On the morning of the contest, Palamon goes before dawn to the temple of Venus to beseech her aid in winning Emily, while Arcite at the same time steals to the temple of Mars to pray for victory in war. Each deity not only promises but actually grants the suppliants precisely what they ask; for Arcite, though fatally wounded, is victorious in the battle, and Palamon in the end weds Emily. Although Boccaccio's _Teseide_ furnished the general plot for this _Knightes Tale_, Chaucer's story is, as Skeat says, "to all intents, a truly original poem." The other pilgrims tell stories in keeping with their professions and characters. Perhaps the next best tale is the merry story of _Chanticleer and the Fox_. This is related by the Nun's Priest. The Clerk of Oxford tells the pathetic tale of _Patient Griselda_, and the Nun relates a touching story of a little martyr. Chief Qualities of Chaucer.--I. Chaucer's descriptions are unusually clear-cut and vivid. They are the work of a poet who did not shut himself in his study, but who mingled among his fellow-men and noticed them acutely. He says of the Friar:-- "His eyes twinkled in his heed aright, As doon the sterres in the frosty night." Our eyes and ears distinctly perceive the jolly Monk, as he canters along:-- "And, whan he rood, men might his brydel here Ginglen in a whistling wind as clere, And eek as loude as dooth the chapel-belle." II. Chaucer's pervasive, sympathetic humor is especially characteristic. We can see him looking with twinkling eyes at the Miller, "tolling thrice"; at the Monk, "full fat and in good point," hunting with his greyhounds, "swift as fowl in flight," or smiling before a fat roast swan; at the Squire, keeping the nightingale company; at the Doctor, prescribing the rules of astrology. The Nun feels a touch of his humor:-- "Ful wel she song the service divyne, Entuned in hir nose ful semely." Of the lawyer, he says:-- "No-wher so bisy a man as he ther nas, And yet he semed bisier than he was." Sometimes Chaucer's humor is so delicate as to be lost on those who are not quick-witted. Lowell instances the case of the Friar, who, "before setting himself softly down, drives away the cat," and adds what is true only of those who have acute understanding: "We know, without need of more words, that he has chosen the snuggest corner." His humor is often a graceful cloak for his serious philosophy of existence. The humor in the _Prologue_ does not impair its worth to the student of fourteenth-century life. III. Although Chaucer's humor and excellence in lighter vein are such marked characteristics, we must not forget his serious qualities; for he has the Saxon seriousness as well as the Norman airiness. As he looks over the struggling world, he says with a sympathetic heart:-- "Infinite been the sorwes and the teres Of olde folk, and folk of tendre yeres."[35] In like vein, we have:--