256 CHAUCER. 



enter dispersedly, as the old stage directions used to 



say, and they have not learned the art of concentrating 



their force on the key-point of their hearers' interest. 



They neither get fairly hold of their subject, nor, what is 



more important, does it get hold of them. But they 



sometimes yield to an instinctive hint of leaving-off at 



the right moment, and in their happy negligence achieve 



an effect only to be matched by the highest successes of 



art. 



" That lady heard his mourning all 

 Eight under her chamber wall, 

 In her oriel where she was, 

 Closed well with royal glass ; 

 Fulfilled it was with imagery 

 Every window, by and by; 

 On each side had there a gin 

 Sperred with many a divers pin; 

 Anon that lady fair and free 

 Undid a pin of ivory 

 And wide the window she open set, 

 The sun shone in at her closet." 



It is true the old rhymer relapses a little into the habit- 

 ual drone of his class, and shows half a mind to holt 

 into their common inventory style when he comes to his 

 gins and pins, hut he withstands the temptation man- 

 fully, and his sunshine fills our hearts with a gush as 

 sudden as that which illumines the lady's oriel. Cole- 

 ridge and Keats have each in his way felt the charm of 

 this winsome picture, but have hardly equalled its hearty 

 honesty, its economy of material, the supreme test of 

 artistic skill. I admit that the phrase " had there a 

 gin " is suspicious, and suggests a French original, but I 

 remember nothing altogether so good in the romances 

 from the other side of the Channel. One more passage 

 occurs to me, almost incomparable in its simple straight- 

 forward force and choice of the right word. 



" Sir Graysteel to his death thus thraws, 

 He welters [wallows] and the grass updraws; 



