Lectures On The English Poets William Hazlitt

28
That he had lerned out of som decree;
No wonder is, he heard it all the day.--
In danger hadde he at his owen gise
The yonge girles of the diocise,
And knew hir conseil, and was of hir rede.
A gerlond hadde he sette upon his hede
As gret as it were for an alestake:
A bokeler hadde he made him of a cake.
With him ther rode a gentil Pardonere--
That hadde a vois as smale as hath a gote."
It would be a curious speculation (at least for those who think that
the characters of men never change, though manners, opinions, and
institutions may) to know what has become of this character of the
Sompnoure in the present day; whether or not it has any technical
representative in existing professions; into what channels and conduits
it has withdrawn itself, where it lurks unseen in cunning obscurity, or
else shews its face boldly, pampered into all the insolence of office,
in some other shape, as it is deterred or encouraged by circumstances.
_Chaucer's characters modernised_, upon this principle of historic
derivation, would be an useful addition to our knowledge of human
nature. But who is there to undertake it?
The descriptions of the equipage, and accoutrements of the two kings
of Thrace and Inde, in the Knight's Tale, are as striking and grand, as
the others are lively and natural:
"Ther maist thou se coming with Palamon
Licurge himself, the grete king of Trace:
Blake was his berd, and manly was his face,
The cercles of his eyen in his hed
They gloweden betwixen yelwe and red,
And like a griffon loked he about,
With kemped heres on his browes stout;
His limmes gret, his braunes hard and stronge,
His shouldres brode, his armes round and longe
And as the guise was in his contree,
Ful highe upon a char of gold stood he,
With foure white bolles in the trais.
Instede of cote-armure on his harnais,
With nayles yelwe, and bright as any gold,