CHAUCER'S PILGRIMS 13 



]3ortraiture of the man, his appearance, his speech, and 

 his ways of thought. 



He was a considerable person, this host. He was 

 a Member of Parhament, and his name is an index 

 of his importance, for Baihff of Southwark his ancestor, 

 Henry Tite, or Martin, had been made in 1231, and 

 himself held the position through so long a line of 

 grandfathers and great-grandfathers that their name 

 had become merged in that of his civic office. So 

 Chaucer's description we know to be very truth, so 

 far as his worth and position are concerned : — 



A seemly man uur hoste was withal 



For to have been a marshal in a hall. 



A large man was he, with eyen steep, 



A fairer burgess is there none in Chepe ; 



Bold of his speech, and wise, and well ytaught ; 



And of manhood lacked righte nought, 



Eke thereto he was right a merry man. 



This explains the host's sitting at supper with his 

 guests, even with such gentlefolk as the knight and 

 his son, the squire, and with the Lady Abbess. Thus 

 is he able to take charge of and assume leadership 

 over his party on the road to Canterbury, and to 

 reprove or praise each and all, according to his mind. 



The " Tabard " is, of course, only a memory now, 

 and, indeed, so often had it been patched and repaired, 

 that but little of the original could have been standing 

 when the great fire of Southwark, in 1676, swept 

 away many of the old inns. But the "" Talbot," as it 

 was called in later times, stood until 1870 on the 

 site of the older building, and was itself so venerable 

 that many good folks were used to believe it to have 

 been the veritable house where those old-time pilgrims 

 lay before setting out on their journey. 



To that shrine of St. Thomas crowds of pilgrims 

 flocked from every part of the Christian world. Rich 

 and poor, high and low alike, left court and camp, 

 palace or hovel. The knight left his castle, the lady 

 her bower ; the merchant his goods, the sailor his 

 ship ; and the ploughman forsook his tillage to partake 



