The complete works of John Gower, volume 4

by John Gower

NOTES

EPISTOLA.

This Epistle, written apparently on the occasion of sending a copy of the book to the archbishop, is found only in the All Souls MS., and it is reasonable to suppose that this was the copy in question. The statement of Mr. Coxe in the Roxburghe edition, that ‘the preface to archbishop Arundel ... is also in the original hand’ of the book (Introduction, p. lix) is a surprising one, and must have been due to some deception of memory. The hand here is quite a different one from that of the text which follows, and has a distinctly later character. The piece is full of erasures, which are indicated in this edition by spaced type, but the corrections are in the same hand as the rest. Having no other copy of it, we cannot tell what the original form of the erased passages may have been, but it is noticeable that the most important of them (ll. 26-34) has reference almost entirely to the blindness of the author, and nearly every one contains something which may be regarded as alluding to this, either some mention of light and darkness, or some allusion to the fact that his only perceptions now are those of the mind. We may perhaps conclude that the Epistle was inscribed here before the author quite lost his eyesight, and that the book then remained by him for some time before it was presented. The illuminated capital S with which this composition begins is combined with a miniature painting of the archbishop.

2. tibi scribo, ‘I dedicate to thee.’

3. Quod ... scriptum: written over erasure; perhaps originally ‘Quem ... librum,’ altered to avoid the repetition of ‘librum’ from the preceding line.

4. contempletur: apparently in a passive impersonal sense.

17. Cecus ego mere. The word ‘mere’ alone is over erasure here, but if we suppose that the original word was ‘fere,’ we may regard this as referring originally to a gradual failure of the eyesight, not to complete blindness.

19. Corpore defectus, ‘the failure in my body,’ as subject of ‘sinit.’

23. dumque: equivalent to ‘dum’ in our author’s language; cp. i. 165, 2007, &c.

33. morosa: this word has a good meaning in Gower’s language; cp. ‘O deus immense,’ l. 2, where ‘morosi’ is opposed to ‘viciosi.’

VOX CLAMANTIS

CAPITULA.

Lib. I. Cap. iii. quandam vulgi turmam. It may be noted that these headings do not always exactly correspond with those placed at the head of the chapters afterwards. For example here the actual heading of the chapter has ‘secundam vulgi turmam,’ and for the succeeding chapters ‘terciam,’ ‘quartam,’ ‘quintam,’ &c. Usually the differences are very trifling, as ‘illius terre’ for ‘terre illius’ above, but sometimes they proceed from the fact that alterations have been made in the chapter headings, which the corrector has neglected to make in this Table of Chapters. This is the case for example as regards Lib. VI. Capp. xviii. and xix. Slight variations of the kind first mentioned will be found in Lib. III. Capp. i, v, viii, xii, xvi, xix, xx.

Lib. III. Cap. iiii. The form which we have here in D corresponds to the heading of the chapter given by LTH₂ (but not by D itself) in the text later. G has the text here after ‘loquitur’ written over an erasure.

Lib. VII. Cap. xix. Here S has lost two leaves (the sixth and seventh of the first full quire) to Lib. I. Cap. i. l. 18. The verso of the former of these leaves had no doubt the four lines ‘Ad mundum mitto’ &c. with picture, as in the Cotton MS.

LIB. I. Prologus.

3 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, iv. 2921 f.,

‘Al be it so, that som men sein

That swevenes ben of no credence.’

‘propositum credulitatis’ seems to mean ‘true ground of belief.’

12. interius mentis: cp. i. 1361.

15. That is, ‘hinc puto quod sompnia que vidi,’ &c.

21 ff. We are here told to add to ‘John’ the first letters of ‘Godfrey,’ the beginning of ‘Wales,’ and the word ‘Ter’ without its head: that is, ‘John Gower.’

23. que tali. The use of ‘que’ in this manner, standing independently at the beginning of the clause, is very common in Gower.

33 f. Taken from Ovid, Tristia, v. 1. 5 f.

36. Cp. Tristia, i. 1. 14, ‘De lacrimis factas sentiet esse meis,’ which, so far as it goes, is in favour of the reading ‘senciat’ here.

37 f. This couplet was originally Tristia, iv. 1. 95 f.,

‘Saepe etiam lacrimae me sunt scribente profusae,

Humidaque est fletu litera facta meo.’

The first line however was altered so as to lose its grammatical construction, and the couplet was subsequently emended.

43 f. Cp. Ovid, Tristia, i. 5. 53 f.

47 f. Cp. Pont. iv. 2. 19, where the comparison to a spring choked with mud is more clearly brought out.

49. The original reading here was ‘confracto,’ but it has been altered to ‘contracto’ in C and G, while E gives ‘contracto’ from the first hand. The general meaning seems to be that as the long pilgrimage to Rome is to one with crippled knee, so is this work to the author, with his limited powers of intellect.

56. The reading ‘conturbant’ in all the best MSS. seems to be a mistake.

57 f. The author is about to denounce the evils of the world and proclaim the woes which are to follow, like the writer of the Apocalypse, whose name he bears. Perhaps he may also have some thought of the formula ‘seint John to borwe’ by which travellers committed themselves to the protection of the saint on their setting forth: cp. Conf. Amantis, v. 3416.

LIB. I.

1. The fourth year of Richard II is from June 22, 1380 to the same date of 1381. The writer here speaks of the last month of that regnal year, during which the Peasants’ rising occurred.

4. Cp. Ovid, Her. xvii. 112, ‘Praevius Aurorae Lucifer ortus erat.’

7 f. Godfrey of Viterbo, Pantheon, p. 24 (ed. 1584), has

‘Luce diem reparat, mirandaque lumina praestat,

Sic fuga dat noctem, luxque reversa diem.’

He is speaking of the Sun generally, and the second line means ‘Thus his departure produces the night and his returning light the day.’ As introduced here this line is meaningless.

9. Adapted from Ovid, Metam. ii. 110.

11. Cp. Metam. vii. 703, but here ‘mane’ is made into the object of the verb instead of an adverb.

13. Cp. Metam. ii. 113.

15. Cp. Metam. ii. 24.

17 f. From Godfrey of Viterbo, Pantheon, p. 24 (ed. 1584).

21 ff. Cp. Metam. ii. 107 ff.,

‘Aureus axis erat, temo aureus, aurea summae

Curvatura rotae, radiorum argenteus ordo.

Per iuga chrysolithi positaeque ex ordine gemmae

Clara repercusso reddebant lumina Phoebo.’

‘alter ab auro’ seems to mean ‘different from gold.’

27. Cp. Metam. ii. 23.

33-60. This passage is largely from Ovid: see especially Fasti, i. 151 ff. and iii. 235-242, iv. 429 f., v. 213 f., Metam. ii. 30, Tristia, iii. 12. 5-8.

40. In Ovid (Fasti, iii. 240) it is ‘Fertilis occultas invenit herba vias.’ The metrical fault produced by reading ‘occultam ... viam’ seems to have been corrected by the author, and in G the alteration has been made by erasure, apparently in the first hand.

44. redditus: apparently a substantive and practically equivalent to ‘reditus.’

59. Ovid, Fasti, v. 213 f., where however we have ‘Saepeque digestos.’ It is difficult to say exactly what our author meant by ‘O quia.’

67. Cp. Metam. xiii. 395.

79 f. Speculum Stultorum, p. 47, ll. 9 f. (ed. Wright, Rolls Series, 59, vol. i.).

81. irriguis. Perhaps rather ‘Fontibus irriguus, fecundus,’ as given by most of the MSS.

131. ad ymum, ‘to that low place,’ i.e. his bed.

135. Non ita ... Quin magis: cp. ll. 264 ff., 351 ff., 442 ff., 499 ff, &c. This form of sentence is a very common one with our author and appears also in his French and English: cp. Mirour, 18589, Balades, vii. 4, xviii. 2, xxx. 2, Conf. Amantis, i. 718, 1259, 1319, &c.

For example, Bal. xviii. 2,

‘Tiel esperver crieis unqes ne fu,

Qe jeo ne crie plus en ma maniere.’

Conf. Amantis, i. 718 ff.,

‘So lowe cowthe I nevere bowe

To feigne humilite withoute,

That me ne leste betre loute

With alle the thoghtes of myn herte.’

It is most frequent in Latin, however, and the French and English forms seem to be translations of this idiom with ‘quin.’

152. ‘Dreams cast the soul into wanderings’: ‘ruunt’ is transitive, as very commonly, and apparently we must take ‘vaga nonnulla’ together.

155. grauis et palpebra, &c., ‘and my heavy eyelid unclosed pondered over troubles, but no help came.’ This is the best translation I can give, but the explanation of ‘ex oculis’ as ‘away from the eyes’ must be regarded as doubtful.

168. That is, on a Tuesday. It would be apparently Tuesday, June 11, 1381. The festival of Corpus Christi referred to afterwards (see l. 919), when the insurgents entered London, fell on June 13.

201. Burnellus: a reference to the Speculum Stultorum, p. 13 (Rolls Series, 59, vol. i).

205 ff. Cp. Speculum Stultorum, p. 13, whence several of these lines are taken.

211 f. ‘They care not for the tail which He who gave them their ears implanted in them, but think it a vile thing.’ The former line of the couplet is from Speculum Stultorum, p. 15, l. 17.

213 f. Speculum Stultorum, p. 15, ll. 23 f.

255. caudas similesque draconum, ‘and tails like those of dragons.’

267. Minos taurus, ‘the bull of Minos,’ sent from the sea in answer to his prayer.

271. There is some confusion here in the author’s mind between different stories, and it is difficult to say exactly what he was thinking of.

277 f. Cp. Ovid, Metam. xi. 34 ff.

280. crapulus. I do not know what this is, unless it is equivalent to ‘capulus,’ which is rather doubtfully given by D. That would mean the ‘handle’ of the plough, but we have ‘ansa’ in l. 282.

289 f. Cp. Pont. i. 3. 55 f.

291. Metam. viii. 293.

325 ff. For this passage compare Metam. viii. 284 ff.

335. Metam. viii. 285. The Digby MS. has a rubricator’s note here in the margin, ‘sete. a bristell.’

341. quod: consecutive, ‘so that’; cp. ‘sic ... quod,’ ll. 223, 311, &c. In the next line ‘pascua’ seems to be singular.

351 ff. See note on l. 135.

381. Fasti, ii. 767.

395. Cutte que Curre, ‘Cut and Cur,’ names for mongrel dogs.

396. As a note on ‘casas’ the Digby MS. has ‘i.e. kenell’ in the margin.

402. ‘Neither does he of the mill remain at home.’

405. The rubricator of the Digby MS. has written in the margin, ‘i.e. threefoted dog commyng after halting.’

407. Digby MS. rubric, ‘i.e. Rig þe Teydog.’ Note the position of ‘que,’ which should properly be attached to the first word of the line: cp. l. 847.

455. As a note on ‘thalia’ here (for ‘talia’) the Digby MS. has ‘Thelea i.e. dea belli’ written by the rubricator. It is difficult to conjecture what he was thinking of.

457. The Digby MS. rubricator, as a note on ‘Cephali canis’ has in the margin, ‘i.e. stella in firmamento.’

465. ‘super est’ is the reading of the Glasgow MS. also.

474. artes. This seems to be the reading of all the MSS., though in S the word might possibly be ‘arces.’ I take it to mean ‘devices,’ in the way of traps, or ingenious hiding-places.

479. ‘The grey foxes determine to leave the caverns of the wood’: ‘vulpes’ (or rather ‘vulpis’) is masculine in Gower.

483. ‘Henceforth neither the sheep nor the poor sheepfold are anything to them.’ For this use of ‘quid’ with a negative cp. l. 184.

492. solet. The present of this verb seems often to be used by our author as equivalent to the imperfect: cp. l. 541, iii. 705, 740, &c. Also ‘solebat,’ i. 699, iii. 1485; cp. v. 333, where ‘solebant’ seems to stand for ‘solent.’ In other cases also the present is sometimes used for the imperfect, e.g. l. 585 ‘quas nuper abhorret Egiptus.’

499 ff. See 1 Sam. v. The plague of mice is distinctly mentioned in the Vulgate version, while in our translation from the Hebrew it is implied in ch. vi. 5. ‘Accharon’ is Ekron.

541. solent: see note on l. 492.

545. Coppa: used as a familiar name for a hen in the Speculum Stultorum, pp. 55, 58, and evidently connected with ‘Coppen’ or ‘Coppe,’ which is the name of one of Chantecleer’s daughters in the Low-German and English Reynard.

557 f. ‘They determine that days are lawful for those things for which the dark form of night had often given furtive ways.’

568. quod: equivalent to ‘vt’; cp. ll. 600, 1610.

576. G reads ‘perstimulant’ with CED.

579 f. See Ovid, Metam. vi. 366 ff. Apparently ‘colonum’ is for ‘colonorum.’

603. Toruus oester: cp. Speculum Stultorum, p. 25.

615 f. Cp. Speculum Stultorum, p. 24, l. 21 f.

635. Cp. Speculum Stultorum, p. 25, l. 15.

637 f. Speculum Stultorum, p. 26,

‘Haec est illa dies qua nil nisi cauda iuvabit,

Vel loca quae musca tangere nulla potest.’

652. stramine: probably an allusion to the name of Jack Strawe, as ‘tegula’ in the next couplet to Wat Tyler.

Cap. ix. Heading, l. 3. It seems to be implied that the jay, which must often have been kept as a cage-bird and taught to talk, was commonly called ‘Wat,’ as the daw was called ‘Jack,’ and this name together with the bird’s faculty of speech has suggested the transformation adopted for Wat Tyler.

716. There is no punctuation in S, but those MSS. which have stops, as CD, punctuate after ‘nephas’ and ‘soluit.’ The line is suggested by Ovid, Fasti, ii. 44, ‘Solve nefas, dixit; solvit et ille nefas.’ There it is quite intelligible, but here it is without any clear meaning.

It may be observed here that the passage of Ovid in which this line occurs, Fasti, ii. 35-46, is evidently one of the sources of Confessio Amantis, v. 2547 ff.

749. Sicut arena maris: cp. Rev. xx. 8, to which reference is made below, ll. 765 ff.

762. ‘All that they lay upon us, they equally bear themselves.’ Apparently this is the meaning, referring to the universal ruin which is likely to ensue.

765-776. These twelve lines are taken with some alterations of wording and order from Godfrey of Viterbo, Pantheon, p. 228 (ed. 1584). In l. 765 the reference to the Apocalypse is to Rev. xx.

774. forum: apparently ‘law.’

783 ff: This well-known chapter was very incorrectly printed in the Roxburghe edition, owing to the fact that a leaf has here been cut out of S, and the editor followed D. Fuller, whose translation of the opening lines has often been quoted, had a better text before him, probably that of the Cotton MS.

810. It is difficult to see how this line is to be translated, unless we suppose that ‘fossa’ is a grammatical oversight.

821. Cp. Ovid, Metam. i. 211, ‘Contigerat nostras infamia temporis aures.’

849 f. Adapted from Amores, iii. 9. 7 f., but not very happily.

855 ff. With this passage we may compare the description in Walsingham, vol. i. p. 454, ‘quorum quidam tantum baculos, quidam rubigine obductos gladios, quidam bipennes solummodo, nonnulli arcus prae vetustate factos a fumo rubicundiores ebore antiquo, cum singulis sagittis, quorum plures contentae erant una pluma, ad regnum conquaerendum convenere.’

868. The reading ‘de leuitate’ is given also by G.

869. limpidiores. The epithet is evidently derived from 1 Sam. xvii. 40, where the Vulgate has ‘et elegit sibi quinque limpidissimos lapides de torrente.’

876. ‘These fools boast that the earth has been wetted,’ &c.

871 ff. Cp. Metam. xi. 29 f.

879 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 37*. One of the charges against Sir Nicholas Brembre in 1388 was that he had designed to change the name of London to ‘New Troy.’

891. siluis que palustribus, ‘from the woods and marshes.’

904. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. iii. 577 f.

