1. The birds on the weathervanes were set up facing the wind, so that it entered their open mouths, and by some mechanism produced the musical sound.
2. “And to you been of governance Such as you found in whole pleasance” That is, “and have governed you in a manner which you have found wholly pleasant.”
3. Hext: highest; from “high,” as “next” from “nigh.” Compare the sounds of the German, “hoechst,” highest, and “naechst,” next.
4. “Your brother friend,” is the common reading; but the phrase has no apparent applicability; and perhaps the better reading is “our bother friend” — that is, the lady who has proved herself a friend both to me and to you. In the same way, Reason, in Troilus’ soliloquy on the impending loss of his mistress, is made, addressing Troilus and Cressida, to speaks of “your bother,” or “bothe,” love.
5. The ships had high embattled poops and forecastles, as in mediaeval ships of war.
6. Compare Spenser’s account of Phaedria’s barque, in “The
Faerie Queen,” canto vi. book ii.; and, mutatis mutandis,
Chaucer’s description of the wondrous horse, in The Squire’s
Tale.
7. Salad: a small helmet; french, “salade.”
8. Gardebrace: French, “garde-bras,” an arm-shield; probably resembling the “gay bracer” which the Yeoman, in the Prologue to The Canterbury Tales, wears on his arm.
9. Confession and prayer were the usual preliminaries of any enterprise in those superstitious days; and in these days of enlightenment the fashion yet lingers among the most superstitious class — the fisher-folk.
10. The knights resolved that they would quit their castles and houses of stone for humble huts.