true romance which goes by his name; and people were soon busy "unrhyming " recent verse work. The director of the anchoresses himself, as we have seen, thinks it equally probable that they may have read English or French books of devotion, and these must pretty surely have been in prose. The first of the great French prose Arthurian romances, even if not so old as they did seem to most critics not long ago, and still seem to some, were not to be long in coming. From the thirteenth century itself onward there were undoubtedly French models before English prose-writers, though even at the end of it—even at the beginning of the next-the unripeness of the language and its subjection to the general law of “verse first, prose afterwards" make Robert of Gloucester and Robert of Brunne choose the former rather than the latter as their implement in the task of recovering History for English. Manning's original had actually employed French verse in preference to English prose. Let us therefore see what French prose, in this its earliest stage, had to offer to the new pupil for which it was doing so much in verse, and which yet was showing so much independence in its discipleship. But for this purpose we had better start a new chapter, all the more so that almost our sole predecessor, Mr. Earle, has relinquished Chaucer and Mandeville, if not Wyclif, to "the beneficial effect of French culture "-it is French culture that has " improved the habit of the native prose."1

Voyons!

1 Some readers will no doubt say, "Where is Hampole?" My copies of Horstmann's Hampoliana would show a fair, and fairly long, acquaintance with him. But the difficulties of dates and personalities are great; and I doubt whether, in prose, anything attributable to him with any certainty would do us much good. The general remarks of this chapter apply,—though there are beautiful passages.

CHAPTER IV

a school language.

FROM CHAUCER TO MALORY

English made a school language-The four prosemen of the late fourteenth century-Wyclif-The Tracts and Sermons-The translation of the Bible-Trevisa-Sir John MandevilleChaucer His various prose pieces-Their somewhat neglected importance The Parson's Tale-The Tale of Melibee-Its blank verse-The Astrolabe-The Boethius-The fifteenth century-Its real importance-Pecock and the RepressorHis syntax-His compound equivalents-The Paston Letters— Malory His prose and the earlier verse Morte-Guinevere's last meeting with Lancelot-The Lancelot dirge-The Throwing of Excalibur-His devices-His excellence a rather lonely one-Berners-Style of his romance translations-And contrast

of their Prefaces-Fisher.

English made THE historical circumstances which helped, if they did not wholly cause, the second stage of Middle English Literature, and thereby produced, in effect, the first stage of Modern, are, or ought to be, well known. Mere political history-the severance of England and France as kingdoms, and the greater and greater Anglification 1 of the kings and nobles of England-had much to do with Social and educational changes had perhaps not a The famous passage of John of Trevisa-himself

it.
little.

2

1 It is doubted, seemingly on good grounds, whether Richard Cœur de Lion knew any English at all; and Jocelyn of Brakelonde in the passage noted above (p. 44) seems to be rather more surprised that Abbot Samson could read English than that he could speak it. In fact, it would be not a little interesting to know what English books Samson did read and could have had to read.

2 Whether part of this is repeated from others does not matter; but the text should be given, from Morris and Skeat's Specimens:

"Pys manere was moche y-vsed to-fore pe furste moreyn, & ys seþthe somdel

one of the remarkable group of English prose-writers who adorn the latter part of the fourteenth century—explains these latter in all detail-the disuse, about the time of the Black Death, of the older practice of employing French as the medium of teaching and translation in schools, and the substitution for it of English, wherewith is associated, and should be handed down for honour to all ages, the name of John Cornwall, schoolmaster.

That this might or must, in itself, stimulate writing in English for ordinary purposes may be self-evident; but some people may be not unreasonably inclined to ask whether it would not rather repress than stimulate that further blending of Romance and Teutonic vocabulary which has been repeatedly pointed out as being the indispensable preliminary to real accomplishment in the language. A little thought, however, will show that this is a mistake—that the wider range of subjects dealt with necessitated a wider vocabulary, and that English, freed from its inferior position, was sure to anglicise the numerous French words that it was forced to borrow.

the late

century

not Wyclif.

The quartette above referred to, and composed, besides The four Chaucer and Trevisa, of Wyclif and of the persona (if not prosemen of personality) of "Sir John Mandeville," were all, for fourteenth literary purposes, so nearly contemporary that it does matter which is taken first as far as chronology goes. In point of subject and perhaps of date, though not of literary ychaunged. For Iohan Cornwal, a mayster of gramere, chayngede pe lore in gramer-scole, & construccion of Freynsch in-to Englysch; & Richard Pencrych lurnede þat manere techyng of hym, & oþer men of Pencrych; so þat now, þe 3er of oure Lord a pousond þre hondred foure score & fyue, of þe secunde kyng Richard after þe conquest nyne, in al þe gramer-scoles of Engelond childern leuep Frensch & construep & lurneþ an Englysch, and habbeþ þer-by avauntage in on syde & desavauntage yn anoper; here avauntage ys, þat a lurneþ here gramer yn lasse tyme pan childern wer ywoned to do-disavauntage ys, þat now childern of gramer-scole connep no more Frensch pan can here lift heele, & þat ys harm for ham, & a scholle passe pe se & trauayle in strange londes, & in meny caas also. Also gentil men habbep now moche yleft for to teche here childern Frensch. Hyt semep a gret wondur hou3 Englysch, þat ys be burptonge of Englysch men & here oune longage & tonge, ys so dyuers of soun in bis ylond; & pe longage of Normandy ys comlyng of a-noþer lond, & haþ on maner soun among al men þat spekeþ hyt ary3t in Engelond. Nopeles per ys as meny dyuers maner Frensch yn be rem of Fraunce as ys dyuers manere Englysch in þe rem of Engelond."

