Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 2.djvu/502

'My worstypfull mayster, Wynkyn de Worde, havynge a lytell boke of an auncyent hystory of a kynge sometyme reynyne in the countree of Thyre called Appolyn, concernynge his malfortunes and peryllous adventures right espouventables^[1], bryefly compyled, and pyteous for to here; the which boke I, Robert Coplande^[2], have me applyed for to translate out of the Frensshe language into our maternal Englysshe tongue, at the exhortacyon of my forsayd mayster, accordynge dyrectly to myn auctor: gladly followynge the trace of my mayster Caxton, begynnynge with small storyes and pamfletes and so to other.' The English romance, or the French, which is the same thing, exactly corresponds in many passages with the text of the Gesta. I will instance in the following one only, in which the complication of the fable commences. King Appolyn dines in disguise in the hall of king Altistrates. 'Came in the kynges daughter, accompanyed with many ladyes and damoyselles, whose splendente beaute were too long to endyte, for her rosacyate

1. Fearful, terrible.—Fr.
2. "The printer of that name. He also translated from the French, at the desire of Edward duke of Buckingham, the romance of the Knyght of the Swanne. See his Prologue."—Warton.