“Twelve pence!” quoth she; “now may the sweet Saint Mary
So wisely help me out of care and sin,
As in this wide world, though I sold my skin,
I could not scrape up twelve pence, for my life.
Ye know too well I am a poor old wife:
Give alms, for the Lord’s sake, to me, poor wretch.”
“Nay, if I quit thee then,” quoth he, “devil fetch
Myself, although thou starve for it, and rot.”
“Alas!” quoth she, “the pence I have ’em not.”
“Pay me,” quoth he, “or by the sweet Saint Anne,
I’ll bear away thy staff and thy new pan
For the old debt thou ow’st me for that fee,
Which out of pocket I discharged for thee,
When thou didst make thy husband an old stag.”
“Thou liest,” quoth she; “so leave me never a rag,
As I was never yet, widow nor wife,
Summonsed before your court in all my life,
Nor never of my body was untrue.
Unto the devil, rough and black of hue,
Give I thy body, and the pan to boot.”
And when this devil heard her give the brute
Thus in his charge, he stooped into her ear,
And said, “Now, Mabily, my mother dear,
Is this your will in earnest that ye say?”
“The devil,” quoth she, “so fetch him cleanaway,
Soul, pan, and all, unless that he repent.”
“Repent!” the Sumner cried; “pay up your rent,
Old fool; and don’t stand preaching here to me.
I would I had thy whole inventory,
The smock from off thy back, and every cloth.”
“Now, brother,” quoth the devil, “be not wroth;
Thy body and this pan be mine by right,
And thou shalt straight to hell with me to-night,
Where thou shalt know what sort of folk we be,
Better than Oxford university.”
And with that word the fiend him swept below,
Body and soul. He went where Sumners go.
CHAUCER’S
Reve’s Tale.
MODERNISED BY R. H. HORNE.
THE REVE’S PROLOGUE.
When all had laughed at this right foolish case
Of Absalom and credulous Nicholas, [49]
Diverse folk diversely their comments made.
But, for the most part, they all laughed and played,
Nor at this tale did any man much grieve,
Unless indeed ’twas Oswald, our good Reve.
Because that he was of the carpenter craft,
In his heart still a little ire is left.
He gan to grudge it somewhat, as scarce right;
“So aid me!” quoth he; “I could such requite
By throwing dust in a proud millers eye,
If that I chose to speak of ribaldry.
But I am old; I cannot play for age;
Grass-time is done—my fodder is now forage;
This white top sadly writeth mine old years;
Mine heart is also mouldy’d as mine hairs:
And since I fare as doth the medlar tree,
That fruit which time grows ever the worse to be
Till it be rotten in rubbish and in straw.
“We old men, as I fear, the same lot draw;
Till we be rotten can we not be ripe.
We ever hop while that the world will pipe;
For in our will there sticketh ever a nail,
To have a hoary head and a green tail,
As hath a leek; for though our strength be lame,
Our will desireth folly ever the same;
For when our climbing’s done, our words aspire;
Still in our ashes old is reeking fire. [50]