909. Cp. Metam. viii. 421.

919. Corpus Christi day, that is Thursday, June 13.

929 f. via salua: apparently meaning ‘Savoye,’ the palace of the duke of Lancaster in the Strand. In the next line ‘longum castrum’ looks like ‘Lancaster,’ but it is difficult to say exactly what the meaning is.

931. Baptisteque domus. This is the Priory of St. John of Jerusalem at Clerkenwell, which was burnt by the insurgents because of their hostility to Robert Hales, the Master of the Hospital, then Treasurer of the kingdom. Walsingham says that the fire continued here for seven days.

933-936. Ovid, Fasti, vi. 439 ff., where the reference is to the burning of the temple of Vesta. Hence the mention of sacred fires, which is not appropriate here.

937. Metam. ii. 61.

939 f. Metam. i. 288 f.

941 ff. This accusation, which Gower brings apparently without thinking it necessary to examine into its truth (‘Est nichil vt queram,’ &c.), is in direct contradiction to the statements of the chroniclers, e.g. Walsingham, i. 456 f., Knighton, ii. 135; but it is certain that dishonest persons must have taken advantage of the disorder to some extent for their own private ends, however strict the commands of the leaders may have been, and it is probable that the control which was exercised at first did not long continue. The chroniclers agree with Gower as to the drunkenness.

943 f. Ovid, Trist. v. 6. 39 f.

951. Ovid, Fasti, vi. 673.

953. Metam. xv. 665.

955 f. That is, the deeds of Friday (dies Veneris) were more atrocious than those of Thursday.

961 f. The construction of accusative with infinitive is here used after ‘Ecce,’ as if it were a verb, and ‘Calcas’ is evidently meant for an accusative case. It is probable that the names here given, Calchas, Antenor, Thersites, Diomede, Ulysses, as well as those which follow in ll. 985 ff., are meant to stand for general types, rather than for particular persons connected with the government. In any case we could hardly identify them.

997. Vix Hecube thalami, &c. This looks like an allusion to the princess of Wales, the king’s mother, whose apartments in the Tower were in fact invaded by the mob. Similarly in the lines that follow ‘Helenus’ stands for the archbishop of Canterbury.

1019 ff. The text of these five lines, as we find it in DTH₂, that is in its earlier form, was taken for the most part from the Aurora of Petrus (de) Riga, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 88 v^o,

‘Non rannus pungens, set oliua uirens, set odora

Ficus, set blanda uitis abhorret eos.

Anticristus enim regit hos, nam spiritus almus,

Nam lex, nam Cristus, non dominatur eis.’

He is speaking of the parable of Jotham in the Book of Judges.

1046. Fasti, ii. 228.

1073. medioque: written apparently for ‘mediaque.’

1076. posse caret, ‘is without effect.’

1081. Cp. Tristia, iv. 2. 5 f.

1094. Cp. Fasti, i. 122.

1141. Metam. vi. 559.

1143. Cp. Metam. vii. 603.

1161. Metam. vii. 602. Considering that the line is borrowed from Ovid, we cannot attach much importance to it as indicating what was done with the body of the archbishop.

1173. ostia iuris: cp. Walsingham, i. 457, ‘locum qui vocatur “Temple Barre,” in quo apprenticii iuris morabantur nobiliores, diruerunt.’

1188. Cp. Ovid, Her. iii. 4.

1189. Metam. v. 41.

1193 f. Cp. Ars Amat. ii. 373 f., where, however, we have ‘cum rotat,’ not ‘conrotat.’

1206. Quam periturus erat, ‘rather than that he should perish,’ apparently.

1209. Cp. Metam. v. 40.

1211. Metam. xiv. 408.

1215 f. A reference probably to the massacre of the Flemings.

1219 f. Fasti, iii. 509 f.

1221 f. Ovid, Amores, iii. 9. 11 f.

1224. Cp. Her. v. 68.

1253. Cp. Metam. vii. 599, ‘Exiguo tinxit subiectos sanguine cultros.’

1271. Perhaps ‘cessit’ is right, as in l. 1265, but the reading of C is the result of a correction, and the corrections of this manuscript are usually sound.

1279 f. If there is any construction here, it must be ‘Erumpunt lacrimae luminibus, que lumina,’ &c. For this kind of ellipse cp. l. 1501.

1283. Cp. Her. viii. 77.

1289. Metam. ix. 775.

Cap. xvi. Heading, l. 1. quasi in propria persona: cf. Conf. Amantis, i. 60, margin, ‘Hic quasi in persona aliorum quos amor alligat, fingens se auctor esse Amantem,’ &c. The author takes care to guard his readers against a too personal application of his descriptions.

1359. Cp. Ovid, Metam. xiv. 198. In the lines that follow our author has rather ingeniously appropriated several other expressions from the same story of Ulysses and Polyphemus.

1363 f. Ars Amat. iii. 723 f.

1365. Metam. xiv. 206.

1369. Metam. xiv. 200.

1379 f. Cp. Tristia, v. 4. 33 f.

1385 f. Her. xx. 91 f.

1387. Cp. Metam. xiv. 120.

1395. Cp. Metam. iv. 723.

1397 f. Cp. Tristia, i. 3. 53 f.

1401 f. Cp. Fasti, v. 315 f.

1403. Cp. Metam. xv. 27.

1413 f. Pont. i. 3. 57 f.

1420. Cp. Her. iii. 24, used here with a change of meaning.

1424. Cp. Ars Amat. ii. 88, ‘Nox oculis pavido venit oborta metu.’

1425 f. Pont. i. 2. 45 f.

1429 f. Cp. Pont. i. 2. 49 f.

1433. Metam. iii. 709.

1442. Cp. Her. v. 14, where we have ‘Mixtaque’ instead of ‘Copula.’

1445 ff. Cp. Metam. xiv. 214-216.

1453. Adapted from Metam. iv. 263, ‘Rore mero lacrimisque suis ieiunia pavit.’ The change of ‘mero’ to ‘meo’ involves a tasteless alteration of the sense, while the sound is preserved.

1459. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 581.

1465. Metam. ii. 656. Our author has borrowed the line without supplying an appropriate context, and the result is nonsense. Ovid has

‘Suspirat ab imis

Pectoribus, lacrimaeque genis labuntur obortae.’

1467 f. Pont. i. 2. 29 f.

1469. Cp. Metam. xiii. 539.

1473. Ovid, Metam. viii. 469.

1475. Metam. iv. 135, borrowed without much regard to the context.

1485. From Ovid, Her. xiv. 37, where however we have ‘calor,’ not ‘color,’ a material difference.

1496. Her. v. 46.

1497. The expression ‘verbis solabar amicis’ is from Ovid (Fasti, v. 237), but here ‘solabar’ seems to be made passive in sense.

1501 f. i.e. ‘cessat amor eius qui prius,’ &c., with a rather harsh ellipse of the antecedent. The couplet is a parody of Ovid, Pont. iv. 6. 23 f.,

‘Nam cum praestiteris verum mihi semper amorem,

Hic tamen adverso tempore crevit amor.’

1503 f. Cp. Tristia, iii. i. 65 f.,

‘Quaerebam fratres, exceptis scilicet illis,

Quos suus optaret non genuisse pater.’

1506. Fasti, i. 148, not very appropriate here.

1512. Her. xi. 82.

1514. Cp. Her. xiii. 86, ‘Substitit auspicii lingua timore mali.’

1517 f. Cp. Her. iii. 43 f.

1519. Cp. Pont. iii. 4. 75.

1521. Cp. Tristia, i. 11. 23.

1534. Cp. Tristia, v. 4. 4, ‘Heu quanto melior sors tua sorte mea est.’

1535 ff. Cp. Tristia, iii. 3. 39 ff.

1539 f. Tristia, iii. 3. 29 f.

1541. scis quia: ‘quia’ for ‘quod,’ cp. l. 1593; ‘puto quod,’ i. Prol. 15, &c.

1549. Cp. Fasti, i. 483.

1564. Her. xiv. 52.

1565 f. Cp. Her. x. 113 f. The lines are not very appropriate here.

1568. See note on l. 1420.

1569. Cp. Metam. iii. 396.

1571. Cp. Metam. xiv. 210.

1573. Cp. Metam. vii. 614.

1575. Cp. Metam. ix. 583.

1581. Obice singultu, that is, ‘Impediente singultu’: cp. Cronica Tripertita, ii. 3.

1585. Metam. xiv. 217.

1589. Tristia, i. 5. 45.

1593. vidi quia: cp. l. 1541.

1609. quid agant alii, ‘whatever others may do.’

1612. Cp. Her. xix. 52.

1615 f. It seems probable that this is a prayer to the Virgin Mary, whose name ‘Star of the Sea’ was used long before the fourteenth century, e.g.

‘Praevia stella maris de mundo redde procella

Tutos: succurre, praevia stella maris,’

in an address to the Virgin by Eberhard (date 1212) in Leyser, Poet. Med. Aevi, p. 834, and the name occurs also in Peter Damian’s hymns (xi. cent.). For Gower’s use of the expression cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 29925, ‘O de la mer estoille pure,’ and later in this book, l. 2033, ‘Stella, Maria, maris.’ Here, however, we might translate, ‘Be thou a star of the sea going before me,’ taking it as a prayer to Christ.

1623. Metam. i. 265.

1627. Extra se positus, ‘beside himself.’

1630. Fasti, iv. 386.

1631. Cp. Metam. i. 282.

1635. Cp. Metam. i. 269.

1637. Cp. Metam. i. 270.

1653 ff. From this point to the end of the chapter the description is mostly taken from Ovid, Metam. xi. 480-523, many hexameters being appropriated without material change, e.g. ll. 480, 482, 484, 486, 488, 491, 492, 495, 499, 501, 516, 517, 519 f.

1689. The line is taken away from its context, and consequently gives no sense. In Ovid it is,

‘Ipse pavet, nec se qui sit status ipse fatetur

Scire ratis rector.’—Metam. xi. 492.

1693. Metam. i. 292.

1695. From Peter Riga, Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 16 v^o.

1697-1700. Cp. Aurora, f. 15 v^o,

‘Fontes ingresso Noe corrumpuntur abyssi,

Et de uisceribus terra fluenta uomit.

Effundunt nubes pluuias, deciesque quaternis

Sustinet inmensas archa diebus aquas.’

1717 f. Cp. Ovid, Metam. iv. 689 f.

1719. Cp. Metam. iv. 706 f. Ovid has ‘praefixo,’ which is more satisfactory.

1721. Cp. Metam. iv. 690.

1727 f. Tristia, i. 11. 21 f.

1729. Fasti, iii. 593.

1735. Metam. xi. 539.

1739. Cp. Metam. xi. 515, ‘Rima patet, praebetque viam letalibus undis.’

1774. Cp. Fasti, ii. 98.

1775 f. Cp. Amores, ii. 11. 9 f.

1779 f. Tristia, v. 12. 5 f.

1781. Metam. xiv. 213.

1825. Cp. Tristia, ii. 179.

1832. Tristia, i. 5. 36.

1847 f. Cp. Ovid, Pont. iii. 7. 27 f. In the second line Ovid has ‘tumidis,’ for which there is no authority in Gower. Our author perhaps read ‘timidis’ in his copy of Ovid, or made the change himself, taking ‘timidis’ to mean ‘fearful.’

1879. ‘Perhaps that day would have been the last of confusion, even if,’ &c. This, by the context, would seem to be the meaning.

1898. Ovid, Fasti, iv. 542.

1899 f. Cp. Pont. i. 3. 9 f.

1907 f. From Godfrey of Viterbo, Pantheon, p. 82 (ed. 1584).

1909. ‘But he who walked upon the sea,’ &c., that is, Christ.

1913. Cp. Metam. i. 328, ‘Nubila disiecit, nimbisque Aquilone remotis.’

1917. Metam. i. 329.

1919. Cp. Metam. i. 345.

1921. Cp. Metam. v. 286, where we have ‘nubila,’ as the sense requires. Here the MSS. give ‘numina’ without variation.

1923. Cp. Metam. ix. 795.

1925. Metam. i. 344.

1935. Metam. xiii. 440.

1939. Metam. xiii. 419.

1944. Quam prius: for ‘prius quam,’ as often.

1963 f. This alludes to the supposed reply made to Brutus (son of Silvius), when he consulted the oracle of Diana in the island of Leogecia, ‘Brute, sub occasum solis,’ &c., as told by Geoffrey of Monmouth.

1979 f. Ovid, Pont. iii. 8. 15 f.

1991 ff. Cp. Tristia, i. 11. 25 ff.

1997 f. Tristia, iii. 2. 25 f.

2001 f. Cp. Her. xi. 27 f.

2003 f. Her. xiv. 39 f.

2029 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 119 f.

2031 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 531 f.

2033 f. Cp. Her. ii. 123 f.

2037 f. Pont. iv. 3. 49 f.

2043. Cp. Pont. i. 4. 21. In Ovid we read ‘animus quoque pascitur illis,’ and this probably was what Gower intended to write.

2071 f. Cp. Pont. ii. 7. 9 f.

2074. Pont. ii. 7. 8.

2091. Cp. Hist. Apollonii Tyrii, xli, ‘Sicut rosa in spinis nescit compungi mucrone.’

2139. Cp. Pont. i. 5. 47.

2150. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 484.

LIB. II. Prologus.

15. Cp. Speculum Stultorum, p. 11, l. 41 (Rolls Series, 59, vol. i.).

41. Deut. xxxii. 13, ‘ut sugeret mel de petra oleumque de saxo durissimo.’

49 f. Cp. Fasti, i. 73 f.

51. The supposed mischief-maker is compared to Sinon, who gave a signal by fire which led to the destruction of Troy: cp. Conf. Amantis, i. 1172. I cannot satisfactorily explain ‘Excetra.’

57 f. From Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, p. 175 (ed. Wright, Rolls Series, 59, vol. ii.).

61. De modicis ... modicum: cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 16532.

64. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. ii. 166.

LIB. II.

With the general drift of what follows cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 529 ff.

1. Incausti specie, cp. Conf. Amantis, viii. 2212.

18. nos: meaning the people of England, as compared with those of other countries.

31 f. Cp. Ovid, Tristia, v. 8. 19 f.

33. Tristia, v. 5. 47.

41. Job v. 6, ‘Nihil in terra sine causa fit’: cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 26857.

59. This is the usual opposition of rose and nettle, based perhaps originally on Ovid, Rem. Amoris, 46: cp. Conf. Amantis, ii. 401 ff.

67 f. Cp. Boethius, Consol. Phil. 2 Pr. 4, ‘in omni adversitate fortunae infelicissimum genus est infortunii fuisse felicem.’ So Dante, Inf. v. 121 ff.,

‘Nessun maggior dolore,

Che ricordarsi del tempo felice

Nella miseria.’

117 ff. Cp. Ovid, Her. v. 109 ff. In l. 117 ‘siccis’ is substituted, not very happily, for ‘suci.’

138. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Latin Verses after ii. 1878,

‘Quod patet esse fides in eo fraus est, que politi

Principium pacti finis habere negat.’

163 f. Cp. Ovid, Tristia, v. 8. 15 f.

167 ff. Cp. Tristia, i. 5. 27 ff.

199 f. There seems to be no grammatical construction here.

239 ff. With this passage cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 27013 ff., where nearly the same examples are given. The classification is according to the nature of the things affected, first the heavenly bodies, then the elements of air, water, fire and earth, and finally living creatures. This arrangement is more clearly brought out in the Mirour.

259. Cp. Mirour, 27031, and note.

261. ‘And from the hard rocks of the desert,’ the conjunction being out of its proper place, as in i. 407, 847, ii. 249, &c.

267 f. Cp. Mirour, 27049 ff.

281 ff. See Mirour de l’Omme, 27073 ff.

282. Congelat, ‘took form.’ Probably the author had in his mind the phrase ‘congelat aere tacto,’ Ovid, Metam. xv. 415.

306. ‘num’ is here for ‘nonne’; cp. l. 320.

