Onc ne furent si precieulx jouel
D'onneur, bonté, senz, beauté et valour
Con est ma très doulce dame d'onnour.
Se d'Absalon la grant beauté humaine,' &c.
The refrain being, as before, 'Con est ma très doulce dame d'onnour.'
[250]. Ester, Esther; cited as an example of 'debonairte' in the Book of the Duch. 986; see also C. T., E 1371, 1744 (Merch. Tale); and the Tale of Melibeus, B 2291.
[251]. Ionathas, Jonathan; remarkable for his 'friendliness' towards David; 1 Sam. xix. 2.
[252]. Penalopee, Penelope, wife of Ulysses; see the note to Book of the Duch. 1081; and Ovid, Her. i. Marcia Catoun, formerly said to be Marcia, wife of M. Cato Uticensis [not Cato the Censor, as Bell says]. Bell notes that 'her complaisance, apparently, in consenting to be lent to Cato's friend, Hortensius, is the ground of her praise in this place.' Gilman refers us to Clough's tr. of Plutarch, iv. 394, where the story is given. This, however, is not the right solution. Prof. Lounsbury (Studies in Chaucer, ii. 294) points out that the reference is clearly to Marcia, daughter of the same Cato, because Chaucer got the story from Hieronymus contra Iovinianum (i. 46), where we find:—'Marcia Catonis filia minor, quum quæreretur ab ea, cur post amissum maritum, denuo non nuberet, respondit, non se inuenire uirum, qui se magis vellet quam sua.' A much better example would have been her sister Porcia, the devoted wife of Marcus Brutus (Jul. Cæsar, ii. 1).
[254]. Isoude, the heroine of the romance of Sir Tristram; see Parl. of Foules, 288 (and the note on the line); also Ho. Fame, 1796. Eleyne, Helen, heroine of the Trojan war.
[255]. Note how the [original refrain] of this Balade, beginning 'Alceste is here,' is altered to 'My lady cometh'; in order to prevent the premature mention of Alcestis' name. See note to A. 179 above, following the note to l. 242. Disteyne, bedim; viz. by outshining them.