In any guilty man when aught is said.
That was the reason why he drew so near
To his yeoman, his gossiping to hear.
And thus he said unto his yeoman then:
"Now hold your peace and do not speak again,
For if you do you'll pay it ruefully;
You slander me, here in this company,
And you uncover that which you should hide."
"Yea?" said our host, "Tell on, whate'er betide;
For all his threatening do not care a mite!"
"In faith," said he, "my caring is but slight."
And when this canon saw how it would be,
That his yeoman would tell his privity,
He fled away for very grief and shame.
"Ah," said the yeoman, "hence shall come a game.
All that I know anon now will I tell.
Since he is gone, the Fiend take him to Hell!
With him hereafter I'll have naught to do
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For penny or for pound, I promise you!
He that first brought me into that ill game,
Before he die, sorrow have he and shame!
For it's no game to me, sirs, by my fay;
That I feel well, whatever men may say.
And yet, for all my smart and all my grief,
For all the sorrow, labour, and mischief,
I never could leave off, in any wise.
Now would to God that my wit might suffice
To tell of all pertaining to that art!
Nevertheless, I will relate a part;
Since now my lord is gone, I will not spare;
The things I know about I will declare."
HERE ENDS THE PROLOGUE
TO THE CANON'S YEOMAN'S TALE
THE CANON'S YEOMAN'S TALE
Prima pars
Seven years I've served this canon, but no more
I know about his science than before.
All that I had I have quite lost thereby;
And, God knows, so have many more than I.
Where I was wont to be right fresh and gay
Of clothing and of other good array,
Now may I wear my old hose on my head;
And where my colour was both fresh and red,
Now it is wan and of a leaden hue;
Whoso this science follows, he shall rue.
And from my toil yet bleary is my eye,
Behold the gain it is to multiply!
That slippery science has made me so bare
That I've no goods, wherever I may fare;
And I am still indebted so thereby
For gold that I have borrowed, truthfully,
That while I live I shall repay it never.
Let every man be warned by me for ever!
And any man who casts his lot thereon,
If he continue, I hold his thrift gone.
So help me God, thereby he shall not win,
But empty purse and have his wits grow thin.
And when he, through his madness and folly,
Has lost his own, by willing jeopardy,
Then will he incite others, many a one,
To lose their wealth as he himself has done.
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For unto scoundrels it's a pleasant thing
Their fellows in distress and pain to bring,
Thus was I taught once by a learned clerk.
Of that no matter, I'll speak of our work.
When we are where we choose to exercise
Our elvish craft, why, we seem wondrous wise,
Our terms are all so learned and so quaint.
I blow the fire till my heart's like to faint.
Why tell you what proportions of things went
In working out each new experiment,
As five ounces, or six, it may well be,
Of silver, or some other quantity?
Or tell you all the names, my memory fails,
Of orpiment, burnt bones, and iron scales
That into powder we ground fine and small?
Or in an earthen pot how we put all,
And salt put in, and also pepper dear,
Before these powders that I speak of here,
And covered all these with a plate of glass,
And of the various other gear there was?
And of the sealing of the pot and glass,
So that the air might no way from it pass?
And of the slow fire and the forced also,
Which we made there, and of the care and woe
That we took in our matter's sublimating,
And in calcining and amalgamating
Quicksilver, which is known as mercury crude?
For all our skill, we never could conclude.
Our orpiment and sublimed mercury,
Our litharge that we ground on porphyry,
Of each some certain ounces- it is plain
Naught helped us, all our labour was in vain.
Neither the gases that by nature rose
Nor solid matter either- none of those
Might, in our working, anything avail.
For lost was all our labour and travail,
And all the cost, the devil's own to pay,
Was lost also, for we made no headway.
There is also full many another thing
That to our craft pertains in labouring.
Though name them properly I never can,
Because, indeed, I am an ignorant man,
Yet will I tell them as they come to mind,
Though I'll not try to class each one by kind;
Armenian bole, borax, the green of brass,
And sundry vessels made of earth and glass,
Our urinals and all our descensories,
Vials and crucibles, sublimatories,
Cucurbites, and alembics, and such freaks,
All dear enough if valued at two leeks.
There is no need to specify them all,
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The reddening waters and the dark bull's gall,
Arsenic, sal ammoniac, and brimstone;
And, too, of herbs could I name many a one,
Valerian, agrimony, and lunary,
And others such, if I but wished to tarry.
