Lord Rivers presenting his book to Edward IV.  
Female Manners—Lord Rivers—Popular History—Popular Science—Popular Fables—Popular Translations—The Canterbury Tales—Statutes—Books of Chivalry—Caxton's last days.
 
In the library belonging to the Archbishops of Canterbury, at Lambeth, is a beautiful manuscript, on vellum, of a French work, 'Les Dicts Moraux des Philosophes,' which contains the illumination of which the above is a copy. In lines written under the illumination the book is stated to be translated by "Antony erle," by which Lord Rivers is meant. {126} This book was printed by Caxton in 1477; and it is held that the man kneeling by the side of the earl in the illumination is the printer of the book. We have already mentioned the confidential intercourse which subsisted between Lord Rivers and his printer, with regard to the revision of this work. (See page 82.) The passages which we there quote are given in a sort of appendix, in which Caxton. professes to have himself translated a chapter upon women, which Lord Rivers did not think fit to meddle with, and which he prints with a real or affected apprehension. The printer's statement is altogether such a piece of sly humour, that we willingly transcribe it, trusting that our readers will see the drollery through the quaintness:—
"I find that my said lord hath left out certain and divers conclusions touching women. Whereof I marvelled that my said lord hath not writ on them, nor what hath moved him so to do, nor what cause he had at that time. But I suppose that some fair lady hath desired him to leave it out of his book; or else he was amorous on some noble lady, for whose love he would not set it in his book; or else for the very affection, love, and good will that he hath unto all ladies and gentlewomen, he thought that Socrates spared the sooth, and wrote of women more than truth; which I cannot think that so true a man and so noble a philosopher as Socrates was, should write otherwise than truth. For if he had made fault in writing of women, he ought not nor should not be believed in his other {127} Dictes and Sayings. But I perceive that my said lord knoweth verily that such defaults be not had nor found in the women born and dwelling in these parts nor regions of the world. Socrates was a Greek, born in a far country from hence, which country is all of other conditions than this is, and men and women of other nature than they be here in this country; for I wot well, of whatsoever condition women be in Greece, the women of this country be right good, wise, pleasant, humble, discreet, sober, chaste, obedient to their husbands, true, secret, stedfast, ever busy, and never idle, attemperate in speaking, and virtuous in all their works; or at least should be so. For which causes so evident, my said lord, as I suppose, thought it was not of necessity to set in his book the sayings of his author Socrates touching women."
There is a book translated by Caxton from the French, and printed by him in 1484, which we may incidentally here notice, as illustrating the female manners of that century. It is called 'The Knight of the Tower;' and really would seem to justify the sarcasm of Caxton where he says, "The women of this country be right good, &c., or at least should be so." The preface implies that the work, though written by a Frenchman, applies to the contemporary state of society in England; and it may be well to see how our ladies were employed about four centuries ago. It appears from this curious performance that the ladies, although well accomplished in needlework, confectionary, church {128} music, and even taught something of the rude surgery of those days, were not great proficients in reading, and the art of writing was thought to be better let alone by them. The Knight of the Tower complains of the levity of the ladies. Their extravagance in dress, the husband's standing complaint, is thus put by the Knight of the Tower: "The wives say to their husbands every day, 'Sir, such a wife and such hath such goodly array that beseemeth her well, and I pray you I may have of the same.' And if her husband say, 'Wife, if such have such array, such that are wiser than they have it not,' she will say, 'No force it is [that is of no consequence], for they cannot wear it; and if I have it, ye shall see how well it will become me, for I can wear it.' And thus with her words her husband must needs ordain her that which she desireth, or he shall never have peace with her, for they will find so many reasons that they will not be warned [put off]." The women of lower estate come in for the same censure, the complaint being that they fur their draperies and fur their heels. It appears to have been the practice for ladies to go very freely to feasts and assemblies, to joustings and tournaments, without what we now call the protection of a husband or a male relation. A contemporary writer says, they lavished their wealth and corrupted their virtue by these freedoms. If we may judge from the warnings which the Knight of the Tower gives his daughters of the discipline they would receive at the