[374]. 'The allusion is to the several successful adventurers, like the Visconti, who in the 13th and 14th centuries succeeded in seizing upon the governments of Milan, and other free cities of Lombardy'; Bell. See the article Visconti in the Eng. Cyclopædia; we are there referred to Verri, Storia di Milano, and to Muratori, Annali d' Italia. Cf. Dante, Inf. xxviii. 74, 81; and see Chaucer's reference to 'Barnabo Viscounte' in the Monkes Tale, B 3589.
[375]. Reward at, regard to. Reward and regard are etymologically identical. Observe the accent on the former syllable. Cf. l. 399.
[378]. Fermour, a farmer of taxes; who is naturally exacting and oppressive.
[380]. Before is supply hit, which, as in l. 379, refers to a suppliant culprit. His own vassals are a lord's treasures, to be cherished, not oppressed.
[381]. Bech refers us to Seneca, De Clementia, lib. i. c. 3, § 3; c. 5, § 4. Or perhaps Aristotle is meant, whose supposed advice to Alexander is fully given in Gower's Confessio Amantis, bk. vii. See particularly the passage in Pauli's edition, iii. 176:—
'What is a king in his legeaunce,
Wher that ther is no law in londe?'
There is a similar long and tedious passage in Lancelot of the Laik, ed. Skeat, ll. 1463-1998. Gower calls Aristotle 'the philosophre'; C. A. iii. 86. We may also compare Hoccleve, De Regimine Principum, ed. Wright, pp. 102-3, translated from Ægidius, De Reg. Princ., lib. i. pars 1, cap. xiv; where the reference to Aristotle is:—'Propter quod V. Ethicorum scribitur, quod principatus uirum ostendit.'
[384]. Al, although. 'Although he will preserve their rank for his lords.' Note that his lordes is in the dative case. It was probably from not observing this that Thynne's edition and the Pepys MS. have needlessly inserted the word in before hir. Cf. A. 370.
[387]. Half-goddes, demi-gods. Cf. 'the demi-god Authority'; Meas. for Meas. i. 2. 124.