Chaucer's other prominent contemporary "the moral Gower," in Chaucer's own phrase, was a far more commonplace character than Langland. John Gower was entitled to write himself Esquire, and owned lands in Norfolk and Suffolk; he died in 1408, and his tomb, with his three great books under his head, exists in St. Saviour's church, in Southwark. Chaucer was a friend of Gower and, during one of his missions abroad, left Gower in charge of his affairs. At the close of "Troilus and Criseyde" he writes:-- O moral Gower, this book I directe To thee, and to the philosophical Strode, To vouchen-sauf, ther nede is, to correcte. Strode is unknown, and we need not examine conjectures about him. Gower was not ungrateful for Chaucer's compliment, and in the earlier version of his "Lover's Confession" ("Confessio Amantis") he repaid it, very prettily. Venus bids Gower's poems greet Chaucer well "as my disciple and my poet, who, in his youth filled the land with ditties and glad songs which he made for my sake". This passage was later omitted by Gower: who, it has been suggested, was annoyed by some words in the Prologue to the Man of Law's Tale (in Chaucer's "Canterbury Tales"). At the same time, Gower may have removed the compliment to Chaucer merely to make room for more matter. If not, literary people have quarrelled bitterly over smaller things than the criticism by the Man of Law. With Gower's French and Latin poems we have little to do. His Fifty Ballades, in French, to his lady, are very pleasing examples of that old formal verse, with its difficult rhymes; and but for the grammatical liberties which the Anglo-French writer took, would secure for Gower a high place among the French versifiers of his age. In French he wrote "Le Mirour de l'Omme," "Man's Mirror," which has a curious history.[3] The "Mirour," in French, and the "Speculum" in Latin, deal allegorically with virtues, vices, and the way of salvation; they contain many stories from all quarters, which are retold by Gower in English, in his immense "Lover's Confession". In his Latin "Vox Clamantis" (1381) ("The Voice of one crying") and in his "Mirour de l'Omme," but especially in the former, Gower had given his testimony against the sins of the age, and had impartially rebuked all sorts and conditions of men. He described the peasant rising, under Wat Tyler and others, of 1381, exculpating King Richard, who was only a brave boy. But, as time went on, and dissatisfaction increased, Gower turned from Richard, and, very early, to the son of John of Gaunt, later Henry IV. Gower transferred his affections so early to Henry, that it would be unfair to call him a venal turncoat: he saw no hope for English liberty except in the Lancastrian cause.