hands of their husbands {129} for any act of disobedience,—the discipline not only of hard words, but of harder blows,—it is not to be wondered at that they sought abroad for some relief to the gloom and severity of their home lives. It is pleasant, amidst these illustrations of barbarous and profligate manners, to find a picture of that real goodness which has distinguished the female character in all ages, and which, especially in the times of feudal oppression of which we are speaking, mitigated the lot of those who were dependent upon the benevolence of the great possessors of property. The good Lady Cecile of Balleville is thus described by the Knight of the Tower: "Her daily ordinance was, that she rose early enough, and had ever friars and two or three chaplains, which said matins before her within the oratory. And after, she heard a high mass and two low, and said her service full devoutly. And after this she went and arrayed herself, and walked in her garden or else about her place, saying her other devotions and prayers. And as time was she went to dinner. And after dinner, if she wist and knew any sick folk or women in their childbed, she went to see and visited them, and made to be brought to them her best meat. And there as she might not go herself, she had a servant proper therefore, which rode upon a little horse, and bare with him great plenty of good meat and drink, for to give to the poor and sick folk there as they were. Also, she was of such custom, that, if she knew any poor gentlewoman that should be wedded, she arrayed her {130} with her jewels. Also she went to the obsequies of poor gentlewomen, and gave there torches, and such other luminary as it needed thereto. And after she had heard evensong she went to her supper if she fasted not, and timely she went to bed, and made her steward to come to her to wit [know] what meat should be had the next day. She made great abstinence, and wore the hair upon the Wednesday and upon the Friday." This is a true character of the middle ages;—goodness based upon sincere piety, but that degenerating into penances and mortifications, which our Reformed faith teaches us to believe are unnecessary for spiritual elevation.
Caxton's early friend and patron, Lord Rivers, appears, as far as we can judge from the books which remain, to have been the only one of the first English printer's contemporaries who rendered him any literary assistance. He contributed three works to Caxton's press; namely, the 'Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers,' 'The Moral Proverbs of Christine de Pisa,' and the book named 'Cordial.'
The book named 'Cordial' is clearly described in a prologue by Caxton. It was delivered to him, he says, by Lord Rivers, "for to be imprinted and so multiplied to go abroad among the people, that thereby more surely might be remembered the four last things undoubtedly coming." Caxton, in an elaborate commendation of his patron, of whose former "great tribulation and adversity" he speaks, {131} says, "It seemeth that he conceiveth well the mutability and the unstableness of this present life, and that he desireth, with a great zeal and spiritual love, our ghostly help and perpetual salvation." Lord Rivers had indeed borne tribulation since the time when, the flower of Edward's court, he jousted with the Bastard of Burgundy in Smithfield, in 1468. In the following year his father and brother were murdered by a desperate faction at Northampton. When Lord Rivers, conceiving the mutability and unstableness of life, wrote the book called 'Cordial,' he was only six-and-thirty years of age. Three years after Caxton printed the book, the translator was himself murdered at Pomfret by the Protector Richard. Shakspere did not do injustice to the noble character of this peer when he makes him exclaim, when he was led to the block,
"Sir Richard Ratcliff, let me tell thee this,—
To-day shalt thou behold a subject die,
For truth, for duty, and for loyalty."
Richard III., Act iii., Scene 2.
There is left to us a remarkable fragment which indicates to us something higher than the ability and literary attainment of this unfortunate nobleman. It has been preserved by John Rouse, a contemporary historian, who lived in the pleasant solitude of Guy's Cliff, near Warwick, and died there in 1491. He says (we translate from his Latin), "In the time of his imprisonment at Pomfret he wrote a balet in English, which has been shown to me, having these words—Sum what musyng," &c.; and then Rouse transcribes the ballad, of which {132} the second stanza is imperfect, but has been supplied from another ancient copy. Percy, who prints the ballad in his 'Reliques,' says, "If we consider that it was written during his cruel confinement in Pomfret Castle, a short time before his execution in 1483, it gives us a fine picture of the composure and steadiness with which this stout earl beheld his approaching fate." We subjoin the ballad, modernising the orthography:—
Somewhat musing, and more mourning,
In remembering the unstedfastness,
This world being of such wheeling,
Me contrarying what may I guess.
