ers, and the joy and sorrow from which that sympathy
has drawn nurture. Unseen by us, the ore has been dug, and smelted in
secret furnaces, and when it is poured into perfect moulds, we are apt
to forget by what potency the whole thing has been brought about.

And, with his noticing eyes, into what a brilliant, many tinted world
was Chaucer born! In his day life had a certain breadth, colour, and
picturesqueness which it does not possess now. It wore a braver dress,
and flaunted more in the sun. Five centuries effect a great change on
manners. A man may nowadays, and without the slightest suspicion of
the fact, brush clothes with half the English peerage on a sunny
afternoon in Pall Mall. Then it was quite different. The fourteenth
century loved magnificence and show. Great lords kept princely state
in the country; and when they came abroad, what a retinue, what waving
of plumes, and shaking of banners, and glittering of rich dresses!
Religion was picturesque, with dignitaries, and cathedrals, and fuming
incense, and the Host carried through the streets. The franklin kept
open house, the city merchant feasted kings, the outlaw roasted his
venison beneath the greenwood tree. There was a gallant monarch and a
gallant court. The eyes of the Countess of Salisbury shed influence;
Maid Marian laughed in Sherwood. London is already a considerable
place, numbering, perhaps, two hundred thousand inhabitants, the houses
clustering close and high along the river banks; and on the beautiful
April nights the nightingales are singing round the suburban villages
of Strand, Holborn, and Charing. It is rich withal; for after the
battle of Poitiers, Harry Picard, wine-merchant and Lord Mayor,
entertained in the city four kings,--to wit, Edward, king of England,
John, king of France, David, king of Scotland, and the king of Cyprus;
and the last-named potentate, slightly heated with Harry's wine,
engaged him at dice, and being nearly ruined thereby, the honest
wine-merchant returned the poor king his money, which was received with
all thankfulness. There is great stir on a summer's morning in that
Warwickshire castle,--pawing of horses, tossing of bridles, clanking of
spurs. The old lord climbs at last into his saddle and rides off to
court, his favourite falcon on his wrist, four squires in immediate
attendance carrying his arms; and behind these stretches a merry
cavalcade, on which the chestnuts shed their milky blossoms.