Our lamps that burned by day and burned by night
To bring about our end, if but we might,
Our furnace, too, white-hot for calcination,
And waters all prepared for albication,
Unslaked lime, chalk, and white of egg, I say,
Powders diverse, and ashes, dung, piss, clay,
Little waxed bags, saltpetre, vitriol;
And many a different fire of wood and coal;
Alkali, salt, potassium carbonate,
And our burnt matters, and coagulate,
Clay mixed with horses' or men's hair, and oil
Of tartar, alum, glass, yeast, wort, argoil,
Realgar, and our matters absorbent,
And with them, too, our matters resorbent,
And how we practised silver citrination
And our cementing and our fermentation,
Our moulds and testers, aye, and many more.
I will tell you, as I was taught before,
The bodies seven and the spirits four,
In order, as my master named of yore.
The first of spirits, then, quicksilver is,
The second arsenic, the third, ywis,
Is sal ammoniac, the fourth brimstone.
The seven bodies I'll describe anon:
Sol, gold is, Luna's silver, as we see,
Mars iron, and quicksilver's Mercury,
Saturn is lead, and Jupiter is tin,
And Venus copper, by my father's kin!
This wicked craft, whoso will exercise,
He shall gain never wealth that may suffice;
For all the coin he spends therein goes out
And is but lost, of which I have no doubt.
Whoso, then, will exhibit such folly,
Let him come forth and learn to multiply;
And every man that has aught in coffer,
Let him appear and be philosopher.
Perhaps that craft is easy to acquire?
Nay, nay, God knows! And be he monk or friar
Canon, or priest, or any other wight,
Though he sit at his books both day and night
In learning of this elvish, fruitless lore,
All is in vain, and by gad it's much more!
To teach an ignorant man this subtlety-
Fie! Speak not of it, for it cannot be;
And though he has booklore, or though he's none,
In final count he shall find it all one.
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For both of them, and this by my salvation,
Come to one end seeking multiplication;
They fare the same when they've done everything;
That is to say, they both fail, sorrowing.
Yet I forgot to tell you in detail
Of the corrosive waters and limaille,
And of some bodies the mollification,
And on the other hand of induration,
Oils, and ablutions, metals fusible-
More than a bible it would need to tell,
The largest ever; therefore I think best
That of these names I say no more, but rest.
For I believe that I've told you enough
To raise a devil, be he never so rough.
Ah no! Let be; the old philosopher's stone
Is called elixir, which we seek, each one;
For had we that, then were we safe enow.
But unto God in Heaven do I vow,
For all our art, when we've done all things thus,
And all our tricks, it will not come to us.
The thing has caused us to spend all we had,
For grief of which almost we should go mad,
Save that good hope comes creeping in the heart,
Supposing ever, though we sorely smart,
The elixir will relieve us afterward;
The tension of such hope is sharp and hard;
I warn you well, it means go seeking ever;
That future time has made men to dissever,
Trusting that hope, from all that ever they had.
Yet of that art they cannot well grow sad,
For unto them it is a bitter-sweet;
So it appears; for had they but a sheet
With which to wrap themselves about by night,
And a coarse cloak to walk in by daylight,
They'd sell them both and spend it on this craft;
They can withhold naught till there's nothing left
And evermore, wherever they'll be gone,
Men know them by their smell of foul brimstone;
For all the world they stink as does a goat;
Their savour is so rammish and so hot
That, though a man a mile away may be,
The odour will infect him, trust to me!
Thus by their smell and their threadbare array,
If men but wish, these folk they'll know, I say.
And if a man but ask them privately
Why they do go clothed so unthriftily,
They right away will whisper in his ear
And say that if they should be noticed here,
Why, men would slay them, what of their science;
Lo, thus these folk impose on innocence!
Pass over this; unto my tale I'll run.
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Before the pot upon the fire be done,
Of metals in a certain quantity
My lord it tempers, and no man save he-
Now he is gone I dare say this boldly-
For, as men say, he can work artfully;
Always I well know be has such a name,
And yet full often has he been to blame;
And know you how? Full oft it happens so,
The pot broke, and farewell! All vanished, O!
These metals have such violence and force
That crucibles cannot resist their course
Unless they are built up of lime and stone;
They penetrate, and through the wall they're gone,
And some of them sink right into the ground-
Thus have we lost, at times, full many a pound-
And some are scattered all the floor about,
Some leap up to the roof. Beyond a doubt,
Although the Fiend's to us not visible,
I think he's with us, aye, that same scoundrel!