I fear doubtless, remediless
Is now to seize my woful chance;
For unkindness withouten less
And no redress, me doth avance,
With displeasance to my grievance
And no surance of remedy:
Lo in this trance, now in substance
Such is my dance, willing to die.
Methinks truly bounden am I,
And that greatly, to be content,
Seeing plainly fortune doth wry
All contrary from mine intent.
My life was lent me to one intent;
It is nigh spent. Welcome, fortune!
But I ne went thus to be shent,
But she it meant—such is her won [wont].
Turn we to one of the more important works of Caxton, in which he sought to inform his countrymen generally with a knowledge of history. 'The Chronicles of England,' printed in 1480, begins at the fabulous period before the Romans, and ends at the commencement of the reign of Edward IV. {133} The early legends of English History, which even Milton did not disdain to touch upon, are founded upon the 'History' of Nennius, which was composed in the ninth century, and which was copied by Geoffrey of Monmouth and other of the early chroniclers. Caxton took the thing as he found it, and continued the narrative to his own time. He deals prudently with contemporary events. Caxton followed up these chronicles in the same year with another book, called 'The Description of Britain,' in which he tells of the extent of the island, its marvels and wonders, its highways, rivers, cities, and towns, provinces, laws, bishoprics, and languages. He describes also Scotland and Ireland. Some of his marvels and wonders are a little astounding; but others are as precise in their description, and as forcible (brevity being an essential quality), as we could well desire. Thus of Stonehenge: "At Stonehinge beside Salisbury there be great stones and wondrous huge; and be reared on high, as it were gates set upon other gates; nevertheless it is not known cleanly nor aperceived how and wherefore they be so areared and so wonderful hanged."
From the chronicles of his own country Caxton sought to lead his readers forward to a knowledge of the history of other countries. He published in 1482 'The Polychronicon, containing the bearings and deeds of many times.' This book was originally composed by Higden, a Benedictine monk of Chester; and was translated from Latin into English {134} by John de Trevisa, who lived in the times of Edward III. and Richard II. Caxton in his title-page, says, "Imprinted by William Caxton, after having somewhat changed the rude and old English, that is to wit certain words which in these days be neither used nor understanden." In another place he says, "And now at this time simply imprinted and set in form by me, William Caxton, and a little embellished from the old making." Caxton was here doing what every person who desires to advance the knowledge of his time, by extending that knowledge beyond the narrow circle of scholars and antiquarians, must always do. He popularised an old book; he made it intelligible. He did not do,—as some verbal pedants amongst us still persist in doing,—present our old writers, and especially our poets, in all the capriciousness of their original orthography. He was the first great diffuser of knowledge amongst us; and surely we think he took a judicious course. He says of the 'Polychronicon,' "The book is general, touching shortly many notable matters." But, general as the book was, and extensively as he desired to circulate it according to his limited means, he does not approach his task without a due sense of the importance of the knowledge he was seeking to impart. The praise of history in his proem is truly eloquent: "History is a perpetual conservatrice of those things that have been before this present time; and also a quotidian witness of benefits, of malfaits [evil deeds], great acts, and triumphal {135} victories of all manner of people. And also, if the terrible feigned fables of poets have much stirred and moved men to right and conserving of justice, how much more is to be supposed that history, assertrice of virtue and a mother of all philosophy, moving our manners to virtue, reformeth and reconcileth near hand all those men which through the infirmity of our moral nature hath led the most part of their life in otiosity [idleness], and misspended their time, passed right soon out of remembrance: of which life and death is equal oblivion." Again, "Other monuments distributed in divers changes endure but for a short time or season; but the virtue of history, diffused and spread by the universal world hath time, which consumeth all other things, as conservatrice and keeper of her work."
