these confessions are illustrated by a great many stories, many of which are interesting and have been used over again with much better effect by later poets, yet, on the whole, Gower is so dull that we will leave him for a much more interesting man, his friend and superior, Geoffrey Chaucer.

TALK XII.

ON GEOFFREY CHAUCER, HIS LIFE AND POETRY.

Born 1328 or 1340.

GEOFFREY CHAUCER, the Father of English Poetry-what a proud title to wear for so many hundred yearsis a different sort of a poet from John Gower, Died 1400. whom I have just mentioned. The two men seem to have been good friends, however, and in the "Confessions of a Lover," the goddess Venus, tells the lover to

"Grete wel Chaucer when ye mete,

As my disciple and my poete."

which is a compliment that Chaucer might well have returned by his epithet of "Moral Gower."

We do not know with certainty the date of Chaucer's birth. Some of his biographers think it is 1328; others, 1340. The first date is the one which has been the longest believed to be the true one; the last is that accepted by several modern scholars. For my part, I think the exact date really makes very little difference so long as we know the great events amid which his life was surely passed, the great ideas which were current in the age during which he must have lived in full mental vigor, and the fact that this group of literary men of whom I have spoken were his contemporaries. We know that he died in 1400, and lived in the reigns of three kings-Edward III, Richard II, and Henry IV.

We do not know much about the early part of his life. He was born in London, the son of a wine-dealer. One of the first certain facts in his life, after the uncertain date of his birth, is that he was a member of a noble family as one of the pages of the household, which, in those days, was a respectable, indeed, an honorable capacity. He was with the army of Edward III when it went to invade France in 1359, and Chaucer was then made prisoner, and ransomed afterwards by the king. After this we hear of him frequently in the court records; once as having a pitcher of wine sent him every day from the royal wine cellars; another time as getting a pension from the crown, for services rendered; again as one of the Ambassadors who went to France to arrange the marriage of Richard II, and as concerned in other diplomatic missions. We know that his friend and patron was John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster-called by Shakespeare "time-honored Lancaster "—whose son became King Henry IV. Chaucer married a Lady Philippa, and it is claimed by several writers that John of Gaunt married a sister of this very lady. If this were so, Chaucer and his noble patron were brothers-in-law.

John of Gaunt was at one time the head of the Wycliffe party, and, although he did not follow as far as Wycliffe led, he aided him in his earlier fight against Papal power by his strong influence. It is probable that Chaucer also sympathized with Wycliffe, and that he took the generous side in religion and politics. I am sure I hope so, for I like to associate the "Father of English Poetry" with freedom of thought and speech, and to believe that he was as much of a man as a poet, or the better poet that he was a liberal, outspoken man. Almost at the close of his century, and near the end of his life, Chaucer took a house on the lands of Westminster Abbey and sat down there to spend his latest days. When he died, he was buried in the Abbey, and you may there read his name on the stones

of the wall in the "Poets' Corner," the first of that long line of great names which adorns that sacred spot in the grand old Cathedral.

Chaucer wrote many works, sometimes in prose, although most commonly in verse. Many of his earlier poems are little more than translations. The Roman de la Rose which first made him known as poet, was a translation from two French writers, although we may be sure Chaucer could not handle anything without leaving a good deal of himself in it. He never made any pretense of originality, and always shows himself a sincere man and without affectation in his work. Others of his principal poems are The House of Fame, The Book of the Duchess, The Legend of Good Women, The Assembly of Fowls, Troilus and Cressida. But we have not time to look at these, but must come at once to his great work, The Canterbury Tales-the only one of his poems which is much read now-a-days.

The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories told by a party of men and women who meet at the Tabard Inn, which was situated on the High street of Southwark, in London, to set out on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Thomas á Becket in Canterbury cathedral, about fifty miles distant. They are a company taken from all ranks of life, and almost every condition is represented. Their number is nine and twenty, when they are joined by the poet, and the host of the Tabard Inn.

In the Prologue, which forms the preface of the stories, nearly every person in the party is described in an easy and familiar style, as if Chaucer were introducing you in a manner to make you perfectly well-acquainted with his character. Each figure drawn by his pen seems like a real person whom we see, rather than read about. The modern novelist, who prides himself on drawing life-like pictures of the men and women of this day, has never succeeded better than the old poet, whỏ gives so perfect an idea of a group of every-day persons of the 14th century. .

First of all comes the knight, "who from the time he first began to riden out, he loved chivalry, truth, honor, freedom and courtesy." He had been in many wars in south and east, at the taking of Alexandria, the siege of Grenada, and in wars against the heathen Turk. Yet, like other truly brave men, he is gentle and unassuming, "as meek of port as is a maid." "In truth," says Chaucer," a very perfect, gentle knight." The next figure, that of the knight's son, a young squire, is a very different sort of person. He is a dashing young fellow, with curling hair, fair complexion; a fine horseman, who can also dance gracefully, write songs and sing them, "and play the flute like a lover." Then comes Madame Eglantine, a prioress of a convent, a sweet gentlewoman, who, although the bride of the church, wears as the motto on her brooch, "Love conquers all." Here is her picture as Chaucer gives it:

"Full well she sang the service divine,
Entuned in her nose full swetely;

And French she spoke full fair and cleverly,
After the school of Stratford upon Bow,
For French of Paris was to her unknown.
At meat she was well taught withal;
She let no morsel from her lippes fall,
Nor wet her fingers in her sauce-deep.
Well could she carry a morsel and well keep
That no drop ne'er fell upon her breast.
But for to speaken of her conscience,
She was so charitable and so piteous,
She woulde weep if that she saw a mouse
Caught in a trap, if it were dead or bled.
Of smalle houndes had she that she fed
With roasted flesh and milk and wastel bread;
And sore wept she if one of them were dead.

* * Her nose was straight; her eyes as grey as glass;
Her mouth full small, and thereto soft and red,

And certainly she had a fair forehead.

Full tasteful was her cloake, as I was ware.

Of small coral about her arm she bare;

A pair of beads, gauded all with green;

And thereon hung a brooch of gold full sheen,

On which was written, first a crowned A,

And after 'Amor Vincet Omnia.'"

Can we not see Madame Eglantine as plain as if she stood before us in broad day, with her grey eyes, her little, soft, red mouth, her fair forehead, and her dainty ways when she sits at the table. The only other woman of the party, except a nun attendant on the prioress, who passes without description, was the Wife of Bath, a great contrast to the delicate Madame Eglantine.

"She was a worthy woman all her live.

Of husbands at the church door had she five."

And besides her matrimonial experiences, she had been a great traveler, having been in Jerusalem, Rome, Germany, France. She had a fair face, though somewhat red and bold; her shoes were shining new, and her stockings of fine scarlet; she rode her ambling nag easily, and had on spurs like a man.

Next comes a monk, in a fur-trimmed mantle, his hood fastened under his chin with a curious pin of gold, and his scarf tied in a love-knot. His companion is a merry friar, who gives easy penance to his parishioners, and administers absolution "full swetely."

"Somewhat he lisped for his wantoness,

To make his English sweet upon his tongue."

The Oxford student who follows is lean, like his horse; his coat is threadbare; he might be twin-brother to the poor student of the present day. He would rather have a shelf full of books at his bed's head than rich clothes or any other pleasures. What a contrast to him is the Frankelein, an English Squire of the fourteenth century, with a beard white as a daisy, a full, red face, and all the marks of a gourmand.

"Without baked meat never was his house,

Of fish and flesh, and that so plenteous,

It snowed in his house of mete and drink."

Then come a quartette of mechanics, all dressed in the