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Singing he was, or floyting[1] all the day,
He was as freshe, as is the moneth of May.
Short was his goune, with sleves long and wide;
Wel coude he sitte on hors, and fayre ride.
He coude songes make, and wel endite,
Juste[2] and eke dance, and wel pourtraie and write.
So hote he loved, that by nightertale[3]
He slep no more than doth the nightingale.
Curteis[4] he was, lowly, and servisable,
And carf[5] before his fader at the table.”
He was as freshe, as is the moneth of May.
Short was his goune, with sleves long and wide;
Wel coude he sitte on hors, and fayre ride.
He coude songes make, and wel endite,
Juste[2] and eke dance, and wel pourtraie and write.
So hote he loved, that by nightertale[3]
He slep no more than doth the nightingale.
Curteis[4] he was, lowly, and servisable,
And carf[5] before his fader at the table.”
My next specimen shall be taken from Sir John Fortescue’s Treatise on The Difference between an absolute and limited Monarchy.[6] He was probably born about the year that Chaucer died, and in the twentieth year of King Henry the Sixth (1441–2) was made Lord Chief Justice of England. Whether he composed this curious work before or after he retired into France with Prince Edward and his mother, after the battle of Tewksbury in 1471, has not been ascertained.
