The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1856-11-05
ENGLAND IN cHAucER's TIME.
BY ALEXANDER SMITH.

t If ever England merited the tit
e "merrie," it was during the century
t which Chaacer fourished. The Cor
f quest had long before beer consummatec
e and the bitter feelings engendered be
tween the rival races had disappeared
, The impetuous blood and fiery spirit c
the Norman were engrafted on the lar
ger limbs and more placid and persist
ent temperament of the Saxon, and tn
result was--an Improvement on both
the modern Englishman. The Norman
gave him that adventurous spirit whicl
in later days won India, which woos con
genial danger in the attempt to pierce
the polar seas, and which has sown will
the colonies every savage shore.
From the Saxon he drew that calm
ness and love of order which makes
England, perhaps, the least exeitable
and revolutionary country in the world
The Norman spirit famed up at the
brightest when the Light Brigade
/ charged at Balaklava; it was Saxon
nerve and sinew which sustained for SO
many hours the agony at Inkermann.
In those days life had certain breadth,
color and picturesqueness which it does
not possess now. It wore q braver
dress, and faunted more in the sun.
| The passions-thcse wild beasts of the
heart-were not, as now, tanned and
| dom mesticated. If that time had more
violence, it had less bypocricy; if it
had more brawling and bloodshed, there
was less envy snawing at its heart.
Five centuries effect great change
of manners. A man may nowadays,
and without the slightest suspicion of
the fact, brush clothes with half the
English peerage on sunny forenoon in
Piccadilly or Pail Mall; then it was
quite different. The fourteenth century
loved mngnifcence and show. Great
lords, when they went abroad, were &C
C ,mpanied by immense retinues, and
held profuse and half barbaric hospi-
tality when they dwelt in their castles
at home. At later period, the num-
Der of retainers who are said to have
feastod at the princely tables of War
wick, the king akcr, would make
modern political economist aghast, and
lead him to form strange ideas of the
wisdom of his ancestors.
Iu Chaueer's days, Goodwin tells US,
a certain nobleman arrived in London
with such a tribe Of rotainers, that they
consumed six bullocks every morning
for breakfast-great stalwart English
men, who washed down the steaks with
mighty horns of home brewed. Think
of it and shudder, oh, modern dandy
and dyspeptic London is already
considerable place, numbering, perhaps,
two hundred thousand Inhabitants, the
houses clustering close and high along
the river banks, and the grass is green,
and on the beautiful April nights the
nightingales are singing round the su
burban villages of Strand, Holborn and
Charing. 1t is rich witbal, for after the
battle of Poictiers, burly Harry Picard,
wine merchant and Lord Mayor of Lon
don, entertained in the city, and at his
own expense, four kings-to wit, Ed
ward, King of England; John, King of
France; David, King of Scotland, and
the King of Cyprus; and, after feastiug
to their hearts content, the last-named
potentate, slightly heated with homes:
Harry's wine, offered to engage him at
dice, and was nearly ruined thereby
perceiviDg which, the bluff wine merch-
ant returned the poor king bis money,
which was received in all thankfulness.
There was great stir one summer
morning in that grim castle in War
wickshire, paving of horses, tossing of
brides, clanking of spurs. After i'm
mense to do, the old lord rides off to
attend court, his favorite falcon on his
wrist, four squires in attendance, car
rying his arms, and behind those, in the
sunny day, stretches long and merry
cavalcade. During the absence Of the
old Earl, young Hopeful spends his time
as BELTS his rank and expectations. He
grooms his steed, plays with his hawks,
feeds his hounds, and labors diligently
to acquire grace and dexterity in the
use of arms. He spends half his morn
ings in fitting at revolving Saracen, with
great google eyes, ferocious whiskers,
aud large wooden scimetar, which he
has erected on pole in the green. If
he strikes him full and fair, the figure is
of course overthrow; if he fails, the
infdel wheels round on his pivot, and
administers to the back of the squire
sound thwack with his ignoble weapon
as he gallops past. At noon, the port
cullis is lowered, and out shoots bril-
liant train of ladies and gentlemen, and
falconers with hawks; they bend their
course to the distant river, over which a
rainbow is rising from the shower. You
see that young lady laughing at our
STRIPPING squire, who seems half angry,
half pleased-they are lovers, depend
upon it. A few years, and the teasing
beauty will have become a noble and
gracious woman, and the gallant young
fellow-who has long since given up
fighting with painted Saracens-sitting
by watch-6re at Cressy, will wonder if