'It was in the old Tower of Aldgate that he made himself a supreme master of the poetic craft, and turned his mastery to immortal account in the production of so exquisite a piece as _Troilus and Cressida_, and in the designing of a work that should give yet ampler expression to his manifold gifts and graces, to his maturest thought and his highest inspiration.'[62] In 1382 he obtained an additional comptrollership, that of the Petty Customs of the Port of London, with leave to nominate a substitute on the understanding that he was responsible for him. In February 1385 the same privilege was allowed him in regard to his old comptrollership, and soon afterwards he left the gate house of Aldgate. In October 1386 he was elected Knight of the Shire for Kent, and then political troubles caused him to lose both his comptrollerships. Professor Hales finds that the premises were granted in October 1386 to Richard Foster, possibly identical with Richard Forrester, who was one of Chaucer's proxies when he went abroad for a time in May 1378.[63] The date of _The Legend of Good Women_ is given as probably in the spring or summer of 1386, and as the house in which he was then living had a garden and an arbour, it could not have been the dwelling-house of Aldgate. Professor Hales believes that when the poet left the latter place he went to live at Greenwich. 'When that the sun out of the south gon weste, And that this flower gon close and go to reste For darkness of the night, for which she dredde, Home to mine house full swiftly I me spedde, To go to rest and early for to rise, To see this flower spread, as I devise; And in a little arbour that I have That benched was on turves fresh ygrave, I bad men shoulde me my couche make, For dainty of the newe summer's sake, I bad them strawen flowers on my bed.'[64] The year 1387 has been fixed as the date of the framework of the Pilgrimage to Canterbury, starting from the Tabard, fast by the Ball in Southwark. Some of the Tales had certainly been written before this, but then it was that they were gathered together. A very interesting note by Professor Hales, on the date of the _Canterbury Tales_, is printed in the _Athenæum_ (April 8, 1893), in which some excellent reasons are given in support of this date: 'It has been and is by some still placed as late as 1393. But the evidence for placing it so late is extremely slight, if, indeed, there is any at all that bears investigation; whereas assuredly many things point to the year 1387 or thereabouts as the year of the pilgrimage and of Chaucer's immortal description of it.'[65] In 1389 Chaucer was Clerk of the King's Works at the Palace of Westminster, the Tower of London and various royal manors. In 1390 he was employed to repair St. George's Chapel, Windsor, and to erect scaffolds at Smithfield for Richard II. and his Queen, Anne of Bohemia, for them to view a great tournament.