tions are free imitations of the originals in the Narrenschiff. But as Barclay's adaptation of The Ship of Fools was printed by Pynson in 1509, it scarcely seems probable that Wynkyn de Worde would have thus copied his rival. It is more likely that for his English poem he copied illustrations from the Latin edition of Locher. The dating of the poem, then, would be around 1500. But if this be true, the similarity between Cock Lorell's Bote and the Narrenschiff becomes very slight. Professor Herford thinks that the first was suggested by the chapter Das schluraffen schiff of the latter and quotes the lines from Barclay to show the resemblance.2 Here shall Jacke charde, my brother Robyn hyll With Myllers and bakers that weyght and mesure hate Receyve theyr rowme. But these lines are in neither the German nor the Latin! Nor has the chapter, a curious Odyssey in classic seas, much resemblance to the vividly local voyage of Cock Lorell. Whatever similarity may be found in such passages, then, is probably due rather to the omnivorous Barclay than to the anonymous author of Cock Lorell's Bote. But the moment this conception that Cock Lorell's Bote is an English modification of a foreign idea is abandoned, the poem appears as the Medieval Latin type and its characteristics become normal. There is nothing surprising in its incoherence, its cataloguing, or its concreteness. They all belong to the type. Nor when judged in comparison with others of the same sort does it seem noteworthy. Surely it lacks the swing of London Lickpenny, and the author has not a tithe of the power of Skelton. Even the last character 1 Herford, Literary Relations op. cit., 342. “All the five woodcuts in the Cock Lorell's Bote are free imitations of originals in the Ship of Fools. None stand in very obvious relation to the text. That at B ii., (a Fool, with outstretched tongue, standing before a tree up which a magpie is ascending to her nest) is from the chapter Of to much speaking or babling. That at B iii., (the hunter whose dogs are divided between the attractions of two hares running in opposite directions) is taken from the illustration to the chapter Of him that together would serve two masters. Those at B.v. and C ii, are identical, and are freely adapted from the Universal Ship (Schluraffenschiff). That on C iii, (four Fools playing cards round a table) is also freely adapted from the chapter on Card players and dysers." I quote Professor Herford's note as I have never seen the original. 2 Ibid, page 347. istic, the use of concrete detail, has been overstressed. There is, of course, an antiquarian interest in allusions to old London. There came suche a winde fro wynchester In wherye as I wyll you tell Some at saynt Kateryns stroke a grounde Also in aue maria aly and at westmenster Naturally in comparison with the humanistic moralizations of Barclay, this seems startling. In comparison, however, with the vividness of Elynour Rummyng it is quite simple. The reader finds also the list of fools after Lydgate, the pre-Reformation joking on religious immorality, and the characteristic indirect satire. It is in fact so definite a specimen of the type that, were it not for the notoriety it has obtained from the mis-classification, the amount of space here given to the discussion could not be justified.1 Its conformity to the type seems to imply an early dating. 3 At least, in poems of the middle of Henry's reign the reader is conscious of a mingling of elements. The Hye Way to the Spittal Hous, compiled and printed by Robert Copland, by its allusion to the Act of 22nd Henry Eighth 2 and its mention of false popery must have been written in 1535. Here then we shall find the late development of this type. It opens with twelve stanzas of rimeroyal, the body of it is in the heroic couplet, and it closes with the 1 A question, quite apart from the literary one, arises concerning the historicity of Cock Lorell. Samuel Rowlands in 1610 states that he was a tinker and lived until the year 1533. Unhappily, aside from the date, he seems to have gathered his information from a tract printed by John Awdely in 1566, in which Cock Lorell is a character. I can find no historical allusion to such a person, and the name, Chief Knave, is a priori, against such historicity. On the other hand Cock Lorell is alluded to by Feylde, Controversy between a Lover and a Jay (ante 1530), in Hye Way to the Spyttel Hous (1535?), Doctor Double Ale (1545?), Heywood, Proverbs (1556), Gascoigne, Adventures of Master F. I. (1577), and by Ben Johnson, Gypsies Metamorphosed. As this wealth of allusion through the century cannot be explained either from the historical standpoint or from the popularity of the particular poem, we must be dealing here with a lost proverb. 