understanding of men and women; and, though something of the lengthy tediousness of the old romance still remains, the story is told with a consummate delicacy and skill that make it worthy of a great master of English narrative verse.

Chaucer Becomes Poor, 1386. But a change in Chaucer's fortunes was at hand. So far his success as

a courtier had given him many opportunities which proved of advantage to him in his art. He had learned from prosperity, he was now to feel the discipline of another teacher. In 1386, the same year in which he had entered Parliament, he was suddenly reduced to comparative poverty. Edward III, who had done so much for Chaucer, had died some years before this; and, during the minority of Richard II, now one and now another of the young King's uncles gained the chief power. Chaucer was among those who lost their government positions as a result of this political change. Among Chaucer's minor poems is a group of ballads in which he meditates upon the fickleness of Fortune, upon contentment in adversity, on the vanity of wealth without nobleness, and on kindred themes. It is highly probable that we have in these poems an indication of the spirit in which Chaucer met his misfortunes. The tone of these ballads is brave, sensible, and manly; they bring before us a man of sweet and kindly nature, sustained by religion, philosophy, and a sense of humor, who is able to take "fortune's buffets and rewards " with "equal thanks." "No man," he says, "is wretched unless he chooses to think himself so,"

"And he that hath himself hath sufficiance."

The little poem the Ballad of Good Counseil, or Truth, seems to bring Chaucer very close to us:

"Forth, pilgrim, forth! Forth, beste, out of thy stal!

Know thy contree, look up, thank God of all;

Hold the hye wey, and lat thy gost thee lede:

And trouthe shal delivere, it is no drede."

The Canterbury Tales. In these years of financial stress and "litel besinesse" Chaucer is supposed to have turned his leisure to good account and found rest" in composing the greater part of his Canterbury Tales

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(1386-91?), the crowning work of his life. The Canterbury Tales consists of a number of separate stories supposed to be told by the various members of a company of pilgrims, journeying together to the tomb of St. Thomas à Becket at Canterbury. In a general prologue we are told how these pilgrims met at the Tabard Inn in Southwark, the district opposite to London on the other side of the Thames; how they agreed to be fellow-travelers; how the jolly inn-keeper, "Harry

Bailly," proposed that each pilgrim should tell two tales on the way to Canterbury and two returning. There are, by way of interlude, prologues to the several stories thus told, which bind the whole series more firmly together and recall to us the general design.

Chaucer's work is founded on a pilgrimage, one of the characteristic and familiar features of the life of the time. With rare tact he has selected one of the few occasions which brought together in temporary good-fellowship men and women of different classes and occupations. He is thus able to paint the moving life of the world about him in all its breadth and variety; he can give to stories told by such chance-assorted companions a dramatic character and contrast, making Knight, Priest, or Miller reveal himself in what he relates.

The chief interest of the Prologue lies in the freshness and truth with which each member of the little party of pilgrims is set before us. As one after another of that immortal procession passes by, the intervening centuries are forgotten, and we ourselves seem fourteenth-century pilgrims riding with the rest. It is a morning in the middle of April as we with the jolly company, thirty-two in all, with our host of the Tabard, Harry Bailly, as "governor," pass out of the square courtyard of the inn and take the highroad toward Canterbury. The freshness of the spring is all about us; showers and sunshine and soft winds have made the budding world beautiful in tender green, and the joy of the sweet season in the hearts of innumerable birds makes them put their gladness into song. This time, when the sap mounts in the trees, and the world is new-charged with the love of life, fills us with restless desires and the spirit of adventure:

"Thanne longen folk to gon on pilgrimages."

Our little company is made up of men and women of many sorts and conditions. Chivalry is represented by the Knight and the Squire. The Knight has been in fifteen battles, but he is plainly dressed, for he is modest and brave. The young Squire, on the other hand, with his curled hair and embroidered dress, is as fresh as the month of May. The Knight has a single attendant, dressed in the green of the forester, and bearing a mighty bow. Various typical personages suggest the ecclesiastical life of the time. There is a coy and smiling Prioress, who affects court manners; a fat Monk, a begging Friar, and a Parish Priest, faithful and patient. Law, medicine, and learning, too, as well as many of the humbler trades or occupations, have their representatives. Last of all is the poet himself, noting with twinkling eyes every trick of costume, and looking through all to the soul beneath. In this truly wonderful group the moving and varied life of Chaucer's England survives in all its bloom and freshness, in the vital power of its intense humanity. Student of books as Chaucer was, and teller of old tales, we see here and elsewhere the shrewd observer and interpreter of life and character, the man with the poet's gift of fresh and independent vision.

As we have said, the several stories in the Canterbury Tales are dramatic studies as well as masterpieces of narrative, as each narrator unconsciously reveals something of his own character in the tale he tells. Thus the Knight's Tale is steeped in the golden atmosphere of chivalry, and the gorgeous description of the tournament sparkles and glitters with the luster of that romantic and knightly world. Yet the "Knight's Tale" is not wholly medieval. The luxurious beauty of the description of the temple of Venus seems to breathe the spirit of beautiful and pagan

Italy. The Knight takes us into his world of the gentles; so the drunken Miller, a consummate example of obtuse vulgarity, brutally strong and big of brawn and bones, incidentally acquaints us with life as he knows it; while the dainty Prioress, speaking from her sheltered nook of pious meditation, tells her tender story of a miracle.

Among the most beautiful of the tales are those told by the Clerk and the Man of Law, two stories that in some respects may be placed together. Both reveal Chaucer's deep reserve of gentleness and compassion; both reveal his reverential love of goodness; both bring before us, as the central figure, a patient and holy woman, unjustly treated and bearing all wrongs and griefs with meek submission.

In the Middle Ages it was not customary to invent new plots, and Chaucer, like many another poet, translated or adapted old stories gathered from many sources

French, Italian, or Latin. Critics have discovered the sources of many of the Canterbury Tales, and it is quite possible that none of them was entirely original with Chaucer. But Chaucer, the teller of the Canterbury Tales, was not an imitator or translator, but a new creative force. Chaucer's originality became more pronounced as his genius matured. As we read his masterpieces we feel that he painted from life, and that, whether he borrowed from France or from Italy, he made a style of his own, breathing into it the breath of his own spirit.

Chaucer's Last Years. On the accession of Henry IV in 1399, the son of Chaucer's old patron, John of Gaunt, the poet's fortunes again improved. Chaucer lost no time in bringing his poverty to the notice of the King, by sending him a humorous little poem, the Complaint of his Empty Purse. It was evidently in response to this appeal that Henry promptly granted a pension of forty marks a year to his father's old protégé. But