The Tracts

1

importance, Wyclif may have precedence. He deserves, however, the less notice, because he did not write his purely philosophical works in English, and because the works which he did write in English were mainly of the same class as those which we considered in the last chapter, though a little more popularly scholastic in style. To call him "the first writer of English prose" is merely an unconscious aposiopesis, and an equally unconscious confession of ignorance. If there be added to it, "of whom the writer or speaker ever heard," it might, no doubt, be admitted pro tanto. The tracts attributed to, and certainly in some cases written by, Wyclif show, as one might expect, a certain advance in facility of handling, and, as one would expect, a certain greater advance still in violence. All bad language has a positive tendency to vivacity, though also to monotony. I do not know whether any German or English "enumerator" has ever counted the number of times the word "cursed" occurs in Wyclif's tracts. And the abundance, enthusiasm, and popularity of Wyclif's wandering preachers must have done something for our speech. But "father of English prose" is, as applied to him, one of the silliest of these usually silly expressions, and is perhaps most frequent in the mouths of those who also consider him-and perhaps really mean by it" father of English Protestantism." However, from a person with such a reputation, if not such a record, some specimen should doubtless be given, especially as he might, without any absurdity, be called father of English philosophical prose, even with the caution above. Here is a passage of an argumentative kind: 2

Nisi granum frumenti.-JOHN xii. 24.

In this short Gospel be doubts, both of conscience and of other. and Sermons. First philosophers doubt, whether (the) seed loseth his form when it is made a new thing, as the Gospel speaketh here; and some men think nay, for sith the same quantity or quality or virtue

1 Select English Works of Wyclif, 3 vols. (1869-1871), ed. T. Arnold. Wyclif's English Works [not included in the above], ed. Matthew (E. E.T.S.). 2 From this point onwards, with a few exceptions, the extracts are modernised in spelling, on the principle adopted in Sir H. Craik's Selections (v. Preface).

that was first in seed, liveth after in the fruit, as a child is often like to his father or to his mother, or else to his eld father, after that the virtue lasteth,—and sith all these be accidents, that may not dwell without subject,-it seemeth that the same body is first seed and after fruit, and thus it may oft change from seed to fruit and again. Here many cleped philosophers glaver [claver, chatter] diversely; but in this matter God's law speaketh thus, as did eld clerks, that the substance of a body is before that it be seed, and now fruit and now seed, and now quick and now dead. And thus many forms must be together in one thing, and specially when the parts of that thing be meddled together; and thus the substance of a body is now of one kind and now of another. And so both these accidents, quality and quantity, must dwell in the same substance, all if it be changed in kinds, and thus this same thing that is now a wheat corn shall be dead and turn to grass, and after to many corns. But variance in words in this matter falleth to clerks, and showing of equivocation, the which is more ready in Latin; but it is enough to us to put, that the same substance is now quick and now dead, and now seed and now fruit; and so that substance that is now a wheat corn must needs die before that it is made grass, and sith be made an whole ear. And thus speaketh holy writ and no man can disprove it. Error of freres in this matter is not here to rehearse, for it is enough to tell how they err in belief.

This, of course, is very far from contemptible; indeed, it is distinctly good. Still, we can as distinctly perceive the man thinking in Latin and translating as closely as

he can. Even the English order he does not always keep, as in the last sentence, "Error of freres," etc. "The which is more ready in Latin" is a phrase of further reach than its author intended.

If any one wishes to appreciate further the value of the translations of the Bible by Wyclif and his followers1 as regards English prose style and rhythm, the process is facilitated for him by Bosworth's parallel edition of the Gothic, Anglo-Saxon, and Wyclifian Gospels, with Tyndale's to fill the fourth place. The enormous advance made by the latter must be, in fairness, postponed till we come to its luckless author; and with Ulphilas we 1 The distribution of the work between Wyclif, Hereford, Purvey, etc., would, in any case, hardly concern us much; but as the gospels are almost nem. con. attributed to the Master himself, it becomes practically irrelevant. But Purvey did certainly improve on that master's rhythm. The great edition of Forshall and Madden must, of course, be consulted by any one who wants to investigate the subject; but there are excellent specimens in Morris and Skeat, the latter of whom has also reprinted Job and the Psalms (Clarendon Press).