Part 29

"I grant you all your asking," she replies; "let your works be dead." The second company arrive immediately afterwards, and prefer the same request in the lines versified by Pope, when Fame, with her usual capriciousness, refuses their prayer, and orders Eolus to sound their praises.]

Though deep yet clear, though gentle yet not dull.--WAKEFIELD.]

Tho came the sixthe companye, And gan faste to Fame cry, &c.,

being too prolix to be here inserted.--POPE.]

And at each blast a lady's honour dies

in the Temple of Fame, I lament as much to find it placed there as to see shops and sheds and cottages erected among the ruins of Diocletian's baths.--WARTON.]

Tho come another companye That Lad ydone the treachery, &c.--POPE.

Pope in this paragraph had not only Chaucer in view, but the passage of Virgil where he describes the criminals in the infernal regions. The second line of Pope's opening couplet was suggested by Dryden's translation, Æneis, vi. 825:

Expel their parents and usurp the throne.]

Tho saw I stonde in a valey, Under the castle faste by A house, that Domus Dedali That Labyrinthus cleped is, Nas made so wonderly I wis, Ne half so queintly ywrought; And evermo, as swift as thought, This queinte house aboute went, That never more stille it stent-- And eke this house hath of entrees As fele of leaves as ben on trees In summer, when they grene ben; And in the roof yet men may sene A thousand holes, and well mo To letten well the soune out go; And by day in every tide Ben all the doores open wide, And by night each one unshet; No porter is there one to let No manner tydings in to pace: Ne never rest is in that place.--POPE.]

Geffray, thou wottost well this, &c.--POPE.]

If that thou Throw on water now a stone, Well wost thou it will make anon A little roundel as a circle, Paraunture broad as a covercle, And right anon thou shalt see wele, That circle will cause another wheel, And that the third, and so forth, brother, Every circle causing other, And multiplying evermoe, Till that it so far ygo That it at bothe brinkes be.

* * * * * * * * * *

And right thus every word, ywis, That loud or privy y-spoken is, Moveth first an air about, And of this moving, out of doubt, Another air anon is moved, As I have of the water proved That every circle causeth other.

A "covercle" was the cover or lid of a pot.]

Whence all things, though remote, are viewed around And hither bring their undulating sound.--WAKEFIELD.]

Of werres, of peace, of marriages, Of rest, of labour, of voyages, Of abode, of dethe, of life, Of love and hate, accord and strife, Of loss, of lore, and of winnings, Of hele, of sickness, and lessings, Of divers transmutations Of estates and eke of regions, Of trust, of drede, of jealousy, Of wit, of winning, of folly, Of good, or bad governement, Of fire, and of divers accident.--POPE.

The dismissal of Lord Oxford, the death of Queen Anne immediately afterwards, on August 1, 1714, and the overthrow of Bolingbroke, were events which had recently happened when Pope published his poem, and there never was a time when "changes in the state," "the falls of favourites," and "old mismanagements" were a more universal topic of conversation.]

But such a grete congregation Of folke as I saw roame about, Some within, and some without. Was never seen, ne shall be eft-- And every wight that I saw there Rowned everich in others ear A newe tyding privily, Or elles he told it openly Right thus, and said, Knowst not thou That is betide to night now? No, quoth he, tell me what And then he told him this and that, &c.--POPE.]

Thus north and south Went every tiding fro mouth to mouth, And that encreasing evermo, As fire is wont to quicken and go From a sparkle sprong amiss, Till all the citee brent up is.--POPE.]

Fame sits aloft.

In Ovid the scene is laid in the house of Fame. Pope lays it in the house of Rumour, and having left Fame enthroned in her own temple, he now represents her as permanently "sitting aloft" in a totally different edifice.]

And sometime I saw there at once, A lesing and a sad sooth saw That gonnen at adventure draw Out of a window forth to pace-- And no man be he ever so wrothe, Shall have one of these two, but bothe, &c.--POPE.]

This is an imperfect representation. While Chaucer is standing in the House of Fame, a person goes up to him,

And saide, Friend, what is thy name, Artow come hither to have fame?

The poet disclaims any such intention, and protests that he has no desire that his name should be known to a single soul. He is then asked what he does there, and he replies that he who brought him to the place promised him that he should learn new and wonderful things, in which, he says, he has been disappointed, for he was aware before that people coveted fame, though he was not hitherto acquainted with the dwelling of the goddess, nor with her appearance and condition. His interrogator answers that he perceives what it is he desires to know, and conducts him to the house of Rumour. There he has revealed to him the falsehood of the world, and especially of pilgrims and pardoners, which was an important doctrine to be inculcated in those days. When the scene has been fully disclosed, "a man of great authority" appears, and the poet starts up from his sleep, by which he seems to intimate that the wise and serious frown upon those who listen to idle tales. His awaking "half afraid," is the result of his

Remembring well what I had seen, And how high and far I had been In my ghost.

Pope, by reserving the inquiry addressed to him for the end of the poem, represents himself as being asked in the temple of Rumour whether he has come there for fame, which, is not more, but much less natural than the arrangement of Chaucer, who supposes the question to be put in the temple of Fame itself. Nor would it have been congenial to Chaucer's modest disposition to make himself the climax of the piece.]