bill. Up peine of cursing loke that thou be Now lord, quod she, Crist Jesu, king So wisly help me, as I ne may. Yes, quod this Sompnour, pay anon, let see, Twelf pens to me, and I wol thee acquite. I shal no profit han therby but lite: My maister hath the profit and not I. respectability, and I hold myself as firmly pledged to you, as you do yourself to me. We are to ride and prosper together. You are to take what people give you, and I am to take what I can get; and if the profits turn out to be unequal, we divide them.' "Quite right,' said the devil; and so they push forward. "The companions continued their way through the town, and were just quitting it, when the Summoner, pulling his bri dle as he reached a cottage-door, said, There's an old hag living here, who would almost as soon break her neck as part with a halfpenny. I'll get a shil ling out of her, for all that, though it drive her mad. She shall have a summons else, and that'll be worse for her. Not that she ever committed any offence, God knows. That's another business. But mark me now; and see what you must do if you would get any thing in these parts. be spilt. Alas! quod she, God wot, I have no Pay me, quod he, or by the swete As I wol bere away thy newe panne I paied at home for thy correction. Thou liest, quod she, by my salvation. Ne was I never or now, widew ne wif, Sompned unto your court in all my lif; Ne never I n'as but of my body trewe. Unto the devil rough and blake of hewe Yeve I thy body and my panne also. any scrape about my husband or any thing; nor ever summoned into your court in all my born days. Go to the devil yourself! May he take you and the pan together!' "The poor old soul fell on her knees as she uttered these words, in order to give the greater strength to the imprecation. 66 6 "Now, Mabel, good mother,' cried the devil, do you speak this in earnest ?' Ay, marry do I!' cried she. May and all!--that the devil fetch him, pan is, unless he repents.' "Repent!' exclaimed the Summoner. 'I'd sooner take every rag you have on your bones, you old reprobate!' "Now, brother,' said the devil, calm your feelings. I'm very sorry, but you must e'en go where the old woman desires. You and the pan are mine. We must arrive to night, and then you'll know more about us and all our craft than ever was discovered by Doctor of Divinity' "And with these words, sure enough, the devil carried him off. He took him to the place where summoners are in the habit of going." Queen's columns for the better hanging of the picture. It looks very The well, all things considered. quiet smile of Chaucer is well trans ferred to the modern frame; but a little of his natural pathos - those simple circumstances which he loved to introduce even into his merriest sketches-is, perhaps, wanting. The complaint of the old woman, that she had been sick "full many a day," is scarcely preserved in " the poor sick body" of the new version. The eye misses the long perspective of suffering, with the old cottage in the distance. The tale itself belongs to the lowest order of the poet's genius, being entirely wanting in his rural touches, and the gay colours of red skies, bloom, and sunshine. Perhaps he felt that the shadow of trees would be out of harmony with the utter and irreclaimable wickedness of his hero, for whom he provides a duskier background. The portrait of the Summoner, swelling with vice and blasphemy, is vividly drawn: his ignorance, also, is in keeping with his brutality; as, indeed, is generally seen in nature. So is his conceit. He is fond of enriching his conversation with Latin words, picked up from proceedings in the courts he represented. This story, like most of its companions, requires a running pen here and there. Warton remarked of Chaucer, that his writings altogether refute the vulgar notion of ages of simplicity being marked by purity. The grossness of rude periods is their luxury. Men are less ashamed as they are less polite. Enough has been said upon the wonderful accuracy of Chaucer's delineations of character; anticipating the novelists, as well as the poets. It seems, however, that the use of the word humour, indicating oddities of temperament, was not known in this sense before the time of Ben Jonson. Such, at least, is the opinion of Whalley, which Gifford echoed. About that period, the manners of a Play began to be called the humours. Jonson, who never wanted * Every Man out of his Humour. learning, defined the meaning and proper application of the word, and puts them into the mouth of Asper, in one of his elaborate comedies.* Humour has the property of fluids, that it cannot contain itself, always flowing to and fro; so with the passions, they are constantly in motion, and circulating through every part of the body. Hence the truth and force of the general metaphor, as illustrative of the tempers and dispositions of men : "As when some one peculiar quality Doth so possess a man that it doth draw All his effects, his spirits, and his powers, In their confluctions all to run one way, This may be truly said to be a humour." If Chaucer had not the name, he had the thing. The volume contains some good examples of Goldsmith, worthy to be named after Chaucer, for naturalness, liveliness, and truth; and concludes with Wolcot, the once notorious Peter Pindar,-a contemptible person, who always recalls to our memory the indignation of Plato against Homer's sacrilegious freedom with the gods, in making them give way to laughter. The mirth of Wolcot is of the lowest order,-the travestie of wit. Mr. Hunt prints his best and most unobjectionable performance, the versification of conversations between Mrs. Thrale and Boswell; this he calls masterly, for its facility and straightforwardness. "To compare great things with small, I can say that Lear does not more surely move me to tears, or Spenser charm me, than I am thrown into fits of laughter when I hear these rhyming Johnsoniana." We, who have less mirthfulness in us, and who have seen in the case of Marvell how easily Mr. Hunt is driven to hold both his sides, cannot quite echo this panegyric. But the descriptions are fine specimens of quizzing.† "Mad. Piozzi. In Lincolnshire, a lady shewed her friend A grotto, that she wish'd him to commend; Quoth she, How cool in summer this abode!' 'Yes, madam,' answered Johnson, 'for a toad!"" APPARITIONS, 231 INDEX TO VOL. XXXIV. Aristocracy of Rank: Is it the Aristo- Bach, John Sebastian, 28 Battle of Wagram, and Termination of Beagle's Discoveries in Australia, 105 Boar-Hunt in Brittany. By a Resident, Bohn's De Grammont, 603 Bowring, Dr. Contemporary Orators, Bright, Mr. Contemporary Orators, No. Brittany, A Boar-Hunt in. By a Resi- Brotherton, Major-General, and Colonel Brougham's Men of Letters and Science, 67 Cabinet, A Few Words about the, and Campaign of Prussia, Chap. I. 49 ; Chap. Campaign of Wagram, Chap. I. 283; Christie, Mr. William Dougal. Con- Clergyman, The Young Country, 686 Wood, 212; Mr. T. Milner Gibson, Cunningham (John) Life of the Strol- De Grammont, by Bohn, 603 "Ecrivain Public," a Sketch from Pa- Edith, Poems upon Little, 724 Etruria, The History of, 505. Second Ewart's (William, Esq. M.P.) Letter to Few Words about the Cabinet and Things Foster's (John) Life and Correspond- Foster (John) A Postscript about. Ina French Novel, Passages from an Un. Friedland, the Campaign of, 182 Lord-Mayor and Lord-Mayor's Day, 709 Mackinnon's (W. A.) History of Civilisa Madrid, Memoranda and Mementos of, Major-General Brotherton and Colonel Manners, Traditions, and Superstitions of Memoranda and Mementos of Madrid in Men of Letters and Science. By Lord Michel de Montaigne in the Cradle, the 61. Morgan Rattler on the Italian Opera, 85 National Education, 370 Nightmare on the Rails, 522 Of the Italian Opera. By Morgan On Revisiting the Sea-shore, 368 Parties, the State of, 118 Passages from an Unpublished French Personality and Politics; being a few Politics and Personality; being a few No. XI. Corn-Law Speakers, Pro and Con, |