The artistic interest of the narrative couplet in the Knight’s Tale has been heightened by Dryden. Beneath the superficial differences which mark each verse with its time is a difference of conception. Chaucer’s time gave him easier variations; but he himself bent them narratively. The larger movement of the Knight’s Tale conveys the magnificence of princely chivalry less in action than in pageantry. Romance as story was not for Chaucer, one might say but for the tale of the Franklin. Here he shapes a plot complementary to that of _Troilus and Criseyde_ in briefer compass, but with equal onwardness. The issue again is convincing because it is reached by distinct stages. The fourth, for instance, culminates upon the squire’s desperate triumph. Doth as yow list; have your biheste in minde; For quik or deed, right ther ye shul me finde. In yow lyth al, to do me live or deye; But wel I woot the rokkes been aweye. F. 1385-1338. And the next begins: He taketh his leve; and she astonied stood. In al hir face nas a drope of blood. F. 1339-1340. The crisis upon Dorigen’s taking all to her husband, thus fulfilling her character while she flies in the face of the code of secrecy, is rendered in dialogue of sharp interaction. “Is ther oght elles, Dorigen, but this?” “Nay, nay”, quod she, “God help me so, as wis; This is to muche, and it were Goddes wille.” “Ye, wyf”, quod he, “lat slepen that is stille. It may be wel, paraventure, yet to-day. Ye shul your trouthe holden, by my fay! For God so wisly have mercy on me, I hadde wel lever ystiked for to be, For verray love which that I to yow have, But if ye sholde your trouthe kepe and save. Trouth is the hyeste thing that man may kepe.” But with that word he brast anon to wepe. F. 1469-1480. No less eloquent is her reply to the squire at their meeting. [He] asked of hir whiderward she wente. And she answerde, half as she were mad, “Unto the gardin, as myn housbond bad, My trouthe for to holde, allas! allas!” F. 1510-1513. Such passages, as in _Troilus and Criseyde_, are narrative leads. The last leads directly to the squire’s fine renunciation; for the tale of generosity has been embodied in individuals working out its issue. Even the illusion of the rocks is lifted above magic because they were first an obsession of the anxious wife. An _exemplum_ and a tale of marvel have been reconceived and recomposed in a moving story.