41. #midde warðe#: OE. #middeweard# is usually an adjective, occasionally a noun: it is probably adj. here, and miswritten for middewarðre. Comp. ‘In mideward þe felde,’ KH, O 574. #clusterlokan# is explained as ‘enclosures,’ Morris; ‘cloisters,’ Strat.-Bradley. The corresponding passage in B iv appears to be, ‘Et ostendit illi puteum signatum ·vij· sigillis et ait illi: Sta longe ut possis sustinere fetorem hunc,’ and the meaning, fastening, lock, seems most appropriate here. The word is OE. #clūstorloc#: comp. Pogatscher, §§ 179, 182; L. L. claustella, _pl._ of claustellum, is glossed clusterlocæ, Sweet, Oldest E. Texts, 50/220; hæpsan, loca, Napier, OE. Glosses, 106/4003; clustello, loce, fæstene, id. 136/5936. The metrical versions have ‘seals,’ except the Jesus MS., ‘Seoue duren þer beoþ on’; OEM 153/235 and the second prose version renders, ‘a put ylokke wiþ seuen lockes,’ ES xxii. 136/53. Comp. also, ‘Til he vnclustri al þe lokes | þat liif ligges vnder,’ ES ix. 441/59, 60. 42. #þar neh#, near that place; an expression of rare occurrence; comp. ‘magas þa þe þær neah wæron,’ BH 139/16. 44. #escade . . . to#: see 77/49; a rare construction, not in OE., and probably influenced by F. demander à; comp. ‘Huet may þe zone betere acsy to his uader þanne bread,’ Ayenbite, 110/14: analogous is, ‘fulluht we to þe ȝeorneð,’ L 29473. But at is older, ‘hwæt axast ðu æt us,’ Ælf. Lives, ii. 74/112, and of is in Layamon, ‘he axede gauel of þan londe,’ 6122. Comp. ‘þretest to,’ 155/83. 45. In the Latin and the other versions the bad bishop is not in the ‘puteus,’ but in another place of less torment; there he is ‘avarus et dolosus et superbus,’ here he is specialized into one who iniquitously vexed his tenants and dependants by legal proceedings and steady oppression. So the Monk of Eynsham saw a bishop grievously tormented ‘quod placitoris loco inter saeculares iudices consedere plurimum delectari soleret, multis etiam bona conscientia nitentibus in litigantibus violentus contra iustitiam oppressor exstiterit,’ 698/5. Some contemporary is here meant, such as Gilbert Glanville, Roffensis (Godwin, De Presulibus, i. 572), or perhaps the earlier Gerard of York (id. ii. 27; Mapes, De Nugis Curialium, 224). The haughty maiden of ll. 50-54 is not in the Latin; in all probability she is drawn from the life. 46. #lokien#: ‘non custodivit legem dei,’ B iv. 77/21; see 4/20 and comp. ‘witen,’ 77/58. 49. #swiðe unbisorȝeliche#, with great want of care, consideration, like ‘mid mycelre reþnesse,’ said of the bishop’s treatment by the devils in BH 43/29. 52. #Elmesȝeorn#, fond of giving alms, benevolent; OE. #ælmes-georn#: it occurs here only in ME. #prud . . . ⁊ modi#: comp. 3/4; ‘So modi and so prute,’ OEM 82/300. 53. #wreðful ⁊ ontful#: comp. 56/31. 55. #forð mid#, together with: see 1/19 note. #of#, from: a common use with dative in OE.; comp. ‘Peahte ðeod com of Scyþþia lande on scipum,’ Bede, 28/7.