The Canterbury Tales [300]
loveliness and virtue, for which three male eagles advance contending claims. The disputation lasts all day; and at evening the assembled birds, eager to be gone with their mates, clamour for a decision. The tercelet, the goose, the cuckoo, and the turtle -- for birds of prey, water-fowl, worm-fowl, and seed-fowl respectively -- pronounce their verdicts on the dispute, in speeches full of character and humour; but Nature refers the decision between the three claimants to the female eagle herself, who prays that she may have a year's respite. Nature grants the prayer, pronounces judgment accordingly, and dismisses the assembly; and after a chosen choir has sung a roundel in honour of the Goddess, all the birds fly away, and the poet awakes. It is probable that Chaucer derived the idea of the poem from a French source; Mr Bell gives the outline of a fabliau, of which three versions existed, and in which a contention between two ladies regarding the merits of their respective lovers, a knight and a clerk, is decided by Cupid in a Court composed of birds, which assume their sides according to their different natures. Whatever the source of the idea, its management, and the whole workmanship of the poem, especially in the more humorous passages, are essentially Chaucer's own.]
THE life so short, the craft so long to learn, Th'assay so hard, so sharp the conquering, The dreadful joy, alway that *flits so yern;* *fleets so fast* All this mean I by* Love, that my feeling *with reference to Astoneth* with his wonderful working, *amazes So sore, y-wis, that, when I on him think, Naught wit I well whether I fleet* or sink, *float
For *all be* that I know not Love indeed, *albeit, although* Nor wot how that he *quiteth folk their hire,* *rewards folk for Yet happeth me full oft in books to read their service* Of his miracles, and of his cruel ire; There read I well, he will be lord and sire; I dare not saye, that his strokes be sore; But God save such a lord! I can no more.
Of usage, what for lust and what for lore, On bookes read I oft, as I you told. But wherefore speak I alle this? Not yore Agone, it happed me for to behold Upon a book written with letters old; And thereupon, a certain thing to learn, The longe day full fast I read and yern.* *eagerly
For out of the old fieldes, as men saith, Cometh all this new corn, from year to year; And out of olde bookes, in good faith, Cometh all this new science that men lear.* *learn But now to purpose as of this mattere: To reade forth it gan me so delight, That all the day me thought it but a lite.* *little while
This book, of which I make mention, Entitled was right thus, as I shall tell; "Tullius, of the Dream of Scipion:" <1> Chapters seven it had, of heav'n, and hell, And earth, and soules that therein do dwell; Of which, as shortly as I can it treat, Of his sentence I will you say the great.* *important part
First telleth it, when Scipio was come To Africa, how he met Massinisse, That him for joy in armes hath y-nome.* *taken <2> Then telleth he their speech, and all the bliss That was between them till the day gan miss.* *fail And how his ancestor Africane so dear Gan in his sleep that night to him appear.
Then telleth it, that from a starry place How Africane hath him Carthage y-shew'd, And warned him before of all his grace, <3> And said him, what man, learned either lewd,* *ignorant That loveth *common profit,* well y-thew'd, *the public advantage* He should unto a blissful place wend,* *go Where as the joy is without any end.
Then asked he,* if folk that here be dead *i.e. the younger Scipio Have life, and dwelling, in another place? And Africane said, "Yea, withoute dread;"* *doubt And how our present worldly lives' space Meant but a manner death, <4>
THE life so short, the craft so long to learn, Th'assay so hard, so sharp the conquering, The dreadful joy, alway that *flits so yern;* *fleets so fast* All this mean I by* Love, that my feeling *with reference to Astoneth* with his wonderful working, *amazes So sore, y-wis, that, when I on him think, Naught wit I well whether I fleet* or sink, *float
For *all be* that I know not Love indeed, *albeit, although* Nor wot how that he *quiteth folk their hire,* *rewards folk for Yet happeth me full oft in books to read their service* Of his miracles, and of his cruel ire; There read I well, he will be lord and sire; I dare not saye, that his strokes be sore; But God save such a lord! I can no more.
Of usage, what for lust and what for lore, On bookes read I oft, as I you told. But wherefore speak I alle this? Not yore Agone, it happed me for to behold Upon a book written with letters old; And thereupon, a certain thing to learn, The longe day full fast I read and yern.* *eagerly
For out of the old fieldes, as men saith, Cometh all this new corn, from year to year; And out of olde bookes, in good faith, Cometh all this new science that men lear.* *learn But now to purpose as of this mattere: To reade forth it gan me so delight, That all the day me thought it but a lite.* *little while
This book, of which I make mention, Entitled was right thus, as I shall tell; "Tullius, of the Dream of Scipion:" <1> Chapters seven it had, of heav'n, and hell, And earth, and soules that therein do dwell; Of which, as shortly as I can it treat, Of his sentence I will you say the great.* *important part
First telleth it, when Scipio was come To Africa, how he met Massinisse, That him for joy in armes hath y-nome.* *taken <2> Then telleth he their speech, and all the bliss That was between them till the day gan miss.* *fail And how his ancestor Africane so dear Gan in his sleep that night to him appear.
Then telleth it, that from a starry place How Africane hath him Carthage y-shew'd, And warned him before of all his grace, <3> And said him, what man, learned either lewd,* *ignorant That loveth *common profit,* well y-thew'd, *the public advantage* He should unto a blissful place wend,* *go Where as the joy is without any end.
Then asked he,* if folk that here be dead *i.e. the younger Scipio Have life, and dwelling, in another place? And Africane said, "Yea, withoute dread;"* *doubt And how our present worldly lives' space Meant but a manner death, <4>