689. 'And more beards made in two hours,' &c. 'Yet can a miller make a clerkes berd'; (Reves Tale), C. T., A 4096. 'Yet coude I make his berd'; C. T., D 361. Tyrwhitt's note on the former passage is: '_make a clerkes berd_,' i.e. cheat him. _Faire la barbe_ is to _shave_, or _trim_ the beard; but Chaucer translates the phrase literally, at least when he uses it in its metaphorical sense. Boccace has the same metaphor, Decamerone, viii. 10. Speaking of some exorbitant cheats, he says that they applied themselves 'non a radere, ma a scorticare huomini' [not to shave men, but to scarify them]; and a little lower--'si a soavemente _la barbiera_ saputo menare il rasoio' [so agreeably did the she-barber know how to handle the razor]. _Barbiera_ has a second and a bad sense; see Florio's Dictionary. 'Myght I thaym have spyde, I had _made thaym a berd_.' Towneley Mysteries, p. 144. 692. _Holding in hond_ means keeping in hand, attaching to oneself by feigned favours; just as _to bear in hand_ used to mean to make one believe a thing; see my note to Man of Lawes Tale, B 620. 695. _Lovedayes_, appointed days of reconciliation; see note in vol. v. to Chaucer's Prol. 258, and my note to P. Plowman, B. iii. 157. 'What, quod she, maked I not a _louedaie_ bitwene God and mankind, and chese a maide to be nompere [umpire], to put the quarell at ende?' Test. of Love, bk. i. ed. 1561, fol. 287. 696. _Cordes_, chords. Apparently short for _acordes_, i.e. musical chords, as Willert suggests. It is rather a forced simile, like _cornes_ in l. 698. 698. _Cornes_, grains of corn; see note to Monkes Tale (Group B, 3225). 700. _Wis_, certainly; cf. _y-wis_. The _i_ is short. 702. _Impossíble_, (accent on _i_); cf. Clerkes Tale, E 713. 703. _Pyes_, mag-pies, chattering birds; Squi. Ta., F 650. 708. _Worthy for to leve_, worthy to believe, worthy of belief. 712. _Thyn owne book_, i.e. the book you are so fond of, viz. Ovid's Metamorphoses, which Chaucer quotes so continually. Libraries in those days were very small (Cant. Ta. Prol. 294); but we may be almost certain that Chaucer had a copy of the Metamorphoses of his own. The reference here is to Ovid's description of the House of Fame, Metam. xii. 39-63. See Golding's translation of this passage in the Introduction. 730. This passage is founded on one in Boethius; cf. Chaucer's translation, bk. iii. pr. 11, ll. 98-110. Imitated also in Le Rom. de la Rose, 16963-9. Cf. Dante, Par. i. 109, which Cary thus translates:-- 'All natures lean, In this their order, diversely,' &c. 738. _That_ practically goes with _hit falleth doun_, in l. 741. The sentence is ill-constructed, and not consistent with grammar, but we see what is meant. 742. _By_, with reference to (as usual in M. E). Cf. Dante, Purg. xviii. 28, which Cary thus translates:-- 'Then, as the fire points up, and mounting seeks His birth-place and his lasting seat,' &c.