This lord hath graunted his requeste.
Taken altogether, these appropriations by Gower, though not in themselves very marked, must have been annoying to his brother-poet.
It is worth while to notice that, in the three cases of the Wyf of Bathes Tale, the Phisiciens Tale, and the Maunciples Tale, Chaucer and Gower again tell the same stories; and though Chaucer wrote at a later date, he certainly has not copied.
§ 39. The Shipman's Prologue. This Prologue is assigned to the Shipman in MS. Arch. Seld. only; see the footnote to B 1179. MS. Harl. 3774 assigns it to the Sompnour; whilst very many MSS. assign it to the Squire. The three chief MSS. (E., Hn., Cm.) omit it altogether; from which we may perhaps infer that it was a very late addition to the set of Tales.
In order to exhibit the variations of the MSS. more clearly, Dr. Furnivall has printed this Prologue from no less than twenty-two MSS., with the result that only one, viz. MS. Arch. Seld. above, rightly assigns it to the Shipman and, at the same time, places it after the Man of Lawes Tale. Three of the MSS., viz. Harl. 7334, Rawl. Misc. 1133, and Royal 17 D. XV, assign it to the Sompnour, but they are all clearly wrong, because, notwithstanding this mention of the Sompnour, the Tale that follows is assigned, in the first, to the Wyf of Bathe, and, in the others, to the Squire! Eighteen of the MSS. assign this Prologue to the Squire, and insert his Tale after it. We may hence conclude that, in some early copies, a displacement of the Tales occurred at this point.
But it is easy to see that MS. Arch. Seld., the sole authority for the present arrangement, is here quite right[[114]]. The latter part of the Prologue (B 1178-90) is quite unsuited to the character of the Squire, but in keeping with that of the Shipman. Further, the Squire has a Prologue of his own, though it is incomplete in the sense that there is no indication whom the Squire is to follow (F 1-8). But the clearest proof that the author's latest intention was to place both the Shipman's Prologue and Tale precisely here, and nowhere else, appears from the following facts. First, we see, as above, that it is clearly a Shipman's Prologue, and therefore precedes the Shipman's Tale; whilst there is an obvious allusion in it to the Man of Lawes Tale as being the one which it must needs follow. The former of these points was seen by Tyrwhitt long ago; and he accordingly assigned this Prologue to the Shipman. The latter point was made by Mr. Henry Bradshaw, who conclusively shewed that no other arrangement would suit, by pointing to the author's own words. Thus, in B 46, the Man of Lawe says—'I can right now no thrifty tale seyn,' and is inclined to be apologetic; but, after the tale is told, the Host is well pleased, and consoles him in express terms in the words—'This was a thrifty tale for the nones.' And, to put the matter beyond dispute, turns to the Persone, with the words—'I see wel that ye lerned men in lore,' meaning the Persone and the Man of Lawe. In most MSS., the Shipman's Tale follows the Pardoner's; which involves the difficulty of making the Host call the Pardoner 'a lerned man in lore.' The proof that this is the very last title the Host would have bestowed on the Pardoner, is given in C 942-968, where the Host's contempt of the Pardoner is expressed in the strongest terms which he could command; and his capabilities of expression were considerable. Few happier hits have been made than the convincing argument which we are glad to owe to Mr. Bradshaw, whose knowledge of Chaucer's text was believed by many scholars to be without parallel.
But the story of the Shipman's Prologue is not yet ended. Many scribes perceived how ill suited this Prologue was for following the Pardoner's Tale, or the Cook's Tale, or the Tale of Gamelyn, which were the places it was sometimes made to occupy. In order to remedy this apparent defect, a spurious Shipman's Prologue was concocted, consisting of but twelve lines. This is the Prologue given in the black-letter editions, which, in order to make the true Shipman's Prologue do duty for a Squire's Prologue, actually resorted to the arbitrary process of suppressing the true Squire's Prologue altogether! I here give this spurious Prologue, but in true Chaucerian spelling, in order to shew more clearly how ill some of the lines scan. I follow mainly the Petworth MS., denoted by 'Pt.'; and give all the variations worth mentioning that occur in the other eight MSS., viz. Roy. (Royal 18 C ii), Sl. (Sloane 1685), B. (Barlow 20), H. (Hatton 1), M. (Camb. Univ. Lib. Mm. 2. 5), R. (Rawl. Poet. 149), L. (Laud 739), and I. (Camb. Univ. Lib. li. 3. 26).
Spurious Shipman's Prologue.
'Now freendes,' seide our Host so dere,
'How lyketh yow by Iohn the Pardonere?