In Hell, wherein he is the lord and sire,
There's not more woe, nor ****rancour, nor more ire.
For when our pot is broken, as I've said,
Each man will scold and think that he's been bled.
One said that it was due to fire-making,
One said it was the blowing of the thing
(There I was scared, for that was what I did);
"O straw! You silly fool!" the third one chid,
"It was not tempered as it ought to be."
"Nay," said the fourth, "shut up and list to me;
It was because our fire was not of beech,
That's why, by all the wealth I hope to reach!"
I cannot tell where one should put the blame;
There was a dreadful quarrel, just the same.
"What!" cried my lord, "there's no more to be done,
Whatever 'twas, I'll know the reason soon;
I am quite certain that the pot was crazed.
Be as it may, do not stand there amazed;
As always, sweep the floor up quickly lad,
Pluck up your hearts and be both blithe and glad."
The rubbish in a heap then swept up was,
And on the floor was spread a large canvas,
And all this rubbish in a sieve was thrown,
And sifted, picked, and whirled, both up and down.
"By gad," said one, "something of our metal
There is yet here, although we have not all.
Although this thing has gone awry for now,
Another time it may be well enow.
We must put all our wealth at adventure;
A merchant's luck, gad! will not aye endure,
Believe me, in his high prosperity;
Sometimes his freight will sink beneath the sea,
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And sometimes comes it safely unto land."
"Peace," said my lord, "next time I'll understand
How to proceed and with a better aim;
And, save I do, sirs, let me be to blame;
There was defect in something, well I know 't."
Another said the fire was far too hot.
But were it hot or cold, I dare say this,
That we concluded evermore amiss.
We fail of that which we desire to have,
And in our madness evermore we rave.
And when we're all together, then each one
Seems as he were a very Solomon.
But everything that glisters like fine gold
Is not gold, as I've often heard it told;
And every apple that is fair to eye
Is yet not sound, whatever hucksters cry;
And even so, that's how it fares with us:
For he that seems the wisest, by Jesus,
Is greatest fool, when proof is asked, in brief;
And he that seems the truest is a thief;
That shall you know ere I from you do wend,
When of my tale I've made at length an end.
Explicit prima pars.
Et sequitur pars secunda.
There is a canon of religion known
Among us, who'd contaminate a town,
Though 'twere as great as Nineveh the free,
Rome, Alexandria, Troy, and others three.
His tricks and all his infinite treacherousness
No man could write down fully, as I guess,
Though he should live unto his thousandth year.
In all this world for falsehood he's no peer;
For in his terms he will so twist and wind
And speak in words so slippery of kind,
When he communicates with any wight,
That he soon makes a fool of him, outright,
Unless it be a devil, as he is.
Full many a man has he beguiled ere this,
And will, if he may live a further while;
And yet men walk and ride full many a mile
To seek him out and have his acquaintance,
Naught knowing of his treacherous simulance.
And if you care to listen to me here,
I'll make the proof of what I say quite clear.
But most religious canons, just and true,
Don't think I'm slandering your house, or you,
Although my tale may of a canon be.
Some rogue's in every order, pardon me,
And God forbid that for one rascal's sake
Against a group we condemnation make.
To slander you is nowise my intent,
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But to correct what is amiss I'm bent.
This tale I tell here not alone for you,
But even for others, too; you know well how
Among Christ's twelve disciples there was not
One to play traitor, save Iscariot.
Then why should all the rest be put to blame
Who guiltless were? Of you I say the same.
Save only this, if you will list to me,
If any Judas in your convent be,
Remove the man betimes, I counsel you,
Lest shame or loss or trouble should ensue.
And be displeased in nothing, I you pray,
But hear what on this matter I may say.
In London was a priest, an annualeer
Who had therein dwelt many a quiet year,
A man so pleasant and so serviceable
To the goodwife who shared with him her table,
That she would never suffer him to pay
For board or clothing, went he ever so gay;
Of spending-silver, too, he had enow.
No matter; I'll proceed as I said, now,
And tell about the canon all my tale,
Who gave this priest good cause to weep and wail.
This canon false, he came, upon a day
Into the chaplain's chamber, where he lay,
Beseeching him to lend him a certain
Amount in gold, the which he'd pay again.
"Lend me a mark," said he, "for three days, say,
And when that time's done, I will it repay.
And if you find me false, I shall not reck
If, on a day, you hang me by the neck!"
This priest brought him a mark, and quickly, too,
