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EDITED FROM THE LAUD MS. 622 IN THE BODLEIAN LIBRARY BY F. J. FURNIVALL, M.A., TRINITY HALL, CAMBRIDGE.
LONDON: PUBLISHED FOR THE EARLY ENGLISH TEXT SOCIETY, BY N. TRÜBNER & CO., 57 & 59, LUDGATE HILL. MDCCCLXXVIII.
CLAY AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS, BUNGAY.
in "The Elegy on the Death of Edw. I", from Harl. 2253, leaf 73, in Mr Thos. Wright's"Nou is Edward of CarnarvonKing of Engelond al aplyht",
"DIuers is þis myddellerede To lewed Men & to lerede; Bysynesse / care & sorouȝ Is myd Man vche morowȝe." (&c.)]
[THE first following version of the Life of St Alexius, from Laud 622, is the longest—and latest, no doubtAltenglische Legenden; and he having calld my attention to the other three versions of the Alexius legend, I have, for completeness' sake, added them here. I have also printed the Laud 108 opposite the Vernon text, from which it differs slightly sometimes in words, and in more distinctly Midland forms (waster, was there, l. 10; hauest tou, l. 490; and tou, l. 496; and te, l. 547; some a forms, like gan, l. 168), for convenience of comparison of two later repre|sentatives of one unknown original. I should perhaps apologize for wasting so much space on a mere legend of a so-calld saint's life. But the present story is the same pathetic one as Guy of Warwick's; it is prettily versified; and the comparing of the four ways in which the same incidents are told, has a certain interest: one likes to see how the religious-story writers of old spun out or shortend their material
Dr Horstmann,—who edited the Laud 108 Life in Herrig's Archiv, vol. iii. p. 102-10, 1873Vita metrica, auctore Marbodo, primum archidiacono Andegavensi, deinde Redonensi episcopo († 1123)', printed in the Acta Sanctorum, Boll. 17. Juli, p. 254-256; and another 'Vita, auctore anonymo', ib. p. 251-254. To the last, the Laud 108 version is nearly related, often even in words. Eight Middle High German versions of this Legend were edited by Mass|mann, Quedlinburg, 1843. The following Early English lives do not belong to the great Collection of long-line "Saints' Lives" in the Harleian, Vernon, and other MSS, from which I printed a selec|tionc' as Midland or Northern 'ic', instead of the Southern 'ich'.Transactions, of 1858. This Collection will be edited in a separate volume some day for the E. E. Text Society, by Dr Horstmann, after he has edited for us all the Extra Legends not in the Collection or in the Vernon Gospel-stories.]
A BOOK OF MORAL PRECEPTS AND PRACTICAL ADVICE (lines 1-105),
Taken from the Laud MS. 622's headless rymed Bible Story, and followd by the end of that Story, an account of
All in alternate fours and threesDay of Doom, 268; and herein, p. 89-90;Havelok, fiht, rith, 2716; with, knith = wiht, knight, 2720.—Skeat.prep. mytte (with), wytte, 43-4; but 'myde', iryde (ridden), 249-50; erþe, fierþe (fourth), 99-100; mesure, here, 89-90; consaile (obl.), availe (inf.), 115-16; but conseil (obj.), israel, 141-2; seiȝe (3 pl. perf. saw), diȝe (inf. die), 191-2; but 'seiȝ', on heiȝ (high), 201-2; pite (put,? inf., imp., or subj.), a 'lite' (little), 225-6; ydytte (pp. of dihtan, see 254) 'pytte' (pit), 241-2; vchone, fon, 262-3. The ie is right: folie, wrie (inf.), 79-80; Elye, prophecie, 152-3, &c. The final e can hardly be allowd to þing (obl.) to match springe (inf.), 3-4 (see 59-60); cp. telle, wel, 55-6. Mowe, abouȝe, 27-8, seem to show the silence of ȝ. There are two 'longe' s probably of the same mean|ing ryming, 91-2. The ryming of 'ysed' (pp.) with 'ded' (dead, pp.), 195-6; of 'sede' (perf.) with 'falshede', 266, and the six '-ede' words in 267-272 (drede among them); of 'seide' with 'rede', 179-180, shows that the Elizabethan and our 'sed' is not, as has been asserted, a mere late slurring of the broad 'said', tho' that form or spelling has won in the fight for the survival of the fittest.
Laud MS. 622, leaf 69, back.]
(See other englisht copies of these '15 Tokens' attributed to St. Jerome, in my Early English Poems (Philolog. Soc. 1862), p. 7-12, and p. 162-4 (from Metrical Homilies, ed. Small, before publication); my Hymns to the Virgin and Christ (E. E. T. S., 1867), p. 118-125; Dr Morris's 'Hampole's Pricke of Conscience' (Philolog. Soc.), p. 135, l. 4738, &c, and Cursor Mundi (E. E. T. Soc.), p. 1282-1298, Part IV, and p. 1616-18 (from the Edinburgh MS), in the Appendix, Part V; Mr T. Wright's Chester Plays (copid by Geo. Bellin in 1592), vol. ii. 147-9; and in the same vol., p. 219-21 (from Harl. MS. 913, ab. 1309 A.D.), and p. 222-4 (from Harl. 2255); Mr Small's Northern 'Metrical Homilies', p. 25-6, given also in Morris and Skeat's Speci|mens of Early English, 1298-1393, p. 83-5; Sir David Lyndesay's Monarche, book iv, l. 5462 (in Skeat's Specimens, 1394-1579, p. 254-6), &c, &c, &c. Old Friesic has a version of these 15 Tokens, says Mr Skeat: see Richtofen, Friesische Rechtsquellen, p. 130. Mr Small says that 'no copy of the original is to be found in the Benedictine edition of Jerome's Works'; and Mr Wright states that 'others say they are first found in the Prognosticon futuri seculi of Julianus Pomerius, a theologian, who died in the year 690'.)
The Song that follows the Signs here, has pretty bits and good words in it.
Laud MS. 622, leaf 70, back, col. 2.]
[In order to complete the Life of Solomon, of which his Book of Wisdom, &c., form part, I add the MS. bit that comes before the Book. The passage about his birth is too far back to be taken.]
[Laud MS. 622, leaf 69, col. 1.]