, his inexhaustible and unflagging fun and spirit, and the all-accommodating humour and perfect sympathy with which, without for a moment stooping from his own frank and manly character, he bears himself to every individual of the varied cavalcade. He proposes that they should draw cuts to decide who was to begin; and with how genuine a courtesy, at once encouraging and reverential, he first addresses himself to the modest Clerk, and the gentle Lady Prioress, and the Knight, who also was "of his port as meek as is a maid:" Sir Knight, quod he, my maister and my lord, ↑ Stand. 2 Work, do. 3 If ye shall not be merry. Smite. The imperative has generally this termination. Resist, oppose, withstand. Cometh near, quod he, my Lady Prioress; But for personages of another order, again, he is another man, giving and taking jibe and jeer with the hardest and boldest in their own style and humour, only more nimbly and happily than any of them, and without ever compromising his dignity. And all the while his kindness of heart, simple and quick, and yet considerate, is as conspicuous as the cordial appreciation and delight with which he enters into the spirit of what is going forward, and enjoys the success of his scheme. For example, When that the Knight had thus his tale told, And worthy to be drawen to memorie,1 2 And namely the gentles everich one. 3 Our Hoste lough and swore, So mote I gone, 9 And swore, By armes, and by blood and bones, 14 With which I wol now quite the Knightes tale. By Goddes soul, quod he, that woll not 1, 9 With difficulty. 7 To requite. "Stop for. 12 In such a voice as Pilate was used to speak with in the Mysteries. Pilate, being an odious character, was probably represented as speaking with a harsh disagreeable voice."-Tyrwhitt. 13 Know. 16 Go to work. 14 For the nonce, for the occasion. 15 Dear. Thou art a fool; thy wit is overcome. Now, hearkeneth, quod the Miller, all and some; That I am drunk, I know it by my soun, And therefore, if that I misspeak or say, Wite it the ale of Southwark, I you pray. The Miller is at last allowed to tell his tale-which is more accordant with his character, and the condition he was in, than with either good morals or good manners;-as the poet ob serves: What should I more say, but this Millere The Miller's Tale is capped by another in the same style from his fellow "churl" the Reve (or Bailiff)-who before he begins, however, avails himself of the privilege of his advanced years to prelude away for some time in a preaching strain, till his eloquence is suddenly cut short by the voice of authority: When that our Host had heard this sermoning, He gan to speak as lordly as a king, And saide, What amounteth all this wit? 1 Lay the blame of it on. 4 Cobbler. 2 Churl's. Physician. 3 Choose. 6 Deptford. 7 Tyrwhitt supposes this means half-past seven in the morning. The last specimen we shall give of "our Host" shall be from the Clerk's Prologue :— Sir Clerk of Oxenford, our Hoste said, This worthy Clerk benignely answerd; As Linian did of philosophy, Or law, or other art particulere; But death, that wol not suffre us dwellen here But as it were a twinkling of an eye, Them both hath slain, and alle we shall die. And our last specimen of the Canterbury Tales, and also of Chaucer, being a passage exhibiting that power of pathos in the delicacy as well as in the depth of which he is unrivalled, shall 1 Sophism, perhaps generally for a logical argument. 2 Be. Proved. 3 Faith. 4 Surely. 6 A great lawyer of the fourteenth century. |