ROBERT OF GLOUCESTER.--Among the rhyming chroniclers of this period,
Robert, a monk of Gloucester Abbey, is noted for his reproduction of the
history of Geoffrey of Monmouth, already presented by Wace in French, and
by Layamon in Saxon-English. But he is chiefly valuable in that he carries
the chronicle forward to the end of the reign of Henry III. Written in
West-country English, it not only contains a strong infusion of French,
but distinctly states the prevailing influence of that language in his own
day:

Vor bote a man couthe French, me tolth of him well lute
Ac lowe men holdeth to Englyss, and to her kunde speche zute.

For unless a man know French, one talketh of him little;
But _low_ men hold to English, and to their natural speech yet.

The chronicle of Robert is written in Alexandrines, and, except for the
French words incongruously interspersed, is almost as "barbarous" Saxon as
the Brut of Layamon.


LANGLAND--PIERS PLOWMAN.--The greatest of the immediate heralds of
Chaucer, whether we regard it as a work of literary art, or as an historic
reflector of the age, is "The Vision of Piers Plowman," by Robert
Langland, which appeared between 1360 and 1370. It stands between the
Semi-Saxon and the old English, in point of language, retaining the
alliterative feature of the former; and, as a teacher of history, it
displays very clearly the newly awakened spirit of religious inquiry, and
the desire for religious reform among the English people: it certainly was
among the means which aided in establishing a freedom of religious thought
in England, while as yet the continent was bound in the fetters of a