5

A Balade in the Praise and Commendacion of Master Geffray Chauser for His Golden Eloquence Maister Geffray Chauser, that now lithe in grave, The noble rhetoricion and poet of Great Bretaine, That worthy was the laurer of poetry to have, For this, his labor, and the palme to atteine, Whiche first made to dystil and reine The gold dewe dropes of speche and eloquence, Into English tong through his excelence. From John Stow's Workes of Geffrey Chaucer, 1561 (fol. 337v). These seven lines served as an envoy to Chaucer's Parliament of Fowls in both Trinity College, Cambridge MS R.3.19 and British Library, MS Harley 7333. The extract from John Lydgate's Life of Our Lady (2. 1628-34). Described by Walter Skeat as "a poor imitation of the style of Lydgate" (Chaucerian, p. 554).

who now lies in [his] grave laurel