316. Cumque, for ‘Cum’: cp. l. 545, iii. 958, &c.

353 f. Cp. Godfrey of Viterbo, Pantheon, p. 9 (ed. 1584).

‘Ante creaturam genitor deus et genitura,

Primaque natura, novit statuitque futura.’

357-359. These three lines are from the Pantheon, p. 9.

371-374. Taken with slight change from the Pantheon, p. 10.

377 f. From Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 7 v^o.

414. ‘That which the new star brings argues that he is God.’

423. That is, ‘Lux venit, vt obscurari possit tenebris,’ &c.

485. ‘Every one who thinks upon Jesus ought to resolve to lay aside,’ &c.

487. The MSS. give ‘benedicti,’ but it seems probable that ‘benedici’ was meant. The verb is commonly transitive in later Latin.

495 ff. Cp. Isaiah, xliv. 9-20.

531 f. Psalms, cxiii. 8.

619 ff. Cp. Ovid, Metam. i. 74 ff.

LIB. III. Prologus.

11 ff. The author characteristically takes care to point out that in his criticism of the Church he is expressing not his own private opinion, but the ‘commune dictum,’ the report which went abroad among the people, and the ‘vox populi’ has for him always a high authority. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 18445 ff., 19057 ff., and see below, l. 1267 ff, iv. 19 f., 709 f.

With what is said in this Book of the condition of the Church and the clergy we may compare the author’s Mirour de l’Omme, 18421-20832.

25 f. Compare with this the author’s note on Mirour de l’Omme, 21266-78.

61. Cp. Ovid, Pont. iv. 14. 41.

64. Cp. Pont. iv. 9. 10.

67 f. Cp. Tristia, ii. 301 f.

82. Cp. Pont. ii. 2. 128.

LIB. III.

1-28. The form of these lines which stood originally in S is given by the Trinity College, Dublin, and the Hatfield MSS. The passage has been rewritten over erasure in CHG, and it must be left doubtful what text they had originally. From the fact that the erasure in G begins with the second line, it may seem more probable that the original text of this manuscript agreed with that which we have now in S, rather than with TH₂: for in the latter case there would have been no need to begin the erasure before l. 4. In CH the whole passage has been recopied (the same hand appearing here in the two MSS.) so that we can draw no conclusion about the point where divergence actually began. EDL have the same text by first hand. It will be noted that the lines as given by TH₂ make no mention of the schism of the Papacy.

11 ff. With this we may compare Mirour de l’Omme, 18769 ff.

22. nisi, for ‘nil nisi’: cp. l. 32.

41. Cp. Ovid, Amores, iii. 8. 55.

63. Fasti, i. 225.

65 f. Cp. Fasti, i. 249 f.

85-90. Chiefly from the Aurora of Petrus (de) Riga, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 71,

‘Ollarum carnes, peponum fercula, porros,

Cepas pro manna turba gulosa petit.

Quosdam consimiles sinus ecclesie modo nutrit,

Qui pro diuinis terrea uana petunt.

. . . . .

Carnes ollarum carnalia facta figurant

Que uelut in nostra carne libido coquit.’

It would seem that Gower read ‘Gebas’ (which has no meaning) for ‘Cepas’ and ‘preponunt,’ as in MS. Univ. Coll. 143, for ‘peponum,’ which is the true reading, meaning ‘melons’ or ‘pumpkins.’

115. Cp. Metam. xv. 173.

Cap. iii. Heading. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 288 (margin), where this is given as a quotation from Gregory.

141 f. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 18553.

167 f. From Aurora, f. 37.

175. gregis ex pietate mouetur, ‘is moved by pity for his flock.’

193 ff. With this passage compare Conf. Amantis, Prol. 407-413, and Mirour de l’Omme, 20161 ff. In all these places a distinct charge is brought against the clergy, to the effect that they encourage vice, in order to profit by it themselves in money and in influence: ‘the prostitute is more profitable to them than the nun,’ as our author significantly says in the Mirour (20149).

209 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 20113 ff.

227 ff. For this attack on the ‘positive law’ of the Church cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 247, Mirour, 18469 ff. The ‘lex positiva’ is that which is enjoined not as of inherent moral obligation, but as imposed by Church discipline.

249 f. Cp. Mirour, 18997 ff. Apparently ‘nouo’ is an adverb, meaning ‘anew,’ ‘again’: cp. 284, 376.

265 ff. Cp. Mirour, 18505 ff.

283 ff. Cp. Mirour, 18637, Conf. Amantis, ii. 3486.

329 ff. With this chapter compare Mirour, 18649-18732.

375. The note which we find here in the margin of SCHGD refers to the crusade of the bishop of Norwich in Flanders in the year 1383, which probably took place soon after the completion of our author’s book. It is added in SCHG in what appears to be one and the same hand, possibly that of the author himself. If we may judge by the manner in which the campaign in question is referred to by contemporary chroniclers, it seems to have been considered a public scandal by many others besides Gower.

419. Gower uses ‘sublimo’ as an ablat. sing, in l. 701; therefore ‘sublimis’ may here be an ablative plural agreeing with ‘meritis.’

425 ff. Cp. Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 103,

‘Cogitat inde domum domino fundare, sed audit

A domino, “Templi non fabricator eris.

Es uir sanguineus, ideo templum mihi dignum

Non fabricare potes, filius immo tuus.”

Sanguineus uir signat eum qui, crimina carnis

Amplectens, templum non ualet esse dei.

Ecclesie sancte talis non erigit edem,

Nec sacre fidei collocat ille domum.’

508. ‘And whosoever may sound trumpets, we ought to be silent’; cp. i. 1609.

531 f. Aurora, f. 75 v^o.

619 f. Ovid, Pont. ii. 5. 61 f.

623 f. Pont. ii. 6. 21 f.

641. See Ars Amat. ii. 417, where we find ‘semine,’ a reading which is required by the sense, but not given in the Gower MSS.

651. ‘The line of descent by right of his mother proclaims Christ to be heir of that land in which he was born.’ The author argues for crusades to recover the Holy Land, if there must be wars, instead of wars against fellow Christians, waged by one pope against the other under the name of crusades: cp. below, 945 ff.

676. quo foret ipse vigil, ‘where it ought to be watchful,’ a common use of the imperfect subjunctive in our author’s Latin: cp. ‘gestaret,’ 695, ‘lederet,’ 922, ‘medicaret,’ 1052.

815. What follows is spoken as in the person of the supreme pontiff: cp. Mirour, 18505-18792, where somewhat similar avowals are put into the mouth of a member of the Roman Court.

819 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 261,

‘The hevene is ferr, the world is nyh.’

835. Ovid, Fasti, v. 209.

955 f. I take this concluding couplet as a remark made by the author on the sentiments which he has just heard expressed by the representative of the Pope. It practically means that ‘Clemens’ is not a proper name for the Pope: it is in fact a ‘headless name’ and should rather be ‘Inclemens.’ Compare the address to Innocent III at the beginning of Geoffrey de Vinsauf’s Poetria Nova:

‘Papa, stupor mundi, si dixero Papa nocenti,

Acephalum nomen tribuam tibi: si caput addam,

Hostis erit metri,’ &c.

957 ff. It seems best to take what follows as, in part at least, a dialogue between the author and the representative of the pope, who has just spoken. Soon however the speech passes again entirely to the author. The Biblical reference here is to Revelation, xxii. 8 f. The same use is made of it in the Mirour, 18736 ff.

1077-1080. These four lines are from the Aurora, f. 44 v^o.

1113 f. Ovid, Ars Amat. iii. 595 f. (where we have ‘sequatur’). The original application is to the effects of rivalry in stimulating the passion of lovers. For the use of ‘sequetur’ here, apparently as a subjunctive, compare l. 1946, ‘Inueniet tardam ne sibi lentus opem.’

1118-1124. These lines are almost entirely borrowed from the Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 21 v^o.

1124. In the Glasgow MS. ‘Est’ has been here altered to ‘Et.’

1145-1150. Almost verbatim from Aurora, f. 93 v^o.

1169. S has here in the margin in a somewhat later hand than that of the text, ‘Nota hic quattuor neccessaria episcopo.’

1171 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 44 v^o,

‘Est olei natura triplex, lucet, cybat, unguit;

Hec tria mitratum debet habere capud.’

1183 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 44 v^o,

‘Lux est exemplo, cibus est dum pascit egenos,

Vnctio dum populis dulcia uerba ferit.’

Gower is right in reading ‘serit,’ which is given in MS. Univ. Coll. 143, f. 13.

1206. Cp. l. 1376.

1213. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. iii. 655.

1215 f. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 653 f.

1233. Cp. Ars Amat. ii. 279.

1247 ff. Cp. Mirour, 18793 ff.

1267. Vox populi, &c.: cp. Speculum Stultorum, p. 100, l. 4, and see also the note on iii. Prol. 11.

1271. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 304 ff. and Mirour, 18805.

1313. With the remainder of this Book, treating of the secular clergy, we may compare Mirour de l’Omme, 20209-20832.

1341. Cp. Mirour, 18889 ff.

1342. participaret, ‘he ought to share’: see note on l. 676.

1359 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, i. 1258 ff.

1375 ff. Cp. Mirour, 20287 ff.

1376. The reading ‘vngat vt’ is given by the Digby MS. and seems almost necessary: cp. l. 1206.

1405. prece ruffi ... et albi, ‘by reason of the petition of the red and the white,’ that is, presumably, by the influence of gold and silver, ‘dominis’ in the next line being in a loose kind of apposition to a dative case suggested by ‘Annuit.’

1407. S has here in the margin, in a rather later hand, ‘contra rectores Oxon.’

1417. Eccles. iv. 10, ‘Vae soli, quia cum ceciderit, non habet sublevantem se.’

1432. The margin of S has here, in the same hand as at 1407, ‘Nota rectores et studentes Oxon.’

1443. formalis, that is, ‘eminent,’ from ‘forma’ meaning ‘rank’ or ‘dignity,’ but here also opposed to ‘materialis.’

1454. Originally the line was ‘Dum legit, inde magis fit sibi sensus hebes,’ but this was altered to ‘plus sibi sensus hebes est,’ with the idea apparently of taking ‘magis’ with ‘legit.’ This involves an awkward metrical licence, ‘hebes est’ equivalent to ‘hebest,’ and the original text stands in CEH as well as in TH₂. The expedient of the Roxburghe editor is quite inexcusable.

1493 ff. Cp. Mirour, 20314. The sporting parson was quite a recognized figure in the fourteenth century. Readers of Froissart will remember how when the capture of Terry in Albigeois was effected by stratagem, the blowing of the horn to summon the company in ambush was attributed by those at the gate to a priest going out into the fields, ‘Ah that is true, it was sir Francis our priest; gladly he goeth a mornings to seek for an hare.’

1498. fugat: used apparently as subjunctive also in l. 2078, but it is possible that ‘Nec fugat’ may be the true reading here.

1509 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 20313 ff.

1527. Est sibi missa, ‘his mass is over.’

1546. Apparently a proverbial expression used of wasting valuable things.

1549. If benefices went from father to son, little or nothing would be gained by those who go to Rome to seek preferment, for an heir would seldom fail.

1555 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 20497 ff. The priests here spoken of are the ‘annuelers,’ who get their living by singing masses for the dead, the ‘Annua seruicia’ spoken of below:

‘Et si n’ont autre benefice,

Chantont par auns et par quartiers

Pour la gent mort.’ Mirour, 20499.

1559. In the Mirour,

‘Plus que ne firont quatre ainçois’ (20527).

1587-1590. Taken with slight change from Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 65 v^o.

1591. ‘With the ancients it is possible to say “hic et hec sacerdos,”’ that is, ‘sacerdos’ is both masculine and feminine.

1693-1700. Adapted from Aurora, f. 65,

‘Omen in urbe malum bubo solis iubar odit,

Escam uestigat nocte, ueretur aues:

In quem forte gregis auium si lumina figant,

Et clamando uolant et laniando secant.

Incestus notat iste reos, qui corpore fedi

Contra nature iura latenter agunt:

Hos iusti quasi lucis aues discerpere querunt,

Zelo succensi uerba seuera serunt.’

(‘Conclamando’ for ‘Et clamando’ in MS. Univ. Coll. 143.)

1727 ff. Cp. Mirour, 20713 ff.

1759 ff. Cp. Mirour, 20725 ff.,

‘Ne sont pas un, je suis certeins,

Ly berchiers et ly chapelleins,

Ne leur pecché n’est pas egal,

L’un poise plus et l’autre meinz,’ &c.

1775. fierent, ‘ought to become’: cp. l. 1789.

1791-1794 are from Aurora, f. 93 v^o, and the succeeding couplet is adapted from the same source, where we have,

‘De lino que fit per ephot caro munda notatur,

Nam tales seruos Cristus habere cupit.’

1797. Cp. Aurora, f. 46 v^o,

‘Balteus ex bysso tunicam constringit honeste.’

1799 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 45 v^o.

1801 f.

‘In medio tunice capitale ligat sibi presul,

Vt capitis sensus non sinat ire uagos.’

Aurora, f. 46.

1807 f.

‘Aurum ueste gerit presul, cum splendet in illo

Pre cunctis rutilans clara sophia patris.’

Aurora, f. 45.

1809 ff.

‘Ne tunice leuiter possit ruptura minari,

Illius in gyro texilis ora micat:

A grege ne presul se disrumpat, set honestus

Ad finem mores pertrahat, ista notant.’

Aurora, f. 46.

1813 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 46 v^o.

1815-1818.

‘Aaron et natis uestes texuntur, ut horum

Quisque sacerdotis possit honore frui.

Nam modo presbiteri, seu summi siue minores,

Conficiunt Cristi corpus idemque sacrant.’

Aurora, f. 45.

1823 f. Aurora, f. 43 v^o.

1841-1848. These eight lines are taken with insignificant changes from the Aurora, f. 63 v^o.

1853. The reference here given by Gower to the Aurora of Petrus (de) Riga has led to the tracing of a good many passages of the Vox Clamantis, besides the present one, to that source.

1863-1884. These lines are almost entirely from Aurora, ff. 66 v^o, 67. The arrangement of the couplets is somewhat different, and there are a few slight variations, which are noted below as they occur.

1866. eius: ‘illud,’ Aurora, f. 67.

1868. tumet: ‘timet,’ Aurora. (MS. Bodley 822), but Gower’s reading is doubtless the more correct.

1871. nimio: ‘magno,’ Aurora.

1872. ipse: ‘esse,’ Aurora.

1876. ligante: ‘trahente,’ Aurora, f. 66 v^o.

1878. tardat ad omne bonum: ‘ad bona nulla ualet,’ Aurora.

1880. Lumina nec: ‘Nec faciem,’ Aurora, f. 67.

1881 f.

‘Per pinguem scabiem succensa libido notatur;

Feruet vel fetet corpus utroque malo.’

Aurora, f. 67.

1885 ff. Our author still borrows from the same source, though from a different part of it. We find these lines nearly in the same form in the Aurora, f. 103,

‘Oza manus tendens accessit ut erigat archam,

Set mox punita est arida facta manus.

Hinc ideo dicunt meruisse necem, quia nocte

Transacta cohitu coniugis usus erat.

Declaratur in hoc quod si pollutus ad aram

Accedas, mortis uulnere dignus eris.’

1891 f.

‘Namque superiectas sordes detergere pure

Nescit nostra manus, si tenet illa lutum.’

Aurora, f. 103.

1905-1908. These two couplets are from Aurora, f. 69 v^o, where however they are separated by four lines not here given.

1911 ff. Cp. Aurora, f. 69 v^o,

‘Radices non extirpat rasura pilorum,

Set rasi crescunt fructificantque pyli.

Sic licet expellas omnes de pectore motus,

Non potes hinc penitus cuncta fugare tamen.

Hec de carne trahis, quia semper alit caro pugnans;

Intus habes cum quo prelia semper agas.’

Gower’s reading ‘pugnam’ in l. 1915 is probably right.

1937. Ovid, Rem. Amoris, 669.

1939. Tristia, iv. 6. 33 f.

1943 f. Rem. Amoris, 89 f.

