Iberia Won; A poem descriptive of the Peninsular War / With impressions from recent visits to the battle-grounds, and copious historical and illustrative notes

by T. M. Hughes

That maketh me syke and sorrow among. &c.

Chaucer was the first who wrote this stanza in the heroic line of ten syllables, and his contribution to the stanza is therefore quite as important as Spenser’s addition of the closing Alexandrine. In this stanza Chaucer has written the whole of the Monk’s Tale, and how entirely it is the stanza of Childe Harold, with the exception of the Alexandrine at the end, may be seen from the following example:—

His wif his lordes, and his concubines

Ay dronken, while her appetitis last,

Out of thise noble vessels sondry wines;

And on a wall this King his eyen cast,

And saw an hand armles that wrote ful fast,

For fere of whiche he quoke, and siked sore.

This hand that Balthasar so sore aghast,

Wrote Mane techel phares and no more.