re were nine muses in Greece of old, and no one of these daughters
of Apollo was expected to inspire the writer of prose-fiction."[9]

[Footnote 9: In his introduction to _Materials and Methods of
Fiction_, by Clayton Hamilton, published by the Baker & Taylor Co.,
New York.]

He argues from this that "prose seemed to the Greeks, and even to the
Latins who followed in their footsteps, as fit only for pedestrian
purposes." It is more probable that, as regards prose-fiction, they
did not realize that they were called upon to explain the omission of
the tenth muse. Her exclusion was based on no reasoned principle, but
was due to a sensuous art-instinct: the Greeks felt that the unnatural
limitations of the poetic medium were more in keeping with the
unnatural[10] brevity of a story which must be short. The exquisite
prose tales which have been handed down to us belong to the age of
their decadence as a nation; in their great period their tellers of
brief tales unconsciously cast their rendering in the poetic mould.[11]
In natures of the highest genius the most arduous is instinctively the
favorite task.

[Footnote 10: "The short-story is artificial, and to a considerable
degree unnatural. It could hardly be otherwise, for it takes out of
our complex lives a single person or a single incident and treats
that as if it were complete in itself. Such isolation is not known
to nature."--Page 22 of _Short-Story Writing_, by Charles Raymond
Barrett, published by the Baker & Taylor Co., New York.]

[Footnote 11: For example, the story told by Demodocus of _The
Illicit Love of Ares for Aphrodite, and the Revenge which Hephaestus
Planned_--Odyssey, Bk. VIII.]

Chaucer, by reason of his intimate acquaintance with both the poetry
and prose-fiction of Boccaccio, had the opportunity to choose between
these two mediums of short-story narration; and he chose the former.
He was as familiar with Boccaccio's poetic method, as exemplified
in the _Teseide_, as with his prose, as exemplified at much greater
length in the _Decameron_, for he borrowed from them both. Yet in only
two instances in the _Canterbury Tales_ does he relapse into prose.

The _Teseide_ in Chaucer's hands, retaining its poetic medium, is
converted into the _Knight's Tale_; while the _Reeve's Tale_, the
_Franklin's_, and the _Shipman's_, each borrowed from the prose
version of the _Decameron_, are given by him a poetic setting. This
preference for poetry over prose as