Then I munte me1 forth the minster to knowen,
And awaited woon 3 wonderly well y-built.
With arches on every half,4 and bellich' y-carven,
With crotches on corners, with knots of gold.
Vide windows y-wrought, y-written full thick,
Shining with shapen shields, to shewen about,
With marks of merchants y-meddled between,
Mo than twenty and two, twice y-number'd.
There is none herald that hath half swich a roll.
Right as a regeman7 hath reckon'd them new.
Tombs upon tabernacles, tyled upon loft
Housed in hornes hard set abouten

Of armed alabaster clad for the nonce,
Made upon marble in many manner wise.

! Mounted?

2 Watched, observed, Fr.

• One? or wone, a habitation?

4 Part.

5 Beautifully. Fr.

Y-meddled is mixed; the marks of merchants are put in opposition to the shapen shields, because merchants had no coats of arms.

7 This word sometimes means simply an accompt: but it here seems to allude to the famous Ragman's roll, and to be put as an antithesis to the herald's roll.

8 Raised aloft.

9 Mr. Warton supposes that horns may mean irons, i. e. iron rails; or that perhaps we ought to read hurnes, which mean caves or obscure places. But why not harnes, harness, e. armour ?

i.

Knights in their conisante1 clad for the nonce:
All, it seem'd, saints; y-sacred upon earth.
And lovely ladies y-wrought, layen by their
sides,

In many gay garments that weren gold-beaten.
Though the tax of ten years were truly gathered,
N'old it not maken that house, half as I trow.

Then came I to that cloister, and gaped abouten, How it was pillar'd and paint, and pourtray'd well clean,

All heled with lead, low to the stones,

And y-paved with poyntil,3 each point after other
With conduits of clean tin, closed all about
With lavers of latten+ lovely y-greithed.5

I trow, the gainage of the ground in a great shire,
N'old apparell that place, no point till other end.

6

Then was the chapter-house wrought as a great church,

Carven, and covered, and quaintly entailed,

With seemly cielure y-set on-loft,

As a parliament-house y-painted about.

1

Then fared I into Fraytour, and found there another;

An hall for an high king an house-hold to holden.
With broad boards abouten, y-benched well clean;
With windows of glass wrought as a church.
Then walked I farrer, and went all abouten,
And saw halls full high, and houses full noble,
Chambers with chimneys, and chapels gay,
And kitchens for an high king in castles to holden.
And her dortour2 y-dight with doors full strong
Fermerye and Fraytour, with fele+ mo houses.
And all strong stone wall, stern' upon height,
With gay garrets, and great, and each hole glased.
And other houses enow to harbour the Queen.
And yet these builders will beggen a bag full of
wheat

Of a pure poor man, that may unneth pay
Half his rent in a year, and half been behind.

of this curious poem, which, as he justly observes, is nearly as rare as a manuscript; but the printed copies, like those of Pierce Ploughman's Vision, seem to be full of typographical errors; and an editor who should reprint a correct edition of these two forgotten poems, would make a valuable addition to our stock of early literature.

Langland's work, whatever may be thought of its poetical merit, cannot fail of being considered as an entertaining and useful commentary on the general histories of the fourteenth century, not only from its almost innumerable pictures of contemporary manners, but also from its connection with the particular feelings and opinions of the time. The reader will recollect, that the minds of men were greatly incensed by the glaring contradictions that appeared between the professions and actions of the two great orders of the state.

The clergy of a religion founded on humility and self-denial, united the most shameless profligacy of manners with the most inordinate magnificence. An armed aristocracy, who, by their oath of knighthood, were bound to the maintenance of order, and to the protection of the helpless and unfortunate, were not satisfied with exercising, in their own persons, the most intolerable oppression on their vassals, but were the avowed protectors of the

subordinate robbers and assassins who infested the roads, and almost annihilated the internal intercourse of every country in Europe. The people were driven to despair, flew to arms, and took a most frightful revenge on their oppressors. Various' insurrections in Flanders; those of the Jacquerie in France, and those of Wat Tyler and others in England, were the immediate consequences of this despair; but the popular discontents had been in a great degree prepared and fomented by a set of itinerant preachers, who inveighed against the luxury and crimes of the great, and maintained the inalienable rights and natural equality of man.

Langland's poem, addressed to popular readers, written in simple, but energetic language, and admirably adapted, by its dramatic form, and by the employment of allegorical personages to suit the popular taste, though it is free from these extravagant doctrines, breathes only the pure spirit of the Christian religion, and inculcates the principles of rational liberty: this may possibly have prepared the minds of men, for those bolder tenets which, for a series of years, were productive only of national restlessness and misery, but which ultimately terminated in a free government, and a reformed religion.

The reader who may be desirous of seeing farther