Page:The Canterbury tales of Geoffrey Chaucer.djvu/122

 straightway this cursed petition was read; the sense of it was as ye shall hear.

"To you, my lord, Sir Apius, sheweth your poor servant Claudius how a knight called Virginius, against the law and all equity, holdeth expressly against my will my servant, by law my thrall, that was stolen from my house by night while she was full young; this will I prove by witness, lord, so it offend you not. She is not his daughter, whatsoever he saith. Wherefore I pray to you, my lord judge, yield me my thrall, if it be your will." Lo! this was the sense of his petition.

Virginius gan look on the churl, but hastily ere he told his tale and would have proved as a knight should, and eke by many a witness, that what his accuser had said was false, this cursed judge would tarry no whit nor hear a word from Virginius, but gave his judgment and said, "I decree that straightway this churl have his servant ; thou shalt keep her in thy house no longer. Go bring her forth and put her here in our charge. The churl shall have his thrall; this I award him."

When Virginius, this worthy knight, by the sentence of this justice, must needs give his dear daughter unto the judge to live in lechery, he goeth home and sitteth him in his hall and straightway letteth his dear daughter be summoned, and with a face dead as cold ashes he gan gaze upon her humble face with a father's pity sticking through his heart, albeit he would not swerve from his purpose.

"Daughter," quoth he, "Virginia, there be two ways, either death or shame, that thou must suffer. Alas! that I was born! For never thou deservedst to die with a sword. O dear daughter, ender of my life, whom I have fostered up with such gladness that thou wert never out of my remembrance! O daughter, that