LIBRARY OF OLD AUTHORS. 259 



upon this word ; but the explanation is correct. Be ivroght was 

 a misprint, however, for he wroght? The error occurs in a 

 citation of three lines in which lother is still left for tother. The 

 original note affords us so good an example of Mr. Hazlitt s style 

 of editing as to be worth preserving. In the * Kyng and the 

 Hermit we read 



He ne wyst w[h]ere that he was 

 Ne out of the forest for to passe, 

 And thus he rode all wylle. 



And here is Mr. Hazlitt s annotation on the word wylle : 



i.e. evil. In a MS. of the Tale of the Basyn/ supposed by 

 Mr. Wright, who edited it in 1836, to be written in the Salopian 

 dialect, are the following lines : 



The lother hade litull thoght, 



Off husbandry cowth he noght, 



But alle his wyves wz7/be wroght. (Vol. I. p. 16.) 



It is plain that he supposed will, in this very simple passage, to 

 mean evil! This he would seem to rectify, but at the same 

 time takes care to tell us that the explanation [of wylle ] is 

 correct. He is willing to give up one blunder, if only he may 

 have one left to comfort himself withal ! Wylle is simply a 

 rhyming fetch for wild, and the passage means that the king 

 rode at random. The use of wildw\\h this meaning is still 

 common in such phrases as he struck wild. In Havelok we 

 find it in the nearly related sense of being at a loss, knowing not 

 what to do : 



To lincolne barfot he yede 



Hwan he kam ther he was ful w il, 



Ne hauede he no frend to gangen til. 



All wylle^ in short, means the kind of editing that is likely to 

 be done by a gentleman who picks up his mis-information as he 

 goes along. We would hint that a person must know something 

 before he can use even a glossary with safety. 



In the King and the Barker/ when the tanner finds out that 

 it is the king whom he has been treating so familiarly, and falls 

 upon his knees, Mr. Hazlitt prints, 



He had no meynde of hes hode, nor cape, ne radell, 



and subjoins the following note : Radell, or raddle, signifies a 

 side of a cart ; but here, apparently, stands for the cart itself. 

 Ritson printed ner adell. Mr. Hazlitt s explanation of raddle, 

 which he got from H alii well, is incorrect. The word, as its 

 derivation (from O. F. rastet] implies, means the side or end of 

 a ^tfj-cart, in which the uprights are set like the teeth of a rake. 

 But what has a cart to do here ? There is perhaps a touch of 



