Alliteration is used by Gower in a manner which is especially characteristic of the new artistic style of poetry. It is sufficiently frequent, both in formal combinations, such as ‘cares colde,’ ‘lusty lif,’ ‘park and plowh,’ ‘swerd or spere,’ ‘lief and loth,’ ‘wel or wo,’ ‘dike and delve,’ ‘slepe softe,’ ‘spille ... spede,’ and as an element of the versification:
i. 886 f. ‘For so, thei seide, al stille and softe
God Anubus hire wolde awake.’
iv. 2590 ‘The lost is had, the lucre is lore.’
iv. 3384 f. ‘Which many a man hath mad to falle,
Wher that he mihte nevere arise.’
v. 3670 f. ‘And thanne he gan to sighe sore,
And sodeinliche abreide of slep.’
vii. 3468 f. ‘Sche hath hir oghne bodi feigned,
For feere as thogh sche wolde flee.’