courage, resignation, and philosophic calm; and by the “Retractation” at the end of The Canterbury Tales, which, if it was not foisted in by monkish transcribers, may be supposed the effect of Chaucer’s regrets and self-reproaches on that solemn review of his life-work which the close approach of death compelled. The poet was buried in Westminster Abbey; <12> and not many years after his death a slab was placed on a pillar near his grave, bearing the lines, taken from an epitaph or eulogy made by Stephanus Surigonus of Milan, at the request of Caxton: “Galfridus Chaucer, vates, et fama poesis Maternae, hoc sacra sum tumulatus humo.” <13> About 1555, Mr Nicholas Brigham, a gentleman of Oxford who greatly admired the genius of Chaucer, erected the present tomb, as near to the spot where the poet lay, “before the chapel of St Benet,” as was then possible by reason of the “cancelli,” <14> which the Duke of Buckingham subsequently obtained leave to remove, that room might be made for the tomb of Dryden. On the structure of Mr Brigham, besides a full-length representation of Chaucer, taken from a portrait drawn by his “scholar” Thomas Occleve, was — or is, though now almost illegible — the following inscription:— M. S. QUI FUIT ANGLORUM VATES TER MAXIMUS OLIM, GALFRIDUS CHAUCER CONDITUR HOC TUMULO; ANNUM SI QUAERAS DOMINI, SI TEMPORA VITAE, ECCE NOTAE SUBSUNT, QUE TIBI CUNCTA NOTANT. 25 OCTOBRIS 1400. AERUMNARUM REQUIES MORS. N. BRIGHAM HOS FECIT MUSARUM NOMINE SUMPTUS 1556. <15>