'The Image or Mirror of the World' is one of the popular books which Caxton translated from the French. It treats of a vast variety of subjects, after the imperfect natural philosophy of those days. We have an account of the seven liberal arts; of nature, how she worketh; and how the earth holdeth him right in the middle of the world. We have also much geographical information, amongst which the wonders of Inde occupy a considerable space. Meteorology and astronomy take up another large portion. The work concludes with an account of the celestial paradise. This book seems specially addressed to high and courtly readers, for Caxton says, "The hearts of nobles, in eschewing of idleness {136} at such time as they have none other virtuous occupations on hand, ought to exercise them in reading, studying, and visiting the noble feats and deeds of the sage and wise men, sometime travelling in profitable virtues; of whom it happeneth oft that some be inclined to visit the books treating of sciences particular; and other to read and visit books speaking of feats of arms, of love, or of other marvellous histories; and among all other, this present book, which is called the 'Image or Mirror of the World,' ought to be visited, read, and known, by cause it treateth of the world, and of the wonderful division thereof." But the translator tells us, "I have endeavoured me therein, at the request and desire, cost and dispense, of the honourable and worshipful man, Hugh Brice, citizen and alderman of London." We may therefore believe that Caxton intended this book for a wider circulation than that of the nobles whom he addresses; especially as he says, "I have made it so plain that every man reasonable may understand it, if he advisedly and attentively read it, or hear it." The good old printer rendered the book intelligible to all classes, under the condition that all who read it should give their attention. This is one of the books into which Caxton has introduced woodcuts, giving twenty-seven figures, "without which it may not lightly [easily] be understood." These twenty-seven figures are diagrams, explanatory of some of the scientific principles laid down in this book; but there are eleven other cuts illustrative {137} of other subjects treated in the work. An idea maybe formed of the manner in which those cuts are engraved from the following fac-simile of 'Music.'
music
One of the most popular books of Caxton's translation must unquestionably have been the 'History of Reynard the Fox.' It is held that this work was composed in the twelfth century; and surely the author must have been a man of high genius to have constructed a fable which has been ever since popular in all countries, and delights us even to this hour. Caxton has no woodcuts to his edition, to which the book subsequently owed a portion of its attractions.
{138}
'The Subtil Histories and Fables of Esop,' translated by Caxton from the French, were printed by him in 1483, "The first year of the reign of King Richard the Third." In the first leaf there is a supposed portrait of Esop, a large rough woodcut, exhibiting him as he is described, with a great head, large visage, long jaws, sharp eyes, a short neck, curb-backed, and so forth. There is a controversy whether Richard the Third was a deformed man or not. It is held by many that it was one of the scandals put forth under his triumphant successor (which scandal Shakspere has for ever made current), that Richard was
"Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deform'd, unfinish'd."
