[70] A face as red as the fiery cherubin: a rather profane simile! In many ancient pictures we find the cherubin painted wholly scarlet; and the term had become a proverb. ‘Sawceflem’ is from salsum flegma, a disease of the skin.
[71] See note, [p. 92], note 175.
[72] Pardoner: Seller of the Pope’s indulgences.
[73] A vernicle—diminutive of Veronike—was a small copy of the face of Christ, worn as a token that he had just returned from a pilgrimage to Rome.
[74] The Pardoner’s eloquence and musical gifts account, perhaps, for the exquisite story he afterwards tells.
[75] Mr. Wright says this place was situated at the second milestone on the old Canterbury road.
[76] Tyrwhitt. Hyppolita, Smith’s Dic.
[77] Feste in this place means rather festival than feast, as Theseus was only on his way to the city.
[78] At this period, the personal pronoun you was used only in the plural sense, or in formal address, as on the Continent now; whilst thou implied familiarity. The Deity, or any superior, was therefore addressed as you: intimates and inferiors as thou. Throughout Chaucer the distinction is noticeable: but as the present mode reverses the order, I have in my lines adhered to no strict principle, but have used the singular or plural personal pronoun according as it seemed most forcible.
[79] Thebes, in Greece.