Amenities of Literature Part 17

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Barrington's "Observations on the more ancient Statutes."

[2] For the general reader I fear that "The Visions of Piers Ploughman" must remain a sealed book. The last edition of Dr.

WHITAKER, the most magnificent and frightful volume that was ever beheld in the black letter, was edited by one whose delicacy of taste unfitted him for this homely task: the plain freedom of the vigorous language is sometimes castrated, with a faulty paraphrase and a slender glossary; and pa.s.sages are slurred over with an annihilating &c. Much was expected from this splendid edition; the subscription price was quadrupled, and on its publication every one would rid himself of the mutilated author. The editor has not a.s.sisted the reader through his barbarous text interspersed with Saxon characters and abbreviations, and the difficulties of an obscure and elliptical phraseology in a very antiquated language. Should ever a new edition appear, the perusal would be facilitated by printing with the white letter. There is an excellent specimen for an improved text and edition in "Gent. Mag.," April, 1834. [This improved text of the "Vision" and "Crede" has, since this note was originally written, been published with notes by T. Wright, M.A.; and has been again reprinted recently.]

OCCLEVE; THE SCHOLAR OF CHAUCER.

Warton pa.s.sed sentence on OCCLEVE as "a cold genius, and a feeble writer." A literary antiquary, from a ma.n.u.script in his possession, published six poems of Occleve; but that selection was limited to the sole purpose of furnishing the personal history of the author.[1]

Ritson's sharp snarl p.r.o.nounced that they were of "peculiar stupidity;"

George Ellis refused to give "a specimen;" and Mr. Hallam, with his recollection of the critical brotherhood, has decreed, that "the poetry of Occleve is wretchedly bad, abounding with pedantry, and dest.i.tute of grace or spirit." We could hardly expect to have heard any more of this doomed victim--this ancient man, born in the fourteenth century, standing before us, whose dry bones will ill bear all this shaking and cuffing.

A literary historian, who has read ma.n.u.scripts with the eagerness which others do the last novelty, more careful than Warton, and more discriminate than Ritson, has, with honest intrepidity, confessed that "OCCLEVE has not had his just share of reputation. His writings greatly a.s.sisted the growth of the popularity of our infant poetry."[2] Our historian has furnished from the ma.n.u.scripts of OCCLEVE testimonies of his a.s.sertion.

Among the six poems printed, one of considerable length exhibits the habits of a dissipated young gentleman in the fourteenth century.

OCCLEVE for more than twenty years was a writer in the Privy Seal, where we find quarter days were most irregular; and though briberies constantly flowed in, yet the golden shower pa.s.sed over the heads of the clerks, dropping nothing into the hands of these innocents.

Our poet, in his usual pa.s.sage from his "Chestres Inn by the Strond" to "Westminster Gate," by land or water--for "in the winter the way was deep," and "the Strand" was then what its name indicates--often was delayed by

The outward signe of Bacchus and his lure, That at his dore hangeth day by day, Exciteth Folk to taste of his moisture So often that they cannot well say Nay!

There was another invitation for this susceptible writer of the Privy Seal.

I dare not tell how that the fresh repair Of Venus femel, l.u.s.ty children dear, That so goodl, so shapely were, and fair, And so pleasant of port and of manere.

There he loitered,

To talk of mirth, and to disport and play.

He never "pinched" the taverners, the cooks, the boatmen, and all such gentry.

Among this many in mine audience, Methought I was ymade a man for ever-- So tickled me that nyce reverence, That it me made larger of dispence;-- For Riot payeth largely ever mo; He stinteth never till his purse be bare.

He is at length seized amid his jollities,

By force of the penniless maladie, Ne l.u.s.t[3] had none to Bacchus House to hie.

Fy! lack of coin departeth compaignie; And heve purse with Herte liberal Quencheth the thirsty heat of Hertes drie, Where chinchy Herte[4] hath thereof but small.

This "mirror of riot and excess" effected a discovery, and it was, that all the mischiefs which he recounts came from the high reports of himself which servants bring to their lord. The Losengour or pleasant flatterer was too lightly believed, and honied words made more harmful the deceitful error. Oh! babbling flattery! he spiritedly exclaims, author of all lyes, that causest all day thy lord to fare amiss. Such is the import of the following uncouth verse:--

Many a servant unto his Lord saith That all the world speaketh of him, Honour, When the contrarie of that is sooth in faith; And lightly leeved is this Losengour,[5]

His hony wordes wrapped in Errour, Blindly conceived been, the more harm is, O thou, FAVELE, of lesynges auctour,[6]

Causest all day thy Lord to fare amiss.

The Combre worldes;[7] 'clept been Enchantours In Bookes, as I have red----.

