er theyr husbondes be departed to God.

+ _Of him that kissed the mayd with the longe nose._ xi.

+ A bablynge gentylman, the whiche on a tyme wolde haue bassed[155] a
fayre mayde, that had nat the leest nose, sayde: how shulde I kysse you:
youre nose wyll not suffre our lyppes to mete? The mayden, waxinge
shamfast and angrye in her mynde (for with his scoffe he a lyttell
touched her) answered on this wyse: syr, if ye can not kysse my mouth
for my nose, ye may kysse me there as I haue nere a nose.

Ye may by this tale lerne, that it is folye so to scoffe, that youre
selfe therby shulde be laughed to scorne agayne. One that is
ouer-couetous ought nat to attwite[156] an other of prodigalite. Thou
arte her brother (sayd Alcmeon to Adrastus) that slewe her husbande. But
he blamed nat Alcmeon for an others faute, but obiected against him his
owne. Thou hast with thy hande (sayd he) slayne thin owne mother. It is
nat ynough to haue rebukes redie, and to speke vyle wordes agaynst
other: for he, that so shuld do, ought to be without any vyce. For of
all men, sayth Plutarchus, he ought to be innocent and haue the lyfe
vnculpable, that wolde reprehende the fautes of other. The lyttell
morall boke[157] sayth:

It is a foule thynge worthye rebuke and blame
A vyce to reprehende and do the same.

FOOTNOTES:

[154] Whispered--_Singer_.

[155] Kissed, from the French word.

[156] _i.e._ twit or taunt.

[157] _Parvus et Magnus Catho_, printed by Caxton, n.d. 4to. Chaucer, in
his _Miller's Tale_ (_Chaucer's Works_, ed. Bell, i. 194), describes the
old carpenter of Oxford, who had married a young girl, as having
neglected to study [_Magnus_] _Catho_, which prescribed that marriages
ought to take place between persons of about the same age.

"He knew not Catoun, for his wyt was rude, That bad man schulde wedde
his similitude."

No doubt both _Cato_ and _Parvus Cato_ circulated in MS. before the
invention of printing. The former was printed by Caxton in 1483-4. See
Blades (_Life and Typography of William Caxton_, ii. 53-4).

+ _The Uplandisshe mans answere, concerninge the steple and pulpit._
xii.

+ In a certayne place, on a tyme the perysshyns[158] had pulled downe
theyr steple, and had buylded it vp newe agayne, and had put out theyr
belles to be newe-founded: and bycause they range nat at the bysshops
entrynge into the village, as they were wont and acustomed to do, he
asked a good homely man, whethe