A. E. B.
P.S.—Since writing the foregoing I have obtained, through the kindness of Mr. Thoms, the several readings of the lines commented upon in six different MSS. in the British Museum. And I have great satisfaction in finding that five out of the six confirm my hypothesis, at least with respect to the uncertain spelling of "alway." The readings in respect of the two words are these:
I meene alweye.
In mena alway.
I mene allweye.
In mene allwey.
I mene alweie.
I mene alwaye.
I acknowledge that, from the first, if I could have discovered a probable interpretation of "mene" as an independent word, I should have preferred it rather than that of making it a part of the Arabic name, because I think that the star is sufficiently identified by the latter portion of its name "Al auwâ," and because the preservation of "mene" in its proper place in the line would afford a reading much less forced than that I was obliged to have recourse to. Now it very singularly happens that in "NOTES AND QUERIES" of this day (page 388.) I find, upon the authority of A. C. M., that there is an Armorican word "menex" or "mene," signifying a summit or boundary. Here is an accidental, though most probable, original of the Chaucerian "mene," because the moon's place in longitude at the time specified was precisely on the verge or boundary of Libra: or even in the sense "summit" the word would be by no means inappropriate to the point of a sign in the ecliptic which first emerges from the horizon; with such a reading the lines would stand thus, which is a very slight change from their present form:
"Then, with the mone's exaltacioun