1945 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 115 f.

1946. Inueniet: apparently meant for subjunctive; cp. l. 1114.

1947-1950. Rem. Amoris, 81-84.

1952. Cp. Her. xvii. 190.

1953. Rem. Amoris, 229.

1955 f. Rem. Amoris, 139 f.

1999 f.

‘Cum sale uas mittens in aquas Helyseus, easdem

Sanat, nec remanet gustus amarus aquis.’

Aurora, f. 140.

2001. Aurora, f. 60 v^o.

2017-2020. From Aurora, f. 8.

2035-2040. From Aurora, f. 15 v^o, but one couplet is omitted, and so the sense is obscured. After ‘sunt sine felle boni’ (l. 2038), the original has,

‘Cras canit hinc coruus, hodie canit inde columba;

Hec vox peruersis, congruit illa bonis.

Cras prauum cantant, dum se conuertere tardant,

Set tales tollit sepe suprema dies.’

The meaning is that the bad priests cry ‘Cras,’ like crows, and encourage men to put off repentance, while the others sing ‘Hodie,’ like doves, the words ‘cras’ and ‘hodie’ being imitations of the notes of the two birds. The expression ‘Cras primam cantant,’ in l. 2039, is not intelligible, and probably Gower missed the full sense of the passage.

2045. ‘sit’ has been altered in S from ‘fit.’

2049 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 20785 ff.

2071. Cp. Mirour, 20798.

2078. fugat: cp. l. 1498.

2097 f. Cp. iv. 959 and note.

LIB. IV.

The matter of this book corresponds to that of the Mirour de l’Omme, ll. 20833-21780.

19 f. Cp. Lib. iii. Prol. 11.

34. ‘dompnus’ or ‘domnus’ was the form of ‘dominus’ which was properly applied as a title to ecclesiastical dignitaries, and it seems to have been especially used in monasteries. Ducange quotes John of Genoa as follows: ‘Domnus et Domna per syncopen proprie convenit claustralibus; sed Dominus, Domina mundanis.’ Cp. l. 323 of this book and also 327 ff.

57. humeris qui ferre solebat, ‘who used to bear burdens,’ as a labourer.

87. Cp. Godfrey of Viterbo, Pantheon, p. 74 (ed. 1584).

91. Pantheon, p. 74.

109 f. Cp. Ovid, Fasti, i. 205 f.

111. Ars Amat. ii. 475, but Ovid has ‘cubilia.’

112. Cp. Fasti, iv. 396, ‘Quas tellus nullo sollicitante dabat.’ Gower has not improved the line by his changes.

114. Fasti, iv. 400.

115. Metam. i. 104, but Ovid has of course ‘fraga.’

117. Cp. Metam. i. 106, ‘Et quae deciderant patula Iovis arbore glandes’: ‘patule glandes’ is nonsense.

119. Cp. Metam. i. 103.

128. A play on the word ‘regula’: ‘re’ has been taken away and there remains only ‘gula.’

145. Cp. Metam. viii. 830.

147. Metam. viii. 835.

151 ff. Cp. Metam. viii. 837 ff.

163. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 647.

165 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 473 ff.

175. Ars Amat. iii. 503 f., but Ovid has ‘Gorgoneo saevius,’ for ‘commota lenius.’

177. Cp. Metam. viii. 465, ‘Saepe suum fervens oculis dabat ira ruborem.’ The reading ‘oculis’ is necessary to the sense and appears in one manuscript.

179. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. iii. 509.

215. ‘corrodium’ (or ‘corredium’) is the allowance made from the funds of a religious house for the sustentation of a member of it or of someone else outside the house: see Ducange under ‘conredium’ and New Engl. Dict. ‘corrody.’ Gower himself perhaps had in his later life a corrody in the Priory of Saint Mary Overey, of which he was a benefactor.

302. The reference is to Ecclus. xix. 27, ‘Amictus corporis et risus dentium et ingressus hominis enunciant de eo.’ Cp. Confessio Amantis, i. 2705, margin.

305-310. Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 65,

‘Est nigra coruus auis et predo cadaueris, illum

Quem male denigrat ceca cupido notans.

. . . . .

Sub uolucrum specie descripsit legifer illos,

Quos mundanus honos ad scelus omne trahit.

Hunc aliquem tangit qui religionis amictum

Se tegit, ut cicius possit honore frui.’

(MS. Univ. Coll. 143: ‘libido’ for ‘cupido,’ ‘amictu’ for ‘amictum,’ ‘maius’ for ‘cicius’).

311. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. iii. 249, ‘Turpe pecus mutilum,’ &c. The word ‘monstrum’ in Gower came probably from a corruption in his copy of Ovid.

327 ff. With this chapter compare Mirour de l’Omme, 21133 ff. The capital letters of ‘Paciens,’ ‘Castus,’ ‘Luxus,’ &c. are supplied by the editor, being clearly required by the sense.

354. Apocapata, ‘cut short’: cp. ‘per apocapen,’ v. 820.

363 f. The habit described is that of the Canons of the order of St. Augustine.

395. Cp. Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, p. 175 (Rolls Series, 59, vol. ii),

‘Vovistis, fratres, vovistis; vestra, rogamus,

Vivite solliciti reddere vota deo.

397. De Vita Monachorum, p. 176.

401. De Vita Monachorum, p. 178.

403 f. De Vita Monachorum, p. 177.

405-430. Most of this is taken from Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, p. 176.

425. Ovid, Ars Amat. ii. 465.

427. foret, ‘should be,’ i.e. ‘ought to be.’

431-446. Taken with slight alterations from De Vita Monachorum, pp. 187, 188.

442 f. De Vita Monachorum, p. 188.

449 Cp. Ovid, Fasti, ii. 85,

‘Saepe sequens agnam lupus est a voce retentus.’

Our author has interchanged the sexes for the purpose of his argument, the man being represented as a helpless victim.

450. The subject to be supplied must be ‘agnus.’

451. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 419.

453 f. Tristia, i. 6. 9 f.

461-466. De Vita Monachorum, p. 188.

469-490. Nearly the whole of this is taken from Neckam, p. 178.

537 f. Cp. Ovid, Rem. Amoris, 235 f.,

‘Adspicis ut prensos urant iuga prima iuvencos,

Et nova velocem cingula laedat equum?’

575. Cp. Amores, iii. 4. 17.

587. ‘Genius’ is here introduced as the priest of Venus and in l. 597 in the character of a confessor, as afterwards in the Confessio Amantis. The reference to the ‘poets’ in the marginal note can hardly be merely to the Roman de la Rose, where Genius is the priest and confessor of Nature, but the variation ‘secundum Ouidium’ of the Glasgow MS. does not seem to be justified by any passage of Ovid. The connexion with Venus obviously has to do with the classical idea of Genius as a god who presides over the begetting of children: cp. Isid. Etym. viii. 88. The marginal note in S is written in a hand probably different from that of the text, but contemporary.

617 f. Cp. Ars Amat. ii. 649 f.,

‘Dum novus in viridi coalescit cortice ramus,

Concutiat tenerum quaelibet aura, cadet.’

623. Spiritus est promptus, &c. Gower apparently took this text to mean, ‘the spirit is ready to do evil, and the flesh is weak’: cp. Mirour, 14165.

624. Cp. Mirour, 16768.

637. For this use of ‘quid’ cp. that of ‘numquid,’ ii. Prol. 59, and v. 279.

648. Rev. xiv. 4, ‘Hi sequuntur agnum ... quocunque ierit.’

657 f. Apparently referring to Rev. xii. 14.

659. Cp. the Latin Verses after Confessio Amantis, v. 6358.

681 f. Cp. Ovid, Pont. iv. 4. 3 f.

689 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 21266, margin.

699. fore: used here and elsewhere by our author for ‘esse’; see below, l. 717, and v. 763.

715. Acephalum. This name was applied in early times to ecclesiastics who were exempt from the authority of the bishop: see Ducange. The word is differently used in iii. 956, and by comparison with that passage we might be led to suppose that there was some reference here to the ‘inopes’ and ‘opem’ of the next line.

723 ff. Compare with this the contemporary accounts of the controversy between FitzRalph, archbishop of Armagh, and the Mendicant Friars, who are said to have bribed the Pope to confirm their privileges (Walsingham, i. 285), and the somewhat prejudiced account of their faults in Walsingham, ii. 13. The influence of the Dominican Rushook, as the king’s confessor was the subject of much jealousy in the reign of Richard II.

735 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 21469 ff.

736. sepulta: used elsewhere by Gower for ‘funeral rites,’ e.g. i. 1170. The meaning is that the friar claims to perform the funeral services for the dead bodies of those whose confessor he has been before death. Perhaps however we should take ‘sepulta’ here as equivalent to ‘sepelienda.’

769. Hos. iv. 8: cp. Mirour, 21397, where the saying is attributed to Zephaniah.

777 f. Cp. Ovid, Tristia, i. 9. 7 f.

781. Tristia, i. 9. 9.

784. Cp. Fasti, v. 354.

788. See Mirour, 21625 ff. and note.

795. ‘Prioris’ in S, but it is evidently an adjective here.

813 ff. Cp. Mirour, 21499 ff.

847. The wording is suggested by 1 Cor. ix. 24, ‘ii qui in stadio currunt, omnes quidem currunt, sed unus accipit bravium.’

864. Titiuillus: see note in Dyce’s edition of Skelton, vol. ii. pp. 284 f.

869. Cp. Job ii. 4, ‘Pellem pro pelle, et cuncta quae habet homo, dabit pro anima sua.’

872. vltima verba ligant. As in a bargain the last words are those that are binding, so here the last word mentioned, namely ‘demon,’ is the true answer to the question.

874. ‘Men sein, Old Senne newe schame,’ Conf. Amantis, iii. 2033.

903. Cp. Ovid, Metam. ii. 632, ‘Inter aves albas vetuit consistere corvum.’ Gower’s line seems to have neither accidence nor syntax.

953 f. Fasti, ii. 219 f.

959. A reference to Ps. lxxii. 5, ‘In labore hominum non sunt, et cum hominibus non flagellabuntur.’ The same passage is alluded to in Walsingham’s chronicle (i. 324), where reference is made to the fact that the friars were exempted from the poll-tax. The first half of this psalm seems to have been accepted in some quarters as a prophetic description of the Mendicants.

963. There is no variation of reading here in the MSS., but the metre cannot be regarded as satisfactory. A fifteenth (or sixteenth) century reader has raised a slight protest against it in the margin of S, ‘at metrum quomodo fiet.’

969. Cp. Ps. lxxii. 7, ‘Prodiit quasi ex adipe iniquitas eorum: transierunt in affectum cordis.’

971 ff. Cp. Mirour, 21517 ff.,

‘Mal fils ne tret son pris avant,

Par ce qant il fait son avant

Q’il ad bon piere,’ &c.

981 ff. Cp. Mirour, 21553 ff.

1059-1064. These six lines are taken without change from Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 65.

1072. ‘lingua’ was here the original reading, but was altered to ‘verba’ in most of the copies. H and G have ‘verba’ over an erasure.

1081. In G we have ‘adepcio’ by correction from ‘adopcio.’

1090. adheret: meant apparently for pres. subj. as if from a verb ‘adherare.’

1099 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 19 v^o,

‘Sarra parit, discedit Agar; pariente fideles

Ecclesia populos, dat synagoga locum.’

1103. Odium: written thus with a capital letter in H, but not in the other MSS.

1143 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 21403 ff. and note.

1145 ff. These lines are partly from Neckam’s Vita Monachorum, p. 192:

‘Porticibus vallas operosis atria, quales

Quotque putas thalamos haec labyrinthus habet.

. . . . .

Ostia multa quidem, variae sunt mille fenestrae,

Mille columnarum est marmore fulta domus.’

Gower alters the first sentence by substituting ‘valuas’ for the verb ‘vallas.’ ‘It has folding-doors, halls, and bed-chambers as various and as many as the labyrinth.’

1161. ‘historia parisiensis’ in the MSS. I cannot supply a reference.

1175 f. From De Vita Monachorum, p. 193.

1189 ff. The reference is to the Speculum Stultorum, where Burnel the Ass, after examining the rules of all the existing orders and finding them in various ways unsatisfactory to him, comes to the conclusion that he must found an order of his own, the rules of which shall combine the advantages of all the other orders. Members of it shall be allowed to ride easily like the Templars, to tell lies like the Hospitallers, to eat meat on Saturday like the Benedictines of Cluny, to talk freely like the brothers of Grandmont, to go to one mass a month, or at most two, like the Carthusians, to dress comfortably like the Praemonstratensians, and so on. What is said here by our author expresses the spirit of these rules rather than the letter.

1197 f. The text here gives the original reading, found in TH₂ and remaining unaltered in S. CHG have ‘et si’ written over an erasure, and in the next line ‘Mechari cupias’ is written over erasure in G, ‘Mechari cupias ordine’ in C, and ‘ordine’ alone in H. The other MSS. have no erasures.

1212. CHG have this line written over an erasure.

1214. Written over erasure in CHG, the word ‘magis’ being still visible in G as the last word of the line in the earlier text. The expression ‘Linquo coax ranis’ is said to have been used by Serlo on his renunciation of the schools: see Leyser, Hist. Poet. p. 443.

1215. The word ‘mundi’ is over erasure in CHG.

1221*-1232*. These lines are written over erasure in CHG.

1225. A planta capiti, ‘from foot to head’: more correctly, v. 116, ‘Ad caput a planta.’

LIB. V.

45. Architesis. It must be assumed that this word means ‘discord,’ the passage being a series of oppositions.

53. Est amor egra salus, &c. Compare the lines which follow our author’s Traitié, ‘Est amor in glosa pax bellica, lis pietosa,’ &c., and Alanus de Insulis, De Planctu Naturae, p. 472 (Rolls Series, 59, vol ii).

79 ff. There is not much construction here; but we must suppose that after this loose and rambling description the general sense is resumed at l. 129.

98. Nec patet os in eis: cp. Chaucer, Book of the Duchess, 942.

104. Nec ... vix: cp. l. 153 and vii. 12.

121 f. Cp. Ovid, Her. iv. 71 f.

123 f. Cp. Fasti, ii. 763.

165. From Metam. vii. 826, but quoted without much regard to the sense. In the original there is a stop after ‘est,’ and ‘subito collapsa dolore’ is the beginning of a new sentence of the narrative.

169 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 691 f.

171. Cp. Her. iv. 161.

193. Cp. Her. v. 149. For ‘O, quia’ cp. i. 59.

209. Cp. Metam. x. 189.

213. Cp. Her. vii. 179. We have here a curious example of the manner in which our author adapts lines to his use without regard to the original sense.

221. Cp. Her. ii. 63.

257 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 23920, Conf. Amantis, iv. 1634.

280. Numquid. This seems to be used here and in some other passages to introduce a statement: cp. ii. Prol. 59, iv. 637. Rather perhaps it should be regarded as equivalent to ‘Nonne’ and the clause printed as a question: so vii. 484, 892, &c. For ‘num’ used instead of ‘nonne’ cp. ii. 306.

299. S has in the margin in a later hand, ‘Nota de muliere bona.’ The description is taken of course from Prov. xxxi.

333. In the margin of S, as before, ‘Nota de muliere mala et eius condicionibus.’

341 ff. Cp. Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, p. 186.

359 f. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. iii. 289, 294. Presumably ‘bleso’ in l. 360 is a mistake for ‘iusso.’

361. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 291.

367 f. Ars Amat. iii. 311 f.

376. Cp. Ars Amat. i. 598.

383 f. This reference to Ovid seems to be with regard to what follows about the art of preserving and improving beauty. Some of it is from the Ars Amatoria, and some from Neckam, De Vita Monachorum. For ‘tenent,’ meaning ‘belong,’ cp. iii. 584.

399-402. Taken with slight changes from Ars Amat. iii. 163-166.

403. Cp. Metam. ii. 635.

405. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 179.

407. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 185.

413-416. De Vita Monachorum, p. 186.

421-428. De Vita Monachorum, p. 189.

