cer,
since its poetic beauty, as there can be no harm in observing, is not
in itself very great.

To come to an end of this topic, there seems no possibility of escaping
from one of the following alternatives. EITHER the Philippa Chaucer of
1366 was Geoffrey Chaucer's wife, whether or not she was Philippa Roet
before marriage, and the lament of 1369 had reference to another
lady--an assumption to be regretted in the case of a married man, but
not out of the range of possibility. OR--and this seems on the whole
the most probable view--the Philippa Chaucer of 1366 was a namesake
whom Geoffrey married some time after 1369, possibly, (of course only
POSSIBLY,) the very lady whom he had loved hopelessly for eight years,
and persuaded himself that he had at last relinquished--and who had
then relented after all. This last conjecture it is certainly
difficult to reconcile with the conclusion at which we arrive on other
grounds, that Chaucer's married life was not one of preponderating
bliss. That he and his wife were COUSINS is a pleasing thought, but
one which is not made more pleasing by the seeming fact that, if they
were so related, marriage in their case failed to draw close that
hearts' bond which such kinship at times half unconsciously knits.

Married or still a bachelor, Chaucer may fairly be supposed, during
part of the years previous to that in which we find him securely
established in the king's service, to have enjoyed a measure of
independence and leisure open to few men in his rank of life, when once
the golden days of youth and early manhood have passed away. Such
years are in many men's lives marked by the projection, or even by the
partial accomplishment, of literary undertakings on a large scale, and
more especially of such as partake of an imitative character. When a
juvenile and facile writer's taste is still unsettled, and his own
style is as yet unformed, he eagerly tries his hand at the reproduction
of the work of others; translates the "Iliad" or "Faust," or suits
himself with unsuspecting promptitude to the production of masques, or
pastorals, or life dramas--or whatever may be the prevailing fashion in
poetry--after the manner of the favourite literary models of the day.
A priori, therefore, everything is in favour of the belief hitherto
universally entertained, that among Chaucer's earliest poetical
productions was the extant English translation of the French "Roman de
la Rose." That he mad