9. He is hence concluded
to have belonged to Prince Lionel's establishment as squire or page to
the Lady Elizabeth; and it was probably in the Prince's retinue that he
took part in the expedition of King Edward III into France, which began
at the close of the year 1359 with the ineffectual siege of Rheims, and
in the next year, after a futile attempt upon Paris, ended with the
compromise of the Peace of Bretigny. In the course of this campaign
Chaucer was taken prisoner; but he was released without much loss of
time, as appears by a document bearing date March 1st, 1360, in which
the king contributes the sum of 16 pounds for Chaucer's ransom. We may
therefore conclude that he missed the march upon Paris, and the
sufferings undergone by the English army on their road thence to
Chartres--the most exciting experiences of an inglorious campaign; and
that he was actually set free by the Peace. When, in the year 1367, we
next meet with his name in authentic records, his earliest known
patron, the Lady Elizabeth, is dead; and he has passed out of the
service of Prince Lionel into that of King Edward himself, as Valet of
whose Chamber or household he receives a yearly salary for life of
twenty marks, for his former and future services. Very possibly he had
quitted Prince Lionel's service when in 1361 that Prince had by reason
of his marriage with the heiress of Ulster been appointed to the Irish
government by his father, who was supposed at one time to have destined
him for the Scottish throne.

Concerning the doings of Chaucer in the interval between his liberation
from his French captivity and the first notice of him as Valet of the
King's Chamber we know nothing at all. During these years, however, no
less important a personal event than his marriage was by earlier
biographers supposed to have occurred. On the other hand, according to
the view which commends itself to several eminent living commentators
of the poet, it was not courtship and marriage, but a hopeless and
unrequited passion, which absorbed these years of his life. Certain
stanzas in which, as they think, he gave utterance to this passion are
by them ascribed to one of these years; so that if their view were
correct, the poem in question would have to be regarded as the earliest
of his extant productions. The problem which we have indicated must
detain us for a moment.

It is attested by documentary evidence, that in the year 1374, Chaucer
had a wife b