N'is there hawk, no fowl so swift,
Better fleeing by the lift,

Than the monkis, high of mood,
With their sleeves and their hood.
When the abbot seeth them flee,
That he holds for much glee.
Ac natheless, all there among,
He biddeth them 'light to eve-song.
The monkis 'lighteth not adown,
As far fleeth into randun ;' 1
When the abbot them y-seeeth,
That his monkis from him fleeeth,
He taketh maiden of the route,
And turneth up her white toute;"
And beateth the tabor with his hand,
To make his monkis 'light to land.
When his monkis that y-seeeth,
To the maid down they fleeeth;
And goeth the wench all about,
And thwacketh all her white toute.

• At random.

• There is much pleasantry in this picture of the young monks taking wing, by means of their sleeves and hoods, and flying like so many cupids: and our ancestors were probably not offended by the direct mention of the drum by which the reverend abbot called them back to their devotions.

And sith, after their swink,
Wendeth meekly home to drink :
And goeth to their collation
A well-fair procession.

Another abbey is thereby,
Forsooth a great fair nunnery:
Up a river of sweet milk,
Where is plenty great of silk.
When the summer's day is hot,
The young nuns take a boat,
And doth them forth in that rivér,
Both with oarés and with steer.
When they beth far from the abbey,
They maketh them naked for to play,
And lieth down into the brim,
And doth them slily for to swim.

The

young monks that hi1 sceeth,

They doth them up, and forth they fleeeth, And cometh to the nuns anon.

And each monk him taketh one,

And snellich beareth forth their prey,

To the muckle grey abbéy.

And teacheth the monks an orison

3

With jambleus up and down.

1 Them.

3 Gambols.

2

• Swiftly.

The monk that wol be staluu1 good,

And can set aright his hood,

He shall have, without danger,

Twelve wives each year:

All through right, and nought through grace,

For to do himself solace.

2

And thilk monk that clepith best,

And doth his likam 3 all to rest,

Of him is hope, God it wot,
To be some father abbót.

Whoso will come that land to,
Full great penance he mot do.
Seven years in swine's dritte 4
He mot wade, wol ye y-witte,
All anon up to the chin,
So shall he the land win.

Lordings, good and hend,
Mot ye never off world wend,
'Fore ye stand to your chance,
And fulfill that penance;

1 Stout.

2 Is declared; or perhaps clippeth, i. e. embraceth.

3 He who forces all his likes, or fellows, to take rest.

• Dirt.

• You must know.

6 Civil.

That he mot that land y-see,

And never more turn ayé.'

Pray we God so mot it be!
Amen, per sainte charité.

A great many of our poets in the sixteenth century allude to this story of Cokain, but they change its name without much improving it: they call it Lubber-land. In France and Italy the original expression is become proverbial. In the second volume of Mr. Way's translations from Le Grand's abridgment of the ancient French Fabliaux, is a poem on the "Pays de Cocaigne;" but not at all resembling the work which we have been examining. This was, perhaps, imported by the Crusaders, and bears some resemblance to the story told by Sir J. Mandeville, of the Chief of the Assassins, or Old Man of the Mountain, as he is usually called. His name, says our traveller, was Gatholonabes; a man "full of cauteles (cunning) "and sotylle disceytes," who had a castle on a mountain, strongly walled round; and within this a garden, the fairest that any man might behold," with trees bearing all manner of fruits, 66 and all manner of virtuous herbs of good smell, and all

"other herbs that bear fair flowers." And many "fair wells." And, "beside those wells, he had "let make fair halls and fair chambers, depainted "with gold and azure." And he had all kinds of beasts; and birds "that sang full delectably, and "moved by craft, that it seemed they were quick." And "the fairest damsels that might be found "under the age of 15 years; and the fairest

66

young striplings." "And he had also let make "three wells, fair and noble, and all environed "with stone of jasper, and of chrystal, diapred "with gold, and set with precious stones, and 66 great orient pearls. And he had made a conduit "under earth, so that the three wells, at his list, "one should run milk, another wine, and another "honey. And that place he called Paradise." (Sir J. Maundeville, fol. 336. Edit. 1727.)