It strikes us that Caxton would scarcely have ventured, in the first year of King Richard III., to exhibit a print of a hump-backed Esop (for any print was then a rare thing), if his dread sovereign had been remarkable amongst the people for a similar defect. The conclusion of these fables of Esop has a story told by Caxton as from himself, which is a remarkable specimen of a plain narrative style, with a good deal of sly humour:—
"Now then I will finish all these fables with this tale that followeth, which a worshipful priest and a parson told me late: he said that there were dwelling at Oxenford two priests, both Masters of Arts—of whom that one was quick and could put himself forth; and that other was a good simple priest. And so it happened that the master {139} that was pert and quick was anon promoted to a benefice or twain, and after to prebends, and for to be a dean of a great prince's chapel, supposing and weening that his fellow, the simple priest, should never be promoted, but be always an annual, or, at the most, a parish priest. So after a long time that this worshipful man, this dean, came running into a good parish with five or seven horses, like a prelate, and came into the church of the said parish, and found there this good simple man, sometime his fellow, which came and welcomed him lowly. And that other bade him 'Good morrow, Master John,' and took him slightly by the hand, and axed him where he dwelt.—And the good man said, 'In this parish.' 'How,' said he, 'are ye here a sole priest, or a parish priest?' 'Nay, Sir,' said he, 'for lack of a better, though I be not able nor worthy, I am parson and curate of this parish.' And then that other vailed [lowered] his bonnet, and said, 'Master Parson, I pray you to be not displeased; I had supposed ye had not been beneficed. But, master,' said he, 'I pray you what is this benefice worth to you a year?' 'Forsooth,' said the good simple man, 'I wot never; for I make never accompts thereof, how well I have had it four or five years.' 'And know ye not,' said he, 'what it is worth?—it should seem a good benefice.' 'No, forsooth,' said he, 'but I wot well what it shall be worth to me.' 'Why,' said he, 'what shall it be worth?' Forsooth,' said he, 'if I do my true dealing in the {140} cure of my parishes in preaching and teaching, and do my part belonging to my cure, I shall have heaven therefore. And if their souls be lost, or any of them, by my default, I shall be punished therefore. And hereof I am sure.' And with that word the rich dean was abashed: and thought he should be the better, and take more heed to his cures and benefices than he had done. This was a good answer of a good priest and an honest. And herewith I finish this book, translated and imprinted by me, William Caxton." The moral of the fable is not obsolete.
One of Caxton's most splendid books, of which he seems to have printed three editions, was 'The Golden Legend.' This is, indeed, an important work, printed in double columns, and containing between four and five hundred pages, which are largely illustrated with woodcuts. It was not without great caution, as we have already mentioned (page 107), that Caxton proceeded with this heavy and expensive undertaking. Happy would it have been for all printers if puissant and virtuous earls, and others in high places, had thought it a duty to encourage knowledge by taking a "reasonable quantity" of a great work; but happier are we now, when, such assistance being grudgingly bestowed or honestly despised, the makers of books can depend upon something more satisfying than the rich man's purse, which was generally associated with "the proud man's contumely."
{141}
In the prologue to the 'Golden Legend' Caxton recites several of the works which he had previously "translated out of French into English at the request of certain lords, ladies, and gentlemen." Those recited are the 'Recueil of Troy,' the 'Book of the Chess,' 'Jason,' the 'Mirror of the World,' Ovid's 'Metamorphoses,' and 'Godfrey of Boulogne.' It is remarkable that no printed copy exists of Ovid's 'Metamorphoses;' but in the library of Magdalen College, Cambridge, there is a manuscript containing five books of the 'Metamorphoses,' which purport to be translated by Caxton. It was evidently a part of his plan for the encouragement of liberal education, to present a portion of the people with translations of the classics through the ready means that were open to him of re-translation from the French. Many translators in later times have availed themselves of such aids, without the honesty to indicate the immediate sources of their versions. Caxton printed 'The Book of Tully of Old Age,' and 'Tullius his Book of Friendship.' He seems to have had great difficulty in obtaining a copy of an old translation of 'Tullius de Senectute.' The Book 'De Amicitia' was translated by John, Earl of Worcester, the celebrated adherent of the house of York, who was beheaded in 1470. Caxton, we think somewhat unnecessarily, limits the perusal of the treatise on Old Age. "This book is not requisite nor eke convenient for every rude and simple man, which understandeth not of science {142} nor cunning, and for such as have not heard of the noble policy and prudence of the Romans; but for noble, wise, and great lords, gentlemen, and merchants, that have been and daily be occupied in matter touching the public weal: and in especial unto them that been passed their green age, and eke their middle age, called virility, and been approached unto senectute, called old and ancient age. Wherein they may see how to suffer and bear the same patiently; and what surety and virtue been in the same, and have also cause to be joyous and glad that they have escaped and passed the manifold perils and doubteous adventures that been in juvente and youth, as in this said book here following ye may more plainly see."
