Canterbury Tales and Other Poems, Geoffrey Chaucer [good fiction books to read txt] 📗

strained them to cry: “Now woe the time,” quoth they, “that we be boun’! bound This hateful order nice* will do us die! into which we foolishly We sigh and sob, and bleeden inwardly, entered Fretting ourselves with thought and hard complaint, That nigh for love we waxe wood and faint.” mad And as I stood beholding here and there, I was ware of a sort full languishing, *a class of people Savage and wild of looking and of cheer, Their mantles and their clothes aye tearing; And oft they were of Nature complaining, For they their members lacked, foot and hand, With visage wry, and blind, I understand.

 

They lacked shape and beauty to prefer Themselves in love: and said that God and Kind Nature Had forged* them to worshippe the sterre,* fashioned **star Venus the bright, and leften all behind His other workes clean and out of mind: “For other have their full shape and beauty, And we,” quoth they, “be in deformity.”

 

And nigh to them there was a company,

That have the Sisters warray’d and missaid, I mean the three of fatal destiny, <38>

That be our workers: suddenly abraid, aroused Out gan they cry as they had been afraid; “We curse,” quoth they, “that ever hath Nature Y-formed us this woeful life t’endure.”

 

And there eke was Contrite, and gan repent, Confessing whole the wound that Cythere <39>

Had with the dart of hot desire him sent, And how that he to love must subject be: Then held he all his scornes vanity,

And said that lovers held a blissful life, Young men and old, and widow, maid, and wife.

 

“Bereave me, Goddess!” quoth he, “of thy might, My scornes all and scoffes, that I have No power for to mocken any wight

That in thy service dwell: for I did rave; This know I well right now, so God me save, And I shall be the chief post* of thy faith, *prop, pillar And love uphold, the reverse whoso saith.”

 

Dissemble stood not far from him in truth, With party* mantle, party hood and hose; *parti-coloured And said he had upon his lady ruth, pity And thus he wound him in, and gan to glose, Of his intent full double, I suppose:

In all the world he said he lov’d her weel; But ay me thought he lov’d her *ne’er a deal. never a jot*

 

Eke Shamefastness was there, as I took heed, That blushed red, and durst not be y-know She lover was, for thereof had she dread; She stood and hung her visage down alow; But such a sight it was to see, I trow, As of these roses ruddy on their stalk: There could no wight her spy to speak or talk In love’s art, so gan she to abash,

Nor durst not utter all her privity:

Many a stripe and many a grievous lash She gave to them that woulde lovers be, And hinder’d sore the simple commonalty, That in no wise durst grace and mercy crave, For were not she, they need but ask and have; but for her

 

Where if they now approache for to speak, Then Shamefastness returneth them again: turns them back

They think, “If we our secret counsel break, Our ladies will have scorn us certain, And peradventure thinke great disdain:”

Thus Shamefastness may bringen in Despair; When she is dead the other will be heir.

 

“Come forth Avaunter! now I ring thy bell!” <40>

I spied him soon; to God I make avow, confession He looked black as fiendes do in Hell: “The first,” quoth he, “that ever I did wow, woo *Within a word she came,* I wot not how, she was won with So that in armes was my lady free, a single word

And so have been a thousand more than she.

 

“In England, Britain,* Spain, and Picardy, Brittany Artois, and France, and up in high Holland, In Burgoyne, Naples, and in Italy, *Burgundy Navarre, and Greece, and up in heathen land, Was never woman yet that would withstand To be at my commandment when I wo’ld:

I lacked neither silver coin nor gold.

 

“And there I met with this estate and that; And her I broach’d, and her, and her, I trow: Lo! there goes one of mine; and, wot ye what?

Yon fresh attired have I laid full low; And such one yonder eke right well I know; I kept the statute <41> when we lay y-fere: together And yet* yon same hath made me right good cheer.” *also Thus hath Avaunter blowen ev’rywhere

All that he knows, and more a thousand fold; His ancestry of kin was to Lier, Liar For first he maketh promise for to hold His lady’s counsel, and it not unfold; —

Wherefore, the secret when he doth unshit, disclose Then lieth he, that all the world may wit. know For falsing so his promise and behest, trust I wonder sore he hath such fantasy;

He lacketh wit, I trow, or is a beast, That can no bet* himself with reason guy* better **guide By mine advice, Love shall be contrary To his avail,* and him eke dishonour, *advantage So that in Court he shall no more sojour. sojourn, remain “Take heed,” quoth she, this little Philobone, “Where Envy rocketh in the corner yond, yonder And sitteth dark; and ye shall see anon His lean body, fading both face and hand; Himself he fretteth,* as I understand devoureth (Witness of Ovid Metamorphoseos); <42>

The lover’s foe he is, I will not glose. gloss over “For where a lover thinketh *him promote, to promote himself*

Envy will grudge, repining at his weal; It swelleth sore about his hearte’s root, That in no wise he cannot live in heal; health And if the faithful to his lady steal, Envy will noise and ring it round about, And say much worse than done is, out of doubt.”