450. The line (in the form ‘Illa quidem fatuos,’ &c.) is written over an erasure in the Glasgow MS.

454. ‘interius’ is written over an erasure in HG.

461. Vt quid, ‘Why.’

501. The reading ‘nos,’ which is evidently right, appears in CG as a correction of ‘non.’

510. ‘While one that is stained with its own filth flies from the field.’

520. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 23701 ff.

556. The neglect of the burden of a charge, while the honour of it is retained, is a constant theme of denunciation by our author: cp. iii. 116, and below, ll. 655 ff.

557 ff. With this account of the labourers cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 26425 ff. It is noticeable that there is nothing here about the insurrection.

593. Cp. Metam. vi. 318.

597. H punctuates here ‘salua. que.’

613. A quotation from Pamphilus: cp. Mirour, 14449.

659. maioris, ‘of mayor.’

693 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 36,

‘Dupla die sexta colleccio facta labore

Ostendit quia lux septima nescit opus.’

703. The capitals which mark the personification of ‘Fraus’ and ‘Vsura’ are due to the editor. ‘Fraus’ corresponds to ‘Triche’ in the Mirour de l’Omme: see ll. 25237 ff.

731. Nonne, used for ‘Num,’ as also in other passages, e.g. vi. 351, 523, vii. 619.

745 ff. Cp. Mirour de l’Omme, 25741 ff.

In l. 745 SG have the reading ‘foris’ as a correction from ‘foras.’

760 ff. Cp. Chaucer, Cant. Tales, C 472 ff.

775. See note on l. 280.

785 f. The readings ‘fraus’ for ‘sibi’ and ‘surripit’ for ‘fraus capit’ are over erasure in CG.

812. ‘Thethis,’ (‘Thetis,’ or ‘Tethis’) stands several times for ‘water’ (properly ‘Tethys’): cp. vii. 1067. The line means that the water is so abundant in the jar that it hardly admits the presence of any malt (‘Cerem’ for ‘Cererem’).

835 ff. It is difficult to say who is the bad mayor of London to whom allusion is here made. The rival leaders in City politics were Nicholas Brembre and John of Northampton. The former was lord mayor in the years 1377, 1378, and again in 1383 and 1384, when he was elected against his rival (who had held the office in 1381, 1382) in a forcible and unconstitutional manner which evoked many protests. Brembre, who belonged to the Grocers’ company, represented the interests of the greater companies and was of the Court party, a special favourite with the king, while John of Northampton, a draper, engaged himself in bitter controversy with the Fishmongers, who were supported by the Grocers, and was popular with the poorer classes. In the Cronica Tripertita Gower bitterly attacks Brembre (who was executed by sentence of the so-called ‘Merciless Parliament’ in 1388), and we might naturally suppose that he was the person referred to here; but that passage was written before the political events which led to that invective and in all probability not later than 1382, and the references to the low origin of the mayor in question, ll. 845-860, do not agree with the circumstances of Nicholas Brembre. Political passion in the City ran high from the year 1376 onwards, and the person referred to may have been either John of Northampton or one of the other mayors, who had in some way incurred Gower’s dislike: cp. Mirour, 26365 ff.

877. Cp. Conf. Amantis, v. 7626,

‘It floureth, bot it schal not greine

Unto the fruit of rihtwisnesse.’

915 f. Ovid, Tristia, i. 5. 47 f.

922. Cp. Prov. xxv. 15, ‘lingua mollis confringet duritiam,’ and the verses at the beginning of the Confessio Amantis,

‘Ossibus ergo carens que conterit ossa loquelis Absit.’

953 f. Ars Amat. ii. 183 f., but Ovid has ‘Numidasque leones.’

957 f. Rem. Amoris, 447 f. (but ‘ceratas’ for ‘agitatas’).

965 f. Pont. iii. 7. 25 f.

967 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 97 f.

969 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 101 f.

971 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 729 f., ‘Admonitus refricatur amor,’ &c.

973. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 623.

975 f. Cp. Rem. Amoris, 731 f., ‘Ut pene extinctum cinerem si sulfure tangas, Vivet,’ &c. The reading ‘sub’ must be a mistake on the part of our author for ‘si.’

979. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 597.

981. Ars Amat. iii. 373.

983 f. Ars Amat. iii. 375 f., but Ovid has ‘iratos et sibi quisque deos.’

985 f. Cp. Ars Amat. iii. 501 f.

990. Fasti, iii. 380, absurdly introduced here.

991 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Latin Verses before Prol. 499.

1003 f. Cp. Tristia, ii. 141 f.

LIB. VI.

1-468. With this section of the work compare Mirour, 24181 ff.

11. Ps. xiv. 3.

89-94. From Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 66, where however the reading is ‘sapit’ in l. 94 (for ‘rapit’).

95-98. Aurora, f. 65, where we find ‘in nocte’ for ‘in noctem’ and ‘reprobi’ for ‘legis’ (l. 97).

101 f. Cp. Aurora, 64 f.,

‘Inprouisus adest cum pullos tollere miluus

Esurit, in predam non sine fraude ruit.’

This is adapted by our author to his own purpose, but as his meaning is altogether different, some obscurity results, and he does not make it clear to us how the biter is bit.

113. Metam. v. 606.

115-118. Cp. Metam. vi. 527 ff.

133. In the Glasgow MS. ‘locuplex’ has been altered to the more familiar ‘locuples.’

141 f. Is. v. 8, ‘Vae qui coniungitis domum ad domum et agrum agro copulatis usque ad terminum loci: numquid habitabitis vos soli in medio terrae?’ The same text is quoted in the Mirour, 24541 ff.

144. By comparison with Mirour, 24580 ff. we may see that the dissipation of the property by the son is here alleged as a proof that it has been ill acquired:

‘Qu’ils font pourchas a la senestre

Le fin demoustre la verrour.’

176. forum, i.e. the market price.

188. que foret equa, ‘(the balance) which should be fair’: so also ‘foret’ below, l. 190.

203. Basiliscus: cp. Mirour, 3748 ff.

209 f. Ovid, Pont. ii. 3. 39 f. (but ‘lasso’ for ‘lapso’).

217. nam nemo dolose Mentis, &c. ‘for no man of a crafty mind can have sure speech.’

225. tenebrescunt, ‘darken.’ So other inceptives are used transitively, e.g. ‘ditescere,’ ii. 607, Cron. Trip. iii. 119.

233 f. ‘And this lex, legis, from ledo, ledis, as ius from iurgo, administers justice at this present time.’ It is meant that the administration of law, as we see it, suggests the above etymologies. The use of ‘isto’ for ‘hoc’ is quite regular.

241 ff. Cp. Mirour, 24253 ff.

249 ff. Cp. Mirour, 24349 ff., and see Pulling, Order of the Coif, ch. iv.

269. The reference is to Ecclus. xx. 31, ‘Xenia et dona excaecant oculos iudicum.’

274. ‘Fear puts to flight the discernment of justice.’

313-326. These fourteen lines are taken with some alterations (not much for the better) from Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, pp. 180 f.

327 f. Cp. De Vita Monachorum, p. 182,

‘Sic mihi, divitibus si quando defuit hostis;

Hos terit et quassat saepe ruina gravis.’

Where, it would seem, we ought to read ‘Dic mihi.’

329 ff. De Vita Monachorum, p. 181. Most of the lines 329-348 are borrowed.

351. ‘Nonne’ for ‘Num,’ as often: cp. v. 731.

355 f. Cp. De Vita Monachorum, p. 182,

‘Iustitiae montes virtutumque ardua nullus

Scandet, dum mundi rebus onustus erit.’

357. De Vita Monachorum, p. 190.

359-372. Most of these lines are borrowed with slight alterations from De Vita Monachorum, p. 191.

387 ff. Cp. Mirour, 24733 ff.

389. Cp. De Vita Monachorum, p. 192, ‘Cur ampla aedificas busto claudendus in arcto?’

397. De Vita Monachorum, p. 193,

‘Et cecidit Babylon, cecidit quoque maxima Troia

Olim mundipotens, aspice, Roma iacet.’

419 ff. Cp. Mirour, 24817-25176.

421 f. For the idea contained in ‘vnccio’ and ‘vncta’ cp. iii. 1376.

433. ‘The word comes receives its beginning not from vice but from vicium.’ That is, apparently, the prefix which makes ‘comes’ into ‘vicecomes’ is to be derived from ‘vicium.’

439 f. Cp. Mirour, 25166 ff.

445 ff. With this compare the corresponding lines in the Carmen super multiplici viciorum Pestilencia, under the head of ‘Avarice’ (246 ff.),

‘Vendere iusticiam nichil est nisi vendere Cristum,’ &c.

463 f. Cp. Mirour, 24973 ff.

467 f. Vt Crati bufo, &c.: cp. Mirour, 24962 f.

498. Cp. Mirour, 22835 f.

522. The insertion which is found after this line in the Digby MS. (and in no other) consists of eight lines taken from the original text of the passage 545-580, which was rewritten by the author: see ll. 561*-566* and 579* f.

523 ff. ‘Can a house be built without timber? But of what use is timber to the builder if it be not hewn?’ ‘Nonne’ for ‘Num,’ as frequently: see note on v. 731. It seems that ‘sibi’ refers to the builder rather than to the house; in any case, it has no reflexive sense. Finally ‘ligna’ is here used as a singular feminine: all the MSS. have ‘foret’ in l. 524 and ‘valet’ in 525.

The idea of the passage seems to be that good laws are as the material, and the ruler as the builder of the house.

529 ff. Cp. Conf. Amantis, vii. 2695 ff.

545-580. It is certain that the passage preserved to us in the Dublin and Hatfield MSS. is that which was originally written in those books which now exhibit an erasure; for in several places words are legible underneath the present text of these latter MSS. For example in S ‘maior’ is visible as the last word of the original l. 547, and ‘locuta,’ ‘aula,’ similarly in ll. 549, 551. The chief difference introduced is in the direction of throwing more responsibility on the king, who however is still spoken of as a boy. Thus instead of ‘Stat puer immunis culpe,’ we have ‘Rex puer indoctus morales negligit actus’ (or more strongly still ‘respuit’).

The text of 545*-580* follows the Dublin MS. (T) with corrections from H₂. Neither text is very correct: both omit a word in l. 549*, which I supply by conjecture, and both read ‘omnes’ in l. 561*. There are some obvious errors in T, as ‘sinis’ for ‘sinit’ in l. 554*, ‘Tempe’ for ‘Tempora’ in l. 559*, which have been passed over without notice.

Cap. viii. Heading. The ensuing Epistle to the young king, which extends as far as l. 1200, assumes a more severely moral form owing to the alteration of the preceding passage, the exclusion of all compliment (‘regnaturo’ in this heading for ‘excellentissimo’) and the substitution of ‘doctrine causa’ for ‘in eius honore.’ (The readings ‘excellentissimo,’ ‘in eius honore’ no doubt are to be found in the Hatfield MS., but I have accidentally omitted to take note of them.)

629 f. Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, p. 185,

‘Quid tibi nobilitas et clarum nomen avorum,

Si vitiis servus factus es ipse tuis?’

640. ‘vix’ is sometimes used by our author (apparently) in the sense of ‘paene.’

696. Ovid, Rem. Amoris, 526.

710. iudiciale, ‘judgement,’ used as a substantive: cp. iii. 1692.

718. culpe ... sue, ‘for their fault,’ i.e. the fault of his ministers.

719-722. Cp. Aurora, (MS. Bodley 822) f. 65,

‘Euolat ancipiter ad prede lucra, suisque

Deseruit dominis in rapiendo cybum.

Sic multi dominis famulando suis, ad eorum

Nutum pauperibus dampna ferendo nocent.’

725. presul, ‘the bishop.’

740. The expression ‘Cuius enim’ for ‘Eius enim’ occurs more than once, e.g. l. 1238: cp. vii. 372. It is found also in the Confessio Amantis, Latin Verses after vii. 1984, but was there corrected in the third recension.

765. stabiles: apparently used in a bad sense.

793 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 96 v^o,

‘Exiguus magnum vicit puer ille Golyam,

Nam virtus humilis corda superba domat.’

816. Ovid, Amores, i. 8. 62, ‘Crede mihi, res est ingeniosa dare.’

839 f. Cp. Aurora, f. 95 v^o.

846. Fasti, ii. 226.

875-902. This passage of twenty-six lines is taken with few alterations from the Aurora, f. 76.

876. bella: in the original ‘corda’ (or ‘colla’ MS. Univ. Coll. 143).

883. noctibus: in the original ‘nutibus.’

884. Spirant: so in the original according to MS. Bodley 822, but ‘Spirent’ in MS. Univ. Coll. 143.

886. acuum ferrum: in the original ‘minitans ferrum.’ Apparently our author took ‘acus’ to mean a spear or javelin. The choice of the word in this passage is unfortunate.

887 ff. ‘vincit,’ ‘tenet’ (or ‘teret,’ MS. Univ. Coll. 143), ‘consurgit’ in the original.

891. In the original, ‘Rex hoc consilium grata bibit aure, puellas Preparat,’ &c.

892. ‘genis’ in the original.

894. ‘furit’ for ‘fugat’ is the reading of the original, and we find this in several MSS. of our text, but in the Glasgow MS. this has been corrected to ‘fugat,’ which is the reading of S.

898. In the original, ‘Vultus que geminus ridet in ore decor,’ (or ‘Vultus et geminus,’ &c., MS. Univ. Coll. 143).

907. Aurora, f. 100.

947-950. Taken from the description of Saul at the battle of Gilboa, Aurora, f. 100 v^o.

971 ff. Cp. Praise of Peace, 78 ff.

985-992. From Aurora, f. 64 v^o,

‘Alta petens aquila uolat alite celsius omni,

Quisque potens, tumidus corde, notatur ea:

Vt sacra testantur cythariste scripta prophete,

In celum tales os posuere suum.

Pennatum griphes animal, pedibusque quaternis

Inuitos homines carpit, abhorret equos:

Designatur in his facinus crudele potentum,

Qui mortes hominum cum feritate bibunt.’

986. Our author no doubt read ‘mundus corde’ here in the Aurora.

987. citharistea: properly no doubt ‘cithariste,’ to be taken with ‘prophete,’ as in the Aurora.

990. ‘horret equos’ seems to represent the ‘equis vehementer infesti’ of Isidore, Etym. xii. 2.

1019-1024. From Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, p. 185, with slight variations.

1037. esse: as substantive, ‘existence.’

1041-1050. Taken with slight changes from Aurora, f. 108.

1066. fugat: used as subjunctive; so also iii. 1498, 2078.

1085 f. From De Vita Monachorum, p. 184.

1107-1112. De Vita Monachorum, p. 193.

1115 f. De Vita Monachorum, p. 183.

1159* ff. That this was the text which stood originally in S is proved partly by the fact that the original heading of the chapter stands still as given here in the Table of Chapters, f. 5, and also by the traces of original coloured initials at ll. 1175 and 1199. A considerable part of the erased chapter reappears in the poem ‘Rex celi deus,’ &c., addressed to Henry IV: see p. 343.

1189 f. Si tibi ... cupias conuertere ... Te. These words appear in S as a correction of the rewritten text by a second erasure and in another hand.

Cap. xix. Heading. The original form, as given by DLTH₂, is still to be found in the Table of Chapters in S.

1201. Cp. Ovid, Metam. vii. 585 f.,

‘veluti cum putria motis

Poma cadunt ramis agitataque ilice glandes.’

1204 ff. Note the repeated use of ‘modo’ in the sense of ‘now’: cp. 1210, 1218, 1222, 1232, 1235, 1243, 1263, 1280, &c. The usual word for ‘formerly’ is ‘nuper’; see 1241, 1245, 1279, &c.

1205. Metam. ii. 541.

1223. Oza, that is Uzzah (2 Sam. vi.), who is selected as a type of carnal lust, apparently on the strength of the quite gratuitous assumption adopted in Lib. III. 1885 ff. Apparently ‘luxus’ in the next line is genitive, in spite of the metre: cp. ‘excercitus,’ i. 609, ‘ducatus,’ Cron. Trip. iii. 117.