'The Book of Eneydos,' compiled from Virgil, is not a translation of Virgil's great epic, but a sort of historical narrative formed upon the course of the poet's great story. The most remarkable passage of this book is that of Caxton's preface, in which he complains of the unstedfastness of our language, and the difficulty that he found between plain, rude, and curious terms. (See page 5.) In this translation he again limits his work to a particular class of persons; as if he felt, which was probably a prejudice of his time, that the inferior members of the laity ought not to touch anything that pertained to scholastic learning. He says, "Forasmuch as this present book is not for a rude uplandish man to labour therein, nor read it, but only for a clerk and a noble gentleman that feeleth {143} and understandeth in faits of arms, in love, and in noble chivalry: therefore, in mean between both, I have reduced and translated this said book into our English, not over rude nor curious, but in such terms as shall be understanden, by God's grace, according to my copy."
'The book called Cathon' (Cato's Morals) was destined by Caxton for a wider circulation:—"In my judgment it is the best book for to be taught to young children in schools, and also to people of every age it is full convenient if it be well understanden."
Dr. Dibdin, in his 'Typographical Antiquities,' says of Caxton, "Exclusively of the labours attached to the working of his press as a new art, our typographer contrived, though well stricken in years, to translate not fewer than five thousand closely printed folio pages. As a translator, therefore, he ranks among the most laborious, and, I would hope, not the least successful, of his tribe. The foregoing conclusion is the result of a careful enumeration of all the books translated as well as printed by him; which [the translated books], if published in the modern fashion, would extend to nearly twenty-five octavo volumes!" The exact nature of his labours seems, as might well be imagined, to have been often determined by very accidental circumstances. One noble lord requests him to produce this book, and one worshipful gentleman urges him to translate that. He says himself of his Virgil, "After divers works made, translated, {144} and achieved, having no work in hand, I, sitting in my study whereas lay many divers pamphlets and books, happened that to my hand came a little book in French, which late was translated out of Latin by some noble clerk of France, which book is named Eneydos, made in Latin by that noble poet and great clerk Virgil." Some books, indeed, he would be determined to print by their existing popularity. Such were his two editions of Chaucer's 'Canterbury Tales' which we may be sure, from his sound criticism, he felt the necessity of promulgating to a much wider circle than had been reached by the transcribers. (See page 31.) Caxton was especially the devoted printer of Chaucer. His truly honourable conduct in venturing upon a new edition of the 'Canterbury Tales,' when he found his first was incorrect, exhibits an example in the first printer and the first publisher which the printers and publishers of all subsequent times ought to reverence and imitate. The early printers, English and foreign, were indeed a high and noble race. They did not set themselves up to be the patrons of letters; they did not dispense their dole to scholars grudgingly and thanklessly; they worked with them; they encountered with them the risks of profit and of fame; they were scholars themselves; they felt the deep responsibility of their office; they carried on the highest of all commerce in an elevated temper; they were not mere hucksters and chafferers. It was in no spirit of pride, it was {145} in the spirit of duty, that Caxton raised a table of verses to Chaucer in Westminster Abbey. In his edition of Boetius, which he gives us to understand was translated by Master Geoffrey Chaucer, he says, "And furthermore I desire and require you, that of your charity ye would pray for the soul of the said worshipful man Geoffrey Chaucer, first translator of this said book into English, and embellisher in making the said language ornate and fair, which shall endure perpetually, and therefore he ought eternally to be remembered; of whom the body and corps lieth buried in the Abbey of Westminster, beside London, to fore the chapel of Saint Benet, by whose sepulture is written on a table, hanging on a pillar, his epitaph made by a poet-laureate, whereof the copy followeth." The writer of the Life of Chaucer, in the 'Biographia Britannica,' says, "It is very probable he lay beneath a large stone of gray marble in the pavement where the monument to Mr. Dryden now stands, which is in the front of that chapel [St. Benet's], upon the erecting of which [Dryden's monument] this stone was taken up, and sawed in pieces to made good the pavement. At least this seems best to answer the description of the place given by Caxton." There appears, according to the ancient editors of Chaucer's works, to have been two Latin lines upon his tombstone previous to the epitaph set up upon a pillar by Caxton. That epitaph was written by Stephanus Suriganius, poet-laureate of Milan. The monument of Chaucer, which still {146} remains in the Abbey, around which the ashes of Spenser, and Beaumont, and Drayton, and Jonson, and Cowley, and Dryden, have clustered, was erected by an Oxford student in 1555. There might have been worse things preserved, and yet to be looked upon, in that Abbey, than honest old Caxton's epitaph upon him whom he calls "the worshipful father and first founder and embellisher of ornate eloquence in our English."
