"Kneeling alway, til it uncloséd was
Upon the swetë, softë, swotë gras
That was with flourës swote embroidered all.
In his dream there came to him the God of Love, with his queen, Alcestis, who, daisy-like, was clad in royal habits green—
"A fret of golde she hedde next her heer,
And upon that a white courone she beer."
She it was who made him swear that from henceforth he would "poetize of wommen trewe in lovying," "speke wel of love," and so make a glorious legend.
Chaucer had intended writing at least nineteen stories on the lines decreed by Alcestis, but his days of prosperity had come to an end for the time being, with the exile of John of Gaunt, and he became so poor after his dismissal from the Customs, that he had to raise money on his pension. And so the legend seems to have been laid aside.
When Henry of Lancaster became king five years later, he doubled the pension, remembering how his father, just dead, had loved the poet; and so the cloud, which had been heavy enough while it lasted, passed away. But it is to those dark days that we owe the greatest of all Chaucer's work—his "Canterbury Tales"—work, it must be remembered, which rings and re-rings with cheerfulness, courage, sympathy, and kindliness. We know so little of Chaucer as a man but this one fact stands out, that he never allowed his own troubles or anxieties, or even his pressing poverty, to over-cloud his heart or his mind. For him the sun shone always, though he saw it not, and because of that sunshine no trace of bitterness or harshness is to be found in his work.
In the prologue to the "Tales" Chaucer explains his plot in the most natural and personal way. One day in the spring, he says, he was waiting at the Tabard Inn, to rest before continuing a pilgrimage he had set out to make to Canterbury, when twenty-nine other pilgrims, all bound for the same destination, arrived. He soon made friends with them, and, finding their company very entertaining, arranged to join this party. Then came the proposal that each one should tell two tales to enliven the journey; a good supper at the end to be the reward of the pilgrim whose story found most favour. The jovial host of the inn decided to join them, and one morning in early spring the procession set out. What a motley crowd they were! Yet Chaucer, with his happy knack of describing people just as they appeared, has made them all so real to us, that it is easy to picture each one of them, and in so doing to get a vivid glimpse of the men and women whom the poet was accustomed to meet every day of his life. But for Chaucer we should know next to nothing about the people of his day. First came the knight, who "lovede chyvalrye," who had ridden far afield in his master's wars; a great soldier, but tender as a woman, "a verrey parfyte gentil knight." With him was his son, acting as his squire, great of strength, able to make brave songs, and to sit well his horse, handsomely dressed, yet in his manners "curteys, lowly, and servysable." His attendant was a yeoman, sunburnt and sturdy, who carried the sheaf of arrows, which he could dress right yeomanly. It seems likely that for a short while Chaucer served as a soldier in France, and if so, how familiar these three must have been to him. Then came the prioress, very "pleasant and semely," adopting court manners, and impressing every one with the idea that she was so compassionate and charitable that even to see a mouse in a trap made her weep. She had her own attendant nuns and priests. The monk was only interested in riding, but the friar, who was licensed to hear confessions, raise money, and perform the offices of the Church in a certain district, was merry, the good friend of all rich women, and reported to "hear confession very sweetly," being easy with the penances he ordered. Sometimes he lisped, "to make his English sweet upon the tongue," and when he sang to his guitar, "his eyes shone like stars on a frosty night." The merchant sat high on his horse, and talked loudly of his increased wealth, a great contrast to the poor clerk of Oxford, who looked hollow, wore a threadbare cloak, and had not been worldly enough to get a benefice. The sergeant-at-law, the landholder, the haberdasher, carpenter, weaver, dyer, tapestry-maker, the cook, the sailor, and the doctor, all had their special characteristics, but of these there is not space to speak. The wife of Bath had a bold face and wore bright clothes; had buried five husbands, all of whom she had ruled, and was quite willing to try a sixth. The poor parson, who was "a shepherd holy and vertuous, never despising sinful men, but teaching them the law of Christ, which he faithfully followed," was, I think, the pilgrim whom Chaucer most reverenced. The religion of the monks and friars revolted him, but those poor priests, leading their simple lives of work and worship, were to his eyes in very truth the servants of Christ, who witnessed loyally to their Master, in spite of the contempt with which their very poverty caused them to be treated. His brother, the ploughman, was in his way as good a man as the priest, for he was a true and honest labourer, who lived in charity with all, loved God, and would, for Christ's sake, "thresh, dyke, or delve for the poor widow's hire." The miller; the manciple, who bought the food for an Inn of Court; the reeve or steward; the summoner to the ecclesiastical courts; and the pardoner, with his packets of relics which he always sold successfully, made up the party; and all having agreed to the host's proposals as to the tales to be told, they drew lots to decide who should begin, the choice falling on the knight, whereat all rejoiced. "Tell us merry things," was the injunction of the host, who was rejoicing in a spell of freedom from his wife's sharp eyes and sharper tongue, and—
"Speak ye so plain at this time, we you pray,
That we may understandë what you say."
Just as Chaucer gave to each pilgrim his own individuality, so in every case he fitted the story to its teller. The knight had a tale of love, romance, and adventure; the clerk chose for heroine the patient, much-suffering Griselda; the prioress told of a child-martyr, and the poor parson, in earnest words, drew their thoughts upward to "that parfyt glorious pilgrimage which each and all must make to celestial Jerusalem." Chaucer did not live to finish all the tales he had planned out. In the year 1399 he had taken on a long lease a house at Westminster, which stood where now is Henry VII.'s chapel, and here he spent the last few months of his life, reading and writing contentedly to the end, in high favour at the Palace hard by, and the centre of a little group who loved and revered him. Probably the poor priest's tale was his last bit of work, and that significantly ends with words concerning the pilgrimage of man to the Heavenly City, "To thilke life He bring us, that bought us with His precious blood. Amen."
Chaucer's wife had been dead many years, and of his children we know nothing, except that to his son Lewis he gave an astrolabe, an instrument for taking the height of the stars, and wrote for him a "little treatise" on the subject, in which he craves pardon for his "rude inditing and his superfluity of words," explaining that a child is best taught by simple words and much repetition. But we can never think of Chaucer as alone or solitary in his old age. Rather was the house at Westminster a pleasant haven of rest where he anchored surrounded by his many comrades and friends. So greatly honoured was he, that when he died it was at once decided to bury him in the Abbey. The verses with which I end have been called Chaucer's Creed, and some say he repeated them just before his death. Certain it is that they guided his conduct through life.