became the fashion for men of all classes to go on pilgrimages to his
tomb. As robbers infested the highways, the pilgrims usually waited at
some inn until there was a sufficient band to resist attack. In time
the journey came to be looked on as a holiday, which relieved the
monotony of everyday life. About 1385 Chaucer probably went on such a
pilgrimage. To furnish amusement, as the pilgrims cantered along, some
of them may have told stories. The idea occurred to Chaucer to write a
collection of such tales as the various pilgrims might have been
supposed to tell on their journey. The result was the _Canterbury
Tales_.

Characters in the Tales.--Chaucer's plan is superior to Boccaccio's;
for only the nobility figure as story-tellers in the _Decameron_,
while the Canterbury pilgrims represent all ranks of English life,
from the knight to the sailor.

The _Prologue_ to the _Tales_ places these characters before us almost
as distinctly as they would appear in real life. At the Tabard Inn in
Southwark, just across the Thames from London, we see that merry band
of pilgrims on a pleasant April day. We look first upon a manly figure
who strikes us as being every inch a knight. His cassock shows the
marks of his coat of mail.

"At mortal batailles hadde he been fiftene.
* * * * *
And of his port as meke as is a mayde.
He never yet no vileinye ne sayde
In al his lyf, un-to no maner wight.
He was a verray parfit gentil knight."