2 V. 376. ' V. 551. Lydgatean apology. In its cataloguing it suggests the Order of Fools. So far it follows the lines of the English tradition. Yet instead of the expected allegory, or the conflictus, there is a humanistic dialogue. But instead of the humanistic point of view, there follows a realistic description of vagabondage in London. The poem proper opens with the conventional astronomical beginning, to change suddenly into the concrete.1 But playnly to say, even as the tyme was, And with black cloudes darked was the sky. With frost, and rayne, and stormes ouer all. While standing there he enters into conversation with the porter of the hospital in regard to the type of person aided by it. This hospital refuses the professional beggar, the false soldier, the false priest, and the false student of medicine. Incidentally these are all characterized and their tricks exposed.2 This occupies five hundred and sixty-two lines. Here comes a distinct break. Tell me shortly of all folke in generall, That come the hye way to the hospytall. Then follows roughly five hundred lines more of condensed cataloguing of the various evil doers. Suggesting the scholastic tradition, Latin appears in the verse, but instead of the accentual Medieval Latin it consists of Biblical quotations, or humanistic The power of the poem lies in its concrete detail. The professional beggars have their haunts 3 where verse. 1 I am using the text in Hazlitt's Early Popular Poetry, 1866, IV, 26. 2 These characterizations may be compared with those of the beggar, the soldier and the priest in Mother Hubberd's Tale. 3 It will be remembered that two hundred years later the unsavory crowning of Shadwell as Mac Flecknoe took place in the Barbican. This particularization may be illustrated in another way, in the long account of the fraud perpetrated by the rogue physician. In company with his servant he arrives at a farm house. As he feigns that he cannot speak English, With, me non spek Englys by my fayt: his servant conducts the conversation, all of which tends to the glorification of his master's skill. While they talk, the rogue discovers a "postum" in the stomach of the child. He will cure it, but he will take no pay. And these two depart. The trap being thus baited, the third member of the gang arrives the next day, makes the same diagnosis, praises the "doctor" in whose favor in any case the family is now prejudiced because he took no money, and the gang live upon the family for a fortnight. Each step in the process thus outlined is developed with definite detail. We are told what the hostess said, the servant said, the doctor said. The last apparently speaks French with Italian reminiscences. For example, Dys infant rumpre vng grand postum,3 Viginti solidi pour fournir vostre coffre, 4 Non, poynt d'argent, sayth he, pardeu, ie non cure.5 A description such as this of the "clewners" gives the difference 1 Vv. 241-2. 2 Vv. 439-40. 3 V. 467. 4 V. 482. 5 V. 484. 6 This variety of rogue is not listed in Harman's Caveat or Warning for Common Cursitors, 1573. between the scholastic tradition and the humanistic attitude. Whereas humanism tended to stress generalizations and abstractions, scholasticism tended to stress the individual. That is the change made by Locher in re-writing the scholastic Narrenschiff, and when Barclay in accordance with his scholastic training introduced the English specific detail, he produced quite unconsciously the effect of the original German. Consequently between the Ship of Fools and the Hye Way there is a puzzling resemblance, the difference consisting only in the amount of stress. In a humanistic original Barclay interpolates scholastic detail; to a scholastic treatment Copland adds the humanist's love for generalizations. If the resemblance of the first half of the Hye Way is to the Ship of Fools, the second half suggests Cock Lorelles Bote. Instead of a general crowd of knaves, "The thyrde persone of Englande,” 1 coming to the boat, an unestimated, but innumerable, crowd of fools seek refuge in the hospital. The beneficiaries are more numerous than the guests of Cock Lorell, because the latter are expressly included.2 In any case, the number would be greater, since all are reckoned that may come to this sad end,-vicious priests, and clerks, bailiffs, stewards, provision-buyers, renters, paymasters, creditors, negligent receivers, lazy farmers, merchants of poor judgment, thriftless craftsmen, penniless courtiers, knaves, taverners, etc., etc., even to the husband and wife that quarrel. Thus, while the Bote enumerates all the rogues of England, the Hye Way lists also all the unfortunate. By this method the author gives a vivid and sinister picture of social conditions during the middle of Henry's reign. This vivid but sinister view of society may be said to be both the literary contribution and the limitation of this type. On the one side it may be argued that there is a very real value in having thus thrust upon the reader the fact that life in those days was not all beer and skittles. With the sporadic popularity of the swashbuckler novel, with its romantic love and clashing sword-play, the 1 Cocke Lorelles Bote . . . fifth line from the end. 2 The Hye Way, 1058-60. Copland. Come ony maryners hyther of Cok Lorels bote? We must them receyue, and gyue them costes fre. |