(THE CHAUCER PRESS) LTD., BUNGAY, SUFFOLK




PREFACE.


Good wine needs no bush, and this tale needs no Preface. I shall not
tell the story of it--let readers go to the verse itself for that; nor
shall I repeat to those who begin it the exhortation of the englisher of
_Sir Generides_,

"for goddes sake, or ye hens wende,
Here this tale unto the ende."--(ll. 3769-70.)

If any one having taken it up is absurd enough to lay it down without
finishing it, let him lose the fun, and let all true men pity him.
Though the state of morals disclosed by the story is not altogether
satisfactory, yet it is a decided improvement on that existing in Roberd
of Brunne's time in 1303, for he had to complain of the lords of his
day:

Also do þese lordynges,
Þe[y] trespas moche yn twey þynges;
Þey rauys a mayden aȝens here wyl,
And mennys wyuys þey lede awey þertyl.
A grete vylanye þarte he dous
Ȝyf he make therof hys rouse [boste]:
Þe dede ys confusyun,