e leaders of a movement, which others have followed, "to
beautifie our mother tongue," and thus the _Confessio Amantis_ ranks as
one of the formers of our language, in a day when it required much moral
courage to break away from the trammels of Latin and French, and at the
same time to compel them to surrender their choicest treasures to the
English.

Gower was born in 1325 or 1326, and outlived Chaucer. It has been
generally believed that Chaucer was his poetical pupil. The only evidence
is found in the following vague expression of Gower in the Confessio
Amantis:

And greet well Chaucer when ye meet
As _my disciple_ and my poete.
For in the flower of his youth,
In sondry wise as he well couth,
Of ditties and of songes glade
The which he for my sake made.

It may have been but a patronizing phrase, warranted by Gower's superior
rank and station; for to the modern critic the one is the uprising sun,
and the other the pale star scarcely discerned in the sky. Gower died in
1408, eight years after his more illustrious colleague.

OTHER WRITERS OF THE PERIOD OF CHAUCER.

John Barbour, Archdeacon of Aberdeen, a Scottish poet, born about 1320:
wrote a poem concerning the deeds of King Robert I. in achieving the
independence of Scotland. It is called _Broite_ or _Brute_, and in it, in
imitation of the English, he traces the Scottish royal lineage to Brutus.
Although by no means equal to Chaucer, he is far superior to any other
English poet of the time, and his language is more intelligible at the
present day than that of Chaucer or Gower. Sir Walter Scott has borrowed
from Barbour's poem in his "Lord of the Isles."

Blind Harry--name unknown: wrote the adventures of Sir William Wallace,
about 1460.

James I. of Scotland, assassinated at Perth, in 1437. He wrote "The Kings
Quhair," (Quire or Book,) describing the progress of his attachment to the
daughter of the Earl of Somerset, while a prisoner in England, during the
reign of Henry IV.

Thomas Occleve, flourished about 1420. His principal work is in Latin; De
Regimine Principum, (concerning the government of princes.)

John Lydgate, flourished about 1430: wrote _Masks_ and _Mummeries_, and
nine books of tragedies translated from Boccaccio.

Robert Henryson, flourished about 1430: Robin and Makyne, a pastoral; and
a continuation of Chaucer's Troilus and Creseide, entitled "The Testament
of Fair Creseide."

William Dunbar, died abou