CHAUCER. 237 



Let us put a bit of Langland s satire beside one of 

 Chaucer s. Some people in search of Truth meet a pilgrim 

 and ask him whence he comes. He gave a long list of 

 holy places, appealing for proof to the relics on his hat : 



&quot; I have walked full wide in wet and in dry 

 And sought saints for my soul s health. 

 Know st thou ever a relic that is called Truth ? 

 Couldst thou show us the way where that wight dwelleth ? 

 * Nay, so God help me,&quot; said the man then, 

 1 1 saw never palmer with staff nor with scrip 

 Ask after him ever till now in this place. &quot; 



This is a good hit, and the poet is satisfied ; but, in what 

 I am going to quote from Chaucer, everything becomes 

 picture, over which lies broad and warm the sunshine of 

 humorous fancy. 



&quot; In olde dayes of the King Artour 

 Of which that Britouns speken gret honour, 

 All was this lond fulfilled of fayerie : 

 The elf-queen with her joly compaignie 

 Danced ful oft in many a grene mede : 

 This was the old opinion as I rede ; 

 I speke of many hundrid yer ago : 

 But now can no man see none elves mo, 

 For now the grete charite and prayeres 

 Of lymytours and other holy freres 

 That sechen every lond and every streem, 

 As thick as motis in the sormebeam, 

 Blessyng halles, chambres, kitchenes, and bourcs, 

 Citees, and burghes, castels hihe and toures, 

 Thorpes and bernes, shepnes and dayeries, 

 This makith that ther ben no fayeries. 

 For ther as wont to walken was an elf 

 There walkith none but the lymytour himself, 

 In undermeles and in morwenynges, 

 And sayth his matyns and his holy thingcs, 

 As he goth in his lymytatioun. 

 Wommen may now go saufly up and doun ; 

 In every bush or under every tre 

 There is none other incubus but he, 

 And he ne wol doon hem no dishon6ur.&quot; 



How cunningly the contrast is suggested here between the 

 Elf -queen s jolly company and the unsocial limiters, thick as 



