And forþi ich wolde biseken you, Þat haue{n} herd þe rim[e] nu, [Sidenote: Each of you say a _pater-noster_ for the author.] Þat ilke of you, with gode wille, 2996 Seye a pat{er}-nost{er} stille, For him þat haueth þe rym[e] maked, And þer-fore fele nihtes waked; Þat ih{es}u c{ri}st his soule bringe 3000 Bi-forn his fader at his endinge. +Amen.+ NOTES. [The following notes are abridged from the notes in Sir F. Madden’s excellent edition, the abridgement being effected almost entirely by occasional omissions, and with but very slight unimportant changes of a few words, chiefly in the case of references to later editions of various works than were existing in 1828. I have added one or two short notes upon difficult constructions, but these are distinguished by being enclosed within square brackets. --W. W. S.] 9. _He was the wicteste man at nede That thurte riden on ani stede._ This appears to have been a favourite expression of the poet, and to have comprehended, in his idea, the perfection of those qualifications required in a knight and hero. He repeats it, with some slight variation, no less than five times, viz. in ll. 25, 87, 345, 1757, and 1970. The lines, however, are by no means original, but the common property of all our early poetical writers. We find them in Laȝamon: þis wes þe feiruste mon þe æuere æhte ær þusne kinedom, þa he mihte beren wepnen, & his hors wel awilden. _Laȝamon_, vol. i. p. 174. So also in the Romance of _Guy of Warwick_: He was the best knight at neede That euer bestrode any stede. Coll. Garrick, K. 9. sign. Ll. ii. Again, in the _Continuation of Sir Gy_, in the Auchinleck MS., (ed. for the Abbotsford Club, 1840, 4to; p. 266), The best bodi he was at nede That ever might bistriden stede, And freest founde in fight. And again, in the _Chronicle of England_, published by Ritson from a copy in the British Museum, MS. Reg. 12. C. XII. After him his sone Arthur Hevede this lond thourh and thourh. He was the beste kyng at nede That ever mihte ride on stede, Other wepne welde, other folk out-lede, Of mon he hede he never drede. --l. 261. The very close resemblance of these lines to those in Havelok, ll. 87-90, would induce a belief that the writer of the _Chronicle_ had certainly read, and perhaps copied from, the Romance. The MS. followed by Ritson was undoubtedly written soon after the death of Piers Gaveston, in 1313, with the mention of which event it concludes; but in the Auchinleck copy it is continued, by a later hand, to the minority of Edward III. It only remains to be observed, that the poem in MS. Reg. 12. C. XII. is written by the same identical hand as the MS. Harl. 2253 (containing _Kyng Horn_, &c.), whence some additional light is thrown on the real age of the latter, respecting which our antiquaries so long differed.