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And faid him thus; To Athenes shalt thou wende; Ther is thee shapen of thy wo an ende.

And with that word Arcite awoke and ftert. 1395 Now trewely how fore that ever me fmert, Quod he, to Athenes right now wol I fare; Ne for no drede of deth fhal I not fpare To fe my lady, that I love and ferve;

In hire prefence I rekke not to fterve,

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And with that word he caught a gret mirrour,

And faw that changed was all his colour,

And faw his vifage all in another kind;
And right anon it ran him in his mind,
That fith his face was fo disfigured

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Of maladie the which he had endured,
He mighte wel, if that he bare him lowe,
Live in Athenes evermore unknowe,
And fen his lady wel nigh day by day.
And right anon he changed his
saray,
And clad him as a poure labourer.
And all alone, fave only a squier,
That knew his privite and all his cas,
Which was difguifed pourely as he was,
To Athenes is he gon the nexte way.
And to the court he went upon a day,
And at the gate he proffered his fervice,

To drugge and draw what fo men wold devife.
And fhortly of this matere for to fayn,

He fell in office with a chamberlain,

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The which that dwelling was with Emelie,
For he was wife, and coude fone espie
Of every fervent which that ferved hire:
Wel coude he hewen wood, and water bere,
For he was yonge and mighty for the nones,
And therto he was strong and big of bones
To don that any wight can him devife.

A yere or two he was in this fervice,
Page of the chambre of Emelie the bright,
And Philoftrate he fayde that he hight.
But half fo wel beloved a man as he

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Ne was ther never in court of his degre..

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Ther as he might his vertues exercise.
And thus within a while his name is fpronge
Both of his dedes and of his good tonge,

That Thefeus hath taken him fo ner
That of his chambre he made him a squier,

'

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1430. Philofirate] In The Thefeida Arcite takes the name of Pentheo. See the Discourse, &c. p. 186. The name of Philoftrate might be fuggefted to Chaucer either by Boccace's poem entitled Philoftrato, or by 'The Decameron, in which one of the characters is fo called. In The Midfum. Night's Dream, of which the principal fubject is plainly taken from this Tale, a Philoftrate is alfo introduced as a favourite fervant of Thefeus, and mafter of his fports.

And gave him gold to mainteine his degre;
And eke men brought him out of his contre-
Fro yere to yere ful prively his rent;

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But honeftly and fleighly he it spent,

That no man wondred how that he it hadde.
And thre yere in this wife his lif he ladde,

And bare him fo in pees and eke in werre

Ther n'as no man that Thefeus hath derre.

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And in this bliffe let I now Arcite,

And fpeke I wol of Palamon a lite.

In derkeneffe and horrible and strong prison
This feven yére hath fitten Palamon,
Forpined, what for love and for diftreffe.
Who feleth double forwe and hevineffe
But Palamon? that love diftraineth fo,
That wood out of his wit he goth for wo,
And eke therto he is a prifonere
Perpetuell, not only for a yere.

Who coude rime in English proprely
His martirdom? forfoth it am not I,
Therfore I paffe as lightly as I may.
It fell that in the seventh yere, in May-
The thridde night, (as olde bokes fayn,
That all this ftorie tellen more plain)
Were it by aventure or destinee,
(As whan a thing is shapen it fhal be)
That fone after the midnight Palamon,
By helping of a frend, brake his prison,

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And fleeth the cite faste as he may go,
For he had yeven drinke his gayler fo
Of a clarre made of a certain wine,
With narcotikes and opie of Thebes fine,

That all the night though that men wold him shake, The gailer flept, he mighte not awake:

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And thus he fleeth as fafte as ever he may.

The night was fhort, and faste by the day,

That nedes coft he mofte himfelven hide;

And to a grove faste ther befide

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With dredful foot than stalketh Palamon:
For fhortly this was his opinion,

That in that grove he wold him hide all day,
And in the night than wold he take his way
To Thebes ward, his frendes for to preie
On Thefeus to helpen him werreie;
And fhortly, eyther he wold lefe his lif
Or winnen Emelie unto his wif.

This is the effect, and his entente plein.

Now wol I turnen to Arcite agein, That litel wift how neighe was his care,

Til that Fortune had brought him in the fnare.

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. 1479. That nedes coft] The fenfe of this paffage, as it ftands in the mff. is fo obfcure that I am inclined to adopt the alteration proposed in Gl. Urr. v. Nede; "That nedes caft he "motte himselven hide;" i. e. that he must needs caft or con trive to hide himself.—But I find the fame expression in Z. 17. 2686;

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Or nedes cofte this thing mote have an ende.

The befy larke, the meffager of day,
Salewith in hire fong the morwe gray,
And firy Phebus rifeth up fo bright,
That all the orient laugheth of the fight,
And with his ftremes drieth in the greves
The filver dropes hanging on the leves.
And Arcite, that is in the court real
With Thefeus the fquier principal,
Is rifen, and loketh on the mery day;
And for to don his obfervance to May,
Remembring on the point of his defire,
He on his courfer, fterting as the fire,
Is ridden to the feldes him to pley,
Out of the court, were it a mile or twey;
And to the grove of which that I you told
By aventure his way he gan to hold,'
To maken him a gerlond of the greves,
Were it of woodbind or of hauthorn leves,
And loud he fong agen the fonne shene.

'Maye, with all thy floures and thy grene,
Right welcome be thou faire freshe May,
I hope that I fome grene here getten may.
And from his courfer with a lufty herte
Into the grove ful haftily he fterte,"
And in a path he romed up and doun,

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Ther as by aventure this Palamon

Was in a bufh, that no man might him fe,

For fore afered of his deth was he.

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