As to the date of this poem, Ten Brink (_Studien_, p. 127) shews that it must have been written later than 1373; and further, that it was probably written earlier than Troilus, which seems to have been finished in 1383. It may therefore have been written in 1382, in which case it may very well refer to the betrothal (in 1381) of King Richard II to Queen Anne of Bohemia. See, on this subject, Dr. Koch's discussion of the question in Essays on Chaucer, p. 407, published by the Chaucer Society. Prof. Ward (who follows Koch) in his Life of Chaucer, p. 86, says:--'Anne of Bohemia, daughter of the great Emperor Charles IV., and sister of King Wenceslas, had been successively betrothed to a Bavarian prince and to a Margrave of Meissen, before--after negotiations which, according to Froissart, lasted a year[261]--her hand was given to young King Richard II. of England. This sufficiently explains the general scope of the _Assembly of Fowls_, an allegorical poem written on or about St. Valentine's Day, 1381[262]--eleven months or nearly a year after which date the marriage took place[263].' I here note that Lydgate's _Flour of Curtesie_ is a palpable imitation of the _Parliament of Foules_; so also is the earlier part of his _Complaint of the Black Knight_. On the other hand, it is interesting to find, in the Poésies de Marie de France, ed. Roquefort, Paris, 1820, that Fable 22 (vol. i. p. 130) is entitled:--'Li parlemens des Oiseax por faire Roi.' In this fable, the Birds reject the Cuckoo, and choose the Eagle as king. § 23. VI. A COMPLEINT TO HIS LADY.