3373. _Balthasar_; so spelt by Boccaccio, who relates the story very briefly, De Cas. Virorum Illust., lib. ii. cap. 19. So also, by Peter Comestor, in his Historia Scholastica; and by Gower, Conf. Amant., lib. v (ed. Pauli, ii. 365). The Vulgate generally has _Baltassar_; Daniel, cap. v. 3379. _and ther he lay_; cf. l. 3275 above. 3384. The word _tho_ is supplied for the metre. The scribes have considered _vesselles_ (_sic_) as a trisyllable; but see ll. 3391, 3416, 3418. 3388. _Of_, for. Cf. 'thank God _of_ al,' i. e. for all; in Chaucer's Balade of Truth.--M. See note in vol. i. pp. 552-3. 3422. Tyrwhitt has _trusteth_, in the plural, but _thou_ is used throughout. Elsewhere Chaucer also has '_on_ whom we _truste_,' Prol. A. 501; '_truste on_ fortune,' B. 3326; cf. 'syker _on_ to trosten,' P. Pl. Crede, l. 350. 3427. _Dárius_, so accented. _degree_, rank, position. 3429-36. I have no doubt that this stanza was a later addition. 3436. _proverbe._ The allusion is, in the first place, to Boethius, de Cons. Phil., bk. iii. pr. 5--'Sed quem felicitas amicum fecit, infortunium [235] faciet inimicum'; which Chaucer translates--'Certes, swiche folk as weleful fortune maketh freendes, contrarious fortune maketh hem enemys'; see vol. ii. p. 63. Cf. Prov. xix. 4--'Wealth maketh many friends; but the poor is separated from his neighbour,' &c. So also--'If thou be brought low, he [i. e. thy friend] will be against thee, and will hide himself from thy face'; Ecclus. vi. 12. In Hazlitt's Collection of English Proverbs, p. 235, we find-- 'In time of prosperity, friends will be plenty; In time of adversity, not one among twenty.' See also note to l. 120 above; and, not to multiply instances, note st. 19 of Goldsmith's Hermit:-- 'And what is friendship but a name, A charm that lulls to sleep; _A shade that follows wealth or fame_, And leaves the wretch to weep?' ZENOBIA. 3437. _Cenobia._ The story of Zenobia is told by Trebellius Pollio, who flourished under Constantine, in cap. xxix. of his work entitled Triginta Tyranni; but Chaucer no doubt followed later accounts, one of which was clearly that given by Boccaccio in his De Mulieribus Claris, cap. xcviii. Boccaccio relates her story again in his De Casibus Virorum, lib. viii. c. 6; in an edition of which, printed in 1544, I find references to the biography of Aurelian by Flavius Vopiscus, to the history of Orosius, lib. vii. cap. 23, and to Baptista Fulgosius, lib. iv. cap. 3. See, in particular, chap. xi. of Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, where the story of Zenobia is given at length. Palmyra is described by Pliny, Nat. Hist. lib. v. cap. 21. Zenobia's ambition tempted her to endeavour to make herself a Queen of the East, instead of remaining merely Queen of Palmyra; but she was defeated by the Roman emperor Aurelian, A.D. 273, and carried to Rome, where she graced his triumph, A.D. 274. She survived this reverse of fortune for some years.