wood he went on his play Of deer to have his game; He found a knight, where he lay In armés that were stout and gay, Y-slain and made full tame.

“That child did off the knightés wede, And anon he gan him schrede In that rich armoúr. When he haddé do that dede, To Glasténburý he gede, There lay the King Arthoúr.

“He knelde in the hall Before the knightés all, And grette hem with honoúr, And said: ‘Arthoúr, my lord, Grant me to speak a word, I pray thee, par amour.

“‘I am a child uncouth, And come out of the south, And would be made a knight, Lord, I pray thee nouthe, With thy merry mouthe, Grant me anon right.’

“Then said Arthoúr the king, ‘Anon, without dwelling, Tell me thy name aplight! For sethen I was ybore, Ne found I me before None so fair of sight.’

“That child said, ‘By Saint Jame, I not what is my name; I am the moré nis; But while I was at hame My mother, in her game, Clepéd me Beaufis.’

“Then said Arthoúr the king, ‘This is a wonder thing By God and Saint Denis! When he that would be knight Ne wot not what he hight, And is so fair of vis.

“‘Now will I give him a name Before you all in same, For he is so fair and free, By God and by Saint Jame, So clepéd him ne’er his dame, What woman so it be.

“‘Now clepéth him all of us, Li Beaus Disconus, For the love of me! Then may ye wite a rowe, ‘The Faire Unknowe,’  Certes, so hatté he.”

John Gower’s “Confessio Amantis” was a story book, like the Canterbury Tales, with a contrivance of its own for stringing the tales together, and Gower was at work on it nearly about the time when his friend Chaucer was busy with his Pilgrims. The story here extracted was an old favourite. It appeared in Greek about the year 800, in the romance of Barlaam and Josaphat. It was told by Vincent of Beauvais in the year 1290 in his “Speculum Historiale;” and it was used by Boccaccio for the first tale of the tenth day of his “Decameron.”

Chaucer, Gower, Lydgate were the old poetical triumvirate, though Lydgate, who was about thirty years old when Chaucer died, has slipped much out of mind. His verses on the adventures of the Kentish rustic who came to London to get justice in the law courts, and his words set to the action of an old piece of rustic mumming, “Bicorn and Chichevache,” here represent his vein of playfulness. He was a monk who taught 

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