As the popularity of Chaucer demanded various impressions of his works from Caxton's press, so did he print an apparently cheap edition of Gower's 'Confessio Amantis,' in small type. Two of Lydgate's works were also printed by him. The more fugitive poetry which issued from his press has probably all perished. In one of the volumes of Old Ballads in the British Museum is a fragment of a poem, of which nothing further is known, telling the story of some heroine that lived a life of unvaried solitude:—
"From her childhood I find that she fled
Office of woman, and to wood she went,
And many a wild harte's blood she shed
With arrows broad that she to them sent."
One of the most important uses of early printing in England is to be found in fragments of the Statutes of the Realm, made in the first parliament of Richard III., and in the first, second, and third parliaments of Henry VII., some leaves of which exist. That the promulgation of the laws would soon follow the introduction of the art of printing {147} was a natural consequence. Early in the next century the publication of Acts of Parliament became an important branch of trade; and a King's Printer was formally appointed. Up to our own times all the cheapening processes of the art of printing had been withheld, at least in their results, from that branch of printing which was to instruct the people in their new laws. The Statutes were the dearest of books, and kept dear for no other purpose but to preserve one relic of the monopolies of the days of the Stuarts. The abuse has been partially remedied.
We have purposely reserved to the conclusion of this account of the productions of Caxton's press, some notice of those works to the undertaking of which he seems to have been moved by his familiarity with the frequenters of the court,—those whose talk was of tournaments and battles, of gallant knights and noble dames; and whose heads, like that of the worthy Knight of La Mancha, were "full of nothing but enchantments, quarrels, battles, challenges, wounds, complaints, amours, torments." It is quite marvellous to look upon the enthusiasm with which Master Caxton deals with these matters in the days when he had achieved
"The silver livery of advised age."
 
It offers us one of the many proofs of the energy and youthfulness of his character. We have already quoted his address to the knights of England {148} (see page 66), given in his 'Book of the Order of Chivalry,' supposed to have been printed in 1484. After this address he proposes a question which shows that he considers he has fallen upon degenerate days. "How many knights be there now in England that have the use and the exercise of a knight? that is to wit, that he knoweth his horse, and his horse him; that is to say, he being ready at a point to have all thing that belongeth to a knight, an horse that is according and broken after his hand, his armour and harness suit, and so forth, et cetera. I suppose, an a due search should be made, there should be many founden that lack: the more pity is! I would it pleased our sovereign Lord, that twice or thrice a year, or at the least once, he would cry jousts of peace, to the end that every knight should have horse and harness, and also the use and craft of a knight, and also to tourney one against one, or two against two; and the best to have a prize, a diamond or jewel, such as should please the prince. This should cause gentlemen to resort to the ancient customs of chivalry to great fame and renown: and also to be alway ready to serve their prince when he shall call them, or have need." There is always some compensating principle arising in the world to prevent its too rapid degeneracy; and thus, although the tournament has long ceased, except as a farce, there is many a noble who may still say, "That he knoweth his horse, and his horse him," through the attractions of Melton Mowbray and Epsom. {149} Hunting and horse-racing have done much to keep up our pristine civilization. In 'The Fait of Arms and Chivalry,' 1489, Caxton undertakes a higher strain. He translates this book, "to the end that every gentleman born to arms and all manner men of war, captains, soldiers, victuallers, and all other, should have knowledge how they ought to behave them in the faits of war and of battles." And yet, strange to relate, this belligerent