 

And Privy Thought, rejoicing of himself, —

Stood not far thence in habit marvellous; “Yon is,” thought I, “some spirit or some elf, His subtile image is so curious:

How is,” quoth I, “that he is shaded thus With yonder cloth, I n’ot* of what color?” know not And near I went and gan to lear and pore, to ascertain and gaze curiously*

And frained* him a question full hard. *asked “What is,” quoth I, “the thing thou lovest best?

Or what is boot* unto thy paines hard? *remedy Me thinks thou livest here in great unrest, Thou wand’rest aye from south to east and west, And east to north; as far as I can see, There is no place in Court may holde thee.

 

“Whom followest thou? where is thy heart y-set?

But *my demand assoil,* I thee require.” answer my question

“Me thought,” quoth he, “no creature may let hinder Me to be here, and where as I desire;

For where as absence hath out the fire, My merry thought it kindleth yet again, That bodily, me thinks, with *my sov’reign my lady*

 

“I stand, and speak, and laugh, and kiss, and halse; embrace So that my thought comforteth me full oft: I think, God wot, though all the world be false, I will be true; I think also how soft

My lady is in speech, and this on loft Bringeth my heart with joy and great gladness; This privy thought allays my heaviness.

 

“And what I think, or where, to be, no man In all this Earth can tell, y-wis, but I: And eke there is no swallow swift, nor swan So wight* of wing, nor half so yern** can fly; nimble *eagerly For I can be, and that right suddenly, In Heav’n, in Hell, in Paradise, and here, And with my lady, when I will desire.

 

“I am of counsel far and wide, I wot,

With lord and lady, and their privity

I wot it all; but, be it cold or hot,

They shall not speak without licence of me.

I mean, in such as seasonable* be, prudent Tho first the thing is thought within the heart, *when Ere any word out from the mouth astart.” escape And with the word Thought bade farewell and yede: went away Eke forth went I to see the Courte’s guise, And at the door came in, so God me speed, Two courtiers of age and of assise size Like high, and broad, and, as I me advise, The Golden Love and Leaden Love <43> they hight: were called The one was sad, the other glad and light.

 

At this point there is a hiatus in the poem, which abruptly ceases to narrate the tour of Philogenet and Philobone round the Court, and introduces us again to Rosial, who is speaking thus to her lover, apparently in continuation of a confession of love: “Yes! draw your heart, with all your force and might, To lustiness, and be as ye have said.”

 

She admits that she would have given him no drop of favour, but that she saw him “wax so dead of countenance;” then Pity “out of her shrine arose from death to life,” whisperingly entreating that she would do him some pleasance. Philogenet protests his gratitude to Pity, his faithfulness to Rosial; and the lady, thanking him heartily, bids him abide with her till the season of May, when the King of Love and all his company will hold his feast fully royally and well. “And there I bode till that the season fell.”

 

On May Day, when the lark began to rise, To matins went the lusty nightingale,

Within a temple shapen hawthorn-wise;

He might not sleep in all the nightertale, night-time But “Domine” <44> gan he cry and gale, call out “My lippes open, Lord of Love, I cry,

And let my mouth thy praising now bewry.” show forth The eagle sang “Venite,” <45> bodies all, And let us joy to love that is our health.”

And to the desk anon they gan to fall, And who came late he pressed in by stealth Then said the falcon, “Our own heartes’ wealth, ‘Domine Dominus noster,’ <46> I wot,

Ye be the God that do* us burn thus hot.” *make “Coeli enarrant,” <47> said the popinjay, parrot “Your might is told in Heav’n and firmament.”

And then came in the goldfinch fresh and gay, And said this psalm with heartly glad intent, “Domini est terra;” <48> this Latin intent, means The God of Love hath earth in governance: And then the wren began to skip and dance.

 

“Jube Domine; <49> O Lord of Love, I pray Command me well this lesson for to read; This legend is of all that woulde dey die Martyrs for love; God yet their soules speed!

And to thee, Venus, sing we, *out of dread, without doubt*

By influence of all thy virtue great,

Beseeching thee to keep us in our heat.”

 

The second lesson robin redbreast sang, “Hail to the God and Goddess of our lay!” law, religion And to the lectern amorously he sprang: “Hail now,” quoth be, “O fresh season of May, *Our moneth glad that singen on the spray! glad month for us that Hail to the flowers, red, and white, and blue, sing upon the bough*

Which by their virtue maken our lust new!”

 

The third lesson the turtle-dove took up, And thereat laugh’d the mavis* in a scorn: *blackbird He said, “O God, as might I dine or sup, This foolish dove will give us all a horn!

There be right here a thousand better born, To read