er, not only that Chaucer was, as the
"Host" of the Tabard's transparent self-irony implies, small of stature
and slender, but that he was accustomed to be twitted on account of the
abstracted or absent look which so often tempts children of the world
to offer its wearer a penny for his thoughts. For "elfish" means
bewitched by the elves, and hence vacant or absent in demeanour.

It is thus, with a few modest but manifestly truthful touches, that
Chaucer, after the manner of certain great painters, introduces his own
figure into a quiet corner of his crowded canvas. But mere outward
likeness is of little moment, and it is a more interesting enquiry
whether there are any personal characteristics of another sort, which
it is possible with safety to ascribe to him, and which must be, in a
greater or less degree, connected with the distinctive qualities of his
literary genius. For in truth it is but a sorry makeshift of literary
biographers to seek to divide a man who is an author into two separate
beings, in order to avoid the conversely fallacious procedure of
accounting for everything which an author has written by something
which the MAN has done or been inclined to do. What true poet has
sought to hide, or succeeded in hiding, his moral nature from his muse?
None in the entire band, from Petrarch to Villon, and least of all the
poet whose song, like so much of Chaucer's, seems freshly derived from
Nature's own inspiration.

One very pleasing quality in Chaucer must have been his modesty. In
the course of his life this may have helped to recommend him to patrons
so many and so various, and to make him the useful and trustworthy
agent that he evidently became for confidential missions abroad.
Physically, as has been seen, he represents himself as prone to the
habit of casting his eyes on the ground; and we may feel tolerably sure
that to this external manner corresponded a quiet, observant
disposition, such as that which may be held to have distinguished the
greatest of Chaucer's successors among English poets. To us, of
course, this quality of modesty in Chaucer makes itself principally
manifest in the opinion which he incidentally shows himself to
entertain concerning his own rank and claims as an author. Herein, as
in many other points, a contrast is noticeable between him and the
great Italian masters, who were so sensitive as to the esteem in which
they and their poetry were held. Who could fancy Chaucer cro