Chaucer's Works, Volume 5 — Notes to the Canterbury Tales

by Geoffrey Chaucer

Right so this knight, on daies brode,' &c.

This line, for a wonder, is unaltered by Dryden in his paraphrase.

1085. walweth, rolls from side to side, turns about restlessly; cf. Leg. Good Wom. 1166; Troil. i. 699; Rom. Rose, 2562.

1088. Fareth, pronounced as Far'th; cf. tak'th in 1072.

1090. dangerous, distant, unapproachable; see D. 151.

1109. Gentilesse. See my notes (in vol. i. 431, 553) on R. R. 2190, and Gentilesse. Compare Boethius, bk. iii. pr. 6 and met. 6; Roman de la Rose, ed. Méon, 6603-6616, and 18807-19096; and see B. 2831.

1114. Cf. privee n'apert in l. 1136; 'in private and in public.'

1117. wol we, desires that we; see 1130 below.

1121. Cf. Balade of Gentilesse, ll. 16, 17.

1128. Cf. Dante, Purgat. vii. 121:—