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Of one suit, for to serve of the butlery.
Before the queen it was also of all such courtesy.

For to tell all the nobley' that there was y-do,

Though my tongue were of steel, me should nought dure thereto.

2

Women ne kept of 3 no knight as in druery,4

But 5 he were in arms well y-proved, and at least thrye. 6

That made, lo, the women the chaster life lead, And the knights the stalworder, 7 and better in her

deed.

8

Soon after this noble meat, as right was of such

tide,

10

The knights atyled 9 them about, in each side,
In fields and in meads to prove their bachelry:
Some with lance, some with sword, without villany:"

prepositions was not fixed as it now is, but many of them were used indifferently. Many proofs of this occur in the present extract, and they are therefore marked in italics.

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9 Prepared, or perhaps armed. It seems to be the French word atteller; and the English word harness was also syna. nymous with armour.

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With playing at tables, other at chekere,

With casting, other with setting, other 3 in some

ogyrt 4 manere.

And which-so of any game had the mastery,

The king hem of his gifts did large courtesy.

Up the alures 5 of the castles the ladies then stood, And beheld this noble game, and which knights

were good.

6

All the three heat days y-laste this nobleye,

In halls and in fields, of meat, and eke of play. These men came the fourth day before the king there,

And he gave them large gifts, ever as hii worth

were.

Bishopricks and churches clerks he gave some, And castles and towns, knights that were y-come.* (Vol I. p. 191.)

1. Or.

• Chess. Chekere is properly a chess-board.

3 This may possibly refer to tric-trac, or back-gammon ; but casting and setting may also relate to throwing the bar. 4 Other.

5 The walks on the roof of the castle.

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For the purpose of shewing how exactly Robert of Gloucester translates from his original, I shall here add the whole corresponding passage from Geoffrey of Monmouth.

Rex et regina-ille ad suum palatium cum viris, hæc ad aliud cum mulieribus, epulatum incedunt: antiquam nam

The reader who compares the foregoing extract with the satirical piece contained in the last chapter, will probably think that Robert of Gloucester's

que consuetudinem Troja servantes Britones, consueverant mares cum maribus, mulieres cum mulieribus, festivos dies separatim agere.

Collocatis postmodum cunctis ut singulorum dignitas expetebat, Caius dapifer, hermenio ornatus, mille vero nobilissimis juvenibus comitatus est, qui omnes, herminio induti, fercula cum ipso ministrabant. Ex aliâ parte vero Bedverum pincernam, totidem vario amicti sequuntur, qui in scyphis diversorum generum multimoda pocula cum ipso distribuebant. In palatio quoque reginæ, innumerabiles ministri, diversis ornamentis induti, obsequium suum præstabant, morem suum exercentes; quem si omnino describere pergerem, nimiam historiæ prolixitatem generarem. Facetæ autem mulieres, consimilia indumenta habentes, nullius amorem habere dignabantur, nisi tertio in militiâ approbatus esset. Efficiebantur ergo castæ mulieres, et milites amore illarum meliores. Refectæ tandem epulis, diversi diversos ludos composituri, campos extra civitatem adeunt. Mox milites, simulacrum prælii ciendo, equestrem ludum componunt: mulieres, in edito murorum aspicientes in curiales, amoris flammas more joci irritant. Alii telis, alii hastâ, alii ponderosorum lapidum jactû, alii saxis, alii aleis, cæterorumque jocorum diversitate contendentes, quod diei restabat, postpositâ lite prætereunt. Quicumque vero ludi sui victoriam adeptus erat, ab Arthuro largis muneribus ditabatur. Consumptis ergo primis in hunc modum diebus tribus, instante quarto vocantur cuncti qui ipsi propter

of Edward I. and was reputed (though it seems falsely) to be the author of some metrical prophecies not yet forgotten in Scotland. His contemporary Kendal is only known by the accidental mention of Robert de Brunne. There is, however, an unclaimed metrical Romance apparently belonging to this period, which the generosity of future critics may possibly assign to him. This is the Gest of King Horn, which is preserved in a very curious miscellany in the British Museum, (Harl. MSS. No. 2253) and mentioned by Chaucer as one of the romances of price. Mr. Warton has given an excellent abridgment of it, together with a considerable extract, in the first volume of his Poetry, p. 39.*

In the same manuscript which contains this romance, are found some political satires of considerable merit; one of which was certainly com

*Having procured from the Museum a transcript of this very curious work, I should not have failed to insert it entire, but that I had reason to hope that the task of editing it will fall into much better hands. The reader will certainly learn with pleasure that Mr. Ritson has it in contemplation to publish a series of our old metrical romances, many of which exist only in manuscript. Such a work executed by him, is likely to prove the most valuable repertory of early language and manners that has yet been presented to the public.

posed in the year 1265. (It is inserted in Percy's Reliques, as is also an elegy on the death of Edward I. written in 1307.) Another, on the defeat of the French army by the Flemings, in 1301; and a ballad against the Scots, composed in 1306.' As the first of these pieces may be considered as anterior to the composition of Robert of Gloucester's poem, and the others were written very soon after its conclusion, Mr. Warton seems to have employed them as terms of comparison, for the purpose of ascertaining, by internal evidence, the dates of several love-songs, devotional and moral poems, and other smaller pieces contained in the same miscellany. He was perhaps mistaken in referring some of these to so early a period as the year 1200; but they certainly appear to have been written near the middle of the thirteenth century; and as specimens of our earliest lyric compositions are not unworthy of our curiosity, the reader is here presented with two, one of which is a moral ditty, and the other a love-song; both copied from the volume of ancient songs published by Mr. Ritson, who has corrected some trifling mistakes, committed by Mr. Warton in decyphering the obsolete characters of the ancient MSS.

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