The Works of Alexander Pope Part 27

[Footnote 22: Chaucer is more particular in his description:

He portrayed in his heart, and in his thought Her fresche beauty, and her age tender, Her middle small, her armes long and slender, Her wise governance, her gentilnesse Her womanly bearing, and her sadnesse.--BOWLES.]

[Footnote 23:

For when that he himself concluded had, He thought each other mannes wit so bad, That impossible it were to replie Against his choice; this was his fantasie.]

[Footnote 24: In seeking a wife for him.]

[Footnote 25:

Placebo came, and eke his friendes soon, And althirfirst he bad them all a boon, That none of them no argumentes make Against the purpose which that he had take; Which purpose was pleasaunt to G.o.d said he, And very ground of his prosperite.]

[Footnote 26: "And may serve my turn" is one of Dryden's familiar colloquial terms, happily used. Dryden among other excellencies of a varied style was happy in the use of such terms.--WARTON.

The phrase fails to convey the conception of Chaucer, that the knight too much smitten by the charms of May to consider anything else of the slightest importance.

All were it so she were of small degree, Sufficeth him her youth and her beaute.]

[Footnote 27: The humour is brought out by Chaucer with increased force from his dwelling with greater detail on the fond conviction of January that the only risk he runs in marriage is from the excess of the felicity. He says he stands aghast when he contemplates pa.s.sing his life in that perfect peace, and blessedness,

As alle wedded men do with their wives,

and trembles to think that he shall have his heaven upon earth.

This is my dread, and ye my brethren twey a.s.soileth me this question I you pray.]

[Footnote 28:

And when they saw that it must needis be, They wroughten so by sleight and wise treate, That she, this maiden, which that Maybus hight, As hastily as ever that she might, Shall wedded be unto this January.]

[Footnote 29: Dryden's Palamon and Arcite:

For women to the brave an easy prey, Still follow fortune where she leads the way.]

[Footnote 30: Dryden's Palamon and Arcite:

I pa.s.s their warlike pomp, their proud array.]

[Footnote 31: This line has no warrant from Chaucer.]

[Footnote 32: Here followed a bad couplet, which Pope afterwards omitted:

Expensive dainties load the plenteous boards, The best luxurious Italy affords.]

[Footnote 33: Joab, the leader of the Israelites in battle, blew the trumpet, as is recorded in the Bible, to gather them together. Theodomas is thought by Tyrwhitt to be a character in some fict.i.tious history which was popular in the days of Chaucer.]

[Footnote 34: Chaucer says that the bed was blessed by the priest, and the form used on these occasions may be seen in the old Latin service books.]

[Footnote 35: Dryden's Sigismonda and Guiscardo:

What thoughts he had beseems me not to say.]

[Footnote 36: A circ.u.mstance is added by Chaucer which brings vividly before the reader the advanced age of the knight:

The slacke skin about his necke shaketh While that he sung.]

[Footnote 37: Chaucer had previously mentioned that it was the usage for newly married wives to keep their chambers till the fourth day, and he repeats the fact here:

As custom is unto these n.o.bles all, A bride shall not eaten in the hall, Till dayes four, or three days atte least I-pa.s.sed be; then let her go to the feast.

The fourthe day complete from noon to noon, When that the highe ma.s.se was i-doon, In halle sit this January and May, As fresh as is the brighte summer's day.]

[Footnote 38: In the original January pa.s.ses a warm panegyric upon the excellent qualities of Damian, which is meant to display in broader contrast the treachery and infamy of the squire. The merchant in his own person denounces the villany of Damian's conduct, and prays that all persons may be protected from the machinations of those deceitful vipers, who, when fostered in a family, employ their opportunities to injure their benefactors. Pope has omitted every allusion of the kind, and has treated the baseness of the squire as if he regarded it in the light of a joke.]

[Footnote 39: It was at first "speaking sigh," which was distinctive.

"Heaving" is the accompaniment of all sighs, and, as the sigh of Damian was soft, did not mark his in an especial degree.]

[Footnote 40: There is not a word, as may be supposed, in Chaucer of the squire asking for divine a.s.sistance in his wicked schemes.]

[Footnote 41: May, on her return from the visit which, at her husband's desire, she paid to Damian in his chamber, that she might cheer him in his illness, read the billet that he had given her covertly, and the result is thus told by Chaucer in a pa.s.sage which has not been versified by Pope:

This gentle May fulfilled of pite, Right of her hand a letter maked she; In which she granteth him her very grace; There lacked nought but only day and place.

And when she saw her time upon a day To visite this Damian goeth May, And subtilely this letter down she thrust Under his pillow; read it if him l.u.s.t.

She taketh him by the hand, and hard him twist So secretly, that no wight of it wist, And bade him be all whole; and forth she went To January, when that he for her sent.

Up riseth Damian the nexte morrow; All pa.s.sed was his sickness and his sorrow.]

[Footnote 42: The Epicurean philosophers.]

[Footnote 43: Addison's Letter from Italy:

My humbler verse demands a softer theme, A painted meadow, or a purling stream.]

[Footnote 44: Pope has here shown his judgment in adopting the lighter fairy race of Shakespeare and Milton. Chaucer has king Pluto and his queen Proserpina.--BOWLES.

There was not much judgment required. They are fairies in Chaucer, but, as was not unusual in his day, he called them by names taken from the heathen mythology. Pope merely dropped the cla.s.sical appellations, which would have been an incongruity when he wrote. In the details of his description he did not copy Shakespeare or Milton, but Dryden's version of Chaucer's Wife of Bath:

The king of elfs, and little fairy queen Gambolled on heaths, and danced on ev'ry green.]

[Footnote 45: Another couplet preceded this in the first edition:

Thus many a day with ease and plenty blessed Our gen'rous knight his gentle dame possessed.]

[Footnote 46: Dryden's Palamon and Arcite:

Nor art, nor nature's band can ease my grief, Nothing but death, the wretch's last relief.]

[Footnote 47: There is a natural trait in the original which is not preserved by Pope. The knight weeps piteously at his sudden calamity:

But atte last, after a month or tweye, His sorrow gan a.s.suage sooth to say; For when he wist it may not other be He patiently took his adversitie.