PART IV.-EARLY BRITISH POETS.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES.

IN the infancy of all great nations, poetry is found to have preceded prose, and to have existed long before lettersthe bard was the chronicler and the historian. Laws were treasured up traditionally in metrical form, and permanence was given to the records of great events by the poetical effusions of the national minstrel, whose rhythmic chronicle, committed to the trusty memory of other bards, was thus handed down from generation to generation, till literature had its origin, and superseded tradition. In this way ancient ballads have preserved, through many generations, a partial record of important public occurrences, and of striking events in domestic history, though in most cases tradition has failed to preserve to us the names of the minstrels. The early written chronicles of England and Scotland are, in like manner, metrical histories. Geoffrey of Monmouth, Robert of Gloucester, Robert de Brunne, Wynton, and others of our rhyming chroniclers, are familiar to all students of early British history, though for the most part their verse includes little to engage the attention of the lover of ancient poetry. When Edward II. made his vain attempt on the liberties of Scotland, he took with him his poetical historian, Robert

Baston, a Carmelite friar, to celebrate his heroic deeds. The unfortunate minstrel was taken prisoner by the Scots on the defeat of his royal master, and, with amusing poetical justice, was compelled by Robert the Bruce to write a panegyric on the Scottish victor and the defeat of Edward, as the price of his ransom: a poem which still exists.

John Barbour, Archdeacon of Aberdeen, was the author of a metrical history, which we only know of from Wynton's notice of it in his later chronicles. But his biographical poem entitled "The Bruce," and containing the history of the two great heroes of Scottish independence, is still highly valued as a historical poem. We have also allusions scattered through various of those early chroniclers and poets, to others once highly esteemed, but whose works have long since perished; and occasional snatches of older poems are found in their pages, serving to indicate the probable beauty of many long lost songs and historical ballads.

In Wynton's Chronicle, for example, the following beautiful elegiac stanza is quoted, composed apparently by some contemporary bard, on the death of Alexander III. of Scotland in 1285:

When Alexander our king was dead,

That Scotland led in love and lee,

Away was sons of ale and bread,

Of wine and wax, of gamyn and glee:

Our gold was changed into lead.

Christ! born into virginity,
Succour Scotland, and remede,

That stad is in perplexity.

More recently, Bishop Percy, Ritson, Burns, Scott, and many others, have collected together the traditional songs and ballads of England and Scotland, belonging to many

different periods of the past, and have thus given permanency to the fleeting records of ancient poetry, and the works of many nameless but not ignoble bards. Yet notwithstanding the beauty of some of these early minstrels' songs, and the interest which attaches to others of the more elaborate chronicles, it is not without reason that Chaucer is designated "The Father of English Poetry," or, as Campbell styles him :

Chaucer! our Helicon's first fountain stream,
Our morning star of song, that led the way

To welcome the long-after coming beam

Of Spenser's lights, and Shakspeare's perfect day.

GEOFFREY CHAUCER,

BORN, 1328; DIED, 1400.

ABOUT as little is known concerning the personal history of "The Father of English Poetry," as of that of his great successor, Shakspeare. The contemporaries of both knew as much of them as they cared to ascertain, and had little thought of the deep interest with which posterity would seek in vain for more. We learn from himself that he was born in London, and that he received part of his education at Cambridge. A tradition also exists that he studied at Oxford under the celebrated Wickliffe, when the illustrious reformer was warden of Canterbury College. It is also believed that he went to Paris and studied there for a time at its celebrated university. His family appears to have been of some standing; and he is early found the recipient of court favour. His first post was that of valet or yeoman of the palace of Edward III., from which he

enjoyed an annuity of twenty marks. His next appoint ment was that of comptroller of the small customs of wine in the port of London, and of the custom of wood; but with the provision that he was to perform the duties of his office in person, and not by substitute. He was a special favourite of the celebrated John of Gaunt, from whom he received in marriage Philippa Rouet, a near connection of his patron; and through his patronage the poet became a favourite at court, and obtained appointments which enabled him to live in affluence. He was thereafter despatched on successive embassies to Genoa and Rome.

In the succeeding reign he was involved in the civil and religious troubles of the time, and, having favoured the doctrines of Wickliffe, he had to fly to the Continent. On his return, he was thrown into the Tower, and deprived of his offices. He afterwards recovered the royal favour so far as to obtain new grants from Richard II., which were subsequently confirmed by his successor; but there is reason to fear that his latter days were embittered by difficulties and privations. He died in Westminster, in a house which is believed to have stood on the site of Henry VII.'s chapel; and was buried in the south transept of Westminster Abbey-the first of England's poets laid in that spot which has since been the restingplace of the majority of his most worthy successors, as well as the site of the commemorative memorials of others, whose great names justify its title of the "Poets' Corner."

Chaucer is not merely great, as the first in point of time, and by influence of example, among our poets; but he justly ranks as one of the greatest of them, and is still fitly named along with Spenser, Shakspeare, and Milton—

four poets such as no other country can equal.

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"His

original works," says Southey, are distinguished by a life, and strength, and vivacity, which nothing but original genius, and that of the highest order, can impart. Whoever aspires to a lasting name among the English poets, must go to the writings of Chaucer, and drink at the well-head." Like other early writers, and especially Boccacio, who supplied so many of the tales of the poets, he is occasionally impure and indelicate; and this moral blemish on his great works occasioned himself much grief as his life drew near a close. He is said to have repeatedly cried out, when on his death-bed, "Woe is me, that I cannot recall and annul these things!"

Along with Chaucer, the name of his contemporary, JOHN GOWER, has been coupled from very early times. The precise date of his birth is unknown, and we are nearly destitute of any materials for the history of his life. After surviving Chaucer two years, he was buried in the Church of St. Mary Overy, in Southwark, to the rebuilding of which he was a liberal contributor; and his curious tomb still forms one of the most interesting features of that ancient church. His "Florent" is generally believed to have been the source of Chaucer's "Wife of Bath's Tale." But, curiously enough, Gower's early French ballads surpass in poetic beauty and elegance any of his later compositions in his native language.

"fathers

Though these two are not unjustly styled the of English poetry," the period which immediately succeeded was singularly barren in all fruits of poetic genius in England; and it is among the poets of Scotland that we must look for those who received the lyre from the hand of Chaucer, and maintained its musical powers during the unpropitious era of upwards of a century,