The Man of Law's Tale
Folio 59v
20 of 27 folios
Vitailled was the shipe / it is no drede
Habundantly / for hir ful longe space
And othere necessaries / that sholde nede
She hadde ynogh / heryed be goddes grace
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For wynd and weder / almygħty god prchace
And brynge hir hoom / I kan no bettre seye
But in the See / she dryueth forth hir weye
¶ Explicit secunda pars ~
Alla the kyng comth hoom soone after this
Vn to his Castel / of the which I tolde
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And asketh / where his wyf / and his child is
The Constable / gan aboute his herte colde
And pleynly / al the manere he hym tolde
As ye han herd / I kan telle it no bettre
And sheweth the kyng his seel and his lettre
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And seyde lord / as ye comanded me
Vp peyne of deeth / so haue I doon certein
This Messager / tormented was til he ;
Moste biknowe / and tellen plat and pleyn
Fro nygħt to nyght / in what place he had leyn
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And thus by wit and sotil enquerynge
Ymagined was / by whom this harm gan sprynge
¶ The hand was knowe / that the lettre wroot
And al the venym / of this cursed dede
But in what wise / certeinly I noot
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Theffect is this / þt Alla out of drede
His mooder slow / that may men pleynly rede
For þt she traitour was to hir ligeance
Thus endeth olde Donegild with meschance
The sorwe that this Alla / nygħt and day
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Maketh for his wyf / and for his child also
Ther is no tonge / that it telle may
But now wol I / vn to Custance go
That fleteth in the see / in peyne and wo
Fyue yeer and moore / as liked cristes sonde
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Er that hir shipe / approched vn to the londe