Page:Essays and studies; by members of the English Association, volume 1.djvu/98

Troilus, the Knight's Tale, and the Franklin's Tale have been pointed out by Professor Skeat.^[1] There may be added borrowings from Chaucer's Shipman, in the prologue^[2] to the Tales, used to shape the Red Reivar of Wallace.

Mr. Brown first showed that the alliterative Morte Arthure of Huchown (Sir Hew of Eglintoun) was drawn upon for passages descriptive of a voyage,^[3] for the lament over Sir John the Graham,^[4] and much more questionably for possible touches in Wallace's dream.^[5] To these, additions may be made. A romance attribute of great heroes, for example, of the Cid,^[6] is that their very aspect overawes and abases their enemy when they meet him in conference. This is used in Morte Arthure and followed in Wallace.^[7] In Morte Arthure Watling Street is mentioned with curious particularity, and in the Wallace the mariner Jop was familiar with it^[8]—the way

Fra Carleill throucht Sandwich that ryoll stede (vi. 305). The arming of Arthur in Morte Arthure is imitated^[9] in the arming of Wallace. Distinct allusion is made in the Wallace to the St. Michael's Mount episode^[10] of Morte Arthure: there

1. Professor Skeat in Modern Language Quarterly, November, 1897, followed and extended by Mr. Brown in Wallace and Bruce Restudied, pp. 42–5. Passages cited include Troilus, ii. 99, 105 (Wallace, vii. 191–2), Knight's Tale, 2135, 2450–69, 2466, 2466 (Wallace, ix. 1922, vii. 175–95, 183, 189), Franklin's Tale, prol. 716–28 (Wallace, xi. 1461–63). For Wallace, xi. 1451–2, cf. also Kingis Quair, 194.
2. Canterbury Tales, prologue, 399–400, Wallace, vi. 303, ix. 91, 210, x. 822.
3. Morte Arthure, 740–52, Wallace, ix. 47–58,Wallace and Bruce Restudied, 34–40.
4. Morte Arthure, 3951–63, Wallace, x. 561–70.
5. Morte Arthure, 3358–9, &c., Wallace, vii. 75–6, &c.
6. Southey's Chronicle, bk. ix. chap. 10, El Romancero del Cid (ed. 1870), part iv. No. 70.
7. Morte Arthure, 116–36, Wallace, vi. 881.
8. Morte Arthure, 447, 450, 476, 482, Wallace, vi. 305.
9. Morte Arthure, 900–30, Wallace, viii. 1177–1210.
10. Morte Arthure, 1213–4, Wallace, viii. 886.