1236. Giesi, i.e. Gehazi.

1238. Cuius enim: cp. note on l. 740.

1243. Liberius: pope from 352-366 A. D. He is mentioned here as a type of unfaithfulness to his charge, because he was induced to condemn Athanasius.

1251. defunctis, ‘for the dead,’ that is, to bury them charitably, as Tobit did.

1261. Cp. John xii. 24.

1267. Perhaps an allusion to Wycliffe, who seems to be referred to as a new Jovinianus in a later poem, p. 347.

1268. dant dubitare, ‘cause men to doubt.’

1273. Troianus: i.e. Trajan, whose name is so spelt regularly by our author.

1277. Valentinianus: cp. Conf. Amantis, v. 6398 ff.

1284. Leo: cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 739.

1286. Tiberii: i.e. Tiberius Constantinus; cp. Conf. Amantis, ii. 587 ff.

1306. quis, for ‘quisquam’: so also ‘quem’ in l. 1308; cp. i. 184.

1321 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, vii. 2217 ff.: ‘relinquendo’ is used for ‘relinquens,’ as i. 304, 516, &c.

1323. Cp. Conf. Amantis, v. 6372 ff., Mirour, 18301 ff.

1330. Vix si: cp. iv. 218, Cron. Trip. iii. 444.

1345. Cp. Ovid, Amores, i. 9. 1.

1357 f. ‘She is silent as a jackdaw, chaste as a pigeon, and gentle as a thorn.’

1361 f. Perhaps an allusion to the case of Edward III and Alice Perrers.

LIB. VII.

5. Cp. Conf. Amantis, Prol. 595 ff.

9. modo, ‘now’: cp. note on vi. 1204.

12. nec ... vix. For this combination of ‘vix’ with a negative cp. v. 104, 153.

42. dicunt ... volunt, ‘say that they wish’: cp. ii. 200 f.

47 f. Cp. Conf. Amantis, v. 49 ff.; so below, ll. 61 ff.

123. Rev. ii. 25, ‘id quod habetis tenete, donec veniam.’

125 f. Ovid, Tristia, i. 8. 41 f.,

‘Et tua sunt silicis circum praecordia venae,

Et rigidum ferri semina pectus habet.’

159 f. It is difficult to construe this couplet satisfactorily, and the reading ‘Est’ seems quite as good as ‘Et.’ The Glasgow MS. has ‘Et status’ erased, as if for correction.

163 ff. Cp. Mirour, 8921 ff.

167. The original reading seems to have been ‘grassantur,’ for which S gives ‘grossantur’ (‘o’ written over erasure), and CG ‘crassantur,’ also by correction.

182 ff. I have no record of the readings of H₂ in this passage, but I have no doubt that it agrees with EHT.

184. No record of the reading of T.

186. abhorret: apparently subjunctive; so we have ‘adhero’ for ‘adhereo,’ l. 1296.

192. habere modum: a first-hand correction in S, whereas the others in ll. 182-192 are in a different hand.

194. caput ancille: an allusion to the form in which Satan is supposed to have appeared in the garden of Eden.

243. specialis, subst., ‘a friend.’

255 f. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. ii. 201 f.,

‘Riserit, adride; si flebit, flere memento:

Imponat leges vultibus illa tuis.’

In adapting the couplet to his purpose our author has contrived to make it unintelligible.

265. Fuluus ... talus: referring to the gilded spur of knighthood; gold is ‘metallum fuluum.’

273 f. Cp. Tristia, v. 13. 27 f.

315 f. Cp. Metam. i. 144 f.

323 f. Cp. Ars Amat. i. 761 f.

327 f. Fasti, iv. 717 f. The application belongs to our author.

331 f. Cp. Ovid, Tristia, i. 9. 5 f.

334. Ars Amat. iii. 436.

340. Cp. Tristia, i. 8. 8.

347. Cp. Metam. i. 141.

349. cumque, for ‘cum’: cp. ii. 302, &c., and l. 872, below.

361 ff. Cp. Mirour, 26590 ff.

372. Talis enim, ‘such, indeed,’: for this use of ‘enim’ cp. vi. 740.

375 f. From Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, p. 177.

379-383. Taken with slight change from De Vita Monachorum, pp. 183 f.

387. De Vita Monachorum, p. 195.

389-392. Taken with slight change from De Vita Monachorum, p. 197, and so also 395 f.

417-420. De Vita Monachorum, p. 196.

437 f. De Vita Monachorum, p. 196.

440. ne sit, for ‘ne non sit.’

441 f. De Vita Monachorum, p. 189.

459 f. Cp. Ovid, Ars Amat. iii. 65 f.

463 f. Cp. Tristia, v. 10. 5 f., ‘Stare putes, adeo procedunt tempora tarde,’ &c. The couplet has neither sense nor appropriateness as given here.

465 f. Pont. ii. 2. 37 f.

484. Numquid, for ‘Nonne’: cp. l. 892 and note on v. 280.

485 f. Ars Amat. iii. 119 f.,

‘Quae nunc sub Phoebo ducibusque Palatia fulgent,

Quid nisi araturis pascua bubus erant?’

‘Qui’ is evidently a mistake for ‘Que.’

489 f. Fasti, i. 203 f.

499-504. From De Vita Monachorum, p. 181.

509 f. Cp. Mirour, 26605 ff. and Conf. Amantis, Prol. 910 ff.

519. This seems to be dependent on ‘noscat’ in the line above. The indicative in dependent question is quite usual, though not invariably found: cp. l. 516, where subjunctive and indicative are combined.

574. consequeretur eum, ‘should follow him,’ i.e. should be subject to man.

599. Arboribusque sitis. There must be something wrong here, but the variant given by D does not help us.

619. Nonne, used for ‘Num’: cp. v. 731.

639 ff. This quotation from Gregory appears also in the Mirour de l’Omme, 26869 ff., and the Confessio Amantis, Prol. 945 ff.

645. minor est mundus homo, ‘man is a microcosm’: cp. Mirour, 26929 ff.

647 ff. Mirour, 26953 ff.

684. The Glasgow MS. has ‘queris’ written over an erasure.

685-694. From Neckam, De Vita Monachorum, pp. 197 f.

699-708. With slight changes from De Vita Monachorum, pp. 193 f.

793. nuper to be taken with ‘auaricia,’ ‘the avarice of former times’; ‘modo’ with ‘prestat.’

872. Cumque, for ‘Cum’: cp. l. 349.

892. Numquid, for ‘Nonne’: cp. l. 484, and see note on v. 280. For the idea cp. Mirour, 1784 ff. It is originally from Augustine.

909 f. From De Vita Monachorum, p. 178.

911-918. From De Vita Monachorum, p. 179, with slight variations.

919-924. De Vita Monachorum, p. 180.

921. The reading ‘nostre,’ though it has small authority, is necessary to the sense and is given in the original passage.

929-932. De Vita Monachorum, p. 180.

955 f. Cp. Mirour, 11404 ff., where the often-quoted lines of Helinand’s Vers de Mort are given.

990. habet ... habitare, used perhaps for the future, ‘will inhabit’: so ‘habet torquere,’ l. 1047. On the other hand in l. 1148 ‘habent regi’ means ‘must be guided,’ and the same meaning of ‘must’ or ‘ought’ may be applied to all the passages.

1067. Thetis, used for ‘water’ or ‘sea’: cp. v. 812. All the copies here give ‘thetis’ (or ‘Thetis’) except D, which cannot be depended on to reproduce the original form in a case like this. On the other hand in the Cronica Tripertita, i. 80, S and H have ‘tetis.’

1079. furor breuis, ira set: the words are suggested by the common expression ‘ira furor breuis,’ but the sense is different. This is frequently the case with our author’s borrowings, e.g. v. 213, vi. 101.

1095. vix si: cp. vi. 1330; but perhaps ‘vix sit’ is the true reading here.

1106. Quam prius, as usual, for ‘prius quam’: cp. i. 1944.

1148. habent: see note on l. 990.

1185. Que: the antecedent must be ‘virtuti,’ in the next line: ‘solet’ is of course for ‘solebat’; see note on i. 492.

1215. tueri: apparently passive.

1240. deficit vnde sciam, ‘I do not know.’

1305 f. ‘Because justice has departed, therefore peace, who is joined with her, is also gone.’ The reference here and in the next lines is to the Psalms, lxxxiv. 11.

1342. An allusion apparently to the debasement of the coinage. The reading ‘suum’ in G is over an erasure.

1344. Nobile que genuit, ‘she who produced the noble,’ i.e. the gold coin of that name, called so originally because of its purity.

1356. sine lege fera: for this kind of play upon words cp. iv. 128, 215, 243, 509, &c.

1409 ff. It may be noted that the Harleian MS. is defective for ll. 1399-1466. Its readings here would probably agree with those of EDL, &c. SCG have the text written over erasure.

1436. Exiguo ... tempore: for the ablative cp. i. 1568.

1455 f. It is the galled horse that winces at the load; that which is sound feels no hurt. Thus, if the reader is not guilty of the faults spoken of, he will pass untouched by the reproof.

1470. ‘Vox populi, vox dei’: a sentiment repeated by our author in various forms; cp. note on iii. Prol. 11.

1479 ff. These last three lines are over erasure in SCHG. They seem to have been substituted for the original couplet in order to point more clearly the moral of the Cronica Tripertita, which is intended for a practical illustration of the divine punishment of sin.

Explicit, &c. It will be seen that in these later years Gower has almost brought himself to believe that the events of the earlier part of the reign were intended for a special warning to the youthful king, whom he conceives as having then already begun a course of tyrannical government. At the time, however, our author acquitted him of all responsibility, on account of his youth.

11 ff. The swan was used as a badge by the duke of Gloucester and also (perhaps not till after his death) by Henry of Lancaster. For the horse and the bear as cognizances of Arundel and Warwick see Annales Ricardi II (Rolls Series, 28. 3), p. 206.

CRONICA TRIPERTITA

1. Ista tripertita, &c. These seven lines must be regarded as a metrical preface to the Chronicle which follows. In the Hatton MS. these lines with their marginal note are placed before the prose of the preceding page (which is given in a somewhat different form) and entitled ‘Prologus.’

Prima Pars

1. Take the first letter of ‘mundus’ and add to it C three times repeated and six periods of five years, plus ten times five and seven. The date thus indicated is MCCC + 30 + 57, i.e. 1387. For a similar mode of expression cp. Richard of Maidstone’s poem on the Reconciliation of Richard II (Rolls Series, 14. 1),

‘M. cape, ter quoque C. deciesque novem, duo iunge.’

4-12. These lines are written over an erasure in SCHG. The original version of them is not extant, so far as I am aware.

51. Penna coronata. This, as the margin tells us, is the Earl Marshall, that is Thomas Mowbray, earl of Nottingham, afterwards duke of Norfolk.

52. Qui gerit S: the earl of Derby, from whose badge of S, standing probably for ‘Soverein,’ came the device of the well-known collar of SS. His tomb has the word ‘Soverayne’ repeated several times on the canopy.

55. aquilonica luna, ‘the northern moon,’ that is, the earl of Northumberland. The variation of the text in the Harleian MS., written over an erasure, arises no doubt from the later disagreement between Henry IV and Northumberland.

58. Troie, i.e. London.

65. The earl of Oxford, lately created duke of Ireland, whose badge was a boar’s head, was Chief Justice of Chester in this year, and there raised forces for the king, with the assistance of Thomas Molyneux, Constable of Chester, ‘cuius nutum tota illa provincia expectabat,’ Walsingham, ii. p. 167 (Rolls Series, 28. 2).

80. Tetis: see note on Vox Clamantis, vii. 1067: a parte means apparently ‘on one side,’ or perhaps ‘on the side of the victors.’

The place where this affair happened is not very well described by the authorities, but it seems clear that the first attempt of the earl of Oxford (or duke of Ireland) to cross the river was made at Radcot (Knighton, Rolls Series, ii. 253). Here he found the bridge partly broken, so that one horseman only could cross it at a time, and guarded by men-at-arms and archers set there by the earl of Derby. At the same time he was threatened with attack by the earl of Derby himself on the one side and the duke of Gloucester on the other, both apparently on the northern bank of the river. Walsingham says that he went on to another bridge, and, finding this also guarded, plunged in on horseback and escaped by swimming over the river. Knighton gives us to understand that he was prevented by the appearance of the duke of Gloucester’s force from making his way along the northern bank, and at once plunged in and swam the stream, ‘et sic mirabili ausu evasit ab eis.’ Walsingham adds that he was not pursued, because darkness had come on (it was nearly the shortest day of the year) and they did not know the country. This chronicler does not mention Radcot Bridge, but refers to the place vaguely as ‘iuxta Burford, prope Babbelake.’ It is impossible, however, that either the fight, such as it was, or the escape of the earl of Oxford can have taken place at Bablock Hythe. No doubt the lords returned to Oxford after the affair by this ferry, which was probably the shortest way. The earl of Oxford seems to have made his way to London, and after an interview with the king to have embarked at Queenborough for the Continent (Malverne, in Rolls Series, 41. 9, p. 112).

89 ff. The marginal note speaks of the ‘castra, que ipse [Comes Oxonie] familie sue pro signo gestanda attribuerat.’ The cognizance referred, no doubt, to the city of Chester. The same note tells us that the duke of Gloucester bore a fox-tail on his spear as an ensign: cp. Harding’s Chronicle, p. 341:

‘The foxe taile he bare ay on his spere,

Where so he rode in peace or elles in warre.’

103. Noua villa Macedo, i.e. Alexander Neville: a very bad attempt on the part of our author.

104. maledixit. The particular form of curse in this case was translation to the see of S. Andrew, which he could not occupy because Scotland was Clementine.

107. Hic proceres odit, &c. He is said to have especially urged the king to take strong measures against Warwick (Malverne, p. 105).

109. de puteo Michaelis, ‘of Michael de la Pool.’ The same view of the meaning of the name is taken in Shakspere, 2 Henry VI, iv. l. 70, by the murderer of William, duke of Suffolk, son of this Michael, ‘Pole, Pool, sir Pool, lord! Ay, kennel, puddle, sink.’

111 ff. This is Thomas Rushook, a Dominican, who was translated from Llandaff to Chichester by the king’s special desire in 1385. He had incurred much suspicion and odium as the king’s confessor and supposed private adviser. Walsingham says, ‘ipse sibi conscius fugam iniit’ (ii. 172); but he certainly appeared at the bar of Parliament and was sentenced to forfeiture of his goods (Rot. Parl. iii. 241, Malverne, p. 156).

113. ater: alluding to his Dominican habit.

121 ff. Cp. Knighton, ii. 255 f. All the five Appellants seem to have entered the Tower, but the three spoken of here are of course the three leaders, referred to in l. 41 and afterwards. Knighton says that the king invited the five to stay for the night, but only the earls of Derby and Nottingham accepted the invitation. The fact that Gower here assigns no political action to his hero the earl of Derby (who was under twenty years old), but gives all the credit to the three leaders, shows clearly that the young Henry played a very subordinate part.

131. covnata: that is, ‘co-unata,’ meaning ‘assembled.’

133 ff. Cp. Knighton, ii. 292.

141. senecta. Burley was then fifty-six years old.

142. This evidently means that the queen interceded for him; cp. Chronique de la Traïson, p. 9. Walsingham tells us only that the earl of Derby tried to save Simon Burley and quarrelled with his uncle Gloucester on the subject. Burley had been the principal negotiator of the marriage of Richard with Anne of Bohemia.

150. Walsingham says of him that he was ‘ab antiquo fallax et fraudulentus.’

152. Pons Aquilonis, ‘Bridgenorth.’ Beauchamp was keeper of Bridgenorth Castle (Rot. Pat., 10 Rich. II. pt. 2. m. 15), but it does not appear from other sources that he had the title here given him by Gower of ‘baron Bridgenorth.’ In 1387 he was made a peer by patent (the first instance of this) under the title of lord Beauchamp of Kidderminster.

