115. 'What ails you, and how it came about?'; cp. l. 102.
129. ichil = ich wille; and so ichaue 209, icham 382, ichot XV b 23. These forms, reduced to chill, cham, &c., were still characteristic of the Southern dialect in Shakespeare's time: cp. King Lear, IV. vi. 239 Chill not let go, Zir.
131. þat nouȝt nis: 'That cannot be'; cp. l. 457 þat nouȝt nere.
157-8. palays: ways. The original rime was perhaps palys: wys 'wise'.
170. 'Wherever you may be, you shall be fetched.'
201-2. barouns: renouns. Forms like renouns in rime are usually taken over from a French original.
215. The overloaded metre points to a shorter word like wite for vnderstond.
216. Make ȝou þan a parlement: ȝou is not nom., but dat. 'for yourselves'. Observe that Orfeo acts like a constitutional English king.
241. þe fowe and griis: A half translation of OFr. vair et gris. Vair (Lat. varius) was fur made of alternate pieces of the grey back and white belly of the squirrel. Hence it is rendered by fowe, OE. fāg 'varicolor'. Griis is the grey back alone, and the French word is retained for the rime with biis, which was probably in the OFr. original.
258. berien: The MS. may be read berren, but as this form is incorrect it is better to assume that the i has been carelessly shaped by the scribe.