proverbe seith, he that to muche embraceth, distreyneth litel.' It is also quoted by Lydgate, in his description of the Merchant in the Dance of Machabre.
7. Embrace must be read as embrac', for the rime. Similarly, Chaucer puts gras for grac-e in Sir Thopas (Group B, l. 2021).
XXI. Balade against Women unconstant.
5. In a place, in one place. In the New E. Dictionary, the following is quoted from Caxton's print of Geoffroi de la Tour, leaf 4, back:—'They satte att dyner in a hall and the quene in another.'
7. From Machault, ed. Tarbé, p. 56 (see p. [88] above):—'Qu'en lieu de bleu, Damë, vous vestez vert'; on which M. Tarbé has the following note:—'Bleu. Couleur exprimant la sincérité, la pureté, la constance; le vert, au contraire, exprimait les nouvelles amours, le changement, l'infidélité; au lieu de bleu se vêtir de vert, c'était avouer que l'on changeait d'ami.' Blue was the colour of constancy, and green of inconstancy; see Notes to Anelida, l. 330; and my note to the Squire's Tale, F 644.
In a poem called Le Remède de Fortune, Machault explains that pers, i. e. blue, means loyalty; red, ardent love; black, grief; white, joy; green, fickleness; yellow, falsehood.
8. Cf. James i. 23, 24; and see The Marchantes Tale (Group E, ll. 1582-5).
9. It, i. e. the transient image; relative to the word thing, which is implied in no-thing in l. 8.
10. Read far'th, ber'th; as usual in Chaucer. So turn'th in l. 12.
12. Cf. 'chaunging as a vane'; Clerkes Tale, E 996.