53. 'As respects this matter, may good befall the great clerks that treat of it.' Of these great clerks, Macrobius was one, and Jean de Meun another. Vincent of Beauvais has plenty to say about dreams in his Speculum Naturale, lib. xxvi.; and he refers us to Aristotle, Gregory (Moralia, lib. viii.), Johannes de Rupella, Priscianus (ad Cosdroe regem Persarum) Augustinus (in Libro de diuinatione dæmonum), Hieronimus (super Matheum, lib. ii.), Thomas de Aquino, Albertus, &c. 58. Repeated (nearly) from l. 1. 63. I here give the text as restored by Willert, who shows how the corruptions in ll. 62 and 63 arose. First of all _dide_ was shifted into l. 62, giving _as dide I_; as in Caxton's print. Next, an additional _now_ was put in place of _dide_ in l. 63; as in P., B., F., and Th., and _dide_ was dropped alltogether. After this, F. turned the _now_ of l. 64 into _yow_, and Cx. omitted it. See also note to l. 111. 64. 'Which, as I can (best) now remember.' 68. Pronounced fully:--With spé-ci-ál de-vó-ci-óun. 69. Morpheus; see Book of Duch. 137. From Ovid, Met. xi. 592-612; esp. ll. 602, 3:-- 'Saxo tamen exit ab imo Riuus aquae Lethes.' 73. 'Est prope Cimmerios,' &c.; Met. xi. 592. 75. See Ovid, Met. xi. 613-5; 633. 76. _That ... hir_ is equivalent to _whose_; cf. Kn. Tale, 1852. 81. Cf. 'Colui, che tutto move,' i.e. He who moves all; Parad. i. 1. 88. Read _povért_; cf. Clerkes Tale, E 816. 92. MSS. _misdeme_; I read _misdemen_, to avoid an hiatus. 93. Read _málicióus_. 98. 'That, whether he dream when bare-footed or when shod'; whether in bed by night or in a chair by day; i.e. in every case. The _that_ is idiomatically repeated in l. 99. 105. The dream of Croesus, king of Lydia, and his death vpon a gallows, form the subject of the last story in the Monkes Tale. Chaucer got it from the Rom. de la Rose, which accounts for the form _Lyde_. The passage occurs at l. 6513:-- 'Cresus ... Qui refu roi de toute _Lyde_, ... Qu'el vous vuet faire au _gibet_ pendre.' 109, 10. The rime is correct, because _abreyd_ is a _strong_ verb. Chaucer does not rime a pp. with a _weak_ pt. tense, which should have a final _e_. According to Mr. Cromie's Rime-Index, there is just _one_ exception, viz. in the Kn. Tale, A 1383, where the pt. t. _seyde_ is rimed with the 'pp. _leyde_.' But Mr. Cromie happens to have overlooked the fact that _leyde_ is here _not_ the pp., but the _past tense_! Nevertheless, _abreyd-e_ also appears in a _weak_ form, by confusion with _leyd-e_, _seyd-e_, &c.; see C. T., B 4198, E 1061. Cf. Book of the Duchess, 192. In l. 109, he refers to l. 65. 111. Here again, as in l. 63, is a mention of Dec. 10. Ten Brink (Studien, p. 151) suggests that it may have been a _Thursday_; cf. the mention of _Jupiter_ in ll. 608, 642, 661. If so, the year was 1383.