154. Tribulus: i.e. Nicholas Brembel (so called by Gower), called Brembul or Brembyl by Knighton, Brambre by Walsingham and Brembre or de Brembre in the Patent Rolls and Rolls of Parliament. Presumably he was of Brembre (Bramber), in the county of Sussex. He had been Mayor of London last in 1386. Knighton says of him ‘quem saepius rex fecerat maiorem praeter et contra voluntatem multorum ciuium’ (ii. 272), and Walsingham declares that he had planned a proscription of his opponents, with a view to making himself absolute ruler of London with the title of duke (ii. 174).

158 f. Though he was a knight, he was not dignified with the nobler form of execution, being a citizen of London.

162. Cornubiensis: Sir Robert Tresilian, Chief Justice.

172. falsa sigilla: that is, the seals set by the judges to the questions and replies submitted to them at Nottingham. ‘In quorum omnium testimonium Iusticiarii et Serviens predicti sigilla sua presentibus apposuerunt’ (Rot. Parl. iii. 233; cp. Knighton, ii. 237). They all pleaded that they had set their seals to these replies under the influence of threats from the archbishop of York, the duke of Ireland, and the earl of Suffolk.

173. magis ansam, ‘or rather a handle’ (i.e. a pretext). The reading of the MSS. is doubtful (S apparently ‘ausam,’ but with a stop after ‘regi’). The form of expression is not unusual with our author.

174 f. ‘There was no punishment which would have been sufficient,’ &c.

176. ficta pietate: that is, what our author in the Conf. Amantis calls ‘pite feigned,’ i.e. false or misplaced clemency.

176 ff. Knighton says that the queen interceded for them with the prelates (ii. 295). For the intervention of the prelates see Rot. Parl. iii. 241.

178 f. For the terms of their exile see Rot. Parl. iii. 244, Knighton, ii. 295 f.

183. The sense of the preceding negative seems to be extended to this line also.

188 ff. I do not know of any other authority for this expulsion of friars.

200. cantus: apparently genitive in spite of the metre; so ‘ducatus,’ iii. 117, ‘excercitus,’ ‘luxus,’ Vox Clamantis, i. 609, vi. 1224.

215. hirundo: a reference to the name Arundel.

Secunda Pars

There is an interval of nearly ten years between the first and the second part of the Chronicle. Our author proceeds to the events of 1397. He assumes that the king carried out a long-meditated plan of vengeance, cp. ll. 23 ff., but this was of course an after-thought by way of accounting for what happened.

15. A pardon was granted to all three in the Parliament of 1387-88, ‘par estatut’ (see Rot. Parl. iii. 350), and a special charter of pardon was granted to the earl of Arundel at Windsor, April 30, 1394 (Rot. Parl. iii. 351; cp. Ann. Ric. II, p. 211). See below, ll. 259 f., where the charters of pardon are said to have been procured by archbishop Arundel who was then Chancellor. It seems to be implied that the other two had similar charters, but nothing is said of this in the Rolls of Parliament; cp. Eulog. Hist. iii. 374.

56. Cp. Ann. Ric. II, p. 202 (Rolls Series, 28. 3) ‘iurans suo solito iuramento, per sanctum Iohannem Baptistam, quod nihil mali pateretur in corpore, si se pacifice reddere voluisset.’

69 f. In the Annales Ricardi II it is definitely stated that Warwick came to the king’s banquet and was arrested after it (p. 202). According to Gower’s account there was no banquet at all, and Gloucester was arrested before Warwick; and this agrees with the accounts given in the Chronique de la Traïson, p. 9, and by Froissart, vol. xvi. p. 73 (ed. Lettenhove).

85 ff. From this account we should gather that the king officially announced the death of the duke of Gloucester to parliament before it had occurred; but this was not so. Parliament met on Sept. 17, and on Sept. 21 a writ was sent in the king’s name to Calais, ordering the earl of Nottingham to produce his prisoner. This was replied to, under date Sept. 24, with the announcement that he was dead (Rot. Parl. iii. 378). It is certain, however, that a report of the duke of Gloucester’s death was circulated and generally believed in the month of August, and equally certain that this was done with the connivance of the king, who probably wished to try what effect the news would produce upon the public mind. Sir William Rickhill, the justice who was sent over to extract a confession from the duke of Gloucester, received on Sept. 5 a commission from the king to proceed to Calais, no purpose stated, the date of the commission being Aug. 17. On arrival he was presented by the earl of Nottingham with another commission from the king, also with date Aug. 17, directing him to examine the duke of Gloucester. He expressed surprise, saying that the duke was dead and that his death had been ‘notified’ to the people both at Calais and in England. On the next day he saw the duke and received his so-called confession (Rot. Parl. iii. 431). When this confession was communicated to parliament, the date of it was suppressed, and things were so arranged as to favour the opinion that the interview with Rickhill took place between the 17th and 25th of August, the latter being the accepted date of Gloucester’s death; cp. the article by Mr. James Tait in the Dict. of National Biography, vol. lvi. pp. 157 f.

It is probable enough that the duke of Gloucester was still living when parliament met, as Gower seems to imply. Unfortunately John Halle, who confessed that he was present at the murder of the duke (Rot. Parl. iii. 453), gave no precise date. The statement of Gower that the king waited until he had secured his condemnation, may mean only that he satisfied himself of the temper of Parliament before taking the final and irrevocable step.

101 ff. The body seems first to have been laid in the Priory of Bermondsey: then it was buried by Richard’s command in Westminster Abbey, but apart from the royal burial-place. Afterwards the body was transferred by Henry IV to the place chosen by Gloucester himself, between the tomb of Edward the Confessor and that of Edward III (Adam of Usk, p. 39).

121 f. For the insults levelled against the earl of Arundel see Ann. Ric. II, p. 215, Adam of Usk, p. 13.

With regard to the events of this parliament generally, it is worth while here to observe that Adam of Usk must certainly be regarded as a first-hand authority and his account as a contemporary one. It has usually been assumed that, though he says himself that he was present at the parliament (‘In quo parliemento omni die presensium compilator interfuit’), he actually borrowed his account of it from the Monk of Evesham. This assumption rests entirely on the statement of the editor of Adam of Usk’s Chronicle, that he must have written later than 1415, a statement which is repeated without question by Potthast, Gross, and others. It may be observed, however, that the evidence adduced for this late date is absolutely worthless. It is alleged first that Adam of Usk near the beginning of his Chronicle alludes to the Lollard rising in Henry V’s reign, whereas what he actually says is that the Lollards planned an attack on Convocation, but were deterred by the resolute measures of the archbishop of Canterbury, at the time of the second parliament of Henry IV, that is the year 1401, when Convocation was engaged in an endeavour to suppress the Lollards and the archbishop procured the execution of William Sawtree; secondly we are told that the chronicler refers (p. 55) to the death of the dauphin Louis, which happened in 1415, whereas actually his reference is obviously to the death of the dauphin Charles, which took place at the beginning of the year 1402. Mr. James Tait in the Dict. of National Biography, vol. xlviii. p. 157, has already indicated that an earlier date than 1415 is necessary, by his reference to p. 21 of the Chronicle, where the chronicler speaks of Edmund earl of March as a boy not yet arrived at puberty, which points to a date not later than 1405. It seems probable that the Monk of Evesham had before him Adam of Usk’s journal of the parliament of 1397, to which he made some slight additions from other sources, introducing into his account a political colour rather more favourable to Richard II. The close correspondence between them is confined to the proceedings of this parliament at Westminster. It may be added that the account given by Adam of Usk is full of graphic details which suggest an eye-witness.

129. The pardon pleaded by the earl of Arundel had already been revoked by parliament, therefore the plea was not accepted. From the attempts made by the king to recover Arundel’s charter of pardon, even after his execution (Rot. Claus. 21 Ric. II. pt 2, m. 18 d.), we may perhaps gather that some scruples were felt about the revocation of it.

135 ff. Cp. Annales Ric. II, pp. 216 f.

155 f. Annales Ric. II, p. 219.

179 ff. Rot. Parl. iii. 380, Annales Ric. II, p. 220.

199 f. ‘Qu’il demureroit en perpetuel prison hors du Roialme en l’isle de Man par terme de sa vie’ (Rot. Parl. iii. 380).

201 f. By the sentence upon the earl of Warwick all his property was confiscated, but it is stated in the Annales Ric. II (p. 220) that a promise was made that he and his wife should have honourable maintenance from the forfeited revenues, and that this promise was not kept. Adam of Usk says that an income of 500 marks was granted to him and his wife, but was never paid (p. 16).

217 f. It seems impossible to construe this, and I suspect that a line has dropped out.

230. His sentence of death was commuted for that of exile to the isle of Jersey (Rot. Parl. iii. 382).

231 f. So also below, l. 280, our author expresses a hope for the safe return of the archbishop of Canterbury, who came back in company with Henry of Lancaster; cp. 330 f., where a hope is expressed for future vengeance on the king. Yet we can hardly suppose that this second part of the Chronicle was actually written before the events of the third part had come to pass. All that we can say is that the writer gives to his narrative the semblance of having been composed as the events happened. The return of Cobham is mentioned by him afterwards (iii. 262).

233 ff. Our author reserves the case of the archbishop to the last, as a climax of the evil. He was actually sentenced on Sept. 25, before the trial of the earl of Warwick (Rot. Parl. iii. 351). Sir John Cobham, whose sentence is mentioned above, was not put on his trial till Jan. 28, when parliament was sitting at Shrewsbury.

242. That is, the court of Rome was bribed to consent to his translation.

243. The title of his father, who was the second earl of Arundel, was used by him as a surname.

267 ff. This seems to mean that other private reasons were alleged to the Pope.

280. See note on l. 231.

326 f. An allusion to the campaign of 1380.

328 f. Referring especially to the very popular naval victory of Arundel in 1387 (Walsingham, ii. 154).

340. That is, in the twenty-first year of the reign (1397).

Tercia Pars

17. This comparison of Richard’s proceedings to the work of a mole under the ground (see also l. 12, margin) is appropriate enough as a description of the plot which he undoubtedly laid against the liberties of the kingdom, but the comparison is perhaps chiefly intended to suggest that Richard, and not Henry, was the ‘talpa ore dei maledicta’ of prophecy (Glendower’s ‘mould-warp’), cp. Archaeologia, xx. p. 258.

27 ff. This refers to the appointment of a committee with full powers to deal with the petitions and other matters left unfinished in this parliament. The committee consisted of twelve lords, of whom six should be a quorum, and six commons, three to be a quorum: see Rot. Parl. iii. 368, Annales Ric. II, p. 222[819]. The latter authority accuses the king of altering the Rolls of Parliament ‘contra effectum concessionis praedictae.’

35 ff. Cp. Annales Ric. II, p. 225.

47. Que non audiuit auris, &c. The same expression is used by Adam of Usk about the king’s proceedings in this parliament at Shrewsbury (p. 17).

49 ff. These transactions are related, but not very intelligibly, in the continuation of the Eulogium Historiarum, iii. 378. It seems that the king summoned the archbishop and bishops to his Council at Nottingham, and used their influence to obtain from the city of London and the seventeen counties adjacent acknowledgements of guilt and payments of money to procure pardon. After this the king ordered that the archbishops, bishops, abbots, &c., and also the individual citizens of towns, should set their seals to blank parchments, wherein afterwards a promise to keep the statutes of the last parliament was inscribed, to which it was supposed that the king intended to add acknowledgements placing the persons in question and their property at his own disposal: cp. Monk of Evesham, p. 147. These last are the ‘blanche-chartres’ spoken of below called ‘blanke chartours’ in Gregory’s Chronicle, p. 101, where the form of submission sent in by the city of London, ‘in plesauns of the kynge and by conselle and helpe of Syr Roger Walden, Archebischoppe of Cauntyrbury ande Syr Robert Braybroke, Byschoppe of London,’ is given in full, pp. 98-100. See also Rot. Parl. iii. 426, 432, where they are referred to as ‘les Remembrances appellez Raggemans ou blanches Chartres.’

73. pharisea: that is, hypocritically submissive to the king.

77. melior: comparative for superlative; so ‘probacior,’ l. 79.

85 f. Gower attributes Henry’s exile to what was probably the true cause, namely the king’s jealousy of his popularity and fear that he might take the lead in opposition to the newly established arbitrary system of government. The very occasion of the quarrel with the duke of Norfolk, an allegation on the part of Henry that the duke of Norfolk had warned him of danger from Richard and had said that the king could not be trusted to keep his oaths, made it difficult to take more summary measures against him at that moment. Indeed it seems probable that the conversation was reported to the king with a view to obtain a contradiction of the design imputed to him. Adam of Usk says definitely that the king’s object in appointing the duel at Coventry was to get rid of Henry, and that Richard had been assured by astrologers that the duke of Norfolk would win; but that on seeing them in the lists he was convinced that Henry would be the victor, and therefore he broke off the duel and banished both, intending shortly to recall the duke of Norfolk (p. 23). It is noteworthy that Gower makes no mention whatever of the duke of Norfolk here.

128 (margin). It cannot of course be supposed that Henry embarked at Calais. Probably he sailed from Boulogne. Froissart says that his port of departure was Vannes in Brittany, but he expresses some uncertainty about the matter, and his whole account here is hopelessly inaccurate (xvii. 171, ed. Kervyn de Lettenhove).

137. nepote: that is Thomas, son of the late earl of Arundel; see l. 130, margin.

160 ff. The suggestion here that Richard foresaw the coming of Henry and went to Ireland through fear of it, is of course absurd. At the same time it is certain that he received warnings, and that in view of these his expedition to Ireland was very ill-timed. The statement in the margin, that he fatally wasted time in Ireland, is supported both by the English annalists and by Creton. In the Annales Ric. II we read that a week was wasted by Richard’s hesitation as to the port from which he should sail (p. 248), and Creton says that Richard was delayed by the treacherous advice of the duke of Aumerle, who induced him to leave the levying of troops in Wales to the earl of Salisbury and to embark at his leisure at Waterford (Archaeologia, xx. 312). Nothing is said of unfavourable winds in any of these authorities, except that Creton observes that the news of Henry’s landing was delayed by the bad weather (p. 309). Henry landed July 4, and Richard was in Wales before the end of the month.

188. There is no authority for reading ‘sceleris’ in this line, as the former editors have done. Presumably ‘sceleres’ is for ‘celeres,’ and this form of spelling is found occasionally elsewhere in the MSS., as conversely ‘ceptrum’ frequently for ‘sceptrum.’ It is not easy to translate the line, whatever reading we may adopt. It seems to mean ‘So in their ignorance they hesitate,’ (‘few show themselves quick in action’).

205. mundum nec abhorruit istum, ‘nor renounced this world’: ‘istum,’ as usual, for ‘hunc.’

244. Augusti mensis. Richard left Flint on Aug. 19, and arrived in London Sept. 2 (Annales Ric. II, p. 251).

256. Humfredum natum: that is Humphrey, the young son of the duke of Gloucester. Richard had taken him to Ireland, and on hearing of the landing of Henry had ordered him to be confined, together with young Henry of Lancaster, in Trim castle (Walsingham, ii. 233).

272. transit moriens. He died apparently on the way back from Ireland, in Anglesea according to Adam of Usk, who says that he was poisoned (p. 28). Walsingham says that he died of ‘pestilence’ (ii. 242): cp. Annales Henrici IV, p. 321 (Rolls Series, 28. 3).

276. Cignus: apparently the young duke of Gloucester is here meant, and it is not intended to state that he was killed by grief for the loss of his father, but that his mother died of grief for him: cp. Annales Henrici IV, p. 321.

286. dies Martis, Tuesday, Sept. 30. Richard’s renunciation was made on Sept. 29 (Rot. Parl. iii. 416 ff.).

300 ff. The demise of the crown made new writs necessary, but the same parliament met again six days later (Oct. 6).

310. verbalis ... non iudicialis. This appears to mean that the proceedings were confined to a recital of the circumstances connected with the deposition of Richard, and that no parliamentary business was done until after the coronation, which took place on the next Monday, Oct. 13.

