276 CHAUCER. 



Dicendo, lascia con la ria ventura 



Tuo padre aiidar che tulti ha offeso taiito, 



E tu, sicura e lieta, senza noia, 



Mentre t 'aggrada, con noi resta in Troia." * 



"Now was tliis Hector pitous of nature, 

 And saw that she was sorrowful begon 

 And that she was so faire a creature, 

 Of his goodnesse he gladed her anon 

 And said [saide] let your father's treason gon 

 Forth with mischance, and ye yourself in joy 

 Dwelleth with us while [that] you list in Troy." 



If the Italian were read with the same ignorance that 

 has wreaked itself on Chaucer, the riding-rhyme would 

 be on its high horse in almost every line of Boccaccio's 

 stanza. The same might be said of many a verse in 

 Donne's satires. Spenser in his eclogues for February, 

 May, and September evidently took it for granted that 

 he had caught the measure of Chaucer, and it would be 

 rather amusing, as well as instructive, to hear the main- 

 tainers of the hop-skip-and-jump theory of versification 

 attempt to make the elder poet's verses dance to the tune 

 for which one of our greatest metrists (in his philological 

 deafness) supposed their feet to be trained. 



I will give one more example of Chaucer's verse, again 

 making my selection from one of his less mature works. 

 He is speaking of Tarquin : — 



" And ay the more he was in despair 

 The more he coveted and thouglit her fair; 

 His blinde lust was all his coveting. 

 On morrow when the bird began to sing 

 Unto the siege he cometh full privily 

 And by himself he walketh soberly 

 The image of her recording alway new: 

 Thus lay her hair, and thus fresh was her hue, 

 Thus sate, tlms spake, thus span, this was her cheer, 

 Thus fair she was, and this was her manc^re. 

 All this conceit his heart hath new ytake, 

 And as the sea, with tempest all toshake, 



* Corrected from Kissner, p. 18. 



