answerable to the excellencye of yo{u}r iudgemente, and mete to declare the fulnesse of the dutyfull mynde and service I beare and owe unto your Lordshippe, to whome in all reuerence I commytte this simple treatyce. Thus (withe hartye prayer comendinge youre estate to the Almightye (who send to yo{u}r Lordshippe manye happye and helthfull yeres and to me the enlarged contynuance of youre honorable fauo{r}) I humblye take my leave. Clerkenwell grene the xx of December 1599. Yo{u}r Lordshippes wholye to dyspose, Francis Thynne. [Footnote 3: “_The names and Armes of the Chancellors collected into one Catologue by ffrancis Thynn declaring the yeres of the reignes of the kinges and the yere of our Lorde in whiche they possessed that office._” --_Folio MS. Bridgewater Library._] TO MASTER THOMAS SPEIGHTE ffrancis Thynn sendeth greeting. [Sidenote: The author is vexed that Master Speight did not consult him on his new edition of Chaucer.] THE INDUSTRYE AND LOVE (MASTER SPEIGHT) whiche you haue used, and beare, uppon and to oure famous poete Geffrye Chaucer, deseruethe bothe comendat{i}one and furtherance: the one to recompense yo{u}r trauayle, the other to accomplyshe the duetye, whiche we all beare (or at the least yf we reuerence lernynge or regarde the honor of oure Countrye, sholde beare) to suche a singuler ornamente of oure tonge, as the woorkes of Chaucer are: Yet since there is nothinge so fullye perfected, by anye one, whereine some imp{er}fect{i}one maye not bee founde, (for as the prouerbe is Bernardus, or as others have Alanus, non videt omnia,) you must be contented to gyve me leave in discharge of the duetye and love whiche I beare to Chaucer, (whome I suppose I have as great intereste to adorne withe my smale skyll as anye other hath, in regarde that the laborious care of my father made hym most acceptable to the worlde in correctinge and augmentinge his woorkes,) to enter into the examinat{i}one of this newe edit{i}one, and that the rather, because you with _Horace_ his verse “si quid novisti rectius istis, candidus imperti,” have willed all others to further the same, and to accepte yo{u}r labors in good p{ar}te, whiche as I most willingly doo, so meaninge but well to the worke, I ame to lett yo{u} understande my conceyte thereof, whiche before this, yf yo{u} wolde have vouchesafed my howse, or have thoughte me worthy to have byn acqueynted with these matters, (whiche yo{u} might well have donne without anye whatsoeuer dispargement to yo{ur}selfe,) you sholde haue understoode before the impressione, althoughe this whiche I here write ys not nowe uppon selfe will or fonnd conceyte to wrangle for one asses shadowe, or to seke a knott in a rushe, but in frendlye sorte to bringe truthe to lighte, a thinge whiche I wolde desire others to use towardes mee in whatsoeuer shall fall oute of my penne. Wherefore I will here shewe such thinges as, in mye opynione, may seme to be touched,