332 ff. The threefold right is stated here by Gower in the same way as by Chaucer:

‘O conquerour of Brutes Albioun,

Which that by lyne and free eleccioun

Ben verray kyng,’ &c.

In the margin, however, Gower places the right by conquest last, and tempers the idea of it by the addition ‘sine sanguinis effusione.’ Henry’s challenge claimed the realm by descent through ‘right line of blood’ (that is, apparently, setting aside descent through females, cp. Eulog. Hist. contin. iii. 383) and by ‘that right which God of his grace hath sent me ... to recover it’ (that is, by conquest). To these was added the right conferred by parliamentary election. It is not at all necessary to suppose that he relied on the legend about Edmund Crouchback, which had been officially examined and rejected (Adam of Usk, p. 30). His reference to Henry III may have been occasioned only by the fact that he was himself of the same name, and would come to the throne as Henry IV.

324. That is Oct. 13, the Translation of Edward the Confessor.

341. augit. This form is given by all the MSS.

352 ff. Rot. Parl. iii. 426.

364 ff. Rot. Parl. iii. 425.

368 ff. Rot. Parl. iii. 430 ff.

378 ff. Rot. Parl. iii. 449 ff.

384 ff. This refers to the fact that the dukes of Aumerle, Surrey, and Exeter, the marquis of Dorset, and the earl of Gloucester, were condemned to lose the titles of duke, marquis, and earl respectively. The case of the earl of Salisbury was reserved for future decision by combat with lord de Morley.

388 f. This seems clearly to imply that Bagot was eventually pardoned, and this conclusion is confirmed by Rot. Parl. iii. 458 (overlooked by the author of Bagot’s life in the Dict. of National Biography), where there is record of a petition presented by the Commons for the restoration of his lands (Feb. 1401), which seems to have been granted by the king.

394 ff. This is confirmed by Walsingham, ii. 242, and Annales Henrici IV, p. 320.

402 f. Holland and Kent are the former dukes of Exeter and Surrey, now earls of Huntingdon and Kent. Spenser is the former earl of Gloucester.

417 f. Kent and Salisbury were put to death by the populace at Cirencester, and Despenser at Bristol. The earl of Huntingdon was captured and irregularly executed in Essex.

420 ff. For the feeling in London cp. Chronique de la Traïson, pp. 92, 93.

432 ff. The statement here is not that Richard deliberately starved himself to death on hearing of the failure of the rising and the death of his associates, but that he lost hope and courage and could not eat, ‘quod vix si prandia sumit, Aut si sponte bibit vinum,’ and that he desired the death which came to him. This is not an incredible account, and it is fairly in accordance with the best evidence. Most of the contemporary authorities give starvation as the cause, or one of the causes, of death, and the account of it given in our text agrees with that of Walsingham (ii. 245), Annales Henrici IV, p. 330, Eulog. Hist. contin. iii. 387. The Monk of Evesham mentions this commonly accepted story, but thinks it more probable that he was starved involuntarily: ‘Aliter tamen dicitur et verius, quod ibidem fame miserabiliter interiit,’ and this is also the assertion of the Percies’ proclamation (Harding’s Chronicle, ed. Ellis, p. 352). Creton says,

‘Apres le roy de ces nouvelles,

Qui ne furent bonnes ne belles,

En son cuer print de courroux tant,

Que depuis celle heure en avant

Oncques ne menga ne ne but,

Ains covint que la mort recut,

Comme ilz dient; maiz vrayement

Je ne croy pas ensement:’

and he proceeds to say that he rather believes that Richard is still alive in prison (Archaeologia, xx. p. 408). Adam of Usk (p. 41) says that Richard was brought almost to death by grief and the disappointment of his hopes, but that his death was partly caused by the scantiness of the food supplied to him. The Chronique de la Traïson tells the story about Piers Exton, which was afterwards commonly accepted by historians, but this was certainly not current at the time in England.

462 ff. The epithet ‘pius,’ which Gower attaches to Henry’s name in this passage, means in his mouth ‘merciful,’ and in the margin the ‘pietas’ of the new king is contrasted with the ‘cruelty’ of Richard, the vice to which Gower chiefly attributes his fall. There is no doubt that the execution of Arundel and the murder of Gloucester (or the popular opinion that he had been murdered) produced a very sinister impression, and caused a general feeling of insecurity which was very favourable to Henry’s enterprise. It is true also that Henry showed himself scrupulously moderate at first in his dealings with political opponents. Gower expresses the state of things pretty accurately, when he says below:

‘R. proceres odit et eorum predia rodit,

H. fouet, heredesque suas restaurat in edes;

R. regnum vastat vindex et in omnibus astat,

Mulset terrorem pius H., que reducit amorem.’

486. This is a perilously near approach to the Wycliffite doctrine.

REX CELI Etc. (p. [343])

This piece is here connected by its heading with the Cronica Tripertita, but it occurs also in the Glasgow MS. independently and in the Trentham MS. as a sequel to the poem In Praise of Peace, with the following in place of the present heading, ‘Explicit carmen de pacis commendacione.... Et nunc sequitur epistola, in qua idem Iohannes pro statu et salute dicti domini sui apud altissimum deuocius exorat.’ The poem itself is an adaptation of the original version of Vox Clamantis, vi. cap. 18: see vol. iii. p. 554.

H. AQUILE PULLUS Etc. (p. [344])

The word ‘Prophecia’ in the margin seems to be intended to recall the supposed prophecy of Merlin about the ‘filius (or pullus) aquilae’ (Archaeol. xx. p. 257, Adam of Usk’s Chronicle, p. 133).

These four lines immediately follow the Cronica Tripertita in the Glasgow and Hatton MSS., and are themselves followed by two quotations from the Psalms (lxxxviii. 23, xl. 3):

‘Nichil proficiet inimicus in eo, et filius iniquitatis non apponet nocere ei.’

‘Dominus conseruet eum, et viuificet eum, et beatum faciat eum in terra, et non tradat cum in animam inimicorum eius.’

In the Trentham MS. we have the lines ‘H. aquile pullus,’ and the above quotations, subjoined to the first eight lines of ‘O recolende,’ as part of the dedication of the Cinkante Balades: see vol. i. p. 336.

1. aquile pullus: Henry is called so because his father was named John and used the eagle as one of his cognisances: cp. Adam of Usk, p. 24, ‘pullus aquile, quia filius Iohannis.’ The reference is to a prophecy, one form of which is quoted by the editor of Adam of Usk’s Chronicle, p. 133. For the use of the eagle by John of Gaunt see Sandford’s Genealogical History, p. 249.

2. colla. The reading of S may be supported by reference to Vox Clamantis, vi. 876, where our author in borrowing from the Aurora substitutes ‘bella’ for ‘corda’ or ‘colla.’

3. aquile ... oleum: this is the oil produced for Henry’s coronation, which was said to have been miraculously delivered to Thomas à Becket in a vial enclosed within an eagle of gold, and deposited by him in the church of St. Gregory at Poitiers. It was said to have been brought to England by Henry, first duke of Lancaster, and to have been delivered by him to the Black Prince. Thus it came into the possession of Richard II, who is said to have worn it constantly about his neck. He had desired to be re-anointed with this oil, but archbishop Arundel had refused to perform the ceremony (Annales Henrici IV, pp. 297-300, Eulog. Hist. contin. iii. 380).

O RECOLENDE, Etc. (p. [345])

The first eight lines of this appear in the Trentham MS. in combination with ‘H. aquile pullus’ as part of the dedication of the Cinkante Balades.

16 ff. For ‘pietas,’ ‘pius,’ see note on Cronica Tripertita, iii. 462.

CARMEN SUPER MULTIPLICI VICIORUM PESTILENCIA (p. [346])

‘Putruerunt et corrupte sunt,’ &c. This is in fact a quotation from the Psalms, ‘Putruerunt et corruptae sunt cicatrices meae a facie insipientiae meae,’ xxxvii. 6. (xxxviii. 5).

32. quasi Iouiniani. Already in the Vox Clamantis we have had reference to the ‘new Jovinian’ who is a sower of heresy (vi. 1267), and the person meant is no doubt Wycliffe. Jovinian, the opponent of Jerome on the marriage question, is taken as a type of the ecclesiastic of lax principles. Milman calls Jovinian and Vigilantius ‘premature Protestants’ (History of Christianity, Bk. III. ch. iv).

36. sub grossa lana: an allusion perhaps to the simple russet garb of Wycliffe’s poor priests.

52 ff. Cp. Vox Clamantis, ii. 437 ff., whence many of these lines are taken, e.g. 54-57, 60-77.

54. mortis ymago: that is, the mortal creature.

86. ‘time’ was probably written originally for ‘stude’ in SCH, as well as in F, but it was perceived perhaps that ‘reuereri,’ which was required for the rhyme, would not stand as an imperative. Similarly in line 88 ‘Que fantasias aliter tibi dant’ stood no doubt originally in SCH, and was altered for grammatical reasons.

181 f. This couplet is repeated from Vox Clamantis, vi. 861 f.

190. quam prius, for ‘prius quam,’ as frequently: cp. ll. 202, 292.

199. This line is from Ovid, Metam. vii. 826, ‘Credula res amor est,’ &c., and is quite without sense as it stands here: cp. Vox Clamantis, v. 165.

203 f. 1 Cor. vi. 18.

246 ff. Cp. Vox Clamantis, vi. 445 ff.

250. semel nisi, i.e. ‘once only’ for ‘non nisi semel’: cp. Vox Clamantis, iii. 22.

312. bis deno Ricardi regis in anno. The twentieth year of Richard II is from June 22, 1396 to the same date of 1397. The arrests of Arundel and Gloucester took place in the first few days of the twenty-first year.

DE LUCIS SCRUTINIO (p. [355])

The Ecton MS. (E) gives a different form of the marginal notes, as follows: 6. Nota de luce prelatorum et curatorum. 18. Nota de luce professorum. 30. Nota de luce regum. 44. Nota de luce procerum. 51. Nota de luce militum. 58. Nota de luce legistarum et causidicorum. 67. Nota de luce mercatorum. 79. Nota de luce vulgari in patria. 89. Nota quod Iohannes Gower auctor huius libri hic in fine tenebras deplangens pro luce optinenda deum exorat.

25 ff. See Praise of Peace, 225 ff.

64 f. Cp. Vox Clamantis, v. 703.

91 ff. The language is of course figurative: we must not assume that the author is referring to any physical blindness.

ECCE PATET TENSUS Etc. (p. [358])

This piece is found in the Trentham MS. f. 33 v^o, following the Cinkante Balades. It is probably imperfect at the end, the manuscript having lost the next leaf.

25. que naturatur, &c., ‘which is irresistibly disposed to that which is unlawful.’ This seems to be the meaning, but it is awkwardly expressed.

EST AMOR Etc. (p. [359])

This piece occurs also in combination with the Traitié: see vol. i. p. 392. For the substance of it cp. Vox Clamantis, v. 53 ff.

QUIA VNUSQUISQUE Etc. (p. [360])

The form given by G is practically identical with that of the Fairfax MS. That of the text, as given by SCH, varies from it in the first paragraph, where it adopts the wording found in the second recension copies, BTA. See vol. iii. pp. 479 and 550.

10. The word ‘meditantis’ is written over an erasure in G.

11 ff. This paragraph, as finally rewritten, seems intended to include the Cronica Tripertita as a sequel to the Vox Clamantis: cp. p. 313, where in the note which connects the two works language is used very similar to that which we have here. The author in his retrospective view of Richard’s reign has brought himself to feel that the earlier calamities were a divine warning, by the neglect of which the later evils and the final catastrophe had been brought about. It has already been pointed out (vol. iii. p. 550) that in the Fairfax MS. this account of the author’s books is completely separated from the text of the Confessio Amantis and is written in a later hand, the same in fact which we have here in the All Souls MS.

ENEIDOS BUCOLIS Etc. (p. [361])

These lines, which Gower says were kindly sent to him by ‘a certain philosopher’ (not ‘quidam Philippus,’ as printed by the Roxburghe editor) on the completion of his three books, are found also at the end of the Fairfax MS. The author is probably the same as that of the four lines ‘Quam cinxere freta,’ &c., appended to the Confessio Amantis, which are called ‘Epistola super huius opusculi sui complementum Iohanni Gower a quodam philosopho transmissa.’ I have ventured on the conjecture that this philosopher was in fact Ralph Strode, whom Chaucer couples with Gower in the last stanza of Troilus with the epithet ‘philosophical,’ and of whom we know by tradition that he wrote elegiac verse.

O DEUS IMMENSE Etc. (p. [362])

There is no reason why the heading should not be from the hand of the author, though added of course somewhat later than the date of composition. The phrase ‘adhuc viuens’ or ‘dum vixit’ does not seem to be any objection to this. It is used with a view to future generations, and occurs also in the author’s account of his books (p. 360, l. 4).

2. morosi: opposed here to ‘viciosi’; cp. l. 57 and Epistola (p. 1), l. 33.

7. foret, ‘ought to be.’

19. Isaiah xxxiii. 1.

49. Cp. Traitié, xv. 7, &c.

62. habet speciale, ‘keeps as a secret.’

74. recoletur: apparently meant for subjunctive.

QUICQUID HOMO SCRIBAT, Etc. (p. [365])

Of the three forms given here we must suppose that of the Trentham MS. to be the earliest. It is decidedly shorter than the others, it has no prose heading, and it names the first year of Henry IV in such a manner that we may probably assign it to that year. The poet’s eyesight had then failed to such an extent that it was difficult for him any longer to write; but complete blindness probably had not yet come on, and he does not yet use the word ‘cecus.’ Of the other two forms it is probable that that given by S is the later, if only because the precise date is omitted and the very diffuse heading restrained within reasonable limits. S, it is true, ends with this piece, while CHG have the later pieces; but these were probably added as they were composed, and the All Souls book may have been presented to archbishop Arundel before the last poems were written.

This concluding piece is written in S in the same hand as the Epistola at the beginning of the book, the heading apparently over the writing of another hand, some parts as ‘dicitur,’ l. 2, ‘tripertita—tempore,’ 2, 3, being obviously over erasure. The original hand remains for ‘est qualiter ab illa Cronica que,’ ‘in Anglia—rerum,’ ‘varia carmina—quia.’

ORATE PRO ANIMA Etc. (p. [367])

I have no doubt that this exhortation was set down by Gower himself, who had probably arranged before his death for the promised indulgence, following the principle laid down in the last poem of the collection, of being his own executor in such matters. The verses ‘Armigeri scutum,’ &c., which are appended in the Glasgow MS. were originally upon his tomb, and they have every appearance of being his own composition: cp. p. 352, ll. 217 ff. Berthelette after describing the tomb says, ‘And there by hongeth a table, wherin appereth that who so euer praith for the soule of John Gower, he shall, so oft as he so dothe, haue a thousande and fyue hundred dayes of pardon.’

PRESUL, OUILE REGIS, Etc. (p. [368])

This is evidently addressed to archbishop Arundel. The comet referred to is no doubt that of March, 1402. The evils complained of are the conspiracies against the king, and we are told by the chroniclers that the appearance of this comet in the north was taken as a presage of the troubles in Wales and in Northumberland: cp. Walsingham, ii. 248. Adam of Usk, who saw it when on the Continent, says it was visible by day as well as by night, and that it probably prefigured the death of the duke of Milan, whose arms were also seen in the sky (p. 73).

DICUNT SCRIPTURE Etc. (p. [368])

5. The neglect complained of is of prayers for the soul of the departed. Gower seems to have followed his own precept and made arrangements for some of the prayers in his lifetime, though others are provided for by his will. Berthelette in his preface to the Confessio Amantis (1532) speaks of Gower’s place of burial as having been prepared by himself in the church of St. Mary Overes, ‘where he hath of his owne foundation a masse dayly songe. And more ouer he hath an obyte yerely done for hym within the same churche, on fryday after the feaste of the blessed pope saynte Gregory.’ St. Gregory’s day is March 12.