ABSTRACT
The contents of the next Fragment are in some doubt. It certainly begins with The Man of Lau/’s Introduction and Tale. Chaucer seems not to have finally decided which tale should follow, as appears from the variants in the Epilogue to The Man of Law’s Tale, and the omission of the Epilogue itself from many good manuscripts. The section begins with the curious Introduction to The Man of Law’s Tale. There are several puzzles here. W hy does Chaucer give a list of the contents o f The Legend of Good Women through the mouth of the Man of Law - especially as it is a list different from the tales he had actually written? Then the Man of Law condemns two stories about incest. Chaucers dislike of tales about such ‘unnatural abomina tions’ was probably genuine, and a similar fastidiousness appears else where in the Tales, but is this passage merely a hit against his friend Gower, who had recently written these very stories? The Man of Law promises to speak in prose, though his tale is actually in verse, and The Tale of Melibeus was perhaps first assigned to him, but was later transferred to Chaucer. The Invocation which is the Lawyer’s Prologue has nothing to do with his story of Constance, to which it makes hardly more than a grammatical bridge. The whole Introduc tion cries aloud the lack of revision.
