Mary Baldwin College - Bluestocking Yearbook (Staunton, VA)

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THK AUGUSTA SEMINARY ANNUAL. 11 Call up him who left half told, The story of Caiiibuscaii bold, Of Cainbull atul of Algarsife, And who had Canace to wife. That owned the virtuous ring and glass. Still we see in her a bright, happy girl, delighted with the present of the wonderful ring and glass, full of pity and sorrow for the heart-broken falcon, carrying her home and, day and night, watching and caring for her till healed. What patterns of submission, patien ce, and loyalty are Uorigene, Griselda and Constance ! In them are portrayed some of woman ' s noblest traits. When Dorigene, sorrow- fully but submissively at the bidding of her super-chivalrotis husband, goes forth to keep her troth, for truthe is the hyest thing that man may kepe, her lover Aurelius gives his opinion of her character — As of the treweste and the beste wyf. That evere jet I knew in al my lyf. Griselda ' s patience is proverbial; but though the story of her many trials is interestingly and sweetly told, there is not enough of the earth, earthy, to make weak mortals realh ' admire her character. Constance, driven from her home by one mother-in-law, ' a scorpion, a wicked goost, a serpent under femy- mynytee, is kept by her faith in the cross of Christ fro the feend and fro his clawes, and when on reaching a strange land she is again plotted against, accused of murder, and brought before the King, help comes to her from heaven, proclaiming her innocence. No sooner has she married Alia, the King, than the second mother-in-law, Donegal , intercepts her letters and causes her to be sent away from the home where she had found new love and happiness. But at last, after all her wanderings and misfortunes, by means of the litel son, Maurice, and his resemblance to his mother, Constance and Alia came together again. ' •In joy and bliss at mete I let hem dw elle, A thousand foold wel moore than I kan telle ' Sue Browne Stribling.

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10 THE AUGUSTA SEMINARY ANNUAL. and also that if any might arouse our angry passions — Trewely thern ' is noon of us all, That we nill kike for that he seth us soth Assay, and he shal fynde it that so doth. Frequently Chaucer tries to impress upon his readers that these are not his personal feelings on the subject, as when he sa5 ' S : Thise been the cokkes wordes and not myne. I kan noon harm of no womman divyne. And yet in spite of all this harmless sarcasm, Chaucer really has, we feel, a great respect for women and a bright ideal of what a woman ought to be. Chaucer, like Shakes- peare, has made his women his most interesting characters. Nor could we have better examples of Chaucer ' s descriptive powers than when portrajdng his women, though he is ever declaring that his English eke is insufficient. It is not, however, in many words and highly wrought figures that he gives us a picture of them, but in some telling epithet or short phrase — faire, yonge and fresche, high beaute withouten pride, as rody and bright as the yonge sonne, faire as is the rose in May are some of his favorite expressions. Emelye ' s beauty calls forth more than this, he speaks of her as one That fayrer was to seen. Than is the lilie upon his stalke grene. And fressher than the May with floures newe, For with the rose colour stroof hire hewe, I noot which was the fyner of hem two. ' ' The character of this beautiful girl, whose stor} the knight tells, is brought out in her prayer to Diana before the contest between Palamon and Arcite, in which she prays that love and peace be sent between them, that their love for her be quenched or turned to another place, for she de- sires to be a maiden all her life, and, like Diana herself, to live a life of liberty, hunting and wandering in the woodes wylde. But, adds she, If my destynee be shapen so, That I shall needes have oon of hem two, As sende me him that moost desirethme. To judge how Canace would have acted when put to the test, we should have to —

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12 THE AUGUSTA SEMINARY ANNUAL. The Fool : a Stud) from King Lear. TN ancient times, amid the purple hangings and - - gold fringed draperies of the royal court, where king and courtiers shone in their jeweled robes, often was seen the merry face of the court jester. Arrayed in motley robe, with shaven crown, and a long cowl surrounded by a cox- comb, right gaily did the fool jingle his bells and crack his jokes. A pleasant life was his. The only dut} of his office was to be witty, and hard a task as this would be to some of us, not so to him. We cannot help feeling a certain respect for this strange, quaint fellow. The difference is so great between one who intentionally and for sufficient rea- sons makes a fool of himself, and one who by nature is spared the task. Perhaps the kind hand of fortune has been more lavish than of yore; at an} rate the ancient fool has now no more employment. Yet he was a vast improvement on the ordinary modern affair. He openly confessed his vocation and gloried in his profession, and all his foolishness did not deprive him of constancy to those whom he served, and of kind and faithful affection. Keen to discern men ' s character, sharp to reveal their faults, his wit was of no ordinary kind, and even now it excites the envy of his many rivals. And if men must be fools of some kind, give me your good old fool with bells and hollow cap, rather than your modem one, with a hollow head and no cap. Of sterling quality was the jester who whiled away the hours for Lear, King of Ancient Britain ; a man of mature age and bright and winning parts, and of nervous, sensitive temperament was he who for many years was an atten- dant on the King. Perchance in other days he had played with a little Goneril and Regan, and had carried in his arms a bright-haired, blue-eyed Cordelia. And when this lovely babe grew tall and winsome, he still had tended her; with growing joy had watched her rounding form, her ripening lips and cheeks, the sweet unfolding of her womanhood. How well he knew her older sisters too: their dark, fierce