CANTERBURY TALES. Eighteen tales told by a company of pilgrims going to visit the shrine of "St. Thomas à Becket" at Canterbury. The party first assembled at the Tabard, an inn in Southwark, and there agreed to tell one tale each both going and returning, and the person who told the best tale was to be treated by the rest to a supper at the Tabard on the homeward journey. The party consisted of twenty-nine pilgrims, so that the whole budget of tales should have been fifty-eight, but only eighteen of the number were told, not one being on the homeward route. The chief of these tales are: "The Knight's Tale" (_Pal´amon and Ar´cite, 2 syl._); "The Man of Law's Tale" (_Custance, 2 syl._); "The Wife of Bath's Tale" (_A Knight_); "The Clerk's Tale" (_Grisildis_); "The Squire's Tale" (_Cambuscan_, incomplete); "The Franklin's Tale" _(Dor'igen and Arvir'agus)_; "The Prioress's Tale" (_Hugh of Lincoln_); "The Priest's Tale" (_Chanticleer and Partelite_); "The Second Nun's Tale" (_St. Cecil'ia_); "The Doctor's Tale" (_Virginia_); "The Miller's Tale" (_John the Carpenter and Alison_); and "The Merchant's Tale" (_January and May_) (1388). CANTON, the Swiss valet of lord Ogleby. He has to skim the morning papers and serve out the cream of them to his lordship at breakfast, "with good emphasis and good discretion." He laughs at all his master's jokes, flatters him to the top of his bent, and speaks of him as a mere chicken compared to himself, though his lordship is seventy and Canton about fifty. Lord Ogleby calls him his "cephalic snuff, and no bad medicine against megrims, vertigoes, and profound thinkings."--Colman and Garrick, _The Clandestine Marriage_ (1766). CAN'TRIPS (_Mrs._), a quondam friend of Nanty Ewart, the smuggler-captain. _Jessie Cantrips_, her daughter.--Sir W. Scott, _Redgauntlet_ (time, George III.). CANT'WELL (Dr.), the hypocrite, the English representative of Molière's Tartuffe. He makes religious cant the instrument of gain, luxurious living, and sensual indulgence. His overreaching and dishonorable conduct towards lady Lambert and her daughter gets thoroughly exposed, and at last he is arrested as a swindler.--I. Bicker staff, _The Hypocrite_ (1768). Dr. Cantwell ... the meek and saintly hypocrite. L. Hunt. CANUTE' or CNUT and EDMUND IRONSIDE. William of Malmesbury says: When Canute and Edmund were ready for their sixth battle in Gloucestershire, it was arranged between them to decide their respective claims by single combat. Cnut was a small man, and Edmund both tall and strong; so Cnut said to his adversary, "We both lay claim to the kingdom in right of our fathers; let us therefore divide it and make peace;" and they did so. Canutus of the two that furthest was from hope ... Cries, "Noble Edmund hold! Let us the land divide." ... and all aloud do cry, "Courageous kings, divide! 'Twere pity such should die." Drayton, _Polyolbion_, xii. (1613).