And at the last, out of a grove faste by, A world of ladies; but, to tell aright Telle you a part, though I speake not of all. THE COURT OF LOVE. The Court of Love (date about 1500) is a poem of the Chaucerian school, containing many echoes of Chaucer, and making distinct reference to The Compleynte of Pite and The Legende of Goode Women. 'Philogenet, of Cambridge Clerk,' who, in the days of unreflecting Chaucerian criticism, was always supposed to represent the young Chaucer himself, repairs to the Court of Venus, where he finds Admetus and Alceste, the heroine of The Legende of Goode Women, with her 'ladies good nineteene' presiding over the Castle of Love. The Queen's handmaid Philobone takes him in charge and shows him the wonders of the place. He swears allegiance to the Twenty Statutes of Love, and is then introduced to the Lady Rosial, with whom he has already fallen in love in his dream, and whose presence inspires him with long protestations of devotion. Rosial is for the time obdurate, and sends him away again with Philobone to wait her pleasure. After a graphic description of the Courtiers of Love, an unequal but vigorous piece of writing, there appears to be a break in the poem, for we find ourselves suddenly in the middle of a tender speech of Rosial, who describes how Pite, risen from the shrine in which Philogenet had seen her buried within the temple of Venus, had softened her breast towards him. The poem ends with one of the favourite bird-scenes of the time, a curious paraphrase of the Matins for Trinity Sunday. This song in honour of Love, sung on May morning by a chorus of birds, should be compared with the last scenes of the Parlement of Foules. The first of the following extracts, a beautiful sketch of Privy Thought or Fancy, among the Courtiers of Love, is full of delicate imagination, and represents the author better than the tedious Statutes of Love, or the hymn to Venus, taken from Boethius, of which his master, Chaucer, had before him made more successful use. The second piece, which represents the close of the May festival, is so characteristic of the school of poetry and of the time, that it will bear quoting, in spite of its conventionality. And Prevye Thought, rejoycing of hym-self, How is,' quod I, 'that he is shaded thus And framed him a question full hard. There is no place in courte may holden the. 'Whom folowest thow? where is thy harte iset? But my demaunde asoile I thee require.' 3 'Me thoughte,' quod he, 'no creature may lette For where as absence hath don out the fire, 'I stand and speke, and laugh, and kisse, and halse', I think, God wot, though all the world be false, I wil be trewe; I think also how softe My lady is in speche, and this on-lofte Bryngeth myn harte in joye and grete gladnesse ; 'And what I thinke or where to be, no man And eke there nys no swalowe swifte, ne swan 1 know not. 2 remedy. absolve, solve. embrace. So wight of wyng, ne half so yerne can flye; In Heven, in Helle, in Paradise, and here, 'I am of councell ferre and wide, I wot, I wot it all; and be it cold or hoot, Tho first the thing is thought withyn the harte, And furth the cokkowe gan procede anon, Thus sange thay all the service of the feste, Eke eche at other threw the flourës brighte, The prymerose, the violet, and the golde; My lady gan me sodenly beholde, And with a trewe love, plited many-folde, She smote me thrugh the very harte as blive", And Venus yet I thanke I am alive. WILLIAM OR LANGLEY, LANGLAND. CONTEMPORANEOUSLY with Chaucer there lived and worked one of the most remarkable of our poets, of whom we know little or nothing except from his works. And even these have been so little studied by the generality of readers, that the singular mistake has arisen of confusing the name of the work with the name of the author. It is common to see references made to 'Piers Plowman' as if he were a writer living in the fourteenth century, which is no less confusing than if we should speak of Hamlet as flourishing in the reign of Elizabeth. Our author's name is not certainly known. That his Christian name was William there can be no doubt, though by some mistake he has sometimes been called Robert. In a note written on the fly-leaf of one of the Dublin MSS., in a hand of the fifteenth century, we are told that a certain Stacy de Rokayle, living at Shipton-under-Wychwood (about four miles from Burford in Oxfordshire), and holding land of Lord le Spenser, was the father of William de Langlond who wrote the book called Piers Plowman. The only difficulty about this testimony is the name Langland, which should rather, perhaps, be read as Langley; since the Langland family was at that date connected with Somersetshire, whilst there is actually a hamlet named Langley at no great distance from Shipton. By a careful study of the internal evidence afforded us by the poet's works, we can make out quite sufficient to give us a clear idea of the man. We gather, chiefly from his own words, that he was born about A.D. 1332, probably at Cleobury Mortimer in Shropshire. His father and his friends put him to school (possibly in the monastery at Great Malvern), made a clerk or scholar of him, and taught him what holy writ meant. In 1362, at the age of about thirty, he first began work upon the poem, which was to occupy him during a great part of his after life. The real subject of the poem is the religious and social condition of the poorer classes of England during the reigns of Edward III. and Richard II. His testimony is invested with a peculiar interest by the fact that he clearly knew what he was talking about. His own experience, and his own keen powers of observation provided him with an abundant supply of material. He saw the necessity of some reform, and endeavoured to realise in his own mind the person of the coming reformer. To this ideal person he gave the name of Piers the Plowman, to signify that great results can often be achieved by comparatively humble means; and perhaps as hinting, at the same time, that if the labouring classes were to expect any great improvement to take place in their condition, they had best consider what they could do to help themselves. As years wore on, William's supposed reformer seems to have become less actual to him, and assumed, as it were, a more spiritual form to his mind. At last he fully grasps the idea that it is better to turn from any expectation of a reformer to come to the contemplation of the Saviour who has come already. At this point, his mind seizes a bolder conception; he no longer describes Piers Plowman as he had done at first, as if he were no more than what was formerly called a head harvestman, giving directions to the reapers and sowing the corn himself that he might be sure it was sown properly; but he identifies him rather with the Good Samaritan, or personified Love, who is to be of more help to mankind than Faith as typified by Abraham, or than Hope as typified by Moses. The true Good Samaritan is He who told the parable of Himself; the Reformer is no other than Christ. When Christ became incarnate, He was like a warrior doing battle in another's cause, and wearing his arms and cognisance. He put on the armour of Piers the Plowman when He took upon Himself human nature; and His victory over death was the earnest of the deliverance of mankind from all miseries, and the beginning of the improvement of the condition of the lower orders. Such ideas as these form, in fact, a part of the author's own life; they are essentially an important chapter in his autobiography. In the first instance, he began his poem under the form of a Vision, which took at last the name of the Vision of Piers the Plowman; though it is rather a succession of visions, in some of which Piers is never seen at all. The poet describes himself as wandering on the Malvern Hills, where he falls asleep beside a murmuring brook, and dreams of a Field full of Folk, i.e. the world, of the Lady Holychurch who acts as his instructress, of the Lady Meed who corrupts justice and is ready to bribe even the |