That made me that I coulde not withdraw My chamber of Venus from a good fellaw. [Yet have I Marte’s mark upon my face, And also in another privy place. For God so wisly* be my salvation, *certainly I loved never by discretion, But ever follow’d mine own appetite, All* were he short, or long, or black, or white, *whether I took no keep,* so that he liked me, *heed How poor he was, neither of what degree.] <25> What should I say? but that at the month’s end This jolly clerk Jenkin, that was so hend,* *courteous Had wedded me with great solemnity, And to him gave I all the land and fee That ever was me given therebefore: But afterward repented me full sore. He woulde suffer nothing of my list.* *pleasure By God, he smote me ones with his fist, For that I rent out of his book a leaf, That of the stroke mine eare wax’d all deaf. Stubborn I was, as is a lioness, And of my tongue a very jangleress,* *prater And walk I would, as I had done beforn, From house to house, although he had it sworn:* *had sworn to For which he oftentimes woulde preach prevent it And me of olde Roman gestes* teach *stories How that Sulpitius Gallus left his wife And her forsook for term of all his For nought but open-headed* he her say** *bare-headed **saw Looking out at his door upon a day. Another Roman <27> told he me by name, That, for his wife was at a summer game Without his knowing, he forsook her eke. And then would he upon his Bible seek That ilke* proverb of Ecclesiast, *same Where he commandeth, and forbiddeth fast, Man shall not suffer his wife go roll about. Then would he say right thus withoute doubt: “Whoso that buildeth his house all of sallows,* *willows And pricketh his blind horse over the fallows, And suff’reth his wife to *go seeke hallows,* *make pilgrimages* Is worthy to be hanged on the gallows.” But all for nought; I *sette not a haw* *cared nothing for* Of his proverbs, nor of his olde saw; Nor would I not of him corrected be. I hate them that my vices telle me, And so do more of us (God wot) than I. This made him wood* with me all utterly; *furious I woulde not forbear* him in no case. *endure Now will I say you sooth, by Saint Thomas, Why that I rent out of his book a leaf, For which he smote me, so that I was deaf. He had a book, that gladly night and day For his disport he would it read alway; He call’d it Valerie,<28> and Theophrast, And with that book he laugh’d alway full fast. And eke there was a clerk sometime at Rome, A cardinal, that highte Saint Jerome, That made a book against Jovinian, Which book was there; and eke Tertullian, Chrysippus, Trotula, and Heloise, That was an abbess not far from Paris;