after an examination of several copies of this MS. has found the poem only in four of them:  namely, in two among the Harleian MSS. (Nos. 753; 2256—­from which his transcript and collation have been made) in one belonging to Mr. Coke of Holkham, and in a fourth belonging to the Cotton Collection:—­Galba E. viii.  This latter MS. has a very close correspondence with the second Harl.  MS. but is often faulty from errors of the Scribe, See Gentleman’s Magazine, May, 1829.

So much for the history of the discovery of this precious old English Poem—­which is allowed to be a contemporaneous production of the time of the Siege—­namely, A.D. 1418.  A word as to its intrinsic worth—­from the testimony of the Critic most competent to appreciate it.  “It will be admitted, I believe, (says Mr. Madden) by all who will take the trouble to compare the various contemporary narratives of the Siege of Rouen, that in point of simplicity, clearness, and minuteness of detail, there is NO existing document which can COMPARE with the Poem before us.  Its authenticity is sufficiently established, from the fact of the Author’s having been an EYEWITNESS of the whole.  If we review the names of those Historians who lived at the same period, we shall have abundant reason to rejoice at so valuable an accession to our present stock of information on the subject.” Archaeologia, vol. xxii. p. 353.  The reader shall be no longer detained from a specimen or two of the poem itself, which should seem fully to justify the eulogy of the Critic.

“On the day after the return of the twelve delegates sent by the City of Rouen to treat with Henry, the Poet proceeds to inform us, that the King caused two tents to be pitched, one for the English Commissioners, and the other for the French.  On the English side were appointed the Earl of Warwick, the Earl of Salisbury, the Lord Fitzhugh, and Sir Walter Hungerford, and on the French side, twelve discreet persons were chosen to meet them.  Then says the writer,

  ’It was a sight of solempnity,
  For to behold both party;
  To see the rich in their array,
  And on the walls the people that lay,
  And on our people that were without,
  How thick that they walked about;
  And the heraudis seemly to seene,
  How that they went ay between;
  The king’s heraudis and pursuivants,
  In coats of arms amyantis. 
  The English a beast, the French a flower,
  Of Portyngale both castle and tower,
  And other coats of diversity,
  As lords bearen in their degree.’

“As a striking contrast to this display of pomp and splendour is described the deplorable condition of those unfortunate inhabitants who lay starving in the ditches without the walls of the City, deprived both of food and clothing.  The affecting and simple relation of our Poet, who was an eye-witness, is written with that display of feeling such a scene must naturally have excited, and affords perhaps one of the most favourable passages in the Poem to compare with the studied narratives of Elmham or Livius.  In the first instance we behold misery literally in rags, and hiding herself in silence and obscurity, whilst in the other she is ostentatiously paraded before our eyes: