Page:The lives of the poets of Great Britain and Ireland to the time of Dean Swift - Volume 1.djvu/15

 the counteſs of Pembroke gave him their warmeſt patronage as a poet. In his poem's called the Ro- maunt, and the Roſe, and Troilus and Creſeide, he gave offence to ſome court ladies by the looſeneſs of his deſcription, which the lady Margaret reſented. and obliged him to atone for it, by his Legend of good Women, a piece as chaſte as the others were luxuriouſly amorous, and, under the name of the Daiſy, he veils lady Margaret, whom of all his patrons he moſt eſteemed.

Thus loved and honoured, his younger years were dedicated to pleaſure and the court. By the recom- mendation of the Dutcheſs Blanch, he married one Philippa Rouet, ſiſter to the guardianeſs of her grace's children, who was a native of Hainault: He was then about thirty years of age, and being fixed by marriage, the king began to employ him in more year of his majeſty's reign, Chaucer was ſent to Doge and Senate of Genoa, about affairs of great importance to our ſtate. The duke of Lancaſter, whoſe favourite paſſion was ambition, which de- manded the aſſitance of learned men, engaged warmly in our poet's intereſt ; beſides, the duke was remarkably fond of Lady Catherine Swynford, his wife's ſiſter, who was then guardianeſs to his chil. dren, and whom he afterwards made his wife; thus was he doubly attached to Chaucer, and with the varying fortune of the duke of Lancaſter we fir d him ri e or fall. Much about this time, for his ſucceſsful negociations at Genoa, the king grani- ed to him by letters patent, by the title of Armiger Noſter, one pitcher of wine daily in the port of London, and ſoon after made him comptroller of the cuſtoms, with this particular proviſo, that he ſhould perſonally execute the office, and write the accounts relating to it with his own hand. But B 3