book was written by a fair lady, Christina of Pisa. The 'Histories of King Arthur,' printed in 1485, lands us at once into all the legendary hero-worship of the middle ages. Caxton, in his preface to this translation by Sir Thomas Mallory, gives us a pretty full account of the Nine Worthies, "the best that ever were;" and then he goes on to expound his reasons for once doubting whether the Histories of Arthur were anything but fables, and how he was convinced that he was a real man. But surely in these chivalrous books Caxton had an honest purpose. He exhorts noble lords and ladies, with all other estates, to read this said book, "wherein they shall well find many joyous and pleasant histories, and noble and renowned acts of humanity, gentleness, and chivalries; for herein may be seen noble chivalry, courtesy, humanity, friendliness, hardiness, love, friendship, cowardice, murder, hate, virtue, and sin. Do after the good, and leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and renown." 'The Life of Charles the Great' succeeded the 'Histories of King Arthur;' for, according to {150} Caxton, Charlemagne was the second of the three worthy. It is in the preface to this book that Caxton says that his father and mother in his youth sent him to school, by which, by the sufferance of God, he gets his living.
We may conclude this imperfect description of Caxton's labours in the literature of romance and chivalry, so characteristic of the age in which he lived, with the following extract from the 'History of King Blanchardine and Queen Eglantine his wife,' which he translated from the French, at the command of the Duchess of Somerset, mother of King Henry VII. The passage shows us that the old printers were dealers in foreign books as well as in their own productions: "Which book I had long to fore sold to my said lady, and knew well that the story of it was honest and joyful to all virtuous young noble gentlemen and women, for to read therein, as for their pastime. For under correction, in my judgment, histories of noble feats and valiant acts of arms and war, which have been achieved in old time of many noble princes, lords, and knights, are as well for to see and know their valiantness for to stand in the special grace and love of their ladies, and in like wise for gentle young ladies and demoiselles for to learn to be stedfast and constant in their part to them, that they once have promised and agreed to, such as have put their lives oft in jeopardy for to please them to stand in grace, as it is to occupy the ken and study overmuch in books of contemplation." {151} This is a defence of novel-reading which we could scarcely have expected at so early a period of our literature.
In 1490 Caxton was approaching, according to all his biographers, to the great age of fourscore. About this period he appears to have consigned some relation to the grave, perhaps his wife. In the first year of the churchwardens' accounts of the parish of St. Margaret's, Westminster, from May 17, 1490, to June 3, 1492, there is the following entry:—
"Item; atte bureynge of Mawde Caxton
for torches and tapers ... iiij? ij?."
On the 15th June, 1490, Caxton finished translating out of French into English 'The Art and Craft to know well to die.' The commencement of the book is an abrupt one: "When it is so, that what a man maketh or doeth it is made to come to some end, and if the thing be good and well made it must needs come to good end; then by better and greater reason every man ought to intend in such wise to live in this world, in keeping the commandments of God, that he may come to a good end. And then out of this world, full of wretchedness and tribulations, he may go to heaven unto God and his saints, unto joy perdurable."
That the end of Caxton was a good end we have little doubt. We have a testimony, which we shall presently see, that he worked to the end. He {152} worked upon a book of pious instruction to the last day of his life. He was not slumbering when his call came. He was still labouring at the work for which he was born.
There is the following entry in the churchwardens' accounts of the parish of St. Margaret, in the second year of the period we have above mentioned:—
"Item; atte bureyng of William Caxton
for iiij torches ... vj? viii?
Item; for the belle at same bureyng ... vj?."