[AH] They do not, however, contain the additions above mentioned, at Prol. 495, 579, i. 1403, 2267, &c.
[AI] It is doubtful, however, whether the special connexion between B and T extended over the whole book. It seems rather to begin about iii. 1500. The question about the relative position of these two MSS. would be easier of solution if it were not that T is defective up to ii. 2687, that is as regards the part where the connexion of B with the first recension is most apparent. The fact is that until about the middle of the third book B is found usually in accord with the ERCLB₂ group, and though it sometimes in these first books presents the characteristic second recension reading, as ii. 193, 365 ff., iii. 168, at other times it departs from it, as i. 1881, 2017.
[AJ] K belongs to the beginning and H₃ to the middle of the fifteenth century.
[AK] In the case of most of these passages the text proves them to be taken from Caxton’s edition. Thus in Prol. 497 both editions omit ‘to,’ Prol. 583 both omit ‘propre,’ i. 2248 both have ‘Vnder graue’ for ‘Vnder the grene,’ in 2354 ‘other’ for ‘thilke,’ and in 2372 ‘in me’ for ‘I me.’
[AL] These lines have never been printed in any edition before the present, though published separately by K. Meyer in his John Gower’s Beziehungen, &c., 1889, and by Prof. Easton of the University of Pennsylvania in his Readings in Gower, 1895. There are a large number of sound emendations from the Brit. Museum MSS. suggested in this latter book, but the author had no clear idea of the principles on which the text should be constructed.
[AM] The following will serve as examples of those omitted:
iii. 367 tawh B
422 vngood lieste A
618 is (for it) A
652 softe softe B