OCCLEVE was a shrewd observer of his own times. That this rhymer was even a playful painter of society we have a remarkable evidence preserved in the volume of his great master. "The Letter of Cupid," in the works of Chaucer, was the production of Occleve, and appears to have been overlooked by his modern critics. He had originally ent.i.tled it, "A Treatise of the Conversation of Men and Women in the Little Island of Albion." It is a caustic "polite conversation;" and deemed so execrably good, as to have excited, as our ancient critic Speght tells, "such hatred among the gentlewomen of the Court, that Occleve was forced to recant in that boke of his called 'Planetas Proprius.'"[8] The Letter of Cupid is thus dated:--

Written in the l.u.s.ty month of May, In our Paleis where many a million Of lovers true have habitation, The yere of grace joyfull and jocund, A thousand four hundred and second.

Imagery and imagination are not required in the school of society.

Occleve seems, however, sometimes to have told a tale not amiss, for WILLIAM BROWN, the pastoral bard, inserted entire a long story by old Occleve in his "Shepherd's Pipe." To us he remains sufficiently uncouth.

The language had not at this period acquired even a syntax, though with all its rudeness it was neither wanting in energy nor copiousness, from that adoption of the French, the Provencal, and the Italian, with which Chaucer had enriched his vein. The present writer seems to have had some notions of the critical art, for he requests the learned tutor of Prince Edward, afterwards Edward the Fourth, to warn him, when,--

Metring amiss;

and when

He speaks unsyttingly,[9]

Or not by just peys[10] my sentence weigh, And not to the order of enditing obey, And my colours set ofte sythe awry.

We might be curious to learn, with all these notions of the suitable, the weighty, the order of enditing, and the colours often awry, whether these versifiers had really any settled principles of criticism. Occleve is a vernacular writer, bare of ornament. He has told us that he knew little of "Latin nor French," though often counselled by his immortal master. His enthusiastic love thus exults:--

Thou wer't acquainted with Chaucer?--Pardie!

G.o.d save his soul!

The first finder of our faire langage!

There is one little circ.u.mstance more which connects the humble name of this versifier with that of Chaucer. His affectionate devotion to the great poet has been recorded by Speght in his edition of Chaucer.

"Thomas Occleve, for the love he bare to his master, caused his picture to be truly drawn in his book 'De Regimine Principis,' dedicated to Henry the Fifth." In this ma.n.u.script, with "fond idolatry," he placed the portraiture of his master facing an invocation. From this portrait the head on the poet's monument was taken, as well as all our prints. It bears a faithful resemblance to the picture of Chaucer painted on board in the Bodleian Library.[11] Had Occleve, with his feelings, sent us down some memorial of the poet and the man, we should have conned his verse in better humour; but the history of genius had not yet entered even into the minds of its most zealous votaries.[12]

FOOTNOTES:

[1] "_Poems by_ THOMAS HOCCLEVE, _never before printed, selected from a ma.n.u.script in the possession of George Mason, with a preface, notes, and glossary_," 1796. The notes are not amiss, and the glossary is valuable; but the verses printed by Mason are his least interesting productions. The poet's name is here written with an H, as it appeared in the ma.n.u.script; but there is no need of a modern editor changing the usual mode, because names were diversely written or spelt even in much later times. The present writer has been called not only _Occleve_, but _Occliffe_, as we find him in Chaucer's works.

[2] Turner's "History of England," v. 335.

[3] No desire.

[4] n.i.g.g.ardly heart.

[5] A Chaucerian word, which well deserves preservation in the language.

[6] FAVELL, author of "Lyes." FAVELL, the editor of Hoccleve, explains as _cajolerie_, or flattery, by words given by Carpentier in his supplement to "Du Cange." Pavel is personified by "Piers Ploughman," and in Skelton's "Bouge of Court." FAVELE in langue Romane is Flattery--hence _Fabel_, Fabling.--Roquefort's "Dictionnaire." The Italian FAVELLIO, parlerie, babil, caquet--Alberti's "Grand Dictionnaire"--does not wholly convey the idea of our modern _Humbug_, which combines _fabling_ and _caquet_.

[7] The enc.u.mbrances to the world. In another poem he calls death "that Coimbre-world." It was a favourite expression with him, taken from Chaucer. See "Warton," ii. 352, note.

[8] A t.i.tle which does not appear in the catalogue of his writings by Ritson, in his "Bibliographia Poetica."

[9] Unfittingly.

[10] Weight; probably from the French _poids_.

[11] It is in Royal MS. 17 D. 6. The best is in the Harleian MS.

4866. There is also a very curious full-length preserved in a single leaf of vellum, Sloane MS. 5141; which has been copied in Shaw's "Dresses and Decorations of the Middle Ages," vol. i.--ED.