"The besy larke, the messager of day, Sal[=e]weth in hire song the morw[=e] gray; And firy Phebus riseth up so bright, That all the orient laugheth at the sight; And with his strem[=e]s drieth in the greves The silver drop[=e]s hanging on the leves." Such is the description of the morning of the "thridde of May;" and perhaps, if no other mention of that date were to be found throughout Chaucer's works, we might be justified in setting it down as a random expression, to which no particular meaning was attached. But when we find it repeated in an entirely different poem, and the same "observaunce to May" again associated with it, the conviction is forced upon us that it cannot be without some definite meaning. This repetition occurs in the opening of the second book of _Troilus and Creseide_, where "the thridde" has not only "observaunce to May" again attributed to it, but also apparently some peculiar virtue in dreams. No sooner does Creseide behold Pandarus on the morning of the third of May, than "_by the hond on hie, she tooke him fast_," and tells him that she had thrice dreamed of him that night. Pandarus replies in what appears to have been a set form of words suitable to the occasion-- "Yea, nece, ye shall faren well the bet, If God wull, all this yeare." Now unless the third of May were supposed to possess some unusual virtue, the dreaming on that morning could scarcely confer a whole year's welfare. But, be that as it may, there can at least be no doubt that Chaucer designedly associated _some_ celebration of the advent of May with the morning of the third of that month. Without absolutely asserting that my explanation is the true one, I may nevertheless suggest it until some better may be offered. It is, that the association may have originated in the invocation of the goddess Flora, by Ovid, on that day (_Fasti_, v.), in order that she might inspire him with an explanation of the Floralia, or Floral games, which were celebrated in Rome from the 28th of April to the _third_ of May. These games, if transferred by Chaucer to Athens, would at once explain the "gret feste" and the "lusty seson of that May." Supposing, then, that Chaucer, in the _Knight's Tale_, meant, as I think he meant, to place the great combat on the anniversary of the fourth of May--that being the day on which Theseus had intercepted the duel,--then the entry into Athens of the rival companies would take place on {203} (Sunday) the second, and the sacrifices and feasting on the _third of May_, the last of the Floralia. A. E. B. Leeds, March 4, 1851. [Footnote 1: [Of which there can be no doubt. See further p. 205. of our present Number.--ED.]] * * * * * INEDITED POETRY, NO. II. CHORUS. (Harleian MSS., No. 367. fo. 154.)